KittyCat has started a course of steroids as of this morning, and she's scheduled for an upper GI immediately, and may be sent for an airway test under sedation in another week or so. She's also developed an alarming heart murmur in the past month. That's the good news....

My Boy and I are going away for a few days. This was previously arranged and I've decided that it will be good for us not to fret- meaning, of course, that I need to stop obsessing over all this until later. Like, say, when the actual results are seen by the specialists in charge of the case.

I feel like the other shoe is about to drop on my head. Suddenly, and when my mother is on her way out of town. It's going to break loose when my Boy deploys, for sure. I'm a preemie mom. I survived the NICU. I survived coming home from the NICU. I can take whatever comes my way with a firm attitude and cope; after all, I'm a navy wife and I can handle anything. It's what my family needs from me right now. When it's all over, in the privacy of the night and in the comfort of my own bed when my family's asleep- that's when I'll cry. Not today.

Serenity. Now.

Last night I kept crawling back under the blankets and pulling them over my head. What don't I want to see, to deal with? KittyCat was well-behaved and went to bed early. My family was happy and content watching shows on the tv that I like, and yet I wanted to lay in bed and stare blankly into my pillow.

Deep down, I'm already detaching from them. Deep down, I'm already preparing for the separations. My mother goes home on Friday. My husband leaves my side in 16 or so days. Not that I'm counting, mind you. Pretty soon it's just going to be me again, against the world and caring for my baby girl. I know that I can handle it, a part of me is looking forward to being the great big supermommy again. The rest of me, that frightened little part that wants to cling to my husband and whisper "don't go", the same part that wants to burrow deep into my mommy's armpit and whimper, that part still needs a bit of consolation. That's what I'm going to do over the next few days. Console that little girl.

We just won't think about what will happen to us in one more pay period's time. Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof, or something like that. Take care, my friends. Hug your loved ones and know how blessed you are if they are coming home to sleep beside you tonight.

Domestic tranquility has struck once again. My Boy is home. Where he belongs. KittyCat's curled up on his lap right now, cuddling. I'm sitting at the computer thinking about all the fun stuff to do over the next week with them home, and I'm thinking seriously about tucking up under the blankies in a bit with some cold medicine and nap. Especially since I was awake way too early this morning.
Dinner tonight is brewing and bubbling away in the crockpot. Paprika Chicken and rice and carrots. I need to go back out and get some sour cream, but that will come later. The important thing is that it's under control and I don't have to think about any of it until much, much later. Lovely.

We have one edge of a front tooth! It's poking out gingerly from the gum right now, and I am so proud of her! It seems like such a little thing, people, until it's your own child who's throwing fevers and having that miserable little whimper, burrowing their hot heads against your chin. It adds a whole new dimension to motherhood that I never dreamed of even a year ago.

To switch topics to something totally different, I've been thinking about gender roles lately. When did men stop being Men, and women stop being Women? Really. I'm not advocating a return to the olden days of prejudice/sexist thinking where one gender is the chattel of another, but I'm coming to think that when we had the Sex Wars and Feminist Revolution a lot of the good stuff got thrown out with the bad. For one example, a lot of men and women that I've known spent a lot of time in their young adulthood trying to figure out where they belonged -as they were learning who they were, what the rules of society currently dictated for that role, and how they were going to incorporate all of that with what they had been raised to believe. Our own parents suffered from this; mothers teaching their girls to reach for the stars and letting their sons play with girlie things. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I'm concerned about the opposite being true- that girls don't get to play with dolls enough and dream of being homemakers. Boys don't get to grow up with the assumptions of one day having a family and supporting them, being the Man of the House. We have learned a mishmash of the way things should be now and the way things were in our grandparents' time. I know that I struggled for a couple of years with the thought that my true dream in life was to be a good wife and mother, a frugal and thrify housekeeper, in the ways of my foremothers... There's no career in that. There's very little glory and a lot of criticism in that, these days. The choice to have me stay home involves a lot of careful planning and budgeting, and we've agreed that this will mean that we're going to pass up a lot of expensive things. We're also not going to live on revolving credit cards. As much as my husband complains from time to time about always being broke, we're not in debt, and we're living in one of the most expensive economies in the country on one income (his) and with a child. There *is* a certain status in that which we can be proud of. I'm a lot less emotionally fragile than I used to be, believe it or not. I know where I am now is where I truly want to be. My husband can feel a real pride in being the sole breadwinner, knowing that he is providing for his family. There may be a lot of things he can't provide- he never went to college, he never learned to drive, and he is in an occupation that makes him leave us for a lot of the year. All those things are nothing compared to knowing that he is providing the roof over our heads, the food on our table, and that he's living up to the role that (for good or ill) he found instilled in his own subconscious mind as a boy.

