January 29th, 2015 - Carrie Koepke

I wake readily. Motherhood made sleeping lightly a permanent accessory. No longer do I afford myself the luxury of deep sleeping through midwestern tornado sirens . . . or someone breathing in their room. A glimmer of dawn edges above the blackout curtains and I am ready to launch. 

Sage, nine, is awake, already let their dog out and made breakfast. Our earliest riser with the latest start time for the day. Sky, eleven, has the dreaded early start for middle school and would love to sleep for four more hours. I have them both help me get our bag of trash and our collection of recyclables to the curb. The dog barks at us from inside. Betrayed.

We gauge the need for coats vs jackets. Warm clothes and jackets. The air makes our cheeks pink, but it doesn’t bite.

We are a self sufficient household in the morning, circulating our routines around the house to give everyone time and space. My husband whistles as he prepares his breakfast. I will not speak unless absolutely necessary. My head is full and speaking takes focus. I wake with an instant to-do list. Knowing the list is already too big to complete and that more is to be added. It is comforting. It is terrifying. 

I congratulate my eldest before she heads to the bus. Her team won their first FIRST LEGO Robotics competition yesterday. Fueled by brownies, they spent the day with furrowed brows of concentration and self induced pressure, yet laughed endlessly.

They don’t know yet that they are creating a foundation to establish Columbia on the map of this strange competition. They will spend the coming years competing, tutoring other teams, writing college essays about the experience. Their prize comes with a life changing international level competition in Arkansas.

We don’t yet know that we will return when my youngest qualifies to compete with their own team. We will find the same grilled cheese restaurant, stop at the same art museum, eat waffles in the same hotel.

The kids find endless symmetry, supporting one another from one adventure to the next. They still believe in fairies. In ten years, they will admit that they wanted to believe in fairies. I inhale my husband deeply before he heads to work. He speaks tech. I speak books. There are times that we nod at one another, knowing we are speaking entirely different languages. We are the magic of opposites. This will never change. 

He smells of spice and warmth and love. This will never change.

Sage and I walk to school. I stay, make copies. I’ve taken these years to not formally work. I spent my youth raising other people’s children. It is time to invest in mine.

I battle the endless haunting that I am not doing enough. This will never change.

I come home to my desk in the kitchen, space carved out, but open to the world and invasion of every thought, time, need. Still I write. I have only a couple hours to tackle chores and the blank screen. I don’t think about how in ten years, I will have a desk in a room. A daughter who only needs it when she is in town. It aches before I even know it will happen.

I sip hot cider from a Tiger Tales Bookstore mug. The best job I’d had to date . . . but one I don’t allow myself to think of as more than something to do in youth. I question if leaving science was the right choice. I question if I can continue to manage to put my words out into the world. I hold the newest pages and feel an old urge to burn them. To keep them for myself. It is safer that way.

I don’t realize that a new friendship forming will turn into a very real best job ever. Writing still in spare time, reading always, and walking into our very own Skylark Bookshop. Where my children turn into adults before my eyes. Where I have some of my hardest days ever and mostly the best. Where in time, my own pages might grace the shelves. The ones I don’t burn.

The pets wind insistently at my ankles and soon the kids are home. Mine and my nephew. My kids, all of them. He will be moving out of state soon. We don’t think about it. We don’t want to. We curl more and more deeply into our routine together. Our time. Our us-ness. Ten years later I text a random photo. Keeping the threads unsevered through the miles and years. Ten years later I have a new nephew and an urge to check flight prices.My brother comes home first, collects my nephew. Lingers. These fleeting years we have had together. Living mere blocks apart. We are old enough to realize how important we are to one another. Something our kids figured out instantly. I envy their extra years of knowing. Ten years later we call . . . to say hello. To say nothing and share everything.Homework. More chores. The dog barks. Dinner. I could sleep.My husband returns. We tuck the kids into bed - they are never too old. Ten years later - I can’t stay awake that long. I am too old.

We curl into bed and I rest my hand on his wrist. I trust this other heartbeat to guide mine to sleep.

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Carrie Koepke is co-founder of Skylark Bookshop in Columbia, MO. She has served on panels for both Indie Next and the 2025 Andrew Carnegie Selection Committee for both the Non-Fiction and Literary Fiction Medals. She has served as a board member for MIBA, the Midwest Independent Bookseller Association, and currently as Board Vice President. If she isn't in the bookshop, she is probably reading . . . or outside, or outside reading. Books to come.