Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Category Archives: memories


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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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A skunking good tale.

Bonnie: May 1992 – February 2007

I read a column in the Detroit paper the other day, describing a dog’s skunk adventure at 3 in the morning. It made me laugh out loud and recall my first skunk experience during the early years of living rurally. This story’s heroine is not current dog Katie, but the previous sheltie Bonnie. Well, heroine might be too strong. Lets just call her the lead drama queen. Though I had a pretty important supporting role. As it turned out.

I worked back then in the very stressful demanding mortgage industry, lots of hours, lots of late nights. Poor Bonnie waited patiently for me every night, but was always ready to run out and do her thing as soon as I got home. This particular night I let her out the front door, and followed her out as I did every night. She ran over the berm by the garage to go to her favorite wetting spot. Not unusual. What was unusual is that she ran back almost immediately, shaking her head and coughing. I didn’t figure it out immediately, but the smell followed her. Of course I panicked, and we both ran into the house. Bad idea. She immediately began to rub her face on all the furniture, with me running after her yelling to stop! Now! Really! Stop! The smell was..well…horrendous is a kind word for it.

I eventually got her shepherded down to her kennel in the basement. Not finding any dog shampoo I headed back out, still in business suit and heels to a neighborhood convenience store, looking for tomato juice. I walked the isles twice before approaching the register in the front. I asked if they had any tomato juice, the attendant said, no…then paused as my smell arrived…and apologized profusely that they didn’t, and offered her condolences. I headed further into town to the larger grocery store. It was going on 11:00 p.m. My feet hurt. So did my head.

At the grocery store I quickly grabbed a couple of cans of tomato juice and a big bottle of dog shampoo. I headed to the express lane (this was before there were such things as self checking) and waited in a long line. The people in front of me glanced at me, wrinkled their noses and moved almost imperceptibly forward, away from me. When it was finally my turn and I put the cans of tomato juice and bottle of dog shampoo on the conveyor belt the cashier asked how my day had been. I replied that I was buying tomato juice and dog shampoo. She finally got a whiff of me and said she was sorry. But as I was picking up my bag of goodies she still sang out that I should “have a nice evening!” Yeah. Right.

Back at the house I loaded the dog into the laundry tub and poured tomato juice all over her. Then I shampooed her with the dog shampoo. And then I rinsed and repeated. I can tell you with authority that tomato juice merely makes your skunky dog an orange skunky dog. She smelled still, ode of skunk with a faint tomato base. Yummy. It was late and I had to be at work early, so I gave up on the dog, confined her to her kennel and went to take a shower. I showered until there was no more hot water. In the morning I showered again until the hot water ran out.

I dragged myself into work, exhausted but determined to get a lot of work done. I sat quietly in my cubicle while the rest of the staff came in. My neighbor in the adjoining cube sat down, turned her computer on and called over the wall, “Hey Dawn! Did you smell skunk when you walked in here this morning?” DRATS! I didn’t let on that I did, and hoped I could finish out the day, but by afternoon she was having headaches and could still smell skunk, so I went into my boss and told him the (short version) story and went home. Walking in the door I realized the house reeked of skunk. I took the dog to the groomer for a skunk bath. But it took almost a month before the smell was gone from the house.

Poor Bonnie, she got skunked two more times in her life. I learned not to let her inside, and not to waste my time with tomato juice; just schedule the groomer’s skunk bath. I’m pretty sure that if Katie ever gets to run free she’ll be skunked too. I’ve got the groomer phone number on speed dial.

Katie: born December 2006

Still skunk free…knock on wood.


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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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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!

**

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!”

**

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

**

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.

**

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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Mom

Today is the fourth anniversary of Mom’s death. Time really does help, though I wouldn’t have believed it back then. I’ve been working on a stack of photos, a mixture of old and new, pictures that I stole out of her photo albums four years ago and that I will put back into those albums soon. It’s an eclectic mix of times in our family, and for the past several days I’ve been pulling out photos that included Mom. There aren’t so many, she was usually the photographer. I have lots of great images of the four kids, but few of her.

It has always been difficult to imagine Mom as anything other than my mom. But as I sort through these photos I begin to see her as a person, separate, though always connected, to her role as a mother. Most of the pictures have some or all of us in them. But these few simple pictures spanning fifty years, which are spread out before me encapsulate her adult life. They make her more real to me, a person with more facets and interests than the mother I knew way back then. In these photos I can see her evolve.

