I went to a reading a few weeks back. It was filling up by the time I arrived. I wound my way through uneven rows of dented metal chairs, set in crooked lines on the hardwood floor between European Architecture and Science Fiction at Powell’s Books on Hawthorne in Portland.
I’d been intrigued by a blurb in the local paper about the young writer who’d be the guest. I sat with the appreciative group of readers, writers, seekers, on-their-way-to-somewhere-elsers who’d stumbled in with a cup of coffee and a bit of spare time.
I love being read to. Living on my own makes that tricky, so I attend readings when I can.
The young writer, she was delightful. Honest, nervous, funny. A little amazed that anyone would come out on a school night to listen to the words she’d had the courage to write. She read to us from her newest collection of narrative pieces. They were genuine, heartbreaking, tender. She received the polite applause with an embarrassed grin, and then patiently answered the questions that invariably get asked at these gatherings: “How much time do you spend writing every day?” “How do you disguise your characters so your family won’t recognize themselves?” “How can I get my own book published?” Her answers were gracious and thoughtful, as if she were hearing these questions for the first time. She took the cap off a new Sharpie pen, grabbed a book off the stack fresh from the publisher, and signed her name over and again on the flyleaf that still smelled of bookbinding glue.
I was glad I’d gone. I was glad to spend a slice of evening with other grown-ups who like being read to. I’d gone intrigued and left intrigued.
But it isn’t this young writer’s work or her particular story that has stayed with me since that evening. It was what someone else said along the way. Truth has a habit of doing that, showing up unannounced, making its presence known when we’re not looking or listening for it. She mentioned, as she spoke to us, of a writing workshop she’d attended some time ago where she had been under the instruction of one of her favorite writers: Katherine Dunn, an award-winning novelist and poet. Katherine, during her own Q and A at this workshop, had said the following to the writers leaning in to capture her every word: “I don’t write so I can escape. I write so I can stay.”
“I don’t write so I can escape. I write so I can stay.”
The young writer told us of the deep impact this bit of truth had on her. I left Powell’s that night knowing just how she felt. These are the words that resonated with me that evening, these are the words that resonate with me still.
“I write so I can stay.” So I can stay. Stay.
I picture that award-winning writer, staying, choosing to be present. Staying with a character til his or her voice finds itself. Staying with a plot idea until it unfolds and sets out on its own winding path. Staying with the doubt that she can ever write another story until the doubt passes. Staying with the noise of everything that’s calling her away from what she truly loves to do… write, to be… a writer. Staying with the noise until she can stare it down, until quiet takes its place and she can pick up where she left off. Not writing so she can escape. Writing so she can stay. Allowing space and time and stillness so truth can weave itself into the narrative.
We struggle sometimes to allow for space and time and stillness. There are so many escape routes, so many getaway cars. They screech toward us, we hop in and disappear. We grab hold of any distraction, and the very things that need stillness are avoided: an unspoken concern, an unuttered doubt, a bit of wound unattended, the weight of what overwhelms. Even a bit of hope or joy unexpressed.
The noises, loud and large, drown out the voice that is still and small. The voice that says “Come to Me. Be with Me. Stay with Me.”
My friend Elliott told me that he doesn’t possess the “fight or flight” instinct that’s inherent in most of us. He admits he’s all “flight or flight”. When confronted, escape is his only option. It’s all “get me outta here”. I smiled at that, just because it sounded a tiny bit familiar.
“The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you… He will rejoice over you with singing… He will quiet you with His love.” (Zephaniah 3:17)
What if, increasingly, instead of escaping, we could “stay”. What if, tiny breath by tiny breath, we could allow ourselves to be quieted.
What if we could stay with our own story as it unfolds. Find our voices. See the path come into view a step at a time, and trust that we are not alone in the staying.
My heart is not proud and my eyes are not haughty,
I am not concerned with lofty things
I have stilled my soul like a babe with its mother
And my hope rests in God, both now and forever
I have stilled, stilled my soul, oh my soul, be still
Be still my soul
I have stilled, stilled my soul, oh my soul, be still
Be still my soul
(Lyric from Psalm 131)
Set aside, for a moment, the instinct to fight, to flee, to escape.
Take a tiny breath.
Allow for the stillness.
And stay.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Triptych ~
\‘trip-(,)tik\ – noun – from the Greek
A picture or carving in three panels, side by side
A few years ago I began to gather old black and white photos of my family.
My little house has no fireplace, so my piano is my mantle, and I’ve gathered quite a collection.
My Scottish great-grandmother, the preacher from Oklahoma, my mom, my dad as chubby-cheeked toddlers. The great-grandfathers, the one who played catcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates, the one who went to sea to rescue the shipwrecked. The grandmother who taught me to play piano, the grandpa who was a proud Northwest logger, who I know only from a scratchy piece of 8mm film where he is tossing me in his arms. My nana and pa, strolling down an avenue in the 40s like a couple ‘a swells.
My own family, my parents, my siblings, we’re a small bunch, we’re a bit scattered. My parents each had only one sibling. I’ve got an aunt in Florida somewhere, I think, and a few random cousins who are essentially strangers to me. Family reunions when I was young were, well, not so much reunions as the occasional afternoon picnic where we’d play lousy croquet and I’d do my best to dodge grandma’s three-bean salad. She was a little heavy-handed with the vinegar.
Every once in awhile when I feel envious of big families with extensions that still reach far and wide, I glance at this gallery on my piano for a booster shot of belonging. Connection. Where I come from. My people.
Scattered around my house I’ve placed a few other black and whites I have come to treasure. Photographs of my two older sisters and myself. My parents were in full-Kodak mode for several years, and they did a terrific job of getting the three of us to pose together, side by side.
Little girls in Easter dresses with bonnets. I enlarged this photo some time back only to discover that it wasn’t my petticoat peeking out from beneath my pale dress, no, that was a loaded diaper. Later on we pose again, a little more grown up, bonnets exchanged for white gloves and patent-leather purses. Mom was our seamstress, letting us pick out a favorite color of matching-patterned fabric. Greens, pinks, lavenders. Another shows the three of us sitting stagger-staired on the front porch of a grand old house, bare arms and sunsuits, another with my sisters on tricycles, me walking just ahead of them with shoulders and head held high, as if I had appointed myself grand marshal of our sister parade. We show up again, all tom-boyed out in shorts and sweatshirts, holding our fishing poles and showing off fresh-caught lake trout (reeled in, no doubt, by daddy).
The flashbulb stopped popping after a handful of years, at least these triptych poses came to an end, which is a good thing, since, you know, the seventies were not a photogenic time.
