Peace be with you

My dinner partner last night has been through it, meaning that she’s lost her Mother and she possesses the unique and un-enviable knowledge of what I’m going through. I remember it, when she lost her mother; I was there and I remember feeling that it was something I knew I would face one day. And I remember feeling foreign, looking through a window at a scene that would one day be my own but not that day. It comes around. I haven’t seen her since my father’s service but she’s kept in touch, leaving me long and personal messages about her thoughts, her caring, her wondering but also her allowing that I did not have to return her call. Simply, she put forth that when I was ready, she’d be there. I saved her messages and listened to them again and again, there was so much comfort for me in her words.

Our conversation last night went straight to my heart, because I’ve been teetering with hope again, have reacquainted myself with it. Because I believe in hope. Even when it’s dark in my world and I feel alone and, well, hopeless, I still know that hope is there and it’s my choice to embrace it or follow it. I want hope, and it’s my choice. Totally up to me.

She reminded me of this last night because while I’ve been understandably wrapped up in the loss, dynamics and responsibilities of my own world, the world has of course continued to spin in all of our lives. And for her, a nine-year relationship came to an end, to her surprise. Well, perhaps not an end, but it is going through enough to threaten the foundation of her world because it took such a hard turn and she's left to evaluate every single thing. And that’s shattering. I’ve known her for years, sometimes closely and sometimes at a distance. But sitting across from her last night, although we never spoke of it, I learned that we both believe in the value of peace of mind. Serenity, happiness, peace of mind, hope. Related feelings. We both believe that it’s a reasonable goal, and that we are responsible for it, not any other person, here or gone. It doesn’t happen; we have to work for it. It’s not handed to us, we have to go in search of it. For me, on a small but powerful level, it’s pausing to feel a soft breeze, or to warm myself in a spot of sun. But it’s also larger. It’s allowing the differences between each other, parent-to-child or lover-to-lover. Really accepting our approaches to life, grief, sadness, happiness, struggles, goals, self-definition, hardships, and gifts. I think that through the years and through these life-changing surprises that we did not want, we both have realized that we have to release ourselves from the hold that fear has on us, we cannot focus on how things did not go as we wanted or assumed they would, but rather let God guide us and let peace seep into us. Give up the resistance and embrace acceptance.

In spite of everything, I know just how lucky I am. I am lucky to have my family and my friends. I am lucky to have one-on-one, very compassionate nights like last night. Because it doesn’t always happen that way – when two people have two very real needs to speak and be heard and understood and loved, and they both manage to give and get that, that’s a good connection, a good night. And, speaking for myself, it feels good to be able to get AND to give. Because I can do that. I can listen and love and care and focus on another’s life. I can do it. And my goodness, I say that it feels good to do it. It feels very good.

Speaking freely, but lost the language

Stranger walking past me in office building hallway: Hello
Me: How

And of course I just cringed. What was that about? There are so many options, Hello, Hi, Good Morning, or even a silent nod would have been acceptable, and yet what came from my mouth was "How." What's that, me practicing the Native American Indian tongue learned in elementary school? Where did my brain go when all it had to do was say Hello? *Sigh*

Chocolate on the outside, nuts on the inside - oh yeah, she's my crazy girl

Today's count

Ten things that bring a smile this morning:

1. Waking up before my alarm clock
2. Watching the sun rise
3. Seeing the bright green leaves glow in the sunshine
4. Feeling on my skin the cool temperature outside
5. Reading today's paper – because Thursday has the Preview and Neighborhood sections
6. Remembering that I packed today’s lunch last night, so I don’t have to think about it this morning
7. Seeing the Mexican Heather and Confederate Jasmine along my fence, robust and healthy and smelling divine
8. Enjoying the perfect cup of coffee that I somehow managed to make
9. Looking forward to having dinner with a dear friend this evening
10. Thinking about how tomorrow I’ll be heading to the cabin for the weekend
10. Thinking about how tomorrow I’ll be heading to the cabin for the weekend*

* The last one warrants repeating since it brings a particularly grand smile to my face. That and the use of color!

I've been looking so long at these pictures of you

There are thousands, millions, of words written about photographs. Words and photographs have a fairly strong marriage I’d say, though both can certainly stand independent, requiring the reader or the viewer to complete the... I’m tempted to say picture or sentence here but instead will say story.

Monday night I began the task of organizing and categorizing my father’s photographs. Photographic documentation of a life. And hefty evidence of the way standard photograph sizes have changed over the years. Sometime in the mid-70s, for instance, they stopped being square. I have 4” x 4” boxes filled with square black and whites; 3” x 3” color photos; Polaroids, etc. and many, many envelopes, filled with 3” x 5” and 4” x 6” photos. This collection is for the most part grouped into several enormous cardboard boxes of certain time periods, say snaps of his childhood, or early in his marriage to Mom, or family trips, Christmases and other family events that bring out the camera, and then hunting and fishing photos throughout.

The particular box I started going through last night was heavily populated with boat and fishing images. Except for the large cardboard envelope that held my parents’ wedding and honeymoon images, as well as newspaper clippings regarding their nuptials, clippings I've never seen before. And black & white photos of my parents ice-skating, and of my mother hunting with my father – both taken when they were in their 20s, long before we came along. Both looking very much like LL Bean ads from time gone by.

