4/8/10 - Seafood and Recap

My mom has been trying to do something nice for me. And I keep thwarting her efforts. Mostly because what she’s been trying to do requires the expenditure of money that’s just not necessary. But regardless, she’s starting to get irritated with me I think. So she’s taking me and the kids to dinner tonight. At Red Lobster. I’ve been craving seafood for weeks and it’s the only seafood restaurant in town so off we go.

My Dad had a doctor’s appointment today with his main doc to debrief and reassess after last weekend’s debacle as well as the doc being out of town for the last two and half weeks. The doc was irritated that everything was handled the way it was and was also irritated that his prescription of a gout medication made everyone assume that my Dad had been diagnosed with gout. I kind of wanted to tell him to either get over himself or else write better diagnostic notes in the file. But he’s also endeavored to mess about with my Dad’s meds, so we’ll see how it goes. He’s taking my Dad off the blood thinners so that he can switch him to anti inflammatories and is switching his pain med to a slow release pain patch instead of the every 4 hours morphine he had been on. I’m worried about taking him off the blood thinners as that opens him up to risks of heart attack and stroke. But hopefully the benefits outweigh the risks. And the doc said we’d know the benefits fairly soon, so if they don’t outweigh, then he’ll go back to the blood thinners. It’s all such experimentation at this stage, which I find utterly infuriating. I mean, my dad has to pay the price of his comfort so that the docs can figure all of this out, in a case that is not unique that they’ve all seen so many times before and still can’t get right. And when my Dad has little more than his comfort left, I tend to get my hackles raised when they start messing with it.

So I’m keeping my fingers crossed and looking forward to scallops this evening.

4/4/10 - Happy Easter!

Oh yeah, that’s right, it’s Easter. Happy Easter! I had almost totally forgotten about it. It’s just such a holiday that’s not on my radar really. I’m not religious so it holds little personal meaning for me in that respect and it always creeps up on me. More so this year than most given everything else that’s going on. My mom sent me to the grocery store yesterday (yes, on a Saturday, again, and the Saturday before Easter, so not a good idea) to restock the fridge and get a few things for the kids for an Easter egg hunt this morning. This morning still arrived as a bit of a shock.

My Mom had taken The Boy outside to enjoy the gorgeous morning while I set up the indoor egg hunt and strategically placed their bigger Easter gifts. The Girl woke up lat morning after falling back asleep on the couch and came to me with an egg in hand saying “What this?” She caught on quickly though as she kicked off the hunt with a good head start on her brother. They had a good time.

Dad got up after the hunt was over and was still not doing well, so Mom called the new on call hospice nurse to request a home visit today. Dad moved as little as possible and read the paper. The Girl played with her new Barbie princess and horse and The Boy begged my Mom shamelessly to get started on his new medieval castle herb garden which would require painting. It was a normal Sunday morning except for the pain and discomfort etched across my Dad’s face.

But my Dad has gotten better as the day has gone on, The Girl seems to be fever free although her cough has evolved into a nasty wet thing that needs little provocation, The Boy had a grand time painting and planting his indoor garden. The hospice nurse arrived and took a thorough account of my Dad ending with a long talk about pain management and a declaration that the gout med should be utterly discontinued.

Now it’s on to dinner and sneaking the ears off the kids’ chocolate bunnies.

4/3/10 - Not a Good Day

My Dad’s doctors decided to start monkeying with his meds and now he is paying a high price for their experimentation. It’s so easy to blame them for his discomfort. It’s so easy to point fingers, especially at hospice, and demand that it be fixed. Because to watch my Dad suffer like he has today is by far the most horrible part yet of this whole process. My Dad has had increasing swelling and pain in his joints, particularly his elbow, knee and ankle joints. After some blood work it was decided that he had gout. Over the past week or so his pain and swelling has been getting really bad and they decided to up the gout medication they had him on. Worst. Decision. Ever.

