A Memoir by Jen Schneider
I bought the leather riding boots on a whim. Filene’s Basement had a close-out that coincided with a visit to my newborn son’s pediatrician. I didn’t plan the purchase (or his many follow-ups). I also didn’t have extra money to spend. But somehow, the baby and I made a quick detour, and I grabbed the closest Size 10 box I could find, then quickly moved through check-out (his newborn feeding schedule primarily on demand).
The box fit perfectly in the base of my baby’s pram. It didn’t matter that it was a balmy 80 degrees in the middle of June. I was preparing for the coming winter and, with a planned move back home at the end of summer, I was already missing Beantown and newly planted roots.
Boston was a new-to-me city, but I had already sowed seeds that felt less seasonal and more like destiny. Friends didn’t understand why I was leaving so soon. Colleagues blamed the decision on the weather. That winter had been one of the worst (or best, depending on who’s speaking) in recent history.
“One for the records,” the locals liked to say with their signature fast-paced speech.
Icy crystals had fallen from the middle of October straight through April, with a few seen in early May. I recall flakes falling outside the hospital’s labor and delivery room window.
“It’s not always like this,” friends insisted as we pushed prams, our boots still on, down Boylston Street one Saturday in June. The Red Sox often in town.
Three of my colleagues and I had given birth within a span of eight weeks. Jokes about the water in our downtown office building turned to promises about Boston’s other charms. My friends pitched everything from historic landmarks to games at Fenway to ongoing deals at Filene’s.
“Stay,” they said. “There’s no guarantee it won’t storm at home.”
“I wish we could,” I replied, then braced myself for what the upcoming season might bring.
The weather didn’t bother me. I didn’t know how to tell my colleagues-turned-friends that my baby would undergo medical procedures scheduled for a winter delivery. We needed to move closer to my family home and a doctor who specialized in cranial neurosurgery.
As Fall brushed shoulders with Winter, my husband and I packed up what we had collected over the prior two years, boots included, and rented a Honda that took us and the baby first West on 1-90 then South on 1-84 and 1-95. As we drove on numbered highways, we carefully tracked our baby’s vital signs.
Once at our destination, we unpacked what boxes we had and continued with pre-op preparations. We spent most of that early winter in the front room of a house with very little furniture. The four bed, two bath rental right off a main highway was close enough to feel like a city — not Boston, but not the middle of nowhere.
Within walking (stroller-pushing) distance, we found hot chicken at a gas station and a 24/7 laundry. The clerk, dressed in a blue button-down with a red bowtie, always wore a smile, even as I stood at the dryer crying from exhaustion. My baby and the riding boots were constant companions.
A few weeks after unpacking, we traded a rental car for a Land Rover. No more pushing the pram to the Walgreens three miles down the highway only to turn back before trading currency for the day’s recommended intake because I feared the baby might stir prematurely. During fever spikes and worrisome lab reports, we’d spend hours in ERs and rooms with no doors waiting for blood ports.
In a world when the Internet was still in its infancy, I was left with little other than a single printout to understand my infant’s upcoming surgery. As I struggled to gain my footing, I’d wear the boots, a reminder of the power of durability. Mostly, I learned that the rarer the condition, the less routine the journey.
“Together, we’ll rally,” I remember whispering to myself as I’d pull off the boots come evening, but not truly believing.
Pre-op procedures went into overdrive right around Halloween. We rarely left the house, as the OR demanded a cold-free, clean bill of health status. When the doorbell rang, I (used to our situation) opened the door with my baby in my arms, his head wrapped with some sort of compression band I didn’t understand.
“A mummy!” trick-or-treaters exclaimed.
Hearing only “Mommy,” I’d quickly check to make sure the baby was okay.
In late November, came the surgery. After a marathon twelve-hours, new bandages were freshly applied. Discharge tracked by the hour. For weeks, passersby didn’t understand and thought we were playing some form of dress-up.
On my own to learn how to navigate life suddenly doctor-free, I turned to winter as a welcome hiding place – boots always on.
“Take time to rest,” the doctors said, “be careful to avoid infection.”
Under winter’s blanket, quilted of carols, cardinals and stuffed animals, we did.
Incredibly, the post-surgery routine was a period of calm and curiosity. As sutures quietly dissolved and scars healed, we would stand at the window and count the birds that would gather. A trio of mourning doves, warblers, and crows came to know our routine. They asked no questions.
Our days were stitched of quiet wonderings. We’d watch the snow pile then pull at the weeping willow’s expansive hug. We’d drink warm liquids like milk and cider. I’d knit the baby skull caps in fabric that didn’t scratch scars.
That winter was marked by heavy snow and simplicity like I hadn’t known prior. Friends from Boston wrote, “I told you so,” signed with a 😊 and hand-drawn snowflakes.
I know, I remember thinking — there’s no guarantee of limited precipitation. In my small house near a big city, I cried less, and we controlled what we could.
His hair grew, as whispers of green grass poked through the winter’s glow. On walks neighbors would comment on his attire and his smile — bandages no longer the focus of the hour. The house with few furnishings had a sunroom with green carpeting. We’d sit as if we were picnicking and read picture books — Katy and the Big Snow, The Mitten, and Snow.
I wore my leather riding boots as my baby dug his toes in the artificial grass and learned to crawl. Together, we’d watch the snow fall. As we read Puss in Boots and How to Build a Snowman, we learned how to re-build our post-surgery routines.
On leave from work to focus on post-op recovery, I had few non-baby-related distractions to claim.
In the middle of winter, there was, suddenly, extended time.
No needles. No blood draws.
No spinal taps. No release forms.
Instead, we planted seeds in letters and dug our toes in the newly designated playroom’s thick green carpet.
As winter bloomed, “ER” slowly became nothing other than an opportunity to learn.
E is for elephant, egg, and electric.
R is for regular, routine, and rabbit.
We’d practice letters and I’d think of my Boston-based comrades.
As the days’ limited light turned, that world felt increasing far.
F is for fun, funny, and future.
Recovery was a release amidst winter’s surprising warmth.
Few phone calls.
Mail delivered through slots in front doors.
Six days a week, around noon, a voice boomed, “Hellooooo!”
My baby would laugh as winter blew.
The mailman, a friendly fella named Roger who wore leather boots of his own, would drop envelopes and flyers through a gold flap in the front door. As the weeks wore on, hospital bills folded like origami into smaller and smaller tallies and my baby’s laugh grew into its own.
“Mail!” and “Mama!” were his first words.
As the scars healed and the storms quieted, we ventured back outside. I’d pull my leather boots up high and zipper my fleece as I wrapped his head in hand-knit styles.
I’d push the stroller around icy patches, no longer worried if the baby woke from his nap early. The pharmacy-free supermarket across the street stocked everything we might need.
We’d count jars of pureed peaches and baby carrots, stack Cheerios in tiny plastic cups, and track the color of cars (not scars).
We took walks simply to observe — Big Diggers, Little Dippers, people movers.
With life in slow motion, tensions, once as tight as origami penguins, began to unfold. As I relearned how to sleep, breathe, and even knit pom poms, my baby consumed solid food. I’d scratch in spiral notebooks and write haiku while the baby would stretch limbs and coo.
Together, we bloomed in winter’s arms. Always with my boots, together, my baby and I weathered winter’s ride and solidified new roots. As seasons go, Spring tends to be the focus for rebirth, but I’ll always think of Winter as a time of quiet gratitude and appreciation for life on Earth. A homecoming, for me, my family, and my leather boots.
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Jen Schneider is a community college educator who lives, works, and writes in small spaces in and around Philadelphia. She served as the 2022 Montgomery County (PA) Poet Laureate