Crumbs From the Bottom My Backpack

My lunch today and damn grateful. The crushed, stale madeline I saved up as a surprise treat for my son I found wedged between my notebook and ipod and the various papers of no particular import (ATM transactions, Visa receipts, play program, spent theater tickets, to do lists, grocery lists christ it's all weighing me down!). Flat, in word, the madeline was! Flat. In all respects except for its modest nutritional value. It's a world in that backpack which by the way also boasts a 1997! edition New York subway map it appears I rediscovered on January 17, 2003 (consulting above mentioned notebook) when sitting at the Baylands in Palo Alto where I took my son after gymastics to watch (feel!) the airplanes fly over us as they landed at the Palo Alto airport.

Forgotten Notebook exchange dated 1/17/03
Q: What is my obstacle?
A: You are.

What would happen if you were to write about now? Describe the ducks in the marsh. The smooth dripping clear sound of the water off their backs (at the time wishing I could shake my pain so easily). The brown marsh grass. The sun brilliant on the water. The bubbles as bugs rise to the surface and nip at algae. The wind gentle on the water. Private planes overhead. My son, three years old, lying on the bench beside me studying the subway map driving his cars over it and talking to himself: "standed on top he has standed on top catch a bubble catch a bubble you do that you do that is it circular? is it round? is it circular?" (the kid has demanded these distinctions all his life) "Duck!" (on his sippy cup) he raises it up so the duck can see the airplane rushing over our heads.

Pressing questions from 1/17/03
Is there always a hole in your heart where the soul of your child came through? Does one ever recover? Or will I feel the pull of that new body like a satellite as long as either of us is alive? Or beyond that? Have we always known each other? Been moving towards each other? From all other matter? Throughout time? And what of the dead? What of my dead child? Surely we are pierced as much by the dead, the unborn, the never was, as much as we are by all that is. What thread is strong enough to sew up the wound?

yes. these are the thoughts that return and return even today when I'm starving and nervous waiting to present my thesis proposal.