2.3.12

{i took my african violets to work and put them in the conference room where they are thriving. every day when i see them i smile. gramma, i miss you.}

Advice

I accidentally found this poem and it addressed the feelings I so often have of needing to have everything in my life in order before I can allow myself the gift of creating anything. . .

Advice to Myself

by Louise Erdrich

Leave the dishes.
Let the celery rot in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator
and an earthen scum harden on the kitchen floor.
Leave the black crumbs in the bottom of the toaster.
Throw the cracked bowl out and don’t patch the cup.
Don’t patch anything. Don’t mend. Buy safety pins.
Don’t even sew on a button.

Let the wind have its way, then the earth
that invades as dust and then the dead
foaming up in gray rolls underneath the couch.
Talk to them. Tell them they are welcome.

Don’t keep all the pieces of the puzzles
or the doll’s tiny shoes in pairs, don’t worry
who uses whose toothbrush or if anything
matches, at all.
Except one word to another. Or a thought.

Pursue the authentic-decide first
what is authentic,
then go after it with all your heart.

Your heart, that place
you don’t even think of cleaning out.
That closet stuffed with savage mementos.

Don’t sort the paper clips from screws from saved baby teeth
or worry if we’re all eating cereal for dinner
again. Don’t answer the telephone, ever,
or weep over anything at all that breaks.
Pink molds will grow within those sealed cartons
in the refrigerator. Accept new forms of life
and talk to the dead
who drift in though the screened windows, who collect
patiently on the tops of food jars and books.

Recycle the mail, don’t read it, don’t read anything
except what destroys
the insulation between yourself and your experience
or what pulls down or what strikes at or what shatters
this ruse you call necessity.

Good Work

{this sticker that says 'good work' is on the floor of the women's bathroom where i work. it's been there for about a week. i'm not commenting on the quality of the cleaning. . . somehow this message to smile must have been meant for me!}

So. . . I've been coughing for awhile now. A while meaning somewhere in the neighborhood of seven weeks, give or take a week or two. I mean, really. . . after a month or so who keeps track?

Ali has it too. She gave up a while back and went to the doctor for antibiotics. Didn't do a thing for her but lighten her wallet so I didn't go.

By the way, she's still coughing.

Last Friday morning I woke up feeling like a cranky old woman. My back hurt. My lungs were full of crud and a had a new, terrible pain in my right side. The kind of pain that hurt to breathe. That made me feel nauseous. I was just positive I was having a gallbladder attack or something.

All I could think was, "Damn, it really sucks getting old! What in the world is going to go bad next??"

The pain in my side persisted. Finally on Sunday I gave it up and took myself to the urgent care place where, it turns out, I learn that I've broken my rib from coughing so much. {Seriously?? Do I now have osteoporosis or what??}

As the 12 year old nurse was writing out a prescription for some antibiotics {i have bronchitis too} she casually asked how old I was. When I answered "46," her next question made me question my non-violent values.

"And do you remember when your last period was, or are you all the way through menopause now?"

She's lucky that I'm old. And have a broken rib. Because I sure did want to punch her.

Curling Inward

When I was 26, my mother was 46 and that's the year she began to disappear.

It didn't happen all at once. Like a leaf curling inward as the hours of sunlight grow short in fall, it seemed as though she grew smaller every day. Where her smile and energy had been infectious, weariness began to find it's home in her soul.

There was a wedge of distance between her and the world and every day it seemed as if that slice of remoteness expanded in the tiniest of increments and she became a boat that slowly drifted away.

I tried to talk to her about it. She wouldn't hear any of it. "I'm just tired. I don't have the energy to care about all the things I used to care about. Maybe I'm sick." But no doctor ever found anything wrong. And her energy didn't come back. And she never started to care about all the things that had once brought her joy.

Somewhere in her 46th year she began to disappear.

Now she's 66 and she's housebound.

Depression is a thief. It takes the things most precious to your soul and hides them so far away you forget they were ever good to begin with. At first you remember the energy and vitality and you wonder where they might have gone. And then slowly, you stop caring that they are gone as you struggle just to get through another day. The urge to create beauty becomes too much to contemplate and you bide your time, watching the clock so you can go to sleep for just a little while longer. The words that used to swirl and tumble in your head, demanding to be released through your fingers are now introverted and unapproachable.

Silence becomes the noise of your mind.

And I think I know all this because now I am 46. I am 46 and I feel like a leaf curling inwards. I am 46 and there is a thin slice of remoteness poking at my soul and the joy of creating words and pictures has become muted and desaturated.

