By Deb Montgomery
Years ago when I was playing with my first band in Toronto, I wrote a song called Inbetween. It was a slow build in the verses describing what it’s like to be in an in-between place. In between, we don’t know very much / In-between it’s just that it’s such. The chorus let loose into a double time, chaotic and somewhat funny, sped up version of the verses. The chorus was meant to embody the disoriented, stunted, stalled and lonely experience that we can have when we are not here and we are also not there.
One year when I was in between vocational tides and experiencing the coming and going of longing and wonder, my drummer and his wife had a baby. I was unemployed and future-curious. I was restless and a little lost in terms of how I would leave my service industry days and move into another kind of work. My friends, knowing that I was in migration, asked if I’d be interested in taking care of their newborn because they had to work after a few months of having him. I have always been a bit of a baby whisperer so this was an easy “Yes”.
One day with Max asleep in my arms in our neighborhood coffee shop, I enjoyed my coffee with Michelle Williams, who at the time had her newborn baby with her. Other neighbor-friends also had newborns so I hung out with the Moms while we drank coffee and chatted about life and kids. Max was always with me on my lap or asleep on my shoulder.
Max and I buddied around Brooklyn. I loved lulling him to sleep with songs or using silly counting games (his favorite) to amuse and entertain him. Max and I became a well-known duo, and regularly, I had to clarify that he was not my son, but that he was definitely my little buddy.
Max needed me to be present. Max needed me to be attuned. Max needed me to stay aware of the very moment he and I were in, and to be good at it. Max needed me to not worry about what would be next, or how I would find my way or how I’d make money in the next iteration of my life. He just needed me to be with him. He needed my withness.*
I think now about that year with Max and I think about how the parts of us that feel unsettled and untethered may be asking us to practice withness. Can I find the courage to come alongside myself in a time where the familiar is dying and quiet down to let the deepest parts of me know that I am here? And, perhaps this is where God also comes close and says I am here. I am with you. Sometimes the greatest courageous act is to be still and be with yourself exactly where you are right now. Maybe this is even truer when you’re in between things.
*Pax lay down shoulder to shoulder with the old fox, pressing tight in full company. He could only offer withness but nothing else was asked. Linked with Gray’s final memories, he heard the song of an arctic bird instead of the human’s shouts…and then peace. Sara Pennypacker, Pax (New York City: Balzer & Bray, 2016) .158
Deb Montgomery is a Songwriter and Certified Life Coach.
