Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Category Archives: family


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The letter "D"

We were tagged by Reilly to find 5 things that Katie either likes, doesn’t like or can think of that start with the letter “D”. We will list those five words, and then tag one blogger from our list to continue the game. So here goes, Katie’s five “D” words – – in no particular order:

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1. Doggie; the pink dog squeaky toy that Katie loves to play with. It’s soft and bumpy and has TWO squeaky parts. It’s fun to retrieve…and it’s PINK, perfect for a princess.

2. Dinner! Maybe Katie’s most favorite word. According to her, it’s dinner time all the time, and she asks for it all the time too. If she could she’d con my husband AND me into getting her dinner for her.

3. Dunking for ice cubes in her water dish. Such a fun game! She will get soaked getting the ice out of the bowl, carry it over to the carpet and let it melt, waiting innocently for barefoot parents to wander into the danger icy zone.

4. Distractable, which Katie is not. (is that a word?) If she wants her dinner she wants it…and she wants it now. Playing won’t distract her. Going out for a walk won’t distract her. It’s dinner she wants and that…is…absolutely…that.

5. Devouring, as in devouring Mom’s shoes. Never Daddy’s shoes, just Mom’s. Mom has to hide all her shoes, or put them up high. Any shoes of Mom that are within reach are fair game.

6. Driving either to the PARK!! (YEA!!) or to the groomer for a bath (OH NOOO!) Katie loves to go for a ride in the car.  Especially to school.

WAIT that’s SIX “D” words! ah well, there are more…but we will stop!

Now…to find one person to continue the game….that hasn’t already done a letter? Hmmm…hey Diana, have you played yet?  Does Miley want to think up words that start with M?

katie-1246


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It's a brand new year!

The first day of 2009 dawned a delicate pink here in Michigan. Fresh snow on the ground, clear skies and the sun coming up make for a hopeful feeling. Katie and I watched the sun rise as we wandered the yard looking for the perfect place. If you know what I mean.
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Traditionally this is the time to plan future goals.  So here are a few things I hope for in the year 2009:

That my family members find peace and resolution to their current troubles.

That I find a full time library job.

That Katie gets to take some more agility classes.

That the economy finds its bottom and begins to improve.

That the Middle East finds some sort of structured peace (hey if you’re wishing might as well wish big!)

That all of you are safe and happy.

Love to all, from Katie and me.

katie-1127


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See? Tomorrow IS OK!

While I was not sleeping apparently it was snowing. This morning Katie and I ventured out late, having slept in after our long night of contemplation. The snow is deep enough in places that her belly drags through it. It’s beautiful, sticky wet snow, and Katie wanted to explore under every tree and shrub, looking for something to pounce on. Soon her fur hung with Christmas ornaments made of snow, which she occasionally tried to shake off.

I had to drag her back in the house; she wanted to stay outside all day! So today the ghosts of last night have receded again, and Katie and I can appreciate how beautiful everything looks in the fresh snow. Thanks for letting me spill all over you, it helps to have a place to store the images.


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Can't sleep tonight

The librarian who runs the branch where I worked today asked about my family and whether I was spending Thanksgiving with them. I explained all my siblings were gathering in the South but I couldn’t go this year. Then she asked if my parents would be there as well. I guess I could have said that they would be there, as I’m sure they’re around inside our hearts, but I just said they were both gone. Oddly, she asked how. Hardly anyone does that. So I gave her the brief three sentence explanation and we moved on. Or so I thought.

Turns out I can’t sleep tonight. Every time I close my eyes, there they are, Mom and Dad. And the memories just keep sliding through my mind. Mostly the memories of that summer day when my cell rang and I heard about Mom, and that early winter morning at work when both brothers called independently, their ragged voices supporting the truth of what they were saying about Dad, even though my mind refused to believe it. And the memories of standing in a UPS store late that night, two days before Christmas, waiting for a fax from the funeral home; a form for me to sign giving permission to the funeral home to cremate Dad without us seeing him. Because the damage from the semi truck crash was so great they said. And the employees in the UPS store laughing and goofing around behind the counter, and my husband getting angry with them. And me pulling him away and saying it was OK, they didn’t know. And memories of us sitting around the Christmas tree that Dad put up before he headed out to the airport that year, waiting for Christmas Day to be over so that we could start calling his friends. We didn’t want to ruin Christmas for them.

