I pulled a pair of undies out of my washing machine the other night. Not so unusual, except that these had been stuck in there for oh, eight, maybe ten weeks.
If its true that things tend to be simpler than they seem, I, apparently, am not yet convinced. I tend to tackle things from the most complicated angle first, then work my way back to simple. I'm considering a swap, but hey, give me time, we'll see.
A few months back, I'd done a load of laundry and realized that the clothes weren't ringing out as they should. I had a soggy mess of towels at the bottom of the washer tub. I rung things out the best I could (not an easy task, a big tip of the hat to washer-women everywhere), tossed things in the dryer that weren't too soaked, counted to make sure I had enough undies to get me through for awhile, and walked away.
My washer and dryer are in the basement, the least inviting part of my funky little 1928 bungalow. I've always been a bit afraid of it, being a "ranch-house" girl most of my life. There are the usual suspects, shadowy corners, torn insulation, cobwebs that go unseen til they are in my mouth (arrgh), and I am in a position to know the location of a bumble bee cemetery (I was there when they were laid to rest). So yea, I make myself get down there once a week to do some laundry, but that's the extent of my basement visits. So when I discovered the washer problem, part of me felt relief. Sweet! No more trips to the basement. Well, you know, until I run out of undies or get a new washer, whichever comes first.
I set out on my somewhat complicated path to a solution. I went to Home Depot and Sears and window-shopped for a new washer. I put it on my "to-do" list to clean out the entry-way to the basement stairs and remove the handrail (its a narrow passage with a turn and no delivery man can get down there with a washer in tow.) I checked the checkbook to see if I could afford such a thing in the middle of this downturn. And I visited the pal I go to whenever I run into a household fix-it problem, my pal Google. He told me to check for leaks, check for kinks, check the fuses, and check for anything that may be clogging the pipes and hoses. You know, like a neighborhood kitty cat. I felt overwhelmed by all of those possibilities, so I bought some more undies, did my washer woman routine every other week and walked away. This went on for weeks.
The other morning, a little voice told me to quit avoiding it and just go take a look. You know, square one. I promised the voice I would, since I can't keep putting undies on the grocery list. So before I gave myself a chance to renege, I marched into my room the moment I got home and put on my "fix-something" sweats. I took a deep breath and headed downstairs. I positioned the clamp light just so, and started inspecting. I unplugged every possible connection to my possible electrocution, and tipped and tilted and pushed and pulled. Nothin'. Then I took a closer look, and there, just where the top of the tub and the drum meet, I saw a little something. My first thought was "mouse". My second thought was "grow up", and I dug in. About 5 minutes later, after a good deal of pulling with all I had in me, I freed my washer from the culprit: a pair of undies that had gotten themselves jammed into the works and prevented a good rinse and spin for the last few months. Those poor undies. A successful spin-cycle test-drive and I was back in business.
I'm an over-stuffer. That applies to a couple of topics, but lets keep it to the washer for now. I've never been a lights and darks sorter, my piles are "clean" and "dirty". And I figure if I can get the door shut, we're in and we're ready to go. My mama taught me different, but I'm a pretty low maintenance, casual girl when it comes to clothes, so sorting them into a couple of reasonably sized loads never really figured in to my laundry routine. Lesson learned.
When I look back at the last several weeks and how I fumbled around with this problem, I recognize the girl that's been following me around all my life, you know, me. A little afraid the problem will be too much to manage, a little afraid I won't know what to do. A little too willing to be overwhelmed and hope it will go away or be transformed by some sort of magic. But, I also recognize another side of that girl (a side that's popping up a little more often these days). A girl who is willing to respond. I've learned that every time I say "ok, I'll try", to that little voice (the voice of hope, the voice that says "I know you need some help"), that a solution finds me.
Its ok to be overwhelmed, its ok to work my way back to square one.
Its ok to get stuck. But it turns out, unstuck is better. Just ask those poor undies.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Teaching Little Fingers To Play
A page, yellowed with 40 years, sets in a silver frame on a bookcase in my living room. Its a "Certificate of Merit" with rips and taped borders and a scraggly-edged golden seal that certifies that I completed the piano course, "Teaching Little Fingers To Play", in January of 1968. I was 6 years old. My Grandma Mary signed it in blue ink-pen.
