I used to love playing hackey-sack as a teenager. Not that I was very good at it, but it was something simple and fun to do to pass the time after school with my friends.
As we would hang around drinking our slurpees from 7-11 and kicking a hackey-sack around, life was so...easy. I mean, sure, I had a job as head bus girl from as early as 13 years old, working at The White Whale restaurant down the road from my house in the harbor, with my freshly-ironed white collared shirt and black slacks, every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night. Sunday brunch was the worst; it was always old ladies who tipped poorly and required constant water refills as they all seemed to take their pills at meal time. And I had studying and homework, and picking up my little brother, Billy, from school. My mother had me dust the hardwood furniture with lemon polish until it shined, and I had to clean all of the glass and windows, too. So I was not without my responsibilities...
Nevertheless, life was simple. Like hackey-sack.
Gradually, as I got older, life became more difficult. I worked my way to wiffle ball status when I was 21, and sharing a house in North Bellmore with 5 other people; 4 men and 1 woman. We were an odd bunch; some vegan, some punk rockers, some both. I was neither. But after work, we would all hang around together and play wiffle ball in the backyard. The house was always a mess to me, as I had lived alone for many years before and was used to everything being ''just so''. Living with so many other people was challenging, and I realized then how much I genuinely enjoyed my solitude. I really missed just being alone sometimes. I was working full time at this point, as well as a second job at night, and babysitting on weekends. I also spent a lot of time with my Grandma, who was like a mother to me, and my best friend. I would bring her groceries and she would make me spaghetti with butter and parmesan, just like when I was a child. I was busy, but still, life was simple. Those fun summer evenings, being greeted by my roomates and knowing there was always someone to talk to, someone around just waiting to play wiffle ball with me in the backyard.
Nevertheless, life was simple. Like wiffle ball.
Somewhere between 21 and 34, life became more challenging. Now it's like one of those fussy sports that requires fancy equipment. Now life is like golf, with all of the different clubs, and fiddly bits, and funny clothing and shoes and cart to get you from A to B. It's not as simple as kicking around a hackey-sack, or swinging a yellow wiffle ball bat. I feel like now I am constantly pick up toys and goldfish wrappers off of the floor, cleaning up spilled yogurt, buying endless cartons of milk and cereal and cooking dinners my kids barely touch. Parenting is hard. Marriage is hard, too. It never used to be. After cancer, a lot of things seem more difficult. I have no idea why; I guess I am still figuring that part out myself.
I have a beautiful house on a sweet little lake, with wall colors I helped select, a new hardwood floor I helped select the stain on, shiny granite counter tops, new bathroom tile and fixtures. For all intents and purposes, it's everything I have ever wanted. Yet I find myself feeling unsatisfied, disillusioned, even, every so often, longing to have one more day in my teenage bedroom, with the tacky gold velvet chair in the corner and magazine clippings on my vanity mirror, and my brothers barging in, or a friend always dropping by unannounced. Or in my tiny little basement apartment, with its 70's shag carpeting and older-than-the-hills appliances, and shitty 2 pot coffee maker that always had French Vanilla coffee brewing, and my bike with a basket to cram my groceries in to because I didn't have a car. Or in that crazy, messy house I rented, with the big dog that drooled and shed all over my clothes and the roommates that left beer bottles all over the place. Or in the loft my husband and I shared in England when we first got married, or in our first apartment in Atlanta, where we arrived with only the clothes on our backs and 2 suitcases each filled with all of our belongings. Or our first little house, where we brought home our first two babies and I'd stroll them into town in the double stroller on Friday mornings to the farmer's market.
Things were so much simpler in those days. All of those days, all of those seasons of my life.
Perhaps surviving cancer has made me see things differently. I don't care about scrubbing the carpets by hand with rose water, or fescue lawns, or building a big kitchen island. It seems like such a waste of precious time now. I want to spend my time reading, and creating beautiful things, and cooking wonderful meals, and engaging in meaningful conversations, and going on adventures. In short, I want to return the simpler days; the hackey-sack days. Even the wiffle ball days. I just can't handle the golf days anymore.
At the mall yesterday I was in a skateboard shop and saw something I hadn't seen in a very long time.
Can you guess what it was?
My face lit up with joy. Literally, I beamed. It were as if I had just run into an old friend and no time had passed between us.
Today, after going to the post office, and the gym, and cleaning and laundry, and bill paying and emails, when my children get off of the school bus, I am teaching them how to play hackey-sack.
Today is the return of the hackey-sack days.
Today is the return to simplicity.
I may even put on some white eyeliner and turn on my 1996 soundtrack to celebrate...
