Tying up loose ends before I fly the unfriendly skies in a few days, I spent time with a friend who is about to have surgery. We are both exiting this world briefly on Monday and I miss spending more time with her. She is a very, very smart woman who works for the government. A lucky girl too, life gave her an amazing brain. She is one of those Mensa types though she would never be so pretentious as to attend cocktail parties for the huge intellect set. She is a smart woman with lots of feelings and we find ways to laugh together.
Today we moved her dwarf African frog homeward so she could float in her tank at the homestead while my friend recuperates. It made me wonder what it is like to be a small frog in a glass tank with a personal rock and food floating down through the water occasionally. Would it be simpler than this life? What do frogs think we both wondered.
Her webbed back feet splayed in the water as she hung near the surface compelled me to wonder what a frog's eye view of this world looks like. I hope she is, at least, carefree in her frog thoughts unlike the rest of us sizing up our relationships, our jobs and our future. Let's just get past the surgery and a Monday flight to Texas.
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Friday, August 5, 2011
Two wishes, two very different lives
I had a day, as I do sometimes, that covers the breadth of our county. It has been full of people and two poignant stories.
This morning, I swam at the gym and the pool was filled with retired folks who do laps so effortlessly. It seems so to me anyway. I love that I can be in that sapphire pool and swim laps with folks who have been doing so for years. They are not spring chickens. And, I have to stop and breathe at the ends of the pool but they carry on with grace and with a gentility that I admire.
The woman next to me today, besides Ms. M. and the kind man who allowed me to share his middle lane, swims with a union jack on her cap. I pause for breath at the end and turn and watch that union jack approach in the water. It tickles me. Today, we chatted a bit before she left the pool and a story about her life spilled out into my waiting heart and mind.
Today, she told me that her husband had surgery in April as they were about to go on a trip and that has brought their travel this summer to a close. More than that, her husband's ability to travel is more limited now and that holds regret in its' grasp. She has a wish, that they had done more earlier in life when work kept them busy and putting off what they would be able to share as they retired. Now, that may be very different for both of them. To me, I felt the yearning of someone who I often admire and just liked so much. She was, the first person to welcome me to the pool this winter and it helped me overcome my shyness and just get in the pool. I have swam in rain, hail and sunny skies and she is the one who generously offered her encouragement. And so, I felt her sadness, though held in acceptance of what life has brought since April and always with her former British sense of strength and courage. I hold her wish as a treasure today.
This afternoon I drove to Forestville to volunteer at Food For Thought-a food bank for people living with HIV. It is a dynamic, fun loving, kind, generous and compassionate place to be and I love being there. The food bank has a store front with a slick produce case and shelves displaying items for the clients to choose. In the back we have grocery stock, a walk-in fridge and freezer. We breakdown items for the clients including produce, meat, poultry, eggs and fish. It is a thriving place and the kidding and spirit of the volunteers and staff is like nowhere I have ever been.
I always take a break at about three and walk over for a coffee and cookie. My friend Mr. P. and I used to do that and I miss him. He got a job and he really loves the people he works for now. I am happy for him and I miss his dark humor and wonderful wit and stories.
At the end, about closing time, one of the volunteers told me a story about his daughter and his wish. He is a man who cared for a man who was dying. When the man died, he lost someone he was very close to, and a job and a place to live. Perhaps this is what I see in my fellow volunteer. It is grief and I just did not know until today. He told me a story about his daughter letting go of her profession of over a decade and traveling to South America. He expressed to me his wish to visit the country that his daughter finds compelling. This is a place he has been dreaming of for some time. His daughter seems to be welcoming him into the pool and he seems ready to cast off his grief and go for a long swim. I am holding his wish as the second treasure shared with me today.
May the world find peace tonight and may we all find ways to swim and rejoice in the water's baptismal.
This morning, I swam at the gym and the pool was filled with retired folks who do laps so effortlessly. It seems so to me anyway. I love that I can be in that sapphire pool and swim laps with folks who have been doing so for years. They are not spring chickens. And, I have to stop and breathe at the ends of the pool but they carry on with grace and with a gentility that I admire.
The woman next to me today, besides Ms. M. and the kind man who allowed me to share his middle lane, swims with a union jack on her cap. I pause for breath at the end and turn and watch that union jack approach in the water. It tickles me. Today, we chatted a bit before she left the pool and a story about her life spilled out into my waiting heart and mind.
