the yellow cup
In February we loaded up our car and drove it onto a 20 foot container to cross the Atlantic. It was supposed to have been an 18 day journey....
two months later...
As the time stretched on, I forgot most of what I'd packed. There'd been a lot of re-packing and re-thinking and haste when everything was loaded; but, the main decision for me was not to pack anything I wouldn't want to lose or couldn't be replaced. So, while it was a delightful mystery to see what was in the car, I wasn't expecting anything especially dear.
For the past 15 years, I've had two bright yellow cups from which I drink my morning tea--one for me and one for Addie. Sometimes, I made her a cup of hot carob, vanilla soy milk with maple syrup (Vegan Cocoa). She had other special mugs for herself--one from Sandypoint stables, a soup mug which had pastel colored shellfish painted on it, one with a paradise of porpoises in a tropical lagoon (to name a few).
When Addie moved in with Moose, the yellow cups stayed with me. When Addie and Moose got married and moved into 33 Gunning Court, and Frank and I moved to Ireland, the mugs stayed with them.
Somehow those two mugs, together, seemed to suggest, "someday, when we're living together--the two of us--again..."
This is the first time since living in Ireland that I have not had a return ticket to America; so, I'm realizing that I now live 3,000 miles away from my daughter. I don't know when I will see her again. We, who, were "just the two of us" for most of her first 15 years, are now, both, married women putting down roots away from each other.
Anyway, in the middle of our hasty packing, Addie told me to take one of the cups. I guess I was thinking that if one was lost; at least I'd still have one there, with her. So, I carefully packed it, like a Russian Fol-der-al doll into a felt lined hat, within bubble wrap, within a small bucket (I use for carrying compost) within a soup pot and forgot all about it. In fact, I had no recollection of how meticulous I'd been in ensuring it's arriving intact, until I unpacked it.
I have friends who fret about their failing memory--some who spend a few hours everyday with cross-word puzzles and brain-teasers to keep that grey matter from atrophy.
Perhaps the reason this process of "loss" doesn't particularly bother me is because, a renewed sense of wonder replaces the loss. For instance, I first listened to Barbara Kingsolver reading "Prodigal Summer" about two years ago. I just re-listened to it with as much rapture as I had the first time. All I could remember is that I loved it. I will listen again, soon because already, I've forgotten enough to be just as entranced in a few weeks. But, I digress...
When I finally set out to unpack the car, I'd gotten to the soup pot and the compost bucket and the felt hat and puzzled over what I could possibly have taken such pains to pack and there it was--the yellow cup.
For these past two months, missing Addie has been the big tug on my heart. Had she been a difficult child, it would have been a tug; but, it would have been tempered with a pang of relief, I suspect. But, for me, Addie is a delight and Addie and Moose together are a joy.
When I discovered the cup, I came hooting and bounding into Frank "It's my yellow cup!" "I can't wait to tell Addie it's here, it's here! Now we can have our tea together!" The infernal obstacles of time, and space, breached entirely by a bit of fired clay, jauntily painted, and slightly chipped!
Cheers, Addie!
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