On Roots

“There is a point at which even grief feels absurd..."

Today is sunny but it rained half of yesterday straight through the evening. The weather lately has been the weirdest; oscillating between sweaty pits and hot flashes, to forgotten chunky sweaters retrieved from the cleaners. Everyone I know has a bout of allergies that makes them believe they have Covid. And those that don’t have allergies, actually do have Covid. In my own world, the rapid tests have accumulated and suggest I’d benefit instead from  rounds of Claritin, Flonase, and medical-grade eye drops. An accumulation only to provide some relief, until the trees are done doing their thing. 

In conjunction with the planets and Mercury and all that stuff we pretend not to care about, but really do care about, things feel strange. I’m never spared and I almost always get my period the day after a full moon.

Last Sunday, I had this sinking feeling, something I feel on occasion, but now connect with deep waves of grief. In the middle of a mundane task, a heap of it climbs over my body. Like that same afternoon when I was planting window boxes with the kids–as the window boxes propped up, my body swung over the unscreened window, violets threaded their stems to one another in the wind, it was there. Then, as unexpectedly, the grief was gone. I am back in the present joy of the task at-hand.

“It’ll -all work out. It’ll be the better of the worst situation. The silver lining will reveal itself soon, someone unforeseen will cut some red tape, etc “ a friend wrote in response to an instagram story about The Mae House three days later.

Soon after that moment at the window, the tubs and sinks began gurgling whenevever they drained. And an unfamiliar sound of water leaking led me to the basement, where a white pipe with a screw on 10 inch top pushed water out of its crevices and continued to do so anytime we ran the shower, washed a dish, or took a shit. I walked away from the basement later that day, unwilling to drown in the proverbial water fountain that had called my already damp basement home, and proceeded to continue on with my children, attempting to bring myself back to that present moment.

Moments passed for hours, and the feeling of the leak being larger than what I had hoped continued down and showed itself in the way I responded when one kid didn’t listen, or the other. 

In the midst of the chaos, Oak casually told us that he had, “three of those mint things” on the table within six hours, and off we were to the Well Now, submitting to the reality that my nearly 8-year-old had dissolvable children’s Claritin. The nurses gave O a “you know better” look and sent us on our way with a number to poison control, with instructions to call immediately.  On the phone in the parking lot, they assured me it wasn't that bad, but any more and they would be concerned. And maybe, maybe, I need to have another talk with my son about taking things that weren't administered to him. “It tastes like mint, he said,” I told her. “It does. Happy Mother’s Day,.” she laughed in reply. 

We left the next morning, on the early train for the city with men and women in suits, others who lingered through the weekend, like us. I shuffled the kids to school an hour and a half late. I grabbed a coffee. Took a quick nap. I sent the plumber to the house, trying to  deal with the grief still, trying to view that call to the plumber as a final act of love.

The plumber worked for two days straight—I heard the birds chirping and saw sharp blades of green grass glistening from the mounted front door bell while he tugged on a cig poised between two fingers in confusion and desperation. His gray wispy hair flowing back, forward, a tug of the cig, a push of the hair, forward, back, a walk to another angle of the house to make sense of the mess before him, back to where he started. He tried every trick he knew. That evening, a text confirmed that an unfortunate clog in the main line from the house to the street was the culprit. He’d exhausted all other options.

The exhaustion came to me too,  leading me to post about the events on social media, even as that seemed laughable. I’ve been hesitant to share what’s happening in real-time to avoid the plethora of suggestions in my DMs or saying something that might scare-off a potential homebuyer about to take the plunge. 

"Investors are coming in and pushing out the first-time buyers," Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, said to NPR this February. Yun continued, “the percentage of home sales that went to investors rose to 22% in January, up from 15% a year earlier.” 