I am 46 and perhaps depression is genetic.

I watched my mother curl inward and slowly drift away. I don't want to do the same.

Love What You Do

What The Hail?

{the size of the hail at our house}

{hail across town!}

Been an interesting few days. . .

:: the worst stomach flu I've ever had.

:: the biggest hail I've ever seen.

:: a desperate push towards Friday and a much needed day off which will make a four day weekend.

:: because of the aforementioned stomach flu I'm terribly behind on my creative challenges. it's catch-up this weekend for me!

To Dance

{warning. this is stream-of-consciousness writing. i've been unable to write lately so this is kind of raw. perhaps i should warn you with "danger will robinson! danger!"}

Writing. . .the antidote to self doubt and self forgetting.

That's exactly where I am right now and where I feel like I've been. And I didn't even know that I had forgotten.

The daily-ness of life took over and being on auto-pilot seemed like the only way to keep going. Sure. It was devoid of some small amounts of stress. But I guess it was also empty of the spark of interest and vitality that keep things smoldering and sprightly.

How to get back?

It seems to be the question of my ages. The question that keeps returning to me in the endless cycles that my life seems to be engaged in. I get a few areas of myself "together" and then something else seems to fall apart. I change my focus to try and heal that and something else falls out and exposes it's warts and ugly hair for the world to see.

Perhaps I spend too much time analyzing. Too much time staring at my navel and wondering if everyone is as messed up as I am.

Perhaps it's all my illusions of control. The world has been spinning for millions of years without my help and will continue to spin long after I am gone. Surrendering myself into the great unknown of that creativeness and life sustaining-ness calls to me. But the process of letting go seems so novel and strange.

My brain longs for order in the chaos. Neatness in the mess. A plan in the empty slate of the day. That's the way I've spent my life. And it has worked for me. Perhaps the reason I can't just plunge myself into the chaos of creation is that deep down I'm afraid that it just can't work. That if I empty myself of my "plans" and my "control" I will lose.

Lose what??

{Seems crazy when I write it, but there has to be a core of truth in there.}

Planning has worked. I'm "successful" if mostly broke. I have a house, a car, a job, a partner, three dogs, a cat. People who don't plan don't have those things. Do they?

Surrender means what? to cease resistance to an opponent and submit to their authority

But, if I surrender my fears isn't that different? Right now my fears are the opponent. Right now I already submit to their authority. They win. I lose. They shape my decisions and my future.

{fear is a thief. it takes and never gives. how many times have i preached that sermon?}

Tired. Of. It.

I want to paint. To create. To write. To think. To sing. Maybe even to dance.

But I can't do those things when my brain screams YOU MUST HAVE A PLAN. CREATION IS MESSY. YOU ARE UGLY AND STUPID. WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE ANYWAY? YOU ARE NOTHING. NO ONE LIKES YOU. YOU AREN'T GOOD.

And so far, no amount of wishing, pretending, gratitude list-making has made any of those voices any quieter.

So maybe it's time to surrender. To make a mess of things. To lay down the fear of doing something wrong and having someone laugh at me. To tell my brain to shut the fuck up about how no one likes me.

We started the ball rolling yesterday.

And perhaps today I will take one more tentative step towards a dance.

Heading North

{sign on the wall at City Barbeque • taken with my phone}

Is it just me, or does it seem like crazy is winning here of late?

Crazy weather, crazy politics, crazy tragedy.

Sometimes it just makes we want to yell. Sometimes it makes me want to cry. And sometimes it makes me want to move to Canada.

The questions are always more clear than the answers.

Should we allow a very rich, supercilious celebrity to question the legitimacy of our President? We do.

Should we continue to ignore the changing global climate and hope that it will just go away, or fix itself? We do.

Should we keep fighting change, in our medical system, our fiscal structure, our energy policy, because we fear it? We do.

I don’t have the answers. But I am starting to understand this: we have to stop letting crazy win.

The extreme ends of the spectrum keep getting all the attention, and the voice of the middle – you and me – we keep getting drowned out.

I want to stand up and be counted.

Before it’s too late and I book that UHaul headed north.

Good Enough

Several things happened this week that reminded me that I'm not really good enough at anything.

I'm OK at a few things.

I'm acceptable. I will do in a pinch. I'm marginal, borderline, average, fair-to-middling, moderate and so-so.

I'm tolerable.

But I'm not good.

