Pretty Good Day

Today was a pretty good day. 

I can make that statement with certainty, because I’ve had some really terrible days in the past few months.  Days when I literally had to make life and death decisions for people I loved.  Days when I had to sort through the belongings of those same people and decide what they should be buried in.  Days when I sat staring at lists of bills and endlessly adding up numbers in my head, trying to make the bottom lines come out somewhere within arms reach.

But today wasn’t that kind of day at all.  Oh, there were frustrations.  At work, one of our client’s appointments got moved up from next week to tomorrow, which necessitated that I drop everything I had planned to do for the day and get all their paperwork and medical records in order.  At home, the pork tenderloin I planned to cook for dinner smelled a trifle off, and so I had to come up with something else.

Everyday dilemmas, quite delightful in their normalcy.

It’s all about perspective, isn’t it?  The things that once seemed insurmountable often pale in comparison to the real trials and traumas of life.  I suppose that’s one of the gifts of growing older, having enough experience of life’s vicissitudes to really understand what’s traumatic and what’s nothing more than an annoyance. 

I can be grateful for the small trials and tribulations like todays, because I’ve had days of such overwhelming sadness. I can wrap myself around the small moments of happiness – like watching the sun glinting on a pile of golden leaves, or seeing Magic curl up next to Molly and prop his head on her back.  I can laugh out loud at my friend’s jokes, and revel in the sound of Bon Jovi turned up full blast on my car stereo.   I can (almost) stop being afraid of what the day will bring.

Today was a pretty good day.

I hope it was for you too.

 

The End of the Tunnel

It may be the sunshine and unseasonably warm temperatures…

It may be that I’ve had three days off in a row…

Or it may be that I’m beginning to see some light at the end of this dark tunnel I’ve been traveling through…

Whatever the reason, I awoke this morning feeling  ~dare I say? ~ hopeful ~ for the first time in a long while.  As if the tipped axis my world has spun upon for the past four months might be starting to right itself.  As if I might begin to breath easy once more, to stop looking for danger and disappointment around every corner, to actually smile and really mean it.

The heavy anvil of heartache may be lifting, my friends, and I’m delirious with excitement.

Looking back on the things I’ve been writing here, I see how deeply enmeshed in sorrow I’ve been.   I want that to change in the days ahead, want to find the source of my writer’s eye once again, and particularly want that source to focus on the positive aspects of life in general.  I want to believe that life can be bright and beautiful, that some of my dearest dreams will come true, and that I will be happy again.

 For the past three years, this space has been where I’ve come to express my feelings about life in general and my own in particular.  I think each one of us has a unique personal story that bears telling to the world, a story that reflects a deeper meaning on this roller coaster ride we call life.   We travel the road together, my friends, and sharing our experience is a way of learning from it and making it meaningful.  Sometimes the days are dark, and we need to huddle together to find a glimmer of hopeful light.  And when the darkness lifts, we can’t wait to share the joy and spread the beacon of hope.

In the weeks ahead, look  for some changes here at the Byline.  Perhaps a makeover, a shiny new space to match this shiny new beginning that’s rising in my spirit.  

I want this journey into the future to be a happy one.

And I hope you’ll all come join me.

 

Women at Work

Last spring, I was sitting a lunch with my co-workers, several of whom are young mothers, and they were discussing the woes associated with finding (and keeping) good daycare/preschool situations.  “This is the third preschool we’ve gone to this year,”  Anna moaned.  “Josh had just gotten to know the teacher and made a few friends, and now they’re closing!”  Not surprising, of course, but the stagnant economy here in Michigan affects daycare and preschools too, and they find themselves unable to stay in business.

As this discussion swirled around me, I reminded myself to give my husband a hug, kiss, and a big thank you when I got home.  For what? you’re asking.  Well (and I apologize if this offends anyone’s feminist sympathies), for working so successfully and so hard all those years ago when I was a young mother, so that I could stay home with our son and not have to worry about daycare and preschool.  I didn’t fully appreciate it at the time, of course, and especially not when he was away from home long hours, or traveling for weeks on end.  Looking back, however, life was quite a lark for me in those days.  I was able to set my own schedule, play with my child as much as I liked, dabble in music and writing as much or as little as I wished.  I had family and friends nearby for support.  Life was good.

