She sees it before I do. “Nina Boo boat!” screams Linus. They woke up unhappy and in an effort to help them feel better, I’d opened the heavy drapes and put two chairs in front of the window. They love looking out the window and watching the world. And there in the garbage was the boat. He’d thrown it in there on the way to work. I wished he’d put it in there upside down. Now there was no mistaking their scribbles and drawings and Nina Boo on the side. “Nina Boo boat in the gawbij…” she says and they both dissolve in heartbreaking tears.
The worst thing I recall from my childhood was finding out there was no Santa Claus. In their childhood, my babies will remember abject cruelty, from their father…I close the drapes and try to get them involved in other fun things. They don’t want anything. They barely eat their lunch and they fall asleep, on the floor, watching Sesame Street. By the time they wake up, and look out the window again, the garbage truck has mercifully come by and taken away the boat.
While he has his dinner, the babies have an extra long bath; they love their bath time and the splashing and bubbles makes them smile for a little bit. But they don’t want to kiss Daddy goodnight. He knows what he’s done and he doesn’t push them. Again, they go to bed sad. I tell them we’ll find another boat. Linus says “Dad boke nother boat too.” God it hurts so bad to see them this way…
I ask him why he would do such a thing. He says he was tired and they were annoying him. “Would it have hurt you to get into that box and pretend you were in a boat, just to make them happy? They’re just little. All they’ll remember is that you broke their boat. It’s stupid to you, but it’s a big thing to those little ones.” I don’t dare ask him if he’s ever had anything good in his childhood because I know he didn’t. He doesn’t say much and decides to go to bed early. I hate when he does that, because I have to go to bed at the same time and just lay there, awake for hours. I would love to just sit in the kitchen and read a good book. I love books but I have none because they’re frivolous. So I lay here and chew over all the wrongs in my life. I work myself up into such a frenzy of anger that I end up being awake half the night.
Today, he came home with a huge cardboard box. He put it in the living room and made a great show, to the babies, how they could have another boat. He helped to cut it down, write Nina Boo on the side. The babies watched. It took him awhile to get them to draw on it. He even got into the box and began to sing row, row, row your boat. “Not like that,” Linus tells him. So the babies and I get in the boat and show him how to sing and rock side to side and fall in the “water.” He picks up his guitar and when we sing, he plays. Finally they smile and then laugh…
At bed time, they look very serious again. I watch as they drag the boat to their bedroom and put it in their closet. They think, that like us, it’s safe in there…
Next -> On Our Street
Tags: books, bubbles, garbage truck, Sesame Street