Laura Young Photography

Day 17 A Wholesale Cut

Hmm...despite Adam Gottleib's Ode to his bicycle singing in my head, I may not get on the trail today as Penny isn't at all anxious to go indoors. I'm a little out of writing steam so I'm poking around in my ninety (really) vignettes that await editorial decisions adn wathing duckings that are still too quick and tiny to count swim in the marsh leaving trails behind them in the thick yellow pollen coat on the water's surface.

This is a 'Dear Diary' entry that I can find nothing redeeming in but if you are curious to see some really bad writing, here you go. This was written around the time I was dismantling my coaching office, closing out my business bank account, shutting off the phones, feeling like I was erasing myself off the face of the earth in some respects and also feeling a little abandoned in other respects. The Patrick I refer to here will be known to some of you who have known me for years. If you don't know that story and are curious, ask me sometime when you see me and I'll share it. Not really something I want to go into great depth on here at this point.

Dear Diary,

It seems as though life is happening faster than I can process it.

Of course, everything about that sentence is a complete lie.

Everything is always perception, so “it seems” is probably one of those phrases that should just be added to every sentence, just like “in bed” gets added to Chinese fortune cookie pronouncements. “It seems” like this happened. “It seems” like he said this to me. “It seems” like she was thinking that way about her circumstance. “It seemed” like it was the best of times. “It seems” like it was the worst.

Of course, it all seems a certain way until something happens to set the kaleidoscope spinning and before you know it you have a whole new take on things that seems even truer that the view you had before. What do we ever really know?

“Life is happening.” Well, that is true but the way I jus said it implies that I have been in some kind of passive role, maybe not a victim of life exactly, but feeling a bit helpless, awash in its tide. But what I am referring to in actuality is nothing but the result of my own actions, the dismantling of my life. You see, I said “life” when I really meant to say “my” life, making that statement even more of a lie than I originally realized.

And all this makes it clear I must restate my position.

If feels like I am ripping the band-aid off my life too fast.

And that is interesting, too, because whether you do it fast or slow, band-aids come off as they do, painfully. But they don’t damage you.

I still find a bit of humor in the way my surgeon said, “The good news is I only have to do this once.” And before I could say, “Do what?” she had ripped the bandage from my belly with such speed it almost sent me through the roof. I was just about to yell when the words “The good news is…” reached my brain. I would have laughed even then if I wasn’t smarting so much.

So maybe it’s the same here. I only have to dismantle this chapter of my life once. And it really hasn’t been fast. I’ve taken a good year to do it. Almost exactly. Dad went into the hospital twelve months ago. My life started to shift then and it was clear almost that soon that my life would not be going back to some prior status quo.

So what AM I trying to say, Diary? Maybe it’s just that I’m letting so much go that “seemed” to be ties to something and now I’m simply letting the cords go, lots of them, and its got me feeling unsettled.

Yesterday, in preparation for having my phones shut off I cleaned out my voicemail messages. There were three there from Patrick from that first AIDS ride in California--500 hundred hilly miles—the June after Sue’s murder. I kept them for three years. It’s been the last two of those since I’ve had any contact with him. I’ve written. I’ve called. I’ve sent cards. Gifts. No response.

He told me the first time we met, our “blind date” for the fundraising walk to benefit the women’s shelter, that it was as though Sue had given him the gift of a new sister. He put an entire chapter and then some about our relationship in the lovely book he composed for her. Sitting with him on that pier that first night while he wept beside me is one of the tender cherished memories of my life.

But somehow, despite the hugs and the “I love you’s” and the Shagadelic Mojo he just…went away.

I was going to record the messages before deleting them but I just didn’t. As I write this now, I think maybe I should have for his mother, or Maggie. In fact, I erased one from his mother, Mary, as well. I even erased one of Hannah’s on our home answering machine but stopped at that. I think I still have four or five and I do think I’ll record some of that in a more permanent place. I don’t know what it is about the sound of a voice that makes me want to preserve it.

Patrick’s messages were so lovely—full of emotion and love and weeping and exhilaration. How could that just be gone? What did I do to make him shut the door against me? Or is it nothing I did but just the fact that I exist…existed…at such a horrible time and he’s moving on from that now, both the dead and the living? And there we have it again. “It seemed” as though we had a bond and it was an important one to me. Patrick touched my heart and I love the man, even now I still do, but his season of me has now passed.

I let the messages go.

It just seems like there should have been a ceremony or something.

