The Night Owl Has Returned

In the wee hours of the night, when the darkness cloaks the air with the same lightweight comfort of my favorite robe; when the silence is so tangible that it whispers it's own sweet, sweet song; when the faces of my babies are relaxed in the peaceful radiance only cherubs can maintain: I search for my name.

The echos of all the names I'm called ping pong through my head. Mom, mommy, mama, honey, babe. These names I answer to, I relate to, and embrace. But they are not my name, they are THEIR names for me. The edges of me seep into those names, like once solid marker lines that are now dappled with drops of water, the colors running without any clear origin, fading as they spread farther.

I have no definition.

During the day, when my movements and thoughts aren't for me, when my activities, one after another are targeted at helping my family find and do the things they love, this realization often slaps me in the face. But like a fighter, dazed from the stinging impact, I shake it off and try to keep my head in the game. Most days, I succeed. Some days, I cry.

My stomach growls. I forgot to eat dinner. And lunch. After the plates were set, drinks gotten, and the inevitable spills wiped up, the kids were finished before I'd stopped moving. I'll eat later, I thought. Later is such a broad term that I'm not exactly wrong, although its far later now then the later I initially intended. Ever so carefully, I ease my arm out from the sleep deflated grasp of my youngest child. For the past three and a half years, my arm has been his comfort item. With the softness of hands not yet toughened by the world, he caresses my arm when he's tired or emotional, rendering me useless as he yanks my arm and tugs my sleeve in a freenzied search for skin to skin contact. Most days, it's the sweestest thing, and I smile at the delicate closeness that makes him feel at at ease. Some days, my soul feels claustrophic.

Quietly, I make my way through the dark to make a cup of soup. This is no time for culinary excellence; he could, and probably would, wake at any moment. As I pass the kitchen sink, I can't help but sigh audibly, a sound I usually reserve for conveying my passive- aggresive displeasure. With the precious few minutes of free time that dessert had afforded me, and the anticipated reward of a clean slate (in the kitchen, at least,) to start the morning tomorrow, I'd tackled the dishes, used and abandoned in the sink. I used to imagine, with each dumped pan, plate, cup or silverware, that user did so while proclaiming "Screw mom! I'm not washing this!" No, I realized, they just had hobbies, things that ignited their passions, that spurred an urgency to spend every waking moment in its throes. That feeling of loving what you do and not being able to think about anything else, akin to the fiery force that drives the beginning weeks of a new relationship, eradicating any existence outside of it. The name I used to call myself had those things too. Hobbies. Passions. The name Mom doesn't, she has laundry, and sweeping, the pressure of coming up with new engaging activites; a comforting arm, a warm embrace, and all the right words. Those are the passions of this name Mom. They don't allow me to forget it, either, as, like magic, newly abandoned dishes smile smuggly at me from the sink. Most days wash these continuous intruders with the satisfication of checking off another to-do list item. Some days, I feel like I am suffocating, imprisioned in a lackluster version of the movie Groundhog Day, from which there is no potential of escape. As I bring my soup back to my room, I fleetingly muse that missing socks eaten by the dryer must be reincarnated into used silverware, birthed into empty sinks.

Sitting down at my largely unused desk, I sweep a potpourri of toys to the side so I can set down the soup. Matchbox cars and shopkins, a barbie, action figures, and some fidgets line the edge; some tumbling to the floor due to lack of balance on my part between the amount of space left and the force I exerted. I scowl at the clutter; an endless war against belongings that aren't my own. I don't even have the time, hobbies, or possentions. to make my own clutter.

As I twirl the noodles onto a fork, I eyes flit around, settling on an overstuffed shelf of unused notebooks: wire bound, leather, compostion books, years worth of unplanned in planners. Ok, I aknowledge, I'm not faultless in the ever ongoing clutter war. I lift the fork of noodles, some not as intertwined as others, plopped back into the steamy broth. The steam from the ones that remained fogged up my glasses as if I opened the dishwasher midcycle, heat bombarding the lenses and rendering me temporarily blind. Too many over zealous bites and the resulting burnt tongues of the past yell "Don't do it!", and I momentarily bail on the bite, setting the fork back down to cool.