Those sorts of investors would have no real difficulty dealing with a clogged main pipe or excavating a potential broken pipe. But then there’s the rest of us. As proud as I am of this house and my work in it, I can account for every red cent that has gone into it. Nicole, who helps manage The Mae House knew the cost. So did her mother, who sat on the phone speaking Spanish with a plumber for me while I weighed the fiscal harm of all of the above. 

As soon as I pressed post, a slew of responses from first-time home buyers poured in, with the most deranged stories of leaky, burst, and clogged pipes. Several on the crumbling foundation of NYC and the amassed build up and out of it. And much on the plight of insurance and how to play, for better or for worse, a game of “gotcha” to have them cover a portion of the unforeseen cost. “The richest people are the ones with the most debt,” a neighbor said to me that same weekend. Even as a Black woman, my home could be seen and misunderstood as wealth, in a town where the median income for white folks scales the poverty line. Her point then, and maybe even the resounding message of conflicts from direct messages in response to my post about the incident, was about how rich I seem. The irony is, this abundant, powerful, and clear evolution and richness, if you will, has been the source of some varied grief. Feeling in and out, out and in.

“We got it, it had roots!” the contractor said over the phone Thursday evening. “WHAT?!” I yelled back.. “There’s a crack, obviously, because there were roots. We used the industrial camera and snake and got it. The water should be fine and just plan on replacing that pipe one day. Not now, but one day.” Sewer pipes hold nutrients, oxygen, and, of course water. Naturally, the roots of the tree that stands in front of the fence, that protects the house, that hides the gate, would grow its way to that nourishing source. 

I thought a lot about the roots on Friday morning while listening to The Daily and stories of those who lost loved ones due to the pandemic over the last few years. You could hear the grief in their throats, every person, undoubtedly loved and extraordinary. Years pass sometimes before the cracks form. The roots, my pipes–the comparison is abysmal.

Although I did not lose a loved one, I think I am grieving what we collectively had to manage through the pandemic years. In my case, despite buying a house (with the seed money for Stand In My Window), which was a gain, I am fraught and worn out from working, parenting, and living through the emotions of the last few years. According to a recent Harvard study by Claudia Goldin, working mothers with no college degree (me) with children in the age group of 5-13 (me) are working more than they were before the pandemic (me). 

Despite how this analysis looks like a triumphant victory for women, Claire Cain Miller points to the fact that many women did so, and are feeling the effects of this: 

“They were stretched thin — and many still are. Child care, after-school care and summer camps are not back at capacity; people are still getting Covid; and for some mothers, the reopening of schools gave them a chance to pause and realize how overwhelmed they were.” Miller continues,  “Black women without college degrees were hit hardest. They were overrepresented in service and caregiving jobs, and also more likely to get Covid or care for someone who did.” 

The point is, what Black women could access before the pandemic was limited already–and then Covid hit. And now, are even more-so limited, despite our ability to do more–and the fact that most of us are doing more. I am grieving so many things these days, but especially the limitations–and the reality that peace of mind is more often granted to those who don’t rely on structures like money, husbands, and proximity to whiteness.

In about six weeks time, this grief will take a new shape. My daughter, River, will graduate from elementary school. The short walks and bike rides with her brother to school this year as I trailed behind will come to an end. Their years in school together will be over. And the apartment that we have called home during these last five years will no longer be ours. 

In the meantime, hopefully, the roots will redirect their path. As they do, hopefully I too will forge a new one. And while the roots tunnel the earth,  lilies will be pulled from the beds to make way for other seasonal flowers. The raised beds are full of oregano, tomatoes, chamomile, marigold, and cosmos, and I’ll hold to the memory of a particular time of an afternoon of kids planting and then walking to school, together. 

In therapy the other day, I spoke about the grief. I want to hold space for it while also making room for laughter, excitement, and anticipation. Her response to it as nothing short of brave, evolutionary and healthy, soothed me and made me think of this quote, on which we’ll end this note, 

“There is a point at which even grief feels absurd. And at this point, laughter gushes up to retrieve sanity.” — Alice Walker

With love, 

L