Today, she told me that her husband had surgery in April as they were about to go on a trip and that has brought their travel this summer to a close. More than that, her husband's ability to travel is more limited now and that holds regret in its' grasp. She has a wish, that they had done more earlier in life when work kept them busy and putting off what they would be able to share as they retired. Now, that may be very different for both of them. To me, I felt the yearning of someone who I often admire and just liked so much. She was, the first person to welcome me to the pool this winter and it helped me overcome my shyness and just get in the pool. I have swam in rain, hail and sunny skies and she is the one who generously offered her encouragement. And so, I felt her sadness, though held in acceptance of what life has brought since April and always with her former British sense of strength and courage. I hold her wish as a treasure today.
This afternoon I drove to Forestville to volunteer at Food For Thought-a food bank for people living with HIV. It is a dynamic, fun loving, kind, generous and compassionate place to be and I love being there. The food bank has a store front with a slick produce case and shelves displaying items for the clients to choose. In the back we have grocery stock, a walk-in fridge and freezer. We breakdown items for the clients including produce, meat, poultry, eggs and fish. It is a thriving place and the kidding and spirit of the volunteers and staff is like nowhere I have ever been.
I always take a break at about three and walk over for a coffee and cookie. My friend Mr. P. and I used to do that and I miss him. He got a job and he really loves the people he works for now. I am happy for him and I miss his dark humor and wonderful wit and stories.
At the end, about closing time, one of the volunteers told me a story about his daughter and his wish. He is a man who cared for a man who was dying. When the man died, he lost someone he was very close to, and a job and a place to live. Perhaps this is what I see in my fellow volunteer. It is grief and I just did not know until today. He told me a story about his daughter letting go of her profession of over a decade and traveling to South America. He expressed to me his wish to visit the country that his daughter finds compelling. This is a place he has been dreaming of for some time. His daughter seems to be welcoming him into the pool and he seems ready to cast off his grief and go for a long swim. I am holding his wish as the second treasure shared with me today.
May the world find peace tonight and may we all find ways to swim and rejoice in the water's baptismal.
The Mourning Dove
There is a Mourning dove who is sitting outside my room here in a growing town in a beautiful county in California where you couldn't find a job to save your life unless, unless, unless. The dove calls for another I suppose but I take it as a lament to all that is lovely, yearned for, lost and found again and acknowledged. It is a beautifully sweet and plaintive call and a bit somber. I remember the same call this winter, maybe January, when I began to wake up from the almost 12 years of chasing real estate values for the government. I remember the Mourning dove as a siren call then, guiding me to the loss of a profession that I now view as less than respectable.
For those of us who watched our property values plummet $100,000 to $200,000, it was freaky. You had to pinch yourself from becoming comatose. Now, it feels strange to hear of people like my gal's former friend who was laid-off, then foreclosed upon and then found herself at the helm of a mental and emotional collapse. Though this story is more and more evidence of our culture, we should be concerned but we are not. We seem to take the news as if this is what is current. And if it is not us, then why should it be a concern? There are lots of reasons and great books to reflect the downfall of a nation. However, it is personal isn't it? Aren't these humans our brethren?
Maybe the Mourning dove knows more than we give him credit for on this foggy Friday in August. Maybe he calls to all that lost innocence and is trying to get us to realize how far we are from the heart of the matter. Our hearts.
For those of us who watched our property values plummet $100,000 to $200,000, it was freaky. You had to pinch yourself from becoming comatose. Now, it feels strange to hear of people like my gal's former friend who was laid-off, then foreclosed upon and then found herself at the helm of a mental and emotional collapse. Though this story is more and more evidence of our culture, we should be concerned but we are not. We seem to take the news as if this is what is current. And if it is not us, then why should it be a concern? There are lots of reasons and great books to reflect the downfall of a nation. However, it is personal isn't it? Aren't these humans our brethren?
Maybe the Mourning dove knows more than we give him credit for on this foggy Friday in August. Maybe he calls to all that lost innocence and is trying to get us to realize how far we are from the heart of the matter. Our hearts.