My own "little fingers" are quite a bit bigger now, and bear the wrinkles and scars and imperfections that come with 40-plus years. But I'm gaining the courage lately, at least enough courage to sort out the next steps, so that I can, hopefully, begin to teach piano to some "little fingers" myself. This is an idea I started kicking around in my own mind a few years ago. And I told just enough people that I can't really turn back now. I could, but I don't want to, and the ones I told know me well enough to remind me, gently, that I said I wanted to do this.
Just last night, I sat across a table with an old friend, sharing coffee and stories, and she told me just how we could make it work for her little daughter to be one of my first students.
I love to play the piano. I have no classical chops to speak of, there's a good chance a set of scales would put a cramp in my hands that would send me for the Ben Gay. Yea, its been a few years. The red-pencil marks in my old piano lesson books (I kept them all) tell the tale, I was no prodigy. But somewhere along the way, what was nurtured in me was a simple understanding that by playing the piano, I could express myself, allow for a little peek into my heart, a tiny glimpse of what I sometimes find hard to express when I speak. We all have this in our lives, that bit of joy or peace where we feel like "ah, this is what I love". Playing a sweet melody on the piano is mine. Another Anne Lamott quote ... "how is it you can play one chord, and then another, and then your heart just breaks wide open?". That's what playing the piano does for me. Opens my heart. Wide open.
I've had opportunities to play since that framed certificate was signed. High school, a tiny bit in college, weddings and funerals, and years in a worship band at a church for a good part of my adult life. But a turn in the road a few years ago brought a change that left me wondering if and where and how my love for playing would show itself again.
An experience last fall reminded me of my almost-forgotten "I want to teach" idea. In preparing for a wedding where I was playing with a violinist friend, the music that was chosen was a real challenge for me. I was nervous enough about it that I set aside the intentional time for a month, to practice every night, every morning. I pulled out the metronome, wrote little notes to myself on the sheet music to get me through the hardest parts. And in the middle of all that practicing, I remembered, this is what I love. This is part of who I am.
I took a few baby steps last night, committing to my friend that I would start taking some action. Her daughter has some little fingers that would like to play, and she'd like to have me teach her.
My own "little fingers" are quite a bit bigger now, and bear the wrinkles and scars and imperfections that come with 40-plus years. But I'm gaining the courage lately, at least enough courage to sort out the next steps, so that I can, hopefully, begin to teach piano to some "little fingers" myself. This is an idea I started kicking around in my own mind a few years ago. And I told just enough people that I can't really turn back now. I could, but I don't want to, and the ones I told know me well enough to remind me, gently, that I said I wanted to do this.
Just last night, I sat across a table with an old friend, sharing coffee and stories, and she told me just how we could make it work for her little daughter to be one of my first students.
I love to play the piano. I have no classical chops to speak of, there's a good chance a set of scales would put a cramp in my hands that would send me for the Ben Gay. Yea, its been a few years. The red-pencil marks in my old piano lesson books (I kept them all) tell the tale, I was no prodigy. But somewhere along the way, what was nurtured in me was a simple understanding that by playing the piano, I could express myself, allow for a little peek into my heart, a tiny glimpse of what I sometimes find hard to express when I speak. We all have this in our lives, that bit of joy or peace where we feel like "ah, this is what I love". Playing a sweet melody on the piano is mine. Another Anne Lamott quote ... "how is it you can play one chord, and then another, and then your heart just breaks wide open?". That's what playing the piano does for me. Opens my heart. Wide open.
I've had opportunities to play since that framed certificate was signed. High school, a tiny bit in college, weddings and funerals, and years in a worship band at a church for a good part of my adult life. But a turn in the road a few years ago brought a change that left me wondering if and where and how my love for playing would show itself again.