The past couple of days have been a big blur to me. I know that stuff has happened. There's a new heat/ac unit in my wall. There's a more or less clean kitchen, and formula keeps getting mixed up to Her Ladyship's exacting requirements, and medicine gets poured down her throat. She's even getting better about swallowing the tylenol when I give it to her. So that's good. I think she's finally made a connection between that taste and feeling better.
Cherry koolaid will never be safe in this house again.
This is not just because I, myself, am fond of it. Or that I bought buffalo chicken strips at the store this afternoon just to provide emotional support through the next 24 hours of teething. Her Ladyship sleeps now, and has for the past hour and a half, and I'm cautiously beginning to relax. I wish I could talk to my Boy tonight. I don't even have the faintest clue as to what I'd say, but I just want to have the option of talking to him.

I've been having odd dreams again. Vivid, strange, dreams that involve the 'true-selves' of people that I know, and some people I don't know. It's hard to interpret them just at the moment, cause I'm still dragged out from the night spent coaxing my baby back to sleep and through her discomfort from the teeth trying to come through. I don't know when, but it's got to be soon.

With luck I can get a nap this morning and try to go back to some of those dreams and sort out what is going on. I hope that all is well with them; it's selfish of me that I don't want to get involved deeply in a dream-healing right now. I feel so drained. Maybe that's the point.

It still looks as though KittyCat's going to sprout all her teeth at one shot. The ridges are there, we can see individual teeth through her gums and those gums are stretched as tight as can be over the teeth. She's in awful pain from it, and fussy, and when the motrin takes the pain away she's all smiles and giggles and sweetness'n'light. The cutest thing I've ever seen or ever hope to see.

I'm also getting better at getting her down for bed. She's asleep now; rocked to sleep with L&O Criminal Intent and a smattering of the Antiques Roadshow. But PBS was starting to overstimulate her, so I had to switch back to the cops and crimes... who knew? Who could have possibly predicted that she is equally fascinated and lulled to sleep by criminal dramas? It couldn't have been all the times I fell asleep to these things while pregnant, right?

Another day in Paradise.

My little girl and I ran out to do some errands on our own this afternoon, and had a lot of fun. Diaper Genie refills are on sale at Target this week, so I stocked up. I bought some more receiving blankets to cut down for pump kit bags- and if anyone knows preemie moms, let me know if they think it would be a good thought to offer a few up on my ETSY.com site. The theory behind this is that it's hard enough to want to pump, and schlep the tubing and horns back and forth from the NICU all the time, but if you've got a nice flannel bag to carry it all in then not everybody knows that you're doing it. Plus, when you get done pumping and discover that you forgot something to wipe up the drips with, the bag can be used to help out. It's also machine washable...

The weather today is glorious. I heard a brief short one-liner message from my Boy this morning when I woke up that really made my day. Even though I've still got the weepies at odd times, it's not so bad right now. I know that he loves us. I know that eventually he'll be home with us again and all will be well.

Tonight's dinner is going to be deviled meat-loaf patties and butter-simmered carrots. I've been drooling over the prospects of this for a couple of days now, and can't wait for tonight. Is it dinner time yet?

Thank you also to everybody who has sent me Virtual Hugs in the past days. I feel better for them. It's nice to hear that somebody else can 'hear' me, and that I still have a voice.

How do we cope with deployments and the long absences of our partners? There's as many ways through it as there are people. Some find that they need to keep busy with every waking moment, exhausting themselves so that they don't have to think about the loneliness. Others find the opposite is true. Some people pack up and move back home with their parents, in a sort of 'reverse' childhood. Others stay on in the marital home, piling the empty side of their bed with all sorts of stuff so that in the middle of the night when they wake up there's still a comforting weight on the covers...

It's okay to grieve the separation. It's okay to cry, and to sob and beat your hands against the pillows. That's part of what makes us human. The anniversaries that we spend alone. The birthdays we spend apart, and holidays, and all the other times when everybody else we know is celebrating with their family- those days we spend with a Partner-Shaped hole in our lives. We can't replace them, and we can't pretend that they don't exist. We've just got to do it without the luxury of having that person in the room.

