Carried Away

warning: heavy post

 I am learning more about the human brain and grief than I had ever imagined.

My most recent adventures have taken me down roads of cognitive medical reading, personal wondering and expansively painful learning.

My father had decided he was going to have the surgery after our visit to the neurologist. The doctor pretty much said, aside from fear of the surgery (which is normal) why NOT have it. At that " suggestion" my father said, fuck it schedule the surgery. 

I was there asking for alternatives and finding out that his long term headaches were probably the start of this who event. After ping pong visits between the neurologist and the neurosurgeon it was shown on MRI scans that my father actually has a lot of atrophy of his brain and so the surgery was not the safest option or the preferred route from the surgeon. So back to where we started and watching his cognitive decline and body function loss up close.

(below text written in stream of consciousness)

I have just finished two of the most challenging weeks with them. My father had a yearly check up and the doctor seemed fine with all he was doing; which seemed like a cursory look at things but I was exhausted and my father had been coughing all day. Doctor listened to his chest and said it was clear. It ended up keeping my mother up all night and she was already running on almost no sleep. He then states when we return that he "isn't feeling well" I say if things are not better soon we are going to a walk in clinic. The weekend that followed was all coughing and my brother took him on Monday, because as an immune compromised person he wanted to make sure I was safer until we knew more and it was bronchitis possibly the start of pneumonia. By Wednesday my mother on a call with me coughed and I returned to town to take her to a clinic that confirmed she had pneumonia, and Friday I returned because she was worse and then we went to the ER because her symptoms pointed to C-diff and she hadn't eaten since Wednesday after the first appointment and my father had decided to stop eating and then the ER, who said she had a viral pneumonia and then we were there again Saturday to watch them eat, because now neither of them was and then Monday and Tuesday my brother and wife took food to them and I spent all day calling non-profits and doctors and learning about Medi-Cal and being overwhelmed with tasks and calls and then Wednesday took my mother to a psychiatrist to see if she could start her SSRI's again because she stopped ALL her meds cold turkey a couple months ago including her zoloft, which might add to why every interaction with her was her crying. Sitting in the office for her meeting was strange, but even stranger was her new dementia like memory looping of phrases and memories was heartbreaking. The doctor said with her level of depression it was common and should start clearing when her new medicines start working. Then Thursday meeting with the exterminator for their home who said we need to replace the dilapidated garage door because they can't help if there is a literal open door for rodents. (it was not a surprise or a shock) So my brother is taking charge of that. A physical therapist who only came for 10min that day and sent me into a mental rage and then finding that a very important document for my father had expired and that stops the process of the other big project. So yesterday was all day of online renewal forms and finally signing documents for in home help that we can pay for out of pocket and ideally that help, will start Tuesday. More meetings Monday and doctors appointments Tuesday and managing schedules and paperwork and answering phone calls and texts from family who want to know all the details....and then ask if I tried x, y, or Z. In the end my mother told me I was really good at the "handholding" I was doing for them and I should make it my job. I said " I'd really just like to be an artist"  and she said " you can be creative with it, the caregiving....That was the javelin into my heart...and I kept a poker face and waited to get into the car and drive away before crying. The diapers, the food fussing, the medications, the water reminders, the doctors offices, the questions and suggestions and assumptions....remind me of my infertility days. The casual suggestions about adoptions and sex positions and the  'if you just" or "have you tried" and the banger "have you considered"

I only made yoga once last week, I am currently sitting in my workspace trying to catch up on normal things, like laundry and bills, but I have gotten 4 calls from the parents already and I am still trying to imagine my work. 

Trying to see it in my minds eye...imagine making it, breathing deeply and feeling content in the process. Telling myself that life isn't passing me by and my work still matters and I still need to make it because although all this time has been stolen from me and my partnership....it really does matter and things will change soon and I can use all this energy to make my own art.

Muddled and Conflicted

 The Barren and I are conflicted and muddled in our mix of feelings and emotions about the passing of our brother in law.

He passed under hospice care with his wife, mother and children in attendance.

He died on the 10th after a 7 year journey with cancer, drug trials, medical interventions and the power of prayer. He was deeply tied to his church and a christian fundamentalist. He coached local football and was on the board of the adventist school his children attended and his wife teaches at. He was a big guy, big voice, big personality. We first were introduced to him at a birthday celebration for my FIL where he got fall down drunk and landed in the bushes apologizing over and over for making a bad first impression. He was always offering help with some thing or another. He was well educated and held a MBA & MS Psychology.

I wrote about our "November Trip" to spend time around the table together. We saw him once more last year when he attended the wedding of his mother in law, that The Barren performed. He offered to perform the service, but was turned down by my MIL because she didn't want any religion in it. 