He could hardly walk today. He was shaking so badly he couldn’t hold a water glass. He was in intense pain and his stomach was screwed beyond belief. He spent most of the day in bed. I spent most of the day shooing the children outside or into my mom’s yoga studio to play and watch TV just to get them out of the house. And worrying. There was lots and lots of worrying.

The Girl is not any better and I knew I should take her far away from my Dad, especially given his sudden turn for the worse. But I could not leave him like this. So I’m staying and keeping my fingers crossed that I don’t compound this by giving him her sickness.

My Mom has been on the phone off and on with the on call hospice nurse all day in amidst sitting with my Dad and getting him to drink as much as possible as they think the shaking and chills are coming from dehydration. I’ve been sitting at the kitchen table mostly, feeling helpless. And feeling that I maybe don’t want to be around for this part. As awful as that confession makes me feel and sound, I don’t know if I can sit and watch him suffer like this as the end draws nearer. And I don’t know if there’s room at his bedside for more than one. I just don’t know.

3/29/10 - Caretaker

I’m a caretaker. I always have been. For as long as I can remember I am always the first to wonder if someone is ok if I see them hurting, no matter if I know them or not. I latch onto babies because I know that they need to be taken care of. I’m just a care taker. Which is a good thing considering the rigors my children have put me through. If I weren’t a natural born care taker, they’d be hurtin’ kiddos right about now. There was a part of me that thought once upon a time that being a caretaker made me weak in some way. That the act of caretaking surrendered my power to the person I was taking care of; that by putting myself at their disposal that I was somehow expressing codependence instead of the inherent strength it takes to honestly put someone else before yourself.

Now I know that was all bullshit of course. I embrace my caretaking abilities on a daily basis. And it turns out to be an extraordinarily good thing when you have one parent have a massive heart attack one day, move in with you to recuperate for 3 weeks another day and then six months later have the other parent diagnosed with end stage lung cancer.

So here I am, taking care of my Dad. By cooking all of his favorite food for him while he still has an appetite and wants to eat. By doing things around the house to make his life easier. By helping to keep track of meds and new symptoms to tell the hospice nurse. All of these everyday things that seem so simple but are the best way I know how to take care of him right now. Because all of these things still allow me to be his daughter whilst doing them. Despite my caretaking proclivities, I have no desire to morph into a full time nurse to my father. I just want to be his daughter. Love him as his daughter. Support him as his daughter. It’s a delicate balance to strike to be sure. But I hope I’m at least in its general vicinity.

3/6/10 - Anger

I think that anger takes two basic forms. Those which are situational, the “I can’t believe you just did that to me!” types of anger. More like bursts of fury. They fade relatively quickly and usually don’t have much to do with anything except the offending person or thing.

Then there is the anger that is rooted in who we are. Rooted somewhere deep enough that it can’t be so easily let go of or dismissed. Rooted somewhere solid enough that it takes years maybe even a lifetime to be able to put it down and direct our energy into something more positive.

And I’ve been going round and round with the latter as of late. There is this anger that is rooted in my childhood. That is connected to my parents and that has been flying in my face as of late in response to the fact that my father is dying and everything that comes with that. You would think that the hardest part would be the issues related directly to my dad. Those that come from the fact that he was gone for a lot of my early childhood. Those that come from the fact that he’s not an emotionally ebullient man and always left me guessing as to my place in his heart. Those that come from the fact that he had exceptionally high expectations for me that I struggled, and often failed, to meet.

But instead, and probably harder than all of those combined, the anger that is arising is with my mother. Perhaps that’s because she’ll still be here and is therefore the safer candidate at which to vent anger. Or perhaps, losing my father is just opening the floodgates to that deeply seated anger that has been dormant for so long. I don’t know. What I do know is that it’s making it extremely difficult for me and my mom right now. And I’ve yet to find the words to explain it all to her without her feeling like I’m just attacking her. And if I want to one day be able to truly let go of this anger, I must first find a way to express it.