I don't know that there's a universal solution to this. Every couple has to manage it on their own. I know that my Boy and I send emails back and forth, as often as we can manage, and we always take a moment to acknowledge these days. Even if he's so busy that all he can do is a two-sentence message. Even if all I can do is send a paragraph into cyberspace that has become one-way due to internet restrictions and Operational Security measures. I haven't heard from my Boy in several days now. It is a physical pain, a tightness in my chest to endure. I just have to suck it up and get through it.

Serenity Now. Breathe. That's all I can do.

Yesterday we went out to Balboa, as per the original plan. I'm happy to say that I made it through three whole exhibits before my stamina gave out and we had to head for home. That one of those three places was a gift shop is totally besides the point.

KittyCat has been getting lots of exercise today. She's been happily rolling around on the floor and inchworming herself around corners and into several odd places. It's fun to watch. As for her Mommy, well- I'm on the lookout for Mother's Little Helpers. Next week I'm seeing somebody to further this search, and hopefully he'll be able to give me something that will help. It's taken me several months to reach this point, and it feels like I'm failing to ask for chemical assistance. But it will help me be a better Mommy. That's the end goal, and how I get there is no longer that important to me.

If you own beautiful things, is there a point to saving them 'for Best'? That's the theory. Save it for a special Occassion, and use the plain stuff for everyday. Only trouble is, there are times when you may never see a Special Occassion for months on end. The Good Stuff gets left up in a cupboard collecting dust and when those special times do come around you may not even remember that they're there.

This morning I pulled out the good china. Painted in wildflowers with a gold rim. It wasn't new when we got it; handed down from a friend who was replacing her Everyday China... this lady (she's a Lady, if ever there was one) doesn't even have plain old everday dishes. She had everyday China. Anyway, I ate my breakfast off a dainty salad plate, and am drinking my tea out of a teacup and saucer. I didn't make anything special, just a hunk of bread and butter, and some herbal tea. But it does taste better, and I feel special this morning even though it's just another Monday. Later on I'm going to paint my toenails, even though no one will ever see them beneath my thick white socks and sensible shoes. The person I usually paint them for isn't here now. I'll still know that they're there, and I also got out a little travel bottle of scented shower gel to put in by the bathroom sink to wash my hands with. Soap is soap. My hands smell fruity and I feel perfectly decadent doing this. It's transformed my attitude from a boring Monday into something else. I am treating myself as though I'm as special as my guests. It's different, it's unusual for me, and I feel slightly naughty for doing it.

I also feel sweet and feminine and like a Lady. Not a bad way to start the week. Not a bad way to feel, either. It makes me feel like anything else that will happen today is survivable and livable. Nothing will be awful after a start like this.

If you own beautiful things, is there a point to saving them 'for Best'? That's the theory. Save it for a special Occassion, and use the plain stuff for everyday. Only trouble is, there are times when you may never see a Special Occassion for months on end. The Good Stuff gets left up in a cupboard collecting dust and when those special times do come around you may not even remember that they're there.

This morning I pulled out the good china. Painted in wildflowers with a gold rim. It wasn't new when we got it; handed down from a friend who was replacing her Everyday China... this lady (she's a Lady, if ever there was one) doesn't even have plain old everday dishes. She had everyday China. Anyway, I ate my breakfast off a dainty salad plate, and am drinking my tea out of a teacup and saucer. I didn't make anything special, just a hunk of bread and butter, and some herbal tea. But it does taste better, and I feel special this morning even though it's just another Monday. Later on I'm going to paint my toenails, even though no one will ever see them beneath my thick white socks and sensible shoes. The person I usually paint them for isn't here now. I'll still know that they're there, and I also got out a little travel bottle of scented shower gel to put in by the bathroom sink to wash my hands with. Soap is soap. My hands smell fruity and I feel perfectly decadent doing this. It's transformed my attitude from a boring Monday into something else. I am treating myself as though I'm as special as my guests. It's different, it's unusual for me, and I feel slightly naughty for doing it.

I also feel sweet and feminine and like a Lady. Not a bad way to start the week. Not a bad way to feel, either. It makes me feel like anything else that will happen today is survivable and livable. Nothing will be awful after a start like this.

