Of the Water

I love the water. I respect the water. When people talk about God being in nature and talk about the ocean I think, "yeh," but it 's more than the ocean. It's the sheer force and fearfulness of Niagara -- the depth of a clear water lake -- the cold of a northern Pennsylvania watering hole -- and even the shallow depths of a sandbar in the Florida Gulf communing with beloved people.

I'm having a very peace-full time with my sister in Florida. She had an unexpected out-of-town visitor, so I have a few moments of quiet time and have felt a pull to sit and write. I've been very relaxed since my arrival. I've had a wonderful massage! an evening of girl talk with some lovelies, and, today, a few relaxing hours in the shallows off of a boat with some of my favorite people.

I grew up an in-lander. I never visited a beach until I was a good 9 years old or so. It was unbelievably exciting to finally be visiting the beach and quite foreign. Though I do have "memories" of that visit, they aren't necessarily good memories. My stay was marred by the supposed pinch of a crab, causing one of my toes to bleed. I didn't go back into the ocean until I was well into high school -- maybe college. For some reason, David and I did not frequent the beach, either -- well, in terms of "beach going" as you would assume. He grew up along the Mediterranean sea in Beirut, Lebanon. He loved the sea air, the heaviness of humidity and heat -- yet stateside, did not feel any strong pull to our Atlantic shore.

I think we've had our kids to the beach in summertime three or four times. In 20 years. Instead, we frequented the Virgina, Maryland or North Carolina shorelines in the midst of winter. Winter whale-watching cruises, kite flying and bundled-up strolls on the sand became a favorite thing for us. There were no crowds; souvenir shops availed very inexpensive wind chimes -- and you could really sense God in that gray, cold surf pounding the sand just outside the balcony window. We were able to truly escape the busy-ness of our regular day-to-day days and just be a family -- playing board games, watching movies and experiencing silence.

Having been a western Pennsylvanian for many odd years, I had several opportunities to visit Niagara Falls. One time I took the "Maid of the Mist" cruise, which putters right up to the base of the falls. My heart pounded with true fear -- the sheer power of that water pounding at the foot of the plunge seemed to be pulling us straight into its deadliness. I felt a similar anxiety when water-skiing in a New York lake for the first time. The water was so black and cold and deep. Just getting INTO the water in the middle of that lake, so far from the safety of shore, took some coaxing. Once I was in and acclimated, I became comfortable and was able to enjoy the water. The thunder hole at Acadia State Park is an in-your-face expression of supremacy over man and even rock. Water is powerful -- immense.

Water is also cleansing. When I'm in and around water, I always experience a sense of being washed, whether it be from ice-cold creek water, the depth of northern lake waters, or the saltiness of the grand ocean. When I was maybe 10 years old, I remember being summoned from the sidewalk into a circle of youngsters in the parking lot of a little general store in a small New Hampshire town. I'm not sure who was doing the summoning -- from which "church" or "faith," but they were reading from Psalm 51 and giving out mini red Gideon Bibles. I was quite taken by the experience. To this day, I will never forget the words of that Psalm: "Wash me and I shall be as white as snow." Since that day I have sung Psalm 51, spoken it, read it ... and more deeply understood: 10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me. 11 Do not cast me away from Your presence, And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me by Your generous Spirit. -- but as a fifth grader, those simple words about being washed and made clean as fresh, New England snow resounded in my heart and mind. Baptism. Washing.

David's last recorded songs had a lot of water references. After he died, we decided to release those songs on a CD. As we began to sort-through, listen critically, layer newly-recorded tracks and work on artwork -- the water theme became evident. There was a song about stargazing and a song about perseverence. There was a song about the fragility of life and a song or two about hope -- but almost every song in the collection referred to water -- being washed -- being baptized. Baptism is a sacrament in the Christian faith -- and when we are baptized we are marked by God, if you will -- granted admission into a Covenant with God. Somewhere, somehow, we settled on WaterMarked as a title. It was perfect. Following his diagnosis -- a life-chainging epiphany -- he had his ear pierced as a second, more outward sign of being marked by God and forever being his servant.

One of his later and, in my opinion, most powerful songs is "Until the Rain." It's about the faith of a child. Near the end of this song, he sings of her simple prayer and of a profound act: "She quietly and slowly turned her face toward the sky and said, 'Lord if you are listening, hear my simple cry. If I were a princess, I would offer you my crown, but all I have is this, so please let your rain come down.' She dug into her backpack without making a sound; opened up her red umbrella and then ... and then the rain came down. Well the rain came down! And in case you didn't know it there's a moral to this tale. Everybody everywhere knows what it's like to fail ... seems as though everyone is waiting for God to make it right; God is waiting for us to walk by faith and not by sight. Act like you believe it's so ... watch your faith begin to grow ..."

The rain was Living Water, bringing renewal and grace and healing. That kind of water can physically come from the sky, from a well on the outskirts of Samaria, from a shallow river, from melting snow -- but it is how we receive the gift that makes it holy -- acknowledging its power to make clean what was not. I sometimes wish that I had been strong enough -- courageous enough -- to wash David after he died. Then I remember that I did try to soothe him that night by touching a cool, wet cloth to his feverish face, washing him with love ... But he had already been made clean.

I'm leaving on a jet plane.

... but I do know when I'll be back again. I'm going to visit a sister and her kids, sans one (also in college). I am currently doing laundry -- for the first time since my son left for college -- really!! (Yes, I have that many pairs of undies and yes, he does generate a lot of laundry.) I am a homebody and don't particularly like to travel. I really dislike preparing to travel -- the packing, getting the house ready to leave, setting up care for the dog, making sure that bills are paid, plants are watered, etc. etc. etc. Once I get on-board the plane, I will relax and enjoy my trip. Up until that time, though -- I'm always on the verge of cancelling my plans (not really, but I feel like that). You know how ridiculous that is? I felt this way when my daughter and I were getting ready to go to Paris! Of course, those days were much more complicated. I was leaving a very ill husband with my 16 year old son for a week. There was a lot more burdening my mind and heart than packing for a week of international travel.

Since that trip to Paris, I think I have only flown once -- to a brain tumor conference the winter after David died. I've taken smaller trips by car with shorter stays away from home. I don't like to be away from home.

We live about 6 miles from our little, wonderful airport. When we decided, quite seriously, to move out of northern Virginia, we had to do some recon. David needed an airport that would get him everywhere he needed to go. I was skeptical about this airport. Certainly it had to be too small -- just a little puddle jumper runway with some obscure destinations. I was wrong! Our airport is served by at least four major airlines and does the trick. We do live under one of the flight paths, but it's not awful because there aren't many big jets slamming into our air space. Every time I hear a plane flying overhead, I think it's David coming home.

He flew out and in just about every week. Usually departing on a Thursday or Friday and returning on a Monday or Tuesday. Weekends were not family time in our household. That got really old. When we found ourselves with a family weekend, we sometimes tried to plan something special like a mini road trip -- but often just relished the time together here on our beautiful land in our cozy home. Since David travelled so much, travelling when he didn't have to wasn't his first choice.

I remember when my dad travelled a lot. We hated it. When we lived in New Hampshire and then, again, later when we were in Pennsylvania, my father's employer was not anywhere near where we lived, so he was away a lot. Breezewood became good news, meaning he was half-way home from DC. I don't remember much about his work when I was very young and we were living in New Hampshire but that he jokingly referred to it as our three-year vacation. I'm not sure my mother thought of it that way when she was alone with four kids in a drafty farm house in 20 below zero weather! I was too young to understand what it meant for my mother. Finally there came a time when he simply no longer had to travel. Our family life then became very sweet.

We never made it to that point with David. There was never any light at the end of the tunnel -- no prospect of the travel ceasing so that we could just be a "normal" family. There was never any true permanence on the horizon -- always transience. It's like living tenuously all the time. At least that's how I felt about it ... and I must imagine the kids did, too. The year my daughter was the drum major for the marching band, he didn't see them march even once. The one and only time he was home and could travel to a competition, it got rained-out. That was tragic. He missed so much of their lives. He really did.

David deeply regretted missing so much of our day to day living. Of course he hated to miss big events in his kids' lives; he hated to miss small events, too! But as his disease progressed, he became less cognizant of these voids. His main focus became his survival, which was marked by his ability to travel and to perform. Performing became the most important thing in his life. How do you explain that to a 16 year old and an 18 year old? Sorry, but Dad just isn't himself. He really would care if his brain allowed him to ...

There were lucid moments like the day our daughter left home for college. He managed to gather every sense and wit that he had to talk to her about how proud he was and how many hopes he had for her education and her future. He was up and about and excited the morning we left, making me pledge to give him hourly text updates on our journey northward and to stay in touch, sharing all the details of the process of her shift into adulthood. Texting was a way of life for us -- the moment to moment way that we communicated (even during Sunday School and church services that we were mutually attending, though in different towns or states). I texted and texted and texted that weekend. He never replied. His silence was alarming.

During the month in Hospice, there were moments here and there of clarity for David. One was sitting together booking a flight home for our daughter. He recalled his password and the process and was quite pleased to be bringing her home with his platinum chairman preferred whatever status with the airline. (Thank goodness he walked me through that! I used his last frequent flyer miles to get her home that Christmas and would not have been able to had he not shown me how and given me the password.) Another was the day he called me asking about the latest book I was reading. And one was the night that he emailed me from his cell phone late, late, late. It was probably after a 3:00 am ice cream sundae (you get whatever you want in Hospice -- cheerfully). In his email he asked me for cigarettes and explained that he would work on quitting very soon after he recovered, got out of there, got on an airplane, got back on the stage -- performing again. This was, perhaps, a week before he died. He absolutely refused to acknowledge anything else.