My father wanted to organize these images – along with boxes and boxes of slides in slide carousels - together with me. Possibly put them on video, or at least transfer them to CDs. It was to be our project, but it was a project we never started. So when I started it Monday, I realized that I have a certain handicap by doing this task alone. There’s so much there to learn and there’s no way to get the answers. Who is that? Where is this? What year was that? What’s the story behind this photo? Um, why are you wearing your hat like that? It’s the million words behind the photographs, it’s the stories I can't have.

If he only knew what he was getting into

She'll be five in October but these were taken December 2000. They all make me smile but I'm particularly fond of the one on the far right. This is when she and Isaac first met. Isaac is a strappingly handsome Yellow Lab, and her number one beau. He may have had one up on her on the day this picture was taken, but it was sadly short-lived. In their adult life, she is his worst nightmare. But he plays Forest to her Jenny. You'd never guess from this photo that she'd grow up and be the absolute boss of him. Rarely does she cut him any slack; equally rarely does he lose patience with her. He doesn't get ruffled that he's never able to return the ball that he outran her to retrieve - no, he tolerates her snapping at him or throwing herself against him to make him drop it. He's so familiar with her antics that, accepting of his defeat, he sees her coming and he'll drop it immediately to avoid the confrontation. Same goes for the pool, though sometimes he raises his gigantic paw and tries to push her away from him, or swims in circles. No matter to her, she just climbs on top of him. But they also cuddle together on his bed, I swear they do. And they sleep with their heads on each other. And he saved her life once. Yes, theirs is a special bond, one we can't understand. Sort of like a canine sadomasochistic relationship, something only they can fully appreciate.

The sad sad tale of Cheyenne's tail

The girl pretty much has it made. Translate that into I spoil her rotten, and she goes just about everywhere with me. And this weekend she went to my parents' with me, she spent the night out with me and she spent the day at a friend's house with me. But that could be any given weekend, really.

What marks this weekend as a bit different is that this one was her first real sampling of the upcoming Summer. What do you do in the summer? You swim. And did she ever get to swim. On Saturday at my parents' house, and on Sunday at friends. Big weekend for her. Now, bless her, she's suffering from her tail. It's limp, and that's an odd sight. It's not jutting outward or wagging back and forth or thumping against the walls, table, floor. It's not happy to greet me. Instead, her tail is hanging down, straight down, and very still. She will not sit down. And she was in obvious pain when I ran my hands down her tail this morning.

A couple years ago, I flipped out when this happened and I had her at the emergency vet before you could say this will cost you $400.00 and they won't have a clue what's wrong with her. But today, due to my friends at the AKC, I have gained valuable knowledge. 1) it has a name: Cold Water Tail; 2) it's a fairly common occurrence in sporting dogs; and 3) it's described to me as a painful but benign affliction following swimming in cold water. Not much is known about it other than x-rays tend to confirm swollen muscles at the base of the tail, and that the recovery time is 2-3 days before the tail is in full wagging, swinging, thumping force again.

I feel so bad for her that I want to buy her stuffed animals and ice cream on the way home. I won't, but I want to. She'll get Greenies though, you can count on that.

The weekend

Taking care of my mother's car
Taking care of the family's grocery shopping
Lunch with my nephew
Laughter with my friends
Champagne
Work
Sunshine
More laughter with friends
Basketball (N.C.!)
Tossing the ball in the pool for the dogs
Good music
Lots of time spent outside
More laughter with friends
Good food
One good movie
and this Sunday night, one sleepy me, one sleepy dog and one early hour bedtime.

Take away

Note to restaurant manager at Willie's Ice House: I'm thinking that rather than leaning against the railing and lazily observing my friend and me move two solid wood tables together, and not doing so with ease I might add -- while we both give you looks that say Hello! Do you think you could get off your duff and help us here? -- and then finally ambling over to join our effort just as we've accomplished our goal and casually pushing in a single chair while asking us how many this afternoon? well, I'm thinking that is simply not good management. Although the food was good, it was this that we discussed at lunch. And on the drive back to the office.

Hello April!

Oh I’m so glad that you’re here. I’ve been waiting for you. You are my favorite, you know. Well, you and October. For similar reasons, but different seasons. Your winds awoke me this morning, eager at my windows. You have to be different, don’t you? Right from the start, you have separated yourself from March, your temperature dropping but your winds jostling all the leaves and blowing the pollen about. Still I’m so happy to see you, to be in your first day. You are the forgiving month, the releasing month, the month that flirts and plays and flies a kite. You are the month of change. You coax the flowers, tickle the bees, make the leaves dance. You intoxicate me with your perfumed air. You invite me outside again. Picnics and evening walks. Yes, evening walks, because Sunday morning, Daylight Savings Time begins and walking at night in the light will again be an option. I care not for that hour of sleep lost, it’s an easy trade for the hours of daylight in the evenings. You are not the cruelest month, no, you send invitations to us: get outside, ride your bike, put your hands in the earth, plant, roller skate, sit on your porch with a book. You send invitations for change. Come walk in my light and my warm air, come let me heal you for I am the month of change. Put your cares on my winds. Release your troubles and be free once again. April, you remind me that however sad things are, Spring reaffirms life. There will be sadness, but we do know that joy is there. I watch you closely and over and over I see you say "Live!"