This is a strange thought: Stretch is going to be the first person in my life that I won't actually meet. I'll be introduced to a bundle of need, which isn't representative of who he/she is. And in a strange way, I won't get to see what they look like. Because the whole process of a new life is all so fluid, and I'm so 'there', that I will probably never be able to be objective. (Photography might be good or bad in that regard.)
I guess it happened with my siblings too, but y'know I was so young that I wasn't nearly as connected or invested with the process, and to be honest I didn't have a poet's mind then either. Stretch will take elements that we give it, things we say and things that are only unmysterious to God, and unfold before us.
2 comments:
You know, I really liked that entry. Care if I riff on that for a while?
None of us ever meet ourselves, either. We spot parts of us, have parts of us pointed out to us, and (from time to time) discover an as-yet-unnoticed part of us in a book or somesuch. Some are lucky enough to have a friend, or a writer, or some piece of art that functions as a mirror, but the image in that mirror (as each time I read Catcher in the Rye and see something different), constantly changes.
A lucky few of us get a mate who is such a soulmate that they become a reference point through which we can measure themselves. . . but even that reference point is constantly changing.
I wonder how people meet me. I wonder how I would meet myself. Once I said to Dad, "I wonder what it would be like to meet a twenty-years-younger version of myself" and he said, "Have a kid." (Which is funny because I've always said Dad and I are more alike than anyone else in my life).
And maybe taking a long time away from family can (if you open your mind wide enough) give you a chance to meet them when you come back. That would be nice.
I'll meet you when I get back from this spell in Korea, my sister, my brother in law (whom I've already met). How's that?
I love you a lot and I've been thinking about you all week.
love love love love love
rob
One more thing about meeting your kid:
do you think with kids, you simply meet them in increments, or meet parts of them? Not all at once, like a grown-up (really, isn't meeting an entire person all at once an incredibly overwhelming addition of possibilities to one's life: no wonder some people are shy! All the variables to be considered!), but bit by bit, tiny revelations, decisions made and noticed. I wonder what a parent would say. . . any parents reading this, let me know what you think.
Post a Comment