Oftentimes, life can seem a blur of images. As children rise, sleepy and kind, disorder following where ever they go. And we fix their meals, and wipe them up. To and fro, to and fro we carry and rush, clean up the messes, roll out the dough, console wild toddlers with messes of tears. Check equivalent fractions from the wooden table over shoulders, set timers for reading or piano, for rice and for watering. Fill up the tub, rainbow bubbles foaming bright, wash away the days, the dirt and dust and red sticky jam from cheeks. Moments of stillness rare and fleeting. A quiet moment to take in their features, process their rounded eyelids, dark curls around their faces, dimpled knuckles. When a fresh new year turns into October, summer escapes and turns to halloween ads and Christmas items within stores.
The images of our lives, on a wheel, spinning, spinning as phases and novelties pass us by, high chairs turn to wooden chairs, and binkies into small metal cars. Long legs replace baby rolls, a backpack instead of a bumbo.
Framing, to still a moment, capture that image, and frame it. Protected, shared.
What is framing?
An intentional exit from the spin, a moment away. Dressing it up, a moment in time, to talk and listen, just as they are. Allowing them to lead the conversation. Constructing, a verb, a real action, to a frame this season. To hear their little hearts, create a real, still memory for us both, rich with tastes and smells, the feel of dresses, dressing up for each other and the importance of our interest in one another.
Framing means not the usual instruction or the course of conventional word flow of do’s and mustn’t. Hearing and laughing and savoring this image that represents more than a moment in time, but two people, suspended enough to relish the quiet and the now. This exact season and stage before it’s gone. One day to recall, “Remember when we used to, and how much you used to love…” for years to come. A gift for us both.
We talked about life and fears and hopes and she asked me every question about our wedding, and I told her whatever she liked. I asked her about her feelings and her interests, she she spilled over, bubbling.
When we returned home, we had a date in the calendar for our next day, a day to frame our life. Everyone was alive and happy when we got home and we entered back into the spin, stronger.
xo,
Amy
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