musings | Change Is Hard

February 8, 2015
by dawnkinster 19 Comments

Exercising with Aunt Vi

I went to visit Aunt Vi this afternoon. She’s 99 and able to live in her own apartment with a little help doing the cleaning and laundry and grocery shopping. She hasn’t been outside for anything other than doctor appointments for a good long while and she’s getting a bit of cabin fever. She has her bird Buddy as company; we tried to get him to come out and play so that I could get a picture of him on her shoulder but he wasn’t having anything to do with me. I guess he’s camera shy.

Come out and play!

We talked a lot about the old days, the early years of her marriage and stories of when she worked at the local hospital. She remembered getting off work late at night after a snow storm and not being able to find her car in the parking lot. I guess in those days there was no such thing as a remote start. We laughed about her having to dig through the snow with her hands to open the truck and retrieve the shovel so she could dig herself out of the parking lot. She shook her head in wonder at the things she used to do when she was younger.

I shook my head in wonder too.

She was having a good day, so she showed me the exercises she does every day to stay loose. Standing up and hanging onto her walker she did knee lifts. Twenty on each side. I told her I wanted to take her picture doing those and she laughed and sat down. Then she made me do them. I was not as graceful and luckily there are no pictures of that either. I did manage to get a couple of her using her stretchy bands. She works her legs….

Keeping the legs in shape.

…and her arms every day.

Strong arms!

I realized she’s doing more exercise than I am, even though I’m the one carrying the Fitbit in my pocket. I feel guilty.

I’ve often wondered what a 99 year old thinks about as she sits in her apartment watching the world go by day after day. Turns out she thinks a lot about the old days, her son, her sisters and brothers, her parents. The same things we think about when we take the time to sit down and reflect. She says she doesn’t plan anything out in the future, she just enjoys today. I said that was a lesson for all of us to learn – to just enjoy today.

She says she’s tired and frustrated that her body doesn’t work the way it used to. She’s not used to accepting help and it still bugs her that she has to. But she’s grateful to be living on her own in her apartment, and she’s happy that she has friends and family that visit. Still, she knows there’s not much to look forward to and sometimes she gets pensive. She’s had a hard but good life filled with family and love and laughter, but there are only two of her original siblings left now. She’s said so many goodbyes.

Telling stories of the past.

I wonder what I will remember most when I’m 99 and looking back. I wonder what will be the most important accomplishments, the favorite memories, the things I will laugh about, what stories I will tell. I wonder if I will be able to carry 99 as well as she does. I don’t know, she’s set the bar pretty high. I had a good visit with her this afternoon. We’re lucky she’s still around to tell the family stories. And if she keeps on exercising she just might be around to tell us about the good old days for years to come.

I certainly hope so.

Meet Buddy

January 29, 2015
by dawnkinster 22 Comments

You know you’re getting old when….

Most of the time I forget I’m almost finished with my 5th decade of life. I think I’m maybe thirty-something. Forty-five at the most. Then along comes some episode and I realize how old I really am, and particularly how much older than most of the people I work with, play music with, hang out with, go to dog events with.

Etc.

So let me share with you a couple of stories that made me realize I’m no spring chicken anymore. These are just little stories, nothing major, no epic drama.

Still…

It’s cold here in Michigan. Sometimes it’s really cold. We had a couple of weeks earlier this month when the wind was howling and the temps were in single digits. When the walk from office to the car in the evenings was excruciating. I happen to sit by a window up on the fourth floor, looking out over the parking lot and most of the winter people stop by to use my window and their remote starts to get their cars warmed up before they head out into the storm. For most of this winter, and last winter too for that matter, it never occurred to me that my key fob also had a remote start. That I too could have a warm car with ice melting on the windshield by the time I stumbled through the dark and wind to my vehicle.

Last week I paid attention, wrote myself a note which I placed near my keys (“start car”) and actually remembered to use the remote start thingy before getting dressed in hat, coat, scarf, boots, and gloves to head for home. I couldn’t actually see my entire car from my office window, it was parked behind a big van, but I could see the front lights, and they blinked so I figured I was good to go.

Just before I headed for the stairs, now dressed like an Eskimo, I happened to glance outside. Looking at my car I became confused. What was that at the back? Why…it’s the hatch, fully open! And why weren’t the lights still on? And no exhaust coming out of the back? Surely I hadn’t….why yes I had. Instead of pushing the start engine button on my key fob I had pushed the open hatch button. Because they look so much alike, don’t you know.