I didn’t remember to thank Jim that night, and although it occurred to me to do so quite a few times over the ensuing few weeks, the timing wasn’t right for some reason, or our conversation got sidetracked before I found the words to mention it. 

And then came July 1, and my husband lost his job.

About a month later, I’m offered the opportunity to increase my own part time work into a full time position, with a nice raise in pay. 

So now I’m the one away from home, working long hours.  I’m the one who feels pressured to meet deadlines, to skirt around the boss’  moods and temperaments, to work according to someone else’s schedule. 

I’m the one…and I’m not liking it so much.  Here’s what’s bothering me - I really, really miss the freedom and flexibility to live life on my own terms.  Dwelling deep within my outwardly placid and agreeable nature, there is a small rebellious streak that despises being accountable to another person for my time.  It’s this demon that ties my stomach into knots when my boss gripes that I haven’t properly cleared my schedule with her.  It’s this demon that brings a string of  stifled curses to my lips when a huge assignment is passed onto me because someone else dropped the ball.   It’s this demon that brings tears to my eyes on occasion as I’m driving into the office and thinking about how much I’d rather be home drinking coffee in my favorite chair, or walking in the park with my dogs.

But now I’m the one who goes bustling out the door every morning while my husband stays home drinking coffee and reading e-mail.  It’s actually a common phenomenon, I understand, especially here in Big 3 territory, where so many wives of unemployed automotive company workers are now the breadwinners of the family.  It seems that women’s jobs, so often centered in service type industry and professions, have been spared more often than those of their husbands.  The husbands – mine included – are now picking up the slack at home, learning to handle all manner of domestic duties.

I’ve always considered myself a “working woman.”  Even in the days when I wasn’t bringing home a regular paycheck, I was involved in numerous activities inside and outside of my home.  When I first began working for pay about 15 years ago, I was able to retain a good balance between the work I was doing and the demands of my family and personal life.  Now, for the first time, the balance is skewed in favor of work, and this is where the difficulty lies.  But this is the lifestyle my husband lived for the better part of our marriage.  He spent years of his life eking out small bits of personal time from his hectic and demanding schedule.  I don’t for one minute begrudge him some time now to rest and regroup, for even though it was forced upon him against his will, it is well deserved after 30 years of relentlessly hard work.

The other day I stumbled in the door, exhausted and grumpy, and tossed a satchel of reports I’d carted home onto the couch.  “I’ve never thanked you properly before,” I said to him, “but I’m doing so now. I don’t know how you did it all those years.”

“Did what?” he asked, genuinely confused.

“Worked every darn day!” I said.  “I could never have done that.  And I really appreciate it.”

He shrugged.  “You don’t think it about it really,” he answered.  “You just do it.”

Ah, so that’s the secret. 

You just do it.

 

Stacked Up

When I was a little girl, one of my favorite games was playing office.  Our first home had a half-second story, one big room tucked under the attic, with a sloping ceiling and one small window that overlooked the sidewalk.  There was a wooden desk tucked into that alcove, with an old-fashioned manual typewriter and a vintage adding machine, the kind you operated with a pull down handle.  At the age of 3 and 4, you’d find me up there happily pounding away on that old Remington, writing all kinds of “important” letters, and adding long columns of numbers.

When I was a bit older, we moved to another home, but my home office went with me.  My dad had a big desk in the basement, with lots of drawers – he didn’t use it much, but I surely did.  My typewriter (by now I’d graduated to a Smith Corona electric) was seated smack in the middle, and I used one of my dad’s cast off electric adding machines (I can still hear that funny little whirr it made when you pressed the “=” sign.) 

Yes indeed, I  loved playing office in those days.  Sometimes I pretended to be a lawyer, other times a magazine editor.  But whatever make believe career I embarked upon, they all required lots of paperwork, because I loved paper.  My fervent wish in those days was to spend my life playing with words on paper.

Well, as they say, be careful what you wish for.

Fast forward several decades to 2009, and I find myself sitting a desk every day, my computer with a large flat screen monitor front and center, calculator at hand, and absolutely surrounded by paper.  Stacks upon stacks of paper.

Not only does my daily job require tons of repetitious and seemingly redundant paperwork, the events of the past three months have found me drowning in a good deal of personal paperwork as well – namely, all the paperflow involved in settling my aunt and uncle’s estate.

