What I Ate, and, How to Translate: November 15, 2020: kindof a lot of caramels

I stay up too late sometimes. Especially lately, when waking up early is failing me — Oliver pops up at the sound of me barely awake in the dark morning. It’s like his body is tuned in to the sound of me living my life in a tiny form of sweet freedom. He can hear me happy. He can hear me seeing, and breathing, and reading. And he comes to me, comes to the day, pads across the floor, and begins living with me.

Tonight I stayed up late. I ate a handful of caramels (a handful is like 10–12 caramels, yes?) and drank a glass of water filled with ice. I used to hate ice in my water, but now I am addicted to crunching it. Someone mentioned this could be indicative of an iron deficiency, and while that seems entirely possible, I haven’t bothered to check it out. I’m just buying a bag of ice every week, and crunching joyously.

While I was sitting there chewing, I thought of my grandmother on my mom’s side. Obedulia. My grandmother whose name was Obedulia— whose name I thought was Abdula all the way up until my mother died and I read my mother’s obituary. I didn’t even find my grandmother’s true name when I read her own obituary, roughly ten years ago. My eyes must have glazed over it, focusing instead on the fact that I would never see her again, and hoping that she had left behind, for me, some of her fashion.

Tonight, when I thought of my grandmother, I thought again, of her fashion. How she loved to dress head-to-toe in the color Kelly Green. Head-to-toe, honestly. Kelly Green hat. Kelly Green blouse. Kelly Green slacks. Kelly Green shoes. (Always open-toed. Always with her toes peeking through her pantyhose.)

I started googling Kelly Green clothes. I wanted to buy something that would remind me of who I was. A fully grown person who was once a little girl who was formed and named in the homage of love. I am, quite literally, a product of love.

My whole life — and even recently — maybe up until just now —I had a bit of a question mark around how I got my name. It’s a cute name, I tell myself. That’s how I got it. My parents must have heard the cute, when they sounded it out. People comment on it all the time. How darling! How unique! It’s the opposite of unique, I tell them. I once read that there were like one million Kelly Greens in the U.S. alone. I don’t know the true statistics on that; I only know that my friend Nisha tried to friend me on Facebook years ago, and friended many, many Kelly Greens before she called me and asked me to please just friend her. I also know that I have never been able to have an email address that adorably featured just my name. I am always forced to add an additional seven numerals, an asterisk and two exclamation points.

I digress. When I have had the convo with myself, in the past, about my name, I have thought this: it’s a cute combo, given that my dad’s last name was Green, and maybe my mom had the light thought run through her head that her mother had loved the color Kelly Green.

Here’s the conversation I should have had with myself: My mom’s great big giant wounded-but-loving heart, after having married a REDHAIRED (like her mother) MAN with the last name Green, and becoming pregnant with a girl, immediately saw the opportunity to line up a little-but-big, ever-constant, ever-present reminder: that her mother of course loved her — that her mother must have loved her — that her mother might love her — if her daughter was named: Kelly Green.

It took me decades to look at the scenario honestly. And I wonder: How much love is lost in translation?

**

My mom was not close with her mother. I was not close with my mother. Not in the way I thought mothers and daughters should be. I didn’t trust her; I had a hard time loving her. And I most certainly did not feel that she loved me.

But we are nothing, if not a lineage of love.

My mother, Antoinette, was loved by way of being Obedulia’s daughter. I was loved by the both of them. Whether or not I could feel it. Whether or not they told me often. Our very existence is like a love letter. As we are born, the letter continues to be written.

**

I had the hardest day loving Ollie today. I just wanted to be away from him. I didn’t want to hear his voice, or feel his kicks and punches (he is in the ninja-training portion of life and is always using our bodies like a punching bag.) I deeply needed more peace around me, and he was unwilling or unable to provide that. The more I wanted him to calm down, the more amped up he got. It felt like he was deliberately working against me. I asked Nic permission to not be the parent to put him to bed; I needed some space from him.

But a little while ago, I tiptoed into his bedroom, and moved near him. I leaned over his still-little-boy body, and placed a kiss on his head. As I did, I whispered, I love you. And immediately! — his little mouth whispered back, me too.

It’s like his body knew I was there. Like his little body could hear me, even in his sleep. Even in the dark. In the chambers of his heart. He knew I was there. He didn’t question my presence; there was no need for translation.

**

I bought three bags of caramels yesterday. No one needs three bags of caramels but I felt like I did. There’s something so methodic about the unwrapping, the decision regarding how many bites you’ll turn each one into, and the sincere effort in the chew.

I love to say I just love caramels! but once again, let’s get real here. I only love caramels because my mom had them around, constantly. Because Antoinette loved them, and likely, Obedulia, too. I don’t need to translate the love out of the equation, out of my mouth, out of my mind. Taste isn’t acquired. Taste is born into us, and fed to us, at our mother’s hands, like love.