Flying Over I-40 S. With Repose.

~ Live & Learn

Cut me some slack. It was a long day. Too long to even share a "It's been a long day" post. Ok, so I didn't know what "repose" meant.  I turned it in my head: Pose…Portrait…Re-pose…Repeat…Poster…Model posing…Model posing? Wow.

“Please repeat the word.”

“And now the origin of the root please.”

A nine year old would have nailed this in a Spelling Bee.

Like it makes a bloody difference. Long day or short day, I don't have a clue what it means. Google it Dummy.

It's 10:15 p.m. and I'm flying over I-40 heading South – reflecting on last night.  It was 8:30 pm.  The house is empty, the TV is spewing white background noise and I’m sprawled out on the couch.

I'm flipping through my RSS feeds and stop. I can't seem to untangle myself from a passage written by Sadegh Hedayat:  “Henceforth I lived like a soul in torment. All my waiting, watching and seeking were in vain.[…] Repose was utterly denied me. How could I have found repose?”

Like a rock skipping over water, the mind ignores words that don’t fit and locks on words that seem to have a mysterious grip.FaceTime interrupts the grip.  It's Rachel. "Hi Dad!  Guess who's here?" She turns the phone and there's her Brother, a close-up and beaming: "Hey Dad!"  Rachel (25) lives and works in Manhattan. Eric (23), has an assignment in the city during the month of August.

Rachel spins the phone around, the picture shimmers because of a break in reception and is then restored: "Dad, don't hang up. Wait till you see the 9-11 Memorial at night."  They run across the street to the overhead viewing area.

The juxtaposition between this sacred ground and our two children giggling triggered Parent, and the need to rein them in: "Be Quiet. Show Respect." Yet, I couldn't get it out, something larger held me back. I sat (mouth shut for a change) and watched the two of them, 50 miles away.

9-11 was more 15 years ago. She was 10. He was 8.  They remember. How does one forget?

They approach the viewing area.  Eric takes pictures. Rachel turns her iPhone to show me the Memorial. There's their moment of silence. The waterfalls. The twin reflecting pools, each one acre footprints set in the base of the giant Twin Towers, which cast large shadows over the memorial. Spellbinding.

"Great, right Dad!?"

"OK, we'll talk to you later."

First Siblings. Now Friends.

Invisible threads. They are gone but I can feel them. Both free of parental chains. He towers over her, on her Ground. She's safe, he has her back.

I stare at the blank FaceTime screen, warmth churns with melancholy.

Repose (n)
a state of rest, sleep, or tranquility.

I found it.

I feel what it means.

~ DK

Notes:

  • Inspired by: "Being a parent makes you feel like a blanket that’s always too small. No matter how hard you try to cover everyone, there’s always someone who’s freezing."  by Fredrick Backman, Beartown: A Novel
  • Image Credit: NewYorkbyrail.com - National September 11 Memorial and Museum in Manhattan, NY – photo by Liz Baller
  • Related Posts: Commuting Series.

39 thoughts on “Flying Over I-40 S. With Repose.”

  4. It’s a gift to have healthy happy kids. You should be proud Mr K they are gorgeous! Life changed for so many on 9/11, that was also the year our son died and so I understand the impact it had on every family. Life is fragile and yet, so precious.

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  10. “They are gone, but I can feel them.” Such a visceral emotion…feeling the presence of one no longer there, whether removed merely by distance or by something more profound. How lovely that R&E could share that moment with you — *thought* to share that moment with you. Linked by invisible threads, now and always. Enjoy that repose, pal, you deserve it….

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  14. Parenting is tough stuff. Watching our children grow into adulthood and allowing them space and support to develop into their own persons while (brutally) watching them make their own mistakes (like we did, only different) is especially challenging. I feel for you, and good you’re in touch with your own feelings around it.

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    1. Thank you Bela. It is difficult.

      “Being a parent makes you feel like a blanket that’s always too small. No matter how hard you try to cover everyone, there’s always someone who’s freezing.” by Fredrick Backman, Beartown: A Novel

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  15. My son called. He’s quitting his good construction job to become a singer songwriter full time. He’s pretty good, but he’s not THAT good. I didn’t tell him that. I searched for a way to be positive, supporting.
    “Well, youre young. You can go back to construction any old time, right?” was the best I could do.
    At the same time my daughter had quit her job and moved to Seattle. She’s just like her mother. Just pull up shop and start something new on a whim. But it always works out.
    I talked to their mother.
    “You know neither of our kids is working right now” I said.
    “Rip is playing music ” she says matter of fact.
    “Oh, yeah, right” I said.
    Its a poor substitute for repose.

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  19. Dave, what you wrote is powerful. The passage of time and imposed distance, physical and in other circumstances events etched in our personal and at times collective memories…
    I am struck by the many parallels…
    “FaceTime interrupts” and I remember how the TV interrupted the quite early morning, to let us know of the breaking news…and how in silence, I watched the unfolding of real time…of tragedy…

    “It’s Rachel” …”there’s her Brother, a close-up and beaming” and I think of the Joy you saw in your children’s faces and I think of how, later we saw the images of those lost in the Towers, their faces showing their past essence, flashing across the tv screen…and I think of their loved ones left behind and impact on the world.

    “the picture shimmers because of a break in reception and is then restored” true, your break is momentary, the scared landscape didn’t shimmer, the twisted, piles of debris, tonnage thickly covered in grey, lifeless & bleak concrete dust enveloping and hanging, thick in the air, erupting and spreading with the wind…as the news of terror spreads across the globe…

    “The twin reflecting pools, each one acre footprints set in the base of the giant Twin Towers, which cast large shadows over the memorial. Spellbinding.” …and I think of your two children representing twin reflecting pools, their big, bright eyes, cast a reflection of their soul’s oculus, such an energy of Life’s Force…

    “Invisible threads. They are gone but I can feel them”… I am thankful that you have this connection with your children…they are full of Joy, Promise and Hope…Illustrating how you and Susan, took such care in investing in their Soul Refinement…/// the Lost One are Gone, though their Souls Presence is Felt,… The Scared Landscape is changed and The Memorial Draws, pulling on people’s Soul’s, a Threaded Connection, To Visit, To Reflect & To Honor….

    “He towers over her, on her Ground” standing firm, rooted…unlike the towers that crumbled…

    “I stare at the blank FaceTime screen”, you took a moment for reflection as the screen images, fade to heart memory….while the Landscape of the Towers base, is No Longer Blank and Marred with Destruction and Deep Anguish…now Light represents symbolically Honor…as the Light Beams Emerge,Flooding Open Sky, Illuminating, Exposing Times Change and Emitting Light of Living in The Present …and in Life, I Remember Love, for When We Love and Experience Loss, We Grieve and Though So Difficult, We Keep Living…Honoring God and Others, Past and Present by Shinning Our Light of Love, Upward and Outward in a Circle that Can Not Be Broken…
    and I think of the World Trade Center bldg 5 daycare child and I wonder how they have grown …
    http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92441&page=1
    and I think of the children who lost a parent, a relative, a neighbor, and those were born after the loss of their fathers who were in the towers…those Lost Live on, in Their legacy of Love…

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