same day/ new life

i am thirty one.

but i remember 9 so clearly..

9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 20....

last night i went to bed bleeding, with cramps and with a belly full of polenta and braised pork and a mindful of ... me.

the seasons are changing-but am i?? i see change all around me, children are getting older (fela four and 1/2 moses nine!), kismet is nearly 2 and i have moved into a new home.. damian and i went to court (which was really big and scary for all of us), and now winter is coming again.. ok, everyone knows what that means--more darkness=holidays="winter weather"..but here in vermont we know it like how i imagine folks in alaska and greenland and russia and gerany knowing it... to us-here in vermont- it means that we better get all we can and do our best before february, because february is brutal and when we say brutal, we mean it.. carrots rotting in the basement, fuel at 5 $ a gallon, long darkness, snowy icy roads, and... tourists all happy and joy full for the same snow that we are only just barely surviving...

ok, ok, it's only September, but already it feels like winter did in california or new zealand.. and i cant help but feel overwhelmed, because we are only just starting..

one of the first projects sara (the dishwasher) and i did when we moved in (after arranging the kitchen and bathroom) was arrange a lit space for the children in our new yard.. for those in common suburbia this may be common place, but for us on barre street (aka the barrio), it is a luxury that needed celebrating.. yes, we live in Vermont- perhaps one of the greatest places to raise children, but we are still poor-- i am still a single mother, and no matter what-- we dont seem to get enough time outside-- so this lit space means so much for me.. my children can go to sleep looking at it from the window and go to sleep wanting to go there in the morning knowing that it is safe, and i can (even if i am working) look out the window and see it and know that festivity is there---there somewhere..

same day..

new life.

i am inlove still.

like i have said before.

i am

my own

and am learning what that means.

i am

waiting for ease

joy

and prosperity

but for now i have this

ease,

these joys

this prosperity..

same day-new life