So this night I try to exercise those ghosts. But it isn’t working. Funny how you think you’re moving along, doing pretty good, and an innocent question, a quick reply can stay inside your head until you relax, and then you’re just blindsided again. And you realize that four years isn’t so long, and yet you keep it all to yourself because the rest of the world rightly has moved on, and you don’t want to drag them all through this again. And when your husband goes to bed after wondering aloud why you’re still up you just say simply that you can’t sleep and let it go.

Because really, what changes if you try to describe the inside of your eyelids to anyone else? The movie playing there is a private showing. And the only way you can get it to stop playing is to let it go on until it wears you down and you finally sleep. And tomorrow will be OK.


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When life's blocks come tumbling down

Sometimes you can be going along building your life, stacking your blocks so to speak without much concern for whether their height can be supported by their strength. Just blindly building the way you figure you’re supposed to, when suddenly someone pulls the string that brings it all down. Even when you know there’s a string attached it can still hurt when the blocks come tumbling down. Oh maybe not right away, maybe right at the moment you’re sort of relieved that they fell, because you always thought they might, and worrying about it was worse than experiencing it. But still. The actual crash is bound to hurt eventually. When you let it.

When you’re ready you can start picking up your life’s blocks. Examine each and figure out which blocks to keep for the new foundation and which to let go. You’ll be redesigning life as it is going to be from now on, and that’s OK. Rebuild that foundation by accepting the strength you find from family and friends, and start building that new life. After your mourn what was you can appreciate what is.

image:  Christmas present, circa 1966


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Advice for someone who is moving on

Sometimes things just change in life and it becomes time to move along. It’s never easy and it’s likely to hurt. A whole bunch. But moving on can also be healing; an exciting time of new beginnings, hopeful new starts heading in new directions, brave explorations of the soul and the world. The best part of considering a move is thinking about all the possibilities, but sometimes having so many options can be overwhelming. My advice is to give yourself time and space for quiet reflection, don’t let anything or anyone interfere with that time. Eventually you, and only you will know which path is the best one for you at this particular place in your life. You’ve made huge strides while taking baby steps through this process of change. Be proud of the distance you’ve come, and don’t be afraid of what still has to be done. You have the basis for building a pretty wonderful, fulfilling life again. Just give yourself time to accomplish all you wish for, and make sure you give yourself credit for all you’ve done along the way.

After all, if you think about it, we’re all moving on.

Photo: My sister and me making one of our first moves many years ago.


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SURPRISE!! New toy!

Katie got a gift from the UPS man this morning. The box was addressed to her, and neither I nor my husband had purchased anything for her. So it was with a sense of mystery that we opened the box. Katie was excited, how she knew is beyond me. Turned out to be a gift from her Uncle P in North Carolina, a bright pink and green Soft Bite Dog Disc to play Frisbee with! She instantly grabbed it and ran around the house shaking her head in an attempt to kill it.

Eventually we got it away from her, took off the tag and tossed it. Turns out we are not expert at tossing, but we will get better. She actually caught several of them, though I didn’t get good pictures of her. She loves it.

Thanks Uncle P! This evening she is napping, exhausted from all the fun. Probably dreaming of becoming a famous frisbee dog. Maybe she can support us in our old age.

We need more practice!


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56th Wedding Anniversary

We woke to frost on the ground today, seems too early, but maybe not. It would have been my parents’ 56th wedding anniversary, if they were still living. They spent their honeymoon camping at Point Betsie up near Traverse City…in a tent. I was thinking about camping in a tent on a frosty morning up north as I took the dog out this morning, while bundled up in a heavy coat and gloves. And just because I’m thinking about them, I’ll show you a few pictures:

This is their wedding day in 1952, at Mom’s childhood home in Ann Arbor…

…and in front of their first home in the mid 50’s.

It’s hard to find a picture of just them together in the 60’s; there always seems to be a few kids around!

The whole family in the 70’s…

…and just them at the lake in the mid 80’s.

At my house in 1993…

…in their own yard later in the 90’s…

…and heading off to church circa 2002.

I didn’t see much aging in them, and looking at these pictures I can see why…it was so gradual. When I think that I am already as old as my mother was when they moved so far away to Alabama, I am surprised. Back then, in the early 80’s, I thought she was pretty old…but yet today I don’t feel old at all. Most of the time anyway. I sure wish they were still around so that I could call them and say “Happy Anniversary!” I have to believe they are celebrating their anniversary privately…and together. But probably not in a tent.


