I Am Your Hummingbird

In some ways, she's still so much the little girl, lost in her own world, except now she has ear buds carefully in place to facilitate the ride. This is her meditation. It always has been.

There has always been swing swing swinging or bounce bounce bouncing or, ugh, spin, spin, spinning. She's a proprioceptive seeker. Her brain finds peace in movement. I can relate.

Don't tell me I must rest; my body at rest is my brain in turmoil, unless it's on my terms.

Every now and again Doot looks wistful, becomes misty-eyed and says, "I'd just love to sit on the couch together; snuggle up and watch a movie." I shake my head, sigh, look away. "That'd be great..." I say, "...if you WANT me to get all depressed and DIE! Geez!" Instead he and his brother meet at their mother's house for movie nights every week or so. I suspect that there's less snuggling than Doot would like, but I'm accepting that I can't be all things to all people and apparently, so is Doot, however reluctantly.

This is me during the worst year of my life; 1998 - the year THP died. The photo was taken by Doot. It was also the year he and I met. Can anyone say, "awesome timing"? I spent a fair bit of time in the psych hospital that year. It was also the only year of my life I had cable TV (thanks to Doot). This is no coincidence. I would lie on the couch for semi-catatonic hour after semi-catatonic hour and watch Rugrats and CatDog on Nickelodeon. There was always something vaguely watchable to help keep the enormity of tragedy on the periphery of my battered mind.

Now I am the hummingbird to Doot's sloth. My hummingbird is calm amidst a blur of movement. Ni is more of a Pacman, joyfully frenetic, with hand-eye coordination to match.

I'm not sure where Wawa fits yet, she seems to have a balance the rest of us lack, but at 6pm on a rainy night when my two year old tells me she needs to be outside jumping on her trampoline, I break out the coats. I learned the hard way.