Of course his next journey was to his Creator -- his Savior. One day, sitting on the floor after he had gently fallen (trying to prove to me that he could stand) we had the most meaningful chat that we'd had in many weeks. He basically asked me where my hope was -- not quite accusing me of failing to share his hope -- his belief that he would recover. I told him that I believed that there was a place at the Table, set just for him. Then we got interrupted. That was the closest we ever got to talking about his death. He never spoke to me of his hopes for the kids and me after he died because he never accepted that he was going to die. No closure. No closure.

So, still, every time I pull-up to the arrival doors at our little airport, I see him coming through those doors, pulling his rolling suitcase with a heavy guitar and a bulky computer case over his shoulder -- tall and strong and alive -- and coming home. For some reason I don't have an image of his back, walking away from me through the departure doors. As I walk through those doors tomorrow to make my way out of town, I wonder if I'll feel like I'm walking in his footsteps. His spirit is still there. He was well-known at our little airport. But they don't know me. I'll be all alone in my musing. Alone in my journey.

I think I just figured out why I'm ambivalent regarding travel. It has historically taken those I love away from me! But tomorrow it's taking ME toward those I love. Home isn't just a place -- it's people. Now I'm going to go pack my suitcase.

Widow Brain

This morning I burned sugar on my stove. It could have been very ugly (uglier than the dark brown burned mess in my pan). I needed to fill my hummingbird feeder, so put a pan on the stove with the water and sugar which just needed to boil for two minutes to kill all the possible impurities. I ran upstairs to get a couple rolls of paper towels. That's it. I got upstairs and immediately forgot what I had been doing. I gathered some dirty clothes -- then remembered what I was up there to get. I got the paper towels -- then, holding them on my lap so I wouldn't forget to take them downstairs -- I checked email. I haven't checked email in days, so there were some items that needed attention. I gave them my attention! Who knows how many minutes passed before I headed downstairs, catching a waft of burning sugar half-way down. I hurried to the stove, imagining that the pan was boiling-over with sugar water down in the burner and under the stove top. Thankfully, that had not happened. What I found was a caramel just starting to burn -- definitely scorched. I considered adding butter! but then abandoned that idea to attend to the pan. There were no glass jars in the garbage, but I did find a paper ice cream container (the plastic yogurt container would not serve this purpose). I put it in the sink and began to pour-out that steaming, sticky substance. Though it might take some elbow grease, the pan will be okay. There was no fire. I was quite thankful. I know better than to leave the kitchen without setting the timer -- ever. Dumb!

When I tell these kinds of stories, most people commiserate -- empathize -- concurring that the aging process brings about these kinds of events more and more, but I know there's more to it. My sister calls it "widow brain." Just for fun, I googled it. (Actually, I like Yahoo, but I love the new verb.) Sure enough, the search results confirmed it. I also discovered some widow blogs that I never thought to look for before. Huh. Anyway -- it's a real thing. Most traumatic events can cause this alteration of your mental faculties -- but it just so happens that the death of your lifemate is hugely traumatic, so we've claimed and named the phenomenon.

My dad ... and my husband ... used to refer to my mind as a 'trap,' that is, once whatever got in there, it stayed. I didn't forget things. David bemoaned this fact when we had discussions (arguments). He never had a leg to stand on because I retained all the facts -- remembered everything. Every word uttered. Every action committed. He often said that I had missed my real calling -- a trial attorney. He put that in a song ...

Our society is so scared of death. We have practically disinfected the process -- insulating the living from the dead -- and yet somehow punish those who remain anyway! The very day my husband died, I was on the phone with the funeral home, making arrangements. I was visiting the funeral home the next day -- a Sunday! There are so many "urgent" decisions to make, especially if you're going to have a regular old burial. There's a rush and you're involuntarily swept-up in it when all you want to do is escape -- to sleep -- to hide. The funeral home people are very practiced at calmness and even-keeled-ness, but it's a farce. You're like cattle moving through the process. After you figure all of that out -- you have the bank accounts, the life insurance, the various accounts you shared -- investments, electric, phone -- even the garbage service. Then there's the house and the cars -- the will ... when all you want to do is rest. How can you possibly think straight with all of this going on when your heart is breaking, your memories are swarming, your children need you ... It's really a form of torture, in my humble opinion.

Ancient communities and some peoples today view mourning in a more caring and restful way. Take the widow, for example. Yes, she wears black -- so that people know she's mourning. They leave her alone! except to bring her food, take care of her home and her other responsibilities. They have no expectations of her. She has no obligations. She is permitted -- encouraged -- to rest. In some cultures, this goes on for a full year. I can't even begin to imagine such respite from the demands of the world.

We do try. I don't want to sound like I wasn't cared-for. I was -- extensively. Many, many meals were brought to my home. Hours of yard work were accomplished while I was just inside my door. Friends called on me -- checked on me. My family was constantly attentive. But some things I just had to do myself -- and there were deadlines. My lists were long. I kept a journal of all the details. This started with the specifics of David's medical care those last few months -- notes from the consultations with doctors and details about surgeries, medications and people in important places. Then I kept a record of the many gifts that were brought and sent to David and us when he was in Hospice. The journal then extended to lists of gifts that were delivered after he died -- and particulars about the business with the funeral home and the extensive planning of a Memorial Service. Finally, it held all the nitty gritty information about the overwhelming business of death. It was a huge relief to close that book for the last time.

So in the midst of all of that minutiae and grief, with your brain and your heart in high gear, it is quite understandable that you forget things. And I did. I still do. For someone who never forgot anything, this drove me nuts. Someone could stand right in front of me and tell me what I had said I would do or what I had already done and I would have no memory of it whatsoever. It was like I had had my memory wiped, like a bad sci-fi movie (or a vampire show;-). Widow Brain. It's a thing.

I'm the first to admit that I don't mind being insulated from death. I've dealt with a lot of it -- but not very up-close and personally. I was not with my mother when she died; the last time I saw her she was unconscious and still on a heart-lung machine. Neither was I with my grandparents nor my father. My parents were cremated, as well, so there were no viewings ("visitations") -- no funeral processions, pall bearers or graveside services. But I think it might be a mistake for our society to treat death with such distance -- with gloves. A Mumford & Sons song talks about being "washed and buried." I know that Amish mothers wash their children for burial. That seems so tragic and yet so unbelievably tender all at once. When did we become so separated from this basic part of life? Death.

The next thing I'm going to write about may just be too personal to share. If it's still here when I publish this post, it's still here. David's ashes were stored at the funeral home. Of course, I was assured by the soft-spoken funeral director, they were at an off-site storage location -- not in the funeral home proper. Okay. I have a picture in my mind of metal storage shelving in a bleak storage room containing a vast variety of urns and black milk jugs. I sure hope they have them labeled. I digress.

At the time of his death, I was uncomfortable bringing his ashes home. One child wasn't crazy about the idea; the other didn't care. I erred on the side of caution on this one because I wasn't sure, either.

Anyway, I knew that David had indicated a desire to be interred in a specific place. I wanted to honor this, so we made arrangements to do so. This meant that I had to transport his ashes. This meant I had to go back to the funeral home to get them. I had to walk back through those doors, be seated behind sliding wood doors on a brocade sofa to wait, and handle that which made me so unsettled. My daughter had come along. I encouraged her to stay in the car if she preferred, but she came on inside with me. Lurch met us at the front door, which jingled with a bell when we opened it. I don't mean to be flip or unkind, but he really resembled Lurch -- tall, stooped and in a dark suit -- and rather behaved like him, too. All very serious and stoic. I almost got the giggles. I had called ahead so they could retrieve the container for the thing contained from the sensibly off-site location. It was in a large, faux leather zipper pouch with the funeral home name on it. Actually, I was really pleased with this. The creep factor was pretty low. When we got to the car I wept. This was an enormously emotional and difficult act for me. I think my daughter was both dismayed and moved by my response. I apologized. I slipped the pouch under my car seat and suggested that we take Dad for a road trip. He would have liked that.

If death were more of an "everyday" thing for we Americans, would this have been such a difficult event for me? I don't know. Is it reverence? or is it fear? or distaste? Maybe a combination. Death isn't meant to be "neat and tidy," but we try to make it so. Death is naked and in your face -- and it permanently changes our lives. It makes us addle-minded from the immense loss -- the sorrow -- the trauma. We are changed forever by it.

Should we turn away from facing that? Should we be forced to get back into life -- be kept busy with all that busy-ness that death brings upon us? Or should we be allowed to rest -- rest our hearts, our souls, our bodies -- and yes, our minds. If we were granted that avenue for comfort and peace, would "widow brain" be a thing? I wonder.

Beloved

I think this is a rather old-fashioned sounding word ... beloved, especially if you pronounce it with three syllables: bi-luv-id. I really like the way it sounds, the way it rolls off of the tongue, what it means and how it's been used in my life.

