Memorial Day After

I always think that when there’s a holiday (like Memorial Day), I’m going to feel really rested afterwards, and that I’m going to somehow get caught up on everything, yes everything! And then I wake up on the Tuesday afterwards and I’m still not caught up on everything, and I wonder why I still think that this is a possibility. There is no catching up in life and I’ve realized that when I’m working I’m not riding bike and when I’m reading in my free time I’m not taking sailing lessons and when I’m shopping I’m not traveling. 

Someone sent me an article today that said when we talk to ourselves if we use our first names (instead of pronouns) we are more likely to be successful. So, here I go, Theresa, you need to walk more dear, you need to work less (and less, and less) and you must make time to travel, and of course do yoga everyday. There, now I’ll wait for this life to emerge. 

Yesterday I decided to go on the last leg of my ex’s yearly Memorial Day cemetery and gravesite visit along with my youngest daughter. My ex honors his ancestors in a way I can’t help but admire. Most of the time I still cannot understand his choices or the way he shows up in relationship, but he is my daughters’ father and I once loved him dearly. And so even though I’ve been angry at him for not being the father I’d want him to be, I went with Megan and her dad, and his long-time friend to Lakewood Cemetery to visit a few of his relative’s graves, and then we literally swung around to the other side of the cemetery and stopped to find my dad’s grave. I was unprepared with no flowers and no flag. 

Being at this place always fills me with tears and memories and loss. My dad was there for me in ways that set the bar of being a dad, that set the bar for me being a mom. He supported 10 people (including himself) and made a good life for us, and when I was a single mom, when I was so overwhelmed that I’m even now just processing many of the emotions I didn’t know how to feel then, he showed up and mowed my lawn and gave me advice. And so, when my spirit flagged, I told myself over and over, that if he could support 10 people, I could support 5--my 3 girls, my grandson, and myself--and I did. 

This didn’t mean that there weren’t casualties of mostly an emotional kind, when my girls were young. I really didn’t have the skills or the energy to be emotionally present most of the time. I didn’t know how not to feel abandoned and angry, or how to actually feel those things and not believe what I thought they told me about life. I didn’t know what I know now, and that makes me sad that I couldn’t give more tools to my daughters, because as a parent, I want to give them so many things. 

I have to stop though, and start with now, with today, and trust that the past gave us all enough. The strange thing about emotions though, is that they stay present with us from the past until we sit with them, invite them in and politely thank them for their message, and this takes time. Sometimes the hard truth is that the people we love leave us in places we never thought we’d be, alone and bewildered, and from there, we find a way.  

Be Longing

I find it interesting that the words be and longing together form the word belonging. Because I think that two of our most important imperatives of being human are to be, and to belong. And in belonging, there is the longing to belong. We exist to be and to belong. And this is enough. We may strive for more, for achievements, for stuff, for adventure, but really all we can ever do is be and belong, wherever we are, and when we are not in a state of being or belonging, there is longing. 

From the Trenches

Sometimes (well a lot) lately, I ask myself, “How come I'm not writing?” I stare at the screen and do actually wonder that. It’s not that I’m not thinking about things that I possibly could write about, it’s just that it seems like the things on my mind would take too long to write about, or be too involved to try to explain in a blog post. Things like why I’m frustrated with all the talk (again) about race. I wonder if there’s an algorithm to topics that tend to trend in the news.

 It does take me back to my younger self, who simply just fell in love with someone with beautiful brown eyes, and beautiful brown skin. We can make it more than that, a statement of bravery, or of social activism, but really, it wasn’t more than that. It seemed like more than that, when people asked stupid shit like, “What about the kids?” Before I even had kids. It seemed like more than that when people would look at us together for too long a time, but really, it wasn’t. 

Not that we shouldn't talk about things, about stuff, but that I’ve been in so many ‘talks’ about ‘difficult’ topics that never really seemed to go anywhere, or I end up trying to give my perspective, as a white person living in a white culture, in a non-white family, and this, like the stories I want to tell, seems to be too long and winding a story to tell.

I'm also thinking about poverty and prosperity, and how we want to pull people up out of poverty, but not too much, not too far, not into prosperity, because then they might just somehow end up one of the 1% and then that, we know would be bad, very bad. We have weird ideas about money in our culture, and I don't want to think those weird ideas anymore. I just want to make money and pay off my student loan debt, so I don't have to think about that anymore either. Or if I do think about it, it's with gratitude for opportunity. I don’t want to rail against the system of education that figured out a way to get guaranteed money and put us all in debt. I really don’t. 