The Mess That I Am

So I have this anger. This anger that I keep expecting to start dissipating as the time goes by. This anger that I’ve been diligently trying to just let be in the hopes that it would burn itself out. Here’s the problem though, it turns out when you “diligently” try to do something, you’re not actually just letting it be, are you?

So, here’s the truth. I am angry. I’m so angry I can hardly see straight. I’m angry that my father is dying. I’m angry that my father will not let me in during this time of grief and ending. I’m angry that he won’t let me help him find the answers he’s craving so that he can have some peace in whatever time he has left. When this diagnosis first happened, it brought my dad back to me. He was present and honest and actively choosing to bring me into his process. Now he’s gone back to sitting still again, in the worst possible way. There’s no peace or growth in this sitting still. Or at least there doesn’t appear to be any, but I wouldn’t really know for sure because he won’t, you know, let me in.

And I’m angry because everyone just expects me to understand. My dad expects me to take care of my family and that’s it. My mom expects me to just let them both do whatever they want exclusive of my place in this family. Our oldest family friends expect me to sit back and just understand. I do not understand. I do not understand how it’s ok to shove your only daughter away from you when you’re dying under the guise of wanting me to take care of my “own family.” What the hell is that?!? My parents aren’t my family?

To be honest I’m tired of understanding. I’m tired of walking on eggshells. I’m tired of pretending like everything is ok. I’m tired of acting as if my feelings about my father dying don’t actually matter.

I want permission to be angry. I want permission to fall apart. I want permission to be the mess that I am.

The angry, tired mess that I am.

Food and Writing

Ah, civilization, how I have missed thee! Ok, that’s being dramatic. We’ve only been snowed in for a couple of days, but I’ve been completely computer and phone free during those days which almost NEVER happens, so it feels like longer. I half expected to get on the computer today to discover The Boy had started college and all of my friends were moving to Florida to retire. Instead it’s only been a couple of days and life has just kept on keeping on while I’ve been away.

My mom took The Girl and me out to lunch today at a new Greek restaurant in Farmington. And it’s the funniest thing to see how people react in this town not only to a new restaurant, but more so to a new “ethnic” restaurant. The place was packed with people oohing and ahhing over the food and the décor and, and, and! It just cracks me up. But it was yummy, and a lovely change of pace from the typical restaurant fare in town. The service was good, although I really wish cute boy servers would pay attention to the fact that all of their cutesy little one liners that they use on most patrons really only work if the customers next to your other table don’t hear you use them on someone else first. Again, it just cracks me up.

And today is my parent’s 39^th wedding anniversary. Although since they’ve been together for 41 years and this will be their last anniversary together, they’re splitting the difference and just calling it their 40^th anniversary. Seems fair to me. So I’m making them the dinner of their choice (linguine with clam sauce and Caesar salad) and another friend of theirs made them a cherry pie for dessert. So once again, we’ll at least have good food and good company if nothing else.

I’m fretting a wee bit about my story for this week. Last week’s story came so easily and has so much potential, but this week, I’m waiting for inspiration to hit. Hopefully it hits sometime soon. This challenge is proving to be a lot of fun, when I don’t have to force it.

Preparing to Travel Again

The Girl and I are headed back to my parents’ house tomorrow. The mountains pretty much all the way through are expecting a large snow storm tonight and tomorrow, which has me a wee bit worried. As well as the fact that the past couple of days every time I mention heading back to Nana and Papa’s, The Girl starts crying. That’s no good. I know it doesn’t really have anything to do with Nana and Papa. It has to do with her missing more school, missing her brother and dad and being away from her own space and stuff. I get it. We’re both starting to feel a little bit like refugees at this point I think. But this weekend is my parents’ wedding anniversary and I promised that we would help them celebrate since it will be their last. And several of our oldest family friends arrived to their house today as well. These are people that I grew up with, absolutely adore and am really looking forward to seeing. But I’m in no way shape or form ready to battle icy and snow packed roads.