We shared a bedroom growing up. I look at that 10x12 room now and can’t imagine how we survived such close quarters. My amazement is tempered by the fact that I was the slob, so my sisters had to bear the most in terms of their unfortunate roommate situation. (Now is a good time to mention that I also have a baby brother. He didn’t make the girls-only photo-shoots, but he got his own room for 20-some years, so that seems like a decent trade-off). Anyway, we shared that space, the three of us, until a cracker-box college dorm room or an available apartment offered the first little taste of privacy.
And private we all became, for years. Each pursuing our own bit of dream, or simply walking the path that unfolded in front of us when dreams seemed elusive or still in-the-making. I don’t know what other sisters do, what they talk about, I just know that we were never the kind to shop or giggle or whisper secrets, we didn’t talk about shoes or boys or clothes. We met up here and there, stayed in touch a bit, came together now and again for children and the bigger holidays, but for the most part, our paths diverged.
We stayed in that place of divergence until just a handful of years ago, when, I don’t know what, or who, or even how, really, I just know that we each saw to it, in our own small way, to draw our paths together again.
There have been no “Timmy and Lassie” moments, no racing into one another’s embrace after years of separation. Our reconnecting has been slow, stumbling, stammering, and yet, marked by intentionality. It’s not so difficult. A phone call made. A phone call returned. An email sent and replied to. An old-fashioned note-card and a postage stamp. The remembering, the acknowledgement of a birthday, an appointment, a previous conversation. An ear to listen to a bit of worry, a bit of gladness, a bit of the quirky or mundane that makes up a day. A touch of teasing, laughter. A cup of coffee. A little something picked up here or there to say, “I was here, or there, and I thought of you”.
Along the way, we are learning who one another are. And we’re forgiving one another for living too many years holding tight to who we thought we were when we shared that small room. The bossy one, the flake, the crybaby. The images of one another’s best and worst still run in our memories, but the images are softened and mellowed by time, grace and understanding. We’re allowing for one another’s “becoming”.
It’s not all “Hallmark”. We have the capacity to annoy one another, to frustrate, we know where the bright red “PUSH” buttons are for each other. There are days one sister reminds me that I was the one who pushed her off a ledge onto the cement patio when she was 5 years old. It was an accident, I swear. Years of living our private lives left each of us with a streak of independence and will that could be described as, oh, maybe, ferocious. So, this coming together, it takes awhile.
I’m not trying to make up for time that feels lost; I just don’t want to lose any more of the time that I get.
I’ve discovered at this place where our paths are coming together again, that I am so grateful to have my sisters with me. I’ve missed them. Now, when there is an ache that needs some balm, a story that needs to be heard outside my own head, it occurs to me to seek out a sister. A hand on an arm, a look in the eye. A familiar voice from miles away. And its because of our history that it bears such sweet weight to have their companionship as we navigate this road through whatever lies ahead… the needs of our mother, the needs of our own lives.
I look at these photos, those little girls in Easter bonnets, sitting on the sunny porch, riding in a tricycle parade; I look through the black and white into their hazel, brown and blue eyes. I don’t know what they saw all those years ago, but looking back at them today, I believe I know what they are coming to see.
“Behold how good it is for brothers, for sisters, to dwell together in unity.” (Psalm 133:1)
How good it is indeed. My “picture, my carving in three panels, side by side”. My sisters. My triptych.
A picture or carving in three panels, side by side
A few years ago I began to gather old black and white photos of my family.
My little house has no fireplace, so my piano is my mantle, and I’ve gathered quite a collection.
My Scottish great-grandmother, the preacher from Oklahoma, my mom, my dad as chubby-cheeked toddlers. The great-grandfathers, the one who played catcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates, the one who went to sea to rescue the shipwrecked. The grandmother who taught me to play piano, the grandpa who was a proud Northwest logger, who I know only from a scratchy piece of 8mm film where he is tossing me in his arms. My nana and pa, strolling down an avenue in the 40s like a couple ‘a swells.
My own family, my parents, my siblings, we’re a small bunch, we’re a bit scattered. My parents each had only one sibling. I’ve got an aunt in Florida somewhere, I think, and a few random cousins who are essentially strangers to me. Family reunions when I was young were, well, not so much reunions as the occasional afternoon picnic where we’d play lousy croquet and I’d do my best to dodge grandma’s three-bean salad. She was a little heavy-handed with the vinegar.
Every once in awhile when I feel envious of big families with extensions that still reach far and wide, I glance at this gallery on my piano for a booster shot of belonging. Connection. Where I come from. My people.
Scattered around my house I’ve placed a few other black and whites I have come to treasure. Photographs of my two older sisters and myself. My parents were in full-Kodak mode for several years, and they did a terrific job of getting the three of us to pose together, side by side.
Little girls in Easter dresses with bonnets. I enlarged this photo some time back only to discover that it wasn’t my petticoat peeking out from beneath my pale dress, no, that was a loaded diaper. Later on we pose again, a little more grown up, bonnets exchanged for white gloves and patent-leather purses. Mom was our seamstress, letting us pick out a favorite color of matching-patterned fabric. Greens, pinks, lavenders. Another shows the three of us sitting stagger-staired on the front porch of a grand old house, bare arms and sunsuits, another with my sisters on tricycles, me walking just ahead of them with shoulders and head held high, as if I had appointed myself grand marshal of our sister parade. We show up again, all tom-boyed out in shorts and sweatshirts, holding our fishing poles and showing off fresh-caught lake trout (reeled in, no doubt, by daddy).
The flashbulb stopped popping after a handful of years, at least these triptych poses came to an end, which is a good thing, since, you know, the seventies were not a photogenic time.
We shared a bedroom growing up. I look at that 10x12 room now and can’t imagine how we survived such close quarters. My amazement is tempered by the fact that I was the slob, so my sisters had to bear the most in terms of their unfortunate roommate situation. (Now is a good time to mention that I also have a baby brother. He didn’t make the girls-only photo-shoots, but he got his own room for 20-some years, so that seems like a decent trade-off). Anyway, we shared that space, the three of us, until a cracker-box college dorm room or an available apartment offered the first little taste of privacy.
And private we all became, for years. Each pursuing our own bit of dream, or simply walking the path that unfolded in front of us when dreams seemed elusive or still in-the-making. I don’t know what other sisters do, what they talk about, I just know that we were never the kind to shop or giggle or whisper secrets, we didn’t talk about shoes or boys or clothes. We met up here and there, stayed in touch a bit, came together now and again for children and the bigger holidays, but for the most part, our paths diverged.
We stayed in that place of divergence until just a handful of years ago, when, I don’t know what, or who, or even how, really, I just know that we each saw to it, in our own small way, to draw our paths together again.
There have been no “Timmy and Lassie” moments, no racing into one another’s embrace after years of separation. Our reconnecting has been slow, stumbling, stammering, and yet, marked by intentionality. It’s not so difficult. A phone call made. A phone call returned. An email sent and replied to. An old-fashioned note-card and a postage stamp. The remembering, the acknowledgement of a birthday, an appointment, a previous conversation. An ear to listen to a bit of worry, a bit of gladness, a bit of the quirky or mundane that makes up a day. A touch of teasing, laughter. A cup of coffee. A little something picked up here or there to say, “I was here, or there, and I thought of you”.