An experience last fall reminded me of my almost-forgotten "I want to teach" idea. In preparing for a wedding where I was playing with a violinist friend, the music that was chosen was a real challenge for me. I was nervous enough about it that I set aside the intentional time for a month, to practice every night, every morning. I pulled out the metronome, wrote little notes to myself on the sheet music to get me through the hardest parts. And in the middle of all that practicing, I remembered, this is what I love. This is part of who I am.
I took a few baby steps last night, committing to my friend that I would start taking some action. Her daughter has some little fingers that would like to play, and she'd like to have me teach her.
Hope is propelling me forward. I hope I can take some steps and figure out how to teach. I hope I can grow into being a good teacher. I hope I can give years of my life to pursuing this. I hope I can encourage a child to express herself when she plays. I hope, when I am in my 70s, I can be the funky old piano-teacher-lady down the street.
And I hope I can sign a "Certificate of Merit" for some little fingers someday.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
SURROUNDED ~
I decided I'd contracted MS last weekend. True confessions, I've decided this a few times before in my life. My poor mom used to have to take me to the doctor in my 10s, 11s and 12s so he/she could convince me I did not have whatever disease I had stumbled upon while leafing through the giant hardback family-medical dictionary. Also, I went through a fainting phase in my early teens, I'd just be minding my own business, then I'd hear a sibling say "there she goes again". That doctor explained that the veins that feed blood to my brain are a little on the small side. Um, yea. I've heard all the punchlines for that one. Anyhow, my "I-think-I-have-MS again" tale started about six weeks ago, I kept waking up in the middle of the night with an achy, buzzing, burning left arm. I know. Left arm, heart attack, but I've been working out and eating healthy, so I let that possibility go. I'd shake it off, get back to sleep just in time for the alarm to go off. It happened a few times a week. Last weekend, I couldn't shake it off, and I buzzed and burned and pinned-and needled all weekend long. Worked myself up into a bit of a state. Pictured needing to sell my house, quit my job, move in with mom and hire someone to tend to my "activities of daily living". You know, those ones. Yikes. I've heard I can get a little anxious. An evening conversation with my sister led to a call to the doctor on Monday. Something in her tone when she said "aren't those symptoms of something serious?"... Thank God for the kindly, older, gentle doctor who pulled my card from the "in-box". He listened to my anxious story, nodded as if he'd heard the likes of me before, and proceeded to poke my extremities with the sharpest objects he could find in the drawer behind him. I felt it all, reacted just right, and even beat him in the arm wrestling contest he challenged me to. He was gracious and patient, and assured me he saw no signs of anything neurological going on. So we played detective and tried to figure out what was causing the buzz and the burn. I suppose he's heard the wildest of confessions, my big breakthrough was to admit to him that I get a pillow and blanky and fall asleep on the loveseat every night (before I wake up around midnight and go to bed). He explained to me that, what with my age (thanks doc), my diminishing hormones (thanks again), and the tiny neck vein thing I've got going on, that putting my neck in such a lousy position each night was not good for the blood flow. He told me too that the round-the-clock symptoms that weekend were likely a result of letting myself get a little too overwrought. So unlike me :) I promised him I would sleep in my big girl bed from now on. I am going to treat myself to some real (non-K-mart) pillows to entice me to follow-through. God bless K-mart, I'm just saying. I've experienced a huge sense of relief in knowing that nothing more serious was going on. There's a bit of a buzz now and then, but, you know, my age, my hormones. The sketchy blood supply to my brain. I can live with that. Could I live with something worse? What if the look on the doc's face was more grim, what if the old guy beat me in that arm-wrestling contest because my muscles wouldn't, couldn't react right? Yes, I could live with it. A writer I love (Anne Lamott) writes that when difficult things happen, the idea isn't to pray for God to take the difficult thing away, but to invite Him into it with us. And last weekend, in between some anxious moments and being on hold to Kaiser and spending way to much time at http://www.ms.com/, I was able to stammer some prayers... some "helps me's", some "I'm scared's", some "I'm probably being ridiculous but I know you get me's". Thank God, for a kindly, gentle, gracious Father. Who has heard these prayers before, but has never tired of leaning in to hear them again.