So not only was my car not warm…it was colder than it had been before. I quietly pushed the ‘open hatch’ button again, watched as it closed and then meekly crept down the 4 flights of stairs and out to my car where I shivered as I drove home. I didn’t tell anyone for a long time. Now I’m sharing with you.

Stop laughing.

Some of you know I’m the librarian for the community band that I’m in. That means that the beginning of most rehearsals is hectic for me as people that have missed previous practices need music. I’m always running around looking for music and making copies. Often they start rehearsing while I’m still off doing something else.

So this week was no exception. I’d put my clarinet together and started to warm up when someone needed something, and then someone else needed something. Before long I’m running around and they’re playing already. Finished with my tasks I rush to sit down in my seat, sharing a stand with the highschool girl next to me who I already know thinks I’m about 95 years old. She looks at me out of the corner of her eye and keeps playing. I suddenly realize I am not carrying my clarinet and I don’t know where I set it down. I scan the room, locate it on a table, go get it and sit back down again, reaching for the top of my head where I keep my glasses when I’m not reading.

They aren’t there.

I don’t remember taking them off while I was running copies, but they could be anywhere. Or maybe I never had them, they could be in the car. I know I can’t read the music without them, but I figure I’ll do the best I can. I push my chair back a bit to be further from the music stand and think “I can see pretty good tonight, maybe I don’t need those glasses anyway,” and I start to play.

The teenager next to me is still watching me out of the corner of her eye.

Sometime in the first piece of music my ear itches and I reach up to scratch it and realize that I’m wearing my glasses. And obviously have been. Which is why my eyes were seeing pretty good. I’ve heard stories about people losing their glasses while they were on top of their heads. But I don’t believe I’ve ever heard of anyone losing their glasses while they were wearing them.

And now you have.

Really.

Stop laughing.

January 15, 2015
by dawnkinster 25 Comments

Planning our escape

Pretty light

This is that in between time here in the Midwest. After the warm holidays filled with lights and family and good food and days off work but before the seed catalogs filled with lush green images of plants and blossoms and the LL Bean catalogs filled with swimsuits and walking shorts fill our mailboxes with hope. For many of us it’s an empty time of year filled with cold windy gray afternoons sandwiched by cold dark mornings and early dark evenings. Some of us can only see endless days of shoveling snow and scraping windshields.

We think it will go on forever.

And so we dream. We dream of warm sandy beaches and blue skies. Palm trees or dessert cacti. Maybe both. And we plan. We look at maps and brochures, scout destinations online. We huddle around our fireplaces or over warm drinks and talk about exotic sights, intoxicating music, crowded markets. Heat. Laughter. Fun.

Sometimes we get to go on those dream vacations. Sometimes it’s not possible. But here’s the thing. While we are dreaming and planning, researching and reading, we experience the fun and sun in a different way. We get to explore the possibilities and the impossibilities. And it is fun. Our souls warm while we dream and plan. The days get lighter, we notice the sun more often.

The weight of winter slips just a bit.

In these last weeks of January take some time to dream, even to plan. Find warmth and fun wherever you can, but be observant. The days are getting longer; soon it will be February and those seed catalogs will be in our mailboxes.

And we will once again shed the gray and move toward the sun.

I’m counting on it.

Pretty bird

January 11, 2015
by dawnkinster 11 Comments

Parenting

I know I’ve talked about this before. And I know, not having kids, that I’m totally unqualified to speak about it. But what’s with parents providing daily, sometimes hourly advice and direction to their kids these days? I sit in a cubicle and am surrounded by parents. Most of them are parents of adult children, children who are off at college or working jobs and living in their own homes. Yet they seem to need to talk to Mom daily.

About every single little thing.

And Mom seems to be the one that orchestrates all decisions, events, discussions and sometimes even meals. Really? These kids can’t decide whether to sell their college books when the news semester starts without discussing it with Mom? They can’t go into their wireless carrier and straighten out a bill without having their Mom call? They need daily prompting from Mom to take stuff out of the freezer for dinner, or to arrange a time when everyone can get together for a holiday meal? They need Mom to negotiate between squabbling siblings?

Huh. I don’t remember ever doing any of that.

When I was in college we only got to call home once a week for a few minutes. And we’d never have called during the day because daytime long distance rates were off the charts. And no way would we have called a parent at work. Ever. For anything.

