Transitions

Transitions

This is me in 1995 when I first went to work at the Indiana Daily Student and newly back from my three month adventure in Scotland. I was 50 years old. It has been quite a journey, with a lot of positive forward movement and a lot of bumps and losses along the way.

I got that job at the IDS when I needed employment desperately. I found a home there with my co-workers who became dear friends, and the hundreds of students I worked with during that time. We survived the sudden death of our boss and kept cranking those papers out. I think he would have been proud. During those 17 years there was a second marriage, a second divorce, 911, breast cancer, my son achieved his dream of becoming a fireman, joined a writing community that brought amazing people into my life, the gift of going into the Monroe County Jail and holding a writing circle for the female inmates, the coming together of five friends who meet monthly to figure out how to be our best selves, a poetry discussion group established and thriving, a yearly retreat to Brown County where four of my dearest friends and I gather to tell our stories, the reacquaitance with some family members who have become very dear to me,  a reconnection with friends from school days, the loss of my brother, dad, mother and sister-in-law in a span of less than a year, and preparation for retirement.

It took a village for me to get here.  And what a village it was!  I’ve had the support of my son, who is always steady and calm, my childhood friend Sharon who has seen me through all of my journeys, a reconnection of another childhood friend, Terri, who welcomed me into to her home through my father’s long illness and passing, my long-time friends Barbara and Merry who have always been there for me with unconditional love, Vivian and Barbara who opened their homes to me for five months so that I could save money and retire debt free, my cousin Diana and her husband Jay who asked me to move in with them, making retirement affordable for me, my cousins Deb, Rich, Shane, Shell, Carson, Brian and Kevin who gave me a family again, Beth  Lodge-Rigal and Women Writing for (a) Change who kept me writing and gave me the wonderful gift of the presumption of goodwill and all the gifts that writing community has brought to my life, my friend Jackie who helped me found Poetry Detectives and has a wicked sense of humor, every amazing woman I’ve met through WWf(a)C , I treasure each and every one of you.  I hope I haven’t left any one out.  You are all precious to me and have helped me get to this wonderful time of my life. Retirement. I started working when I was 13 years old. I’m over it. I’m ready for the next adventure. These last 11 months have been all about me, something I’m not used to. Now it’s time to turn things outward again. It’s time for me to repay and pay it forward. And not stop with 26 acts of kindness. Time for lucky me to give back to the universe.

Rebekah for the Poplar Grove Muse

Be the Light

Be kind, for everyone you meet is carrying a great burden.

–Attributed to Philo

I came upon this attributed quote in Kayak Morning, Roger Rosenblatt’s second memoir of grief upon the sudden death of his beloved only daughter. (His first memoir, Making Toast, explores his grief and the mixed joys of stepping in with his wife to help raise their three motherless grandchildren.)

Philo reminds us how fragile we all are, all the time.

We are entering the darkest days of our calendar, as well as the season of several festivals of light and hope. The interplay of light and darkness at this time of year is always compelling, serving as a potent metaphor for the mix of joy and sadness, gifts and burdens, that life inevitably brings.

I have never felt the shared burdens of so many people in my life as acutely as I do this year. Dear friends facing disease, their own or that of close family members, pacing themselves with great courage and equal difficulty through treatments that bring their own terrible afflictions and uncertain outcomes. Acquaintances fighting visa issues that have shadowed their lives for years, and now finally bring them to face the starkest possibilities. The waters seem to be rising for friends who daily tread against the deep currents of depression and loneliness. Almost everyone my age is making some arduous trip to spend the holidays with failing parents, hoping to do what they can to ease day-to-day living while hedging against the ravages to come. And, as if these trials weren’t enough, our nation reels and mourns at yet another mass shooting in a school, this time of the very youngest schoolchildren and their teachers, who displayed unimaginable courage and resilience in the face of unimaginable horror.

Reading this quotation, and observing the folks around me,  I am struck anew by how difficult, even impossible, the daily carrying of these burdens, much less into a season of celebration, can be.  While this interplay of light and dark has usually, for me, encouraged the perspective of light penetrating gloom (think The Little Match Girl and her impossibly upbeat appreciation for the light shining from warm family homes and from her few brief matches), for those living in deep shadow, the light may not penetrate at all, or may seem to shine an ironic, elusive spotlight on darkness.

And so back to the wise and simple words of Philo: Be kind.

Bring light.

When you think you cannot bear any more of your own darkness, try to lighten the burden of someone around you.

My current practice is to attempt to be present to the beloved friends and family members who need it, whether they know it or not, whether they are able to ask for it or not. To break out of my daily routine and invite a friend who needs a break to a matinee, and afterward, to stand in the parking lot as long as possible, laughing and crying by turns. To celebrate my friends in small ways; call someone I have fallen out of touch with; make eye contact with passersby in a way I usually don’t while walking; tell someone who doesn’t know I am aware of their existence that I appreciate the way they do their job all year.

Be kind. Bring light. Presume good will.