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Lame is a nice word for what Washington is cooking
In the morning, while I am beginning to come into the day's timezone, I listen to a brief bit of news. Always the jobless benefits spiel about how many or how little unemployed people applied for help. Well, we need help but not like that. To me, whether the number of folks applying for jobless benefits ebbs or flows forward is not any kind of indicator to judge how many or just how it is for us. The world is a lame place if you are out of good job. I could write about our own local JobLink but I will save that for today.
I read in the New York Times that President Obama is going to really concentrate on creating more jobs. Oh give me a break. Doesn't every politician say this? It is like the word sustainable. It is everywhere though none of it is happening. I feel cranky about the lack of genuine concern for how our economic Armageddon has turned into a soundbite. It is so lame to simply say the words without any intention behind it or a true understanding of what it is like to wake up unemployed.
It is just so lame.
I read in the New York Times that President Obama is going to really concentrate on creating more jobs. Oh give me a break. Doesn't every politician say this? It is like the word sustainable. It is everywhere though none of it is happening. I feel cranky about the lack of genuine concern for how our economic Armageddon has turned into a soundbite. It is so lame to simply say the words without any intention behind it or a true understanding of what it is like to wake up unemployed.
It is just so lame.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Frank
Today is the day that my father died in 1996. His death changed how I see the human spirit and how I see myself in many, many ways. I still miss him and he is often with me as I make my way about the world.
My father had a stroke in the last weeks of July, 1996. He lived in a board and care home that was a loving place to be and he needed that. He had lived alone for so many years after the divorce from my Mom yet he was a very private man. And so living with Alzheimer's disease meant that I did my best to keep how he lived respected yet frame his life with the kind of care that would keep him safe from his inner dementia demons. So many people still struggle with Alzheimer's and the wrath of our brain's twisted methods of dealing with the disease. We know so little.
Eventually Dad was transferred to the County hospital-now Sutter but I never think of it as such. It was here that for the next 10 days or so my sisters and I became his sentries. One sister came to call me "Frank's Doberman" as she returned to Texas once we made some hard decisions. We were lucky to have one another, my sisters and I, and we often bounced the most difficult aspects of his stroke off of each other. Yet we all agreed. Dad would not want extreme measures on his behalf at this point. So began the final weeks of my father's life.
I sat, many days just writing beside his bed, watching him gesticulate to those I could not see. He could not speak nor swallow yet he was talking to someone. Perhaps lawyers can never be silenced once they get going? I watched and I felt and I waited. I had no idea how to do what I was doing. Pneumonia began to increase its hold on him and things slowly changed.
By the morning of August 3rd, 1996, the experts thought that Dad would exit the planet very soon. And so my sisters boarded a plane from Texas and I stayed vigilant and afraid. I felt like I was such a small, small child sitting at my father's bedside and I guess I was just that inside. I still am just that in many ways. And so I did become very anxious as I watched my father's breathing become more and more labored, his chest working with great effort to rise and fall. I paced, I worried and then a foreign calm and strength welled up from deep within into my thoughts. I still understand that moment as divine in some way.
I stopped, turned and walked to my Dad's bedside. I looked down into his eyes and started to cry. I told him that I knew he understood what was happening to him and that I was very sorry. I told him that my sister's were on their way and they knew he loved them and that he could leave right now. He started to cry. I was crying. I told him that I would miss him and that he could go right now. And he did. My father looked up above me to the corner of that room, took a few deeper breaths and his spirit blew right past the front of me. I could feel that strength push past me as it left through the corner. I stood there crying and took in what just happened.
I watched as my father's chest rose and fell a few more times and then ceased. He was long gone. I bent, crying, and kissed his bald forehead. Goodbye Dad is what I thought, I shall miss you.
I don't understand so much about how cruel the world has become with people so disconnected from one another and running off to do so much that they think is important yet never stopping to look into another's eyes. To me, 8/3/1996 taught me what it is to stand by someone to the very end and witness the evidence that has been right before our eyes. This is simply a vehicle, this body, and albeit a complex one, it is the spirit inside that directs the show going on. We are spirits trying to be human. In my Dad's case, a spirit living with valor, loneliness, generosity, frustration and some glee over any kind of pie.
I am remembering you today Dad. Thank you.