So as I watched the news last week about the hedge fund manager allegedly shot and killed by his 30 something son because he was contemplating lowering the son’s allowance and was going to stop paying the son’s rent I have to ask the question. How much accountability and responsibility is being given to these adult children? And are parents doing the kids or themselves any favors by being so involved in every single aspect of their children’s lives?

When do their kids get to be the adults?

On the other hand Wednesday of last week I also stopped by a funeral home to pay my family’s respect to the mother of a friend. She died right after the New Year, and was only ill a couple of months. You could see the adult children struggling to accept their loss. It’s a lot, the loss of a mother, for anyone no matter their own age. And as I was driving back to work that afternoon I thought about it all. The helicopter parents. The adult children relying so much on their parents for daily decisions in these times. The way things are so different now than when I was a young adult testing the waters of life. Life without parents.

And I knew for sure that there was at least one set of siblings that would give a lot for a little helicoptering right now from a mom that has moved on to her next adventure. Shoot, if I could I’d call my mom right now and ask her how long it took her to grieve her own mother. And the recipe for that broccoli rice casserole.

I turned out to be who I am because of the way they raised me. They weren’t helicopter parents, but that wasn’t the style in those days. Maybe if I had been born at the end of the last century instead of the middle they would have been coptering around me and my three siblings. Somehow I don’t think so. That doesn’t mean they didn’t love us, it just means they came from stock where you let the kids make their own decisions, good and bad. As long as we didn’t kill anyone in the course of growing up we were allowed to learn our own lessons.

Parents have lots of ways of showing love. Maybe parents of today just show it in a myriad of tiny minute decisions and shows of support. Maybe that’s not all bad. Maybe having a parent that cares is all that matters. Maybe kids will grow up when they have to, helicopter parents or not.

In the end who am I to judge parenting skills. Maybe I’m just feeling envious when I hear all those phone conversations between adult kids and their moms.

Maybe a little helicoptering would be welcome in my world about now.

Maybe I just miss my mom.

Yea, that’s probably it.

I miss my mom.

January 5, 2015
by dawnkinster 11 Comments

Abundance

Abundance of ice.

Abundance: “The great or plentiful amount” as defined in any number of dictionaries. Katybeth over at Odd Loves Company chose tarot cards for some of us at the beginning of the year, then asked us to think about our word, how we could incorporate it into our lives, figure out what it meant to each of us.

My word was abundance.

I sometimes think about abundance when I’m at the grocery store, walking past the wall of cereal choices, or picking through mounds of produce. But most of the time I don’t give it much thought. And surely I am not alone in taking for granted the abundance in my life. Especially the abundance of stuff.

And that’s what it’s all about, right? The abundance of stuff? That’s why we all go to work – to pay for all the stuff; the house, the nice car, the trendy shoes, the best cuts of meat, that great bottle of wine. Because we’re used to having abundance. And we think we’ll be happy once we get that next great thing to add to the abundance we already have. Won’t we?

Abundance of deer food.

But I’ve been thinking small lately. There’s a growing trend of living in tiny houses, and even HGTV has jumped on the band wagon and now has a version of the show House Hunters that follows people looking for a tiny house. I’ve read a few blogs and articles that talk about the lifestyle. I think the most difficult thing is the downsizing, the divesting of a lifetime of accumulated abundance. And if you were to succeed at that…would you no longer have abundance?

Or would you, perhaps, recognize an abundance of a different kind?

Looking through my rose colored glasses I think you’d have an abundance of freedom and an abundance of choices for how to spend your day. And a person living tiny would still have all the abundances that really matter. Family love, good friends, a sense of serenity and peace, quiet times and times to share.

So on this winter weekend as I consider the abundances in my life what do you think? How tiny could you go? Have you looked? Not all tiny houses are log cabins on wheels, I’ve seen some stunning glass and wood houses perched on hills overlooking the woods or grasslands, other tiny places that melt into the landscape and let a person enjoy the abundance that nature has to offer.

It’s a thought.

Tiny is a process.

November 11, 2014
by dawnkinster 14 Comments

A simple thank you

Great Lakes National Cemetery

Today was Veterans Day; the eleventh day of the eleventh month and designated by President Wilson in 1919 as a day to honor those who have given so much so that we here in the United States remain free.

It was a day for all of us to say thank you to those who have served our country in the military.

Flowers amid the stones.

