Breathe
Sometimes, it’s hard to tell which way is up. In underwater caves, the key to survival is knowledge of the fact that bubbles float upward. I’m not sure where I learned this from, or why I remember it: I’m claustrophobic and like my feet planted firmly on the ground.
I have a fascination with water, though: I’m not sure if I always have. I used to be terrified of dams, afraid, for some reason, that the roaring water would sweep me away. It’s funny how life changes. Now I seek these places out when I’m needing my space.
I can’t open my eyes underwater, and maybe that’s why this memory is one of those last sticky notes that defied whatever it is that makes post-its fall to the ground like autumn leaves. I might be four…I know I’m at least three. Grew up outside of Boston, but back then, we were decidedly closer to Baltimore and DC. I remember strange things. I remember that the woman who was not my mom was an ENT doctor. I remember her son’s name. I don’t remember what the fountain looked like when I was standing upright, but I can still see what it looked like when he pushed me in. I could open my eyes so I saw everything. I didn’t know how to swim.
I couldn’t tell you how deep it was, but it was too deep for me. Bubbles float upward, the direction of my feet, upside down in the water, for whatever reason, not scared that I couldn’t breathe. I don’t think that I knew what was upon me. This was years before I knew that I should be afraid of drowning. Somebody pulled me out of the fountain by my feet. Probably my mom. I told them that he pushed me, but years later, I’m not sure if he really knew what he was doing.
I didn’t grow up knowing God, but God was always with me. Little me believed in something. I used to ask for my stuffed animals to be transported to a habitable world outside of our solar system so they would be safe when the sun exploded. Odd duck. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
When we moved, there was a family down the road and across the street that had lost a baby to something that could very easily befall a child, certainly could have befallen me. I remember being five and not really understanding how you could grieve for somebody you didn’t know. Too many balloons in the sky now that we’re all grown and wish we didn’t know. But I was little and remember receiving information about my friend’s dead brother and responding with the kind of solemnity that overtakes little kids when they’re confused. I remember being mystified by so much about their family but now that I’m older and have love in my heart for children, I can’t imagine the grief that would accompany losing a baby. Did he die watching the bubbles? Could he open his eyes and see?
And I’ve learned we all have different ways of wearing the pain that we carry. Some are more visible than others, and I deeply regret the judgement that passed through my little mind and cast itself on their family. Not understanding that just a couple of years before, I’d been fortunate enough to have been pulled out of the water by my feet. Not yet cognizant of God’s grace. Not yet understanding what a blessing it was to breathe.