He was in pain and we barely shared a word with each other while I photographed the family, and had a meal at the same table once again. There was another family thanksgiving this year, but we opted to not attend and stayed home instead.

When word came from my MIL that he had entered hospice, we were not surprised but conflicted in our feelings. He was a father to our nephews who we are not close to because their parents chose to not allow it, as we were not "good people", meaning we were not christians. 

(so we thought about the boys, and The Barrens sister)

Over the years, we were fine to reach out to if something was needed, like a schoold donation, christmas gifts or graduation gifts. I left a social media platform because he stated that the confederate flag was not offensive to him, nor was a nazi flag as they were just symbols. He was deeply "american" in that his country came before everyones and should be respected, but had no problem teaching his children that women were here to serve men. He continued to support the rapist in charge of the usa and made sure his family voted the same*...which gave then all great joy. He was a person who was one way with family and another with the world he interacted with. He was a people pleaser and performative around family. 

*the kids are in college

So we sat conflicted with our feelings about his death. Then word traveled around family that The Barrens sister was having a small service and so we assumed it would be the church and her and the kids. We were fine with that. We were outsiders and that made complete sense.

Then I got a text saying "it would mean a lot if we could come."

We have rented a car, and a hotel room and are doing an 800mile round trip in two days to attend. We are even shuttling back our new FIL, as our MIL plans to stay for a longer than he would like. 

The posts are now all over social media and I don't think this will be a small service any longer.

How do you deal with the death of a nazi sympathizer in the family?

Short term: We give. We continue to give and give as that is what makes sense to us. Kindness and love.

I chose to make a donation in his name to a foundation that coaches kids in underserved areas, focusing on girls. “Girls” refers to gender-expansive youth (cis girls, trans girls, non-binary youth, gender non-conforming youth, gender queer youth and any girl-identified youth).

There is also a Gofund me style page set up as well, and The Barren has already said he plans on donating funds to his sister. He even plans on bringing a guitar to one of the nephews who expressed interest in playing. 

Needless to say, we remain conflicted with our feelings, and are muddling our way through.

Fire and Death

 I have been wanting to write, 

but I am finding it hard to find a thread of ideas to share...or rant about.

Then I realized so much time has passed since my last post....

so here I am.

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This post includes a lot of talk about death

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I have been floating on the surface of life...or sitting deeply in it. I seem to find myself falling deeply into the nuances of the day or shielding myself from them. My yoga studio has stopped conducting classes outside and so we are back inside a studio. I so far am only going to meditation classes in the studio....despite my assurances of safer practices I am still struggling to go back to heated full classes. Instead I practice at home on those days with pre-recorded videos.

A full class use to be, a class of 42 people closed into a room and flowing and sweating and exhaling. Now a full class is 35 in heated classes and 25 in un-heated classes (meditation)

I have attended two heated classes in the studio to check how I feel about it.  I wore a disposable mask all through class, not touching it while sweating my way through the asanas. In one class a guy had a full sweat suit on and I later found out he was training for an MMA match. I am the only one in class that wears a mask: often the only one in the studio, outside doing errands, grocery shopping, farmers market...driving. I am still quite frightened of dying from a virus I am TOTALLY protected from. Even knowing that the vaccine is good against the variants has not dissipated enough of my fear to go mask-less. I have reached out to a physician friend to ask about returning to the hot studio and he said wear a disposable mask, but the chances of me getting virus are reduced as I am vaccinated and if I do get it, it will not be deadly.

With all this "reassurance" I am still hesitant. I believe in science and am currently living a life science forward...but, maybe I just have gotten so comfortable being cautious. A sick new way to control things in my life that are totally uncontrollably random. I am thankful that the people I interact with are both vaccinated and gentle with my feelings about my virus fear/comfort. I would liken it to a monster in your bedroom closet as a kid and your parent comes in, turns on the light, opens the door and shows you that indeed there is nothing to be frightened of. Then they turn around and leave. You are still in that room and that bed staring at the door you heard growling from...and are still trying to process the fear.

My meditation group, about 7 of us, that were super regular at the parks, sitting silently behind masks, in 40 degree mornings or windy hot days...while squirrels rained pinecone down on my head or crows screamed the whole time...anyway one of the members arranged a "closing ceremony" to line up with the Summer Solstice.

We had a fire ceremony

We all gathered and meditated on the fire and what we wanted to let go of. It is always eye opening to hear what other people are thinking...especially people you've shared almost a year with in silence.

Most wanted to let go of worries and family judgements....personal judgements and I sent the judgements of others to the flames.

I have held that hope in the front of my mind since then.

(I wore a sun dress with no bra as an act of this resistance, had bedhead hair at the market and coffeeshop. I am working my way up it seems)

***************

This weekend was a "titty twister" of sorts

I got an email at 7am from a longtime friend (old boyfriend) that his mother passed away. I was in total shock! I have know this woman for 30+ years and even worked with her many moons ago.

