That's the thing. Voices happening all around us, too many to parse, so I consciously shut down sometimes. Today, no. Been wide open all ears. Something sharp, glazed edges of cotton clouds. It was just after a storm, today, a nasty Tennessee drop-down storm that bent the trees horizontal left, then horizontal right. In these parts, that means hit the cellar. Some limbs down, enough leaves to sing autumn songs in July.
After, I took Jenna and her friend to the pool. Why not. Storm passes, you move, huh? We were alone there for an hour. Me saying, "Hey, pretend this is our mansion! This pool is all ours--you two are movie stars!" And they strut around in their racing-back Speedos, the kind Jenna says means "I'm a professional now."
A young man and his son come, something I wouldn't have noticed, but this 20-something-year-old was so loud, so animated with his boy that I had to notice. Still, I'm not one to say more than "Hey" to folks generally--asking the open ended questions too easily results in me being stung by the human condition.
So I watch the father jubilant with the boy, throwing him around the pool, running, breaking just about every rule written on the "What's Expected" rule sheet I received when I joined. He lets the little boy jump into the deep end while he's under water and the boy just about hits the wall when he jumps in. But he doesn't hit the wall. He's okay. My heart slows down. And they come up laughing and splashing and just sucking life right into their lungs.
By now I'm in the pool. Here we are, two parents, 20 years age difference, three kids playing some version of swim tag, looking like United Nations child embassadors, Jenna and her very-peach, light-haired friend, and their new Hispanic three-year-old friend, whose name, the Dad tells us, is Ramon. Like his. Two Ramon's.
Then I don't close down. I open instead, say, "He's a cutie. I remember him. He comes here sometimes?"
I remember I'd seen the boy at the pool the previous week with another family, and I remember the woman who brought him saying she was watching the boy because his mother was sick.
Ramon tells me how his wife was pregnant and had a siezure at 30 weeks, how the doctors had to deliver his little girl very prematurely, how his baby girl weighed just 3 pounds 10 ounces, how they brought her home from the hospital yesterday, how proud he is, how well the baby is doing, now 4 pounds 11 ounces. Today he brought little Ramon to the pool so he could give him some attention. It's been so hectic at their house.
You see, when his 24-year-old wife had the siezure that led to the premature delivery of their baby, the doctors did an MRI and found that the siezure had been caused by a brain tumor. At 24 she went from unconsciousness to a c-section to brain surgery.
"They got 90 percent of the tumor, they said, so we're really hoping, we're really gonna beat this thing, you know?"
"Man. Man. You've got the energy, the attitude. I can tell."
And I wasn't just saying that.
We talked for a while. Long enough for him to tell me that the reason he and his boy had shaved their heads was because they wanted to be a team with mommy who was losing her hair to chemo. Long enough for him to tell me he had stopped drinking when this happened--that he hadn't been drinking a lot, but that he knew with stress of these events the temptation to drink hard would have been impossible to resist. So he had to quit, and did a month ago.
"I bought a punching bag and hung it in the basement. That's my place to go."
"Wow. wow. hey. Wshew. That is smart, way smart. I hear you."
I tell him that if he and his wife need little Ramon looked after, I'll watch the boy at the pool some weekdays. With the lifeguard and I both there, I'm sure he'll be safe, I say. He thanks me and tells me how kind people have been, and he holds the boy tighter.
"I appreciate it. I'll think about it. I've been so worried about him since all of this started up. I worry about every little thing that happens to him."
"I know, I would too, but you are doing so great, you two have such fun--I noticed that right away."
He smiles and throws Ramon about six feet in the air, and Ramon hangs for an instant in the sky and then splashes down hard. Soon the girls are there, "Throw me! Throw me!"
And suddenly kids are flying through the sky, one after the other, and as I lean my head back to watch them soar, I notice the edges of the clouds again.
