The Never Normal

I was happy to hear on Saturday morning that Governor Cuomo signed the same-sex marriage bill into law.   2011 is ashamedly late for this to be happening, but at least it finally is here.  Equality and inclusion.  As one comedian said, “Gay people should have the right to be miserable, too.”

So in the afternoon, D came to help me watch Jonah for a while, and we rode him around,  meandering all over God’s creation – past ominous black cloud masses, through driving rain as amazing & short-lived as the taste of Fruit Stripe gum,  finally stopping at one of the Albany Airport’s car turn-offs where you can watch the planes take off and land.  There we saw a huge rainbow in the sky –  D took this pic with her phone and e-mailed it to me; of course it looked so much prettier and vibrant in person…

A rainbow the very first day of same-sex marriage equality in New York State!  God’s nod, I said.  D liked that and posted it on facebook.

Of course we stayed just a little too long for Jonah’s liking and so he started unbuckling all of his harness fasteners, the sound a now-familiar harbinger to his freak outs – this one ending with D and Jonah on the grass outside the car.  Safe hands and body was our mantra, D handling Jonah in the calm, seemingly unfazed manner only one with the expertise of working with these kids can pull off…me standing back, arms folded nervously, not sure what to do – a disempowered, frightened mom.   I got it together quickly enough and was grateful it was D who was with me.  She doesn’t call me on my mental state or make me feel bad about its weakness.   She’s supportive and silent, and so we all just move on down the road.  Sometimes she is my sister and sometimes she is my savior.

I should be used to Jonah’s attacking, but whether it is M or Andy or D in the car with me, when Jonah flips out I go unwillingly to a place inside my head that feels like a little girl place – scared out of my mind, horrified at my child intending to do me and others harm.  I go right into verge-of-tears helpless-mom mode.

Meanwhile Andy walks around with wrists (on both sides) slashed with scratches, making him look like he’d recently, half-halfheartedly, continually attempted suicide with a weak grasp on a plastic knife.

Then:

Daddy?  Huck?  Jonah will say, meekly and sweet, followed once with both skinny little arms wrapping around Andy’s neck, gently and loving -& minutes later those same skinny little arms shooting out to grab/bend/throw daddy’s glasses with one hand and scratch blindly with the other.  That kind of pendulum-swing can mess with a person’s head after a while.  If I feel like I’ve lost it, what must Andy feel?

Then, at times Jonah is pensive, listening, almost Buddha-like in his own little zen way.

When D and I were driving Jonah home after leaving the airport, once in a while he’d sing little snatches of Cake, or Guster, or Paul Simon songs, in tune and perfect rhythm — and D and I would look at each other and say awwww.  He is first a child-demon and next an engaging angel.

By Monday or Tuesday we should know Anderson’s answer. Andy and I are leaving at 6am Tuesday morning to take Jonah to Children’s Hospital in Boston, where he’ll see a pediatric rheumatologist.  I don’t know how in hell we’re going to make it to Boston and back safely, let alone out of the car and into the hospital itself.

As Brett on Match Game would say: Good gravy.   As I would say: shit.