Along the way, we are learning who one another are. And we’re forgiving one another for living too many years holding tight to who we thought we were when we shared that small room. The bossy one, the flake, the crybaby. The images of one another’s best and worst still run in our memories, but the images are softened and mellowed by time, grace and understanding. We’re allowing for one another’s “becoming”.
It’s not all “Hallmark”. We have the capacity to annoy one another, to frustrate, we know where the bright red “PUSH” buttons are for each other. There are days one sister reminds me that I was the one who pushed her off a ledge onto the cement patio when she was 5 years old. It was an accident, I swear. Years of living our private lives left each of us with a streak of independence and will that could be described as, oh, maybe, ferocious. So, this coming together, it takes awhile.
I’m not trying to make up for time that feels lost; I just don’t want to lose any more of the time that I get.
I’ve discovered at this place where our paths are coming together again, that I am so grateful to have my sisters with me. I’ve missed them. Now, when there is an ache that needs some balm, a story that needs to be heard outside my own head, it occurs to me to seek out a sister. A hand on an arm, a look in the eye. A familiar voice from miles away. And its because of our history that it bears such sweet weight to have their companionship as we navigate this road through whatever lies ahead… the needs of our mother, the needs of our own lives.
I look at these photos, those little girls in Easter bonnets, sitting on the sunny porch, riding in a tricycle parade; I look through the black and white into their hazel, brown and blue eyes. I don’t know what they saw all those years ago, but looking back at them today, I believe I know what they are coming to see.
“Behold how good it is for brothers, for sisters, to dwell together in unity.” (Psalm 133:1)
How good it is indeed. My “picture, my carving in three panels, side by side”. My sisters. My triptych.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Found Out ~
I ate some raw Tollhouse cookie dough a few weekends ago.
I'd been craving something doughy, something chocolaty, something not listed on my weight-loss food-plan, so as I was picking up my groceries, I tossed a packet of cookie dough in the basket. I ate a few squares of the good stuff while I baked the rest. A few days later, the ecoli-related recall was announced, and, after checking my belly for gurgling, said to myself: “Kathryn Douglass. Be sure your sins will find you out." (Numbers 32:23)
That's was the voice of my Grandpa Owen in my head.
He was a Conservative Baptist minister for 70 years. He was one of the most loving and tender men I have ever known, generous with hugs and kisses, nicknames and compliments. And yet, he could thump the Bible with the best of them, and I was on the receiving end of some of that thumping for a good part of my childhood. I was warned not to smoke or dance or chew or go with boys who do, warned not to do any of those things that those that were doing them, were, well, doing. I was never sure who these people were or what, exactly, they were all doing, but I listened wide-eyed to grandpa’s warnings.
The first time I remember him quoting that verse from Numbers to me, my younger brother and I had been out riding our bikes. Well, we were riding one bike. I had the seat and the steering; he sat behind me with his fanny perched on the thin metal fender. We bounced along our pot-holed street, scraping along in the gravel and grass that passed for a sidewalk. Shirts, shorts, no shoes. C’mon, nobody wears shoes to ride a bike in the summertime. We’d been warned against this, but paid no attention. What could possibly happen? So, that particular afternoon, when I heard the thud, the crunch, the scream, I knew we were in trouble. I knew what could happen. Turns out bare toes and metal spokes were not meant to meet.
My brother limped his mangled feet home, I followed sheepishly with the bike, rehearsing my lines (“it was his idea.”) Grandpa and grandma happened to be visiting that summer afternoon and met us, along with mom, at the door. Apparently our cries alerted them to somebody doing something they shouldn’t have been. Grandpa helped mom wash my brother’s toes, and get him bandaged up. A little medicine, a little comfort, a little kiss to make it better. And a little thumping. He sat us down, and having been advised that we were told not to ride our bikes without shoes, said, in his firmest preacher voice: “children, be sure your sins will find you out.”
When my youngest niece was in the 2nd grade, she insisted on wearing her AWANA Club Sparky vest to school on picture day. All bright red with yellow piping. She simply could not be talked out of it. Her mom struck a deal, she could wear the vest to school, but when it was picture-taking time, she just had to slip off the vest so her pretty pink sweater would be captured for 2nd grade posterity. She promised, pinky-swore, that she would do it. When she raced in the door after school, the first question her mom asked was “did you remember to take off your vest?” “Yes, mama, I took it off for my picture.” Six weeks later, when the 8x10s arrived in the mail, there was Kaity, missing a couple of teeth, bangs askew, and bright red Sparky vest front and center. Nothing like being “found out” by Kodak.
My sins have “found me out”, to be sure. The lies, the deception, the rebellion. Kid-stuff. Grown-up stuff. Bits of brokenness acting out, showing up in ways that remind me that I am still becoming the girl God has in mind. Sometimes that “becoming” arrives in gentle waves of surrender and growth. Other times, its more like a tantrum, all clenched fists and stubborn pouts.
And yet, what I have experienced more often in my life, is that I have been “found out”, over and again, by grace.
Not chased down by sin, but pursued by God, described by David in this way in Psalm 103: “He forgives all your sins, he heals all your diseases, he redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion. The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in love… He does not treat us as our sins deserve, or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”
His relentless pursuit is not a pursuit of my behavior, but a pursuit of my heart. God is “finding me out”. Finding me to be a beloved child in need of his love, forgiveness and grace.
I know my grandpa meant well with his occasional thumping, and I appreciate what he tried to teach me. A child needs to be warned that toes and spokes don’t mix. Grown-ups need to be warned too, which seems obvious from all the tangles the grown-up world has gotten itself into.
What gladdens and relieves my heart is to discover and experience that sin is not out to “get me” after all. The greater truth is that I was “gotten” long ago. Gotten by grace.
I'd been craving something doughy, something chocolaty, something not listed on my weight-loss food-plan, so as I was picking up my groceries, I tossed a packet of cookie dough in the basket. I ate a few squares of the good stuff while I baked the rest. A few days later, the ecoli-related recall was announced, and, after checking my belly for gurgling, said to myself: “Kathryn Douglass. Be sure your sins will find you out." (Numbers 32:23)
That's was the voice of my Grandpa Owen in my head.
He was a Conservative Baptist minister for 70 years. He was one of the most loving and tender men I have ever known, generous with hugs and kisses, nicknames and compliments. And yet, he could thump the Bible with the best of them, and I was on the receiving end of some of that thumping for a good part of my childhood. I was warned not to smoke or dance or chew or go with boys who do, warned not to do any of those things that those that were doing them, were, well, doing. I was never sure who these people were or what, exactly, they were all doing, but I listened wide-eyed to grandpa’s warnings.
