Maybe it is was the frustration, swelling steadily for the past week, unnoticed until today, the awareness of limits on everyday tasks.Tea in a to-go mug...because her favorite mug is too heavy to lift.
Wearing a nylon belt when showering...because the two remaining drains cannot hold themselves up.
Another night sleeping in a mummified pose...because sleeping on her side is too painful.
Daniela manqué...this unwelcome fabrication colonizing her sense of space (silicone hosiery leeches) and time (calendars mottled with medical appointments), she cried this morning for no particular reason, and for every other reason imaginable.
I may (over)dress Daniela in Supergirl metaphors, but her crying, that form of emotional dispensation made intelligible to the onlooker by a script of facial contortions as unique as fingerprints, is my kryptonite. When she cries, her lips tremble with the intensity of a newborn yowl. The reflex is innocent. The effect is paralyzing.
I sat down to finish my breakfast listening to my own breathing hoping, wondering.... Within the hour, a triumvirate of close friends, Supergirls in their own right, came in succession to visit. Their presence was the simple antidote to the tearful tremors. The rest of the morning went well, so did mid-day.
By late evening, the discomfort has crept back into her mood. The drains need to be emptied. The ritual itself has become a variant couvade...instead of mimetic labor pains for the husband, I ape her sense of exhaustion...emotional and physical. Surreal...I have become mid-wife to my own wife's nightly natality of grumpiness. The drains will expire sometime before noon on Monday. I can weather the tempest. Daniela has overcome much, much more.
A few minutes before I go to sleep recalling what happened this morning, not the crying but the visitors, I smile. Imagining her as a Superhero may be cool, but knowing that she has Super friends is better.
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