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Thinking Inside the Box

They are immersed in a conversation only feet from where she sits, and it is a dialogue in her own language, but she is unable to comprehend. They are speaking of the depths of the latest foreign film they have seen, and of the new exhibit at the modern art museum. They speak of their trips overseas, and of obscure Indian Food restaurants, and of communes and underground music.
She scrambles to pick up after one baby, who has littered the floor with a mosaic of rice and beans. Another child is showing her their bubble blowing abilities in soda.
She searches her brain for a piece of titillating gossip, news or random trivia she could bring to this table, but she is at a loss. She could speak of the new way the babies say thank you, or of the upcoming school year. She could recite Stand By Me word for word, and give a recipe for macaroni and cheese she stole from Paula Deen.
An invisible mirror is suddenly before her and she sees an overweight girl with hair that actually looks frayed along the hemlines. She sees hunched shoulders, and tired eyes. She does not see a higher than average IQ, or an ability to speak rudimentary French. She is mom, and while that is exactly what works on any other given day, it suddenly falls short at this table. Mom ceases to be interesting or well read. While the others at the table talk of Shakespeare and Tolstoy, she is midway through a Judy Blume. While they talk of kayaking through cold, open waters, she fantasizes about someday soon taking a solo soak in the bathtub.
The mirror girl, the one who often speaks in words two syllables or less and who sometimes wears the same jeans three times in a row, eats chips so as to seem too busy to join in the conversation, which has moved to the concert in the park. She notices a pee pee dance, and ushers children to the bathroom. She averts her eyes when the strangers at the next table disdainfully watch her shrieking baby. She feels wider and more bland than even five minutes ago, and wonders if when she goes to stand, the chair will accompany her hind quarters.
They leave the restaurant, and drive to the park, where the suburban moms in their suburban cars have unloaded double strollers and Target brand Crocs. She separates herself from her group, and accompanies her son as he climbs and swings and jumps and slides. She feels a little taller, and thinner as the man with two children of his own acknowledges her tiny waddling baby, and taller still when another asks how many she has, and impressed, calls her brave. She thinks to herself that the women on the park bench could surely tell her the meaning of supercalifragilisticexpialodocious, but hesitate when asked about health care reform. The air feels clearer here, and it helps to ease the fog that had come over her brain. She suddenly remembers the new band she had been reading about, the book she recently got from the library, and the research she has been doing about mood disorders. She looks to find her group, to let the information out, but when she finds them, she sees one making a sand castle, and another giving a piggy back ride.
The girl in the invisible mirror packs up the bag, and baby bottles, secures carseats and drives away. She knows it will not always be like this. Someday, she may be the one in the nearly empty restaurant with oodles of ideas and conversation fraught with nuance and irony. But for now, what works for her is for the box to be compact and light. There are enough holes poked in the top to breathe, and the light that filters in this afternoon illuminates the contents in such a way that the girl in the mirror begins to look rather lovely.

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