She used to gift me photo paper in my super lean days. (I was dating her son then) 

Super sweet woman, last I spoke with her was last year when we exchanged emails so I could mail her handmade masks...It was a real surprise; I knew my friend was going to be super fragile and so I have been checking in on him. On that same day, his longtime (20+year) girlfriend's father was rushed to the ER for a stroke. My brother in law was headed into surgery for lung cancer and when I called my parents to let them know about the death, my mom interrupted me to let me know that they were on the way to the walk in clinic for my father who was having a reaction to a bee sting.

I don't remember doing much other than visiting the cats and coming home.

It was a lot to process.

Does anyone else's life bundle like that? I seem to have days where the space time continuum layer like this...folding one thing on top of the other into a shit sandwich.

Just a few days before I had learned of anther friends parent dying; another person I had know for a long time. She did the flowers for our wedding almost 19years ago.

Is it that time in our lives now...I am SOOOOO not ready for that. I guess we are never really ready to say goodbye to people...but it sux

Today is the anniversary of my grandfathers death. He passed away in 1990. I was sleeping in the bed next to his at the care facility the night he died. In my  twilight sleep I saw him walk down the hall with a friend who was already dead, he waved at me and when I woke up he took one of his last breaths. He had lived/suffered with ALS for too long and it was hard to watch at the end. It took his speech and his mobility and his dignity. I lost my job the next day, as I missed an impromptu company meeting. It was okay, I was being sexually harassed by the owner of the store and it was an easy reason to fire me.

(boy that was a loaded sentence)

Anyway, my grandfather has visited me the least of my deceased grandparents. I can count the times on one hand. I guess we were alright and all that needed to be said was said. I adored him and think about him often...but I must admit as time passes, it is harder to hear his voice or remember specifics about his mannerisms anymore.

Maybe that is what this virus has done...

This virus has made death so much more in the forefront, and common. There are still people in this town that refuse to get the vaccine, and they are  clearly okay being 99% of the deaths from this virus now. Totally preventable. Historically, as the world was growing and changing, death was part of everyday life. People painted it both boldly and symbolically. Memento Mori was everywhere as people were dying so often.

Have we entered a Memento Mori time? We have been so used to a long healthy life now and suddenly as the world all fell to this insane virus, it has become a daily reminder once again.

Building fall, bombs explode, people run into schools with guns, cars crash, people kill each other for shoes or skin color or food.

it is often too much for me to process and I must admit I feel like I need to be an ostrich and run away and hide. I can not bare much more on my nerves and heart.

I guess I can thank my infertility for dulling a lot of my nerves, making me not respond emotionally to horrible things. It takes days, sometimes weeks to actually feel something.

I am trying to return to a "normal" self, but I think I am changed...so massively changed.

Challenge and changes

***warning***

Post about new loss of a companion 

So I finished the 30days of yoga in 31days, I had 35 to do it in.

in the final week, a horrible happened.

Our sweet fat kitty was diagnosed with aggressive large cell lymphoma in his intestines along with a sizable growth that was impeding into this colon.

This came out of no where and to say the least has taken us to the rawest place.

He was diagnosed on Tuesday, the day before his 13th birthday, confirmed cell size on Wednesday and Friday night we had the vet home to home and let him go.

In the two and a half days from diagnosis he had stopped eating and drinking and was no longer sleeping but just gazing. 

The disease moved fast and the vet said that the gazing was it entering the brain.

He was slathered in love, and body rubs and kisses and told over and over how much he was loved.

He was the first cat to have as a companion that spoke to you and moaned and groaned responses.

He loved sleeping and when not sleeping, he liked to nap.

There is a massive hole in us

The Barren declared that he lost his best friend.

I am struck over and over during the day.

The surviving kitty, is 3 years older and today has been calling for him....

It is heart breaking...yesterday he spent a large portion as high up on my chest as he could get

my heart below his flip flopping in my chest.

It is going to be a long road as we all learn to live with this new grief.

I am thankful I had 13years with him

and was able to laugh through tears as memories of his antics flood my mind.

Ideally we were able to free him from his body fast enough to avoid him suffering from an evil fast moving demon....

I was that girl

"A 23-year-old American college student who was killed in the Paris attacks was described as a “gifted student” by her teachers and beloved by her friends.

Nohemi Gonzalez was killed Friday night at the bistro La Belle Equipe in Paris. She was spending time with friends when a gunman opened fire on the scene and fatally wounded her."

When I heard about the attacks in Paris I froze, I literally could not process anything at all.
                                                                         *******

Many years ago, when I was in my early 20's I was a student studying in Paris, living out my dream of being an artist in the epicenter of my creative forefathers and foremothers. Eating bread and canned peas. Going to the museum everyday, drawing and dreaming and learning who I was and what I wanted from life and for myself. Kissing boys and crying and laughing. 