As we would hang around drinking our slurpees from 7-11 and kicking a hackey-sack around, life was so...easy. I mean, sure, I had a job as head bus girl from as early as 13 years old, working at The White Whale restaurant down the road from my house in the harbor, with my freshly-ironed white collared shirt and black slacks, every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night. Sunday brunch was the worst; it was always old ladies who tipped poorly and required constant water refills as they all seemed to take their pills at meal time. And I had studying and homework, and picking up my little brother, Billy, from school. My mother had me dust the hardwood furniture with lemon polish until it shined, and I had to clean all of the glass and windows, too. So I was not without my responsibilities...
Nevertheless, life was simple. Like hackey-sack.
Gradually, as I got older, life became more difficult. I worked my way to wiffle ball status when I was 21, and sharing a house in North Bellmore with 5 other people; 4 men and 1 woman. We were an odd bunch; some vegan, some punk rockers, some both. I was neither. But after work, we would all hang around together and play wiffle ball in the backyard. The house was always a mess to me, as I had lived alone for many years before and was used to everything being ''just so''. Living with so many other people was challenging, and I realized then how much I genuinely enjoyed my solitude. I really missed just being alone sometimes. I was working full time at this point, as well as a second job at night, and babysitting on weekends. I also spent a lot of time with my Grandma, who was like a mother to me, and my best friend. I would bring her groceries and she would make me spaghetti with butter and parmesan, just like when I was a child. I was busy, but still, life was simple. Those fun summer evenings, being greeted by my roomates and knowing there was always someone to talk to, someone around just waiting to play wiffle ball with me in the backyard.
Nevertheless, life was simple. Like wiffle ball.
Somewhere between 21 and 34, life became more challenging. Now it's like one of those fussy sports that requires fancy equipment. Now life is like golf, with all of the different clubs, and fiddly bits, and funny clothing and shoes and cart to get you from A to B. It's not as simple as kicking around a hackey-sack, or swinging a yellow wiffle ball bat. I feel like now I am constantly pick up toys and goldfish wrappers off of the floor, cleaning up spilled yogurt, buying endless cartons of milk and cereal and cooking dinners my kids barely touch. Parenting is hard. Marriage is hard, too. It never used to be. After cancer, a lot of things seem more difficult. I have no idea why; I guess I am still figuring that part out myself.
I have a beautiful house on a sweet little lake, with wall colors I helped select, a new hardwood floor I helped select the stain on, shiny granite counter tops, new bathroom tile and fixtures. For all intents and purposes, it's everything I have ever wanted. Yet I find myself feeling unsatisfied, disillusioned, even, every so often, longing to have one more day in my teenage bedroom, with the tacky gold velvet chair in the corner and magazine clippings on my vanity mirror, and my brothers barging in, or a friend always dropping by unannounced. Or in my tiny little basement apartment, with its 70's shag carpeting and older-than-the-hills appliances, and shitty 2 pot coffee maker that always had French Vanilla coffee brewing, and my bike with a basket to cram my groceries in to because I didn't have a car. Or in that crazy, messy house I rented, with the big dog that drooled and shed all over my clothes and the roommates that left beer bottles all over the place. Or in the loft my husband and I shared in England when we first got married, or in our first apartment in Atlanta, where we arrived with only the clothes on our backs and 2 suitcases each filled with all of our belongings. Or our first little house, where we brought home our first two babies and I'd stroll them into town in the double stroller on Friday mornings to the farmer's market.
Things were so much simpler in those days. All of those days, all of those seasons of my life.
Perhaps surviving cancer has made me see things differently. I don't care about scrubbing the carpets by hand with rose water, or fescue lawns, or building a big kitchen island. It seems like such a waste of precious time now. I want to spend my time reading, and creating beautiful things, and cooking wonderful meals, and engaging in meaningful conversations, and going on adventures. In short, I want to return the simpler days; the hackey-sack days. Even the wiffle ball days. I just can't handle the golf days anymore.
At the mall yesterday I was in a skateboard shop and saw something I hadn't seen in a very long time.
Can you guess what it was?
 |
| Reunited, and it feels so good |
My face lit up with joy. Literally, I beamed. It were as if I had just run into an old friend and no time had passed between us.
Today, after going to the post office, and the gym, and cleaning and laundry, and bill paying and emails, when my children get off of the school bus, I am teaching them how to play hackey-sack.
Today is the return of the hackey-sack days.
Today is the return to simplicity.
I may even put on some white eyeliner and turn on my 1996 soundtrack to celebrate...
 |
| Me and Grandma, during the Wiffle Ball Days, April 2005 |
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