I stop. I breathe. It is most anxious moment of my day—getting everyone out the door.
I’ve woke the kids. Moved and prepped with little nudges to set day-momentum, there comes a moment when time is up and nudges cease.
A bomb goes off, like an EMP that kills and ends all mediums of subtle communications. Haste! Angst! Explosion of the slow and steady smooth encouraged in movements and preparation into race of grab and go and what else I do not know.
At this point, detonation and after-scatter, my morning role is done. Any further action or effort—I am only in the way.
I draw away into a kitchen corner, confined and out of the way giving hugs and kisses when they’re asked (I am blessed that this is almost always).
When I try to help, I am in the way. I impede. I block avenues of egress and cause only further stress. Reading, responding, I withdraw again to corner and place.
Frenetic keeps until the last “I love you!” and close of door.
Quiet, calm, and a still restore. I return again into my way—slow and steady as I pick up morning pieces in the after.
I put away the dishes. I clean breakfast left on table (Owen, always magnanimous, offers me the last of his cereal and milk so that—in thoughtfulness—he does not have to put his cup and bowl away).
I dress. I lock the doors, turn off the lights, and—slow and steady—enter too into my day.
My life-speed is antagonistic to the world’s. Its atavism keeps me sane.