I was that girl who went to a concert in Paris, and got caught in a mosh pit and thrown to the ground, tossed from the chaos yet, alive fwith fear and desire for excitement. 

I was that girl who ate in a cafe and ordered an omelette in her best version of French.

I was that girl who smelt the night air and felt the magic of the city

I was that girl

And I am that very same girl, shaken to my very core when I heard what happened.

I cried a lot and wondered if that magic had been taken away

I felt as though something had blown up my memories of the sweet, 

nostalgia of the city of light

Someone had taken a dreamer away, pulled her from this earth before she could finish her dreams

I felt

I could imagine

I mourned a stranger

I mourned all the dreamers and strangers who were simply

living that night. Living and dreaming and hoping for more wonderful.

I am those girls

I am those boys

I am those children

Remembering Death and Life Lived

I had been wanting to go to an event in a nearby major city for several years now, but never had the right timing or drive. So when a buddy called and said she'd drive and wanted to go right after they opened I cleared my schedule and said I'll buy your ticket!

It turned out to be just what I needed and 

aside from a set of scabs from my new sandals it was a great day!

The Dia de Los Muertos festival takes over whole sections of the cemetery 

it is a mix of altars and memorial structures and vendors selling all things related to the holiday.

There are face painters and food vendors too.

Live music, native dancers and people

AMAZING people watching!!

I celebrate this holiday, as it is the anniversary of The Barren and I getting married.

We purposely chose this day, as it is when the veil is the thinnest between the two worlds 

( the living and the dead)

so we knew that anyone of our loved ones could attend the wedding if they choose to.

It is also around the same time as the first of our miscarriages.

So I feel like our babies can feel our love the most around now.

It is a good cathartic way to celebrate, remember and mourn loved ones.

It is all in the spirit of love

and who could not love that !

I took my camera and the below are some of the fun results

Girlfriends all dressed for the day
(everyone was willing to have their photo taken, no one said no)

Jaguar dancer looking at some of the altars

crazy face painting!

Some famous cool dudes are buried here

LOVED her headpiece,
it sparkled and was amazing dancing with the light

Cat memorial in the wall of marigolds
this broke my heart and had me close to tears
I was glad The Barren was home with our lovelies

A Frida Kahlo sculpture complete
with a reproduction of her chest cast and lost baby.
I wanted to take this home.

Your favorite leaf eater
with one of the many paper mache sculptures
it was 90* (32c) , hence the sleeveless top

I took away a lot of ideas for our personal altar this year.

I was able to be quiet most of the day and just look, which was a gift beyond words.

I have a couple friends that understand quiet doesn't mean that I don't want to talk to you, but instead I am talking so much to myself I can't bear to say words aloud.

Today, tomorrow and many years ago

Today is the 11th of September

it is a big number here in the states.

It leaves me a little unsettled.

I was working at a company that distributed maps when the actual events unfolded 

and for the next year and a half my life was totally changed.

First we got calls from the military 

asking what we were selling and who could buy it.

Then we got calls from the news agencies from all over the world.

Then calls from military families often crying on the phone line asking, 

where these countries

 were that their loved ones were going to.

There were times when we had to call the FBI 

as some calls were requesting very specific kinds of details on maps.

Those were hard and scary.

I know it was best that I walked away from that job when I did.

I was scattered and emotionally spent.

Then in 2006, on this same day
before sunrise, 

and with heavy labored inhales I watched the final breath

 of my beloved grandmother.

She was in her bed, surrounded by family, completely on her own terms.

I had visited and spoken to her two days before.

We just told each other over and over that we loved each other.

It is a beautiful memory above the heartbreak.

This morning, before the sun rose

I got up and shimmed myself into my yoga clothes.

I drove into town for class and watched the sun rise as I 

took deep purposeful breaths with her in my heart.

She died from her lungs filling up...so every time I think of her last moments 

I try and send full complete breathe to her.

I always imagine that would have been the most compassionate thing to give.

A deep breath.

Tomorrow is my nephews birthday, he was born a year later

Life goes on

and on

Aches and Pains

I had a pretty crappy nights sleep, 

between being a pillow/couch for the cats (that seem to triple their weight when asleep) 

and a couple night hot flashes it was a rough night.

I felt achy and sore and old.

I sometimes suffer from a ligament thing in my chest, where it feels like the fibers in my chest are being pulled away from my sternum and it makes simply having boobs painful.

This morning was one of those mornings. 4am and the alarm is going off next to the snoring Barren and I sat up and said my morning thank yous for waking up and pulled my butt and sore boobs outta bed, avoiding the bedside table that I have already walked into and gotten in impressive bruise from and the cats on the floor who now have been "activated" into feed me mode and started a new day.