Beloved means to be dearly loved -- or to be someone who is dearly loved. Everyone should be someone's beloved. I have many beloveds -- and I am beloved to quite a few people -- at least that's what they've told me through their words and their actions. There's nothing quite like the feeling of knowing that you are beloved.

I received a wonderful letter from my daughter today. She made me feel WHOLLY beloved. She expressed a reciprocal sentiment as she wrote, "You're still the only one in the entire world who loves me as I am, and that's all." And I do. God does, too. (She knows that, but she was talking about me.) Chocolate-covered strawberries from my son and love-laden words from my daughter. How well cared-for am I ?!




Most of the time, I use the word as something sacred. Of God. Holy. Beloved. Dearly loved by God. Wow.

Every single day that David walked our kids to the bus stop, he reminded them that they were Beloved Children of God. I'm pluralizing it here. I don't think he did that. He spoke to each one individually: "You are a Beloved Child of God." I said more everyday things like, "Be smart! Be safe! You may not be unkind, but you don't have to endure unkindness!" Stuff like that. He trusted me to cover lunches and general manners and mores -- and I trusted him to remind them of who they were. It was good tag-teaming. I don't think that he ever wrote a song entitled, "Beloved." That actually surprises me. He probably has lyrics somewhere, though -- but a search to find them would be exhausting, if you recall the stretch of song journals through which I would have to leaf. I wonder why something so basic to him did not find its way to a song. Or am I forgetting one?

Being a Beloved Child of God came up in the discussion during my book group last evening. We were reflecting on "paying attention" and celebrating the flesh part of spirituality -- "the practice of wearing skin." Of course in a room full of women, the conversation turned to body image. Most of us are mothers well into and beyond our 40's. It was heartening to hear that most of us had come to terms with loving the bodies that we are residing in right now -- today -- even as we struggle with the discipline of exercise and eating right in our busy, distracted lives (such that we don't pay attention to the the world around us like we might if we were more mindful). The majority of women in the group are Christian women -- with at least an elementary idea of what it means to "love self," so I bet that was a big part of this broad acceptance of ourselves. Beloved of God. Love self. Of course, as the saying goes, perhaps God loves us too much for us NOT to change! I know I need to exercise more. I surely could improve the state of this temple which houses my beloved soul. I surely want to. But unless and until I do that, I am still beloved. That is comforting.

... back to the bus stop ... I wonder if those words each morning comforted our children. "You are beloved." God loves you dearly. Did they forget the words the moment they were uttered? Did they keep them in their thoughts as they ascended the big steps up into the bus? Did they let them float away as they joined their peers and chatted on the way to school? How about throughout the day? Did those words help them to make choices in how they treated other kids? How they related to their teachers? How they took care of themselves? I've never asked! I think I will!

How do we adults perceive such lovely truth? Is it truth for you? Do you believe you are beloved? Are you treated as though you are? Do you know such love through worship or Scripture? Do you regard others as being beloved?

Another topic of last night's discussion was about paying attention -- I liken part of the conversation to the idea of "walking a mile in someone else's moccasins." Sometimes it's a tough pill to swallow -- giving someone the benefit of the doubt -- offering undeserved grace, especially if they're rude or nasty! Slow drivers get me all riled-up. Sometimes I pretend that the aggravating driver that I'm following at 5 mph under the speed limit is my mother, good and old! I can actually become thankful for "her" forcing me to slow in my journey so I can become more mindful and more thankful. That usually calms me down. Paying attention -- walking in someone else's imaginary shoes -- extending grace. Believing deep-down that they, too, are a Beloved Child of God. It can stop you in your tracks -- slow your heartbeat and your breathing. Bring you peace.

Who is beloved to you? Just one or two people? Do you love your neighbor; love your enemies? All of them ... beloved. Do you have a hard time loving self? My sister reminded me of this again today -- she's a great subscriber to self-examination, but also to the healing self-forgiveness that you can find through that journey. Can you welcome-in the belovedness of you?

David gave me a little art piece years ago -- It's just a 6" square lavendery-blue thing that I keep right beside my kitchen sink, on which are printed words penned by Maya Angelou: "I'm convinced that I am a child of God. That's wonderful, exhilarating, liberating, full of promise!" I see those words each and every day so he is constantly reminding me, too. Thanks, David.

The kids and I struggled with what words to have engraved on the urn that holds his ashes. We considered "Living Forever," and "Loving the Time." Also other phrases from his songs -- words that were very important to him. Then it just came to us -- perfect in its simplicity:

David M. Bailey, A Beloved Child of God

David ... Hebrew for beloved.

Go figure.

Crashing the Widowers' Breakfast

I'm not really a group kind of person. I half-heartedly sought a caregiver's support group when David was at his most ill, but was still stunned to discover very little in the way of this kind of organized group -- especially in a major medical center like the one in which he was under care. He would have eschewed any support group for himself -- after all, HE was the "face" of brain cancer survival. (Honestly and very sadly, I think he truly believed that to die was to fail everyone who looked to him for hope and courage.) But I, the care package, was interested in meeting others who were going through what I was going through. Still, to this day, I have never met anyone who has cared for a loved one through to the very bitter, ugly end of brain cancer. Many loved ones die from side-effects of the disease or of the treatment. I know there are some of us out there, but I don't know them. This makes me feel very isolated.

My sister is, for simplicity, a "war widow." She has an enormous network of like-experienced women -- many of whom have become dear friends. Though I certainly don't envy her tragic life event, I do envy her support system a good bit. She, too, has a loving church and many close friends, but her "widow friends" have insider knowledge, so they offer a unique empathy to each other. I "watched" her, from the great distance between us, with these special women. I have met just a few of them; I grieved with some of them graveside, but mostly she speaks of them: how they've blessed her, basically become like family to her, bolstered her as she loved and bolstered them. I sensed real beauty flourish out of great sorrow. But I couldn't even find an organized group of caregivers in a major cancer center, let alone brain tumor caregivers.

After David died, I attended a drop-in bereavement session. A dear friend accompanied me, as her father had died not too long before that. It was a very small group -- maybe one other "mourner" and the Bereavement Counselor. Not to sound haughty or anything, but I had more to offer than I had to gain. I mean, I'd been through this grief process before -- numerous times. I left feeling not just the same, but actually like something had been taken from me. It's not their fault -- it's just the way it was. I remember asking about young widow groups (yes, I still consider my self a young widow ;-) and was disappointed to learn that there really weren't any! There was a Men's Breakfast bereavement group. I thought, Cool! but men don't relate like women. Do they really talk and share their feelings? I hope they do! but womenfolk are the talkers -- the sharers -- the feelers. Women in grief needed a group! but there was none. Again. No group.

I tried again. Family Bereavement Sessions -- seven weeks' worth. I took my son, like a good mom. He didn't fight me on this and that perplexed me, but I didn't question it for fear that he might change his mind. We just went. We went to each and every session. Again, I felt like I offered more than I gained, but I expected that so it wasn't a surprise. There were only two other adults who had lost spouses -- one other woman and one man. They were both about my age, but we didn't have a connection. The other adults had lost parents or siblings -- that kind of grief is very different. I could not relate to the loss of a sister (thank you, God) but, of course, could closely relate to losing a parent. Well, two parents. Still, I hoped that my son might be finding an outlet for his own "stuff." I'm not sure that he did or that he did not. He claims he just went so I could get some support. Whether or not that's true, it's still so tender that I'll leave that one alone, too. We came out the other side not the worst for wear. All along, I felt remorse that my daughter was unable to experience this with us because I knew she was struggling so far away at school -- but knew that she had family and loving professors, the entire chapel staff! and a good church loving her right where she was.

A woman, whose husband also had a GBM and had been at the rehab hospital with David four or five months prior to his death, reached out to me. Her husband had also died. Many months later, we finally got together for lunch. I was really hoping that we would have closely-shared experiences, but her husband had also succumbed to something other than the brain cancer. I could relate to her deeply -- but ultimately, I still felt alone. Death from brain cancer is probably as variable as life with brain cancer, so nobody's story will be just like mine. I know that. Henry said that David would probably begin to sleep more than be awake. He would begin to eat and drink less and less. That the sleep would become unconsciousness and, therefore, shield him from pain. This was not how David died. He always was a square peg. Na -- something way more complicated and geometric with NO chance of fitting into ANY hole. He made that cancer work for it. He took it to the very end, as always, beating any odds. The day before he died, he was up in the wheelchair and we were downstairs in the kitchen at the Hospice House having lunch. Then incredible pain, fever and nausea took over. It was not gentle like a long, peaceful sleep. Is anybody out there who has lived through this? I'd like to talk to you.

The war widows have their own traumatic story, of which I am somewhat familiar. I'm going to have lunch with a few next week -- and I'm very much looking forward to hearing the songs of their hearts. We all know tragic death and the logistics of being widowed, but I don't understand fully the horribleness of what they know -- sudden, unexpected death; just as they don't understand what it means to witness a long, drawn-out illness robbing one's life. I will still tap into their wisdom and spirit and I will share mine with them.

But I continue to hunger for fellowship with others who know what I know. I wonder if some of the men who frequent the "men's breakfast" bereavement group share my experience. I really have considered dropping-in on them to find out. I wonder how that would turn out ... Then I am nagged by a thought that maybe I should start a "women's breakfast" bereavement group -- or lunch or tea time -- (something that wouldn't require a pre 8:30 am waking time?) instead of bemoaning the fact that one isn't already in place for me. Yeh, two years ago, it would have been a gift to have one in place. Today, am I "strong enough" to undertake the planning and implementation of this? Should I? These are questions to tumble back and forth in my mind and heart. Maybe it's time.

