Remembering How to Be Human

July is filled with human interaction. 

My niece (15) and nephew (11) come up to visit for a week with me and my mom. It was niece’s idea and she’s pulled it off.

The weekend before they arrive, my mom stocks up the pantry and fridge with food and prepares the guest rooms while I check in with my niece about her expectations. She says, “I don’t know if there’s anything we are set on doing. I know (11) likes birding and photography so I thought maybe he could do that with Lainey (my mom). I was gonna bring my laptop and I just thought it might be fun to write together or share what we are working on or whatever.” Which sounds great.  

But because my brain loves order and control, and has, in the recent past, had a tendency to lean toward anxiety when plans are too amorphous (and sometimes even when they’re not), I begin to prep myself for a disruption to my routines. I can probably get my workouts in. If I write at least one word a day in my current work-in-progress, that counts as writing and if my niece does want to write together that will be fun. I don’t have to stay up past my bedtime. I can get up at the usual hour.  

These days, too often, I feel that I’m as tricky to handle as a baby on a schedule. Worse, too often I worry I’ve lost the ability to have fun, be fun, appreciate fun.

In spite of myself, after (15), (11), and their mom arrive, I do have fun while we talk, prepare food, watch movies, do artwork, write, eat, and observe the birds and squirrels through the windows.

After waiting out a storm and watching a World Cup game, their mom leaves the next day in the late afternoon.  

Over the following days, I do manage to work in my workouts, write some words, and mostly get to sleep at a decent hour. I interact and respond. Look at how adaptive and flexible I am.

My older sister joins in on Thursday, coming to town by bus. As do my other nephew (7) and niece (5), brought to the house by their dad, my brother.

My mom treats us to a visit to the Dallas World Aquarium.

We’ve had to go in separate cars, so I’ve got the nephews. As we enter the DWA and loiter in the curving entryway to wait for our full party to arrive, gazing into the enclosures holding birds and into the streams of water below us featuring turtles or fish, my nephew (7) clings to my hand.

“I’m scared,” he tells me. One of the birds is loud. And noise has always affected my nephew to some extent.

“You’re fine. It can’t get to you. You’re safe. It’s only being loud,” I tell him.

But I get it, I’m often overstimulated by noise, activity, and (less now than before, probably because my eyes have gotten older) bright lights. I definitely get it. I’ve been having stress dreams this week and the previous one. As he’s always been, (7) is better than I am at vocalizing his feelings in the moment. My internal tendency is to ask myself, “What is wrong with you?” which is not a kind or necessarily helpful question to ask.

I should tell myself, the way I tell (7), “You’re fine. You’re safe. I’m here with you.”

We are all fine and safe at the Dallas World Aquarium and see many interesting creatures.

As we go from level to level, (7) alternates running free, holding my hand, taking my phone to snap photos of things like the axolotls and the manatee, and getting (11) to hold his hand (which is adorable and I wish I’d gotten a picture of it). 

Her eyes bright and her enthusiasm unmatched, (5) is thrilled to have her older cousin’s hand to hold and drags her all around the Aquarium. She doesn’t like things, she loves them.

 

 

(11) is most thrilled by the ocelot.

(15) likes the flamingos.

On Friday, after I manage to get in my morning walk which I grumpily alter to accommodate (7) who thinks the walk we are taking is his walk (can’t I be less grouchy and more fun even as I do everything he wants to do? I shouldn’t need two hours of morning quiet and a thousand cups of tea to be human) and my workout (by the grace of my mother who takes over breakfast prep because (5) cannot be persuaded to eat Cheerios and wants pancakes and I told her I’d make them for her after my walk), and (7) and (5) are picked up by their mom, I drive the correct ones back to the Hill Country and stay the weekend watching movies, World Cup games, coordinating meet up places with siblings, playing games, and sitting on couches together to read or chat. (11) graciously gives up his bed so I have a place to stay (I can’t quit manage driving the extra 50 miles to stay with my other brother in San Antonio and have to remind myself this is okay and not some kind of failure on my part). I manage to preserve a relatively good bedtime.

Sunday morning, I wake before everyone and do my best to be quiet as I make tea and try to keep the dogs happy while I read. I breathe in the aloneness. I breathe out the peace of solitude.

I’m reading another of Connie Willis’s books called Crosstalk which is all about communication, privacy, telepathy, and relationships and (with the main character constantly trying to find a place to hide to have enough time to simply think) is even more frenetic than my brain has felt recently.    

Thank goodness no one can read my thoughts or sense my emotions. What a mess that would be.

When the rest of the house wakes, I breathe in togetherness and breathe out connection.

Then it’s time to go.

With an audiobook to keep me company and a few stops along the way to get matcha lattes or fill the car with gas, I drive the 215 miles home.

Eventually, I pull into the driveway and cart my things into the house. I’ve done it, I’ve been social. I’ve survived a week full of activity. I’ve gone and come back again.

Now I want to live under a rock for the next month. I want to hide away beneath a book’s covers. I want to drink another million cups of tea. And yet, on the other side of that coin, I want to be more “normal” so that I don’t need so much recharge time.

There are all kinds of ways to be. There are phases of life that are easier or harder than others.

I think of the friend I stayed a summer with who told me, “You’re helping me remember how to be human.”

I think I need to be reminded of that myself as I continuously contemplate and act upon what it is to be alive and to live.

I think of what it is to be me. At this time of life. As who I am now.

It’s not always easy. But I’m doing my best. Which, sure, could be better (sometimes much much better), but, like my writing, I’m a work in progress. If I can get this draft down, I can improve upon it.