Susan Senator

I was thinking today of the things I got done, chores mostly, and feeling some relief that I am a useful human being. Bought groceries, paid some bills, filed medical for reimbursements, did laundry. Whew, I have justified my existence.

Well that is just a stupid waste of brain, to have to justify your existence.

So instead, I thought about what I’m grateful for in my life. No justification or explanation or rationale necessary:

Strong marriage

Humor

House

Garden

Healthy sons

Extended Family

Guitar

My guitar pedal (Screamer)

Jerry Garcia

Robert Hunter

Bob Weir

John Perry Barlow

Bob Dylan

Bike

Writing ability

21st Century science and medicine

Nat’s group home/service provider TILL

Charles River Center

BILT, Inc.

Max’s happiness and independence

Ben’s happiness and independence

Nat’s happiness and recent independence from me– hurts so much but is great

Cake

Belly dance always and eternally

Certain friends scattered here and there

Survival shows

Good comedians

Favorite books

So happy today. Everything moved forward and curled around us like a ribbon on a present. We rode our bikes 20 miles, eating breakfast in the middle. But it was later on, almost 4 o’clock, when we discovered a new thing in something very old. We thought we’d seen the whole Outer Cape thing—Ptown, bike path, Nauset Light, Wellfleet Harbor—and yet there it was, as never before. It’s a river leading into the bay. A woman told us about it; neither of us remember who she was. “At the end of the parking lot, the very end.” We couldn’t park yesterday but we could today—thank you Labor Day—and as we walked towards the pale green grasses we could see blue plastic footpaths leading towards water. The water cut through the marshgrass and widened out, lapping at the edges of a white sand beach. We walked the whole way around and saw it, the river, flowing around a gentle bend of beach, beyond which was the bay.

“Where do you suppose is the dividing line, the exact spot where river becomes bay?” I asked, knowing there was no real answer. Still, I walked all the way to that area and I could see a line of tiny dollhouse waves spilling over into a current. This must be the spot!

I walked through it, surprised by the strength of it, like the insistent, pulling hands of a toddler. I met up with Ned who told me to use his goggles and watch the sand fly by underneath us as the current pulled us along. “It’s like flying,” Ned said and I caught a flicker of his deep happiness, having found, at last, what he’d had so easily in dreams.  Then we held hands and we flew together upstream. “I’m Superman,” he said.

After, he floated/flew up and down while I walked against the surprisingly strong current. I moved at a diagonal from the beach, into the bay, my arms spread out from my sides, hands dragging in the water. Everything around me was golden: the sand, the sunlight, the millions of reflections of the sun on the tiny waves. My body felt strong, my eyes felt happy, my mouth smiled. My old love and I had found a new place to play.