I passed that math test with flying colors. After a month on the internet looking up random math shit that every eighth grader knows, I passed. And I signed up for my first class of the summer - Bio: Anatomy and Physiology.
I took the job at the climbing gym. And apart from the young despot manager who enjoys making menial tasks seem monumental (”You know what you could do with these last few minutes? You could just take this plant and move it over there, then slide the pamphlets on over”), I adore it. I love teaching kids, and teaching them to climb is a bonus. I’ll happily scrub floors and toddle plants from one end of your desk to the other if I get to spend the majority of my time with a group of kids, teaching them to love the sport and be safe.
Pnut and I, for the first time, have taken an extensive break from climbing ourselves. It’s been about six months. And we don’t really miss it too much. Probably because we have been spending so much time getting our little plot of land into order. Raking, planting flowers, making stone walls, and clearing firewood. It has only rained about four times this spring. In Brussels, we’d be happy if it only rained four times a day. And we’ve been fishing every weekend.
Did I mention that my mom is cancer-free? Yes, she is. She has one fancy prosthetic boob and zero cancer.
DYFS of New Jersey has been to our home twice now, and our paperwork for foster kids is well underway. We are thrilled and terrified in turns.
Tomorrow, we are going to Mexico for our honeymoon. Tickets are booked, and we shall sit by the ocean and drink Margaritas and maybe learn to scuba dive.
The hardest thing about sitting down and writing something these days is that things are going well. Not because I don’t want to share that with you, but because things are going well and I am walking on eggshells, holding my breath, waiting for the bad. Because it’s been so long since I have been able to breathe, so long since I didn’t feel like an elephant was sitting on my chest, that I have forgotten how to talk. Sometimes, I am afraid that I have forgotten how to be happy. Each new breath of nothing-bad-happened-yet both exhilerates and scares me. I wonder what’s coming next. I had my first mammogram last week, could that be it? Every time the phone rings, I shiver. I wait for it to go to voicemail, so I can have those few extra breaths before I have to face something new. And I know that this is life. I know that the good cannot last. And I am trying, trying to remember how to be happy, trying to remember how to breathe.