My father had a stroke in the last weeks of July, 1996. He lived in a board and care home that was a loving place to be and he needed that. He had lived alone for so many years after the divorce from my Mom yet he was a very private man. And so living with Alzheimer's disease meant that I did my best to keep how he lived respected yet frame his life with the kind of care that would keep him safe from his inner dementia demons. So many people still struggle with Alzheimer's and the wrath of our brain's twisted methods of dealing with the disease. We know so little.
Eventually Dad was transferred to the County hospital-now Sutter but I never think of it as such. It was here that for the next 10 days or so my sisters and I became his sentries. One sister came to call me "Frank's Doberman" as she returned to Texas once we made some hard decisions. We were lucky to have one another, my sisters and I, and we often bounced the most difficult aspects of his stroke off of each other. Yet we all agreed. Dad would not want extreme measures on his behalf at this point. So began the final weeks of my father's life.
I sat, many days just writing beside his bed, watching him gesticulate to those I could not see. He could not speak nor swallow yet he was talking to someone. Perhaps lawyers can never be silenced once they get going? I watched and I felt and I waited. I had no idea how to do what I was doing. Pneumonia began to increase its hold on him and things slowly changed.
By the morning of August 3rd, 1996, the experts thought that Dad would exit the planet very soon. And so my sisters boarded a plane from Texas and I stayed vigilant and afraid. I felt like I was such a small, small child sitting at my father's bedside and I guess I was just that inside. I still am just that in many ways. And so I did become very anxious as I watched my father's breathing become more and more labored, his chest working with great effort to rise and fall. I paced, I worried and then a foreign calm and strength welled up from deep within into my thoughts. I still understand that moment as divine in some way.
I stopped, turned and walked to my Dad's bedside. I looked down into his eyes and started to cry. I told him that I knew he understood what was happening to him and that I was very sorry. I told him that my sister's were on their way and they knew he loved them and that he could leave right now. He started to cry. I was crying. I told him that I would miss him and that he could go right now. And he did. My father looked up above me to the corner of that room, took a few deeper breaths and his spirit blew right past the front of me. I could feel that strength push past me as it left through the corner. I stood there crying and took in what just happened.
I watched as my father's chest rose and fell a few more times and then ceased. He was long gone. I bent, crying, and kissed his bald forehead. Goodbye Dad is what I thought, I shall miss you.
I don't understand so much about how cruel the world has become with people so disconnected from one another and running off to do so much that they think is important yet never stopping to look into another's eyes. To me, 8/3/1996 taught me what it is to stand by someone to the very end and witness the evidence that has been right before our eyes. This is simply a vehicle, this body, and albeit a complex one, it is the spirit inside that directs the show going on. We are spirits trying to be human. In my Dad's case, a spirit living with valor, loneliness, generosity, frustration and some glee over any kind of pie.
I am remembering you today Dad. Thank you.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Postscript
Now home with the laundry done and the dust bunnies scuttled away from beneath the couch, the Greyhounds and us fed and showered and tired from the drive home from Big Sur, it seems more like Big Blur.
I remember yesterday sitting at the picnic table overlooking the ocean. It feels difficult to describe the giant beauty of the rolling swells across a dark, blue water with such power. As far as I could see there was ocean. I sat watching and feeling the heartsick feeling of holding a dream because I cannot help it. I felt enveloped by the great sorrow of it, the expanse of it, the sheer unimaginable nature of life itself and hope for the remainder of my days. I feel humbled by such an afternoon. I feel such passion to know more about myself and my journey.
Now that I am home and answering emails and turning towards the rest of my week, with the three rejection emails from WF and all that encompasses for me, I remember the depth, the color, the light, the angst, the joy and the power of the ocean as my talisman as I set out, somewhat daunted yet not vanquished.
I remember yesterday sitting at the picnic table overlooking the ocean. It feels difficult to describe the giant beauty of the rolling swells across a dark, blue water with such power. As far as I could see there was ocean. I sat watching and feeling the heartsick feeling of holding a dream because I cannot help it. I felt enveloped by the great sorrow of it, the expanse of it, the sheer unimaginable nature of life itself and hope for the remainder of my days. I feel humbled by such an afternoon. I feel such passion to know more about myself and my journey.