I am trying another new thing...wake up and say thank you.

Start the day with gratitude....regardless of what lays past that in the road for the day....

start with a moment of  "wow, I woke up and I'm not dead today!"

I met with a friend the other day to talk about her ideas for her new business launch and how she would like me to help. She is an all around nutrition, exercise, massage, reiki master kind of gal.

She is re-inventing herself...re-imagining what she wants for this stage of her life.

I was mesmerized and in awe of how clear and sure she was...

I aspire to be clear like that for myself.

I am still treading through some murky waters...

but work every day to clear that fluid of grey matter.

She is tending for her mother who is deep into Alzheimer disease

She is still pleasant and able to have a conversation, she is not able to be alone

My friend has come to a point where she is trying to reclaim some time for herself, in preparation for a long road with a mother who might be around a while but is not aware of who she is at all anymore.

I also got a series of emails from another friend, telling me the horribly sad news of our mutual art  teacher from high school...we all hold him dear in our hearts and he just had a stroke that was triggered by his unknown fatal cancer.

Hospice is with him now and his wife has advocated for him to exit under his conditions.

They are a love story...

One their first date he brought her a corsage

she ate it

he was in love from that moment on

Ironically, someone asked them once why they never had kids, 

apparently they tried but had the RH factor and there was no treatment at the time.

Needless to say, I have had many calls in just as many days with my bestie...she and I were both his students and he is always in conversations still.

The friend that forwarded me the emails sent a sweet note to me that I think sums it up:

" I've had my fill of illness and saying goodbye recently. I'm realizing that 50 is really just the beginning of so many good byes. I treasure you dear friend"

I think we are experiencing growing pains

The aches and pains of reality as we are given this gift of aging.

Yesterday and the years before

***warning I talk about death and children***

Yesterday was hard....it wasn't suppose to be and I hadn't planned for it to be.

I got up at 4:15am to get ready for my yoga class...and as I normally do I check the news for accidents, check to see who the teacher for class is

 and social media while I wake up calmly and pull my hair up.

that is when I saw it....I read the words and then only heard a ringing in my ears:

"Goodbye My Love, I will miss you terribly. 

You found the second love letter card from me this morning but never got to open it.

My Wife of 14.5 years (+5.5 years dating) has passed away from heart failure today at noon. She has had health challenges for quite sometime, so this maybe some welcome relief for her.

She was a wonderful woman with a beautiful soul. She made friends easy and captured me on our first meeting with her boy on her knee.

I'm still in shock while I write you all this notice and I'll be back to tell you more later."

The person this husband is referring to was a dear friend from high school.

I met her in high school, she was in our art gaggle, and a talented painter.  She was the token headbanger and wore leather mini dresses and was quick to laugh. She had gotten a full scholarship to the local UC college but was unable to accept it, as around the same time, she became pregnant from a guy who wanted nothing to do with the baby.  She graduated and decorated her mortar board with the words "it's a boy". My bestest and I attended the birth of her son just a few weeks after we graduated. We were there to take photographs at her request. She had to give birth on her hands and knees as she was in a car accident* before getting pregnant and had hurt her back. 

We heard her labor and all she said was "ow that hurts"

She became a single mom, and was asked to move out of the family home as her father could not bare the fact that his daughter was unwed and a mother by the age of 18. 

She went back to school and became a nurse. It was then that she developed a severe latex allergy...so severe that she would pass out, from being unable to breathe, she finally got a service dog and it was these dogs that saved her from death many many times over. 

She still thrived, and found true love in a man that took every moment of the day to make her life wonderful, comfortable and fun.

Her son grew up, joined the marines and is now a sheriff locally.

She fought for animals, had a small menagerie of her own and crafted . 

She joined medical trials to find a cure for this horrible disease that was in every corner of her life outside of the joy.

She had developed seizures that would wipe away short term memories, and recently she passed out at their woodside cabin and had to be airlifted to the ICU, where they found she had low potassium levels. 

They were changing her medications and I guess the strain to her heart was just too much this last time and she left . Freeing herself from her body.

I was unable to think after reading her husband's words, I climbed back into bed and The Barren asked if I had had a nightmare and I whispered "Kara died" and let the tears fall down my face as he wrapped his arm around me. I fell back to slept with a heaviness in my chest that made it a labor to breathe.

When I work up I thought I had dreamt the whole thing...but it was not the case.

I spent the day quiet and watched downton abbey and ate and napped....I texted my bestest and we both agreed that we were really messed up from the news and would call each other later in the day to cry it out together. I was sitting curled in a blanket when the Barren came home and handed me a bag of kettle popcorn, he sat beside me and said nothing but simply shared the bag and we watched something on the screen. He made dinner for us: vegan pancakes and kissed me 

When my bestest called it was the best thing in the world to hear her voice. 