So I’ll have to check the weather again in the morning to see what I’m up against. Right now all it says is “ice.” But overnight might change that for the better. And I think that as long as my dad is still doing ok when I get there I think The Girl and I will head home again early next week. I’m grateful for the chance we’ve had to spend so much time with my parents, but at the same time, I’ve got to work towards striking a better balance between them and my home. I don’t want anyone to feel neglected, and I’ve got a responsibility all the way around to be present and take care of the people I love.

Ever the search for balance. It follows me everywhere it seems. Always work ahead of me. Rightfully I suppose. And there is a part of me that is deeply grateful for the continued opportunity to keep learning. But mostly, right now, I’d rather have a cabana boy delivering me umbrella drinks on the beach.

Bad Day

I’m having a bad day. And here’s the mind fuck that has been chasing its tail through my bad day pity party: I should be above bad days. Or, more to the point, I should be able to rise above bad days. I should be able to just allow them to move past me without buying into their bullshit. I should just make my mind some soothing tea and let it rant and rave without actually giving it any unwarranted attention. I should be able to slough off bad days without a care. But apparently I can’t.

Because I’m crabby and I want to cry. My husband has half the day off and instead of enjoying the family time, I was actually resentful that he was home. My mom called to tell me she was in a car accident and my first thought was “what do you want me to do about it?” What the fuck is wrong with me?!

Here is what’s wrong with me today: my dad has started going downhill again and I’m not there to help or see any of it for myself. My cell phone is dead as dead gets and we have zero funds to get a new one. My car needs about $1,000 worth of work. My husband’s car needs about $1,000 worth of work. I desperately need a haircut. I have zero confidence in my ability to write anything more than simple journal entries and am considering aborting my 52 project. And we have zero wiggle room in our budget and none coming in the foreseeable future and that just flat makes me angry. And we’re out of brownies.

That’s about it. That’s what’s wrong with me. So pretty much nothing has changed. My dad is dying. We have no money. I’m struggling with how to actually be a writer. What the hell else is new? And yet today is a bad day. Because today I’m mired down in the muck of circumstance. Because for some reason, today, I let myself sink down into the swamp water of my mind.

And now I’m all slimy. So I guess I’ll go take a shower and just keep breathing.

The Other Side of Stephen King

My mom has been touting her love of Stephen King for years in my general direction. She’s tried everything under the sun to reel me in – he’s a fantastic writer, not EVERYTHING he writes is horror, he has a wonderful sense of humor, he cusses with abandon! And I’ve read one or two of his books. Mostly the ones that were absolutely not even in the same city as horror and they were great. But I don’t do horror. Ever.

But then yesterday my mom pushed a little book he wrote about 10 years ago in front of me. It’s a book he wrote on writing. I picked it up today as I was waiting for the lunch hour to arrive and I have to admit I’m completely sucked in. He is a fantastic writer. This is not horror, not even really how he wrote horror. He is very funny. And he does, indeed, cuss with abandon. His writing actually reminds me a bit of my own writing thought process when I am at my best.

Interestingly enough, the biggest theme thus far is to write without fear. Which I find a bit ironic considering that is the sole cause for me not writing more often and sooner. Fear of not being good enough, of not having anything worthwhile to say, fear of being rejected, fear of not being able to adequately translate what is in my head into words on paper. You name it and I was pretty much afraid of it. Those fears have served as all the necessary reasoning I could have ever asked for to not write. And they’ve worked well. Until now.

See, now? After this last year? I don’t give a damn whether I’m any good or whether anyone reads it. I just know that I must write. It is no longer a choice. For so long my only tangible motivation to write was for recognition in some way and since my fear shortchanged that motivation, the only option left was simply not to write.

Well, that’s bullshit. So hopefully the book will have some other helpful tidbits to offer and if nothing else, it really is very funny.

Decision Made

I am sitting on my couch. In my house. Writing on my laptop and posting to the blog using our Wi-Fi instead of “borrowed” internet from the neighbors. I’m home. For three and half days.

