What to read next? Maybe The Wind in the Willows.

I finished a book last night: John Grisham's follow-up to The Firm titled The Exchange. It was enjoyable, even though it left me with questions and a sense of moral outrage about the brutal nature of terrorists and the deployment of far too much money in the wrong hands. Now, I'm searching through the TBR pile to find something that will keep my interest. I'm thinking Tracy K. Smith's To Free the Captives. But I feel a tug to re-read The Wind in the Willows.

Maybe.

I've been a bit over-wrought lately, easily triggered, and really melancholy at times. A lot of stuff has happened in the last few years; some really good, like Meg's wedding, Holly, and my little chapbook that will actually see the light of day. But I've also been really prone to tears, too. And I think it's the book, in part. Having to steel myself emotionally through so damned much for the last decade, and even more so through the last six years, has left me pretty numb in a lot of ways. But working on the book, and wanting so badly to tell my dad about it, is causing me a whole lot of upheaval. Add to that just how much I know --I know-- that he would have adored Holly, and I'm just a puddle of emotional slop. I didn't cry when my mother died; I was too damned busy doing all the necessary stuff that dad couldn't or wouldn't do, and our relationship was too complicated. I had to try to prop up my dad, who was failing fast, too. And that whole nightmare of his final decline, clearing and selling the house, the finances, not being able to see him in the nursing home due to Covid protocols, all of it... what a unholy trial by fire that was. In the middle of it, Meg got married during the pandemic --yes, there was that, too-- and then the whole being pregnant and working with Covid patients stress she was under, then last year with Tim's heart crisis, us having Holly for 45 days, and then, just as we were starting to get out of the murkiness, Geoff's foot issue that has been a long seven-plus months of unexpected upheaval, both personally and financially...and his hitting the deer that totaled his car...

Those are the highlights--there are more, things having to do with work and the Frost Place canceling the Studio Sessions and the Conference on Poetry and Teaching, and me not having a position there anymore and losing touch with so many of my poetry family... it's been a bit much. Far too many losses all in a row. I feel untethered.

The Wind in the Willows is talismanic for me; Dad read it to me when I was about four years old, a chapter a night, doing all the voices. I've written a little about it before, both in this blog (I think) and in a poem. His favorite chapter was chapter five, "Dolce Domum," the Christmas one. It is all about home. And since Dad died, I've been trying to regain my sense of home. Too much stuff has kept me from mourning him, and now I cry. I want to say, hey, Dad-- Look what I did! Aren't you proud of me? You gave me all the words, took all the time in the world to read to me, to make me feel loved and safe. I wrote a book, Dad. And it's going to be real, and have my name on the cover. And without him reading to me, spending all that time and attention, I don't think I would have ever done it.

It's Christmas time, and I miss my dad. I want to give him a copy of my book. But I can't. But I can give my words to the rest of you. And I can re-read the ones that got me started.

C