How does one cope when one’s dream comes true and then turns into a nightmare?

I’m looking for ways to crawl out from under this mountain of papers…any ideas?

 

One More Goodbye

At least no one has died this time.

This goodbye is a somewhat happier occasion, as tomorrow marks the retirement of our senior pastor, a man who led our flock of Presbyterians for the last 20 years, taking the church at a time when it was near death’s door and breathing new life into it, growing it to over three times its size in people and program.

We’re happy for him, because, as he said at his gala retirement banquet on Thursday, he is definitely “going out on top.”  He’s healthy, relatively young, he’s left a good, strong mark in the work he’s done.  His congregation fervently hates to see him go.   It’s really the perfect time to ride off into the sunset, in the style of the Western sagas he loves so much.

But still.

Another goodbye?  Really?

On my way into banquet hall Thursday night, we happened to meet up in the parking lot.  “Hey, sweetie!” he said, giving me a hug.  “It’s good to see you! How’re you holding up?”

“I’m hanging in there,” I told him, hugging back.  “You know, I feel badly that I haven’t been in church very much, that I’ve missed your last few sermons.”

“Hey,” he said, with his trademark crooked grin.  “I know you’ve had your fill of goodbyes lately.”

And that’s just one of the reasons we all love this man.  He gets people.  Understands the human condition, in all it’s glory and gloom.  Knows that, though he’d prefer to retire quietly with no fuss and fanfare, the congregation needs to fete and honor him six ways from Sunday.  So he graciously sits through long pot luck dinners and fancy banquets, he smiles at the jokes and tears up appropriately (and genuinely) at the tributes.  He’s a good sport when the choir plops a cowboy hat on his head and sings “Happy Trails to You.”   Because he understands that it’s part of the process we need to go through in order to let him go.

One of the speakers at the banquet referred to him as a man “perfectly suited to the ministry.”  It’s a wonder, isn’t it, when people can do what they are “perfectly suited” to doing?  And it doesn’t happen often in this life.  I thought about that a lot on Friday, as I sat at my computer at work, typing faxes and organizing files, trying to read the chicken scratch of a doctor’s handwriting on this latest medical record review.   It’s not work to which I’m perfectly suited by any means…although I do it well enough, when I look at it in light of the accomplishments of a man like our minister, it pales to nothingness in comparison.

Of course, nowadays one has to be grateful for having gainful employment at all, no matter how “suited” you are to the occupation.  And I’m lucky ~ I pretty much know what I’m perfectly suited to doing, and I still get to do on occasion.

But it would be a fine thing indeed to have spent one’s entire career in pursuit of something that fed the soul as well as the stomach, that put fire in the spirit as well as in the furnace.  I can say with certainty that Reverend Rick Peters has done that during his 45 years in the ministry.  And I wish him Godspeed in the years ahead.

Although I really hate saying Goodbye.

Fallish

I’m disappointed in Michigan this fall.  We’ve had nothing but dismal, bone chilling days for the entire month of October,going directly from Capri pants and t-shirts to winter jackets and gloves, with nary a stop in-between for fuzzy sweaters.  There’s a leaden, gunmetal grey pall over the entire state, and not even the vibrant colors on our maples, elms, and oaks can dissipate it.

In some ways, it’s fitting…I was almost dreading the splendor that adorns this state in the waning days of its season.  Autumn has a glorious bittersweetness to it, one I usually revel in, but one that can sometimes be almost too emotional to bear.  This fall, with all the losses still so fresh in my heart, I was almost afraid of all that fierce beauty, flaunting itself at death.

These trees are in my neighbor’s yard, and greet me when I open the drapes first thing in the morning.  The photo is from last fall, for we’ve not seen any patches of sky that blue so far this month.

Ah well, there’s still November.

Bell-issima

Several months ago, I promised my friends in Classical Bells that I would join them in the recording they were scheduled to make on October 19, out in a small recording studio in Ann Arbor.  A couple of times each year, they do  demo recordings for one of the larger publishers of handbell music.  This fall’s batch of new tunes included a couple of  piano/bell combo pieces, so they asked if I’d do the piano parts.

As is par for the course with Classical Bells, things always turn out to be more involved than you would expect.  Actually, that’s just the nature of music in general.  So a gig that started out being just one easy piano piece, turned into one easy and one not so easy piano piece, plus “garbage bells” on first one, then two, then three bell pieces.  Then, Jim got involved on a piece where the bass bell ringers needed some extra muscle. 