The first time I remember him quoting that verse from Numbers to me, my younger brother and I had been out riding our bikes. Well, we were riding one bike. I had the seat and the steering; he sat behind me with his fanny perched on the thin metal fender. We bounced along our pot-holed street, scraping along in the gravel and grass that passed for a sidewalk. Shirts, shorts, no shoes. C’mon, nobody wears shoes to ride a bike in the summertime. We’d been warned against this, but paid no attention. What could possibly happen? So, that particular afternoon, when I heard the thud, the crunch, the scream, I knew we were in trouble. I knew what could happen. Turns out bare toes and metal spokes were not meant to meet.
My brother limped his mangled feet home, I followed sheepishly with the bike, rehearsing my lines (“it was his idea.”) Grandpa and grandma happened to be visiting that summer afternoon and met us, along with mom, at the door. Apparently our cries alerted them to somebody doing something they shouldn’t have been. Grandpa helped mom wash my brother’s toes, and get him bandaged up. A little medicine, a little comfort, a little kiss to make it better. And a little thumping. He sat us down, and having been advised that we were told not to ride our bikes without shoes, said, in his firmest preacher voice: “children, be sure your sins will find you out.”
When my youngest niece was in the 2nd grade, she insisted on wearing her AWANA Club Sparky vest to school on picture day. All bright red with yellow piping. She simply could not be talked out of it. Her mom struck a deal, she could wear the vest to school, but when it was picture-taking time, she just had to slip off the vest so her pretty pink sweater would be captured for 2nd grade posterity. She promised, pinky-swore, that she would do it. When she raced in the door after school, the first question her mom asked was “did you remember to take off your vest?” “Yes, mama, I took it off for my picture.” Six weeks later, when the 8x10s arrived in the mail, there was Kaity, missing a couple of teeth, bangs askew, and bright red Sparky vest front and center. Nothing like being “found out” by Kodak.
My sins have “found me out”, to be sure. The lies, the deception, the rebellion. Kid-stuff. Grown-up stuff. Bits of brokenness acting out, showing up in ways that remind me that I am still becoming the girl God has in mind. Sometimes that “becoming” arrives in gentle waves of surrender and growth. Other times, its more like a tantrum, all clenched fists and stubborn pouts.
And yet, what I have experienced more often in my life, is that I have been “found out”, over and again, by grace.
Not chased down by sin, but pursued by God, described by David in this way in Psalm 103: “He forgives all your sins, he heals all your diseases, he redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion. The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in love… He does not treat us as our sins deserve, or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”
His relentless pursuit is not a pursuit of my behavior, but a pursuit of my heart. God is “finding me out”. Finding me to be a beloved child in need of his love, forgiveness and grace.
I know my grandpa meant well with his occasional thumping, and I appreciate what he tried to teach me. A child needs to be warned that toes and spokes don’t mix. Grown-ups need to be warned too, which seems obvious from all the tangles the grown-up world has gotten itself into.
What gladdens and relieves my heart is to discover and experience that sin is not out to “get me” after all. The greater truth is that I was “gotten” long ago. Gotten by grace.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
The Deep End ~
When my mom was a little girl, she spent many of her summer days at the home of her Nana and Pa, Helen and Hugh, in British Columbia. The great old house was tucked into a protective blanket of fir trees, just up the fern-covered bank from the edge of the glassy waters of Sproat Lake.
When she was 4 years old, Grandpa Hugh decided it was high time his little girl learned to swim. There was so much activity down at the water, the little boat, the dock, the swimming, the fishing. Not too far off shore there was a little island, and other children would scamper out there to build forts, and craft all kinds of adventures until the "time for dinner" bell yelled from any of a dozen nearby sun-porches. It disheartened him to watch her taking it all in from the safety of dry ground. He wanted her to enjoy the lake, to experience it, and not just stand there tentatively on the shore, shyly tugging at the straps of her life-vest.
One summer afternoon, he helped her out of the vest, walked her to the end of the dock, picked her up gently and tossed her into the deep end. She flailed a bit, choked down gulps of water, whimpered some, but figured out pretty quickly what she needed to do to keep from letting the lake swallow her right up. Grandpa Hugh walked along the dock just above her, calling out to her, saying her name, coaching her, cheering her on, guiding her along. She heard his voice between gulps and cries, and made her way, all gangly 4-year old arms and legs, to the shore. At the end of the "lesson", she was a swimmer. She didn't speak to him for two weeks, but she was a swimmer. She's held to a life-long love of the water ever since.
My own learn-to-swim story is a bit less dramatic. I've never really taken to the water. I took the mandatory swimming lessons with my third-grade class (suited up in a turquoise and white gingham-patterned one-piece with attached pleated skirt purchased at J.C. Penney). At the end of the two-week sessions scheduled in place of recess, I was awarded the "Best Floater" certificate. I wasn't aware until years later that this particular award is not something to which one would normally aspire. Turns out, chubby girls float.
I was thrown into the deep end myself a few months back. My boss was three weeks away from the start of maternity leave, and we had sketched out a tentative plan for how things would run while she was away, since most of what fills her inbox would fill mine. I had a basic idea of what it would take to keep things running smoothly, but I wanted, well, all kinds of direction and assurance, guidance and how-to-do's. We had a lunch date set for noon on a Thursday to strategize. I had my list of questions, the list I'd been mulling over for weeks, she'd have her list of answers. I had my list of concerns; she'd have her list of solutions. But little Isaac John, well, he had other plans, as babies often do. He decided to show up three weeks early. The boss and I never got to have that lunch. I walked into work on a Monday morning, was given the birth announcement, flopped into my chair for a second to grasp the news, and then felt the splash and the chill as me and my notes were tossed into the deep.
What followed were a few months of a wild ride on the learning curve. Things thrown at me I had no idea what to do with. Things found inside myself I never knew were there.
The boss is back, Isaac John is holding his head up on his own, my inbox is back to being simply mine and manageable. Sure, there was a little flailing, a little gulping, a few whimpers. But I learned how to swim.
When my mom tells her story, she assures me that Pa wasn't mean, that his method, while, perhaps a tiny bit misguided, was never meant to scare her, never meant to hurt her. Pa just knew it was time for her to learn the lake and he figured that a toss off the dock was as good a choice as any.
This walk of faith sometimes feels like a toss into the deep end. There are moments where it seems we're not on dry ground, we realize we're running out of dock, and before we know what's happening, things feel dark, deep, overwhelming, and footing is hard to find. Like that 4-year old girl at her first swimming lesson, we feel like, gee, a little warning would have been nice. Like me and my list of questions for the boss, we want to know exactly what to do in every eventuality. But this life of faith can't be decided upon only once we're satisfied that we have all the answers to all the questions. Faith is often lived in the questions... questions like, "what do I do now?", "how am I going to make it through this?", "are You here?"
