I AM REALLY HERE

          Sitting in the middle seat of my daughter’s white mini-van, I listened to her chatter with her long time friend.  The next day, I sat in the same seat and eavesdropped on her conversation with her daughter, my granddaugher.  Every once in awhile, a comment burst into my head, but, before I got a chance to speak, they were onto another topic or story or shared memory.

            For two days I felt invisible.  It was mostly not a bad thing since I understand being with my family was usually all about joining in their lives and doing what was happening:  a birthday, a holiday, a graduation.

            What caused a mixture of feelings to gather in my chest and threaten to spill out my mouth as words or my eyes as tears, was the realization that I was invisible.  I wasn’t even being talked ‘at’ or ‘with’ or ‘around’ but through.  I was just there, being cared for, since I was fed and a bed was provided.

            No one seemed interested in my story of how I got the weed eater to work or how the two weddings I wrote and facilitated went nor did anyone want to hear me read my new short story (the first in three years)?  I did get, “You look nice, Mom!” as a general approval statement.  I searched for any nuance of a sigh that told me she was grateful I wouldn’t embarrass her and was pleased not to find one.

            On one hand, being invisible has its advantages.  I’m free to leaf through my own picture book of memories if the topic of conversation has nothing to do with me.  I can roam around my brain and trace story lines for my next novel or rearrange my furniture.  Just about any kind of mental picture can erupt, as long as I don’t prattle about it out loud.  Rather like my stream of consciousness when I rode behind my late husband on his motorcycle.  Though then, I felt alive with all the physical sensations of wind and changes of temperature and the feel of his sturdy body between my legs and against my chest.  My arms often were wrapped around him, so I remember feeling solid and substantial.

            Now I’m an appendage at times, one more person to find room for in the car.  One more mouth to feed.  Sometimes one more pair of hands to count on for help with a family project.

            I’m not liking the totality of this being invisible though; as if I’m a fading apparition who will eventually dissipate into a memory.

            I’d like to count for something to somebody.  This is what’s spurring me to find some way to be concrete and to contribute to the greater good, either through my blog, my marching with 1000 Grandmothers for Peace, singing with Emandal Chorale, and maybe volunteering at the Mendocino Museum or Phoenix Hospice.  I will allow invisibility with my family if that makes them feel more able to deal with me and what has happened in the last several years.  I won’t allow it in the rest of my dealings with life.