Family

The last week of five am mornings have found me lying flat on my back in Henry's bed (he, relegated to the couch, my parents in mine), the sun hours away from rising, my thoughts more a mull than a muse, my life displayed in front of my mind's eye without death to make it precious, more terror than melancholy. I have no idea whether it's the season, the fact of having my aging (however terrifically) parents in my bed while I lay low to the ground in my boys' baseball player-postered room, my age, or just the damn facts, but I was hard put to remain composed. All the gratitude was schmatitude in the darkest hour before dawn. Texts to a friend on the east coast buoyed me, her reminder that it was the darkest hour before dawn lulled me back to sleep where I dreamed technicolor snippets, walked through parties in houses with rooms and old lovers behind doors. I woke sheepish in light, drove my parents to the airport, embraced them in gratitude for spinning the web, however sticky, where I'm stuck, ran my hand over Oliver's head and wiped away his tears with my thumb. Why do they have to live so far away? he sighed as we pulled away. We waved as they fussed with their bags, smiled, blew kisses.

There's a black reindeer head sitting on my dining room table, waiting for me to bring it back to the store where my mother accidentally dropped her cane and broke off one of its antlers. She paid for half of it and brought it home so that my amazingly handy father could glue it back like new! In the above photo, just to the right of the black plastic-covered foam sheets for Sophie's room -- the path to hell is laid with the best intentions, I believe Blake said --  is the gift they left: a life-sized Santa who dances and sings a number of Christmas tunes -- in our native tongue and Spanish.

That's my family recap. What's yours, dear Readers?