And these are voices that I've heard and wrestled my whole life. These are the voices that simply have to mouth the words and I will lip read them from miles away and fold like a house of cards. When I heard "thanks, but no thanks" this week my instinct was to become the cartoon turtle in Bugs Bunny, flying into my shell, battening down the hatches and raising the white flag of surrender.

And I'm still struggling. My words, my photos, my creativity, my thoughts, my offerings will never be the best mostly because there will only ever be one best. There will always be someone who is better than me. My challenge is to learn to keep going anyway. My challenge is to not listen to the voices who tell me to quit. To disappear. To avoid.

And so I will. And I will look at what I was not asked to do and I will not judge it. I will not think I could have done it better. And I will try not feel less than any more.

Because isn't that the point of creativity in the first place? It's mine, and it will just have to be good enough.

It's Your Birthday

Dear Mother,

When I wrote the date at the top of the cleaning clipboard at the warehouse tonight I suddenly remembered that it's your birthday. I had to do the little thing in my head I've done for the last 46 years to remember whether your birthday is the 25th or 26th. April (your birthday month) comes before June (Cindy's month) so you are the 25th and she is the 26th. You would think I would have figured it out by now, what with 46 tries and all.

I'm sorry that I forgot until tonight.

Does that happen to you yet, when March 15 rolls around? Do you think all day long that something is kind of off, and then suddenly it dawns on you, "Oh yeah. . .today is the day I gave birth to my firstborn?"

It's OK if it does. I get it.

I hope someone took you out to dinner tonight. I hope is was someplace nice. You've cooked too many meals in your lifetime to have to cook your own birthday dinner too.

Did Dad bring you flowers?

Guess I better wrap this up. What with not knowing what to say really, and knowing you won't know I wrote it anyway. Just wanted you to know that I remembered.

And that it still matters.

Love,
Tan

At Night

Since entering my middle years, I've had a hard time sleeping. I wake up at two or three in the morning and my mind races. I worry. I fret. I think about things I have no control over and even though I tell myself that worry is a useless endeavor, I just keep right on doing it.

Very occasionally I pray. I suppose I'm telling myself it's the perfect antidote to worrying.

My prayers at that hour go something like this – "Dear God, here I am. Not sleeping again. Do you think there's something you could do about that? . . . I'm still waiting. . ."

And then, suddenly one night my breath was knocked from my chest and a story I learned as a child came rushing back.

“There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God.”

I took a deep breath of panicky dismay.

I'm him.

I'm Nicodemus.

You see, just like me, Nicodemus only came to Jesus at night.

When the noise of the day was over, when he was left alone with his thoughts, and the night invaded his soul, that’s when he found Jesus. That was when he admitted he needed Jesus.

I’m no different.

It is in the night that I want to talk to Him. That's the time I feel the need to share my fears and dreams, and hear to listen for his whisper, “I love you.” I want to know he and I… that we’re good. It is in these dark hours, I sit beneath the cross, staring up at the lifeless form of my king, and I thank him for all he’s done for me. I stare past the crown of thorns at the dark sky, and notice the solemn twinkle of each star. I wonder how far away each star is, and I marvel at the greatness of creation. I wonder at the immensity of his plans.

And in the morning, I go to work.

I forget about the night-time conversations.

I forget about the cross, the crown of thorns, the solemn stars.

I forget about Jesus.

And here I am in this Holy Week, hearing the Easter message. Here I sit beneath the cross. I thank God for all my blessings. And then, by Thursday surely I will deny that he deserves a place in my day.

And, God forbid, that he deserves a place in the immensity that is the rest of my life.

Kingdom Work

My father was devout. He was so staunchly dedicated to sharing the Gospel that he had very little time to devote to his children.

There were sermons to prepare. Crises to solve. Needy people to counsel. Board meetings to attend.

God had called. He had answered. The calling came first. Family came second. Or third. Sometimes last.

I would sit outside his office door. I would wait until my father had a moment to spare. I knew I was supposed to be quiet - never interrupt, never disturb. He wasn't just doing ordinary work. He was doing God's work.

I tried to think of important things to say - things that would impress him or make him happy with me. "I talked to someone at school about God today Daddy! I memorized John 3:16! Does that make you happy Daddy?"

One day I went to his study door and no one was there. The bookshelves were perfectly organized. The desk was tidy with his favorite silver pen poised on top of a stack of papers he had been writing on. I slowly reached out to touch his pen. I wanted to pretend to be part of his sacred calling too.