My eyes shift back to the shelf. The guilt of hypocracy nudges me. "At least they would look nicer and less like a writer's version of Jenga if I stack them better," I tell myself, so I pull the contents down. I pick one up. Its a hardcover, with otherwise blank lined pages inside. The cover is beautiful; a lush green rainforest, it's canopy penetrated by a beam of sunlight; it exudes life and warmth. It's matte texture is silky smooth to the touch. I close my eyes as I run my fingers over it. My old name filled books like this with an insatiable relentlessness. I remember, one of her favorite activites was to spend hours at the bookstore pouring over all the fine details of the journals, a large iced coffee in hand. There was no rush to be anywhere else, no one else demanding her attention, just the books as they whispered their soul to her. Occsionally, the nostalgia penetrates the name I am called now, but its dull, like a worn down knife, it's sharpness gone long ago. But in the school supply aisle of the grocery store, the closest my name has been to a bookstore, while shooting down pleas for various items, I close my eyes and smile at that name's quiet joy.

My son wakes for a drink, jolting my eyes open. I count my blessings that after a deep drink he rolls back into sleep, but next time he may insist on my arm, and I'd have to leave behind my uneaten soup and a bigger clutter then I started out with. I take three of the widest books; a large planner dated two years prior, a standard wire bound five subject notebook, and a hardcover black notebook with the word Inspired scrawled elegantly across the cover, and place them back on the shelf. I slide them back towards the wall, but something catches against the left side of the stack, preventing it from going any further. Taking the books back off, I look for the culprit. Something is protruding from behind one of short, pillar-like shelf support connected to the shelf above. Reaching behind, my hand meets the transgressor; it solid, cool, and smooth, with ridges snaking along the surface.

I open my palm to examine my discovery under the light of my desk lamp. Like a nighttime streetlight on a quiet cul-de-sac, it sheds a soft cone shaped glow, illuminating my hand and the artifact it displayed: a glass paperweight. I recognize it immeaditly; it belonged to my old name. Though I recognize it, I can't remember the last time I saw it, so I roll it in my fingers as I acknowledge the details time has blurred.

The paperweight is stunning. Carved out of Opal, it is a milky white color that glows irradescent shades of pink, blue, and purple. My old name loved precious stones and crystals, and like a Webster's dictionary definition, my mind's eye easily recalls the catalog card my old name had once made:

Opal: Opal is a stone of love and passion. It encourages creativity, and helps one find express their true self, and assists in letting go of anger and claiming one's own self worth and confidence. Opal is a stone of harmony, bringing to light balance it one's self.

The syncronity of rediscovering the paperweight, built from a stone holding those properties at this moment in time, is not lost to me.

The Opal is carved into the shape of a thick tree branch. Perched on top of the branch, is an owl. Details were not sacrificed during it's creation; layers of feathers adorn the wings of the owl that lay folded at it's sides. It's face, though devoid of expression, houses eyes that seem to peer right into yours, with a quiet wisdom. "You know," I think- speak to the owl as he seems to meet my gaze, "you and me, we're a bit alike. Often unseen during the day, we both come to life at night." I stop rolling it in my fingers as it completes the current turn, and it comes to rest face up. Etched into the front of the branch is one word: Listen. A single word, or a statement? Both, I surmise.

My old name found this paperweight. Hiking on a trail on a cool spring day, she sat on a log for a break. In retrospect, not at all unlike the branch the owl is perched on. On top of the one log she choose to sit on in a forest full of them, was the paperweight. The seredpitious appearance of the statue renewed her spirit that had set out on the hike seeking clarity.

"The night owl has returned," I thought. Listen. Because of their quiet observation, one of the many meanings of an owl are to remind you to be still, and listen to your intution. So, like I did in the middle of the forest, on that warm afternoon, that's what I did. I listened. All my names I've been called : Julia, Jules, daughter, sister, writer, gardener, manager, mom, mommy, wife, honey, babe, cleaner, fixer, accountant, nurse; they all spoke with voices their own. They said, a name is just a name, but YOU are the same no matter by which name you are being called. You aren't one of us; you are all of us. Most days inklings of inspiration and drive arequickly quelled by exhaustion, calls of my name silencing its call. Some days, THIS day, coaxed by the Owl's quiet wisdom, it grips me like a fever.

I felt a fire ignite somewhere in between my soul and my heart. Passion! I hadn't felt it in so long. But I hadn't lost it to a new name, it was there all along. I picked up my pen, opened the rainforest notebook, and began to write.

The Night Owl Has Returned

By: Me

In the wee hours of the night, when the darkness cloaks the air with the same lightweight comfort of my favorite robe...