She remembered the car accident*: Kara and her best friend were in her beloved mustang stopped at a signal headbanging to some song on the tapedeck and got rear ended and they both got whiplash. They proudly came to school the next day with neck braces and laughing about it. 

I remembered us making the 1st birthday cake for her son and choosing bright green filling as it would make the biggest mess when he ate it !

The talk and the memories helped us both. 

My bestest said that although she had her son so young and it made her life rough, it was most likely one of the biggest wonderful in her life. As she was able to watch him grow into the man he is today. Giving her a huge sense of pride. If she had waited she might not have been given that opportunity.

I agreed and it made sense to me.

Hug your friends dear ones, hug the ones you want to but hesitate to.

Hug the ones you always hug.

Currently Processing....

I was sitting alone on the porch of a rented home, listening to the rain, focusing on the person we were gathered to celebrate.

She died last October of rare form of lung cancer, never smoked a day in her life...

and would have been 47 years old this day.

My step Mother in law comes up and sits down in the chair next to mine. My SIL follows her and leans against a handrail on the porch facing me.

 

" The Barrens' father and I have kept quiet about how so disappointed we are that you and the Barren didn't adopt. You know we think you would be AMAZING parents....it is just too bad. You know you still can. I have a friend that runs an agency in San Francisco"

 

I turn to my SIL (The Barrens sister) who has now consumed over a bottle of cheap wine, her lips and teeth are stained purple. She begins to sob: " Have you two ever thought of having someone else carry your baby? It was so easy for me, I feel so badly that it was so easy for me and so hard for you"

 

I took a xanax after we got back to the hotel, it felt like I had been punched over and over again.

That damn Barreness snuck into the party and used others as her puppets

 

New Eyes

OK two things...for some reason I can not load images...blogger is farting or something
and I ramble a little but, I think in the end I make a point.
**************************

So it is the new year, I still haven't sent our holiday cards...or thank you cards...

I am working on the later a lot more than the holiday ones.

 

I think I am sifting through the emotions and feelings of what it really means to have stage four endometriosis and be a family of two. There have been moments in the past week or so when I get this real "real" moment. You know those moments, when you realize that one day you will die,

and all you have is now.

I get those enlightened moments often...I remember the first one was when I was walking alone on the beach with my family, I was in Junior High school and it hit me that I was not going to live forever, that one day I was going to cease. It scared the shit out of me and I think most of that night I spent terrified in bed, hiding under my covers trying to soothe myself back into that lull of everyday living.

 

This new year has been waves of those moments.

The "wait! Can I get a do-over? I really wanted this or that to happen when I was much younger"

and "I don't have time for this bullshit, I am moving forward...to the next great thing."

 

I got the Barren a gift certificate to the local museum to see the space shuttle, I have found that no matter his mood, this man has a gitty boy inside that explodes with glee and light when around space ships, airplanes and all things science. I wanted him to fill that reserve, so we went today. I am not a huge space and engine sort of gal but it was interesting, really wild and it kept my attention and lit some curious questions.

This same museum also has an ecosystems permanent exhibit. One of them was the kelp forest: I became that little girl, totally hypnotized and quiet. Standing before the floor to ceiling seawater tanks, watching sharks and schools of flickering fish, eels hissing from rocks and kelp swaying in sunlight.
Whenever I get that panic of "I'm not going live forever" I think of floating under the sea, being carried by the waves and swimming with the turtles and fish and it calms me.

 

This museum was filled with children, but in all honesty I don't remember any of them. I was not distracted by watching them, or caught dreaming about having them. There was a moment when I heard a child screaming from one of the far off exhibits and I turned to the Barren and mimicked the screaming child but instead of frustration, I had made it into a battle cry...like heck ya, I am awesome! I turned it into something that was funny to me, it made him laugh and it made something that normally upset us into something about us and no one else.
 

 I spent the night watching documentaries and eating leftover Italian food on the couch. One of the films was about measuring happiness. It was an interesting film...there were a few points that I found personally interesting from all the psychologists that were interviewed:
1. tragic events often allow people to become happier
(the example they had was a woman who literally lost her face in an accident and she explained how letting go of the friends that couldn't handle her injury allowed her to free herself.)
2. people have a baseline level of contentment...that accounts for 50% of your measured level.
Another, 10% comes from external measures, like work and status etc...
and then we have 40% of which we control with actions!
AMAZING...almost half our own happiness is based on internal choices.
3. the most rewarding "food source" to that internal choice was acts of kindness....
helping others, as simple as that! Not huge acts like funding a school or sponsoring a research project.
Something like, helping someone carry something. Telling someone they look nice, bringing dinner to a friend who is sick. Little acts make up a HUGE part of our happiness.

