Prime

It’s the stuff of Alison Krauss’s recording of But You Know I Love You, of a barefooted dash to the compost bin across a back yard covered with a foot of snow, of a bittersweet waking up wanting to burst for the sheerest of happinesses even while crying.

A few weeks ago in a faculty meeting a writing teacher had us write to a prompt; one that listed prime numbers and asked what mine was. I wrote about 31, my age: I’m healthy, wealthy, and surrounded by all that is good, so much so that sometimes it hurts.

My dad’s back-pain immobilization on Saturday (earlier in the day of the birthday bash; in the video, he’s sitting in a rocking chair at the dinner table) drove home what I’d already known even as I find effortless the noticing of wonders around me: that even the best of living can instantly–and inevitably will–deteriorate. It’s knowledge that makes me crave soaking up my good life even as I mourn its certain hardships.

The dream I awoke from one morning this week mirrored what I awake so often find myself doing: simply marveling, overwhelmed to tears, at our daughter. (As my mom has said in real life, “How can you stand it?”)

Once, back in the eighties, Mom found Dad sitting in a rocking chair listening to a record and humming along with Mary Hopkins’s Those Were the Days.

“What were your ‘days’?” she asked him.

“These are,” he said.

And these sure feel like they’re mine.