This life of faith, its more like holding on to Grandpa Hugh's hand as we walk along the dock, looking into his gentle eyes with a mix of excitement and uncertainty as he loosens the life vest, feeling the strength of his arms as he cradles us close, and hearing his voice as he calls out to us in the deep: "c'mon sweetheart, I see you, I'm right here, you can do it, don't be afraid, just come to me."
Billy Crockett, a singer-songwriter whose music has kept me good company for years, writes, "the depth of God's love, reaches down, down down, to where we are, until we're found, found, found. Through quiet words, or none at all, He pursues our hearts behind the wall, and to those who wait with darkness all around, the depth of God's love reaches down."
"I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord. "My plans are to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future, to give you hope." ~ Jeremiah 29:11.
You pray, you cry, you swallow a little bit of lake. You believe that the arms and the love that dropped you into the deep will gather you up again.
When she was 4 years old, Grandpa Hugh decided it was high time his little girl learned to swim. There was so much activity down at the water, the little boat, the dock, the swimming, the fishing. Not too far off shore there was a little island, and other children would scamper out there to build forts, and craft all kinds of adventures until the "time for dinner" bell yelled from any of a dozen nearby sun-porches. It disheartened him to watch her taking it all in from the safety of dry ground. He wanted her to enjoy the lake, to experience it, and not just stand there tentatively on the shore, shyly tugging at the straps of her life-vest.
One summer afternoon, he helped her out of the vest, walked her to the end of the dock, picked her up gently and tossed her into the deep end. She flailed a bit, choked down gulps of water, whimpered some, but figured out pretty quickly what she needed to do to keep from letting the lake swallow her right up. Grandpa Hugh walked along the dock just above her, calling out to her, saying her name, coaching her, cheering her on, guiding her along. She heard his voice between gulps and cries, and made her way, all gangly 4-year old arms and legs, to the shore. At the end of the "lesson", she was a swimmer. She didn't speak to him for two weeks, but she was a swimmer. She's held to a life-long love of the water ever since.
My own learn-to-swim story is a bit less dramatic. I've never really taken to the water. I took the mandatory swimming lessons with my third-grade class (suited up in a turquoise and white gingham-patterned one-piece with attached pleated skirt purchased at J.C. Penney). At the end of the two-week sessions scheduled in place of recess, I was awarded the "Best Floater" certificate. I wasn't aware until years later that this particular award is not something to which one would normally aspire. Turns out, chubby girls float.
I was thrown into the deep end myself a few months back. My boss was three weeks away from the start of maternity leave, and we had sketched out a tentative plan for how things would run while she was away, since most of what fills her inbox would fill mine. I had a basic idea of what it would take to keep things running smoothly, but I wanted, well, all kinds of direction and assurance, guidance and how-to-do's. We had a lunch date set for noon on a Thursday to strategize. I had my list of questions, the list I'd been mulling over for weeks, she'd have her list of answers. I had my list of concerns; she'd have her list of solutions. But little Isaac John, well, he had other plans, as babies often do. He decided to show up three weeks early. The boss and I never got to have that lunch. I walked into work on a Monday morning, was given the birth announcement, flopped into my chair for a second to grasp the news, and then felt the splash and the chill as me and my notes were tossed into the deep.
What followed were a few months of a wild ride on the learning curve. Things thrown at me I had no idea what to do with. Things found inside myself I never knew were there.
The boss is back, Isaac John is holding his head up on his own, my inbox is back to being simply mine and manageable. Sure, there was a little flailing, a little gulping, a few whimpers. But I learned how to swim.
When my mom tells her story, she assures me that Pa wasn't mean, that his method, while, perhaps a tiny bit misguided, was never meant to scare her, never meant to hurt her. Pa just knew it was time for her to learn the lake and he figured that a toss off the dock was as good a choice as any.
This walk of faith sometimes feels like a toss into the deep end. There are moments where it seems we're not on dry ground, we realize we're running out of dock, and before we know what's happening, things feel dark, deep, overwhelming, and footing is hard to find. Like that 4-year old girl at her first swimming lesson, we feel like, gee, a little warning would have been nice. Like me and my list of questions for the boss, we want to know exactly what to do in every eventuality. But this life of faith can't be decided upon only once we're satisfied that we have all the answers to all the questions. Faith is often lived in the questions... questions like, "what do I do now?", "how am I going to make it through this?", "are You here?"
This life of faith, its more like holding on to Grandpa Hugh's hand as we walk along the dock, looking into his gentle eyes with a mix of excitement and uncertainty as he loosens the life vest, feeling the strength of his arms as he cradles us close, and hearing his voice as he calls out to us in the deep: "c'mon sweetheart, I see you, I'm right here, you can do it, don't be afraid, just come to me."
Billy Crockett, a singer-songwriter whose music has kept me good company for years, writes, "the depth of God's love, reaches down, down down, to where we are, until we're found, found, found. Through quiet words, or none at all, He pursues our hearts behind the wall, and to those who wait with darkness all around, the depth of God's love reaches down."
"I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord. "My plans are to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future, to give you hope." ~ Jeremiah 29:11.
You pray, you cry, you swallow a little bit of lake. You believe that the arms and the love that dropped you into the deep will gather you up again.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Reconnection ~
My past has been finding me lately. My past in the names, the faces, the stories of some people I once shared a connection with.
An old roommate, a grade-school chum, a woman I met at a community meeting, a high-school friend.
There was that sideways glance on a downtown street corner where I recognized a once-familiar face. Then, a missed bus that led to a different ride, a different route, and then a friendly voice from a few seats back, a hesitant, "hey, how... where have you been?" An email that found its way to me through the net, though I'd not given out my address, a phone call from an area code I didn't know.
Connections... they fray, they strengthen, they deepen, they unwind. I look at my life and see who is with me, who has left, who has stayed. I know the names, the faces, the stories of the people I am growing old with. I wasn't looking to tamper with that picture.
If I let myself think about it too much, I wonder if Dickens is lurking nearby, giving backstage cues to ghosts from the past.
There's a Patty Griffin lyric that resonates. She writes, "as far as I can tell, most everything means nothing, except some things, that mean everything."
It's too soon to tell if it all means nothing, or if, maybe, it means everything. I understand that there's plenty on any given day that's random, mundane, serendipitous. But when the same song plays over and again, like an old, scratched LP, I pay attention.
I welcome some of these reconnections with hope, with delight. My memory's been leafing through a scrapbook, a diary, a collage. I smile at the thought of who we were then, who we are now, and how it is, like that lost pup in the news this week that found his way home months later, to find myself feeling at home again too, at home with people who knew me so long ago, and, despite the distance that comes with time and change, want to share the journey from here.