Now that I am home and answering emails and turning towards the rest of my week, with the three rejection emails from WF and all that encompasses for me, I remember the depth, the color, the light, the angst, the joy and the power of the ocean as my talisman as I set out, somewhat daunted yet not vanquished.
Not by satellite
August 1, 2011
Big Sur
We are sitting here at the picnic table overlooking a perfectly calm, blue-green ocean that appears to expand forever into the horizon. A fishing boat is slowly picking its route up the channel and we can't believe our good luck. I just made my beloved pot of percolator camping coffee and my gal is having her matte'. It is warm with only a breath of wind. I can feel the sun against my cheek as it begins its descent into that fathomless horizon.
We were dreading the campsite, unseen, having assumed it would be far too primitive as it was so overpriced. We spent last night in a Yurt, sweet and cozy but too close to all the others. Sounds of the guests getting drunk drifting down from the restaurant, we had a partial view of this incredible ocean in Big Sur even with the tight quarters
It is here, overlooking the ocean, so vividly deep and mysterious with swells from the great beyond rolling across her surface wide and immense that I make my longing wish to this ocean's unknown. I have made this wish many times, kneeling in the ocean during body boarding, driving home eastward at dusk and in my little chair, in my little room in our little house at the corner here in our home town. I make my wish knowing that I shall not know if "she" exists or even the "she" hears me. I am a tiny dot in this world though I know a few other dots who make the same wishes. My heart is with them tonight with this incredible view.
I look up as I write, in this place where we came for a brief vacation from all that seems to stay the same, roll in and roll out like this gemstone sea but not even close to the beauty of this place. My life. I have a harder time seeing the precious moments of struggle to find work that counts as treasures packing life's journey. I am not a Pollyanna. I feel what it is like to be adrift and hopeless at times, a breathing human hoping for a miracle and asking for divine guidance from a God of my understanding.
What I feel within, that yearning from whence the wish is born, is present physically it seems, in my chest, that torch burning behind the latched door to a heart that also feels an ache of loss as well as the dream. At times it feels as deep and as wide as this ocean, especially now that I see that many employers where I applied never even glanced in my direction. The dream that began last summer is now quite faded and worn smooth in some places where I kept making my wish and rubbing it like a magic lamp over and over and over again. A year of making the same wish wears a person to the bone.
It was a very simple wish and cast out into the world as I tried to gain attention while employers blithely turned away. I had a very sweet and plain wish that I expressed with enthusiasm, strength and my deep desire to be of service to others in my work. The employers simply did not care or had far too many others that were younger, more experienced or just prettier. A year of carrying a wish with outstretched arms gets very, very heavy. My dream is alive and yet it is frayed at the edges and at times, I rest it on the ground.
I have some regrets but most of all I felt ill prepared to compete with others for entry level jobs. That is not my way either. I was naive having left a profession of many years thinking it would be easier to find an honest day's work. Perhaps it could not have been any other way. To understand where I would be today, nine months after the end of a professional journey, then might have caused me to waver and stay right where I was in life. We cannot know many things. I could have stayed and had cardiac arrest one afternoon in my cubicle after the full breadth of our lies got underway. It would have taken them a while to figure out I had stopped breathing and was no longer capable of clicking the mouse.
Those of us who are still unemployed are here and just as employable as we were a year ago. Some of us still have faith and tenacity. Some of us are damn tired of the fight. We could use a miracle by land or by sea.
Big Sur
We are sitting here at the picnic table overlooking a perfectly calm, blue-green ocean that appears to expand forever into the horizon. A fishing boat is slowly picking its route up the channel and we can't believe our good luck. I just made my beloved pot of percolator camping coffee and my gal is having her matte'. It is warm with only a breath of wind. I can feel the sun against my cheek as it begins its descent into that fathomless horizon.
We were dreading the campsite, unseen, having assumed it would be far too primitive as it was so overpriced. We spent last night in a Yurt, sweet and cozy but too close to all the others. Sounds of the guests getting drunk drifting down from the restaurant, we had a partial view of this incredible ocean in Big Sur even with the tight quarters
It is here, overlooking the ocean, so vividly deep and mysterious with swells from the great beyond rolling across her surface wide and immense that I make my longing wish to this ocean's unknown. I have made this wish many times, kneeling in the ocean during body boarding, driving home eastward at dusk and in my little chair, in my little room in our little house at the corner here in our home town. I make my wish knowing that I shall not know if "she" exists or even the "she" hears me. I am a tiny dot in this world though I know a few other dots who make the same wishes. My heart is with them tonight with this incredible view.
