“Lovin’ is what I got, I said remember that”. (Sublime)

That’s what you would have heard had you been in the back seat of my car this afternoon. My two girls singing at the tops of their lungs, “LOVIN’ IS WHAT I GOT! I SAID REMEMBER THAT!” with their little brother doing his best imitation of the guitar riff in between. Every time the song ended, Michael would shout out in protest and the girls would beg me to back the CD up to listen to it again. Around and around we drove from the gas station (can I get a “hell yeah!” for gas prices, please?!) to lunch to Zellers for diapers and wipes and laundry detergent and finally, to the grocery store for a veggie and dip tray (I blame Stiva’s wife for my intense craving for raw vegetables and dip), some cheese and vegetarian pepperoni to accompany our crackers for dinner tonight, all the time with them singing Sublime’s completely un- child friendly lyrics.

I’m not worried. They got the point of the song.

“Love is what I got, it’s within my reach…”

And it was a beautiful reminder, indeed. I’d be lying if I said that this past week wasn’t full of raw emotions and not one, but two huge meltdowns. I haven’t cried this much in a long time and my eyes are permanently puffed and swollen and my nose has a red, scratchy spot underneath it from constantly being wiped. It’s been draining, but also completely necessary, no matter how painful and for that, I am grateful. But I needed Sublime’s reminder, sung to me by the three little voices who bring that love within my reach each and every day.

“Let the lovin’ come back to me…”

I know you want pictures from last night. And believe me, I want to give you pictures. But unfortunately, it was my mother who did the photo taking with her better camera and she took that better camera home with her at the end of the night. And she doesn’t know how to e-mail pictures. So I have to wait for her to burn me a CD with the pics on it. And then, I promise, I’ll share. My Mom and Dad are coming to pick the girls up to go to church tomorrow morning, so cross your fingers and say a prayer to the big guy upstairs and maybe he’ll take a break from wrecking pumpkins long enough to convince my mother to get going on the CD burning.

It was a truly awesome Halloween night. Probably the best we’ve had in years and that’s really saying something because first of all, as you know, I adore Halloween. I love it more than Christmas. No fussy dinners. No seeing relatives you don’t even like that much. The only dressing up is in costume form which is SO much more fun than fancy schmancy dress clothes. No having to buy gifts for the relatives you don’t want to see and don’t even like all that much. Just candy. Lots and lots of candy. And the decorations are WAY cooler.

Second of all, it was amazing that the night turned out to be so much fun because I was in the middle of one of the meltdowns and my parents were in rare form. I won’t bother boring you with the details, but suffice it to say, it’s pretty fucking sad when the three people under the age of seven are better behaved than one retired gentleman and one almost retired nurse. Pretty fucking sad, indeed. I largely ignored them both. They weren’t going to ruin my Halloween!

Michael wasn’t too sure about the whole thing at first. He was poured into his costume (I’m not ruining it for you…you’ll have to wait for the pictures) which he wasn’t too jazzed about. And he wasn’t really digging the doorbell ringing and old people fussing over him and his cuteness. Until he realized what it was those old people were tossing into his treat sack. Once he clued in and discovered it was food, glorious, food, he really starting enjoying himself. After every house for a block, he would look up at me and say, “MMMM!” while smacking his lips until he started losing his shit and needed a bag of Doritos opened to snack on. I’m not doing it justice in the re-telling. It was hysterical. My boy chomping on a chip from house to house, smelly Doritos breath and all.

We steered away from our usual Halloween stomping ground this year because they’ve decided to start charging for parking at the local hospital (that’s where we usually parked and then walked a few blocks around it). Instead, we went back to the street that I grew up on until we moved out to the country when I was in the eighth grade. I have to say, although the people we met were really nice and all, this community didn’t really get into Halloween the same as the other streets did. No haunted houses. No scary people jumping out of bushes (remember that from last year? When I peed myself?) and very few decorations, none of them elaborate at all. And a lot of the homes were dark and not taking trick or treaters. I can’t say that I blame them but it is sad, isn’t it? I’m going to stop right there and spare everyone my “when I was a kid” tangent.

One of the first houses we stopped at was very familiar. It was the house of a woman who used to baby sit me when I was very, very young. I called her, “ma mere” and I called her husband, “ma pere”. Ma pere has long since passed away but ma mere is still kicking it. She still lives in her own home, still has all of her wits about her and still, after all of these years and great-great grandchildren (!), remembers me. I got choked up standing at her door last night, just as I’m getting choked up writing about it now. Ma mere was one of the few people in my young life who really just loved me, without condition. Very recently, someone told me that they “sensed that the stuff I write about is only the tip of what lies beneath my growth and painful experiences”. And they sensed right. I have very few happy memories of my childhood for lots of reasons and even those few happy recollections are marred by something or someone. With the exception of ma mere et ma pere. During a time when the people around me were too wrapped up in their own drama to see what was happening to me, ma mere et ma pere loved me and gave me a space where I truly felt at ease. I trusted them and they returned my trust with unconditional love.

I remember crawling up into ma pere’s lap and listening to him talk softly in my ear, always en francais. Ma pere spoke very little English and he was my first introduction to the French language. I can remember walking down my street with my mother, coming home from the hospital with her and ma mere coming out onto the street to talk to us. I remember so clearly her picking me up and holding me close. I remember even more clearly the lovely feeling of melting into her body, safe at last.

Hard to believe that my own children are now the same age (and older!) as I was that day in the street.

“Love is what I got, within my reach…”

I sometimes wonder if ma mere et ma pere knew what they gave that little girl who learned very quickly to trust no one and that the world, for the most part, was full of people out to get you.

“Let the lovin’ come back to me…”

Probably not. To them I was probably just another kid, another way to earn some extra money. I don’t know, though. There’s something about the way that ma mere looks at me still that makes my eyes tear up and gives me the overwhelming urge to climb up into her arms and let the melting feeling take over. I could have last night, that’s for sure.

“Lovin’ is what I got…I said remember that…”