oh i feel so very happy in my heart
when my kids were little, we used to ride to preschool to the tunes of Sharon, Lois and Bram. we'd turn up the volume and sing along to skinnamarinkydinkydoo, shouting the lyrics at the windows. as soon as the kids were out of the car, i would switch to beach music or top 40, craving a few short hours of semi-adulthood as i ran errands around town.
one morning after drop-off as i drove down a leafy street in Winston-Salem, i realized that instead of hitting the radio button, i kept hitting 'repeat,' so i could keep singing along, alone in the car. never once thought of the radio. the song — and i remember it so clearly — was "there's a little wheel a turning in my heart.... ending with a verse that begins "oh i feel so very happy in my heart, oh i feel so very happy in my heart...."
and i kept singing, even after i'd gotten out of the car to go to the store and come home to make the beds, do the laundry. the words had become a little worm in my head and heart... oh i feel so very happy in my heart. because i did. feel that.
i doesn't matter why, really. i just was. with my happy children on that bright day in that town where all the streets i traveled seemed so beautiful. at the time, there were parts of my life that weren't so happy, but in those few hours, i was not thinking about any of that. i was just feeling very happy in my heart. really.
on sunday morning of this week, i woke well before light and lay there, thinking about that song. that's what i was feeling again, that fullness, the heart so big it feels as if it might just burst open into something like butterflies or a brisk wind or a crashing ocean ...whatever it is that makes your heart feel just like that. a dirt road. a lightning bug. the lap of a grandparent on the back porch. a game of chase. whatever. i felt it. and i had not seen a single ocean sunrise (as is usually my beach week habit), or had the chance to sit alone just watching the surf (also my habit.) but the happy heart was there. in the middle of this very early morning on my last day of our family reunion at the beach.
this, i will tell you, was a surprise. i'd spent the last 9 days with my birth family and their many extensions, and i confess now that on day 1 i imagined that by the time day 9 got here i would feel nothing but relief. family gatherings for me in years past have been somewhat anxiety filled. as the old stories crop up of how much i cried as a child... teen... adult... or how i never stayed at camp always made me feel a bit of an outcast in my put-together family. in the days before we gathered, i found myself with teeth clenched, wondering just when the jokes would rise at my expense and how often i would spend with my head sunk in the pillow crying at the end of the night. (what do they say about self-fulfilling prophecy?)
maybe it was a sign to me when we checked into our rental that there were only three pillows in the whole place, (for 8+ people)— and i had forgotten mine. this time there would be no crying in the pillow.
9 nights with my sister in the house. i have spent no more than a night with her in the past few years, and really mostly just hours. i know now that we buy the same tea bags though not the same toilet paper (close), the same pre-filtered coffee when we go on vacation. the time with her reminded me just how funny she really is, and it is a gift.
watching my brother — sans 30 pounds — play with his one-year-old granddaughter in the surf. and for days, he just kept walking around smiling. another gift.
reading my nephew John's guest blog
walking to the beach with my nephew Jay, talking about his new job
hearing all the good news everyone had to share :)
taking pictures of nephew's Kip's surprise (:!) engagement
getting to know the new girls
shagging with my brother-in-law, nephew and son in the kitchen (stay in the box!)
walking the beach at dusk with my brother and sister-in-law
reading (one good book, though i usually read four on vacation)
having my five-year-old great nephew tell me he didn't want me to leave
watching my parents at a sunset photo session on the sound
walking through the grocery store with my mother as she fingered everything
watching as the whole family gathered to view the video my son made for my parents
listening to the grands and their jokes with each other
meeting my cousin for the first time in many, many years
watching my parents open the pile of cards people sent
lying in the sun with my daughter and rehashing all the stories of the week on our way home
hearing the stories of how much every one of us enjoyed being together
some sun, some rain
laughing, laughing, laughing
tiny spots of quiet to take it all in
my family is not perfect. maybe some who don't know us well think we are. but we have been touched by illness and scandal, by grief and by grace. and we are blessed to have each other and we know it.
my husband no longer has his parents. my sister-in-law has lost both of hers. my brother-in-law's mother is living, but he lost his dad years ago.
and the hug was tight.
writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.
Happy Birthday, Pamula
Pamela Jean Byrum was born on a February morning so foggy that my grandfather drove past the hospital entrance and had to turn around. My father was in the Navy, and my mother, great with child, was living with my grandparents in a tiny village in northeastern N.C. about 20 miles south of Suffolk, Va., when the big day came. Daddy came home shortly after, and from that day on, she stole his heart ... ( ok, so I was a twinkle in God's eye when she arrived and my brother already a reality, but I think all will agree that she is the fave. She dressed as my father for Halloween one year. I mean, who does that and does not win favor from somebody?)
While I was not there to witness her arrival, I imagine my sister made her entrance quietly, unlike my own, as a whirling dervish a little over two years later. And that pretty much sums us up as sisters. She is the quiet one, and I am the one who tries to get all the attention. Do I need to even say that she's not on FB?
My sister can fix a toilet, dance a mean shag, decorate a house, plan a beautiful party — be it wedding, 50th anniversary or birthday — raise remarkable kids, drive anywhere in inches of snow. This from a girl who once left her yellow Pinto on a hill on a major road in the middle of my current city because it was too snowy to climb. And she can do all this, with a certain fashion panache I have never been able to pull off.
And this: what is the source of legend — She loved camp; I screamed til my mother took me home. ( She can get her own blog if she wants to rehash why, because I won't.)
