I flashed back to the bright September day, just over two months earlier, when Chris and I had taken Zack to his first day of kindergarten. Zack was nervous and excited, jumping up and down like a pogo stick as I tried to pose with him while Chris took some quick photos of us on our stoop. I opened the iron gate that led to the sidewalk, and the three of us fell in with the other clumps of parents and children heading up the street to the public elementary school. It felt like another neighborhood parade, all the kids wearing their shiny new backpacks and carefully chosen outfits, the parents beaming or grousing with good humor.
The three of us held hands as we crossed the street, and Zack greeted the crossing guard with gusto. I started snapping pictures of Chris and Zack as they merged with the large throng gathered outside the school entrance, waiting for the doors to open. Zack turned around and looked nervously over his shoulder, flashing a toothy fake grin, and I blew a kiss at my baby, suddenly so grown-up and getting ready to walk away from me into his new world. I felt tears smart in my eyes, but I blinked fast to whisk them away.
The three of us wended our way into the school and found Zack’s classroom. We found the hook in the closet with his name on it for his backpack and located the table where he would sit every day. Zack yelled with delight each time a friend from his preschool walked in the door, and I greeted the parents I knew from the neighborhood. It was a happy chaos and I could have stayed there all day, but the teacher eventually gently nudged the parents from the classroom. I snapped a final photo of Zack sitting in his spot at the blue table, looking at me with wide eyes, and seeming both so big and so small at the same time.
On the walk back to my apartment to pick up our bags before we both headed off the work, Chris and I recapped the morning, laughing about the kids’ amped-up spirits and reassuring each other that Zack seemed to have been settling in fine. It was all so normal and everyday, but Chris and I had been down a long road to get here. I felt exultant, joyful.
I extended my arm up in the air toward Chris for a high five, and as our hands slapped, I said, “Good for us! Good for us for what we’ve done.”
Chris nodded in agreement. We’d done it. We’d broken up without breaking into bits.
After we grabbed our bags and reviewed the details of the evening—the babysitter picking up Zack from school, my night to relieve her, Chris on duty tomorrow night—we headed off in different directions to our respective subways. As I walked the sunlight warmed my back, and I marveled that more than four years had passed since Chris had brought our marriage to an end. I thought about how much our little blond boy had grown and I imagined him trying to sit still in his classroom, barely able to contain his excitement about getting to know all his new friends.
I descended into the cool stairway that led to the subway and passed my card through the turnstile, then folded into the crowd waiting for the train that would take us all to Manhattan. I pulled out my stack of manuscripts and fished around in my purse for one of my blue pens, but I couldn’t quite focus on my work yet; I was still thrumming from the morning’s events. After I’d settled into my seat on the subway car, I stared out the window and waited for the view to appear as the train climbed the Manhattan Bridge to cross the river: the Brooklyn Bridge stretching grandly over the sparkling water, the Statue of Liberty tucked off in the distance behind it, the skyscrapers of Wall Street reaching for the blue sky. It’s a scene I never tire of, that always makes me feel so lucky to have made my way here in New York.
That day I felt even more lucky than usual, with a sense of satisfaction infusing my spirit. I’d made it to the other side in one piece. “Good for you,” I thought to myself. “Good for you!” I clutched my fist around my blue pen and made a little victory pump, and then without even thinking I reached up and put the pen in my mouth to remove the cap so I could get to work.
The subway finished crossing the bridge and hurtled back into the tunnel on the other side of the river, but I didn’t notice; I was already immersed in the next manuscript on my lap, deep into the groove of another day. It was just another day in the new life that had been waiting for me—a glorious day.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I must thank Chris first and foremost, for allowing me to tell this story—my story, which both is and is not his story.
To Janet, Alison, Kim and Melanie at Redbook—the curly girls—there aren’t enough words to thank you for living all this with me the first time around. And then making it possible for me to write it all down and turn it into this book.
To Cathie Black, Ellen Levine, Deb Shriver and everyone at Hearst: my thanks for your generous support. And my gratitude to Alexandra Carlin and Lindsay Galin for your enthusiasm and PR genius. And to Mary Morgan, Redbook’s amazing publisher, thanks for being a great partner and friend.
I’d like to give a standing ovation to the entire team at Redbook for your passion, dedication, and creativity; getting to work with all of you is a great joy in my life. And to all the Redbook readers, thank you for the words of support and love you’ve sent any time I shared a piece of my life as a single mom. You inspire me every day with your honesty and sense of community, and I’m so glad I get to work for you.
And a huge thanks to all the people I couldn’t have done all this without: Jessica DeCostole, Dr. Carol Glassman, Mary Rose Almasi, Eric Hunter, Ellen Whitehurst, Sezin Sengul, Marilyn Machlovitz, Rik Misura, Brian Hajastron, Izzy Gonzales, Michelle Rorke, and Camille Charles. And of course, my family: each of you reached out and helped me in so many ways that this book wasn’t big enough to contain.
These acknowledgments wouldn’t be complete without a deep bow of gratitude to all the people who helped the book itself come into being, but most especially my agent Karen Gerwin, who first told me I should write a book and then made it happen, and Sydny Miner at Simon & Schuster, who convinced me that I could tell this story—and then, somehow, managed to find a gentle way to edit me, a lifelong editor.
To Derek: You helped me write this book in more ways than I’ll ever be able to express. I send a thank you to the universe for you and your lovely, steady spirit every day.
And a final bow of thanks to the curly girls—because, really. Thank you for signing up daily for the ride that is me, and for being as good and smart and talented and challenging and fun as you are. But most importantly, thank you for being my friends.
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