I have been traveling back in time to my childhood through the vehicle of a memoir writing class. This class has no magic buttons, and no scientific instrument panel that takes advantage of advances in quantum physics, but it does take me back. And soon, in my 10 year old girl self, I am experiencing the world through both by child self and my adult self. My child self, hurting, confused, my adult self, saying,”Oh, hmm, now I get it.” And while I’m traveling back I’m trying to also create my future. I’m looking at publishing sites again, wondering, “Will I ever find the time to get this query put together?” Trying to find a place to get my memoir on being the mom of a teen mom published. And visiting places where I hope to rent space for my growing psychotherapy practice.
And so as I find myself traipsing back and forth between past and future, I find the present more empty, more frightening, perhaps because I’m being too thin with myself, and in order to be present, well, in the present, you have to have a certain weight of being. And also, I believe, that in order to be present, and to be a fairly good therapist, you have to do some work of making sense of your own life, including your childhood. The things we don’t make sense of are the things that can take us back by surprise, when we’re not ready, and being the therapist in the room is not the place to be taken by surprise, and dragged back into our own trauma, when there’s a client sitting across from us. So, I travel in time to make peace with the present.
I’m seeing now the non-linear aspects of time, the non-time aspects of movement through space and how children can raise their own parents sometimes, and this is not in the textbooks, but it happens a lot. Of why often good people fail us, when they’re following a linear path through a circular universe. Of why time travel is often important, but coming home to yourself is imperative.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Ashes to Ashes
There was a short time in my childhood when our family didn’t live at 4017 Sheridan Avenue in Minneapolis; instead, we lived at 2109 Hawthorne Street in Franklin Park, Illinois. Nearly everything about living in Illinois was different than living in Minneapolis. Living on Sheridan Avenue, we had a big house, big yard, and I had lots of friends in the neighborhood. We had huge Oak trees in our yard, and two lakes within walking distance. Our house on Hawthorne Street was smaller and newer with no fireplace, and there weren’t many trees in the whole neighborhood. Chain link fences divided the houses, and our neighbors were not so much like us, like the neighbors on Sheridan were. In Franklin Park, on one side was Mrs. Romero, a very loud single mom, who yelled at her kids often. On the other side, were Mr. and Mrs. Hartmann, with their son, my rare friend in the neighborhood, George. The Hartmanns were from Germany. I went to first grade in Illinois, we moved there because my dad took a new job.
I remember sleeping one night in a first floor room, near the back of the house, I was alone in a single bed, with boxes all around, still unpacked. I could hear the television in the living room, my mom and dad talking, and it seemed like the only sense of comfort at all in this strange house. It had only been the year before that we’d moved into the house on Sheridan, we’d lived there while I went to kindergarten, at Lake Harriet elementary school, (now torn down, and townhouses fill the space). As I lay in this strange room trying to sleep, I felt something on my leg, something tickly, I pulled back the blankets, and there was a big, black spider on my leg. I screamed loudly, and both my parents came running, “It’s alright, it’s only a spider, just go to sleep now.” Well, I don’t think living on Hawthorne Street was ever really all right for me, and now the spider seemed a foreboding.
Eventually, my mom had both my older sister Kathy and I, and my two younger brothers, Tim and Mike, have our ‘bedroom’ in the whole second story of the house. This was a large room, and the second floor had it’s own bathroom. This was an improvement on the house on Sheridan, which had only one bathroom. Kathy was five years older than me, so she was in 6th grade, and my younger brothers were only 4 and 2 years old. Mike was still in a crib. My rowdy older brothers, 3 of them, were in the bedrooms downstairs, where my parents also had a bedroom.
I don’t remember so much being in the house, as hanging out outside of the house. My older brothers quickly made friends, and it seemed there were always teenage boys around the yard, with their banana seat bikes, and their cigarettes and their greased back hair and blue jeans. My brother Steve became part of a band, and bought a set of drums. Now, our garage became a stage, and these teen age boys formed a band. They’d play, G-L-O-R-I-A, Gloria, and I was so proud that I could spell Gloria. I felt so proud of my cool brother, Steve, the drummer. This was the beginning of me wanting to be a boy, not a girl, anymore. My oldest sister, Rosie, was off to college, back in Minnesota, and my sister Kathy, it seemed got stuck watching us little kids and doing the dishes. My brothers, however, got to have fun.