Today is my birthday.

Today I turned 48 years old. I think this is quite an accomplishment. I have officially out-lived my mother. I have a 20 year old daughter and an 18 year old son, so I'm not really that old, right? I was barely 46 when my husband died. He was 44. We had been married for 23 years -- half of my life. These statistics are somewhat startling.

Really, it's been more like a birthday week. I've had no fewer than 3 birthday lunches and two birthday dinners. I have a table-ful of gifts that keeps growing! I am nearly overwhelmed by the lovin'. Truly. How blessed can one person be!? Can you say that you've been sung "Happy Birthday to You" in Italian -- twice! (surrounded by formidable church ladies)? I can say that! See? I am blessed! I've been remembered by my family, sweet friends and loving neighbors. Today I got a wonderful pedicure, making an "Altar in the World" of the massaging chair and attention to my feet (a reference to a book I'm reading by Barbara Brown Taylor. Yes, I'm reading a book). Even the sweet servers at my favorite Mexican restaurant catered to me -- I got a hug AND a kiss -- a piece of tres leches cake! and they played "Las Mananitas" for me -- their version of "Happy Birthday."

A crowning glory of my day was the attempted delivery of some wonderfulness from my son. I have no idea what it was supposed to be other than it could have some chocolate in it. I was not here to accept the delivery; the deliveryman waited and waited but was not permitted to leave this special thing on my porch bench. I have NO idea what it is and I am crushed that his loving gift was not successfully transferred to me. He had no idea that I would be out and about getting my toes done! Of course he assumed that I would be home -- but I wasn't and now I feel terrible. But my heart does skip a beat knowing that he did something truly special to honor my day. I love you.

Birthdays are difficult for me. Few of my loved ones have birthdays much past the 50 year mark. Last year I was was harshly impacted by the fact that I had become the age my mother was when she died. She lived just 12 short days beyond her 47th birthday, so I actually out-lived her a long time ago -- but the actual age has an impact on your psyche. Married half my life, but never any longer than 23 years. Good grief. The Fleet Foxes have a song that resonates a little with this concept. They sing "So now I am older than my mother and father when they had their daughter. Now what does that say about me?" He's talking about something different -- bemoaning the fact that he hasn't found true love yet -- but I sort of get it. I've out-lived my mother -- been married half of my short life ... I know it's a loose parallel, but I still relate to it when I hear it and I sing along!

Do the special people in my life know that I struggle with this? Is that why they really go all-out? Maybe last year ... but this year, too? Why so much attention!? Do you know me that well -- love me that beautifully -- to know that each year is almost punishment? That sounds so dumb! Each year is a gift! My children need me to hang in there -- to be healthy and live a nice long life. Why do birthdays seem punishing to me? I just don't know. Maybe next year will be different.

My 46th birthday occurred while David was in Hospice. It really was a gentle couple days. I remember the day before my birthday. Some friends had come to take me out for a birthday lunch. We were settled-in at the Tea Bazaar, not a long walk from David -- having a unique lunch and some needed fellowship and rest. My phone rang. It was David calling. Though in my normal life, this was not such an unusual thing -- THIS call was unusual and unexpected and very sweet. He had not been able to use his phone or speak with anyone on the phone for several weeks -- but there he was -- calling me ... like it was any other day. At first I was a little scared. Was he okay? But he was. He simply asked me what book I had been reading ... and did I have the next in the series. I answered him and he said good-bye. It was very comforting and unsettling all wrapped-up in one. At the time, it didn't really occur to me what that call was all about because he was sort of random those days. However, the following day -- my birthday -- I arrived at the house to discover a huge, bright and beautiful pot of yellow mums and a birthday gift from David. He had "gotten" me the latest book in the Kathy Reichs "Bones" series. He was quite pleased with himself. Perfect gifts. (I think that was the last book I read until the "Hunger Games.") And, though I planted that mum right outside my front door, it did not survive. This is a great sadness for me.

David died ten days later.

Remember ... I found a page in his journal -- written to me on that birthday. It's very private and precious, but I will share a little of it with you. He wrote, "... and each day I thank God for the day you were born and decided to hang your head on my shoulder and allow me to do the same. ... Yes, it has been an adventure, much as you are an adventure and today I celebrate another year of that adventure along with all those who know and love you ... Growing old together? So far, so good."

You see -- though he was a big dreamer, my only dream was to grow old with him. He was able to recall that and write about it with hope on my birthday.

I am now home for the night. All three of my sisters called -- with resounding "Happy Birthdays" sung to me followed by birthday chats. I will have a bowl of my special birthday ice cream (thank you :-) and read a little to catch-up with my book group.

Uncleaving ... is a good bit more difficult than it sounds. But thank God for all the birthday lovin', the "care packages" and containers for the things contained this week. Mercy wins tonight.

Care Packages

I skyped with my daughter today. It was a lovely, long conversation. I admitted that I hadn't written her a letter lately -- then she made a special request. She asked me to mail her one of her favorite things in the world: candy corn. I'm generally a good care package sender. She and her roomies get fun stuff from me for holidays and sometimes I just randomly send a box with her favorite tea, an urban outfitters catalog and new pair of socks or something. I almost always include some kind of candy. However, the last package I mailed to her down under cost me 25 bucks! so I sort of paused, contemplating the weight of candy corn. Of course I'll send her some, but maybe just one bag!

Care packages come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. My kitchen table is currently covered with gift bags and mailing boxes (yet unopened -- it's been a long day) and it isn't even my birthday yet. Each person who has gifted me took time and care to choose, wrap and even mail a special something just for me. I feel so undeserving of all of this attention! I am so well cared-for.

Care is a very broad concept. There are a bunch of noun definitions, but I want to ponder the verb definitions -- and they are complex! so I have omitted a few: care [kair] verb, used without object 1. to be concerned or solicitous; have thought or regard. 2. to make provision or look out. 3. to have an inclination, liking, fondness, or affection. And then verb, used with object 1. To feel concern about.

I think some of these can be combined to be more meaningful. To be concerned about something or someone is to care about something or someone. It's more of an emotion or feeling. I know that plenty of people have been concerned about me and expressed that care over the last few years, in particular. They let me know that they care through various means, but I get the message and I am comforted by their care. The second definition is more about how you show that care. Because so many wonderful people have made provisions of care for me, I believe they may have taken a liking to me -- or feel fondness or affection for me, and that is comforting (like a nice pair of socks).

Caregiving is a variation on this theme. care·giv·er [kair-giv-er] noun 1. a person who cares for someone who is sick or disabled. 2. an adult who cares for an infant or child. Most of us are caregivers -- or have been caregivers at some point -- or will be some day. I have been a caregiver on and off for about 29 years. When my mother died, I was 19 -- right on the cusp of teen and young adult. According to my handy-dandy Motherless Daughters book, that means I share all the effects of losing my mother from both categories. Great. One of the consequences is having to care for the remaining parent (in some capacity) and any younger siblings. Yep. I became the cook and the head-housekeeper care package overnight. Though my grandmother did live with us some of the time, a lot of the household stuff lay squarely in my lap. I had two younger sisters -- one just finishing high school and one still in elementary school. I had almost finished my second year of college and wasn't really equipped to take on this responsibility, but it was mine, nonetheless.

When I was 27 -- just 8 years later -- I had my first child and became a caregiver of my own choosing. Then I had a second baby not quite two years after that. Lots of caring going on! They certainly were objects of my thought and concern -- I made provisions for their keeping -- and I was quite fond of them, and still am. (They continue to be objects of my deepest affection, so the candy corn will be dispatched!) And I physically took care of them -- bathed, clothed, fed and taught. I loved them.

When David was first diagnosed, he needed different kinds of "care." First I had to call an ambulance to take him to the hospital. Then I had to make the decision of where to have them life-flight him for emergency surgery. Then I had to confer with the surgeon and give my consent for brain surgery. After that, I gave great regard to his continued treatment -- along side of him helping to make decisions for treatment options and doctors. I was very mindful of his emotional needs and, when he needed it the most, I knew when to hand him his guitar. (He didn't know if the surgery or tumor had left him with a deficit making it impossible to play, but we had to find out.) All the while, I had to find the balance between what he required in care, what he wanted in care and what care would be "too much." He was still a very independent, proud guy and having to be chaperoned around by anyone, including your wife, can be hard to swallow. I think we figured it out pretty well.

Another form of a care package is medical folk. It's important that the package in which your care is delivered is a good one. One of the nurses that discharged him after his first surgery wasn't such a good one. She crushed my spirit by basically telling me he was a dead man walking -- to let him do whatever made him happy and to get his affairs in order. Her negativity and insensitivity made it into a line in one of his survivor anthems, Live Forever.  His radiation oncologist, on the other hand, shared hope with us. We actually introduced him to David's neuro-oncologist and they established a professional relationship. We found that neuro-oncologist by searching a virtual [clinical] trial website and making a cold-call to a North Carolina number. When Henry actually returned our call himself -- at 10:00 on a Friday night -- and told David he was too young to die, we were delivered an important package of David's care. [If anyone is in need of this information, just leave a comment and I will be happy to help you with resources.]

