We’re sitting on the deck, Katie and I, this lovely spring morning.  I’m rocking and eating my cereal, she’s lying at my feet.  I’ve brought a book out to read, Zada Smith’s White Teeth, but to be honest I’m still too emotionally engaged in the book I finished at 2 this morning  to begin another one so soon.  And this spring morning filled with the sound of newly minted birch leaves shaking in the breeze and rambunctious birds exploring the bird feeders has me mesmerized as well.

Katie and I have been sitting still for awhile, and multitudes of birds are at our feeders, just feet from us.  The titmice have found the new feeder, and being brave, are the first to explore the treats there.  A blue heron, the first I’ve seen this spring glides just overhead, a silent dinosaur of a bird.  I’m reminded that I saw our  resident green herons a couple of days ago, a sure sign that it’s spring.  Off in the distance I can hear a sandhill crane flying somewhere, and here in my own yard a song sparrow has been singing nonstop since before we sat down.  The neighbor’s rooster chimes in.

Last night I was reading Anna Quindlen’s   Every Last One.  It’s her latest novel, the story of a family with three teenage children, told by the mother.  From the front jacket flap I knew something terrible happens, and I read the first 100+ pages slowly, not wanting to get to the bad part.  But the author tells the story almost gently, letting the details seep in slowly over the course of the rest of the book, because knowing the reality in total would just be  too much to bear.  So much like real life, sometimes we have to dull the details until later when we’re strong enough to recognize them.

Once I was past the traumatic event (I won’t tell you what because you might want to read the book.) I couldn’t put the book down.  It’s been a long long time since I stayed up almost all night reading.  Probably not since before my parents died.  It’s like Quinland gets it, gets me, knows exactly the tiniest details about the inside of my brain and the thoughts that flash unexpectedly through my head at the strangest times, the memories that catch me by surprise, the instant shaft of pain that pierces at the oddest moment.

This morning as I watch and listen to the birds and the breeze in the tops of my trees I remember bits of the book, intermingled with bits of my own life.   Here’s the last little bit of the book, edited slightly so that you can’t tell exactly what happened, so as not to spoil it for anyone.

“How are you holding up?” my mother said the other day when she called to tell me about their Thanksgiving travel plans.

I’m trying,”  I replied.

“That’s good,” she said.  “That’s all anyone can ask.”

Exactly.