My brothers Pat and Steve were 6 and 7 years older than me, so that meant that when I was in first grade, they were in junior high. While my brother Steve was more likely to be playing drums, inside the garage, my brother Pat would hang out with his friends behind the garage. There was no alley on this block, just garages in the middle of the block, separated by more chain link fence. It was quiet and private back there, and it felt a little scary to me. I didn’t go back there alone, even though just across the chain link fence was a friend of my sister’s and they had a pool in their yard, sometimes she’d take me with her swimming. But there were dark stories about that family, about how the dad had gone down to the drugstore one night to buy a pack of cigarettes and had never returned. Just like that, never returned. “The mob” my mom would say, and I’d stand there, speechless, wondering what untold horror the ‘mob’ was.
But as long as my big brothers were out there, I’d feel safe and protected and I’d hang out there until they’d tell me to scram, but I liked to be with them, just hanging around. One night, I was hanging out there and then our Dad called us all in for dinner. It was an early, warm spring night, and finally my brothers came in too. While in Illinois, my mom worked nights at the Motorola factory, so it was often just my dad and us kids for dinner, this was weird, too. Until this time, my mom had never worked; I missed her, especially in the evenings. My brother Pat must have finished his cigarette behind the garage. Finally, we could eat. We said grace, as we always, always, did. We were all around the dinner table, just beginning to eat, when one of my brother’s friends came banging through our front door, yelling loudly, “Sorry to barge in like this, but your garage in on fire!” My dad hollered for us to all get outside, while he grabbed the phone and called the fire department. Very soon, I could hear the siren roaring down the block, to our house, to our garage.
My dad joined us all on the front sidewalk, far enough away to be out of harm; where we had a bird’s eye view of our garage in blazes. It burned bright and hot, dark, dark smoke pouring up to the sky. The sooty dark smell filled my nostrils. The firemen were rushing towards the garage with their huge hoses, yelling, pulling on the hoses, spraying out the fire. I don’t remember how long we watched, our dinner cold on the table. Our horror, our surprise, at our garage’s demise. Our new swing set, still in the box, in the garage, our new picnic table, still in the box, in the garage, boxes still unpacked, still in the garage. We’d just been back there, behind the garage, and now, now it was all gone, mostly burned to ashes. Fortunately for my brother, he’d moved his drum set into his bedroom to practice. I don’t know how long it was until we finally, exhausted, went back in to finish our dinner. My mom came home from work, tired and now sad and tired. I could hear my parents up late that night, talking. Things weren’t going so well for our family in Illinois.
The next year, we moved back to Minneapolis, back to house on Sheridan Avenue, which my father had wisely not sold, but had rented out while we were in Illinois. Back to green lawns and lakes nearby and I started a new school in the middle of second grade, St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic grade school, down the hill on Sheridan, and up the hill on Upton Avenue. I’d walk that way, it seemed a hundred times, wearing away the memories of Illinois, and the house on Hawthorne Street.
I remember sleeping one night in a first floor room, near the back of the house, I was alone in a single bed, with boxes all around, still unpacked. I could hear the television in the living room, my mom and dad talking, and it seemed like the only sense of comfort at all in this strange house. It had only been the year before that we’d moved into the house on Sheridan, we’d lived there while I went to kindergarten, at Lake Harriet elementary school, (now torn down, and townhouses fill the space). As I lay in this strange room trying to sleep, I felt something on my leg, something tickly, I pulled back the blankets, and there was a big, black spider on my leg. I screamed loudly, and both my parents came running, “It’s alright, it’s only a spider, just go to sleep now.” Well, I don’t think living on Hawthorne Street was ever really all right for me, and now the spider seemed a foreboding.
Eventually, my mom had both my older sister Kathy and I, and my two younger brothers, Tim and Mike, have our ‘bedroom’ in the whole second story of the house. This was a large room, and the second floor had it’s own bathroom. This was an improvement on the house on Sheridan, which had only one bathroom. Kathy was five years older than me, so she was in 6th grade, and my younger brothers were only 4 and 2 years old. Mike was still in a crib. My rowdy older brothers, 3 of them, were in the bedrooms downstairs, where my parents also had a bedroom.
I don’t remember so much being in the house, as hanging out outside of the house. My older brothers quickly made friends, and it seemed there were always teenage boys around the yard, with their banana seat bikes, and their cigarettes and their greased back hair and blue jeans. My brother Steve became part of a band, and bought a set of drums. Now, our garage became a stage, and these teen age boys formed a band. They’d play, G-L-O-R-I-A, Gloria, and I was so proud that I could spell Gloria. I felt so proud of my cool brother, Steve, the drummer. This was the beginning of me wanting to be a boy, not a girl, anymore. My oldest sister, Rosie, was off to college, back in Minnesota, and my sister Kathy, it seemed got stuck watching us little kids and doing the dishes. My brothers, however, got to have fun.
