Rosanna Dell 1/16/17 Rosanna Dell 1/16/17

Rememory

How could we know

the blessings

which illuminated our days?

The joy too strong to feel

until it was

no longer there to disturb us.

- David Whyte

from "Letting Go," Everything is Waiting for You

Humans aren't much good at living in the present, and though I know doing so would make me a happier, more content person, most of the time, I fail. Oddly, sometimes viewing an image in retrospect gives me more joy than I remember experiencing the moment it was taken.

My Christmas gift to myself this past year was to go through all our photos taken since Nettie was born and order prints for albums and framing. Outside of ordering a few prints for the grandparents here and there, we had not taken the time to print any for ourselves, and didn't even have any framed photos of Nettie around the house. I knew it was going to be a big task. There were over 5000 photos on our hard drive (which I recognize is not a huge number by today's standards), and I wasn't sure how long it would take me. I started in June, and really got serious in October.

Unfortunately, the process was slowed by the fact that we chose to use a popular photo processing service that did not end up functioning well with our sometimes spotty Wi-Fi connection. So often a naptime's worth of work (that's the common currency for stay-at-home parents, right?) was lost to a few seconds of internet interruption. Seriously. As if I need MORE reasons in my life to cry during naptime.

I stayed with it, though, weeding through months and months worth of images, and in early December I placed an order for over 1200 prints. I was so relieved. About a week later they arrived, and I excitedly opened the first envelope. Hmmm. I opened the next envelope. Mmmmm. And the next. Huh-uhh. The fourth and fifth and twelfth. Noooooo. I had chronologically uploaded the photos, and in the cart, they appeared that way, but in the printing process, presumably because our camera re-uses photo numbers each time we delete the old photos, the prints had been re-ordered, all the months mixed. Disappointed is not a big enough word, but then again, I realize this isn't an actual tragedy. So let's stick with disappointment and I'll keep trying to be big about this.

I had pictured myself leisurely spread out on the rug, watching Pride and Prejudice or Little Women, something familiar and comforting, as I brainlessly slipped photos into pockets and wrote cute little captions. Oh mama, bury that idea. Along with the dreams of 7:30 bedtime and "mommy and me" yoga sessions and "fun and easy" toddler art projects. So I shut the photos up in a cupboard and didn't look at them for a month.

I pulled them out a few days ago. Net was safely out of the house for a few hours so I dug in. Photos were spread across and stacked in piles covering the 8 by 10 rug, where I hunched over them with burning eyes, trying to make sense of things. I did not have the heart to start a movie. I just sat in the semi-dark, frantically sifting through the mess. Sadly, I discovered that along with being completely scrambled, I was missing many photos from the first six months, which must not have uploaded completely during one of my interrupted sessions. Back into the cupboard went the photos.

The fun part of this story is that I DID get some photos in frames, and put them up in our upstairs hall, where I've long wanted to create a family photo wall. I'm so pleased with it and Nettie really enjoys seeing and talking about all the pictures. And the photo saga has given me a lot of incentive to keep up with our images as we empty the camera so that I NEVER HAVE TO DO THIS AGAIN.

It also got me thinking about memory. I heard a while back that many of our memories, especially childhood memories, are invented through photos. As in, we don't actually have an independent memory of some events; instead, we invent a memory to correspond to a photograph. Usually we don't do this knowingly. It's just something our brains do. You can read more about this "fake memory" here. In the same vein, seeing photos reinforces our (actual) memories because it triggers the same neurons that were involved in creating the experience captured in the photo. So photos are so valuable in preserving memories.

The last two years have often felt very hard. But the photos we have say differently. They show me that nearly every day since Nettie was born, we have documented smiles and laughter, and countless times, pure joy. I can't change the past two years, but I can shape my memory of them. I can choose to revisit some of the best moments. I see them every morning as soon as I get up and before I go to bed at night, and they remind me to be grateful for what I've been given.

Rosanna Dell 1/7/17 Rosanna Dell 1/7/17

The Conspiracy of Silence

Everything conspires to silence us,

partly with shame,

partly with unspeakable hope.

- Rainer Maria Rilke, "The Impermanence We Are," from A Year With Rilke

Hi! I'm still here! It's been a year since I've been able to write. And frankly, I'm not sure about this post, even as I sit here and click the button to send it out to you. I'm not sure if or when I might feel like writing another. For some reason, it felt right to sit down today and get this out; a part of me wanted to share with you. Another part wants to stay quiet.

The last year has been one of isolation for me. More than usual. I like staying in, being quiet, being alone. But I think what started as a choice, or possibly a coping mechanism, became sort of a trap. After such a long silence, I didn't know what to say to anyone anymore, or how to begin to say it.

I haven't really changed my social habits. I'm still in most of the time. I've not been active on Facebook or Twitter, and I haven't joined any mom's groups yet. I've been socializing in the way I learned to do as a child, in books. I've found that reading every night does so much for my mental state. It's exercise for the mind! And as I've discovered in the past, reading inspiring things inspires me to write inspired things! It's felt so good to get some things out of my head, and though I enjoy writing for the sake of itself - again, it's exercise - I know there's a part of my shy, introverted self that enjoys sharing my writing, because it's the way I feel I best communicate my self and my thoughts.

I'm working on some things to send out as submissions (I hope telling you will hold me more accountable to follow through with that), but I've kept the website up for a whole year, paying the fees and wondering if I would come back to it and want to keep up with it. I still don't know. I struggled with that initially, as I knew it would be a challenge for me to want to share my life, and many particulars about it, in a regular and public way. I didn't want taking photos to get in the way of enjoying something I cooked for lunch. Or ruin the fun of a creative project, because I FORGOT to take photos of the process from the beginning. I don't want to constantly be mining my week for blog material. It seems a little cheap, you know?

And I've struggled to know how to write about motherhood and Nettie in a way that doesn't compromise her privacy and personhood, since she can't have that discussion with me yet. I'm conflicted. But I'm not feeling so very quiet anymore.

I received a very useful birthday present last year, called A Year with Rilke*, and it helps me to take a few minutes each day to reset. So often, what I need, maybe even what I've been longing to hear, is just waiting for me to open my ears or eyes, and receive it.

That Rilke quote about silence was part of yesterday's meditation, and it nudged me to the keyboard. I recognized myself, and the shame I've felt as I've let things go and drawn inward. I've justified it by saying that being a mom to Net takes all my time. And I can allow it to take all my time. I have. But I've been denying a part of myself voice, and I think it's a part that needs a platform, however painful or difficult it is to find one.

I was surprised when I also felt a little flare of hope as I read the final line, and I recognized it as muse. I've been feeling little itches for a week now, since the turning of the year, but haven't known what I should start or how to release them. I've sat down and started half a dozen drawings and have begun knitting a cowl three times. But yesterday I knew without thinking that I needed to write, so I've come here again today, to try to start saying just a little of what I haven't found voice to speak.

January often brings these little needles of hope for me. I don't know what it is, exactly. The days are still short. It's ridiculously cold. Every day's a bad hair day. I've made all the soup in my arsenal half a dozen times. The light is unforgiving: I can see every pore and new wrinkle, and the dust floats and sifts endlessly.

But I love the color of the sky at dawn. It changes in January, and it reminds me of my old Latin professor at the university who would recite Homer's Odyssey with his eyes shut, rolling back and forth on his toes, "When Aurora's rosy fingers stretch across the sky..." That's what it's like. January skies are poetically pink, the color of a thousand beginnings and a goddess's fingertips, the color of unspeakable hope.