Other possibilities at reconnection leave me wary. There's a bit of fear, regret. There are wounds there, self-inflicted, imposed, long-forgotten until I remember how I got that scar, that limp, that ache.
My friend Judy has been reminding me for years that nothing is wasted with God. I look at what seems frayed, what feels broken, and it can feel like a waste sometimes. We're not meant to be alone, we're created for connection, for community, but brokenness and misunderstanding, neglect, and life, just life can cause paths to unwind, bonds to strain. I can consider these disconnections in my own story and ask, "what was that all about?"
God looks at the same and reminds me (from Psalm 139) that He searches me and knows me... that before a word is on my tongue He hears it... that He knows when I sit and when I rise... that there is nowhere I've been, nowhere I could ever go that He would not be with me, that He is familiar, deeply, intimately familiar, with all my ways. All my staying, leaving, fraying ways.
When I was a child, a young woman, I dove in, all intensity and excitement to the possibility of belonging, of being known. Not a child anymore, I understand what it is to be open, and yet to guard my heart, or, to allow my heart to be guarded. I am my Beloved's and He is mine. His banner over me, over this heart, is love, protection, refuge, help.
So I will do my best to set aside fear and regret, to allow for meaning, to be open to possibility. I will trust that it's not Dickens, after all, who is allowing for this song to play over and again, but my Father, who's written all my days in his book, who knows every name, every face, every story that is part of my own.
What I trust finally, is that the connection that heals my life and redeems what feels wasted is connection with my Father.
It's not the old roommate, the grade school chum, the woman from the community meeting or the high school friend who decide if I am a person to grow old with. It's my Father, my Brother Christ, leaning in to remind me, through a glance, a call, a note, a voice, that nothing is wasted, nothing is forgotten, nothing is undone that will be left undone.
Forgiveness and grace. Hope and peace. Healing in the brokenness. Transformation. Reconnection. Some things, they mean everything.
An old roommate, a grade-school chum, a woman I met at a community meeting, a high-school friend.
There was that sideways glance on a downtown street corner where I recognized a once-familiar face. Then, a missed bus that led to a different ride, a different route, and then a friendly voice from a few seats back, a hesitant, "hey, how... where have you been?" An email that found its way to me through the net, though I'd not given out my address, a phone call from an area code I didn't know.
Connections... they fray, they strengthen, they deepen, they unwind. I look at my life and see who is with me, who has left, who has stayed. I know the names, the faces, the stories of the people I am growing old with. I wasn't looking to tamper with that picture.
If I let myself think about it too much, I wonder if Dickens is lurking nearby, giving backstage cues to ghosts from the past.
There's a Patty Griffin lyric that resonates. She writes, "as far as I can tell, most everything means nothing, except some things, that mean everything."
It's too soon to tell if it all means nothing, or if, maybe, it means everything. I understand that there's plenty on any given day that's random, mundane, serendipitous. But when the same song plays over and again, like an old, scratched LP, I pay attention.
I welcome some of these reconnections with hope, with delight. My memory's been leafing through a scrapbook, a diary, a collage. I smile at the thought of who we were then, who we are now, and how it is, like that lost pup in the news this week that found his way home months later, to find myself feeling at home again too, at home with people who knew me so long ago, and, despite the distance that comes with time and change, want to share the journey from here.
Other possibilities at reconnection leave me wary. There's a bit of fear, regret. There are wounds there, self-inflicted, imposed, long-forgotten until I remember how I got that scar, that limp, that ache.
My friend Judy has been reminding me for years that nothing is wasted with God. I look at what seems frayed, what feels broken, and it can feel like a waste sometimes. We're not meant to be alone, we're created for connection, for community, but brokenness and misunderstanding, neglect, and life, just life can cause paths to unwind, bonds to strain. I can consider these disconnections in my own story and ask, "what was that all about?"
God looks at the same and reminds me (from Psalm 139) that He searches me and knows me... that before a word is on my tongue He hears it... that He knows when I sit and when I rise... that there is nowhere I've been, nowhere I could ever go that He would not be with me, that He is familiar, deeply, intimately familiar, with all my ways. All my staying, leaving, fraying ways.
When I was a child, a young woman, I dove in, all intensity and excitement to the possibility of belonging, of being known. Not a child anymore, I understand what it is to be open, and yet to guard my heart, or, to allow my heart to be guarded. I am my Beloved's and He is mine. His banner over me, over this heart, is love, protection, refuge, help.
So I will do my best to set aside fear and regret, to allow for meaning, to be open to possibility. I will trust that it's not Dickens, after all, who is allowing for this song to play over and again, but my Father, who's written all my days in his book, who knows every name, every face, every story that is part of my own.
What I trust finally, is that the connection that heals my life and redeems what feels wasted is connection with my Father.
It's not the old roommate, the grade school chum, the woman from the community meeting or the high school friend who decide if I am a person to grow old with. It's my Father, my Brother Christ, leaning in to remind me, through a glance, a call, a note, a voice, that nothing is wasted, nothing is forgotten, nothing is undone that will be left undone.
Forgiveness and grace. Hope and peace. Healing in the brokenness. Transformation. Reconnection. Some things, they mean everything.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Garden ~
I spent an hour and a half in my garden last week. The first slice of evening where there was just enough light and just enough of a break in the steady rainfall to be outside for awhile.
I'd recently been given a rosebush-pruning lesson and witnessed in just days how life and health seemed to pulse back through the branches, and my hope was to apply my lesson and my snips to a few other scraggly bushes in my garden.
"Garden" may be the tiniest overstatement. When I bought this little place a few years ago, it came with a pristine new-sod lawn and a truckload of barkdust that stretched from the edge of the lawn to the edge of the fence with not a bit of life or color in between. I've been trying to fill in all that empty space a patch at a time ever since. We're no french country garden, but we're coming along.
I don't know what I'm doing in the garden. I guess I'm a bit of a city girl. My family lived in the "country" back when I was learning to tie my shoes, but that was a lot of shoelaces ago. Very little of the country experience made the trip from the "toolies" to the "burbs". For example ~ I like to think that eggs come from the dairy case at Trader Joe's. It's tough for me to admit to myself that they "come shootin' out a chicken's ass", (line lifted from the film, "Fried Green Tomatoes", apologies and credits to Fannie Flagg). In fact, a friend handed me a couple dozen brown eggs from her own chickens last summer and I gave them all away because I was just not ready to eat them after meeting the aforementioned asses from which they shot that very afternoon.
Back to the garden ~ so I don't know what I'm doing. I planted a blueberry bush a few years ago. After a few seasons, while I was delighted with the tiny white blossoms, I was disappointed that there'd been no berries to enjoy. I mentioned my barren blueberry bush problem to a woman I work with, she's a bit of a master gardener in her after-office hours, she frequently brings me little shoots and starts, and, while I can't be sure, I believe she turned her back to me for just a second to restrain a snort. She gathered herself, turned back to me and said, with grace, "um, kid", (she calls me kid)... "you know you need two blueberry plants if you want berries, right?" Um, yea, no. No. Did not know that. City girl. Apparently, mommy blueberry bush has to love daddy blueberry bush and somehow the bees get invited into this arrangement, and, well, there you go, blueberries.
