Emergence

The house down the street has emerged from a cocoon.  I pause with the dog on our walk to look at it.  Hidden for a long time by a high hedge, and then, even after workers hauled the hedge away, by layers of old paint, it stands now on the final brink of renovation, freshly painted and ready to be lived in again.  I would guess that it is at least one hundred years old.  Someone has poured money and care into its renaissance.  Back in Minnesota, my husband Patrick and I owned an old house, and we learned the hard way that we were neither handy enough to tend it nor rich enough to pay others to.  I know the true costs of salvaging this home.

I like to imagine, as I stand here letting the dog smell the grass, that this house might be put up for sale.  I also like to imagine that I am a high-end Portland real estate customer, ready to start a bidding war, and then, after I win it, I will move my family in.  The wood floors sparkle; the glass in the built-in cabinets reflects my smile.  The kitchen purrs with the sound of new stainless-steel appliances.  I look out the window over the sink as I fill a vase for the bouquet I picked up at the Farmer’s Market that morning.  My children play happily in the xeriscaped backyard; Patrick tills the large raised garden beds that capture full sun.  I carry the vase to the dining room table, set for the meal I have prepared (with local, organic ingredients, of course).  I will walk through the living room filled with furniture I didn’t buy at Ikea, turn on classical music at the stereo cleverly hidden in a Craftsman cabinet, and dance my way to the back door.  Did I mention that I have worked all day at a fulfilling and well-paying job, but I’m not tired, and neither are my children?  “Dinnertime!” I call melodiously as I step out onto the porch.  A little blue bird lands, singing, on my hand, and my cartoon version of my grown-up life is complete.

And completely ridiculous.  I am dreaming an impossible dream.  The house belongs to someone else.  A landscaping crew is gently setting rosebushes into the dirt of the front yard, wondering why I am standing here watching them.  The dog is pulling me impatiently to the open park across the street, and I release my hold so we can walk on, to the park, and then back home.  My 1979 ranch is down the road a piece, around a curve, past where the pavement gives way to gravel, with moss on the roof, and poised just before the dead end.   When the dog and I return, we see weeds growing at the edges of the driveway, and smudges on the front window.

*   *   *   *   *

“Why don’t we have a pool in our house, Mommy?” Teresa asked me the other day, as I tried to tidy up.  At the moment I felt glad that I did not have a pool to look after; I was already overwhelmed by 1100 square feet of clutter.

“Are you asking me that because of Annie?”

Teresa nods, bouncing up and down on the couch.  The Annie in question is the Annie with red curls, the one adopted by Daddy Warbucks.  The movie version from the early 1980s shows her swimming in a lovely marble indoor swimming pool.

“We don’t have a pool inside our house because we’re not rich.”

“When will we be rich?”

“Probably never.”

“Why not?”

“Hmm,” I say, considering this carefully, watching where I tread.  “Because you have to do certain things to be rich.  Have certain kinds of jobs.  Jobs that can earn a lot of money.”  I didn’t bother trying to explain about inheriting.

“And teachers don’t earn a lot of money?”

I pause from stacking up the library books and newspapers that had found their way across the living room floor and look at her.  She has that look kids get when they are figuring things out—her head is tilted slightly to the side, and she holds one hand, open, in the air, expectantly.

“That’s right.”  The newspaper is stacked now, and I set it aside to recycle.  “But, you know, compared to some people, we are rich.”

“Like the people at Christmas,” she nods.  I know what she means without more explanation.  We have traveled through this territory before.  She is thinking of the money we saved at Christmas for Heifer International, the canned goods we donated to a food bank, the people asking for money while we wait our turn to merge onto the Ross Island Bridge.

“So,” I say, explaining this to her, and maybe to myself, “if we wanted to be really rich, we’d need to get different jobs.  Jobs that earn a lot of money.”

“I know what job you can get.”

“Oh, really?  What’s that?”  I’m eager for her advice.

“You can stop being a teacher and start being . . . a zookeeper!”  She bounces up and down again, full of her great idea.

So, zookeeper it is.  Of course, I already have that job.  I keep house for two small children, one Betta fish, one Labradoodle, and the five caterpillars who are making their way into painted lady butterflies.  We have a lovely net cage for their cocoons, and after they emerge, they will stay in it until we have had our fill of watching them flutter around the flowers we have scattered at the bottom. I am too tired at night to scrape moss off my roof, and to poor to pay someone to do it, but not too tired or poor to find the website where you can order caterpillars and a cage, to try to Google a free shipping coupon, and to pay to have the kit sent to our house.  The net hangs from a hook screwed into my decidedly unfashionable spatter-plastered ceiling—near my son’s battered old school desk, above a worn linoleum floor, before the faded blinds that hang on the mud-splashed sliding glass door.  Behind the butterfly cage, taped to the glass with masking tape, I see the sun catcher my daughter made out of tissue paper scraps, hung proudly in a construction paper frame.

When we let the butterflies go, they will flutter off into our weedy back yard, over the sagging fence—and as we stand and watch them go, we will be sure, not to back into the garden bed my son Eamon and I built from old railroad ties a few summers ago.  It gives splinters at the slightest provocation.  But it also grows things quite beautifully.  No birds land on my shoulder, but my zoo seems well kept up, after all.  Looking back at the house, I see the suncatcher Teresa made, its colors emerging from the shadows of the house.  Looking before me, I see Eamon and Teresa, dancing with the dog, their voices raised in joy.  Patrick calls to them to watch out for the tomato plants.  Unlike the silent house down the street, my zoo feels alive.