David ultimately had about 11 pretty healthy and relatively uneventful years. He did undergo multiple surgeries, chemo therapies and nuclear medicine within the first year out of diagnosis, but, aside from peripheral vision loss, he led a full life. He travelled extensively and independently. He wrote and recorded and performed. Caregiving rather lessened to rides to and from airports, some help folding shirts for the suitcase and being the support staff -- in addition to everyday stuff like food and laundry and wifey attention. It was the last two years of his life that the role of caregiver took-on a whole new meaning.

When the recurrence happened, the tumor was in a different area than his first two. All along, we knew that a GBM was a tricky, sneaky, mean-spirited bastard, but after 12 years of remission, this was a bit of a surprise for everyone, including Henry. The chemos this time around were much harder on him -- they were newer and he was older. The side-effects were maddening and heartbreaking. Concomitant to the physical side-effects were mental changes -- cognitive and mood. When he experienced yet another recurrence in yet another area of his brain, he became very dependent physically, but he adamantly and, yes, courageously, defied it. Taking care of David became pretty challenging -- and there was nobody to take care of me.

One of the most comprehensive care packages (meeting every definition of "care" and "caregiver" above) that I have had the honor to experience is Hospice. As David lay in the hospital, unable to stand or walk -- and unable to understand these things, I was faced with a very important decision. Do I contract a medical equipment company to bring a hospital bed to my home, clearing out the furniture in the back room of the house and hire in-home nursing care? Would insurance pay for that? There was no way I could possibly lift him. If he were to try to stand and fall, I would have to call the ambulance to come and help me. He could be injured. His doctors told me he probably had between 2 and 6 weeks to live. The social worker offered to work with me finding a nursing home. A nursing home -- for my proud, young, amazing husband? He would be so humiliated. They wanted $11,000 up front, too. The social worker also offered to help me figure out how to go bankrupt so we could qualify for medicaid or something. The Palliative Care floor in the hospital said no. What?! Then my caregiving pastor suggested the Hospice House. It is a beautiful, historic home with only about 7 beds. I couldn't imagine that he could get a bed on such short notice. They had a full house and a waiting list. But he did. I had texted everyone in my phone to pray for this -- and almost immediately, they called offering David a room.

Maybe some other time I will write about these last few weeks, but for now, I will simply end by saying that this last decision assured that David was very well cared-for at the Hospice House. And they cared for me, too. I had many caregivers -- bringing food, praying, sending those cards and letters and gifts -- calling and visiting. I could give David that wifey care -- and give my kids that mother care -- because of these many special people. Still, nearly two years later, I have this table full of gifts and will have had about four or five birthday lunches and dinners before the week is out. I love my care packages very much and thank God daily for each and every one of them. I'll be standing at my island writing thank you notes again -- knowing their loving care through provisions of gifts, food and words -- their regard for me -- and their fondness and affection.

The least I can do is mail a bag -- or two -- of candy corn to my sweet daughter, no matter the cost. My son and his roomie will certainly receive a care package, as well.

A Container for the Thing Contained

I like boxes and bags. So did my husband. So does my daughter. Not sure about my son.

I am possibly a Level 1 Hoarder in terms of cool wooden boxes, antique suitcases, jewelry boxes and baskets. I have pretty stationery boxes and recipe boxes -- sewing boxes and knitting baskets. I also like purses, tote bags, backpacks and duffle bags. David did, too. He collected boxes from all over the world -- from tiny brass gem containers to hand-carved hinged boxes with in-laid ivory or mother of pearl -- to wooden cigar boxes. He also enjoyed cases for things -- cameras, little parts for sound systems and recording devices, laptops and even pills. In our closet alone, we have three leather backpacks, two leather duffles, and an assortment of other luggage-type containers. We have extra guitar cases in our attic, freed-up by the indestructible travel cases that he used on airplanes. We have extra rolling bags that came inside the larger suitcases that he procured to replace luggage destroyed by the airline baggage handlers. Since no doorways or exits in our home are obscured by these things -- we remain at Level 1. phew

My dad also enjoyed such stuff. He's the one who coined the phrase, "A container for the thing contained." (or what that Aristotle?) In other words, whatever it is, it has utility if you assign it utility! Pragmatism was one of his strong points. He also subscribed to the philosophy that everyone needed a good rationalization now and then (ie, every day). He liked brief cases and camera cases -- fishing creels and fishing vests with lots of pockets for stuff. He wasn't much of a hoarder, though.

Our daughter just loves containers. She has stacks and stacks of graduated boxes and vintage suitcases in her room -- very artfully organized and very resourcefully used. Beads in some; jewelry in others. Go larger and we have scarves, sweaters, bulkier oil paints and brushes. She uses vases for knitting needles and mason jars for buttons. (She gets that from me.) When she was very young, she always had a bag. Whether it was a purse or a fanny pack or a little tote bag or backpack -- she always had a bag. She always had a collection of stuff inside it that she would carry around with her everywhere. After a few days or weeks, I would carefully unload it -- put stuff away -- so she could begin again her methodical collecting of each day's treasured items -- except for her "China Book." I never removed that. It was her journal. She kept a journal from about the age of 3 on. She still does. And she still always carries a bag, in which you will find at least one. She has a growing assortment of both and she will not desist in the acquisition there of! (She gets that from her father.) A journal is a container for your thoughts and feelings.

Our son seems to be free of the curse. He doesn't have strange (but sometimes wonderful) attachments to very many things, including containers for the thing contained. I MAKE him use those plastic organizer drawers for guitar strings, 1/4" jacks, string winders and power adaptors. He has acquiesced for the most part, but aside from some hand-made pottery pieces on his dresser top and a few little boxes that his dad gave to him, not so much. Of course the opposite can be a problem -- with no container for stuff, the kitchen table, the end table, the coffee table, the stairs, the trunk of the car, the back seat of the car, etc. become the "container." He's a little spread-out. He needs to contain some of his stuff! However, he does keep a couple song journals. He guards them carefully -- they are very private. Just like he is.

David was, perhaps, the most prolific writer I have ever known. He has scores and scores of journals -- from diaries to travel tales to songs. I keep finding them in strange places and adding them to a shelf. This is only a small segment of the stretch of his writing. He liked those marble composition books for songs and, early-on in his adult life, he kept them very well-organized -- numbered and even copied in case he was to lose one of them. I panicked when I couldn't find those first journals, for those are the ones that contain some of his most profound songwriting, but I did locate them on the floor back in the corner of his closet.

The last few weeks of his life he really couldn't write -- cognitively. I always kept a journal right at-hand with a pen and a book -- he was a reader, too. He would hold the pen and open the journal and maybe write a word or two -- but generally not. I was most thankful that neither did he understand what that meant, so it didn't hurt his heart. After we brought his things home from the Hospice House, I found this last journal in his bag. I don't know why, but I opened it. Page after page of nothing ... then all of a sudden, a full page of writing. I figured it was old, but he had dated it. One very lucid day -- my birthday -- he wrote a whole page to me. I can't begin to express to you what a gift that is. I keep it in my bedside table drawer, which contains my most precious treasures. David's head and his soul were great big containers for words and poetry and music and faith. He bubbled-over with substance and wrote it down and recorded it so that we can visit it over and over again. I'm thankful for the media container called the CD, too!

When I consider myself to be a container, it gets a little weird. [weird - [weerd] Adj. 1. involving or suggesting the supernatural; unearthly or uncanny; 2. fantastic; bizarre.]

I am carrying around so much stuff! The last few days and the next few days I'm experiencing a lot of thankfulness and appreciation because of lots of time with and attention from friends. I've been so busy at work, that I've been a bit frustrated. I miss my kids very much -- I got a little sad when I read an email from my daughter today. I was angry that the post office is making me bring a package in so they can ask me if there is anything flammable in it because it's over 13 oz. -- they wouldn't mail my stamped package, so I feel regret that my son's guitar cords will not get to him this week. I am lonely when I'm not busy. I am overwhelmed with undone paperwork. I am grieving the death of my husband. I fear aging. Wow. I have a large capacity for stuff!

The act of writing is sort of like a spigot -- releasing some of this accumulated cargo that really has no place "inside" me anymore (not unlike the random contents of my toddler's backpack). My mind is brimming over its capacity with thoughts and memories; add to those day-to-day appointments and promises and it's plainly overflowing and I become ineffective! I joke about needing a pensieve (a la Professor Dumbledore) to remove some of those mental bits and pieces and store them where I can access them at a later date. Of course, that's really just a note pad and a calendar :-) I wrote a journal for the first month or two after David died. Somewhere along the way I just quit. Maybe writing those 100's of thank you notes replaced the journal -- I mean writing is writing, right? Before he died, I sent regular email updates to family, friends and prayer chains, so I have a record of the weeks and months leading up to his death. But from the time the thank yous were complete to just a couple weeks ago, I had been storing it all inside of me.

Some memories are really difficult and I have to shut them down. Sometimes I permit a painful memory to blanket me -- I deal with the emotions, whatever they are at the time -- and tuck it away again. Some of these things I will never write about -- not for others, anyway. But I'm grateful for this forum to share some of them with you. Thank you for reading the contents of this container for these things contained.

Doing the Dishes ...

Is it just me? or is doing the dishes a major accomplishment for anyone else? I hate to do the dishes. It's my mother's fault.

