Post MidLife, Still MidWest

Prairie Anchor

I often allow myself to believe that if I were not Molly's mom, I'd be living a different life in a different place. I do not know exactly where and what that life would look like, except that I know there would be mountains or beaches or canyons or wilderness, or a million other landscapes other than that of the Midwest, the prairie.

Today, I had the great idea of asking Molly if she would ever consider living somewhere other than Ames, Iowa. Somewhere that she would not have to deal with winter. "Yes!" she responded enthusiastically. I could feel the seeds of my daydreams stirring. If you can dream it, you can do it, has been my motto since I quit my full-time job last summer. Maybe my life is not done transforming, I allowed myself to think.

"Really," I said as nonchalantly as possible. "So you'd maybe like to live in Arizona or New Mexico?" I thought I'd start with the places I wanted to live, places I think of as spiritual and mystical, places that would foster creativity. Before I could offer Oregon or South Carolina, she responded.

"Not that far," she said in a voice filled with concern.

"So, how far would you like to go?" I asked, hoping for something further south than Des Moines or Omaha.

"Well, I would like to live in San Francisco," came her quick reply.

San Francisco? What did she know of San Francisco? Did she know how expensive it is to live in the bay area? Now I was feeling anxious. I needed to redirect, to make San Francisco sound uninviting.

"Hmm, let me see," I said, trying to sound like I was honestly pondering her suggestion. "You know," I said in a tone that I felt conveyed honest concern for her well-being, "it's really rainy and chilly there every winter. The sun doesn't shine very often." I continued, "they have earth quakes in San Francisco. Have you ever been in an earth quake?" Her silence paired with a scowl told me that I'd been busted - she knew I was trying to get her to choose one of my choices.

As usually happens with Molly, her body language and facial expressions remind me when I am being manipulative. The developmental delays her Down Syndrome incurs in some areas of her understanding, do not effect her ability to recognize my BS. I checked my motivations, let go of my need to control the conversation, and responded as I should have in the first place. "What do you think you'd like about San Francisco?" I asked.

I thought she'd tell me that she wanted to live where the Tanner family, of "Full House" fame, lived. Instead, she told me she would only move away from Ames if she could live by the charmed ones. The remainder of the ten minute drive to McFarland Conservation Park was spent with each of us trying to convince the other that our version of the truth, as it applied to the three sisters in the early 2000's television series "Charmed", was correct. We both cited what we knew - me science, she the fan sites for "Charmed" on the web.

As I stopped the car in the lot at at the park, Molly opened her door, got out, turned and looked at me and said, "Let's just stay in Ames." She then slammed the door and headed up the trail to the bird blind.

"Let's," I said disappointed, defeated, and relieved all at once. I easily caught up with Molly. I put my arm around her shoulders and said, "Let's. Let's just stay in Ames."

"I like that," she said as she allowed me to hold her hand. The rest of the way to bird blind we were silent, other than the labored breaths necessary to propel our too round bodies up the slight incline and through the chill of Christmas Day. We fed the birds seeds and suet as a couple waited in the bird blind for the birds to come feed at dusk.

Molly took a head start back to the car as I put away the bird feeding supplies. She was eager to go eat pizza, I was longing to stay and watch the sun set. At one point, as she walked ahead of me, she was holding her arms out, shoulder height. From my vantage point several yards behind, she looked like an anchor. My Prairie Anchor. She is what keeps my life's ship from drifting away from Ames, from the Midwest. As I walked behind Molly I noticed, and photographed, one of the most stunning Iowa sunsets I have seen. With each click of the shutter, I could feel my wanderlust wane and my contentment with this place, with this moment, multiply.

McFarland Park, Story County Iowa