 

Day 17 Strange Juxtapositions

It is a stunningly beautiful day and I actually was able to coax Penny out of the house to sleep on the patio while I write. She gets intimidated by the commotion of sounds from lawn mowers and various activities within earshot of our house during the day so she has a hard time settling down out here. Mondays are good, though, once everyone is back at work and it's just us and the birds and breeze.

Birds and breeze and ducklings and deliciously perfumed air as the lilacs and honeysuckle envelop this place with their scent...it's an odd space from which to write about death.

As I am gearing up for the next several days of writing after the weekend (and last night's outstanding Waterline Writers event), I found I didn't have a clear starting point for today's writing so I thought I'd flip through the sizeable stack of vignettes I have written to see what might need an editorial eye to the degree that matches my energy.  I chose three to work on, all of the "Dear Diary" variety (my internal processing of the external events), one from the spring before my Dad died, one shortly after Michael died and on from the spring the spring of the following year.

It's a challenge to go back and re-embody those feelings, especially when today is so peaceful and beautiful and I have a dog conked out on a big pile of blankets next to me. But then again, maybe it will make for better writing because I'm having to work to make the scene on the page become as vivid as the scene in which I now sit. When you are in the midst of grief, so much seems self evident that never makes it on to the page. But in the light of a day three years later, you see how much more there was to say, maybe not in quantity of words, but in depth.

Maybe that is why some books take so long to write. The vantage point I am currently writing from is making me more aware, rather than less, of what the impact was of the events that transpired. At first I was worried that if I didn't get everything down right away I would lose vital pieces of information, or lose some memories all together. That may be partially true as this or that detail becomes uncoupled from chronology and some of the jigsaw pieces have rearranged themselves, but in other respects the parts that have remained vivid feel more integrated and whole.

It's like when you deal with the belongings in someone's estate...you don't want to throw out so much as a paperclip early on because it is ALL significant. What if this was their lucky paperclip? Or their favorite? Do you have paperclips at home or will you foolishly realize you need to buy one just after you toss this one out? How many paperclips are needed to make them a sensible collection to pass on to someone else who might use them?  How many unnecessary paperclips are cluttering up our landfills? What defines usefulness?

It's like that with memories and details, too. What is essential, not just to a book, but to oneself in preserving the story of your life and the lives of those you love? You can't keep it all. If you try, where will you fit your own life? What about your own collection of lucky paperclips? You can't make yourself into a living grotto dedicated to the preservation of someone else's life as much as you might be tempted to try (or feel you should out of respect).

So the question becomes, what is powerful enough and important enough that you still want to tell it, if only to yourself, on a gorgeous spring day?

No small question.

Exquisite Article on Aging and Sexuality

Kate sent me a link that led me other places and this is a gorgeously written essay that I highly recommend to you.

Not One Word Out of You, Di Mackey...

So there I am, playing Sisyphus, thinking if I just keep at it long enough I'll get the wild onion population in my woods down to something less that "lawn"proportions, at least around the shade garden areas. So, I was bending over a patch of hosta and astilbe and such when I spied a very long tail...a garter snake easily closing in on two feet long.

I'm cool with snakes and was just glad I hadn't stepped on it. By the way, just how long was this one?

I peeked under some lady's mantle to see where the head was...the head was huge!

Oh.

Not a head.

Well, sort of a head.

A head swallowing a large toad.

And it was then that I discovered there actually are some things even I won't take a picture of.

That doesn't mean that Scott and I didn't check it out and call our neighbor away from his weeding to look at it, too. I mean, I've never seen a snake in action swallowing something many times the size of it's head, let alone the size of its mouth.

I'll spare all details but honestly, you really never know what you are going to find in my yard. Life on a wetland is not for the squeemish.

Godspeed, Mr. Toad.

Whoa, Even the Tooth Chip is Genetic?!

Digging into some old photos of Dad's as I steep myself in writing the memoir about our time together and I just saw this. What the heck?! My Dad and I have the exact same crooked front tooth, same orientation, and same little chip (although mine is hard to see as I think it has smoothed out over the years. His must have, too, since I don't remember him having it). Now that's just crazy.

Dad at Three

Here with my aunt, his only sibling.

