Today is cold. Frozen mist blankets the trees and sky. Pru wears her yellow fleecy jumper and looks sunny and cute. We take Pru’s human sister to school and then pad the stairs up to the office. Pru sits on top of the desk in her tiny yellow jumper in her dog bed. She barks at me to pet her. “Why type when we can snuggle,” Pru barks. Pru is angling for my lap. Pru is now on my lap and is still barking. I’m not sure what Pru wants. I’m not sure Pru knows what she wants.
Yesterday I emailed our daughter’s head teacher what I wrote about reflections and the Grand Bridge at Blenheim. I find it hard to be brave enough to be seen, but I am overwhelmed by the idea that there are girls in schools all of Britain and America and the world who are experiencing what I experienced throughout my schooling. I wonder, if I hadn’t have been so nervous at school, what would I have accomplished? The girls mention me going back to school when we discuss what I’ll do when they grow up and my ‘day job’ as a mom is finished. They don’t know that motherhood doesn’t end when they turn eighteen. Motherhood is forever. That thought warms my heart and scares me too. I do wonder what I’ll do when the ‘day job’ part of mothering is done. Maybe its a question that people ask themselves in midlife. Maybe the question I’m really asking is who do I want to be? Doing and being are not the same. Over the last few years the pull to write has been all consuming. I have ignored the pull until I felt so tortured that I had to write. Breathing and writing go hand in hand for me. At 46 years old I finally realised mirroring other people isn’t what life is about. I’ve always been a late bloomer, so this is par for the course. I want to know more about myself and autism. I want to see the unseen. I want to write and be seen, so that other girls won’t have to experience the same things that many women of my generation and previous generations have experienced. I want these girls to move more freely through the world and I want them to be seen and understood. I don’t want these girls to just survive, I want them to thrive. In order to do that I must write and share my story. I must push the boat out further from the shore. At 46 I know how to navigate life a little better than I once did. I know the importance of ballast. I know when to hoist the sails and when to drop the anchor. It is only by looking to our individual and collective past and present that we can make better choices, prudent choices for the future. I contact our doctor about my 42/50 score and make plans to meet with a fellow at the Ashmolean Museum to see Prudence.
Ivy and Palm 