It was hard to make myself walk out the door. It was hard to leave the children with their beatific smiles. It was hard to leave my dad who woke up feeling crappy this morning. It was hard to leave my mom with everything to handle on her own. It felt utterly selfish. But I did it anyway. Because I know that regardless of what path this process takes, it’s going to get infinitely harder before the end and I needed to take a few days to rejuvenate. To do absolutely nothing I didn’t want to do. To not have my days dictated by my gorgeous little authoritarian offspring. And maybe if I’m really lucky, I will get to meet E and C’s new baby boy before I head back down to my parents’ house.

The drive was easy again thanks to the books on CD (which I shamelessly subjected my husband to). The roads were mostly clear and even though there is something very wrong with the electrical system in my car (I drove home with no speedometer or RPM, oil and battery gauges) we made it in great time.

We only brought one car back, so I’ll be housebound unless I want to take my husband to work every morning (which I don’t). But that’s fine. I have plenty that I want to get done while I’m here. Although I think I probably will take the car one day if for no other reason than to be able to pick my husband up from work and have us do a mega-splurge for a date night (most of our “dates” are shoe-horning a movie in when my mom is visiting and it’s usually at a very non-date time, like first thing in the morning).

I’m giving myself permission to put the guilt down and walk away. So that when I do return, I can resume my role as mother and daughter and be at the top of my game.

Mix Anxiety with Guilt and...

I am feeling guilty. Because I desperately want to go home with my husband tomorrow for a few days until he was planning on coming back to my parents’ house on Thursday anyway. I would love to sit in my house and just enjoy the quiet. I would love to not have to do anything except catch up on my DVR’d TV shows from before I left and watch any and all of the copious movies we got/gave for Christmas. I would love to delve into my music wish list and spend some of the iTunes gift certificates I got. I would love to take some time to start researching and writing notes about the first story in the new blog I’m going to kick off on New Year’s Day. I would love to take three days and just be in a bit of solitude and utter quiet.

Here is the problem. I feel totally guilty wanting that right now. Ridiculously guilty. At this point where my one and only priority should be spending as much time as possible with my dad. At this point where I should be last on my priority list.

I have this sort of double-edged anxiety that sets in when I think about leaving, even for just a couple of days. Anxiety that my mom will call in the middle of the night and tell me my dad has died and I wasn’t there. Anxiety that if I don’t take some time for me, to refocus and decompress that I will very soon lose my footing here and start taking it out on my parents and children. I know the whole theory “if you don’t take care of yourself, you can’t take care of anyone else.” I know that. And I am even willing to concede that it’s true. But I also know that in situations such as these, where my role as mother and daughter far outweigh any role as individual, that little nugget of wisdom simply does not apply.

So I am struggling right now. Trying to figure out what is the right thing to do and hoping like hell that I am right, whichever way I choose.

12/25/09 - Merry Christmas!

Holy present explosion Batman!! I got a great picture of the two of them on first sight of the magnificent pile of wrapped goodies arranged perfectly behind two grand offerings from Santa. The looks on their faces were utter, unabashed joy. It was what Christmas mornings should be. It was what was so sorely lacking in last year’s Christmas.

The Boy’s Christmas was chock full of Star Wars. And that is pretty much it. Between Santa and all the grandparents, The Boy now has his very own Star Wars armada to cheerfully batter about. He was over the moon! Throw in a couple of super cool tie dyed shirts from Nana Ro, a bright orange Wolverine sweatshirt from mom and dad and super cool Spider-Man slippers from Nana and he was a very happy camper indeed.

The Girl’s Christmas was like a diva/princess/rock star Mecca made tangible. I removed the ban on all things Barbie this year so she was awash with tons of familiar pink bubble writing as well as getting her dress up box tripled with super cool princess dresses and truly divine shoes adorned with rhinestones and feathers galore. Round all that out with her first guitar and drum set and she was ready to rock and roll, literally. I don’t think she could have chosen a more perfect assortment of gifts if you had given her free reign and all the money in the world.