I took the pen and a sheet of his blank paper and crouched beneath the desk, writing something I just knew would be beautiful for my Daddy. When I was done I neatly folded up the paper and planned a way to surprise him with my cleverness.

I left the pen underneath his desk.

"WHERE IS MY PEN? YOU KNOW YOU ARE NOT TO TOUCH MY THINGS! NO ONE GAVE YOU PERMISSION TO BE IN MY STUDY!"

Sickness rolled in my stomach. Apologies rolled from my mouth. The regrets were accepted but all I wanted to do was run away and hide. I was ashamed.

All my life I have tried to please my Daddy. And all my life I have failed.

I never did give him the words I wrote that day. All these years later I can't remember what they were. Probably nothing important. These words, like so many sermons, have long since faded away.

All my life I've tried to please God.

All my life I failed. Until one day words started pouring out of my fingers onto a computer screen. And one day words poured out of my mouth in prayers of honest anguish. And one day syllables of sincere praise came bubbling out of my soul.

And God listened.

And God said, "This is my beloved child in whom I am well pleased. . ."

Grace Moments

Weekends are for. . .

:: eating slow meals with old friends, when everyone laughs and eats fried cheese.

:: lots of small peat pots, spread all over our kitchen, germinating colorful hope for spring gardens.

:: wearing your team's sweatshirt as you run errands, and having the store clerk laugh and tell you he shouldn't cash out your order because your team beat his the night before. the grace was in the laughter we shared.

:: forcing forsythia cuttings to bloom early by bringing them into the house and arranging them in an interesting old beer bottle.

:: baking scones and sharing them.

:: small, happy moments of grace.

Getting Real

I have a love/hate relationship with authenticity.

I crave it. I really, really try to model it. I want to live it.

But lately, I'm kind of realizing that maybe I wear it like a coat made out of razors. I'm too sharp, too pointy and just maybe a bit too raw. There are other words that are descriptors - scathing, barbed, acerbic, sarcastic. Do they sound like me?

See, here's the thing. I grew up in a house where everything was hidden. Anything true that wasn't pretty, shiny and delightful was banished to the basement of our lives. It all lived down there behind the big old scary furnace with the octopus arms. Our emotional detritus collected a lot of dust, but like the boxes of outdated clothes and broken kitchen utensils, it just never really went away. I came from stock that always had on happy faces and we didn't talk about anything that made anyone uncomfortable. And Sundays were the worst.

Like most families we got on each other's nerves. Particularly in the car. I clearly remember one trip to church in particular. We kids were most likely being annoying. My father took the bait and war broke out. I remember crying, holding my breath and silently begging for a ceasefire. The words "please stop" were turning over and over in my head all the way to church. And when we pulled up in front of the house in the subdivision that served as the church building there came the inevitable instructions, "You better put a smile on your face before we get inside."

I wiped my tears. Blew my nose. And pasted a plastic smile on my face so we could walk into church. Together. The pastor and his happy family.

And so I live in the tension of a very complicated relationship with authenticity.

Coming into my own, years later I realized I didn't need to pretend anything anymore. And perhaps I went too far.

The whole world doesn't want to know my truth. Nor does it care. I don't need to say everything I think or feel. Maybe I just talk (and write) too damn much.

I don't know.

I do know that I don’t have a red bow to wrap this all together with. I don’t have a grace-lined ending or some nugget of Scripture that ties this all neatly together. Just an honest confession of my constant struggle to be really real. And to be real in a way that doesn't hurt other people in the process.

I think it boils down to the fact that I want to be loved because I am real. Maybe not so much despite my flaws and failures. . .and sarcasm and sharpness. . .I want to be loved because of them.

A Little Conversation

a little text message conversation today. ali went for yet another blood test, hoping for an hCG number between 0 and 5, signaling that this whole thing is finally behind us.

A:: 8.2. WTF? i'm not doing another test.

T:: Ur so close to 0-5. . .

A:: I know.

T:: I hereby and forthwith declare it officially over and done with. Moving ON!!!!!

A:: YES! I second that motion!

T:: Motion carried. It was unanimous. Meeting adjourned!

A:: Lol!

and so this chapter of life ends and we finally are able to look forward with hope

Emerging

“There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle;

you can live as if everything is a miracle.”

~ Albert Einstein

I think I'll still keep choosing the "everything" option.

These tiny little emerging dianthus on our little quilt square of the planet are confirmation of the power that lies just below the surface of most things. They manifest energy that we can't see. They ask me to look a little deeper, listen a little closer and look beyond what seems so hard to believe.

