Silvia had given up on acting like a “normie.” Normie is the term she used to call people like her foster mother and foster sister. Normies can be exhausting in their ignorance of life. It took so much effort to act like a normie that Silvia just stopped trying. But still, she watched them with fascination.
Normies. People who sit at the table together and talk over supper. People who ask about you and mean it. People who open doors and greet strangers in passing. Normies are those people who walk holding their kid’s hand and you can see that the kid feels it and that grownup normie feels it and together they make a normie family.
In foster care, Silvia watched her foster mom and sister carefully. They brushed their teeth before they slept and at night they slept. Normies sleep and dream good dreams. When they have a nightmare, they wake up and they realize that their life is not a nightmare, so thank goodness that bad dream is over and it is time to start a good day.
Silvia heard her foster mother say this to her daughter during an argument: “The most important thing is that I love you and that you love me. We’ll cool off and figure it out later.” It seemed rather miraculous. Silvia saw her normie sister roll her eyes when her mom said it, because of course, her sister had always had that kind of love whenever she needed it. It was that thing her normie sister thought so obvious that she assumed everyone had it, like a coat and a good pair of sneakers.
At Carson’s Teamworks afterschool program, Silvia met people who knew what was up. They already knew what she needed to figure out—she didn’t have to explain it to them. The staff had these fun ways of showing her how to deal with the edginess inside her— the worry and the rage. They helped her figure out how to calm her inside self right down, which helped her sleep at night. Over a couple of years, Silvia began to notice a change. As they fished in the fall or packed holiday packages for the soldiers overseas in the winter, Silvia was feeling a little space inside; she was feeling a little freer. It occurred to her: this is what they have— those normies have… ease.
Silvia noticed that sometimes a new kid would come into the program tight, unsure, and closed down. She got it. She didn’t wonder why; she remembered why. When the new kid’s fish was too big for the bucket, it was Silvia who made him laugh and stop cursing. When the Carson staff got them lost on their way to sledding, Silvia was about to settle into that dark cold place inside when she felt that thing instead: The most important thing is that we care about each other. Let’s cool off and figure it out. She thought it and then she said it out loud. It was still kind of miraculous.
When Silvia was graduating Teamworks, her friends there each told a story about how she had helped them, about the things she had learned to make and do. They wrote words that reminded them of her on little papers that they slipped into little beads. The beads were then strung into a necklace. They hung the necklace around her neck as her Carson friends clapped for her. Silvia keeps that necklace where she can see it. She has read the little notes inside the beads so many times that she has it memorized. She touches a bead and the loving thought comes to her. It’s like a rosary of goodness. It’s a necklace she can wear all the time, even when she leaves it at home. It goes with everything. By JAC Patrissi
