Frances Friday: White Flowers

The last year has been hard for the maternal ego.

Because, you know what? As I alluded to earlier in the week, Erik never goes anywhere, until he leaves town. He is always at home. My theory is that his hobby has replaced his friendships. In any case, there he is. And there I can't be, because I've been so angry at him (consciously and not) that I can't stand it. So I go upstairs and read a book, or scrapbook. Go downstairs and read emails. Go out for a walk. Sit in the same room on the couch with a book and try to avoid conversation.

You're wondering what this has to do with the maternal ego. See, Erik is always there, and Frances is always there, and my choice for the last year has been to get away from Erik (thus getting away from Frances too) or sit and stew and be a horrible bitchy person around Erik (and thus around Frances too). Leaving the house with Frances is an option but it's not something I can do every day, especially in winter. There was a brief time in March when I blew up at him and told him he needed to back the fuck off and give me some space because I was leaving him for a reason and didn't want to sit around playing happy family until I moved out, where he made an effort to get out of the house most nights and on weekends. This lasted for two weeks. Now, he is always there again, and I am left with my old dilemma.

It's been hard not to wonder how well I'll be able to function as a single mother when I end up spending so little time with Frances because Erik is always there.

And then I finally get a rare hour or two with Frances away from Erik, and realize that we'll be more than fine.

Monday was one such day, though it didn't start out that way. I got home at nearly 5 with a bad headache and an asthma attack, and spent an hour in the craft room organizing things while the codeine and the steroids kicked in. Frances was outside with Erik. Then I went outside to see Frances--Erik stayed--one showing ended and I went inside to do a quick workout, since Erik was obviously not going anywhere. I finished. I went upstairs. I changed. It was 7:00; Frances goes to bed at 8:30; Erik was still there. He was not leaving. He was not even leaving the room.

"Frances, do you want to go to the woods?" I asked.

"And then the park!"

"That sounds like a great idea."

The immediate lightening of stress when I wheeled her out of the garage in her red wagon proved what a good idea it was.

First of all--there were doggies! Doggies everywhere. Fluffy doggies, out walking their owners. Friendly small doggies, who let Frances give them gentle pets, and who kissed her fingers in return. She grinned, she jumped up and down, she said "Hi Doggies!" and "Bye doggies!", she burrowed her face into my t-shirt in shy joy when they wagged their tails and sniffed her arm.

And then, at the park? There were rock walls to climb, bridges to run over, tunnels to crawl through; and the tunnels had windows at which pudgy-cheeked faces needed to be pressed so she could say, "I see you, Mummy!" "I see you too, Frances." "No you don't!"--and off she'd run.

Between was the woodlot, with its paths lined partially with flat boulders (making a much more interesting walkway) sloping up and down hills. Frances would run up them full tilt, and you can imagine that her full tilt going uphill is not very fast, even though her tiny legs were working pretty quick. The leaves are coming out. And the trout lilies and trilliums. The forest floor is briefly green.

"Oh Mummy, look at the white flowers," she said.

"Aren't they beautiful? I love trilliums."

"Me too! I love trilliums! Look at them all, Mummy! Look over there. Ooooh. Look over there! Look at all the white flowers. Aren't they beautiful? Ooooh. Can I pick one, Mummy?"

"Oh, sweetie. Trilliums are special. We shouldn't pick them."

"Please? Can I please pick a white flower, Mummy?"

"I don't know...."

"Please? Please?"

"OK. You can pick one. You can pick one white flower, on the way home, if you are a really good girl at the park."

"Yay!"

As she picked her white flower on the way home (and I instructed her to pick only the flower, not the leaves, because if you pick the leaves the plant won't come back the next year) and I stood and looked at the hills carpeted in tall white and shy yellow flowers, all I could think was--at last. Thank god. At last. They're back.

After she was asleep, I downloaded the photos I'd taken. Her pudgy grin through the holes in the tunnel. Skipping over the gaps between boulders on the way to the park. Standing surrounded by trilliums near a large tree. I added the best ones to the "print" file and looked through Sunday's images--her cuddle with R, feeding the goats, running and laughing on her way to the animals, smiling up at me in the backyard.

Someday soon, this is how it will be. Not all the time, not every day, but more than now. Me and my girl.

~~~~~

Addendum: Yellow Flowers!

Do you remember when you thought dandelions were flowers?

Frances is at that age now, and so are all her daycare friends, including S, one of her many many best friends. On Tuesday when I went to pick her up, S's mother was there at the same time, so S and Frances got to walk out together. Between the daycare's doors and our car (and their bus-stop) was a field of dandelions. Ooooooh.

They stopped to pick them, of course, S giving Frances three of hers, to each of which Frances said "thank you," and S said "you're welcome." After Frances had a nice little handful, S said to me, "You can make a centrepiece!"

"That's true! That would be nice, wouldn't it Frances?"

"Yeah!"

"Hey Frances," said S, "Wanna race?"

"Yeah!"

Off they both ran, full tilt, to our car, giggling and laughing. Of course the 'winner' was never in doubt, as S is at least seven inches taller than Frances; but she didn't care about winning and Frances didn't care about losing. They just lost themselves in joy to be running together on a beautiful spring day, fists full of dandelions.

Posted by Andrea at May 11, 2007 6:20 AM under Frances Friday

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