My darling husband surprised me with tickets to see Muse in Denver in April as well as playing to my recent embrace of adolescent obsession with Twilight. And in an effort to plug the one glaring hole in my culinary aptitude, my mom gave me a rice cooker. I seriously cannot make rice to save my life. But now I can! And my husband was happy to get iTunes money and new additions to his sci-fi library.

My mom loved the iPod we gave her and my dad looked like he really appreciated the writing journal I gave him.

Not to mention the fact that I absolutely nailed my grandmother’s cinnamon rolls. They were decadent and perfect.

I could not have wished for a lovelier Christmas.

12/24/09 - Merry Christmas Eve!

Merry Christmas Eve!

I remember when I was a kid, Christmas Eve was like the previews of Christmas Day. I spent all day hollering “Merry Christmas Eve!” to anyone and everyone who would listen. We had our big Christmas dinner with my grandfather and my great aunt on Christmas Eve and I would get to open one gift. I would painstakingly write my letter to Santa. I would slowly pour milk into my favorite glass for him to wash down the tasty iced sugar cookies my mom and I had labored over. I would lovingly peel the carrots left for his reindeer and set it all up together in the most prominent (but out of dogs’ reach) place I could find in the living room. Once everything was set up perfectly, I would go to bed, feeling dutiful in my need to be asleep quickly and without fight so that Santa could come to my house as quickly as possible. As if I could imagine him somewhere tapping his fingers on the side of his sleigh waiting for me to go to sleep as the minutes ticked by, quickly screwing up his efficiently run, once-a-year, delivery service.

The whole tradition of it was huge for me. As was my rock solid belief in Santa. I had friends at school telling me left and right that I was just flat silly to still believe in Santa. But I just knew that he was real.

One night, however, I was bolder than normal and when I awoke for no reason and saw the light still on in the living room, I crept to the doorway to try to catch a glimpse of Santa himself. I felt certain that I would see the fuzzy white trim on his bright red suit as I peeked around the corner.

Instead I saw my mom and dad laboring over the Barbie pool I would awaken to the next morning. I was heartbroken to say the least. But in the years to come, I chose to still believe in Santa. Barbie pool be damned. So when The Boy asked me tonight if Santa was real, I could without any doubt, say yes.

Rambling On

Well I kicked into high gear today and jumped head first into all the Christmas stuff I’d been procrastinating on.

I got my niece’s tutu and hair tie made and I got half of our Christmas cards done. It felt really good to start getting back into the spirit of the season as well as ticking a few things off my to-do list. I had to drive into town halfway through the day to get some of my dad’s prescriptions re-filled as my mom was in bed sick all day (and let me just say right now that if I or The Girl get sick AGAIN, I am going to go entirely, irreparably and utterly mad).

My dad and I made dinner together – he grilled pork tenderloin while I made cold pasta primavera. It was nice to share a kitchen with him again.

And tomorrow we’re meeting with a lawyer to get my dad’s will done. So that should be nice and morbid. But the good news is that after that lovely appointment, I get to go have a manicure courtesy of my mom. Hopefully she’s feeling well enough to join me for her scheduled pedicure at the same time.

The Boy is counting down the days until he gets to come here. I’m fairly sure he thinks that The Girl is getting spoiled rotten while he’s not here (and he’s not far off), hence part of his hurry to get here. I think my husband and I are going to take him to see Avatar t his weekend as his weekly advent calendar surprise. I’m hoping against hope that it won’t be too much for him. But it’s only rated PG-13 and only for things like fantasy violence (so is Star Wars) and smoking and occasional language (he probably hears worse out of my mouth on a daily basis). He gets really excited about it whenever he sees a preview for it, so hopefully it’ll be an exciting thing for him.