I'm reading a small volume of Celtic devotions these days, every day there is a prayer, a bit of Gaelic poetry, a Psalm. And on the day I found out I do not have MS, St. Patrick's breastplate was part of the shield my Father had offered me. It reads, in part...
"Christ, be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me
Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me
Christ on my right, Christ on my left
Christ when I lie down, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise"
So, no MS. Not this time. It'll be something, someday. And it'll be okay. Surrounded, as St. Patrick prays, as I am.
I decided I'd contracted MS last weekend. True confessions, I've decided this a few times before in my life. My poor mom used to have to take me to the doctor in my 10s, 11s and 12s so he/she could convince me I did not have whatever disease I had stumbled upon while leafing through the giant hardback family-medical dictionary. Also, I went through a fainting phase in my early teens, I'd just be minding my own business, then I'd hear a sibling say "there she goes again". That doctor explained that the veins that feed blood to my brain are a little on the small side. Um, yea. I've heard all the punchlines for that one. Anyhow, my "I-think-I-have-MS again" tale started about six weeks ago, I kept waking up in the middle of the night with an achy, buzzing, burning left arm. I know. Left arm, heart attack, but I've been working out and eating healthy, so I let that possibility go. I'd shake it off, get back to sleep just in time for the alarm to go off. It happened a few times a week. Last weekend, I couldn't shake it off, and I buzzed and burned and pinned-and needled all weekend long. Worked myself up into a bit of a state. Pictured needing to sell my house, quit my job, move in with mom and hire someone to tend to my "activities of daily living". You know, those ones. Yikes. I've heard I can get a little anxious. An evening conversation with my sister led to a call to the doctor on Monday. Something in her tone when she said "aren't those symptoms of something serious?"... Thank God for the kindly, older, gentle doctor who pulled my card from the "in-box". He listened to my anxious story, nodded as if he'd heard the likes of me before, and proceeded to poke my extremities with the sharpest objects he could find in the drawer behind him. I felt it all, reacted just right, and even beat him in the arm wrestling contest he challenged me to. He was gracious and patient, and assured me he saw no signs of anything neurological going on. So we played detective and tried to figure out what was causing the buzz and the burn. I suppose he's heard the wildest of confessions, my big breakthrough was to admit to him that I get a pillow and blanky and fall asleep on the loveseat every night (before I wake up around midnight and go to bed). He explained to me that, what with my age (thanks doc), my diminishing hormones (thanks again), and the tiny neck vein thing I've got going on, that putting my neck in such a lousy position each night was not good for the blood flow. He told me too that the round-the-clock symptoms that weekend were likely a result of letting myself get a little too overwrought. So unlike me :) I promised him I would sleep in my big girl bed from now on. I am going to treat myself to some real (non-K-mart) pillows to entice me to follow-through. God bless K-mart, I'm just saying. I've experienced a huge sense of relief in knowing that nothing more serious was going on. There's a bit of a buzz now and then, but, you know, my age, my hormones. The sketchy blood supply to my brain. I can live with that. Could I live with something worse? What if the look on the doc's face was more grim, what if the old guy beat me in that arm-wrestling contest because my muscles wouldn't, couldn't react right? Yes, I could live with it. A writer I love (Anne Lamott) writes that when difficult things happen, the idea isn't to pray for God to take the difficult thing away, but to invite Him into it with us. And last weekend, in between some anxious moments and being on hold to Kaiser and spending way to much time at http://www.ms.com/, I was able to stammer some prayers... some "helps me's", some "I'm scared's", some "I'm probably being ridiculous but I know you get me's". Thank God, for a kindly, gentle, gracious Father. Who has heard these prayers before, but has never tired of leaning in to hear them again.
I'm reading a small volume of Celtic devotions these days, every day there is a prayer, a bit of Gaelic poetry, a Psalm. And on the day I found out I do not have MS, St. Patrick's breastplate was part of the shield my Father had offered me. It reads, in part...
"Christ, be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me
Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me
Christ on my right, Christ on my left
Christ when I lie down, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise"
So, no MS. Not this time. It'll be something, someday. And it'll be okay. Surrounded, as St. Patrick prays, as I am.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)