That comes too close for comfort to where I was; working at a Catholic university where hindsight affords me some clarity and hilarity at that world. I see so clearly the hierarchy, the way pay correlated (mostly) with advancement of degrees, unless of course you were part of the clergy, and if not part of the clergy, part of the belief system of the good patron saint. So, here I go, into anger and resentment, what I’ve been trying to avoid for the most part, at the hypocrisy of gentle folk. Maybe I can shift it into just sadness and disillusionment, there, that feels better. 

Sort of. I have more stories to tell, but I’m just coasting a bit now. Megan is having free rein to buy and cook whatever she wants and I’m eating like a queen. She makes granola whenever we run out! How amazing is that? I’ve found that I can shop at Nordstrom’s Rack online!!! Again, how cool is it to get new clothes in the mail at a fraction of the cost to pay to fight my way to Mall of America on a Sunday afternoon? I don’t have to experience that creepy “the building is swaying” feeling, nor worry about terrorist attacks to dress well. The world is turning out to be more than ok, I think. And I might just be able to leave the past alone, one day. 

Reckless

Synonyms
1. rash, heedless, incautious, negligent, imprudent.

Antonyms
1. careful.

Maybe there is something in the middle, but lately I am drawn to reckless. Drawn to leaving caution to the wind, tired of careful. Maybe I’ve just used up my allotment of caring. Caring what people think, caring what I should wear, caring what I look like, caring what my home looks like, caring for my mother, caring for my sister, caring for my husband, caring for my children, that’s a lot of caring. 

Wondering how do I care for me, and how did I manage to learn to put myself last, not first? What if caring about all those other things is actually a great act of uncaring for myself? What if I’ve been socialized to care about all the wrong things? What if all the internalized messages that I’ve been acting upon day in and day out have left too little room for me? Perhaps this is where recklessness has raised it’s head, and it is saying, “What is it that you want?” And all the while, I’ve been raised to believe that it is imprudent to want what I want, that I would be negligent to take care of me, first. 

So, reckless calls my name and I answer rashly, “Here I am, let’s go.”

Something to Believe In

Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cosy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own. Bertrand Russell 

I have been faithless for a few years now and in the space left, nothing has else has entered in. At first this concerned me, I felt bereft, similar to the anger and angst I felt towards God when my dad died, leaving me more alone than I’d already felt. After nearly 50 years of belonging to a faith community who at the very least believed in a triune god and after nearly 50 years of belonging to both a mother and a father, I was alone, with only myself to believe in. 

My family seemed shattered without my dad holding us together. And my dad was the link to my faith, as well. At first I clung to it, as the gift he had bequeathed to me. In the years following his death, I realized other gifts he had given me, more tangible, more real. Like tenacity, like his ability to grow and reason with age. 

Not having faith is a horrible thing to admit, especially in the United States. We think that people do better in a hierarchy, that we must have someone to be accountable to in order to be good. I know this isn’t true, and that we do our best when we are accountable to ourselves, when we listen to ourselves, when we love ourselves, but we live in a culture of hierarchy, and of crime and punishment. 

So, when I stumble upon this quote by Bertrand Russell, it is with a sense of belonging, and community that says, “See you are not alone in this knowing, this understanding, that great spaces bring their own comfort and awe.” I now exist in and crave these great spaces, and if there is anything at all in this space, it is love. 

Morning Reflection

The day dawned brighter today than it has in a long time. No matter that it is sub zero temp outside, the day looks promising. I could see blue, pink, white reflected on my stainless steel turner in the utensil jar on my counter, I turned to look out my little window, and sure enough the sun was rising peachy pink. 

I’m finally thinking that things just might be ok. Maybe losing the last regular job that I had was a good thing, after all, like people told me it was. I do know now, that I liked working at a university, and being in a doctorate program, because it validated for me that I was smart; something I’d heard my whole life, but really, truly, never knew what it meant. I mean seriously, what does it mean? And interestingly, I don’t feel as smart now, but maybe that is ok, too. I’m trying to feel feelings, not things, these days. 

