Sunday nights have always held melancholy for me. I’m not sure why this is; I used to attribute it to going to a job that I loathed on Monday mornings (EARLY on Monday mornings, which made it that much worse), but I don’t have that burden anymore, and I’m still sad. Maybe it’s just this particular Sunday…I just feel very much alone right now.

I spent all day in the house with my sweet Bear. He is still too young to communicate with me in meaningful ways; we have cuddles, we have tantrums…and at the end of the day, I put him to bed and face a house of silence. Usually, this doesn’t bother me, but tonight, it does.

So I’m just going to let myself have A Sad Night, and just wallow. Maybe I’ll knit and watch some trash TV. Maybe I’ll take a bath and try to go to bed early. Maybe I’m sad because I’m out of wine! Or maybe it’s just one of those nights…one of those humid, late summer nights when I’m longing for the touch of the cool wind in my face, and I want to breathe, and I want to drink pumpkin spice lattes.

Yes. That’s it. I want a cool autumn breeze. I loathe this time of year, and I’m just going to say that and be done with it. Take that, nasty summer.

Writing about anything else seems unthinkable tonight. Though I live in Georgia, I consider myself a daughter of Charleston. I love that city so much. I spent my formative years in college there; I lived and dwelt in its streets for five beautiful years. I love its friendliness, its openness, its pure, unadulterated beauty.

What happened there this week…I’m still trying to wrap my mind around it. Less than a week ago, I rested my head a block from the site of the shootings. I go back there to “go home,” to pay homage, to pretend I’m young again, to revel in the city’s beauty. I am shaken by the senseless horror, the slaughter of innocents in their place of sacred worship.

I may as well confess that I suffer from depression and anxiety. And now, as I’m about to put Bear into a Bible school, and then into a Christian preschool, I cannot help but wonder at this decision…if he would be better off in a secular school, in a neutral place.

We have to decide…Christian or not…if we are children of darkness, children of indifference, or children of light. I am choosing—I am making a conscious choice—to be a child of light, and to raise a child of light.

May the hate of this world be overcome by light. May all of us—Christian, non-Christian, black, white, purple, polka-dotted, scarred, ignorant, hurting, healing—may we all carry these nine precious lives in our hearts. May we let their memories carry us through dark times, and may we let them inspire us. May we never let hate overtake us.

I pray their souls rest in peace and in the glory of their God. We are all in this together. Let us lean upon one another.

There is a great sadness within me tonight, and I am not sure why. My child slumbers peacefully in the room next to me. We have had a good day. The sweet girls next door are having a sleepover, I think; when I sit on my back deck, I can hear their shrieks of laughter as they play with a spotlight, and it occasionally shines my way. I am prone to melancholy, but tonight should be a happy one. I will just accept it as a day without rain, and move on.

Maybe it’s the sound of their laughter that is hard for me. I adore these young girls; maybe it is the knowledge that my own girlhood is over that saddens me. They have a summer stretched out in front of them, a time of soccer, of fireflies, of swimming with friends. And I will find things to hate about myself, as usual; I’m afraid I will let another few months tick by without accomplishing much, without being stellar. I love the autumn, the winter, the early spring, but summer saddens me. It has always been my least favorite season. I do not like watermelon. I am prone to sunburn. I’ve never felt the need to run through sprinklers or catch fireflies, though I appreciate their sweet glow when I am wine-flushed. I am topsy-turvy, at sixes and sevens tonight, and perhaps I should just turn in.

But the night beckons me. I love the silence (though I don’t mind the sounds of their sleepover). I love the quiet time, when I’m not on duty, when I can imagine that I am a girl again, staying up late, reading a novel by the thin light of a seashell nightlight. I can imagine I am young again.

It’s a good night to write. The rain is falling, washing away the film of pollen that has covered everything in sight. On nights like this, I so wish my house had a tin roof, so that I could fall asleep to that gentle, lulling, timeless sound.

I had an interesting experience today. I suppose, on some level, I “collect” people; I love to observe people (although not necessarily to interact with them). I found myself tonight in a rural area, somewhat far from my home, grocery shopping before I found the highway again. While waiting in line at the store’s pharmacy, I stood next to an older lady; her red-rimmed eyes belied either the fact that she was extraordinarily tired, or that she was on a great deal of medication. As the pharmacist was neither discreet nor compassionate, I learned that the latter was true. Our eyes met as we stood in our respective lines; she smiled, and I smiled back.

After dropping off my order at the pharmacy, I meandered around the store, filling my cart with my household staples–diapers, organic milk, coffee. Rounding the corner of an aisle, I encountered the woman and smiled again, ready to pass by and continue my shopping. To my surprise, she reached out and touched my arm, and she held me captive for a good fifteen minutes.