The Girl gets a pair of ultimate, hot pink, sparkliest of all sparkly princess shoes for her surprise.

I cannot believe that Christmas is only nine days away. Where does the time go?

12/13/09 - Mini-Holiday

Here we are, in Albuquerque. My dear friend, R, works for a swanky new hotel in town and she offered to get us rooms for a steal, so we took her up on the offer knowing it would be a nice place. And holy cow am I glad we did. The hotel is gorgeous (not to mention that it’s an entirely sustainable, green hotel so it just sort of makes you feel like a good person to stay there), the rooms are lovely and they have killer views of some amazing murals that have been painted on the sides of buildings downtown. I cannot say enough nice things about the place!

And we got to have dinner with J and J and their gorgeous boy C tonight as well. The male J of that pair is the closest thing I’ve ever had to a brother. We grew up together and I adore him. I also adore his wife and son, so I was thrilled to be able to get together for dinner and playtime with them this evening. We got to see their house, which they’ve spent the last couple of years gutting and transforming into a lovely home, and watch The Girl and C play until well past both of their bedtimes.

Mom and I were also able to somehow be utterly stealthy by finishing up our Christmas shopping at The Big Toy Store this afternoon without The Girl catching on to what we were doing. As far as she knew we just took her there to look around. And without a doubt, this is absolutely the last year that we’ll be able to carry out such a mission with her within a 10 mile radius of the store, let alone in there with us.

It’s been a good start, albeit extraordinarily busy and fast paced, to our little 36 hour getaway. You just can’t beat the ultimate nice road trip, successful shopping trip, yummy dinner, mojitos, watching beautifully sweet children play happily, fabulous conversation, awesome hotel room to come back to, unbelievably comfortable bed to lay awake in when I should be sleeping, lightening fast and free Wi-Fi and killer mini bar combo.

12/11/09 - All for a Good Cause

Every year the big hospice organization that serves the area my parents live in holds a major fundraiser in partnership with the local community college. The art department donates handmade pottery bowls to the event for them to sell for $10 each and you get soup with your bowl as well. It is a lovely idea that so completely embraces the whole idea and purpose of hospice in my opinion. As a career fundraiser it’s so often that you see organizations holding fundraising events that have absolutely nothing to do with their mission. And I have often found myself saying “now tell me again what the hell a silent auction has to do with child welfare?”

But this? This is perfect. You have an organization dedicated to helping patients and their families through the death transition raising money by partnering with a major community based institution whose entire reason for being is to further life through education. Together these two organizations raise money by offering good, homemade, warmth giving soup in the middle of winter served in bowls made by hand with materials from the earth. Maybe I am just feeling overly cheesy tonight, but to me that right there is a circle I want to be a part of.

My mom has been supporting this fundraiser for years and has quite the lovely collection of bowls for her efforts. I have always thought it was a wonderful idea, but haven’t ever been in town visiting when it was happening, until now. Because of the snow days the beginning of the week, my mom has been working all day every day the last three days to get caught up, so I offered to go for her this year since she had to work.

The Girl and I trekked into town to the college campus and wandered around the event looking at pottery and carefully choosing our bowls. She made quite an impression on everyone she met and I walked away knowing that I was not only supporting an organization that does great work in general, but one that will very soon play a pivotal role in my life. And for both, I am immensely grateful.

12/7/09 - Playing Hooky

So apparently I have not yet lost my ability to coerce people into playing hooky (well at least people that are not my husband; I’ve yet to be able to get him to play hooky in the entire 11 years I have known him). Because my mom was supposed to go to work today and then The Girl and I would meet her in town to run some errands. But we got a good amount of snow and my mom decided it was enough to justify playing hooky and spending the day with me and The Girl. She treated us to a lovely lunch at a place that I would have never expected to do such a booming business in a town such as Farmington.

