Finding Charlie

“How are you finding it?”

I’m asked that question at least once a day by very, very well-intentioned people.  This morning it was the poor, unsuspecting insurance guy.   But I don’t really understand the question.  Intellectually I know what they mean- “how do you like it here?”, “have you settled into your home and put a statue of a Georgia peach in your front yard?”, “do your kids like school?”, “have you seen the canals?” etc.   Spiritually, well, it takes on a whole new meaning.  I’m finding it strangely sad and ridiculously hot and humid with the exception of the frigid mornings which leave me paralyzed as to what a girl should wear around here.  I’m finding-even though I’m a grownup- a good one- who reads and learns and listens and gives and holds everyone she loves tightly in her heart, I might be acting a bit like a tantrum-throwing toddler about living here.  I’m finding that I’m working on this.  I’m finding that I…..can’t…..even…..the palmetto bugs- full-blown hyperventilation.  I am finding that much of what I thought and knew and had planned was all thrown out the window when we rolled into Georgia.

I am finding, however, Georgia has it nailed when it comes to the stars.  They are bright lights in a velvety, navy blue sky, and they make my heart sing.  They are deeper and more meaningful here- it is difficult to explain.  So many stories to tell in the Deep South.  They make me pop up out of my rabbit hole and breathe a little deeper, a little more evenly.  I always feel like Orion the Hunter has his eye on me- I got you, kiddo, hold steady, keep running.  And it’s always in star-gazing, I think of Charlie.

“Chaaaaarrrrrleeeeeeeee Garberstripe, get over here!”

I will never, ever forget it.  I never saw the woman or the child.  I was waiting tables being the absolute cliche of a recent college graduate with a theatre degree (skull-cracking eye roll).  But there I was, with my new degree, my new husband, a lot of non-paying acting work and the paying job at a restaurant two blocks away from our mismatched railroad track apartment.  So maybe this moment was only clear and perfectly brilliant to me because everything was SO NEW, SO PROMISING.  So there I am collecting my paltry tip from the lunch bunch, and I hear it.  The most hilarious reprimanding of a child I had ever heard and the creative time machine kicked in- when your brain goes into overdrive, the ideas flow freakishly fast and the shivery, warm feeling mixed with cold sweat sweeps down your body.  You are already writing your major award acceptance speech as you jot down that one name on your “May I Take Your Order” notepad.

Charlie Garberstripe.  I was going to make him a star- that was a character begging to come to life on the pages of a script, a book, anything.  A little boy with a secret, a little boy who was sad and the underdog and had funny sticky-up hair and a bit of magic.  Crap, that’s Harry Potter.

And that’s exactly what happened to my Charlie Garberstripe.  Nothing.  Zero.  A complete loss of focus.  Dead-end ideas that sounded like already-fully-cultivated ideas from people far better at any of this than me.  Jay asked weekly for a year when I was going to write it down.  Just start writing.  It became the talk at family gatherings- hey, how’s Charlie?  Come on, Cecily- it’s the best idea, just write something.  Then there was moving, and jobs that needed to be done to pay the bills and baby-having and the beautiful mountain range of parenthood to tackle.  Each exactly where I needed to be at the moment.  Each filled with everything good and everything hard at the same time.

I recently told my kids I had started writing. “Writing what?” If not forced to write a middle-school paper, why on earth would anyone want to write anything????? I explained I was just trying my hand at some writing, and so I was doing kind-of-a-little-blog-thing and only 7 people are reading it but that doesn’t matter because I’m doing it for me and Mommy isn’t always just sitting home watching the Pioneer Woman on the Food Network, folding laundry (ok maybe a lot of the time) and paying bills, she has a life, too, and not to judge me and no they can’t read it well maybe they can but not right now because you have to go to school and I’m tired and get in the car because it’s only 7:15am and I’m already about to lose it love you, make good choices!

And even with my new little writing gig I hired myself for, I can’t make Charlie come to life.

So maybe this is it, maybe this is Charlie’s destiny.  He’s just been tucked in my back pocket all along, leading me to this place.  To Georgia, I guess?  Where a bit of writing is tethering my soul, keeping me from floating off into space.  My little unfinished talisman who may never be anything more than that and who may never actually come to life on any page but keeps me searching, finding and growing.  I’ll take it- my silent little running buddy.

Come on, Charlie, let’s blow this popsicle stand.  We have places to be.