There's a Somewhere Out There: The Making of a Wish Book

    There are few milestones in life more significant than graduating from high school. It’s right up there with getting married, with having a child. 
    Oh having a child.  My life would be immeasurably different without the raising of our four children.  Each baby gave birth to a new and different me.  A good me:  generous, playful, creative. A bad me:  impatient, overburdened, shrill.  An ugly me: vulnerability disguised in fury.  It’s all there untidily wrapped up in a package called mom.  That’s me.  I am somebody’s mom. Four somebody's:  Jenna, Ben, Daniel, and Nick.  And even though they have graduated from high school and are out on their own I am still, will forever be, Mom.
    As these breathless, radiant, incredibly special human beings approached 18, they managed to accumulate enough credits and good grades to graduate from high school.  I fretted with our first graduation.  What does a parent give to equip a budding adult?  Luggage?  She loved her battered back pack with the tears and stains of adventures like so many earned badges.  An airline ticket?  She had saved her money to travel, and her ticket had more sweat and dreams embedded in it than one her dad and I could give.  In the end her uncle made a mahogany chest we filled with the stuff of independence:  bedding, sharp cooking  knives, a frisbee, towels, phone cards--the kind of stuff that upon launching she would take or borrow from us anyway.  But the most important thing we placed in Jenna’s trunk proved more useful than luggage, more precious than travel.  It could not be borrowed.  She could not do it for herself.  Over the years Jenna has returned to it again and again, during good times as an affirmation, and bad times as a reminder of what could be.  It was a handmade book of memories and wishes from people who loved her, who knew her, who opened her vistas with their rich and singular perspectives.
    I began with a list of important people in her life:  grandparents, family, teachers, her horse trainer.  Children she had babysat for who adored her.  Neighbors, friends of mine who have known her from birth, friends of hers.  The girl is an extrovert and the list was long.  When I made her quieter, more self-contained brother’s book, the list was much shorter.  The key is not the length of the book, but the quality of relationship between the graduate and the wisher.
    I asked each person for a memory of Jenna, and a wish for her future.  It was a look to the past that helped shaped who she was, and a glimpse ahead, of what the future could hold.  This proved to be extraordinarily poignant for me as I transcribed them to the page.  Most folks had memories I had no recollection of, or they had a perspective of Jenna that was different from mine.  There were stories of  adventure and humor, of generosity and honesty.  And truth be told, I needed to be reminded of these traits before she left.  A  strong willed 18 year old, ready to get out of the house can make you lose perspective in a crazy way.  There were wishes I had forgotten to wish for her, that were useful and tender and considerate.
    Now, I am one of those people who love sinking my teeth into a project, and I made this one a little more complicated than pasting photos on a page of words (which can be every bit as meaningful).  I made a Poloroid image transfer of each person onto water color paper, and bound the book by hand.  This took a very long time.  Scotch drinking, bleary eyed, 2:00-in-the-morning-several-nights-in-a-row kind of time.  You don’t want to do that.  Give yourself a stretch of weeks to do it in. 
     Each book I gave our graduates had a title and a photo on the hard bound cover.  I placed a lacy liner paper between the cover and the title page,  I wrote a dedication.  I gave all rights to the graduate in writing on the last page in case they wanted to publish it and make a gazillion dollars one day.  I tied silver beads to the cord that bound Jenna’s book.         
    The process felt like labor, the end result as precious as a newborn--wrinkles, smudges, mistakes and all.   Just like life. Bumping and lurching along, spreading its wings,  standing on tip toes,  ready or not, here she comes. 

Comments

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Sie haben es wieder ~~~V Dank für diesen gefühlvollen Beitrag am Abschluss und der Komplexität der Mutterschaft. Diese kleinen Geschichten, ein zu einer Zeit, immer zu berühren, das ungenutzte Kreativität, die verstecken irgendwo ist in mir. Vielen Dank für Ihre ergreifende und zärtliche Erinnerungen.

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If art museums are the new churches, perhaps they should end the veneration of ambiguity and start serving our inner needs.

[Patricia]

You did it again~thanks for this soulful post on graduation and the complexities of motherhood. These small stories, one at a time,always touch the untapped creativity that's hiding someplace within me. Thanks for sharing your poignant and tender memories.