the perfect outfit

Mother looked terrific when I came home at noon. She had spent the morning deciding on the right outfit. She said she had struggled under the effort needed to return the three other contenders to the closet before settling on the brown sweater and brown trousers. And a silk scarf. And perfume.

We were not going out for lunch, or to a museum, or even out shopping. We would be spending our afternoon at medical offices, getting one of her weekly shots for anemia and a visit to her rheumatologist.

I certainly hope the good Lord gives her enough notice before He calls her home so that she can get ready.

 

I’ve got your back

I needed to know that tonight. This blog has indeed run defense for me, for my spirit. It has my back. I rarely read posts after I have published them. I appreciate the comments, knowing someone took the time to do that. Every time I have attempted a comment, I am asked for things I do not remember. logins and passwords. I do not even know what my password for this blog is. I look at all those little asterisks and wonder. What was I thinking?!

But tonight I know what I was thinking. And none of it was good. I was down. I may not be up now, but it is heartening to know that certain moments and days can be brought back with a few words. Tonight I felt like I should write to sort things out, but I had no idea where to begin. It was a beautiful fall day. I had taken an early morning walk along the rivers and caught the early sun on the leaves, brilliant with color. Coming home, I made breakfast and got ready for church. How can you ever be ready for church? Mother and I had lunch in Shepherdstown and shopped for a necklace for me to wear in New York. We ran other errands and came home. After I put away the groceries, Curt and I worked to tidy the basement a bit. I made some potato soup, scalloped potatoes, and marinated the fish for tonight. I prepared collard greens for the first time. They were fabulous with the roasted vegetables! I tidied the kitchen, made my lunch for tomorrow and sat down to watch the baseball game. I watched for a few minutes before Curt came downstairs to say goodnight.

That made me sad.

I had oodles of paper work to do before I could go to bed.

How can I have time with him and keep mother company? As I write that, it looks a little silly. Curt is my husband. He comes first. We should have a dedicated time together. We need that.

And mother needs me.

I remember when David was a baby. People would call and ask how I was. “I’m fine, he’s sleeping.” Do I now define myself in a similar way by how it goes with Mother?

Probably so.

I am looking at books. Books written by people like me, who felt surrounded and even overwhelmed by life. Even if these people appeared to have ‘all the time in the world’ to write. I don’t think they were aware of that.

Reading backwards helps to see the near-death experiences of everyday life as closer to eternity than I had ever thought.

Mary

I always wanted to sing like Mary. I look at the pictures accompanying her obituary and her eyes remind me of a thousand days and nights. Young, with friends, in love, alone, dreaming, hoping, remembering. I have listened to Peter, Paul, and Mary for as long as they have been singing. I cannot share how it feels to know their songs as I know theirs. It is one of the wonders of our time that I can enter a store now and find the music behind the same picture–the same album cover–that I discovered while in torn jeans and old Weejuns. I can carry it with me  on my ipod and sing along at the top of my lungs. Not only does my brain remember the notes and rests, but my heart remembers something that cannot be measured between regular lines. Some people did not hear it in Mary’s voice. I do not know the songs that people even 10 years younger than I have hidden in the background of times past. I will not say their songs do not speak of things important. As we are growing through those years after childhood and into new places of our own, the music that follows us and surrounds some of us is truly and uniquely ours. In all my years to come, Mary’s voice will remind me who I am and of the many places I have been.

endings beginnings

It is the end of summer for me. The students return tomorrow and the school year will begin the 180 day count to next summer. I had a list in June. I am not certain where it is right now. I am not even certain where I am right now. I couldn’t even remember how old I was last night. I asked myself, “Am I really 60? That sounds old and I don’t feel old at all.” Except that now, with the end of summer, I see the inevitability of autumn. It is a magnificent season, full of life in the midst of death and full of plans for the future in the midst of scattered lists and incomplete projects. For me, it also a season of memories of my brother. He walked with me so often along the rivers even though the path never felt his weight. Our conversations shared with train whistles and rushing waters, painted this place with the holy palette of history. Steve might have been a more ardent Christian if only Christ had been a Virginian.

And so, the summer ends and I walk the path alone, surrounded by family and friends. I take a breath and look around. So much to see in the work that is to be done, words to be written, books to read, songs to sing, meals to share, days to live.

What next?

a still small voice at 3:30 a.m.

I have not slept well this night. The truth I had been given, I have bent and not trusted. It is all small. But I have failed. While I know the Lord  who leads me does not play games or make deals, I feel in my heart He wanted to make different decisions. How can I go on like this, denying what I know is so and resisting what I do not want to be so? Everywhere I look, I see excess. It is a gift to be simple, a gift to be free. I am neither. I have asked for wisdom and not opened the opportunity to acquire it and grow. And what to do now? Is it enough to return the few items that I can return? Am I missing the point? Is my struggle with weight a mirror of my struggle with acquisitions? I come close. I succeed for a short time, and then failure.

As a good friend and mentor, Claudine, once paraphrased, “pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and begin anew.” Take back what I can. Give away what I do not need. Walk humbly with my God, trusting that He loves me and there is nothing I can do to make Him love me more or less.

The sleepless night is of my making. Yes, God is talking to me, reminding me of the joy and peace that He offers. It is His gift to me that I am unsettled with myself and the roads I have taken. I praise Him for the wonder and questioning He allows me to have. It is not the smooth, wide road He gives me each day, but one of twisting turns and an uneven surface that continually requires attention and looking up. Give thanks in all things!

brothers and sisters

I don’t know what to say about brothers and sisters. I have one of each. I used to have more. They share my story, or that is what I have heard said. “It’s hard when a sibling dies because they know your story.” What story do I know of my sister and brother? What story would they tell of me?

