I’m not sure exactly what I want to write about today.
I could write about the book I just read: I Miss You When I Blink by Mary Laura Philpott. I don’t read personal essays as often as I should. In college, I went on a 8-week, life-changing study abroad, hiking all over England and writing personal essays. It’s the genre I still feel the most comfortable writing in. Yet I rarely turn to books of essays for pleasure. I can’t explain why this is, except that when I read, I tend to be more plot driven than I am when I write.
I picked up I Miss You When I Blink because it was recommended on Modern Mrs. Darcy’s Summer Reading Guide and I was trying to expand my reading beyond my usual non-fiction or speculative fiction.
From the second I picked it up, I knew this book was for me. I devoured it. The first essay struck a note similar to the blueberry bushes essay I wrote in spring 2018, when my time of having little babies at home was approaching its end. I was looking backwards at all the me I had been as a writer in college and missing myself so much, as Philpott does in the book. Even though I am still me, writing essays in my head, I am also someone completely different. Someone who focuses on her physical health, not the person who embarked on a hiking study abroad never having walked longer than from her apartment to campus. Someone who has four kids and has learned exactly how different each individual is, rather than someone who thinks she has all the answers.
And Philpott is that person too: a person who thought she had all the answers, who did everything right and yet still found there was something missing in her life. That checking boxes is not the end of life, but the beginning.
And again, she gave me hope. Sometimes, I think about trying to make a career as an essayist. But then I think how small my life is. I wonder what could possibly fill a whole book about me, someone who has checked the boxes, who lives an ordinary and privileged life and likes it that way. And yet I found her writing about her ordinary life fascinating and worth my time.
***
Or I could write about making the decision to home school my kids this year. But is there a point to writing about that? I think every parent in America has been through all the factors a million times: the possibility of spreading germs, the need for socialization, trying to reduce the amount of screen time, trying to increase educational equality, stabilizing our children’s lives, stabilizing school funding. If there were a definite, logic decision, we’d have all made it by now.
Besides, in the end, I made the decision that was best for my kids because of the factors that surround us. None of them are in high school and need credits to graduate. I’m already at home, so we don’t need childcare. And I’m over-qualified to teach these guys all about elementary math and reading.
We can handle this, and I’m actually excited about it. Which puts me outside of the conversation that most American parents are having. I actually feel a little guilty about it, having basically made my decision at the end of June, when people are still wondering even now what they will do.
***
Or I could write about preparing to home school my kids. Because this is where those two lines of thinking come together. As I’ve been getting ready our curriculum for the year, I’m remembering another version of myself that I miss.
I rarely buy books because they just become clutter in a home of curious kids. But home schooling has given me permission to open the floodgates. I had to buy two new bookcases due to new purchases plus reorganizing things to make room for our new school room. I doubted whether our living room really had space around the oversize leather and microfiber couches. I thought the room would look crowded. But when the two black towers were installed, a flood of happiness filled my heart. I was almost shocked by how happy the books made me.
I remembered my past self who just gloried in books. I still do: I read over 50 books a year. But my reading now is so much more controlled and calculated. A spreadsheet tracks my upcoming reads based on various book clubs and goals. I strategize what to read next. Reading has become a life raft of interest, helping me push through the tsunami of cooking and dishes and laundry. Looking at those bookcases reminded me of back when I read for simpler reasons. Back when reading was as natural and unconscious as breathing.
As I started to plan the literature we would read this year, I got excited to introduce my kids to Dickens and Shakespeare for the first time. I remembered the unashamed joy I felt being an English major, declaring to the world that I loved books above all else, damn the torpedoes and the lack of a clear career plan.
Planning to home school has resurrected that old me, one that had been lost for a long time. It was nice to see her again. I hope I can keep her around and that her enthusiasm will rub off on my kids this year.