Poor Mother -- she can't defend herself -- but she had the right idea. I don't have many memories of her doing the dishes. She cooked -- almost exclusively. We helped some; we baked with her and always had a lot of fun while learning the necessary skills to take forward with us in life ... but other than maybe a few pots and pans -- no, she didn't do the dishes. My sisters may have alternative memories to mine.

Imagine, if you will, a scrawny 8 year old, who can barely reach the sink, on the dishes rotation schedule. I was 10. Our big sis was 15. (She liked to "trade" (skip) because she had a boyfriend and had a lot of dates. We resented her for that. We got landed with the dishes. I usually had to wash when the elder sister was out and about because our younger sister could pretty much barely reach the drainer (unless she stood on a chair). She dried. She hated drying, but I hated it, too. Drying was double-duty -- the drying part AND the putting away, which is the worst part. I washed. The baby, 3 years old, did not have to take a turn. (She claims we pushed her off of the back of the toboggan, but that simply isn't true! And she didn't have to do the dishes, either.)

When I was 10, we lived in a really, really old farm house in New Hampshire. Living in the farm house must have been somewhat akin to what my mother grew up with, with the crucial addition of a bathroom. I would daydream about what life had been like when the house was young -- sort of like pioneering. The fireplace was in the kitchen and was huge -- with a great, high hearth. We actually needed a fire for warmth in that drafty house. It was New Hampshire -- not Virginia; winters were COLD. The kitchen was also the largest room in the house. The back door was not lockable -- and was only about a half-inch thick with old-time latches. (Our clever little black siamese cats figured out how to reach up, press down on the thumb latch, and let themselves in.) Across from that back door was a summer kitchen. We never used that ...

Anyway! The stove was an old thing -- hooked up to a propane tank. We had a good supply of Ohio Blue-tip matches with which to start the burners and the oven. You could strike the matches right on the burners themselves then turn on the gas.
Photo by gawain.membrane.com

Lighting that old oven was an adventure; you sort of took your life into your own hands when doing it. We'd strike the match (sometimes on our jeans zippers -- that was cool), lay it just over the flameless pilot light hole, quickly turn on the gas and jump back! BOOM! The oven would light. You could then "safely" get close enough to shut the oven door, without losing any eyebrows, and adjust the temperature. Surprisingly, that oven baked really evenly, though! We made good bread in that old oven.

Picture by blackdogsalvage.blogspot.com

The sink was at least as old as the stove -- possibly older. When we moved-in, we all took note: No dishwasher. Hmmmmm. There was an old porcelain sink with just one bowl and, where the other bowl might have been, a "drainboard." The sink stood alone, so there were no counters on either end and there was no cabinet underneath it. It was a naked, ugly old thing. And it became the bane of our existence. Up went the dishes chart on the door to the dining room. Of course it was designed to be on a rotating basis -- with every third night a night-off. Those nights were coveted. I'm not sure, but I don't think our mother was on the rotation. My current supposition is that when she was a kid, she, too, had to do the dishes. She probably hated it as much as we did -- maybe more, if she had to heat water on a stove that was wood-burning or something really difficult like that!

I don't remember much more about doing dishes until our last family home. By then, it was the norm. The daughters did the dishes. Again, I'm not so sure the baby was in the rotation (she never had to push mow the lawn, either -- and when the rest of us got married and moved-out, our dad got her a riding mower. If you sense bitterness, then you're correct. But only mild bitterness. Really just amusement.

So why do I struggle over the dishes?! In our first home after we got married, we didn't have a dishwasher, either. Newlywed 20-somethings. David was going to school every day; I was going to work. We'd get home, tired, like everyone else -- manage to make some awful, quick & dirty supper -- and then do stuff like golfing or playing tennis or a movie. We didn't make doing the dishes a habit. Eventually, one of us would cave and do the dishes. It was always considered to be a real gift -- an act of unconditional love. How dumb were we!? We could have had a relationship through the dishes. (David's parents do now. She washes; he dries. It's really quite a harmonious, loving thing.) Our next home was a ground floor cave of an apartment. We were commuting into DC, so getting up ridiculously early and getting home late -- eating Domino's and Rice-a-Roni. Ugh. We had an ineffective dishwasher in a kitchen so small we never spent any time in there. We hardly made any dirty dishes.

Then we moved to our first real home -- the house where we started our family. It had a great kitchen (with a dishwasher). We were growing-up -- I was cooking for real. David cleared the table; I did the dishes. I got good at it, doing the dishes right away. I actually was a good housekeeper when our kids were babies. It was following David's diagnosis that I seemed to lose that homemaking edge, though I still got those dishes done. It's really just been in the past few years that I come downstairs in the morning to find dishes in the sink and on the counter (often due to an unloaded dishwasher) and some days I leave the house without handling that! Late afternoon dishes-doing has become a strange norm. The idea of unloading the dishwasher (or the drainer, usually stacked so high with dishes that it's an acrobatic act) can overwhelm me. Isn't that silly!?

But is it? I do remember the first few years after we started the brain cancer rollercoaster when I could make sure David got to all of his medical appointments, get the kids to school, get the laundry done, get the dishes done -- but the insurance paperwork always almost took me over the edge. There were so many explanations of benefits that the stack was over 3" thick. It just tipped my scale.

I think that's what happened with the dishes this go-'round. David had so many surgeries -- then chemo and follow-ups. In and among all of these appointments he was still working some, so there was safety in travel to consider and the coping with decreased income. Lots and lots of worry -- anxiety and stress. For years I had never left dishes in the sink, but I began to put-off doing them. It was so exhausting just getting through each day that I really just needed to rest in the evenings. Life really had no normalcy -- no routine. I think the undone dishes were a manifestation of the disruption of our lives. Nothing was okay about what was going on. Each day was a struggle -- for him to physically prevail, for me to mentally prevail, and for all of us to emotionally survive. And I never established dishes duty rotation for my kids. Fail!

So now, nearly two years into my widowdom when there's just me in the house -- why are there still undone dishes? Surprisingly, I am very busy. I'm no morning person, so I don't get up earlier in the morning than I absolutely have to. I get up, get ready for work or whatever is on my schedule and I go and do that. I don't make time for dishes, laundry, cleaning -- This is a bad habit! Most of the time, I do my dishes right after I use them. It's the unloaded dishwasher that becomes an obstacle. It's the little "normal" things that sometimes become too much to bear. If you have never experienced a true trial or tribution that rocks your world, you may not have any concept of what I mean.

When you've experienced so much trauma -- have lived day to day on such heightened adrenalin and mental fortitude that you aren't even aware of it -- and it all comes to an end, you tend to crash. I crashed. Sort of. (Remember -- resilience. Utility follows after a while ...) A close friend compared my reality after David's death to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Yes, I believe that -- but I also believe that it could have been worse. I might have never gotten out of bed -- might have crawled into a hole and stayed there, but I didn't. I continued to raise my kids, go to work, see my friends, worship and serve the church ... but my housekeeping suffered. I did the big things, but the basics tipped my scale. A dirty bathroom, a sinkful of dishes or a dusty bedroom could make me weepy. Had my mother been living, maybe she would have come and done my dishes, folded my laundry and dusted my dresser, but she couldn't do that -- so it was okay to let some of these things just go.

I'm still working through my recovery. Like picking up a book and actually reading it -- like getting up off of the sofa and writing this blog -- and I do believe that one day very soon getting the dishes done won't be such a trying dang event! I am putting my relationships ahead of clean dishes. Downtime and rest take precedence over a tidy kitchen. Writing is a time-consuming, albeit healing, activity. Dishes keep getting knocked down the totem pole, as they should!

Or maybe I'm just plain old lazy. <groan>

Socks

photo by Terri Royea

An accomplishment of which I am most proud is my ability to knit socks. I love socks. My feet are often cold, so socks are a requirement. They have to be comfy, of course -- fit well. They can't be itchy or saggy. The perfect sock is a real treasure, especially if it's visually appealing. I love pretty socks -- striped socks with lovely colors -- muted tones, jewel tones ... whatever blends nicely and draws the eye. But comfort is the most important attribute. Comfort is a gift I like to give; comfort is a gift I like to receive.

I learned to knit when I was really young. Like 4 or 5. My dad's mother taught me. She didn't knit a lot or knit garments or afghans or anything -- she just liked having something to do with her hands. My two earliest memories of needlecraft were button-sewing and beginning knitting. I remember trying to sew a button onto my bright blue winter coat. This was a mad exercise in frustration for this Virgo first grader (though I could have been a Kindergartener -- I was advanced, you know). It was a regular old button -- with four holes -- not a shank. I was fairly successful with the in and out, up and down, share the wealth between the holes, etc. but when it was time to take the thread to the back and knot it, I just could not figure out how to do that!! I had the thread coming out over the edge of the button and then down to the back. This drove me crazy. When my mother showed me the error of my ways, I was equally stunned at its simplicity and annoyed at my stupidity. I was maybe 5. Okay.

The second memory I have is of knitting on these queerly-colored plastic knitting needles -- a sort of robin's egg blue maybe -- and bubble-gum pink yarn. I was just knitting knitting knitting -- sometimes knitting two stitches together because it made a neato hole! ('Mom showed me that, but never explained the concept of adding that stitch back ...) so my little misshapen swatch of pink knitting just grew and grew until I became bored. I remember this very clearly ... so clearly that it's kind of weird (in this case, meaning fantastic; bizarre). Both memories take place in a hexagonally-shaped conservatory that housed a baby grand and many books and that my dad painted a drab olive green right over the wall-paper. It was a comforting color in a comforting room doing a comforting thing -- needlework.

