{"id":210,"date":"2010-08-28T03:01:02","date_gmt":"2010-08-28T03:01:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.katrinakenison.com\/2010\/08\/28\/the-things-we-carry-2\/"},"modified":"2010-08-28T03:01:02","modified_gmt":"2010-08-28T03:01:02","slug":"the-things-we-carry-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/the-things-we-carry-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Things We Carry"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/span>Tension.\u00a0 Anxiety.\u00a0 Worry.\u00a0 My own load is invisible, but\u00a0 it\u2019s definitely been taking a toll.\u00a0 This week I learned that while I\u2019ve been stretching my spine in downward dog, practicing deep breathing in meditation, walking the back roads of New Hampshire with a grateful heart, I\u2019ve also been clenching my jaw.\u00a0 Clenching so hard and so fiercely and for so long, that I\u2019ve cracked my back teeth and pushed my bite out of alignment as a result.<\/p>\n

It took my dad the dentist to figure it out, after I\u2019d called him for the fifth morning in a row to describe my sleepless nights and to confess that I\u2019d begun counting the hours between painkillers.\u00a0 \u201cPut two rolls of cotton between your teeth so they don\u2019t touch, then sit down and completely relax for a half hour, and call me back,\u201d he advised.\u00a0 Still the good daughter, I did what he told me, weird as it sounded.\u00a0 Within moments, I caught myself clamping down on the cotton rolls — clamping down as if they were a couple of bullets I\u2019d been told to bite while undergoing primitive, excruciating surgery without anesthesia.\u00a0 Except of course, this was not surgery.\u00a0 This was my own everyday life.\u00a0 And apparently, in order to survive it, I\u2019d been holding myself in some kind of death-grip.<\/p>\n

The truth was a bit of a shock.\u00a0 I took a deep breath, made <\/em>myself relax, and then caught myself clamping right down again.\u00a0 For thirty conscious minutes, then, I focused on relaxing my jaw completely.\u00a0 Deliberate, intentional relaxation.\u00a0 And bit by bit, I felt the pain that had plagued me for a week simply drain away.\u00a0 Could it really be that simple?<\/p>\n

This morning, I watched as my son Jack got ready to head up into the White Mountains for a three-day hike with a friend.\u00a0 It’s his first big adventure without an adult along, a true test — for us parents as well as for him. When he proposed the trip at the beginning of the summer, his dad and I\u00a0 were noncommittal–not wanting to nix the idea, yet not at all sure he was ready to take off on his own into the mountains. Back then, August seemed like a long way off.\u00a0 If we said nothing more about his plan, we figured, he might very well forget the whole idea, or never manage to get it organized, or change his mind.<\/p>\n

Instead, over the course of many phone calls, he and his friend chose a date, got some advice about a route, and finally, with our blessing and my credit card, reserved a couple of AMC huts.\u00a0 The funny thing is that by the time he was actually ready to go, I was ready to let him.<\/p>\n

A year ago, this boy of mine was driving me crazy.\u00a0 I despaired of him ever growing up, wising up, straightening up. . .cleaning up.\u00a0 All of a sudden, though, he IS grown up.\u00a0 At six feet tall and 160 pounds, he is a lot bigger and stronger than I am.\u00a0 And finally, it seems that his brain has caught up to his body. \u00a0I send him to the grocery store with a list, and he comes back having made exactly the right purchases. (It was not so long ago that I requested a cucumber and he returned with a zucchini.) \u00a0He calls home, meets his curfew, texts me when something goes awry and sometimes just to say \u201chi.\u201d\u00a0 He asks me how my day was, puts his dishes in the dishwasher and walks the dog.\u00a0 He gets up on time and goes to bed at a reasonable hour.\u00a0 He reads good books and then wants to talk about them. He still trashes his bedroom, and then just before I open my mouth to say something about how it looks like a bomb hit in there, he turns on some loud music and starts cleaning it up.<\/p>\n

Last week, the two of us had an interesting conversation.\u00a0 \u201cWith you, Mom,\u201d he said, \u201cit\u2019s all about honesty.\u00a0 I know that honesty means more to you than anything.\u00a0 And so now I feel like I can\u2019t ever lie to you.\u00a0 Even sometimes when I\u2019ve done something that I don\u2019t want you to know about, I always feel better after I\u2019ve told you.\u201d<\/p>\n

I thought about that for a few days, somewhat reassured in general sort of way.\u00a0 And then something came up that kept me awake for a good part of a night, worrying not so much about what I already knew, but about what might be.\u00a0 In the morning, Jack and I talked again.\u00a0 \u201cOk,\u201d I said, \u201cI think I really need to know a little more about what happened last night.\u201d\u00a0 The story he told me made perfect sense.\u00a0 I knew that it was the truth.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t thrill me, but it was so, so much better than all of the really terrible scenarios I\u2019d spent the night imagining.\u00a0 Now it was my turn to tell him something.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can always handle the truth,\u201d I said.\u00a0 \u201cI may not like it, but if I ask for it, it\u2019s my job to figure out how to deal with it.\u00a0 And I think the truth is probably always going to be a lot better than whatever I can dream up in my mind.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s late now, and Steve and Henry have already gone to bed.\u00a0 I was just about to wrap this up and turn off the lights, when a text came in from Jack, who is settling into his sleeping bag on the top of a mountain far away.\u00a0 \u201cHey mom,\u201d he wrote, \u201crandom service spot here.\u00a0 Everything is going fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been thinking a lot today about the things we carry, both literally and emotionally.\u00a0 I watched the seventeen-year-old boys pack their packs, watched them trying to anticipate what they would need, what was worth lugging up into the mountains and back down again.\u00a0 Their enthusiasm was great to see, though I was less impressed by the rations they were taking — Slim Jims, Ritz crackers, Pop-Tarts, and a sausage. They insisted on carrying their own pillows from home.\u00a0 And I resisted the urge to check to make sure they had toothbrushes and clean underwear. \u00a0(I did insist on hats and four apples.) \u00a0And then it was time for them to shoulder their loads and be on their way.\u00a0 They probably took too much stuff; their packs looked pretty heavy to me.\u00a0 But what they have is what they chose to carry.<\/p>\n

Me, I\u2019m ready for a lighter load.\u00a0 I\u2019ve laid down my burden of worry, at least for now.\u00a0 The mouth guard my dad made me will help me to remember to relax my jaw, to give my poor teeth some rest.\u00a0 And meanwhile, a more conscious part of me has already chosen to let go.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure that Jack is fine out there.\u00a0 He\u2019ll have a good night\u2019s sleep and so will I.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tension.\u00a0 Anxiety.\u00a0 Worry.\u00a0 My own load is invisible, but\u00a0 it\u2019s definitely been taking a toll.\u00a0 This week I learned that while I\u2019ve been stretching my spine in downward dog, practicing deep breathing in meditation, walking the back roads of New Hampshire with a grateful heart, I\u2019ve also been clenching my jaw.\u00a0 Clenching so hard and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15183,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,39,8,10,14],"tags":[263,301,324,451],"class_list":{"0":"post-210","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-letting-go","8":"category-midlife","9":"category-parenting","10":"category-parenting-teens","11":"category-soul-work","12":"tag-letting-go-2","13":"tag-motherhood","14":"tag-parenting-2","15":"tag-truth","16":"entry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/600x600.png?fit=600%2C600","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}