What about that wind and the red shovel I left out which now
clatters against the porch?
Last week a foot of snow spent my back and this week I laid low.
Contentedly.
Until this noisy wind reminds me I am alone.
Like jet plane rising and constant.
Then silent.
A capricious personality.
Needs to be known and then slips away.
For my house to creak the force is strong.
This house, big, and somewhat new, took so long to feel familiar.
Too clean and modern.
Like a fancy hotel room. Comfortable but lacking.
But always warm even when the wind growls.
Like tonight, a wet melty December day when
Snow should be blowing
But the climate shifts and hooks my children's anxiety inside me
And the hot tea tries to comfort a loneliness
And remnants of fall leaves sound against the clapboards.
And I think of no one. 

2016?


WIND
Does it roar? Whistle. Growl. Knock on the door? Scare me? No

"I am here for you"

I know you are there for me"

"I know that you suffer"

"I suffer.  I try my best--Please help me"

Thich Nhat Hanh

I think yesterday was a shift for my relationship with Ron.  He accepts me in a way that no one other has.  He is here for me.  He will still irritate me by who he is....but I cannot overlook his acceptance for me and many others.  Everyone loves Ron.

Dinner with my sister and her husband.

Condense is my only recourse.

A wave of meaningless words push me into anger.
Blather and blab with no watching where the words land.

And there are no questions.
No curiosity.
Nothing exists except ones own blab.

Us at the the table nod.
Look at Tv or phones.
If the thought bubbles could speak there would be far flung entries into this one-sided lecture that never resembles a conversation.

Conversation? Nope. Not for a second.
A lecture.
A lousy lecture.
'Stupid people' says my building anger.

Yet she is my sister.  And I adamantly believe that there is someone IN there who can relate to me.
We had some shared experiences.
I refuse to give up.

I head into the night optimistic that I can make conversation that will have meaning.
Ron says forget it.
I say NO....But can't think of anything to talk about.

Should I quit?

And we sit in a mess with cell phone for light looking at page upon page of photos.
Sex museum
Penis bowl
Him on a phallus...be it a child's riding toy or a cannon.  giggle giggle.

I'm almost nauseous.
Let it go?
sad

Darling I am here for you.

Fuck I hate these people.  I am not them....  Yet she is the closest thing to my past and she is useless.  She cannot link me to myself or my past.

Let it go.

Poetic style perhaps can condense all the words, feelings and thoughts that course through.

Robin Williams kills himself.  This should not have to be.  We are smarter than that. Meds or help should exist.

I make a blueberry peach pie and lap up the warmth and sweet and tang off my finger swabbed across the plate.  Tongue lick too.  More later.

DOUGH
1/3 cup unsalted butter
1/3 cup coconut oil
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups sifted flour
5 T cold h2o

Cut butter and coconut together with the salt/flour.  Pea size. Add water.  Gather up into ball and refrigerate.

Roll.

2 pints blues
1 yogurt container of peaches defrosted from last years harvest

add 2T of cornstarch to a bit of the peach juice and then mix all together.  (I left some of the corn starch liquid out....shouldn't have.  Too juicy of a pie....but delish nevertheless.

Rain rain rain.  Green.
Full belly
Empty heart.
Thirst for something.

Thoughts ramble over the past few weeks. Seeing Aaron and his heartbreak.  His first big love and first big 'break'.  Yet I see how Aaron and Jenna and Ali can practice their emotional intelligence!  Especially with each other.  I'm impressed.  I joked as Aaron and Jenna talked in his room, he laying on his bed and she sitting vigil with him.  They talked about having feelings.  Being and feeling the 'fool' if necessary.  Moving through the feelings will lead you out.  I joked....feigned rising and leaving...."my work is done here...you two have what it takes"  Emotional intelligence!

Next Aaron goes to Argentina.  Jenna back to Brandeis.  Ali back to Connecticut College.  I finish up the land sale to the town and then the next project begins!  May go back to a career counselor.  So wonderful to have her hold the space for me to make these next steps.

Aunt Marilyn:  spent the day with her yesterday in RI.  She is fun and lively.  Great to talk with.  I often have an slightly empty feeling as I leave.  I notice that when I bring up the juicy emotional stuff....she moves on quickly.  It's ok.  She is old and of another generation.  She does what she knows.  Stays in her comfort zone. It's like being with my mother (gogo) but better.  Cuz she doesn't really push my buttons.  And then there is a sad feeling cuz perhaps I may even miss my mother, as limited as she was.

You are not special.

I think, maybe I hope, that I worked this into the raising of my children.  Seems odd.  Of course I told them they are special. Yet I pray I taught them that they were also as special as the next kid.  Sure, my kids got all the good stuff. Love and equipment for sports and dance and skiing. (ha) Oh and food and shelter. Isn't that what mattered. Yet I always let them know that just because we could afford something it didn't mean that we would get that something.

And now my children are careful.  They understand money and responsibility. They, all 3, are hard workers.  Phew.  I didn't fuck up.  I can barely remember what I said yet I hear my words coming back to me through their voices. I can't wait to have grandchildren to hear the voices of my children as they parent.  I have total faith that they will do fine.

Photos on the fridge

When one project winds down a funny feeling arises.  Pretty simply: Anxiety. What's next?  I avoid.  I think about meditating in hopes to focus and tackle my new open time. But I don't meditate.  Prioritize then.  Make lists.  Or...click email again.  Check FB again.  Freecycle more plastic shit.  Everything that permanently leaves the house makes me feel lighter. So far with all that has gone out the door never have I thought about the THINGS later and wish I still had them.  Bye bye.

"If it's not beautiful or useful get rid of it".  (Martha). That's the extreme end of the purge.
"Have everything in your visual field be something that pleases you".  That's the dream.

So I'm a box-method purger.  If I can't get it out the door, then I put it in a box destined for the basement.  Once it's been there a few months or years...when I come across it again, with full knowledge that I haven't missed it and I can't even remember what's in it...then I off load it.

Today I'm thinking about clearing off the fridge.  Not a big task.  But the visual chaos needs some calming.   When I write something like this previous sentence....then I really know I have to get a job/life.  My life is reduced to clearing off the photos on the fridge!

Mothering differently

March 25, 2014

How many 'real' conversations did I have with my mother?

I'm chewing on celery with pb and raisins....ants on a log.  As I put away the pb I look at the photos on the fridge.  My aunt and mother, (sisters) stare at me. They look so alike.  My aunt will be 85 this year.  My mother, now gone for 5 years.  She was about 80 when she died.  I was about 54. I'm guessing; close enough.  (I eschew numbers at ever turn and at all costs).  Yet I always want to quantify.  It hits me.  If I lived at home for 18 years and was the youngest of 3 children then how many REAL conversations did I have with my mother?  How much time did she even have for me? How many times did my mother kiss me goodnight?  Goodnight kisses ended when I was probably 8. That'd be 2,830....if I got one every night.   But conversations?  Maybe 5.  Maybe 10.  Maybe a dozen.  My mom wasn't a deep person. She didn't ask questions.  Her life was to be lived as a picture.  You live the image and you have attained the image.  Suddenly I think of how little I understood my mother.  I barely think about her now. I don't remember being mothered by her. Though perhaps her version of mothering me was to get me to act and dress as she thought I should....like her.   I do remember fighting her at every turn.  I didn't make it easy for her to mother me....but I also knew that her 'mothering' was limited and I was fighting for her to show up in a way that perhaps just wasn't possible.

My relationship with my children is so entirely different than mine was with my mother.
And for that I am so grateful.