Since then I have learned the craft of knitting, including the yarn-over increase-a-stitch technique. I learned to crochet from my other grandmother and was inspired to learn the art and puzzle of filet-crochet and doilie-making. I learned to sew and to quilt. I even dabbled a little with cross-stitching, though that is simply not quick and dirty enough! But I had always been intrigued and a little fearful of the art of sock-knitting, but one day a few years ago, I barrelled right on in.

Typically, someone lovingly shows you how to do these things, passing down the tradition from one generation to the next -- or across :-) They teach you the craft. This had always been my experience and had become my "way." But nobody I knew could teach me this. Thank goodness for the internet! I simply googled "sock knitting" and "free sock knitting videos" and hit pay-dirt. One website was more or less a blog of a woman who was a bit obsessed with making socks. That worked for me, though. The picture that graced her page was a clothesline bearing dozens of beautifully colored striped socks. I was hooked. (Her step-by-step basic sock pattern is still the one I use.) Of course I had no earthly idea how to use double-pointed needles, let alone FOUR or FIVE of them at once! so had to do a little more research. I found a great website that had free videos for some techniques, including the ones I needed! (Amy sold instructional CDs, too -- but thankfully she freely shared the stuff I needed to see. Just hearing her voice and seeing her hands work with the yarn and needles made me want to meet her :-) [http://www.knittinghelp.com/]

I methodically began -- acquiring the requisite degree of obsession -- and in a day or two, I had knit a sock!! It was great-looking yarn -- one that I had used to crochet my niece a funky-cool-jay poncho -- but a little bulky for socks. Nevertheless, I made the second sock. This is the important part: Make the second sock! I still have that pair of socks and I still wear that pair of socks. Though bulky, they work with birks AND, more importantly, are very warm in bed on cold nights.

So what would I do with this new ability? The ability to make socks! A gift! An art form! The first hurdle was yarn. Using acrylic worsted weight yarn was not the best plan. I was going to have to move away from my fiscal comfort zone and spend some real dollars on better yarn (for truer comfort). Wool blends -- self-striping yarns -- finer weights. So I visited a local yarn shop and was immediately intimidated by the hoity-toity ladies in there. If I had told them I had made socks out of Red Heart yarn, I fear they would have swooned on the spot. I had to play the part -- just browsing -- no, I didn't need any needles, etc. I almost swooned over the prices. Thankfully, my handy sock-obsessed webmaster guru had recommended a brand that didn't break the bank. I bought a skein and proceeded to make a pair of wool-blend socks for myself. They came out perfectly. Now it was time to knit for others :-)

I believe my husband was the first to be gifted with hand-knitted socks. They were a lovely brown heather wool blend with the ribbing going all the way down the calf. By the time I gave them to him, sadly, he was unable to appreciate them. A few years prior, I think he would have danced -- but the brain chemistry had so alterered his spirit by that time that his reception of my gift was lukewarm at best. This was crushing to me, but I persevered. (My son now has those socks ... he, too, is not quite in-tune with their distinction, but I hope one day he will be.) I believe both kids got socks next. My daughter's were made of a beautiful yarn -- but it created too slouchy a sock. She still wears them, but they're kind of hard to utilize (she understands the emotional nature of the socks). My son's socks were made to match a beanie I made for him and they are too bulky unless he'll be going snow-mobiling, so these were not my best efforts. SISTERS!

I found uber German sock yarn in a weight that I could work with in great self-striping colors AND that was machine washable -- very important with socks! (I should mention that I won the yarn on ebay and paid about half of what it retails for, so fiscal comfort requirement met.) I set-out to make my sisters each a pair of socks for their Christmas gifts. They were so nice! I wanted a pair for myself! I think they liked them! Then I decided to make socks for some friends. I am blessed to have a LOT of dear friends and I am still working through that list of wonderful deserving women (I hope you will each receive a pair of socks at some point!) but nieces moved-in and took precedence. Two nieces and then my daughter joined the Phi Mu sorority. This is particularly funny for my daughter who hates pink -- their colors are PINK and either black or white or whatever they feel like. A birthday was approaching so I made a niece a pair of Phi Mu socks. Her sister was a little sad that she didn't get a pair, but hers were already on the needles for a Christmas gift! Then daughter had to have a pair! There's one more niece who is thus-far sockless. I hope to eradicate that dishevelment post haste.

What is is about sock-making that gets me all excited?! First of all, they are pretty difficult to make. Figuring out how to manipulate the multiple needles is a challenge. I like a challenge. (Remember ... I'm advanced ;-) Discerning the pattern is challenging, too. So sock-making is not for dummies. If anyone talks down to me about my "little hobby," I just snort. I double-dare you to make a freaking sock!

But it's mostly about comfort. A sister confessed to me that she was so very ill and the socks I gifted to her were like chicken soup -- and could I make her another pair ... Hmmm. This isn't something you turn-out in a day! But how could I possibly not respond?! I made her a second pair -- this time with a little heavier wool and they were in a heather green, not a stripe. Her joy and thankfulness was palpable. My love for her -- shown through my gift of comfort -- meant a great deal to her; her gratitude, in return, meant a great deal to me. Socks can be healing, not unlike unconditional love. That is a gift worthy of beholding -- and worthy of bestowing. Imagine such a simple, small "thing" having so much power to grace -- to heal -- to shower with love. That is truly why I get excited about making socks. Making them brings me comfort and joy -- and gifting them brings those I love comfort and joy. People really need joy in their lives and so often need true comfort.

That sister expressed her gratitude to me through a gift of six wonderfully hand-spun, hand-painted and hand-twisted skeins of alpaca yarn. The colors are magnificent and the texture so soft and lovely. I finally decided that socks would be a perfect way to express my joy in her gift. I have one sock finished ... but really need to get the second one started!

I've been on the receiving end of unfathomable comforting -- prayer, notes, gifts, visits, food, TIME. Do you know someone who could use a little comfort? or a touch of joy? What can you make -- or say or do -- to comfort someone right now?

Up With the Jolly Roger . . . yo ho

I fly a Jolly Roger. This amuses some people and puzzles others. I remember that one of my daughter's boyfriends thought it was a little dubious. (Keep 'em guessing.) Sometimes I fly a Cardinal perched on a dogwood branch (state bird & flower), sometimes a sunflower, sometimes a hummingbird or ladybug flag. (Last year I might have flown a stink bug flag, if they had been available. oy.) During holidays I'll fly a cornucopia, holly leaves or an Easter Lily. Sometimes I just feel a little rebellious and fly my Jolly Roger. It's a full-sized one -- really cool. I finally allowed myself to get it the last time our family of four was at the beach. Virginia Beach? or was it Nags Head ... I'm not sure. Both areas are known for their pirates. Blackbeard, of course, is our most famous pirate. Poor guy was ultimately beheaded ...

What is it about pirates that intrigue me -- and a whole lot of other people, too? Their bad-boy, devil-may-care, dare you to stop me mentality? Probably -- especially since they're rather mythical to we contempory folks -- not just common criminals. At least in stories about pirates, they're very colorful characters -- feathers in their big hats, eye patches, parrots on their shoulders, and the requisite peg leg. Right? And they are dangerous! Are they underdogs? Is that why we root for them? Certainly they weren't much like Captain Jack Sparrow in reality ...

As one of four daughters, I didn't have much exposure to pirate stories -- especially primarily living in the north and rather inland. Pirates weren't big up there, at least to MY knowledge. Had I been a boy or had a brother, maybe I would know differently. Now make no mistake -- my parents brought us up thumbing their noses at the nature vs. nurture debate. We learned to shoot guns -- both rifles and shotguns, targeting non-living clay pigeons and targets (my dad was a "hunter" who really just enjoyed the comaraderie of the huntin' lodge with pals and the smell of gun oil). We did our fair share of the dishes, learned to bake and sew -- but also crawled countless times underneath extensive train platforms to wire the Lionel track -- and I even received a toolbox for Christmas when I was ten. But I'm still pretty girly, as are my sisters. Still, no pirates.

I was really first exposed to the concept of pirates in high school chorus when we sang the "Song of the Jolly Roger" with Mr. Frank. That was fun. Then, when my son became a pre-schooler, we received book club flyers featuring plenty of kiddy books about pirates. He was even a pirate for Halloween. He had a striped shirt that was perfect for the costume. We made a little eye patch, tied a bandana around his head -- got him a gold earring -- rolled up his jeans and slapped on his baby birks (I was clever, but a peg leg? How to accomplish that eluded me -- and tot-sized swashbucklin' boots were not readily available). Then, as he grew older and began to be quite the reader, he chose books on pirates. There were those neato books that had antiqued treasure maps and little jolly rogers in their pockets -- along with cool pieces of silver or gold. Interactive books -- very cool. Pirates are cool.

Not too many years ago, the skull and crossbones became popular with clothing and accessories. I even knit my daughter a sweater. I would have worn skull and crossbones underwear, but Hot Topic didn't have my size ... dang! Still the question: Why am I so attracted to it all?