I don't know what I'm doing in the garden. But in the not-knowing, I'm discovering what I do know. I know that I love the feel of my hands in the dirt. When someone asks me what kind of flowers I like, I know I tend to say "purple". The thick gardening manuals that provide all kinds of instruction on zoning and fertilizer, while I'm sure they're worthwhile, they leave me overwhelmed and confused. But invite me to walk through a nursery and drink in all the grand colors and varieties and hopeful, life-giving possibilities, and I'm your girl. I like to buy bags of bulbs at farmer's markets, even big box stores. I left the Dollar Store a week ago with 4 bucks worth of gladiolas. Why not. I know I love taking my wicker basket out to gather cherry tomatoes and eat handfuls of them right off the vine. I know I love watering in the cool of the evening once the neighborhood is tucked in and only the moon is keeping an eye on me. I know I love stepping off my porch in the morning to discover that a tiny little companion has poked her head up through the soil, against all odds, to be part of my life. I've been known to say "hello baby" to these little blooms who make their home with me.
I know I'm not alone in my garden. I know my spirit is quieted by the companionship I experience. As I tend, I am reminded that I am tended to as well. As I water, my thirsty soul is refreshed by the Spirit that is food and drink to me. Even as I cut away what is dead so that life can bust through again, I am comforted with a gentle understanding. Oh, I see. You want me to live. You want me to grow. You want me to thrive. I know... I know.
I am going to my favorite local nursery spot tomorrow. I have a list. Some new companions to share my home with me. Some purples. And maybe some yellows, some pinks, some greens. And some blueberry bushes. Two of them.
I'd recently been given a rosebush-pruning lesson and witnessed in just days how life and health seemed to pulse back through the branches, and my hope was to apply my lesson and my snips to a few other scraggly bushes in my garden.
"Garden" may be the tiniest overstatement. When I bought this little place a few years ago, it came with a pristine new-sod lawn and a truckload of barkdust that stretched from the edge of the lawn to the edge of the fence with not a bit of life or color in between. I've been trying to fill in all that empty space a patch at a time ever since. We're no french country garden, but we're coming along.
I don't know what I'm doing in the garden. I guess I'm a bit of a city girl. My family lived in the "country" back when I was learning to tie my shoes, but that was a lot of shoelaces ago. Very little of the country experience made the trip from the "toolies" to the "burbs". For example ~ I like to think that eggs come from the dairy case at Trader Joe's. It's tough for me to admit to myself that they "come shootin' out a chicken's ass", (line lifted from the film, "Fried Green Tomatoes", apologies and credits to Fannie Flagg). In fact, a friend handed me a couple dozen brown eggs from her own chickens last summer and I gave them all away because I was just not ready to eat them after meeting the aforementioned asses from which they shot that very afternoon.
Back to the garden ~ so I don't know what I'm doing. I planted a blueberry bush a few years ago. After a few seasons, while I was delighted with the tiny white blossoms, I was disappointed that there'd been no berries to enjoy. I mentioned my barren blueberry bush problem to a woman I work with, she's a bit of a master gardener in her after-office hours, she frequently brings me little shoots and starts, and, while I can't be sure, I believe she turned her back to me for just a second to restrain a snort. She gathered herself, turned back to me and said, with grace, "um, kid", (she calls me kid)... "you know you need two blueberry plants if you want berries, right?" Um, yea, no. No. Did not know that. City girl. Apparently, mommy blueberry bush has to love daddy blueberry bush and somehow the bees get invited into this arrangement, and, well, there you go, blueberries.
I don't know what I'm doing in the garden. But in the not-knowing, I'm discovering what I do know. I know that I love the feel of my hands in the dirt. When someone asks me what kind of flowers I like, I know I tend to say "purple". The thick gardening manuals that provide all kinds of instruction on zoning and fertilizer, while I'm sure they're worthwhile, they leave me overwhelmed and confused. But invite me to walk through a nursery and drink in all the grand colors and varieties and hopeful, life-giving possibilities, and I'm your girl. I like to buy bags of bulbs at farmer's markets, even big box stores. I left the Dollar Store a week ago with 4 bucks worth of gladiolas. Why not. I know I love taking my wicker basket out to gather cherry tomatoes and eat handfuls of them right off the vine. I know I love watering in the cool of the evening once the neighborhood is tucked in and only the moon is keeping an eye on me. I know I love stepping off my porch in the morning to discover that a tiny little companion has poked her head up through the soil, against all odds, to be part of my life. I've been known to say "hello baby" to these little blooms who make their home with me.
I know I'm not alone in my garden. I know my spirit is quieted by the companionship I experience. As I tend, I am reminded that I am tended to as well. As I water, my thirsty soul is refreshed by the Spirit that is food and drink to me. Even as I cut away what is dead so that life can bust through again, I am comforted with a gentle understanding. Oh, I see. You want me to live. You want me to grow. You want me to thrive. I know... I know.
I am going to my favorite local nursery spot tomorrow. I have a list. Some new companions to share my home with me. Some purples. And maybe some yellows, some pinks, some greens. And some blueberry bushes. Two of them.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Nana ~
My nana died last Friday evening. She was 94 years old. Her name was Helen May.
I was given her middle name ("Kathryn May" means I'm in trouble), I wear a sterling silver bracelet that is engraved with her monogram as a single woman in the 1930s, and I possess the memories of a sweet connection with her the past few years of her life.
Many of the grandparents and great-grands in my family tree have lived well into their 90s. There's a running gag among us now ~ we're not photogenic, we have lousy metabolism, but, geez, we live forever. Well, not forever, I guess.
As grandparents go, at least the ones I was most accustomed to in my childhood, nana was, well, a tiny bit scandalous. She had a liquor cabinet in her house that I was fascinated by as a child. We'd visit her on Saturday afternoons and she would offer us "hi-balls". She'd pour cold Pepsi into gin glasses and I'd sip my drink as she sipped hers, and I'd feel fancy and naughty at the same time. She had a limited supply of tolerance, oh, on just about any topic. A roll of her eyes, a "sheesh", a smirk, that was her expressed opinion on countless matters. Any funky smell was "bad enough to knock a buzzard off a gut-wagon", and any child age 12 or below who was in her eyesight was "a farmer". She was, how can I put this, bossy. Its quite possible that the first "dammit" I ever heard came out of her mouth.