A Few Photos of Dad's Yard

Before he became ill and was able to keep up with his place more, Dad's yard was pretty incredible. Not your average Gary, Indiana, backyard, to be sure. Here are a few of his shots:

And this is the waterfall he fell off of, for those of you who heard the story (I'll have it in the book if you haven't):

And this is to help Di Mackey with her Toad Therapy:

Penny and Angel

Oh, wow. Yes, you can still be discovering new things even three years after your father has passed away. I was just going through some photo discs and found these gems from Penny's youth, here with her fellow canine, Angel. We had to put Angel down just one week before Dad died. She had terrible hip dyplasia and was just falling all the time. It was heartbreaking. These guys would play so fiercely, it was hysterical. Just fascinating to watch them go at it, but never having one mishap result in any injury. Check out those teeth on Penny, man. You can see how such a little squirt could take out a few raccoons in her day. She was fearless.

Day 16 Carmel Corn, a Tortoise, an Orange Alfa Romeo and Ram Dass

I got a late start writing today between finishing a scarf for one Miss Annie Baldwin (which you can't see until after I give it to her Sunday at Waterline Writers since she wants to be surprised). And then Penny was sleeping in so I couldn't sit outside until after I got her up and walked and fed. Next thing you know it's close to 10 when I finally got in to my work. So, with a day of mixed obligations before me, I had to content myself with edits on a piece in which I get a craving for carmel corn and which leads me to meeting a paralyzed African Land Tortoise and ends up with me contemplating a whole tapestry of devotional acts.

No snips to share but I do have a marsh update...

The lame mallard female is still visiting my yard daily, although I don't see any change in her leg. She travels with a male who never leaves her side (speaking of devotional acts). She's a strong flyer even though her landings are a little rough due to her landing gear being stuck on one side. She's less skittish around me and Penny (animals seem to figure out she isn't much of a threat and I try to keep my back to them so they don't feel too scrutinized). The birds have been a little less frequent at the feeders the last couple days (maybe nest tending has taken precedence?) so the scattered seed underneath is a little less. I may have to go toss some on the ground for the mallard to make those crash landings a little more worthwhile. 

Cutest little hummingbird has been buzzing over my head this morning.

Now to hit the trails so I can get back here and deal with this house. Hard to write and clean at the same time. Always tradeoffs...

Back after the weekend. Hope to see you all at Water Street (if you are in the area), on Sunday!

~~~~~~~

Time warp

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Oh my gosh, alert reader, Kevin, was right to wonder what the heck an orange Alfa Romeo and Ram Dass have to do with any of this...

Well, in my defense, it was all implied, but for those of you who need things spelled out in excruciating detail, the tortoise lives next to the lady who was weeding her garden and was showing me some lovely plants given to her by a woman who learned to mush sled dogs in Iditarod at the age of 93. And that led me to talk about plants I was thinking I might transplant from my Dad's place since he had just died and then she showed me the Alfa Romeo her husband drove his Dad around in before he died (a 6'5" man, I should add). And that led to talks about caregiving and how the tortoise is likely going to outlive its owners so there were arrangements to be made for her in that event (a sanctuary in Florida).

And so, Ram Dass has a quote I love that we are all just walking each other home. And there was an awful lot of walking home happening that little afternoon when all I really left my house for was carmel corn.

: )

Day 15 Clint Eastwood, Patrick Sharp and Samuel Beckett

Well, it is a gorgeous day and it looks like I'm going to write more than I normally would because Penny is napping on the patio and I can't bear to wake her to make her go inside while I ride my bike. Hence, I do have a small snip from the cutting room floor for Hockey Puck fans at the end of this update. 

I'm in a Dad mode this week so today I was doing some edits on a story involving the unfortunate consequences of milk of magnesia and the effectiveness of lobster for lunch as a way of saying, "Yeah, maybe I shouldn't have taken a double dose. Sorry about the whole carpet thing."

And that sleeping pup situation led me next to work on a piece I did about what I came to understand about the midlife crisis and how suddenly Samuel Beckett made sense to me. Patrick Sharp wound up in the middle of that one but I had to cut him (though I do thank him for making the Hawks game so very much fun to watch last night. Don't you love that we get to play Detroit for one more flurry of games before we get split into different divisions next year? It's just not going to be the same next season.)

Here's your clip:

Michael called to let me know that Patrick Sharp might be on the trading block, not even one week past winning the Stanley Cup. “You remember Patrick Sharp. He’s pretty handsome. Just think of how handsome I am. He’s kind of along those lines.”

Of course, I know Patrick well. Michael and Scotty both chose him as my first hockey crush and only modesty prevents me from telling you, Diary, that Patrick began devoting all his goals to me shortly thereafter. A girl cannot share all her secrets.