On Appreciating Handknit Socks.

While going through my Pablo Neruda collection a few days ago, I came across this poem which I hadn't thought of in years. It could have been written only by a man who has had the sublime pleasure of wearing hand-knit socks on a cold day in winter. The last line is the best.

I can hardly believe now that I have no socks on my needles. There's a reason, I'm sure, but I can't think of one. I'll cast on today. These ordinary luxuries cannot be denied.

On Ten Years.

Neph and I just celebrated Ten Years of Wedded Bliss. It's a cliche, but nonetheless, it's flown by, probably because nine of those ten years have been shared with one or more rambunctious children. I married so young that I have spent, at thirty, a third of my life with this man. Given the notoriously poor judgement of youth, I got very, very lucky.

I wish I could show you us on our wedding day, him in his kilt and long hair, me in cream-colored silk, young and smiley as hell. But the photos are all still packed away from the move.

There's a lot I could say, and I've composed ten posts in my head already, but it always seems to come out maudlin and never captures the essence of what I want to say about this man and my marriage with him. So I will let that well-known poet of his beloved Chile, Pablo Neruda, say it for me.

Love Sonnet IX
Pablo Neruda

There where the waves shatter on the restless rocks
the clear light bursts and enacts its rose,
and the sea-circle shrinks to a cluster of buds,
to one drop of blue salt, falling.

O bright magnolia bursting in the foam,
magnetic transient whose death blooms
and vanishes--being, nothingness--forever:
broken salt, dazzling lurch of the sea.

You & I, Love, together we ratify the silence,
while the sea destroys its perpetual statues,
collapses its towers of wild speed and whiteness:

because in the weavings of those invisible fabrics,
galloping water, incessant sand,
we make the only permanent tenderness.

And he can really make me laugh.

On Babies Up Early.

Doot, doot.

Baby Fancy Pants is sitting in my lap, unwilling to sleep since... two hours ago. I finally got up with him after Daddy Fancy Pants was close to losing it with the kid. I can see his point -- the whole toddler-sitting-on-your-head-while-you're-trying-to-sleep thing loses some its charm at five in the morning. And since he has to go into the office tomorrow, he won't be able to sneak a nap at any point. And all I do all day is nap.

This is me, all mommed out*.