87. Seven Unedited Minutes – Jayson Greene
Sometimes I think my work as a writer is one long rehearsal for such a moment, for when the pressure comes, when I suddenly sense life’s scrutiny training its heat on me.
We live in a time of great and tremendous pressure—bearing down on us from without, twisting us from within. These are convulsive moments, times of great transformation, and out of such darkness emerges tremendous opportunity. This is when human beings speak their minds, unburden their hearts, and when they reveal. Sometimes I think my work as a writer is one long rehearsal for such a moment, for when the pressure comes, when I suddenly sense life’s scrutiny training its heat on me. I write and write and write, hoping that it all proves adequate rehearsal for when the time comes to speak. I pray in such moments that what comes out when I open my mouth feels true and real.
This impulse follows me around everywhere, and it follows all of us into our daily lives—depending on your day, depending on your mood. Maybe that sense of nearly unbearable intensity arose from talking to your parents, who maybe you have not been able to see or touch for quite some time. Maybe it came because of the call for justice echoing throughout society. Maybe you’re asking yourself what you have been saying quietly, when the pressure and heat wasn’t quite so focused, and how it might have been a rehearsal for what you should say loudly.
– Jayson Greene
Prompt:
Wherever you feel creeping unease, where your scalp prickles or something inside of you contracts or hardens, breathe and write everything down that you are resisting saying. Do this for exactly 7 minutes straight. And then, don’t change anything. Resist your writer’s urge to skip back over your sentences with your eyes, cutting and chiseling here. If you like, read it aloud to yourself. Consider if this is something you would ever have the courage to say to someone else. Consider, too, whether it would be kindness or cruelty to say it.
Allison Howells
Location: Austin, Texas
About: About a year and a half ago, a chronic illness I didn't really know I had jumped out in full force, drastically altering my life. I went from performing in three hour musicals to having a hard time showering and walking upstairs and eventually, I had to leave college to become a full-time, professional patient. This journal entry explores the comments of encouragement I received from well-meaning friends and family during this time, and contains a plethora of responses I've been aching to say ever since.
Age: 20
Anonymous
Like many couples, my husband Nathan and I played the imaginary “will we have kids in the future, and what will their names be?” game a few times before we got married. He usually hated the names that I chose, and we would get into funny laughter-filled arguments about my tendencies to prefer things that sounded a little different or exotic, and his reasons for disliking my suggestions. Most of the names we would discuss were female names, mostly because, for years I had been picturing a little girl in my dreams. I would see her often over the years, in my sleep or while awake—very much alive in the images of my mind.
One morning while walking alone, shortly after we got engaged, I was pondering the concept of gratefulness and how central it was to our relationship. One of the things I loved about Nathan since meeting him was his deep gratitude for the simple things in life. He is not really a “sunshine and rainbows” kinda guy when you first meet him, but he really does love the ordinary moments of life. We have small gratitude rituals in our mornings together, and a common desire to stay grateful was one of the things that united us. In my reflection that morning, a sudden lightning bolt of insight came to me. Either from deep inside myself, or maybe from someone higher, I heard a name. A very simple name that I wouldn’t normally love. A name that I almost felt called to, without being able to explain it. A name I felt I could ponder for a lifetime and find new and different meaning in. A name that encapsulated gratefulness.
I came home with tears in my eyes and announced to Nathan: “I think we are going to have a baby girl one day, and this will be her name.” He looked at me and smiled, then replied: “I think that sounds perfect.” Over the years, whenever we saw or heard this special name anywhere, we would look at each other and smile about this little secret we had—just the two of us.
When I discovered that I was pregnant on January 1, 2020, everything felt like a new start—new year, new decade, new adventure as a parent. We decided that we would wait until the very end of the pregnancy (if at all) to find out the sex of the baby. While I was more eager to know right away, Nathan thought the surprise would be fun, and we flip-flopped between those two positions for quite a while. In my mind, from the day I knew I was pregnant, I already pictured this little girl that we had named years earlier.
And then more and more friends announced that they were also pregnant. My brother soon revealed that they were due a few months before us, with a little boy (a new nephew to add to our 3 older nephews on Nathan’s side). Almost everyone I knew (save one person) announced they were also having boys. As our pregnancy progressed, I enjoyed women’s singing circles and retreats, which were replaced with online women’s writing groups and female book discussions once we started to quarantine during Covid-19. My quiet existence at home during
isolation consisted of reflection, introspection, and diving into feminist psychology. Each time another friend announced they were having a boy, I secretly thought to myself, as if there was some type of cosmic stork lottery system: “Horray! Another girl spot is still open!” I also smugly thought: “Good for you, enjoy your boy. Me and my little girl are going to take on the world.”
