Brothers

We humans are thrifty.
And mindful of nature.

I just unpacked a basket of clothes for Mykolas, brought from the village.
Clothes he inherited from “bratko” Do.
And in the gap between the brothers, even sister Jonas managed to grow into them.
And to be completely honest—Patricija in the village had more than once popped out wearing clothes already outgrown by one brother and not yet grown into by the other, all decked out by Grandma.

“What’s the problem?” she’d say.
“It doesn’t say it has to be just for boys.”

I agree. It’s even funnier when Mykolas, happy in pink tights with butterflies from the village, runs off.
And those mid-length blond hairs dancing in the wind…

And so the wheel of time spins.
I run my fingers over clothes that, it seems, not long ago, little Dominykas would whirl through like a whirlwind, ducking under the table.
And now I’m looking at a thirteen-year-old nearly as tall as me.

And sometimes, dressing Mykolas, I mix up the names and call him by his brother’s name.

They grow. We don’t age—like a record stuck in your head.
Only, occasionally, when I ask the kids to describe someone’s age, they say:
“About like you, Mom.”
“And so then this one? Young or old?”
“About like you,” the kids dodge the answer.

Understand this:
Moms never grow old or elderly.
Very young, before they’ve been “gifted” by life’s little miracles,
they simply become MOMS.

Showering them with love
like the finest elixir of youth.
We notice our own age only in the baskets of clothes we outgrow and they grow into.

Sweet, never-aging MOMS,
mirrors may lie.
Round, loving eyes—never.

Mua,
V.