What Speaks To Me

:: the moon outside my door this morning, begging me to try and capture it

:: the sounds of birds giggling and chitchatting in our trees before dawn

:: the smell of dinner on the grill all over our neighborhood

:: the slightest hint of green in the rose who appears to have survived the winter - much like me

:: red-winged blackbirds, in groups of three

:: crocuses emerging from the blackened mud, whose color is louder than their smell

:: watching delilah fly at the park - at once, both unsure and hopeful

:: moments of solitude. the quietness teaches me everything.

It's Not One Moment In Time

if you ever felt this need to look up the word miscarriage in the thesaurus this is what you would find –
miscarriage: failure, foundering, ruin, ruination, collapse, breakdown, thwarting, frustration, undoing, nonfulfillment, mismanagement

and i always thought it was an event. a thing that happened to people who weren't careful. who smoked and drank or who didn't care for themselves or for others. i thought it happened one day and a day or two later you were ready to begin again.

fuck that.

a month later we're still wondering what's going on. we're still taking blood. we're still making phone calls and desperately trying to extract information from doctors who must think that all women are somehow born with some kind of secret knowledge in our dna just because we are female and because of that they don't have to bother explaining things. you know, they are busy and all. . .with people who are still pregnant. . .

weeks later i'm learning that miscarriage is not an event that happens at a moment in time, despite the handwritten note, scribbled on a post-it while the doctor's assistant gives you a precious 30 seconds of her time. the note reads "miscarriage - February 22, 2011 Level still 20.2"

it's a note that breaks my heart when i see it crumpled up on the kitchen counter, between the bread bowl and the paper towels. and i'm not the one still bleeding.

miscarriage isn't one moment in time.

its a slog. and for now it feels like it just goes on and on.

Things I Didn't Do This Weekend

{my surprise birthday cake! see the heart in the candles??}

:: I did not stress that I haven't posted anything since Thursday. I haven't taken any pictures either. Just needed a little break I guess.

:: I didn't act shocked when I came home from Arlington this evening and Ali had made me a birthday cake. From scratch. With candles. She likes to believe she can't cook, but she's learning! It was a really nice surprise to come home to!

:: I didn't drink any wine. Even though one of my closest and oldest friends brought me four bottles that she chose just for me. I have a terrible cold and I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to taste it very well. Thanks Nancy! Seeing you was the best gift ever!

:: I didn't mop my kitchen floor before Nancy arrived yesterday. Even though it was full of doggy tracks all over the place.

:: I didn't color my hair. My grey roots are showing but that's just life.

:: I didn't mind losing an hour of sleep on Saturday night. I can't really describe how much I delight in an extra hour of light in the evenings.

:: I didn't beat Delilah senseless. Even though she needs it.

:: I didn't cry when we learned that my beloved Kentucky Wildcats are in the same region/bracket as Ali's beloved Ohio State Buckeyes. Please dear Lord, don't let them play each other. . . let Ohio State lose first. . .

:: I didn't lose any weight at this week's weigh-in. I was very disappointed. I was so sure I was going to hit the -10 mark. Maybe next week. . .but I kinda doubt it with it being my birthday and all. . .

it was a really good weekend full of things i didn't do. hope yours was too.

It's All About the Kindness

I read someplace the other day that if you type "Why Are Christians So" into the Google search box you might be surprised. Their predictive search function will automatically fill in the most popular queries based on this phrase.

The results are astounding. I guess. Or maybe they aren't? Here's what came up for me.

Maybe these answers are completely on the mark. And that's kind of depressing.

I've always thought that anyone who calls herself a Christian ought to work a whole lot harder on kindness than love. We spend quite a lot of time in churches spouting things like, "God is love," and "Love one another," while most of the time we have no clear idea what that actually might look like. It's just this vague phrase that has no real context or presence in our dealings with each other.

Even worse, there are whole flocks and denominations of Christians who use the word love to justify being harsh and exclusive. Love becomes doing what is "best" for you and, by the way. . . you don't get to decide what is best for you. I do.

Maybe we should go back to the beginning and start small. Work on kindness first and then graduate on to love. If you are a methodically kind person in your day to day interactions with others, odds are you have a great shot at becoming a loving person. But if you skip the lessons of kindness it is very unlikely you'll learn how to love. It's about baby-steps. And they start with kindness.

Today is the first day of Lent. I've got some work to do on kindness. And just maybe, 40 days from now I will also be a little bit more loving.