I'm not feeling so profound today. Maybe it's the restless night I spent, tossing and turning. Maybe it's the early wakeup call from KittyCat, who giggled and wiggled her way all around the crib before the sun was up.

We're going to early church this morning. Then I'm coming home and resting the remainder of the day. Bake some more bread- thanks for the compliment, Tam! I'm glad you like my bread. Don't forget to come back next week and grab some more to take home for your Boy! And remember- since it's seriously lacking in preservatives and chemical additives, it does tend to go Green rather quickly. The flip side to this, of course, is that it's better for you than a lot of other foods...

It's baking day once again; the smell of bread is filling my house and making me feel oddly relaxed. It takes me back to childhood serenity and a time of no worries. Mama's here, knitting on the sofa. I'm here, sitting by the window. The KittyCat is napping in her crib. All is well in Paradise this morning. But...

That's the real problem, isn't it? This afternoon I'm not going to get a call from my Sailor to pick him up at the pier. Tonight we're not going to order a pizza and sit together watching DVDs. He's not going to drink a 6pack of beer and get silly and tell me how much he loves The Mary. Tonight I'm going to comb out my hair and crawl between cold blankets and sleep alone again. I'm used to it. Many times I even look forward to it. This afternoon it's making me a bit morose.

Three Doors Down: Away from the Sun; "Dangerous Games"

And what do I care to get me through these sleepless nights
And what do I have to hold when no one’s there to hold me tight
And what do I see the only thing that gets me through this is

I feel and I feel you


He's still here. For one more night before the last underway before the Long One. He's sleeping. In a few minutes I'm going to go in and lay down next to him and lay awake all night, listening to him breathe. I love him. That's the only thing that matters. I breathe through my pain tonight, and in all the days to come. I'm going to wake up tomorrow and hold our baby, and she's going to laugh with joy to see the sun. She doesn't know that my heart breaks.

Getting ready for deployments is hard, on both sides of the pier. I can only imagine what goes on past the quarterdeck. To be honest, I don't want to imagine it. I know what goes on here and that's enough for me. There's paperwork to get in order: ID cards, Power of attorney, financial arrangements- how much spending money to transfer on a regular basis to the Boy's accounts, and that way he can leave the joint accounts alone except for emergencies. This is especially important to us when the world separates us. This way his spending in a liberty port does not adversely affect my management of the household by accident. There's the unspoken current running through everything I say to him. Sometimes I can feel that current running both ways underneath our words.

Don't forget me.
I love you.
Don't leave me.

The last is spoken only in my tears when he is gone. I know better than to say it to him. He doesn't want to leave me. It's his duty to go, his job to go, this is what we pay for all the 'perks' of military life. Sometimes it helps, more often it doesn't. It's the bandage wrapped tightly around my sprained heart to keep the swelling manageable. I can feel the throbbing of the damage through the bandage, keeping time with my heartbeats. Breathe through the pain. Just like all other wounds.

Then there's the last days before he leaves. Laundry to be done every other day so that all his stuff is clean and ready to go. Shaving cream and razor refills to be set out so that he doesn't forget them. Double and triple checking, paperwork and random things around the house. The unspoken words that rise in my throat, choking my voice. I want to bury my face in his armpit and grab his shirt until my knuckles spasm. I keep having to remind myself to let go before I rip his clothing, before I hurt him. It doesn't do any good, because a minute later my hands are knotted in his shirt again. Don't leave me. Life goes on regardless. I can see empty days stretching out before me. My baby's first steps, her first words. He's not going to be here to see them. As much as that breaks my heart it's worse for him.

So I'm going to give my girl a hug and tuck her into bed tonight, and tomorrow when I see my husband I'm going to hold his hand and tell him that I love him. Because very soon I'm not going to be able to say it to his face.

Deployments suck. The briefing for families was tonight. I went, sat through about half of it. I think. We left early, because I was tired and starting to get weepy. There is just so much to do, so much to think about. So much to get depressed over.

It feels like there's already a Sailor-shaped hole in my life. I'm already starting to think like a single parent, a navy widow, and it frightens me that I'm not more upset over it. I tell myself that he'll be back, and that the time will fly. That's part of what scares me. If I do okay, if I can handle everything that life throws at me, I am the wife that he needs and wants. If I do okay and can handle everything life throws at me I feel as though I am saying to the world that I don't need him. That I don't need him at all, except for the money and benefits that he provides. It's not true- I need him for so much more than that. I need him in my life, in my thoughts. When faced with hard times I need his presence in the back of my mind telling me that he loves me, that he knows I can come through this.