Mary for the Poplar Grove Muse

I am G

I am G

I sit in my garden, touched by the soft morning light.  My arms rest comfortably on my knees and my curved back is tucked into a prickly bush.  The thorny barbs do not worry my tough stony hide and I am content to survey my kingdom from this vantage point. My gray-pebbled skin has a blue-green cast that ripples and bulges into deep muscles and graceful lines. I am the gargoyle G, I am small for my kind but not the smallest of my brethren.  I am the guardian here and watch over my garden and all who live here. Some say I have a melancholy expression. I think it is my downcast eyes, but I am not melancholy, just watchful.  My ears, always alert, are tuned to the cadence around me and they never mistake the garbled language of the earth dwellers with the thrumming voices of the nectar seekers.

 

My garden sets like the centerpiece of a crown, fitting snugly into the setting of swaying bowers that tower above me. Penetrating shards of light dart through the emerald canopy, showcasing the jewels below. Purples and pinks careen with reds and yellows. Some hug tightly to the earth, needing to be securely nestled to its bosom. While others throw caution to the wind, sending capricious buds soaring into the sky. The stone paths attempt to contain the rioting shoots, but fail. The leafy stalks spill over, eager to offer their jewel-flavored blossoms.  I can hear their whispered siren songs calling to the winged ones. The preening blooms compete in a beauty pageant. They are eager to begin their reign as the most beguiling, most enticing, most sought after.

Like living petals the butterflies dance across the garden. Vivid counterpoints, they offer iridescent oranges and blues to the palette. Moving freely among the waiting blossoms they make their selections. Sampling those with the sweetest song before flitting to the next.  Engrossed in their mission the bees search each blossom efficiently; the striped, lumbering bumblebee’s rumble mixing with the honeybee’s soprano tones.

 

I feel the fast beating hearts of the feathered winged ones. They are brilliant rockets that zoom through the garden. Always rushing, always on urgent business. When they finally find their perch, they stridently share their story, determined someone must listen to their tale. Theirs is a complicated language full of drama and pathos.

Marching in regimented lines the tiny ones hurry across the stones. Laden with their bounty they slip into the crevices, finding the entrance to the sprawling city bustling below my splayed feet. In silent communication, they sing of the trail to treasures.  Their song vibrates in the ground and is heard as one voice.   

The darkness stills my garden but it does not sleep. The night dwellers feel safe shrouded in shadows. They come… and I watch.

                                           I am G, I am the Guardian.

Diana and G, for the Poplar Grove Muse

I dress every morning in my dead dad's sweater.

After dad died, mom asked every offspring, and there are seven of us, to take anything of our father's. Her heart was in pieces and this made the parting with his things a tiny bit easier.

 I shook my head at the shelf of birthday and holiday gifts given by me that were never worn. All those Dad gifts left neatly folded and unused. He was always the hardest to buy for since he never expressed a need for much in this mortal life. Any material needs appeared as weaknesses in his manly world. There were scarves, gloves, sweater vests, slippers, socks, blah, blah, blah most with tags still in place. 

     I took a grey cotton, zippered, cabled cardigan. I had often seen him wear this comfy looking sweater. His casual home uniform sans tie was a plaid shirt, yellow sweater vest and this grey sweater that made his quickly disappearing, silver hair shine.  I wear this totem every morning and every night especially those evenings you get into pajamas extra early to just declare: "day is over, i"m doin' nothin' the rest of this day". It fits me perfectly.

     My dad was an ex-marine bird colonel, always physically fit, walking every day after the earliest mass, especially after his coronary incident. He was an exceedingly disciplined man. He drank no stimulants: coffee, tea, alcohol, or sugary soft drinks. He never ate between meals. He loved hot chocolate and ice cream, which became sherbet post-coronary bypass.  He wore a medium but really a 'small' fit his frame better, especially as the average guy got larger with our fast food culture. He sired several children over six feet including one daughter. None of us wore anything small. But the move from men sizes to my womanly frame made this sweater fit just right.

     I hope some of his discipline will ooze into me via cardigan osmosis. But other than immediately going thru an old yoga routine every morning, I have little of his 24/7 vigilance and overdrive ambition. He retired from two jobs, had three very different careers (family mortician, career military, finally business professor). Dad fought in two wars, published one book and had 7 children and one wife. He never watched TV, but for Notre Dame football. Instead, he worked hard on articles for his various military alumni units. He had received his PhD at night while teaching at various war colleges throughout the east coast and was often stationed at the Pentagon. Dad was always studying something.  If we could only live our lives his way, we would have been better people. We were all college educated at much personal sacrifice. Education was THE one true thing; " communists can't take that away from you. If it 's in your head, it will stay," he would chant.

    

     Much useful and useless knowledge is dementedly stuck in my head, but maybe with his silver sweater wrapped around me, Dad's remembered steadfastness will help me greet the day with a starving dog's appetite for meat and end it with a satisfied mothers' sigh for her perfectly peaceful sleeping child. It is said that ‘clothes make the man,’ perhaps his sweater will help his still dutiful daughter.

Carole for PGM