In thinking of my father’s brothers, I remember Uncle Wally and how clever he was. He was much loved and was himself a very caring man. Uncle Fred was generally grumpy, or at least gruff. Uncle Carl in his last years was very sour. My mother has a similar array of personalities and dispositions amongst her siblings. We know Uncle Herb is funny and kind. Aunt Clara was always cautious and ever so judgmental while trying to be politically correct. Aunt Harriet is serious and very cosmopolitan. Uncle Dick is brilliant with words, good one-on-one, not so good in groups.

So why am I surprised that my family looks so different from the inside? That my brother is conservative in all things from politics to religion to nickels and dimes. That my sister…I am not certain how to complete that sentence. I do not know what makes my sister tick or any one or two little phrases that would describe her.

Maybe I don’t really know one or two little phrases about those other relatives I so casually put in nutshells. So what about my own children? I know I never feel quite right in talking about them to anyone who does not know them. I do know their stories from my vantage point and it is enough to make me pause. They are marvelously complex, interesting people who are ever changing, and who awaken each day with some level of enthusiasm.

If I were to greet more people with the assumption that they, too, are marvelously complex, interesting, changing, and awake with hope and dreams; it would be all blessing upon blessing for me.

you did it, mom

So many things to thank for, so much has been given, all generally itemized in grateful phrases on cards over the years. Now the wonder of Mother is the grit to move slowly from chair to wheel chair to car to wheel chair. To be carried into church in a wheel chair and to have the presence to gracefully thank the congregation for the flowers sent to her. To sit in that wheel chair at the end of the pew, hearing little, feeling much, looking back, glancing around, trusting her faith while questioning her God.

Another quiet trip in the car. This time to a Mother’s Day lunch. Her choice. Few accommodations for her wheel chair. Weary. Going through the motions, missing the heart beat. She knew we would not go without her and she wanted to make the day as normal a special day as possible.

Thank the Lord for sunshine and puffy clouds and green fields.

And lavender farms.

She did not get out of the car at the lavender farm because she said it was too difficult to get her in and out of the car. And she probably felt terrible. She waited. Patiently.

Once home she was restored in the knowledge that she had made it through the day, playing the part given her as matriarch.

I remember her cooking in the kitchen. I remember her singing in the choir or standing tall next to me in church. I remember her working at the store. I remember her icing birthday cakes and decorating for Christmas. I remember her watching a toddler in a turtle swimming pool as she held his newborn baby sister on a warm day in May.

And I will remember her today. She looked beautiful. She struggled to do everything from cutting her meat to combing her hair. She glowed as she took telephone calls from her brother, her son, and her grandchildren. She looked beautiful.

whoa! a bright light

While there are still way too many dark corners in my life for which I am still searching for the torch, today was filled with such brightness that it is easy to forget the shadows. When God moves in direct opposition to all reason, it is such a laughable  moment that  for a bit, time stands still. Nothing is real. We think we have it all figured out and make our little preparations and God just moves right in and says ‘not my time.’ And the sun shines on a cloudy day.

Mother fell yesterday. She ached and could hardly walk this morning.  She was just six weeks out from a hip replacement after breaking her femur without falling. She alternately weeped and prayed as we drove for an x-ray. She was so quiet and unresponsive to our attempts at conversation. In our family nothing is worse than when Mother is quiet.

And, indeed, that was the worst. The hospital appeared to have been waiting for her. no waiting for the paperwork or for the x-ray. We shared lunch downstairs while the radiologist looked at the film. As we finished our coffee, my phone rang.

“There is no fracture.”

Such joy we shared.

And then we had ice cream. A simple celebration that lasted through the evening dinner on the front porch, as we marveled at the goodness of God today, listened to the wind in the trees, and enjoyed the soft warmth of the setting sun.

I wonder about just where and how to look for torches for those dark corners.

new life

As Caleb and Simon are growing and so eager to explore the world, mother lies in a strange bed knowing she has not strength to walk across the room. It is a new life for her and it is Easter. She is not at all accepting of this prognosis and will battle beyond the door tomorrow, but today she battled God. Why had he taken from her even the limited mobility she had a few weeks ago? Why one more thing? She was in pain and distressed by the prospect of losing her independence and becoming a burden. There was little idle chatter or cute little remarks. She is patient with the nurses. She eats her meals without complaint. She tells me she does not care what she wears tomorrow for the transition to a skilled nursing facility.

It’s all so new.

what will I remember?

Last night’s Good Friday service came at the end of a long day. I had thought often throughout the day of the sufferings of Christ, but it was still surprising that during the service I was in tears. The reading of the ancient text that has been a part of my Lenten journey  each year brought the tears. I feel so very inadequate to the tasks I have been given, and yet I have been given so much to the good. How can I stand before the love of God alongside the generations of those who came before me? I ask for the strength for each day. Each of my days are scattered with wonder. Caleb calls to say thank you in his very three-year-old voice. David tells of Simon making it through a long Maundy Thursday service after an afternoon walking through the Cloisters. Stephen writes of directing his first movie. Christopher tells me he had breakfast in warm sunshine overlooking the Baltic Sea. Curtis created a welcoming garden along mother’s path in and out of the house. Mother and I listened to the Passion of St. Matthew while she lay in hospital recovering from hip surgery. We both agree that J.S. Bach is sitting next to Peter and Paul in heaven.

I take these pieces of light as gifts. I cannot know why I should have them, for I continue to stumble. I read yesterday that each life has a plot. I have always known that is true. It’s just that is easy to forget. It is also easy to forget who knows the plotline. When reading a good novel, the main character is interesting often because of the interaction with others. When looking at my life, I see many people, many pieces, many opportunities. I also see too much of me. Now, with days interlaced with my mother’s life, I pray for the wisdom to see more clearly through the prism of love, failure, promise, and faith.