I think I like it because it's a little edgy for me. It's unexpected. I hate to be predictable and I think that I often am. Years ago when the internet was relatively new for the mom types, a little online quiz went around: The Prude Quiz. I scored embarrassingly high on it. I do have a friend who scored higher! (I don't think she's ever smoked a cigarette.) I am not a goody-two-shoes -- well not anymore. I probably started out that way. I never sought ways to NOT be a goody goody -- I just evolved naturally. I could have gotten really reckless when my mother died, but I think the worst thing I did was smoke cigarettes with my grandmother. Naughty Naughty. Still, I would wager some of you reading this are a little shocked. (Of course some of you are not ... :-)

Perhaps the most surprising thing I ever did was date (and subsequently marry) David -- and bring him home to Dad. David was a sophomore; I was a senior. He was edgy (with some blue blazer in there); I was preppy (with a few punk rock'isms here and there). David had grown-up in Beirut -- and knew war. Bullets had come through the windows of his family's flat. One of his past-times was collecting various shells from rooftops and the streets following firefights. He had been kidnapped and interrogated by militia. When it became unsafe for him to stay, he left Beirut and attended his last two years of high school at a very "fundamental" Christian boarding school in southern Germany, hitch-hiked all over Europe and even performed behind the then "iron curtain." This kid came to western Pennsylvania to a little Presbyterian college. He was not a "normal" American kid. He was not your everyday kind of boyfriend. But he became MY boyfriend.

I was admittedly a little nervous bringing him home to meet my father. In my head I could hear my dad referring to him as my "terrorist" boyfriend, what with his 3-day beard, shaggy curls, black leather jacket -- sporting a keffiyeh! My wonderful father didn't bat an eyelash. David felt immediately at home and welcome -- even though we were rather raucous in contrast to his very quiet family. When he asked for my hand in marriage a full year before his college graduation, I thought my dad would list the many reasons we shouldn't get married: no job, no money, no home, very young, etc. He didn't. He gave us his blessing, saying that life was too short to put happiness on hold. Wow. I later recalled that he had married quite young himself.

David was not the safe choice for a husband, but life would never be ho-hum. I knew he was "big." Right out of college he nearly got assigned to the diplomatic corps where we would have trained for three years in Tunisia then resided in the Middle East. Me. Pretty scary for a scardey-cat. Not safe! But David's "big'ness" materialized in different ways. Not unlike my dad, David grew restless easily -- got bored. He moved up through and across the ranks -- progressing from an analyst for the "government" to a trainer -- making the leap to the private sector, and eventually becoming a program manager for a large software firm. He was ambitious, very successful and was travelling extensively -- domestically and internationally. We had started our family by then and I found myself alone a lot. Then he was diagnosed and "metaphorphisized." In a very short span of time he went from young upwardly-mobile professional to jeans-wearing, guitar-toting, hope-sharing, cancer survivor performing songwriter. Few can make a living doing that. He did.

Living with brain cancer and the ebbs and flows of his performance schedule was no life for the feint-hearted. No easy-street. When you have to fight so hard to keep your head above water, you tend to get a little more daring. Risks become everyday events. Life with David was dangerous. But living without him has left a great void. My life is a little flat -- a little static. The disease is truly horrible. It can ultimately rob one of their intellect, their personality, their ability to speak or walk -- the sanctity of their emotions and relationships ... so, admittedly, after the brain cancer adventure came to a conclusion, a little "boredom" was a welcome thing. But life without David's spirit is a lonely life. The further-out I get from his dying, the more I remember and celebrate our living -- our great love affair -- the excitement we experienced upon a reunion after a long separation or just a day separated by our respective jobs -- and our dreams for our children. My life with David was exciting -- full of life and passion and, yes, riddled with loss, sorrow, fear, some danger and deep grief. So who wouldn't go a little rogue?

Pirate-y? me? No, I'm no plunderer.
A harmless rapscallion? Yeh, that's more like it.
So, Up with the Jolly Roger!
Living is, after all, a dangerous activity.
And face it! Pirates are cool.
... and I like to keep you guessing.

Tipsy Yoga

Yes, I admit. I have done yoga when tipsy -- on more than one occasion. Please be assured, that this does not occur in the MORNING. I am NOT a morning person -- so sometimes I'm doing things around 10:00 pm when many of you are on your way to bed. I'm never on my way to bed at 10:00 pm. That's early. Of course, I'm not up at 6:00 am for a run ... or yoga ... when the rest of you might be. At 10:00 pm I often find myself facing a small dilemma. Oops -- you didn't go for a run today -- or do anything physical beyond walking to the car -- and you really need some exercise. Hmmm. You've already had two glasses of wine. Yoga? SURE! After all, I'm still on the "beginning" yoga which uses no props -- no bricks or anything -- and the most balance required is for the warrior position. I can handle that! ALL exercise is GOOD exercise :-)

One of the conveniences of living alone is that it doesn't matter what you wear -- or don't wear -- in the house. Why in the world should I go to all the effort of going upstairs, undressing, putting on yoga pants and some shirt that won't fall down over my head when I'm doing downward-facing dog!? Instead, let's just strip down to our underwear, shall we? That works! My girl dog doesn't care! The curtains are drawn and there's really no chance that anyone will come to my window (that hasn't happened since two neighbors banged on our window nine years ago during a blizzard to go midnight sledding!) Remember, I'm not a girl who welcomes suffering -- or inconvenience, as it turns out.

So what do you do when the doorbell rings ... No kidding. I'm two-thirds of the way through my 20 minute work-out when the doorbell rings. It is 10:30 pm. The dog freaks. And so do I! I'm looking at the curtains -- trying to ascertain if it would have been possible for someone walking up my driveway to have gotten a peak through a slice of window where the curtains weren't quite meeting. Half-naked yogi-wanna-be in the headlights -- literally!

I gathered myself (remember, a little tipsy, so not too frantically) and quickly put my clothes back on (thank goodness they were right there! or I really would have been trapped.) I decided to be brave. I composed myself. I turned on the porchlight and opened the door. Two of my son's friends -- both girls -- were standing on my porch, on a homemade cookie delivery. (If you're reading this, I hope you're amused.) They had come bearing a gift of truly delectable shortbread -- the real thing. So, though initially I had been slightly annoyed that anyone would dare interrupt my nearly-naked yoga (I'm going to continue to emphasize that it was NEARLY naked), my heart immediately softened from the random act of kindness standing on my porch -- in the form of two lovely freshman college student girlies.

These girls had delivered cookies at night before -- they're industrious little bakers -- but when the boy was here and I always figured he was the "draw," but now I'm not so sure. Truly, to what do I owe such a thoughtful gesture? It's not a stroll across the street -- they had to drive here. They have gads of friends! Why me?

If you have never been the subject of a random act of kindness, I'm very sorry. I have been on the receiving end of kindness so many times in the last few years, I can't count. I think I wrote over 100 thank you notes during David's Hospice stay and during the months following his death. SO MANY people were kind, thoughtful, generous, loving. Some people simply sent cards (and this is beautiful -- the word "simply" is not meant to minimize their kindness). Others wrote long letters, sharing their own experiences in empathy or writing about a way David had blessed them -- or simply sharing hope and love. Others sent gifts -- meals, flowers, coffee! cookies, money. Still others shared the gift of their time -- their presence. Many travelled from hundreds of miles away to come to be with us -- yes, to be with David one last time, but also to support me -- to sit with me -- to relieve me -- just to gift me with their spirit. Many of these people I had never met before. Still others visited regularly -- to sit quietly with David so that he would not be alone when I couldn't be there or to sit with both of us to lighten my heart for a half an hour.

Since then, I still sometimes come home to a surprise -- a special delivery of food on my porch bench from a loving neighbor or pots of mums in full bloom brightening my porch steps. Most recently, on what would have been our 25th wedding anniversary, a dozen perfect pink roses from a dear friend.

Hundreds of thank you notes... I wrote each and every one of them -- often standing at my kitchen island for hours, methodically checking-off each person as I went down my long list -- recalling their kindness, being re-washed with that love and gratitude that was so bolstering and, at the same time, pondering how I could ever possibly pay all of that forward. All! heck, part?!

I remember receiving a card out of the blue one day many years ago -- just encouraging me somehow. I never forgot how that made me feel and after that, card-writing became a spiritual discipline for me. I sent countless cards and was blessed so greatly in doing so; but, once again, I had become the recipient. It really is very powerful. If anything I wrote in any of those many thank you notes even remotely expressed my gratitude and made someone else's heart swell a little, then it was worth every hour spent.

And now, as I feel stronger (I really hate the generic-ness of that word, but it means something here) and more able to give than to receive again, I am enjoying being the doer of little random acts of kindness. Right now, they are still little. I don't have the financial means to do much bigger stuff, but that's not often necessary. I'm taking baby steps -- still not as accomplished at this as I wish to be -- but "exercising" and trying to improve, because it's really important to me -- to be the bearer of random acts of kindness. It easily blesses ME as much as it may bless the object of my attention. That's sort of selfish, isn't it! I still have a long way to go.

As to the yoga ... Yes, I did pick up where I had left off -- returned to my state of partial dress and finished my yoga session. And it truly is easier to do that thing where your legs are all tangled up like a poorly-fashioned pretzel and you're twisting all the way around, gazing over your shoulder with "soft eyes," after a glass or two of wine.