His body has left a giant hole in my life. His spirit remains with me. There's a song by Stevie Nicks called "Desert Angel". I'm including the text here, with appropriate credits to the artist and album. The melody is haunting and mournful, and in the end words of this song I can feel the longing. This is what I feel when I saw the Sailor-shaped Hole. This is the resolution I feel when I think of the endless miles of ocean between us, and the months before he will hold me in his arms again. I feel a part of all those other wives, living their own personal dramas and heartache while wondering if their husbands, fathers, and sons will ever come walking back to fill that hole again.

From the album "Enchanted"
Written by Stevie Nicks and M. Campbell.
I was born in the desert
So I know how it feels there
Well look up it's a shooting star
But it's as black as night no stars
Well this is the first thing,
That I've written
Since I wrote about freedom
And then the wall came down
Well we thought it was a great beginning
People were free to cross the line
But then something happened in the desert
Something broke the stars into pieces
Well I live below a great red mountain
In the shape of a great huge beast
In a place the indians call Paradice Valley
Well this has always been my sanctuary
I send that to you too
There on the other side of the world
In the desert
And we are the guardians
No black clouds just the faces of you
So where is my father,
Where has he gone
Where is my husband
Where is my son
Where is my father
Where has he gone
What is it that happened here
Is it real
This war
This can't be happening
Ooh well I need to see you
In your far away war
And you should know how much we love you
They call us here, Operation Desert Angel
They call us here, Operation Desert Angel
In waiting
Operation Desert Shield
Operation Desert Storm
Operation Desert Angel

Today was a sucess! KittyCat has slept, and slept well. We've got her napping again and back on a good bedtime schedule. Tonight for dinner I made homemade mac n cheese cassarole, and it was well-received.

On a sober note, the Boy's deployment may be moved up significantly. This is causing no small worry on my part, mostly a vague anxiety. While I don't have the concerns that I had last time he was gone for a long time- there are some new ones. It's going to be an awfully long time on one hand, and not that long on the other hand. I'll write more on this later. I don't want to get all choked up on it tonight.

Tomorrow I get to go and get new contacts~ I am all excited about it. My baby girl won't be trying to pull my glasses off my face with her drooly little hands (as much) after tomorrow. Plus, my peripheral vision is really a lot better when I'm wearing contacts, and I'll be able to wear sunglasses when outside and driving. Now that the days are going to get longer again and I'm driving in the sunshine, this is of great importance.

Went to the quilt shop today, and it brought back so many good memories of childhood. There was a 50% off sale on flannel, and I bought a bunch for the preemies. Tonight I think I'll be able to cut out and sew up a bunch of blankies. The three of us -Grammy, Mommy, and KittyCat- had a lot of fun wandering all over the downtown area. As Grammy pointed out, it's a lot like the town she grew up in. If that town had palm trees and was flat.

It's a very nice area, overall. I'm so glad she's finally here. I took a nap yesterday afternoon and again this morning, and it was AMAZING. I closed my eyes and burrowed under the pillows and quilts, and every muscle I have as well as some I didn't know I had relaxed at once. An hour later I woke up, feeling as though I'd slept for three hours. What's the difference? Mama's here. She fixes everything.

I guess we're ready. One giggly baby- check.
One guest bed, inflated and made up with clean sheets and a Sunbonnet Sue quilt- check
One sink, bleached- check.
Hair? Brushed.
Face? Clean.
Clothes? On body.

Off to the airport. To pick up a grandma. I'm going to have so much fun!

Temptation.
Dove chocolate. Chai Latte. Citrus-based body products.
Anything claimed as 'educational'.
If it's educational, I'll consider it. Especially if it promises to make my life easier. There's just not enough energy to keep up with the demands of adulthood and toddler-hood. If I can distract the KittyCat for a certain crucial period of the day I'm happy. This morning the child got way too over-tired. She was wired. In the happy giggly place that precedes total sleep.

There's a very slight chance that having now gone to la-la-land, she'll actually stay there for the rest of the night. I can cope with that. Tomorrow Grammy descends upon us with the force of a natural Event. Let's all pray that it's not a disaster.

I Heart Costco.