I miss her. Every single day. And I don’t think that is going to change; but then I don’t think I’d want it to change. I’m lucky that I have these memories, a lot of pictures, (hundreds more than the few I borrowed late that night in July of 2004 wait for me back at the lake house), and some pretty cool stories to tell. I was very lucky to have her as my Mom.

Thanks Mom, see you later.


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Cherries and lemonade

This morning I went to an orchard and picked several pounds of tart cherries. This is a family tradition that I carry out most years; the orchard I visit is the same one we used to go to as kids with Mom and Dad. Spicers Orchards has dwarf trees and no ladders; it was the perfect playground for four rambunctious kids. And we picked a lot of cherries too!

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Many years when I go there I feel somewhat sad because I don’t have any of my family there with me anymore. Sometimes I would catch myself looking for my parents among the trees laden with fruit. Sometimes I’d just tear up at memories. But today there were fewer young families, and English was not the predominent language I heard, so I found myself remembering less and enjoying a beautiful day in the beautiful orchard. I did see an older couple that reminded me of my parents, and instead of feeling sad I just smiled at the familiarity of it.

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As the morning moved into afternoon more families arrived and I heard bits and pieces of conversations that made me laugh. “I found one, I found one!” screamed one little girl as she carefully placed one cherry in the bottom of her bucket, crouched among trees heavy with fruit. “I have to go potty!” called another child. His father replied “You should have gone while we were up at the store, you’ll have to wait.” Right I thought, THAT won’t last long. Soon…”I’m taking Anthony to the potty.” called a young mother. “Get down from that tree!” “Just a little bit longer, we’ll go soon.” “Stop hitting your sister.” It all sounded so familiar.

The orchard is getting more commercial now, with rides out to the strawberry patches on trailers pulled by tractors, and employees walking through the orchard to see if we were doing alright. The young man in the Spicer shirt and straw hat that stopped to check on me asked if I had any questions about the orchard. I replied I didn’t think so, I’d been coming here since I was six. He looked at me for a moment and then said “That’s a really long time.” I smiled and said yes it was, and he wandered off.

After I filled my bucket I wandered back up to the store to pay, stopping to watch the automatic pitting machine that has been there as far back as I can remember.

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Then I took the back roads home, like I usually do, enjoying the farm country, the horses in their pastures, the fields of corn that are “knee high by the fourth of July” this year. As I was enjoying the scenery I noticed a young girl by the side of the road with a sign for lemonade. I remembered doing the same thing at her age, and how no one ever stopped. I contemplated that for a couple more miles, and then took the next road to the right and went around the big country block, heading back to buy some “ICE COLD LEMONADE” from her. I’m glad I did, because I came across this field of wheat, browning in the July sun. It was so spectatcular that I had to stop and take a picture.

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As for the lemonade? Well, it wasn’t ice cold, and it was a bit watered down. But it was the best lemonade I’ve had in a really long time. Her smile as I paid my 50 cents confirmed it.

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Peaches and Love

I cut up a fresh peach this morning, put it into my cereal bowl and was transported back in time sixteen years. In early August of 1992 my husband and I traveled to Houston for a week in order to take care of my best friend who was living in an apartment there while being treated for leukemia. Her husband had been there with her for many weeks, and needed a break to go home and check on the mail, their home and their dogs.

On our way to Houston we stopped in Alabama for a day or two. It was just past the end of peach season there and Mom carefully peeled one of the last of the precious fruits into our morning breakfast bowls. The flavor was indescribably wonderful, sweet and smooth, the perfect description of a hot summer day. After breakfast there was one small peach left, enough for her and Dad to share that evening over ice cream, but instead she wrapped it up in some paper towels and put it into a lunch sack for me to take on the plane to Houston. For my best friend who had been just another kid and one of the family when we were growing up. I carried that peach carefully on the plane and in the car to the chilly apartment near the hospital. And on one of her better days my friend, who barely ate anything anymore, enjoyed her own slice of a familiar summer day as she slowly savored that last peach of the year. She said it was the best thing she’d ever eaten and I relayed that message to my mother when Sallie died two months later.

This morning as I slice a peach into my breakfast bowl I remember them both, my mother and Sallie. And I remember a time when a fresh ripe peach symbolized love.