It made me feel like I was building in the right direction: love bombs, food to friends, planting flowers for neighbors...I am building my own happiness. I can have power of things that make my life what it will be now. Today these concepts sounds huge and bright and hopeful. I drank a little too much at New Years, but I was telling 2012 to get the hell away from me she was quite a little bitch. 2013, I have plans for you, and it involves a lot more happiness for myself and my life and our future.
Today I am not going to die and tomorrow is not a good day either!

 

Silence

I woke up early to bake a pie on Friday, as I needed to go into the "big city" to pick up some artwork. I was in a light mood and was keeping busy.

I turned on the news and texted The Barren and then the news hit...and I sat there in shock.

I felt the same way watching the news come in on September 11th....

glued and scared to leave for fear something worse would happen.

What could be worse...

as the news was pouring in, I sat there in a puddle of my own tears

and the first thing that came to mind was:

At least one of those children was an assisted pregnancy.

I felt so deeply for those parents.

I don't know if that is the case, I just went there first.
I guess that is how I connected to those children, and their parents.

 

I have stayed away from the news all weekend, instead spending time with The Barren smiling and loving each other.

Both of us fearful of seeing anymore...our hearts can not bear the loss.

 

This morning as I was waiting for my hot caffeinated drink, I picked up the Wall Street Journal and it had published the faces of those lost.

It took all my power to not collapse into a puddle at the sight of those faces.

As calmly as I had picked up the paper, I placed it back into the rack...heartbroken and at all loss.

I have returned to my mantras, and my projections of love.
I feel compelled to push energy into the air, like I want to push the pendulum in the opposite direction, using all my will and strength...if I can just smile more, hug more, touch more it will mean something. In someway.

The condition of being mortal

Moonrise

So I have had a really strange week or two, it doesn't come as a total surprise that my dreams would reflect this reality.

I am thinly veiled that way.

To start with a childhood friend was just diagnosed with breast cancer.

It appeared between yearly mammograms in one breast.

 She was considering a prophylactic double mastectomy to avoid cancer showing up in the second breast; but, while waiting for labs, a period of two weeks, additional lumps in the first and new ones in second breast appeared.

She is a mother of two boys, one of which had a long battle with cancer himself, and is currently in remission.
It is events like this that make me question life and a higher being.

As I was bra shopping the other day, all I could think about was her. She and her mom took me bra shopping for my first bra, I think we had "mosquito bites" (that is what my Nana use to say)

She is not going to have breasts any more. All I could think about is how selfish of me to be so concerned about finding a bra that wouldn't show through my tee shirt.

This shopping trip was followed by a road trip to a friends wedding, The Barren was playing guitar for the wedding march with one of the brides uncles, it was the first public performance for the Barren so I went to witness this big event.

The bride is a professional dancer, who married a navy seal.

The church was near base, and so there were a lot of military families around. In fact, the whole town was pouring over with babies, pregnant women and toddlers.

There were hours of talk about babies and starting families and it all made sense.

The base felt like a haunted waiting room.

Loved ones leaving and others waiting for months, year after year.

It broke my heart and gave me a new and deeper appreciation for military families.

New brides and new parents.

It broke my heart and made me cling to The Barren even more.

Literally

The following day, Father's day, some of the brides family was gathered at an aunts home.

An uncle, went upstairs and never came down.

It was quite a shock, and totally unexpected.

This Uncle was the brother to the other musician that played in the wedding.

A friend to The Barren

Death seems to be all around me right now

And then today, I awoke from a dream that has me scratching my head.

I had a dream I had IVF done, on a whim. My eggs were projected onto an overhead projector for us to see prior to insemination. They were flat oblong shapes, three of them. Like, grains of rice, broken and poorly shaped.

I had them inseminated and then was told to have an orgasm to "set them deeply into my uterus"

We went to a movie theatre afterwards that was filled with people I recognised from high school. Unaged and staring at me.

I began to have a panic attach and grabbed The Barren and was crying

" I can't do this, these babies will never grow, they are all broken.

I can't go through all this pain again"

Then I woke up

 I am not sure I know what this means...I am feeling loss

In newer and deeper ways maybe?

I know I do feel lost

Selective Memory

Today I attended the funeral of a woman I considered another grandmother.

I attended the funeral of her daughter earlier this week and while driving from that funeral to the afterfood/social gathering we got a phone call that her mother had passed. 

It was beyond surreal.

Today is the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz; 67 years ago today.

For many this is a reminder of horrible history, for Helen it marks her liberation as well as the day she was laid to rest.

(the connections were not lost on any of us)

We remember how she and two siblings were all that remained of her family of 8.

Her best friend was at the funeral; the woman she befriended in the camps and then walked the death marches next to, shared stolen food with, and

who married her surviving brother and became her sister-in-law.