My brothers Pat and Steve were 6 and 7 years older than me, so that meant that when I was in first grade, they were in junior high. While my brother Steve was more likely to be playing drums, inside the garage, my brother Pat would hang out with his friends behind the garage. There was no alley on this block, just garages in the middle of the block, separated by more chain link fence. It was quiet and private back there, and it felt a little scary to me. I didn’t go back there alone, even though just across the chain link fence was a friend of my sister’s and they had a pool in their yard, sometimes she’d take me with her swimming. But there were dark stories about that family, about how the dad had gone down to the drugstore one night to buy a pack of cigarettes and had never returned. Just like that, never returned. “The mob” my mom would say, and I’d stand there, speechless, wondering what untold horror the ‘mob’ was.
But as long as my big brothers were out there, I’d feel safe and protected and I’d hang out there until they’d tell me to scram, but I liked to be with them, just hanging around. One night, I was hanging out there and then our Dad called us all in for dinner. It was an early, warm spring night, and finally my brothers came in too. While in Illinois, my mom worked nights at the Motorola factory, so it was often just my dad and us kids for dinner, this was weird, too. Until this time, my mom had never worked; I missed her, especially in the evenings. My brother Pat must have finished his cigarette behind the garage. Finally, we could eat. We said grace, as we always, always, did. We were all around the dinner table, just beginning to eat, when one of my brother’s friends came banging through our front door, yelling loudly, “Sorry to barge in like this, but your garage in on fire!” My dad hollered for us to all get outside, while he grabbed the phone and called the fire department. Very soon, I could hear the siren roaring down the block, to our house, to our garage.
My dad joined us all on the front sidewalk, far enough away to be out of harm; where we had a bird’s eye view of our garage in blazes. It burned bright and hot, dark, dark smoke pouring up to the sky. The sooty dark smell filled my nostrils. The firemen were rushing towards the garage with their huge hoses, yelling, pulling on the hoses, spraying out the fire. I don’t remember how long we watched, our dinner cold on the table. Our horror, our surprise, at our garage’s demise. Our new swing set, still in the box, in the garage, our new picnic table, still in the box, in the garage, boxes still unpacked, still in the garage. We’d just been back there, behind the garage, and now, now it was all gone, mostly burned to ashes. Fortunately for my brother, he’d moved his drum set into his bedroom to practice. I don’t know how long it was until we finally, exhausted, went back in to finish our dinner. My mom came home from work, tired and now sad and tired. I could hear my parents up late that night, talking. Things weren’t going so well for our family in Illinois.
The next year, we moved back to Minneapolis, back to house on Sheridan Avenue, which my father had wisely not sold, but had rented out while we were in Illinois. Back to green lawns and lakes nearby and I started a new school in the middle of second grade, St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic grade school, down the hill on Sheridan, and up the hill on Upton Avenue. I’d walk that way, it seemed a hundred times, wearing away the memories of Illinois, and the house on Hawthorne Street.
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Some Wisdom
When my girls were little we lived in a big four square house on a corner lot in Owatonna. The house had a big back yard with apple trees, an oak tree, a linden tree and a black walnut tree. A whole row of peonies lined the sidewalk, down the side of the street, a natural fence. There was a wooden playhouse with windows (at one time even curtains) and a swing-set and sandbox made from a tractor tire. In the front we had a large front porch with white spindles that when you were out there, you could see down the block a row of trees and sky and more houses. A very large oak tree grew on the corner and shadowed the porch in the morning. When the girls were really little, they had a toy kitchen set and Strawberry Shortcake table and chairs set out there, too.
It seemed like it was always just me and my girls, for even when Steve and I were married he was often away. On tour with Prince, in UK for rehearsals, with Prince. Up in the cities, doing other concert or promotion work. Just me and my girls and this big, sun-filled house in a small, pretty town. Often, though I had this nagging, dark feeling and it was this, “If only I could start over.” It wasn’t so much about not having the girls, they were always my life and I loved them incredibly. It was about having space and time for the girls, and the thought seemed so dark and encompassing because I kept thinking if only I had more room, if only I could just clean the house all up at once, if only I had the right way to organize everything, then, then, I wouldn’t feel so overwhelmed.