Here is what I learned about her, this greasy-haired, massively overweight, tired woman, pupils dilated enough for me to confirm my original suspicion. She is a grandmother of three; she is the primary caregiver of a grandson who is the same age as my son. His father ran out on him and is currently sitting in the county jail for failure to pay child support to the mothers of his five children. The lady (I never got her name, and chastised myself afterward for not being polite and introducing myself) had received a cortisone injection in her knee earlier in the day; she patted her stained sweatpants for emphasis as she revealed this information. Her knees hurt her because she constantly picks up her grandchildren. I gave her no details about myself other than I had a son, aged two, and my side of the conversation consisted mainly of sympathetic “aw”s and “bless his/your heart”s. She then told me of her twin granddaughters, aged eight, one of whom was a surprise, as a twin was never detected via ultrasound. She pulled out a battered wallet and produced pictures of them, and I responded as anyone presented with photos of someone’s grandchildren would.

What struck me most was that all I wanted to do was to get away from this woman; I wanted to finish my shopping, pick up my prescription, and head home to my own baby. I kept edging away from her, and finally, after inching my shopping cart further and further away, I bade her goodbye and wished her luck. I never saw her again.

But I remember her. As I was driving home, I berated myself for not being more kind. I was not rude, of course, but I didn’t take this opportunity to connect with someone, to let her really be heard, albeit in the toilet paper aisle of a fluorescent grocery store. Maybe she saw a kindness in my smile that I am not aware of; maybe she was a little dopey from her meds; maybe she was just lonely and wanted to talk.

On this night, wherever she is, I hope that she is falling asleep, contented with thoughts of her grandchildren, whom she loves enough to talk about with a stranger in a store. Maybe she is under a tin roof, listening to the rain, putting this day behind her.

Before I start my evening of writing, I wanted to jot down a few thoughts that have been snaking their ways through my head. Two weeks ago tonight, I was at a coastal writing retreat that changed my life. I left the following Monday, determined to continue with my writing in spite of the many daily bites that are taken out of my time, but I have fallen yet again into that pit, that cycle, of I’m-not-writing-oh-God-I’m-not-a-writer-when-will-I-ever-find-the-time-to-write-arggggghhhh. And I need to just forgive myself for that, and nod at that thought while I’m moving forward, passing it by. Yes, l have a young kiddo who needs me, and yes, my house is a mess, and there are eight million reasons for me not to have the time to write. And that is okay right now.

Today, I had the realization that I’ve been approaching everything about my life the wrong way! (Not a big deal there or anything.) I’ve been frantically trying to change my surroundings, smooth my schedule, thinking that if the House Is Clean and Everything Is Neat and Organized that I will then be able to turn inward and have time and peace to reflect and to write. But. That idyllic, candle-burning, rain dripping on the windowpane, quiet neat house scenario is not going to play out for me right now, and I need to turn perspective inside out and upside down and all around. I need to find beauty in chaos and carve out a couple feet for my brain to wheel around, in the midst of the mess, and I WILL BE OKAY. I will write. And I’m going to stop beating myself up for it. Because, gah, there are a million other things for which we moms can beat up ourselves.

So here goes! Tea in hand, actual candle burning (!)…whatever comes tonight will be a gift, and I will accept it and be thankful.

“…I see myself at crossroads in my life, mapless, lacking bits of knowledge – then, the Moon breaks through, lights up the path before me…” –John Geddes, A Familiar Rain

This time of year is always a restless one for me. Here in Georgia, December can careen wildly from hot to cold, from one extreme to the other. It is not-quite-Christmas, and not-quite-winter. But the autumn (always my season of possibility) has departed, and I find myself in waiting mode. The problem is, I have no idea what I’m waiting for.

It’s a little different this year, though. If I were kind to myself, I would say that I find myself “at a crossroads.” The more honest version, I believe, is “I am stuck.” For every push, there is a pulling back. For every inclination, there is a reason not to, so, instead of doing something–anything–I end up screwing around and wasting time.

I am in between. In between careers. In between stages of my life (I still feel like a little kid most of the time. Sometimes it shocks me–it’s a wonderful shock, but still a shock–that I have a two-year-old who is totally dependent on me. It’s hard to reconcile the need to be a strong, free, independent woman with the overwhelming need to completely shelter and protect my Bear, and to facilitate his learning and to spend-every-second-possible-with-him-because-these-moments-will-never-come-around-again. Oy.). In between seasons. In between children, perhaps? In between my past life of being stupid and growing up, and my life-to-come, in which logic would dictate that I will live as though I learned some lessons from…being stupid and growing up.

So, so many in-betweens.

I just feel in my bones that the time is fast approaching when I’m going to have to jump, that a sea-change is about to overtake me, and I can either falter or I can figure out how to embrace it, how to direct it to the place I want it to go. To the place where I end up, looking around myself with fresh eyes, and say, “Oh, yes. This is it.”

I’m not of the land of the polished, the land of the organized junk drawer and the land of fresh manicures. I’m just not. And I’m learning to make peace with that.

I reside in the rain. My heart lies in a crib with a soundly sleeping, sweet-smelling baby boy, growing up much too quickly. My heart lies in the downpour of the water, coursing through the gutters, dampening the grey concrete, smoothing the edges of the world around me. My heart lies in the grass over the bones of my mother, as I sit near her and talk to her and ask her to guide the rest of my life from her–better–vantage point.

There are more important things than vacuuming my living room, or cleaning out my closet. There are more important things than disappearing through drink. There are more important things. And I am finished with not finding them.