Helen was an amazingly strong woman, and from a very early age I was told that she was a survivor. She never spoke of the camps openly, it was always something you had to ask about. She wore shirts that hid her number, and when she caught sight of it showing was quick to cover it again. 

While visiting with her back in 1998, she was talking about how she was marched out of her home in 1942 and had never gone back.

She could never go back.

 She was convinced that her home was destroyed when the Nazi's cleared the Częstochowa Ghetto

Hearing this and loving her as much as I do, I told her I would go to Poland and look for her home.

I carried a little piece of paper in my pocket that had her street name, and the correct spelling of her town and went to Europe in her place.

I found her street, I found her home, I sent her a postcard from her town and I brought her pictures I had taken.

When seeing the images, she cried and started telling stories about living in that home.

It prompted her grandchildren to go there a few years later and see the home themselves and asks neighbors if anyone remembered their grandmother.

She loved family, had a wicked sense of humor and was egged to be even more mischievous when she was in the company of either of my grandmothers.

When I turned 21, my Nana asked me to pick 5 people to celebrate with me.

I picked my "grandmothers", 4 women that were grandmothers to me and my bestest friend.

My Nana took us all to....Chippendale's!

Aside from the awkwardness of being in a strip club with my grandmothers, it quickly faded away when I saw these woman, laughing and squealing and flirting with the strippers.

That is what I remember about the night, not the oiled men, or what I saw them do, but instead these amazing women, being girls...being girls with me.

Ever since that night, every time I saw her she would kiss me, and while hugging me say in my ear

"when are we going to see the big men again?" raising her eyebrows and smirking.

This is how I will remember her, smiling, smirking and giggling.

I miss her terribly and she is only been gone for two days.

 

Here are your big men Helen:

Blown away

The winds were strong, and cold and quieted my mind.

I am thankful for that.

My return was greeted with rough, tumbling winds, and I am spending my first week back attending funerals.
Two: a mother and daughter.

My heart is heavy with empathy and reflection

I am thankful, humbled, and inspired by you

On this day

*I didn't want to write about this, but after meditating on why it became obvious I needed to*

I don't watch television or listen to the radio on this day...I don't like to remember this day.

This day was a devastating day for too many people (understatement)

and I don't like to relive it or be reminded of it.

It is not that I do not acknowledge it, or honor it...it is simply too too painful still.

Five years ago in the early morning hours I was sitting on my Nana's bed, whispering into her ear, smiling with a brave face and taking deep breaths for her. She meanwhile was struggling to take her own air and was slowly slipping into her next journey...

I know she if fine, she told me so...but it still hurts.

10years ago I was working at a map company and my job RADICALLY changed from a simple customer service person, to a witness, a confidant, and a person of interest. I was thrown into the chaos of the day, all while trying to comprehend what was happening and terrified of the immediate hate that that would be set into motion. The simple interesting job that I had taken on a mere year beforehand was now all consuming in my dreams and thoughts.

This day set into motion several more years of nightmarish phone conversations

from strangers and officials.

I don't like to remember this day; not because I do not care, but because I care so so very much.

Long Long time, like yesterday

I have been filled with sorrow as of late.

I am missing my grandmothers terribly.

One passed away in September 2006, the other in December 2008.

It feels like an eternity ago I was sitting next to either,

or

feeling their hands rounding my back in a hug.

My last words with my Nana, had her laboring for breath.

As I was leaving from a visit, she reached out to me... I turned and asked her what is it ?

What are you wanting to tell me...

and thru labored breath she simply said "I love you" 

I looked at her and told her I loved her too.

Three days later she was laying on her bed, surrounded by family

taking her last breathes thru her fluid filled lungs.

I don't remember my last conversation with my grandmother...

I spoke with her often over the phone, as I was unable to visit her in the care facility she lived.

My grandfather was in one too, and since his death in 1991 I promised I would never go back into one.

Even for my grandmother.

I was a selfish granddaughter that way

So I called a lot and spoke to her on the phone, mailed her pictures of the garden and visited with her at my parents home, away from the memories of a care facility

We carved pumpkins together in October and celebrated my parents anniversary together in November, and I called to wish her a happy Hannukah in the beginning of the month.

Then I got a call to come to the hospital a few days later; she was asleep after another fall and was not going to wake up.

We were surrounding her as well, when she took her last breath

She finally escaped the body that gave her so much pain.

Now years later I am left with the emptiness of not being able to call them.

Not hearing their voice

Smelling their perfume or soft skin

Sometimes I wake from sleep, I can hear their voices say my name

I have stopped having dreams of my grandmother yelling at me,

or

my Nana driving and complaining they got her hair color all wrong

Now I simply just feel left, like they are calling me from far away

They feel so so far away