When she was in high school, Pamela (never PAM) took her first trip in an airplane to California to visit the older sister of a friend. I had my birthday when she was gone, and I woke up sad that she wasn't there, but found a banner she had hand-drawn draped across the floor in front of my bedroom door. My brother walked by, saying "Happy Birthday!" and I didn't even think he knew what day it was. He had put it there for her, in her absence. She is that kind of sister.
Since then, she has taught me how to be both birthday fairy and leprechaun to my children, how to tough it up (well, sometimes) when things are not going my way. And the few times through the years when we have fallen out about one thing or another, have left me with my heart frayed at the seams.
In recent weeks, PamULA has become a patron saint of sorts, for The Gathering, which I have helped plan at my church. (She will probably not speak to me for awhile after this.) When we were looking for old photographs that defined the word "story," I ran across many, but one of PamULA, in a dress my grandmother (not the one most like her but the one most like me) made for her. She is pretty in pink, her hair curled just right, but for a dance she didn't want to go to — my brother's senior prom. A sophomore, she had been asked, not to go with a date, but to serve punch in white gloves, on the sidelines. When I showed the photograph to my friend, Katherine, the Great Designer, she was drawn to it. What girl hasn't had to wear a dress she didn't want to, to an event she would rather die than be attending? (hey, I made the picture very small)
So there was PamULA, suddenly representing the marvelous, conflicted, complicated story that is in each of us. To me, she fits perfectly in that role.
My favorite picture of her I took myself, at my niece's wedding a few years ago. PamUla is funny, and she loves nothing better than a good laugh with friends she has known for a long time, and that is exactly what she is doing here. Beautiful in her laughter. That is my sister.
When I talked to her the other day, I told her how her mug was now a LOGO. She can take heart that when we start planning our next event, she will probably be yesterday's news. Maybe. She might just become an ICON, which is what she is for me.
I hope she can forgive me if that happens. Take a look at that first picture. She is still the Pretty One. And I am still the baby, trying my best to make a stink.
Happy Birthday Pam-ul-a, ... I love you so!
Today is her birthday, and since she won't speak for herself, let me say just a few things about PamUla. (she will not be happy with me, but I promise, it won't be the first time.)
One thing to get out of the way: On her wedding day, the priest mispronounced her name, calling her Pam-U-la, and the name has become our affectionate moniker for her ever since.
One thing to get out of the way: On her wedding day, the priest mispronounced her name, calling her Pam-U-la, and the name has become our affectionate moniker for her ever since.
I don't have any first memory of my sister, just soft images of the first room we shared. I think there was a lamb on the wall, and a doll bed, but I am not sure. Pictures of us show that we wore matching nightgowns, and in our crinolines, she looks a bit thinner, which would hold true through the years. Old home movies reveal when we walked down the sidewalk, she tried to hold my hand.
Everybody called her the 'Pretty One' and me the Baby, and our identities have held true to that, too. She is the steadfast to my mercurial, telling me much too often than I would like to admit that I need to buck up and get going. She has lived in Texas, Illinois, North Carolina, Missouri and Iowa, has set her stakes down in every place, and quickly. The first move took her on her wedding day in our childhood hometown to the Texas Gulf Coast, a hurricane swirling close by within a few weeks of her settling. Back then, she called me every day (when Long Distance cost a LOT of money), telling me how she had to take up the carpet, get the wet vac, take care of business, and move on.
Everybody called her the 'Pretty One' and me the Baby, and our identities have held true to that, too. She is the steadfast to my mercurial, telling me much too often than I would like to admit that I need to buck up and get going. She has lived in Texas, Illinois, North Carolina, Missouri and Iowa, has set her stakes down in every place, and quickly. The first move took her on her wedding day in our childhood hometown to the Texas Gulf Coast, a hurricane swirling close by within a few weeks of her settling. Back then, she called me every day (when Long Distance cost a LOT of money), telling me how she had to take up the carpet, get the wet vac, take care of business, and move on.
She is like our grandmother in favor and demeanor, so much in fact that a photograph of my grandmother when she was a teen looks exactly like my sister. I have always marveled that someone could be so much like another, but two generations apart.
And this: what is the source of legend — She loved camp; I screamed til my mother took me home. ( She can get her own blog if she wants to rehash why, because I won't.)
When she was in high school, Pamela (never PAM) took her first trip in an airplane to California to visit the older sister of a friend. I had my birthday when she was gone, and I woke up sad that she wasn't there, but found a banner she had hand-drawn draped across the floor in front of my bedroom door. My brother walked by, saying "Happy Birthday!" and I didn't even think he knew what day it was. He had put it there for her, in her absence. She is that kind of sister.
Since then, she has taught me how to be both birthday fairy and leprechaun to my children, how to tough it up (well, sometimes) when things are not going my way. And the few times through the years when we have fallen out about one thing or another, have left me with my heart frayed at the seams.
So there was PamULA, suddenly representing the marvelous, conflicted, complicated story that is in each of us. To me, she fits perfectly in that role.
When I talked to her the other day, I told her how her mug was now a LOGO. She can take heart that when we start planning our next event, she will probably be yesterday's news. Maybe. She might just become an ICON, which is what she is for me.
I hope she can forgive me if that happens. Take a look at that first picture. She is still the Pretty One. And I am still the baby, trying my best to make a stink.
Happy Birthday Pam-ul-a, ... I love you so!