But I’m not complaining.  Far from it, in fact.  Yesterday’s rehearsal reminded me once again of the restorative power of music making.  Because I went in dragging my residual yoke of sadness, the one that seems perpetually tied to my shoulders, and came out with a definite spring in my step and a considerably lighter heart.  For the first time in a long time, I felt as if I were where I needed to be, doing what I was meant to do. 

And once again, I realized how important it is for everyone to have something they’re passionate about.  For me, it’s music.  For my friend Kim at work, it’s running…and though I couldn’t run  26 miles if my life depended on it, I understand her excitement about the marathon this weekend, the one she’s been training for the past six months.  It’s the same excitement I feel about preparing for a special concert, like the ones we did with the Detroit Symphony several years ago.  And it’s the same sense of satisfaction and pride whether  you’re crossing a finish line or listening to the last tones resounding in the air. 

Whether you’re a musician, an artist, a writer, or an athlete, it’s this passion, this sense of satisfaction, this feeling of all’s right-ness, that helps us survive everything from the occasional boredom of everyday jobs to the searing pain of grief and loss. 

So I’m thankful for my moments of music, and thankful for the friends who invite me to share with them.

Bellisima.

Early Riser

Thump.

The sound of Molly’s four feet hitting the floor, jumping directly from the bed, her failure to use the miniature staircase placed beside it indicative of her emergency need for the backyard.

My eyes jolt open, and glance at the clock on the dresser.  4:11 a.m.

She trots urgently toward the back door, and I stumble along behind, my heart sinking as I feel my eyes opening wider and my mind begin to crank itself into gear.

There will likely be no more sleeping for me this morning.

Oh, I give it my best shot – attempting to woo myself back into sleep with hot chocolate Ovaltine and cinnamon toast.  I even heat up the microwaveable neck wrap, curling it around my neck as I crawl back into bed and prop myself up with lots of pillows.   I take up my book and read for an hour or so, finish another chapter at 5:23 and think I might just be able to close my eyes again, get another hour of sleep before the real wake up time arrives.   I turn out the light, curl up on my right side so that Magic can insert himself into his customary place beside me, and try to fall back asleep.

No dice.

Admitting defeat, I get up and make coffee.

I’m also admitting to some difficulty getting my life in gear this week.   Topping off the trauma of the past couple of weeks is the fact that I’m still getting sorted in my new work routine.   This business of leaving for the office every day at 9 am and not getting home until nearly 6 pm is new for me.  So while I’m in the process of grieving for my aunt, I’m also faced with grieving the loss of more than half my personal freedom.   

And I’m not liking it so much.

I miss having mornings to walk the dogs and go for coffee afterward.  I miss spending an hour or two writing after breakfast.  I miss practicing piano until lunchtime and then eating my sandwich at the kitchen table with a book for company.  I miss the afternoon shopping trips with my mom, and stopping at Panera on the way home for coffee and a danish, and feel guilty about spending less time with her as I know she’s grieving these days too.

And it’s silly perhaps, but I think about all the days now that I won’t get to spend with Magic and Molly, and I jealously watch them grow more attached to Jim because he’s the one here with them all day while I’m the absent figure who comes home exhausted and desultorily throws the ball a couple of times before collapsing on the couch to watch television.

I find myself thinking more and more of the broad spectrum, the long term picture, because I’ve learned this summer how fleeting the happier moments of life can be, how very fragile life itself really is.  I’m angry at circumstances which force me into this position, angry that when my boss pulls one of her little power trips on me I don’t have the luxury of saying fuck-you-and-your-little-job-too.  I’m angry about thrusting myself back into life with all it’s busy-ness before I”ve had a chance to properly come to terms with yet another loss, angry that the modern world expects us to simply pick up and carry on as if nothing ever happened. 

Ultimately, I’m just tired of feeling that life is out of my control, because you all  know  how much I need to be in control. 

All this and it’s only 6:00 in the morning.

I have a feeling it will be a very long day.

