Close to Good

motherhood

They gather close – all of them in their own way. Garrett is on my mind tonight.

At 2:05 P.M., the school bell rings. Harried, haggard, high-hipped teachers lead their strands of child-sized pearls to the Shellman gate. We parents, mothers mostly, stand around chatting while we wait. Some are anxious to have a word with the teacher. Some are anxious to get home, or to soccer practice, or just away. Others simply live in anxiety; chaos follows them like Pig Pen’s dust cloud.

I stand near the sidewalk and watch as others wait stationed in cliques or in isolation. A nerve-grinding bell rings, and the noise fades up to a canned track of shouts and whistles, whines and rebukes. I watch as if it is a Discovery channel documentary speeding past the normal ticking of time. A map of the movement left by footprints on the asphalt would surely reveal the flurry.

Through this hive of backpacks and saddlebags, I see a face smiling back at me. Garrett always finds me before I have noticed that his class has come through the gate. I might look up just in time to see him tentatively tap Mrs. Ford at the waist. I read his lips as he says, “I see my mom.” She follows the track of his arm, the line of his pointing finger, sees me and releases him with a simple “OK.” Garrett comes running, blue eyes shining bright, smile radiating wide. He embraces me at the hips, turning his face against my abdomen. I hold him by his back and hair.

I always ask, “How was your day?” With grins he answers, “good.” Even if the stories that follow recount misgivings or recess rumbles, he slingshots to me with that same expansive smile, and answers my everyday question with the same pleasant description. Good.

I can’t help but wonder, on the days when there has actually been trouble, if “good” describes how he feels when reunited with me. Pure warmth connects us in that moment. There are other moments when I can’t understand his mumbled diction, days when I can’t read the heartfelt worry that makes him whine. But at 2:05 P.M. from eyeball to cheekbone to hug, I hear his heart. And it is good.