I miss being a part of an organization that I could rail against, yep, maybe just like me getting kicked out of seventh grade, having something to be against was almost as good as having something to be for. But I do believe the saying, that what we resist, persists, and it does, and it will, and so, really, cutting my losses and walking away was the best thing for me. 

What I love about the passing of time is the clarity it brings. I’m getting wise enough to know that we don’t get all the answers when we want them, but it’s good enough to get some answers, in time. Making sense somehow makes space, and that’s what happening for me now, both a making sense, and a making of space. I’ve found time in my life to take care of me, and it is pretty awesome, actually. Without being trite to say, I’ve lost ten pounds, and I eat at least three times a day. I’ve started doing yoga again. And I’m turning my attention back to my home now, too. 

While I was in school, I told myself I had to just live like a college student, and really, I did. I lived with the furniture I had, even though it was falling apart, I ate on the run, I stayed up late writing papers and barely had time to breathe. Now I want new furniture. I want to savor just sitting around. I want a big beautiful desk to write on. And I want part II of the manga Monster to read. (Part I is fabulous!) Actually, I want a whole bookshelf full of manga and graphic novels, instead of research articles. I don’t know if I’m smart anymore, or if it matters if people see me as smart. I want to feel what I feel, and see what I see, and know that my own reflection matters. 

Christmas Trees on Cars

Yesterday was the Winter Solstice, last night the longest night of the year. I had wanted to celebrate, commemorate it somehow, but I was mostly tired yesterday. This is not only the time of year for gift giving; it is also the time of year when my youngest daughter is cooking and baking and making candy and gifts of homemade granola. Because of that, I am shopping, shopping, shopping. I think I’ve been to the co-op three times already this week, and then throw in going to Lunds, Kowalski’s and finally the hardware store looking for fireplace matches with which to flambe the coq au vin that she is planning to prepare for the family dinner; well, I am tired. 

Driving around town the last two weekends I see cars with trees strapped on top of them. Now that it is nearly Christmas, the signs on the tree lots say “half price.” Lots that were full of greenery a couple of weeks ago are sparse, the white lights dangling amidst the darkness of early evening. Once I became a teenager, I was the one who went out and got the Christmas tree with my mom. It became her story, “I don’t know if I would have had a real tree if it weren’t for Theresa. No one else would help me.” And I don’t know how we got it into her car, but I think she had a hatchback, and we did. We were never “let’s strap the Christmas tree onto the top of the car” kind of people. Ever. And once we got that tree home, my mom had her ‘rules’ for decorating the tree. The smallest ornaments always went higher up in the tree. 

Christmastime was laden with stress while I grew up. One year, when I was only 6 or 7 years old, I remember crawling into an upstairs crawlspace and I found a child’s glass teapot set. I asked my mom about it, and when she realized I had found my Christmas present that she had hidden, she was upset and angry. As I got older, I was often disappointed by the practical gifts I received. It was at Christmastime that I felt the sting of living in a more affluent neighborhood, but not being affluent. The day after Christmas we’d check out each other’s gifts with friends, and I was always amazed at the things they had gotten. Frivolous, shiny things. My daughters still use the metronome I got as a gift when I was a teenager and played piano. 

In the back of my mind, as I drive through town, seeing folks buying real Christmas trees, I think that maybe one day I too, will buy a real tree. Will have a Christmas that doesn’t feel like I’m just driving around buying things, but I don’t know, maybe that’s just me, succumbing to nostalgia, or being bored with shopping. Because my Christmas with my girls is a real Christmas, it’s just not a big family Christmas like I used to have with my mom, my dad, all my brothers and sisters and their spouses, and then our kids, too. Maybe even the tree lots seem frozen in the 1960’s, because of what they evoke, reminders to me of my past, which changed to become my present. 

My mom’s story about me helping her wasn’t just her being grateful, it was also an indictment. She was sad or angry, that my dad didn’t go out and get the tree with her and I knew it. I helped her in a way to take away her sadness, to alleviate her anger, to try to soothe that which seemed to never get soothed. Sometimes we had fun together, but more often, she’d be telling me her same stories, about her life just not turning out how she’d planned. About my dad not showing up, about my dad stopping at the bar on his way home from work. She never talked about her feelings, but maybe my mom was lonely, lonely at Christmastime, and maybe with eight kids, all she felt like she was doing was shopping and cooking and baking.