Refresh

It rained sporadically all morning, a fine, needle like mist that pelted my cheeks as I dashed from the house to the car.  We spent the morning at my aunt’s house, searching for paperwork (house deeds, car titles, insurance policies…)  We found instead a marriage certificate, signed with a flourish by Justice of the Peace Anthony Owen, on November 15, 1947.  We also found an (incredibly small looking!) uniform shirt, US Air Force, circa 1943, and a pair of purple silks such as a boxer might wear into the ring.  There was a box filled with patchwork quilt squares, ready for my aunt’s Wednesday morning quilting group to piece into one of the many beautiful bed coverings they made back in the 1960’s.  And a class ring, again incredibly small, threaded through a delicate chain so it could be worn as a necklace. 

When we emerged from this time warp, the sun had come out.  The maple leaves sparkled with glints of gold, and raindrops perched on their tips like diamond earrings.  There was a freshness to the air and a similar lightness in my heart, as if the rain had washed away the gloom and sadness which had permeated the past two weeks.  I could see light at the end of this tunnel at last.

My challenge emotionally  for the coming months is to pull myself out of the melancholy pit I’ve been lingering in for most of the summer, seek out opportunities for happiness and indulge in them, refuse to allow myself to get drawn any deeper into self-pity and fearfulness and worry.   It’s a bit like hitting the refresh button on the computer keyboard…the same page will come back on the screen, but with the newest, most up-to-date information.  The basic facts of my life aren’t going to change right now…there is fresh loss and grief, uncertainty about the future, more work to do…but mainly there is still life, and people who love me.  There are dogs to cuddle and take for a walk, music to play, and books to be read.  There are vistas of red and gold maple leaves, cool autumn breezes,  hot coffee and fresh baked cinnamon rolls for the morning.

A dear friend  sent me a card in the mail that reads…

There’s no doubt this is hard.  There are questions, “what ifs.”  Hurts, doubts, regrets…

But I know you.

I know you’ve come through hard times before, and you’ll come through this one, too.

And what’s more,

I know you’ll be even stronger for it –

deeper in understanding and even more certain of your good place in this world.

Today I caught a glimmer of light at the end of this long tunnel, a moment of certainty that there was still a good place in the world.

And I was refreshed.

Another One Gone

On Saturday night, about 11: 15 p.m., my aunt quite peacefully stopped breathing.  There were six people hovering around her bedside – I wasn’t one of them, for I had told her goodbye earlier in the afternoon and gone home.  I knew when I left that I wouldn’t see her again, but the hospice nurse told us that most often people prefer to die alone, and will often “linger” in hopes of being able to do just that.  But there were surprising numbers of people who wanted to be at her bedside – relatives, close friends, even casual acquaintances, who seemed bound and determined to insert themselves into her final hours.  I didn’t feel the need to compete for her attention, or to try and hold her back on this journey.  She was ready to go, and I was ready to let her leave. 

Yesterday afternoon we buried her next to her husband, so they are “together forever” as it says on their newly minted grave marker.  (We will have to leave it to God to decide whether that is reward or punishment for them.)  This picture of her was taken in 1946, not long before they eloped to Bowling Green, Ohio, on a chilly November afternoon.  Like most young couples of their time, they were full of the optimism and hope erupting from the end of  that long war.  And they would definitely have said they achieved the American dream as it was defined in those days.  My uncle, a poor Mexican boy from Texas, got a college education and a professional position.  He earned enough money to buy his own home, wear good suits from Brooks Brothers, and drive Buicks and Cadillacs.  He retired with the security of a lifetime pension and healthcare, and the knowledge that his wife would be well taken care of even after his death. 

They never had children of their own, but there were all of us nieces and nephews to play with and spoil.  There was also a parade of neighbor children and the children of friends who were the beneficiaries of their generosity.  Although my aunt was rather opinionated and demanding, she somehow marshalled an army of loyal followers who were faithful to the bitter end.   She didn’t give of herself unselfishly the way my mother does, but somehow she managed to inspire fierce devotion anyway. 

The end of a life – especially a long one -always inspires introspection, making one think about the mark you leave on the world, the possibilities fulfilled (and unfulfilled), the legacy left behind.   Each of us has one, some certainly larger and more impressive than others, but each one important and necessary in the grand scheme of life. 

“Honey, I just tried to do what the Lord wanted me to do,” my aunt would say.  In her heart, she believed she followed her Higher Power. 

I suppose that’s all any of us can do before we’re gone.