I see now, with the wonderful clarity of hindsight, which of course can become wisdom if anyone cares to listen, is that where I didn’t have space, where I didn’t have room was in myself. Inside myself was a jumble of unfelt and unprocessed emotions which had no way to be expressed. I had no language to express my emotions, and so when all three girls would need me at once, I had no way to say, “Hey, calm down, I’ll get to your issues one by one.” Instead, I panicked, I simply drowned in their neediness, trying to present as if I was in control, trying to stay OK, but inside, was the overwhelming thought that I did not know how to be present, did not know how to parent, and wondered helplessly, “How did I get here? and Can’t I start over?”
So, I thought it was about being physically organized, which I actually was fairly good at. When in reality, it was about my internal self being disorganized, and my internal self not having the tools to be present for my small children. I did read up on parenting, and communication, and I see now, I still did not have tools to learn how to feel and learn from and integrate my emotions, and so I had no tools with which to guide my girls in learning from their emotions. Somehow, especially in this culture, where you don’t have to be particularly good at processing your emotions to get ‘ahead’ we’re all OK, but I do feel like now I have the knowledge to look back on myself with compassion, to make some sense of why I felt so overwhelmed so often.
I’m learning to feel, and process and integrate my emotions into my life now, and I’m becoming happier than I’ve been in years. To repair and reclaim this amazing part of myself is hard work, but fruitful. And Dan Siegel, in The Mindful Therapist, tells us that as we make sense of our own life as parents, that this sense is conveyed to our children, that they too, gain from our insights into our life. So when my daughters talk about me not being there for them, I can agree, instead of argue. I can say, “You’re right, you must have felt scared and alone then.” Even though I was physically present, I wasn’t always ‘there.’ And mostly, our children don’t want retribution, they want affirmation, to be heard, to be seen, to have their presence truly felt. If you could not hear or affirm your children when they were little, it’s not too late. Wisdom, what a truly amazing gift.
It seemed like it was always just me and my girls, for even when Steve and I were married he was often away. On tour with Prince, in UK for rehearsals, with Prince. Up in the cities, doing other concert or promotion work. Just me and my girls and this big, sun-filled house in a small, pretty town. Often, though I had this nagging, dark feeling and it was this, “If only I could start over.” It wasn’t so much about not having the girls, they were always my life and I loved them incredibly. It was about having space and time for the girls, and the thought seemed so dark and encompassing because I kept thinking if only I had more room, if only I could just clean the house all up at once, if only I had the right way to organize everything, then, then, I wouldn’t feel so overwhelmed.
I see now, with the wonderful clarity of hindsight, which of course can become wisdom if anyone cares to listen, is that where I didn’t have space, where I didn’t have room was in myself. Inside myself was a jumble of unfelt and unprocessed emotions which had no way to be expressed. I had no language to express my emotions, and so when all three girls would need me at once, I had no way to say, “Hey, calm down, I’ll get to your issues one by one.” Instead, I panicked, I simply drowned in their neediness, trying to present as if I was in control, trying to stay OK, but inside, was the overwhelming thought that I did not know how to be present, did not know how to parent, and wondered helplessly, “How did I get here? and Can’t I start over?”
So, I thought it was about being physically organized, which I actually was fairly good at. When in reality, it was about my internal self being disorganized, and my internal self not having the tools to be present for my small children. I did read up on parenting, and communication, and I see now, I still did not have tools to learn how to feel and learn from and integrate my emotions, and so I had no tools with which to guide my girls in learning from their emotions. Somehow, especially in this culture, where you don’t have to be particularly good at processing your emotions to get ‘ahead’ we’re all OK, but I do feel like now I have the knowledge to look back on myself with compassion, to make some sense of why I felt so overwhelmed so often.
I’m learning to feel, and process and integrate my emotions into my life now, and I’m becoming happier than I’ve been in years. To repair and reclaim this amazing part of myself is hard work, but fruitful. And Dan Siegel, in The Mindful Therapist, tells us that as we make sense of our own life as parents, that this sense is conveyed to our children, that they too, gain from our insights into our life. So when my daughters talk about me not being there for them, I can agree, instead of argue. I can say, “You’re right, you must have felt scared and alone then.” Even though I was physically present, I wasn’t always ‘there.’ And mostly, our children don’t want retribution, they want affirmation, to be heard, to be seen, to have their presence truly felt. If you could not hear or affirm your children when they were little, it’s not too late. Wisdom, what a truly amazing gift.
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