Over hills and across farmland, not far from where I live, is the Great Lakes National Cemetery. It sits on over 500 acres, was opened in 2005 and is the final resting place for thousands, and someday hundreds of thousands, of veterans and their spouses. The numbers, even now, are staggering and very visual as you look across row after row of white marble headstones. You can become lost in the vastness of it.

Thousands of souls.

Or you can stop and wander, read a few of the names and messages found there.

Wandering and reading.

Each stone honors an individual, a veteran yes, but also a person. A person that had a life outside the military, someone who laughed with family, hung out with friends, traveled, went fishing.

Sometimes the story on the headstone is simple.

Pearl Harbor survivor.

And sometimes it gives you just a tiny glimpse of the person who once walked this earth.

Animal lover.

So many of the stones reminds you how short life can be. How short it was for so many.

While we were out there we had something of a flyover. Five sand hill cranes flew in formation directly overhead, crying their own version of a patriotic melody.

In formation.

It seemed fitting.

Today was Veterans Day. But really, shouldn’t we honor those who serve our country every day? Tomorrow, the day after Veterans Day, take a moment and thank a veteran. Smile at them. Shake their hand. Buy them a cup of coffee.

This WW II veteran understood the truth.

Make someone’s day. And yours.

Let’s not forget.

Just say thank you.

November 1, 2014
by dawnkinster 28 Comments

Walking away

Maybe you’ve heard the news story about the man in Denver that went to a football game and disappeared at halftime, leaving behind his friends and his stepson. He’d worked for the friends who took him to the game for years and they called him ‘reliable’ and said he’d never disappear on his own.

Turns out he walked away – walked over 100 miles south. There are lots of questions now and perhaps we’ll never know why he did what he did. I’m sure people are assuming there are mental issues because no sane adult just walks away from family, friends, job, life. Right?

But let’s be honest.

Who among us hasn’t wanted to do what he did, to walk away, drive away, somehow slip into another life. Surely I am not alone. Aren’t there other people out there, approaching the freeway for the early morning commute, who are pulled, almost physically, toward the entrance ramp heading the other way? And who, when driving back to work after lunch hasn’t dreamed of going right on by the building? Haven’t you ever wanted to slide away from adult responsibilities, bills, home repairs, even vet visits and yard work? Haven’t you wanted to ride off into the sunset without thought about the reality of whatever is just beyond the horizon?

So, though I assume this particular adventurer has a big issue, maybe mental, maybe otherwise, I have to give him a bit of credit. He wanted to go and he did. Irresponsible? Certainly. Unfair? Of course. But still. Monday morning, if I headed north instead of south, how long would it be before someone noticed I wasn’t where I was supposed to be? How many hours of freedom would I have before I had to reluctantly head back to real life.

What do you think? Was he crazy? Or just done in, fed up, tired and worn out? And do you ever dream of doing something similar? I do.

And I bet I’m not alone.

September 4, 2014
by dawnkinster 14 Comments

Dreaming….dream dream dream…..dreaming….

I had a dream this morning just before Katie the dog woke me up at 5.

I had to give a talk to a group of people. I didn’t know what the topic was but I was walking there carrying a cement planter filled with soil. On top of the soil were some roses, some with short stems, some with longer stems. I was going to put the roses in some sort of vases I hoped I could find when I got to my destination. I was wearing black pants and a red shirt with a black sweater over it, and carrying a brown cardigan. I thought I’d just put the brown cardigan on when I got there. I was thinking about how to talk about family and garden no matter what the topic was that I was supposed to be speaking on.

Turns out the topic was supposed to be serenity.

So I’m at the venue and carrying this stupid cement planter and the roses are wilting so I set it down on one of the crowded long tables where there were little name plates assigning seats. But all the tables are strewn with other people’s stuff and I can’t find my name. I finally find the name of someone else at work, and I know she’s not coming so I decide to sit in her spot. But my cement planter is now far off on another table and the roses look horrible so I leave it there, and go put on my brown cardigan over my black sweater and red shirt and black pants and I look in the mirror and the combination looks terrible so I’m taking off the sweaters and trying to get organized and think about what I can say about serenity when it’s my turn.