I look up as I write, in this place where we came for a brief vacation from all that seems to stay the same, roll in and roll out like this gemstone sea but not even close to the beauty of this place. My life. I have a harder time seeing the precious moments of struggle to find work that counts as treasures packing life's journey. I am not a Pollyanna. I feel what it is like to be adrift and hopeless at times, a breathing human hoping for a miracle and asking for divine guidance from a God of my understanding.
What I feel within, that yearning from whence the wish is born, is present physically it seems, in my chest, that torch burning behind the latched door to a heart that also feels an ache of loss as well as the dream. At times it feels as deep and as wide as this ocean, especially now that I see that many employers where I applied never even glanced in my direction. The dream that began last summer is now quite faded and worn smooth in some places where I kept making my wish and rubbing it like a magic lamp over and over and over again. A year of making the same wish wears a person to the bone.
It was a very simple wish and cast out into the world as I tried to gain attention while employers blithely turned away. I had a very sweet and plain wish that I expressed with enthusiasm, strength and my deep desire to be of service to others in my work. The employers simply did not care or had far too many others that were younger, more experienced or just prettier. A year of carrying a wish with outstretched arms gets very, very heavy. My dream is alive and yet it is frayed at the edges and at times, I rest it on the ground.
I have some regrets but most of all I felt ill prepared to compete with others for entry level jobs. That is not my way either. I was naive having left a profession of many years thinking it would be easier to find an honest day's work. Perhaps it could not have been any other way. To understand where I would be today, nine months after the end of a professional journey, then might have caused me to waver and stay right where I was in life. We cannot know many things. I could have stayed and had cardiac arrest one afternoon in my cubicle after the full breadth of our lies got underway. It would have taken them a while to figure out I had stopped breathing and was no longer capable of clicking the mouse.
Those of us who are still unemployed are here and just as employable as we were a year ago. Some of us still have faith and tenacity. Some of us are damn tired of the fight. We could use a miracle by land or by sea.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Pigs are raised for meat and leather
There is a sow at the County fair this year with nine softly pink piglets that were all sleeping when we came upon them. Mom and the piglets were tucked into each other with their pig eyes shut to the chaos of the fair, their strange flat piggy bank noses wet and shiny. The peace in which they slept was a brief lie in light of the life they will lead as farm animals created and kept for our pleasure. Pigs are very intelligent and yet they are part of our supply chain. We don't want to think about the fact that they may understand too well what we are up to. A sign near the sleeping babes indicates that "Pigs are raised for meat and leather," so that we can know that this is an educational display, don't get too attached to these sentient beings.
There were ducklings and peeping chicks too that were part of the display this year. Something different this year though, was the product placement advertising Sonoma Grange Credit, Redwood Credit Union and other Ag related companies. In fact, all the rabbit water bowls had bumper stickers on them reminding us of the presence of lenders and banks who are the underpinnings of our world.
Our "recession" world. Four-H is now the doorway to the Sonoma Grange Credit? It was a strange and not-so-wonderful change to all that has been my county fair. I liked having the illusion that the sow and her piglets would have a peaceful life on a Bennett Valley farm or that they could simply be pigs. Seeing them as a commodity and myself as a commodity is the truth of our lives. Receiving a free credit union visor or a sample of sunscreen doesn't change the facts. Maybe I just don't want to think about it.
There were ducklings and peeping chicks too that were part of the display this year. Something different this year though, was the product placement advertising Sonoma Grange Credit, Redwood Credit Union and other Ag related companies. In fact, all the rabbit water bowls had bumper stickers on them reminding us of the presence of lenders and banks who are the underpinnings of our world.
Our "recession" world. Four-H is now the doorway to the Sonoma Grange Credit? It was a strange and not-so-wonderful change to all that has been my county fair. I liked having the illusion that the sow and her piglets would have a peaceful life on a Bennett Valley farm or that they could simply be pigs. Seeing them as a commodity and myself as a commodity is the truth of our lives. Receiving a free credit union visor or a sample of sunscreen doesn't change the facts. Maybe I just don't want to think about it.
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