21 May Writing: The Spirit World Light

It was clear that the cashier at the grocery store had been crying. I didn’t know her, we’d only interacted a handful of times, but I remembered each one: she was exuberant, always smiling like she’d just won an Oscar; she had a bigness and a glow that seemed a little absurd behind the confines of a cash register. This was the first time I’d seen something fade her shine.

I asked if she was ok, and she told me that her babysitter had just fallen through and there was no one to watch her son the next day after pre-school. Her mom, who had always helped her with childcare, was becoming increasingly sick.

I had almost no experience with kids. But the next day I went and picked up a 4-year old I’d never met and brought him to my house. Then I wound up continuing this ritual more weeks than not for the next ten years.

That exuberance so apparent in his mom was mirrored in Major. I fancied myself a poet, but Major put me in my place: his whole way in the world was poetry. Walking into my rundown kitchen, he pointed to the weird gray burn spot above the oven, gasped in his tiny voice and said with full conviction, “I think that’s the spirit world light.” From there we were deep in his sprawling imagination-scape, where all sticks were swords and all household objects gleamed with sacred reverence. Every time he came over, using exclusively ordinary ingredients, Major enclosed us both in an enchanted realm and everything, even time itself, moved different. It was like being guided through a trip on ayahuasca by a little boy who thought he could eat chicken nuggets for every meal.

In the early years of Lupinewood, folks in the collective took turns watching him in couple-hour shifts. Over time, as different people moved out or changed jobs and his care schedule shifted, I spent longer and longer stretches with him so his time here stayed consistent. For sure, I wanted to help out his mom, who had become a friend. But after a certain point, watching Major was about me as much as anything else. I just had to see who this child would become. I wanted to be at the bus stop after the first day of first grade. I wanted to see him graduate high school.

When I went to pick him up one day, a few years in, he was waiting with another child from the same apartment complex. She asked if she could come too. This was the start of what became a pile of local kids spending Saturdays at Lupinewood while their moms took the day to themselves. First with Ruby as a co-pilot and later with Jayne, Saturdays expanded into birthday parties and Christmases and Kwanzaas, trick-or-treating, dance recitals, county fairs, first days of school and open houses.

While we’re driving to Lupinewood this past Saturday Major starts talking excitedly. At 14, his voice is now deep and resonant. He’s telling me about his future plans to move to North Carolina and attend university there. Completely in love with basketball, this isn’t Major’s first time dreaming out loud about going to UNC. But now he’s worked out how to make it happen: realizing that if he lives in North Carolina for 3 years before the start of university, he’ll qualify for in-state tuition, he’s told his mom he wants to go live there with his aunt starting sophomore year. This summer, he has plans to go visit and scout the campus.

Sophomore year? I’m doing the rough math in my head. Right now Major’s in seventh grade. He’s talking about moving 700 miles away in less than three years.

I make him his customary ramen noodles for lunch in slow motion, with what I imagine is the presence monks bring to their practice. Tear open the blazing hot pink package. Fish out the little silver flavor packet. Pour out most of the broth before serving – Major’s mostly in it for the noodles — but leave a little bit at the bottom. Maybe if I treat with reverence all these ordinary motions, these ordinary ingredients, I can keep the space between us enchanted. And time itself will move different.

Story by Terran

Major, his mom Keyedrya and his grandma Gigi with Terran at the bus stop after his first day of school