In my entire week, it seems that I've been looking forward to today's trip. So much so that my heart leaped for joy when I found that the Boy had run out of deoderant this morning. Or maybe that was just the lingering stomach flu? I digress. There I was, not an hour ago, gleefully steering the oversized shopping bin around the aisles, trying not to run over any of the spanish-jibbering families who were blocking my way, and feeling an insane desire to run really fast behind the cart, and then jump up on the back axle and ride it down the aisle going WHEEEEEE at the top of my lungs.

I mean it. Where else can I satisfy my cheese lust? A 5lb bag of shredded cheese for 10 bucks. That's like, a sale price on shredded cheese! And it's a 5lb bag! Let's see, that's going to last me about 3 weeks. 4, if I behave myself. The scary thing is, that was not a joke.

In the end I walked away with only the essentials. Cheese, freezer bags, deoderant. There are so many things I could have gotten, that would have broken my budget this month and seriously put a crimp in my plans for the next quarter- but that would also mean that I wouldn't have an excuse to go in every other week. That would break my heart.

wild woman
i'm a maiden no more
turned in my garland for a barley sheaf
motherhood in word and deed
i'm dancing up on the hill in the middle night
starless
my child asleep in the leaves
blanketed by the moss
watched over by the spirits
i'm talking to my god in the darkness
strangers no more
buying my answers
if only i could remember my questions
they all change
don't want to know the whys
i want to know the future
i want to know that my babe will grow
i want stars to shine in her blue eyes
eyes that will not fracture as my own
i want her hair to shine
redgold curls that fall over her shoulders...
i'll buy my answers
in blood or gold
in faith held in the silence
hold her close to my heart

do not come to the hill tonight
it's not safe

Another day that I wish I had Mother's Little Helpers. Don't know why, it's not like anything out of the ordinary is happening today. I am even on top of things around the house for once. I just want to feel some sort of warm rush through my skin and not worry about anything. I don't want to worry about the KittyCat, or my body giving out early, or the pain in my hips and back... I don't want to worry that I will get too dizzy carrying the trash to the dumpster. I don't want to get heart palpitations just by doing a simple load of laundry.

Maybe someday this will pass. Maybe someday I'm going to be the mother I want to be and can stop worrying that I won't make the cut- that my daughter isn't going to think that I'm a worn-out broken-down old lady before she's even halfway grown. In the meantime I should just enjoy what I have while it's here. The grass outside, the sun streaming down on the courtyard under my window. The orange and blue Birds of Paradise blooming at every corner of this complex. It's a marvelous place to live, where there are always flowers blooming. I'm going to count my blessings today. Live in the moment. Stop borrowing trouble.

Hi everybody! I'm back. There was a *ton* of computer issues around here for the past week, and then we had to wipe my harddrive last night. But cross my fingers everything is fixed now.

The Child Sleeps, once again, and Mama is loosed upon the world and the internet in general. We've both been under the weather the past couple of days- which did not aid in the computer issues at all. I'm eating scrambled eggs by myself for dinner tonight, as the Boy has duty on the big tin box that we laughingly call his Other Home. At the end of the week my own Mama will be visiting our fair city for a whole month. Yippee! I'm eager for her to arrive. I'm eager once again to throw my own arms around my mama's neck and wish hard that she'll fix everything. Just like when I was a little girl, I'm back to the place where I believe that she can fix all my anxieties in this area. She'll wave a magic wand and by virtue of her believing in me, I'll be able to do it. It had been years, and then one day during the pregnancy I was talking to her and blurted out "Tell me I can do this."

She told me I could. She told me that she believed in me, and that I would be a good mother. I believed her. It was as simple as that. For the first time in years and years, I believed her with the simple trust I had when I was five, and she kissed the boo-boo and made it better. As adults there are so many boo-boos out there. Most of the time we have to deal with them ourselves. Bad bosses, credit card debt, unexpected emergencies that drain the wallet and worse- leave us with barely enough emotional energy to take care of ourselves. As adults, we're expected to not run home to our parents to fix these things, barring their loving advice. Even so, there's still a time when all we really need is for someone else to believe in us. We find that in our lovers and partners, and in our friends, and when those needs touch the deepest and rawest insecurities of our hearts we turn back to where it all begins.

Mama. Daddy. Who are still the gods of our small worlds, who have unlimited powers and abilities. Who make it better.