Separation Anxiety - Laura Zigman Page 0,1
he was three; his last pair of Batman underwear from when he was five. Each item I unfold and refold crushes me. Each time that I ask myself the book’s central question, my answer is always the same: these used to give me joy but don’t anymore, because they only remind me of what isn’t anymore.
I’m into semantics now, but I don’t have the book itself—I was too cheap to buy it and couldn’t square the internal conflict between acquiring a possession (the book) for the express purpose of clearing away possessions—to clarify whether, based on the past/present issue, I should keep or purge the things that once gave me joy but now only make me want to stab my eyes out. I blink at the sea of plastic containers, at all the buried treasure—all the best years—babyhood, toddlerhood, the preschool and elementary school years—everything before middle school—forever gone. I drop to my knees then, onto the damp musty cement floor, my hands still touching the clothes, and weep—a messy untidy unjoyful kind of weeping. I wish I could purge myself of my self.
At some point I dig around in one of the boxes for an old burp cloth to wipe my nose with. And that’s when I pull out the burlap sack with the unused sling in it. Like I said, it happens by accident.
The sight of the sling now doesn’t make me think about women in Birkenstocks and hemp pants floating through organic produce aisles with their newborns. This time, the sight of that empty sling gives me joy. It makes me want to pick it up, and hug it, and marry it. And fill it. With something.
* * *
And so, it starts slowly. One minute I’m hugging and wiping my nose with the old baby sling; the next minute I’m slipping the sling over my head, marveling at the economy of its simple design: no straps, no clasps, no ties or buckles. How many of life’s paths are forged this way—one small unplanned step toward, and away from, something else unknown? At some point I stand up. The sling hangs down below my hips. I feel like Bj?rk at the Oscars wearing that swan.
I take a step, then another step, wondering the whole time why I so stupidly never used the sling when I’d had the chance. All that missed opportunity for human closeness. I snap the lids back onto the big plastic boxes of Teddy’s childhood and head upstairs, the fabric swinging back and forth across my abdomen as I go. It’s annoying but not a deal breaker. I know I’ll get used to it.
Once upstairs, it doesn’t take long before I wonder what it would feel like to carry something in the sling. Something soft but heavy. Something baby-like. It’s been so long.
I scan the kitchen; consider first a clean and folded bath towel at the top of the laundry basket that could be molded into a baby-like rectangle; then a red cabbage on the counter waiting to be sliced and braised with chicken for dinner that could be the baby-head; then a few cans of tomatoes from the pantry that could be thrown in for some baby-weight. But none of these things feels right; none has the right heft; none gives me the feeling I crave of having something next to my body that is alive and childlike, something that wants to be cradled constantly and carried everywhere. Or could be convinced to want that.
So maybe that’s when the dog walks into the kitchen. Or maybe it’s later, when the dog is sleeping on the floor next to the couch, her paws twitching every few seconds and her face, in repose, looking so peaceful and calm—a rare thing for a sheltie, whose mission in life is to herd, to boss, to control—that it first occurs to me. I can’t remember. Does it matter? At some point, as the baby-simulating items go in and out of the sling, I raise an eyebrow and think: What about the dog? And then: What about the dog?
Desire blinds me. I get down on the floor and tug on her collar. And just like that, as her reluctant paws slide along the floor like a Tom and Jerry cartoon sequence, everything changes.
* * *
At first, I only wear the dog inside the house, when no one else is home. It seems harmless enough. An improvised self-care remedy that instantly works better than any psycho-pharmaceutical or baked good ever has.