We used our $2,900 in pandemic stimulus money to get the house painted. The color I selected is a deep blue called “Dark Night,” and it is worlds away from the muted beigy creme that I chose seventeen years ago, the last time we had it done.
My husband and daughters go along with my bold choice, as they have gone along with most of my suggestions since those dark days last summer when a prolonged bout of insomnia led my doctor to prescribe Ambien, and its side effects took me to the Virginia Kendall Ledges in Cuyahoga National Park. I envisioned myself walking calmly to the edge and just tipping into the below, a literal rendering of my state of mind—all edges and drop offs.
But when I arrived at the Ledges, a little boy in a yellow shirt was perched quietly at the top, and he changed my intention. His eyes were closed, and his hands were formed into forefinger-and-thumb meditation Os on his bony knees. He kept peeking at his mother who was meditating next to him, and he was eager to get it right. Together, they pulled me gently out of my ideation and back into the reality of the two mostly-grown girls I had born and pushed into the world. Mother is the first teacher. She cannot simply tip herself off the edge of the earth.
This summer, we are five months into the Covid-19 pandemic. It is dark outside, nightfall, and I am sharing crackers with Honeybee, the ginger cat we adopted last summer to help me heal from the bad medicine and bleak mind I hope has fallen away forever. I place the broken-off cracker corners on my belly pooch for Honeybee to nibble. My daughters giggle about our furry mama’s girl, and I tip into the love and the life of this moment. Although sometimes it is a pained and worried peace we all share in this blue house, it is peace, and we have been in darker places.
Kris Harrington lives in Youngstown, Ohio and teaches for Kent State University at its Salem campus. Her essays have been published online and in print, most recently in Scientists and Poets #RESIST.
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