For most of my childhood, she lived a thousand miles away for most of the year. When the Southern California sun could not be tamed by the pool or the shade of the orange grove, she'd pack up her Cadillac and head north. This went on for years. I'd not see her for months, and then, when she'd lay eyes on me on that first visit of the summer, her first words to me would invariably be, "you need to lose weight", followed immediately by "can I make you a sandwich?"
She was tan and fit, she golfed and traveled. She met "the girls" for bridge at the club. She square danced. She bought handbags bejeweled with designs of peacocks, of flowers. She was a classically trained pianist. She buried two husbands and suffered the betrayal of a son. She kept coffee cans full of the nickels she won playing bingo, she got reprimanded once for pushing and shoving to get on the senior-center activity bus, and she kept a tissue in the pocket of every sweater she owned.
She began to fail several months ago. There was a fall, there was the confusion, and then there was the diagnosis that gave us a hint as to how her life might end.
The past few years, the past few months, have been especially poignant. Watching my mom care for this woman has been a revelation to me, truly, she has revealed to me how it is that one cares for an aging, dying parent. My nana has not been easy to love, as nanas go. She's held firmly to a reluctance toward sentiment, toward expressions of tenderness, a reservation, perhaps an inability to demonstrate, to speak what simply needs to be spoken. And yet, my mom has loved her, has tended to her with compassion and faithfulness and grace.
A few months ago, with nana deep into dementia, mom sat beside her bed, held her hand, and spoke gently to her. "Mom, do you know who I am?", she asked. Nana, who for months had confused my mom with a half-dozen dead relatives, looked her right in the eye, and said "yes, you're my little baby girl." I got to witness that moment, and I will never forget it. I believe it was a cup of cold water offered to my mom's thirsty heart. Offered, not really by nana, but by God, who has watched my mom's faithfulness all her life and knew that refreshment was needed.
There were late-night calls the last week of her life, calls to tell us that it was time to say goodbye. We kissed her, we stroked her hair, we pressed our lips to her ear and told her that she was loved, by us, by God, that she was safe, that she didn't have to worry, that we'd be alright, that she could go. She spoke gibberish for most of the visit, and we cried as we listened to her painful efforts to breathe. My mom held her hand and told her stories from her own childhood, reminded her of scenes that are as vivid to her today as they were sixty-plus years ago. Nana opened her eyes at one point and said clearly, "please hold me, please hold me."
A few moments later, she was fighting with the nurses who were taking care of her in the bathroom, insisting that no one needs more than 3 squares of toilet paper. I heard that "dammit" again. Vintage nana.
Geez, my family, we live forever. Well, not forever, not now, not here. Someday, somewhere else.
Prayers were answered Friday night. Mom's prayer for nana to finally, peacefully, let go. Nana's prayer to be held. After 94 years of reluctance and reservation, I can only believe that, at last, she is letting herself love.
But don't get me wrong, nana's nana. She's bossing somebody around.
I was given her middle name ("Kathryn May" means I'm in trouble), I wear a sterling silver bracelet that is engraved with her monogram as a single woman in the 1930s, and I possess the memories of a sweet connection with her the past few years of her life.
Many of the grandparents and great-grands in my family tree have lived well into their 90s. There's a running gag among us now ~ we're not photogenic, we have lousy metabolism, but, geez, we live forever. Well, not forever, I guess.
As grandparents go, at least the ones I was most accustomed to in my childhood, nana was, well, a tiny bit scandalous. She had a liquor cabinet in her house that I was fascinated by as a child. We'd visit her on Saturday afternoons and she would offer us "hi-balls". She'd pour cold Pepsi into gin glasses and I'd sip my drink as she sipped hers, and I'd feel fancy and naughty at the same time. She had a limited supply of tolerance, oh, on just about any topic. A roll of her eyes, a "sheesh", a smirk, that was her expressed opinion on countless matters. Any funky smell was "bad enough to knock a buzzard off a gut-wagon", and any child age 12 or below who was in her eyesight was "a farmer". She was, how can I put this, bossy. Its quite possible that the first "dammit" I ever heard came out of her mouth.
For most of my childhood, she lived a thousand miles away for most of the year. When the Southern California sun could not be tamed by the pool or the shade of the orange grove, she'd pack up her Cadillac and head north. This went on for years. I'd not see her for months, and then, when she'd lay eyes on me on that first visit of the summer, her first words to me would invariably be, "you need to lose weight", followed immediately by "can I make you a sandwich?"
She was tan and fit, she golfed and traveled. She met "the girls" for bridge at the club. She square danced. She bought handbags bejeweled with designs of peacocks, of flowers. She was a classically trained pianist. She buried two husbands and suffered the betrayal of a son. She kept coffee cans full of the nickels she won playing bingo, she got reprimanded once for pushing and shoving to get on the senior-center activity bus, and she kept a tissue in the pocket of every sweater she owned.
She began to fail several months ago. There was a fall, there was the confusion, and then there was the diagnosis that gave us a hint as to how her life might end.
The past few years, the past few months, have been especially poignant. Watching my mom care for this woman has been a revelation to me, truly, she has revealed to me how it is that one cares for an aging, dying parent. My nana has not been easy to love, as nanas go. She's held firmly to a reluctance toward sentiment, toward expressions of tenderness, a reservation, perhaps an inability to demonstrate, to speak what simply needs to be spoken. And yet, my mom has loved her, has tended to her with compassion and faithfulness and grace.
A few months ago, with nana deep into dementia, mom sat beside her bed, held her hand, and spoke gently to her. "Mom, do you know who I am?", she asked. Nana, who for months had confused my mom with a half-dozen dead relatives, looked her right in the eye, and said "yes, you're my little baby girl." I got to witness that moment, and I will never forget it. I believe it was a cup of cold water offered to my mom's thirsty heart. Offered, not really by nana, but by God, who has watched my mom's faithfulness all her life and knew that refreshment was needed.
There were late-night calls the last week of her life, calls to tell us that it was time to say goodbye. We kissed her, we stroked her hair, we pressed our lips to her ear and told her that she was loved, by us, by God, that she was safe, that she didn't have to worry, that we'd be alright, that she could go. She spoke gibberish for most of the visit, and we cried as we listened to her painful efforts to breathe. My mom held her hand and told her stories from her own childhood, reminded her of scenes that are as vivid to her today as they were sixty-plus years ago. Nana opened her eyes at one point and said clearly, "please hold me, please hold me."
A few moments later, she was fighting with the nurses who were taking care of her in the bathroom, insisting that no one needs more than 3 squares of toilet paper. I heard that "dammit" again. Vintage nana.
Geez, my family, we live forever. Well, not forever, not now, not here. Someday, somewhere else.
Prayers were answered Friday night. Mom's prayer for nana to finally, peacefully, let go. Nana's prayer to be held. After 94 years of reluctance and reservation, I can only believe that, at last, she is letting herself love.
But don't get me wrong, nana's nana. She's bossing somebody around.
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