We had decided to get a bunch of arts and crafts stuff for the kids to make to decorate the house for Christmas. So off we went to Hobby Lobby to gather supplies. I have been slowly getting more artsy craftsy as of late but we decided to keep it relatively simple by keeping it to painting ornaments and festive paper chains. The only problem now will be getting The Girl to wait for her brother to arrive before delving in up to her elbows in paint and glue sticks.

I’ve also been having a hankering for bread baking as of late. I have always been just a wee bit afraid of yeast breads. It just seems like so much could go wrong without really knowing it, yielding not quite so tasty bread. And I’ve just really never had the time to get it all figured out. But with the weather turning colder fresh baked bread has just been calling my name. So I brought a honey challah recipe with me, hoping I’d have more time to experiment and perhaps lay down my fear of bread baking. Hopefully I’ll get to that tomorrow.

My dad is a bit better today. Which is a relief. He’s still moving pretty slowly, but there is a spark back in his eye and he was story telling again before dinner. It appears this process is going to be just as unpredictable as life itself.

12/6/09 - Random Thoughts

Target is a time suckage vortex from hell. And I love it. The Girl, my mom and I lost several hours in there today. We meant to run errands today. Do pricing and research for the last of our Christmas shopping. You know, generally be really productive and tick things off the to do list one by one. Instead, we spent hours wandering around Target (admittedly doing some research and pricing). I haven’t just wandered around Target for a long time. Because typically when I just wander around, looking at whatever happens to catch my eye, I end up spending entirely too much money. So I’ve taken to only going in there with a very specific list and I make a beeline for the locations of my items and then get the hell out of there with a quickness.

And it’s not that I had more money than usual or anything. It’s just that, I felt like browsing. The Girl needed new Christmas PJ’s and my mom wanted to find the kids new slippers (she’s dubbed herself the Slipper Queen). It also turns out that we’re in need of some new ideas for Santa since what The Girl had originally dubbed her number one present request is a piece of thin, janky, plastic crap. And I cannot allow Santa to spend money on, or put in our house, thin, janky, plastic crap. So we’re back to the drawing board for her and wandering about allowed for some additional brainstorming on that piece of business.

The advent calendar gave The Girl her tutu for this first week. And it’s a wee bit big on her and I may have gone a wee bit overboard with the layers of tulle. It’s more of a gigantic, gorgeous, floofy, red and pink skirt than a tutu in the strictest sense. And I think I’ll have to tighten it a bit for her to wear it as much as she’d like. But ultimately I think she really likes it, which gives me great hope that my niece will also love hers when I’m done with it.

Anyway, it’s up and down and the breath continues to move in and out.

Stages 1 and 2

My darling, dear and most appreciated friend M bought The Girl and me lunch again today. She also brought me some books on grief including one to read to the kiddos. One of which is by Elizabeth Kubler Ross who is pretty much the guru of death and dying. It was she who came up with the 5 stages of grief. I have heard her speak and she is without a doubt the kindest, gentlest soul I’ve ever heard utter words of any kind.

My mom and I talked a bit about the 5 stages when I was there and I talked a bit with M today as well. The first stage is denial. After the year I’ve had, I’ve pretty much lost all ability to be in denial about anything, it is just not worth my time and energy anymore. But anger? Anger is something I know a little bit about. And with this particular life event, my anger is twofold. The first of which is absolute anger at the fact that my father is going to be take away from me and my children well before we’ve learned everything he has to teach. The second of which is anger that I am an only child and thus have to shoulder and navigate this cracking a part of my family alone.

Also, I’m angry right now that life seems to not give a damn that my father is dying and so has decided to not just give me a friggin’ break with anything. We are just barely keeping our heads above water financially and are in fact having to learn how to breathe water this month. The mortgage company doesn’t care that my dad was in the hospital, only that I make sure to pay the late fee when I am finally able to make our payment this month. Also? My car is in dire need of some serious TLC and I have no way to provide anything for it but gasoline at the moment, and that only sparingly.

So there’s a tour of my anger. If you’re really lucky you’ll get an equally as thrilling view of the next three stages as well.