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Just a bunch of thoughts

To borrow a theme from a few blogger friends here are some unrelated thoughts, in no particular order:

Today I attended a half day seminar on oral histories put on by the Michigan Historical Society. It’s a concept I’m very interested in, and I thought the $10.00 fee to attend was reasonable for an unemployed librarian. I learned a lot, and am somewhat overwhelmed. Now I need to figure out what to do with the information and how to get more involved. I hope that, aside from enjoying working with oral histories, this may be a step to differentiate me from other library candidates when a position opens up somewhere near home. Plus it was fun to be in a library (it was held at a library not to far away) and be sitting with librarians!

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Last night was week five of intermediate obedience. Katie and I had a good time, and we got to practice heeling OFF LEASH for the very first time! Good thing we were indoors! Still, it was stressful for me to think I didn’t have total control over her. But to be honest she did pretty darn good, except when she’d find a fallen treat along the way and stop to gobble it down. For a dog that initially wasn’t interested in treats while we were in school, she has certainly come out of her shell! I don’t think she even realized she wasn’t on the leash most of the time. And to top off our evening the instructor actually used her as a demonstration about a new skill because she knew that Katie already knew how to do a right finish (walking around me and sitting on my left side). So I got to watch Katie work from a ways away, which was enlightening. When I’m not concentrating so hard on getting her to do stuff, and when she isn’t sitting right next to me, with me looking down at her, I can see that she is a very pretty little girl! Rather than thinking how irritating she is when she won’t sit, or won’t stay, or won’t…well you know. And I know I’m still her favorite; when she got her treat from the instructor for doing the right finish, she glanced over, realized I wasn’t next to her and ran at top speed back to me. I could she in her face that she was saying “MAMA! MAMA! I got a TREAT!”

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I haven’t finished staining the deck. It’s been too rainy. Oh darn.

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I have started picking up “stuff” around the house. There is so much stuff it’s been overwhelming. So I decided to just work on one little part each night. Tonight while cleaning up a part of the closet I found a photograph of Bonnie, our previous sheltie, taken before she was so old. Gosh she was a cute dog! I showed the picture to Katie but I don’t think she cared.

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I also found some lyrics to a song that I wrote down while I was in Alabama. The first evening I was there I sat at my mother’s piano. Randomly I opened a song book (Alfred’s Basic Adult All-Time Favorites) that she used to use when she went to senior housing to play for sing-a-longs. I slowly picked the melody out, then tried to play it with the chords. (I had piano lessons when I was ten, for one very long year.) I could sort of play this simple song. Then I went back and read the lyrics and wondered how I had come to open this particular book to this particular song out of all the music piled on her piano:

There’s a Long Long Trail, by Stoddard King, music by Zo Elliot

Theres a long, long trail awinding into the land of my dreams,

Where the nightingales are singing and a white moon beams

There’s a long long night of waiting

Until my dreams all come true,

Till the day when I’ll be going

Down that long, long trail to you.

I wonder how I came to play this piece, because sometimes I think it’s a long long time until I get to see her again.


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A treat, and it's not even Halloween!

I spent the evenings in Ann Arbor twice this weekend. What a treat! Friday night I attended a rare book event, where I got to look at some of the University’s treasures and hear a few words from the University’s Librarian on the future of books in this digital age. This was held at the Hatcher Graduate Library reading room, a beautiful place to show off the rare books we seldom get to see. It felt comfortableto be back on campus, and back in a library. And the talk reminded me of some of the arguments and discussion we’d had during classes for the previous two years. Where will digital processes and the internet take us? How will it change what we’ve known in the past as libraries? Only the phantom knows…

Saturday night I was lucky enough to attend an Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra concert at the Michigan Theater. That was simply wonderful. We went to the informational talk prior to the concert, given by the composer of one piece, the piano soloist of another piece and the orchestra conductor who explained the third piece. The information we gained from that talk served to heighten our enjoyment of the music itself during the performance. The highlight of the concert for me was the first piece, “Three Poems by Walt Whitman” which was composed by Paul Fetler Mr. Fetler was at the performance and talked prior to the start, about how and why he composed the piece of music. It was so special to hear the inside story from the composer himself! The music supported the narrative of three of Walt Whitman’s poems, and the entire thing was at once beautifu as well as exciting. I have to say that listening to this concert made me want to go dust off the clarinet and rejoin a community band somewhere near me. And get back on track with finding oboe lessons! Those of you living in the Ann Arbor area should be proud of the treasure you have in the talented Ann Arbor Symphony. If you haven’t gone to one of their concerts, consider it. This was the first concert of their 80th season…there is more good music to come.

Thanks Aunt B for the tickets to both events! I had a wonderful time!