I walk back into the room tucking in my red shirt and say:

“How many of you have a stressful job? Raise your hands. Yep, me too. I work in the mortgage industry. If you looked up serenity in a dictionary on my desk the word wouldn’t even be in there. So I ask you – what do you do to relax once you leave that stressful job? Me? I go work in the garden. Well, it’s not really a garden per se, it’s pretty full of weeds, but if you go out and pull weeds for an hour and let your mind go blank you’ll relax and at the end you’ll have something concrete to show for it too. I also travel. Last week I went swimming. Well, not really swimming exactly, we went to New Hampshire and the ocean was so cold I could only run in and out. We went to visit my Aunt on my Dad’s side of the family. She wasn’t home. We knew she wasn’t going to be home but we went to visit anyway just to relax. New Hampshire is serene. I think my Uncle was serene before he died. He was over ninety. Husband’s aunt is going to be 99 this month and she seems serene too. Maybe you learn to be that way the older you get. Maybe as you age you really do learn not to let stuff get to you. Maybe as the years go by the serenity piles up. Maybe it’s not that I’m stressed, maybe it’s just that I’m too young to recognize serenity. Maybe it’s an acquired skill.”

So.

Lesson learned from this dream? Find some serenity today no matter how old or young you are.

And smell a rose along the way.

Katie says HI to everybody!

Wanna play?

August 24, 2014
by dawnkinster 19 Comments

What’s to miss about running.

Once upon a time a long time ago I use to run. I was never fast but I got to the finish line. I used to train for races along with a group of women I’d met online, and then in person at races, and then in person just because they are really cool women. Then I got busy and I didn’t train as carefully as I should have and I tried to get ready for a half marathon having not run for awhile. I ran too much too soon and too far and I suffered a hairline fracture in my foot.

The wheelers get ready to start their race.

I knew as I was going the longer distances that something was wrong. I knew the morning of the race as I got up before light and packed the car with all the essentials, warm up clothes, clothes for after, water, food, extra socks, pins, number, that I shouldn’t be running this race. Still. I had trained for it. People were expecting me. It was an inaugural half marathon through a pretty part of the country.

I wanted to do it.

During the drive to the appointed meeting place I reached over in the dark to the stack of clothing on the other seat. I didn’t feel my race bib with it’s number, that I KNEW I had put on the top of the pile. I pulled into an empty parking lot and stopped under a light. I searched the car. No bib. I drove frantically home and searched the house. No bib.

It was a sign, I decided, that I wasn’t supposed to run this race. I called my friend and told her I wasn’t coming. Then I went back to bed.

And I never seriously ran again. It’s hard to start from scratch. It takes dedication and time and resolve. And I can’t seem to get out the door. It’s been years, the stress fracture is as healed as it’s going to be. I’ve gone to a foot specialist and purchased custom orthotics. I could do it.

Anticipation before the race.

I see runners when I’m driving to and from work, or when we’re on trips. Portland Maine seemed to be the capital of young athletic fit bodies running half dressed through the streets. All seem to float effortlessly. I become enamored again with the concept.

But I don’t float. I slog and running is not as romantic as I remembered.

Here they come!

This weekend I went up to Flint to see the start of the Crim Festival of Races. Ten thousand plus runners and their supporters were celebrating healthy activity, and the love of running. I felt the familiar twinge. No not in my foot; in my heart. I miss the sense of community running gave me. I could do that again, I thought to myself.

In order to run you just have to start.

Just start.

August 16, 2014
by dawnkinster 12 Comments

One last hour

If I could have one hour to spend with anyone, living or dead, I’d spend it with my mother.

I woke last night at 1:00 in the morning with that sentence running through my head. I slowed my thoughts down a bit and explored the concept. Was I sure it would be my mother? Out of all the people in the world, back through all eternity?

Yes, if it could only be one, than she was it.

I’d sit across a small table from her, out on a bluff above the ocean on a pretty spring day with seabirds floating on a breeze that made the grasses dance. I’d ask her questions. How long did it take you to grieve your mother; when did you start to feel better? When grandma died, so long after grandpa, did you feel like an orphan even though you were an adult? What’s heaven like anyway? Is dad there with you every day? Did you get to see your folks, and your own grandparents? Your brother? Can you really see us down here? All the time? Or just when we want you to, because sometimes I do stuff I’d rather you didn’t know about. What’s the secret ingredient in your potato salad?

I’d ask questions, but mostly I’d just sit and listen and look. I’d memorize her face and her voice, soak in the ‘momness’ of her. File it away to be taken out and examined later. And when the hour was gone saying goodbye would be excruciating. But no more excruciating than these past ten years have been, no more excruciating than the next ten will be. I’d hug her tight until she disappeared – until she became nothing but a wisp of sweet air.

And then I’d find myself hugging only me.

Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Tag Archives: musings