In my daily meditations, I would speak to this little girl, and often think of my own close relationship with my mother. I thought about the things from my childhood I had loved, the things I would like to improve upon for this little baby. Nathan and I finally decided that Father’s Day, on my 29th week of pregnancy, would be a good time to find out more about the baby’s sex. I asked my doctor to write the sex on a slip of paper at my appointment earlier that week and seal it up for us in an envelope. Deep down, I already knew the result, and I knew my baby, but the confirmation would finally allow us to unpack a few things and make some final plans.
After wishing both of our fathers in the morning, we crawled back into bed together to open the envelope. Together, we put our hands on my stomach and told the baby we were glad and grateful it was healthy and would love it no matter the outcome. And then we opened the envelope. And I read it. And then re-read it: “It’s a Boy!”
Trying to look happy, the pit in my stomach opened up into a fountain of tears, and I excused myself to go to the bathroom and let them all out. I came back, and Nathan opened up his arms and allowed me to snuggle in, telling me it was ok to feel whatever I was feeling.
I was feeling that there must have been some mistake. I was feeling like suddenly, someone had stolen the little girl that I had been loving for the past 7 months. I missed her already. I was feeling that I know nothing about boys, their emotions, their “parts”. I was feeling disappointed. I was feeling angry. And I was feeling guilty. I told this little baby that I would love them no matter what, just 5 minutes before, and now I was already doubting things and failing in my first promise to them as a Mother.
I knew I would love the baby once it was born. I knew that everything would be ok in the end, but I couldn’t fight the feeling of mourning, of sadness, of not knowing how to shut off the mental movie in my head. Of feeling like this pregnancy was no longer special and different in a sea of other boys being born all around me. Feeling like God had played a trick on me—why even put this name into my heart if it wasn’t meant to be? There were never any boy’s names that we liked during these 7 months. Why not? Wasn’t that a sign? There were actually truly so many things that really annoyed me about men, their leadership styles, the way they have the upper hand in life, in work, in everything. I didn’t want to contribute to that privilege by birthing yet another one!
Of course, it’s not to say I will never have a girl in my life. But, just to be sure in the current situation, I made my midwife double check the results when I went into the office the next week. She said that since we had asked not to know the sex from the beginning, there was nothing written on any of the sonograms about it other than “normal genitalia”. The only result they had to go off was a blood test, which measured chromosomes early on, and was about 98% accurate though “she couldn’t say it had never been wrong.” So, I suppose there is always a
margin for error, but also that for now I have to be open to the idea of things being different than I expected.
Slowly, I have started to unpack some of the “boy’s clothes” I had received for our nursery, and I have to admit they are pretty cute. I opened up to a few close friends about feeling disappointed and many of them shared how they had felt the exact same way during their own pregnancies, without wanting to admit it to anyone. Now, they could not picture any other baby than the one they have. That helped. Even my own mother said: “I know you think we have a very special relationship, and we definitely do. But it’s the only one that YOU know and see. I actually have an equally important relationship with your brother, it’s just that you aren’t in that one and so you don’t think of it in the same way.” A few people pointed out that there is an important role in raising the type of man that respects women and empowers everyone around them. That is true.
A week has gone by since we opened the envelope, and I still have mornings where I wake up and miss my little girl. But I’m also realizing that the image and dreams I had of her are images of a little me, with a few tweaks. They are images of the relationship I have with my doting Dad, and then of seeing Nathan in that same role. They are images of trips I’ve taken with my Mom, and having someone to do that with too. They contain notes of me as the first-born, big sister. They have so much to do with ME.
One of the lessons I’m quickly learning is that you don’t get to control who your children will be. They are themselves, not a chance to do over your life—the good and bad. They may have parts of you, but they are not you. Of course, I knew this before, but I didn’t really let it sink in. I’ll probably have to learn it a million more times in my life, again and again. Maybe there is less of a chance of seeing this little boy as a “little me” and more likelihood of appreciating their uniqueness. Of letting them shine as themselves.
All this being said, there is still a rawness in my heart, along with guilt for not just being grateful —which is how I started this story, isn’t it? Let’s see what feelings next wee