Friday Haiku, Take II ~ by Jay

Confusing morning.
Lost my keys, then tried writing
Haiku with the wrong month.

Enough of winter.
I am ready for spring, but
We have miles to go.

Just An Old-Fashioned Love Song ~ by Jay

Chally was in a soppy mood (her words, not mine) and asked for love stories over at Feministe. I've told our story hundreds of times over the years; in the last six months, I've come to understand the first few chapters very differently.

Sam and I went to college together, and we don't remember our first meeting. We just knew each other - we lived in the same dorm and saw each other at meals and at parties. I already had a boyfriend at another school; he started dating one of our classmates early sophomore year. By the time he moved in with some friends of mine, senior year, we were both unattached and figuring we'd stay that way. Who starts a relationship right before graduation?

Well, we do. We started at a party in January, and we had a series of rational conversations about how ridiculous it would be to start dating, and then we did it anyway. He'd tell me he couldn't get serious about someone, and I'd say "fine", and he'd leave - and then he'd come back. So we dated ("just for fun") all through spring semester and graduation, and then we moved in together ("just for the summer") because Sam had a job on campus and I was working as a volunteer at the local hospital. We had fun together. We could talk about anything and everything. We made each other laugh. Sam was smart and cute and caring and didn't have a misogynist bone in his body, and I loved him more each day we spent together, but it looked like those days wouldn't last.

We spent much of the summer talking about the fall. This was 1982, before Email and cellphones; a long-distance relationship meant long-distance phone bills and lots of letters. On paper. We didn't want to break up, but Sam was also really clear that he didn't think he could ever get married and he certainly didn't think he'd ever want kids. He grew up eyewitness to a bad marriage, convinced that it was his father's fault and that he was so much like his father that he would also be unable to sustain a positive relationship. So we talked about breaking up, and he didn't want to do that either. We went off to school 3,000 miles apart at the end of August.

We did break up, about a month later, and after a week Sam called and said "I miss you". We learned that we needed to talk on the phone every day, even if it was only for a few minutes; Sam learned to write love letters. I sent him poems on scraps of paper torn out of my class notebooks. At Thanksgiving, I flew out for a wedding and we had three precious days together - and the last night, Sam said "I would be willing to do this for four years if it meant I didn't have to lose you". I was tired and scared and sad and lonely, about to get on a plane and start sleeping by myself again, and I had already done the long-distance thing once and nearly wrecked my life. I said "I can't do this for four years without a comittment. I can't do this unless we get engaged". He said nothing at all. I got on the plane, and somehow I managed to take my finals and pass them.

Three weeks later Sam came home for Christmas. We took the train up to his parents' house together, and we ate dinner Christmas Eve and opened presents and went to church, and every moment we were alone we talked. He was still terrified of marriage, and I was still sure I couldn't tolerate what we were doing without it. Finally, late on Christmas night, he said "OK, I'll guess I'll marry you".

We used to joke about the way he didn't propose. Under those jokes was my conviction that I had dragged Sam into marriage. I gave him an ultimatum. He didn't really want to marry me; I forced him into it. That story fit my pre-existing insecurities. Every time Sam pulled away from me, every time I felt more distance from him than I wanted, I told myself that story again and heard the refrain he doesn't really love me, or at least he doesn't love me as much as I love him. And in all of that I forgot the beginning - I forgot that the first night we'd agreed we wouldn't get involved, and then he came back. Night after night, he came back. He told me he wouldn't and then he did.

Sometime last year, we were talking about that first night and I said "why did you come over to me at that party"? Sam smiled and said "I think I was already smitten and I just couldn't admit it to myself". Smitten. I looked at him and all of a sudden I remembered that it was his choice to come back that first week in January, and he was the one who called me when we broke up in September. He came back. I didn't force him. I didn't drag him. That ultimatum was an honest statement of what I needed - and Sam loved me so much he agreed to get married even though it terrified him. Sam, my smart, strong, skilled Sam, didn't think he could figure out how to be a good husband, but he loved me so much he was willing to try, and it took me 25 years to figure that out.

Even old stories look different when you re-read them. We're still writing this one, and every chapter makes it richer and stronger.

Conversations With my Daughter ~ by Jay

Mommy, Laura's boyfriend has a niece who's 20 years old. Her name is Christy.

That's nice.

What's she in our family?

Mishpocha.

Poem For The Day of Shabbat ~ by Jay

(written in response to the rabbi's d'var torah)

Aleph

Beginning

Silent moment

of infinite possibility

All that is, all that could be

Waits within the word, to be created

In breath, in breadth, in the depth of the future.

Light ~ by Jay

When I started gratitude blogging about two weeks ago, I was afraid. Life was piling in on me and I could feel that coil of anxiety, the sense of isolation and powerlessness and invisibility tightening around my chest. Familiar feelings. Frightening feelings.

I knew I needed to do something, and that's why I started gratitude blogging. It helped. A couple of weekends off and a fit of home repair and remodeling helped, too. Today I realized that I felt good again - and that part of what I'd been feeling was the fear of falling down the rabbit hole. I've had three episodes of depression in my life; the last and most severe started in the mid-1990s and finally resolved in 2001. The anxiety started sometime during my internship in 1986 and didn't completely resolve until last year. I don't think I trusted my recovery until today. To come back out of that place of fear without being pulled under, to find my equilibrium again, is such a gift.

I am grateful for peace.

Almost, but not quite ~ by Tigermom

Jay and I have had plans for months to meet for lunch tomorrow.

I treasure these times.

They are few and far between. They are soul enriching. They fill me with warmth and laughter. We stretch the time to the very limits of what is available.

But my baby cub was home with a GI bug all day today and still looks like a wet dishrag. No way should he be in school tomorrow.

I will miss you Jay! Paying bills next to a sick kid will be a poor substitute.

The Way I Walk ~ by Tigermom

Have not posted walks lately. Living life instead.

Not that there have been that many walks, but I have gotten back on the treadmill.

Feels great.

47.24 minutes and 2.75 miles. Last week's episode of Grey's Anatomy.

Back to the salt mines tomorrow.

Handy Man ~ by Jay

Some people say that women who have good relationships with their fathers often marry men just like their father, and I'd say that Sam is like my father in many ways - with one crucial difference. Sam is handy. Sam is REALLY handy.

Sam can fix plumbing, do basic electrical work, paint, drywall, and build things from scratch. His work is pretty cerebral and intellectual, so he really enjoys doing something where he can see an end result. A weekend spent remodeling a powder room is his idea of a good time, and that's just what he's been doing. So far he's stripped the wallpaper, repaired a dangerous electrical connection behind the ugly old vanity fixture (this house specializes in duct-tape splices of extension cord into the household wiring), pulled out the vanity and sink and removed the odd mirror. Turns out the mirror was odd because it was covering the space where the medicine cabinet and two soap holders used to be, so he had to insulate the medicine cabinet space, once we realized that we were looking at the sheathing of the outside of the house. Brrr.

Now he's washing the wallpaper paste off the walls in preparation for painting. He's also been clearing out the back hall shelves as we prepare to move the laundry room there, so when he's done with the powder room he'll remove the existing shelves, scrape more wallpaper, paint more walls and install another stock cabinet. He's already made four trips to the hardware store with at least one more to come before he tackles the hall (paint and something to hang the new light fixture with). He's a very happy boy. I can hear him whistling.

I am grateful for Sam.

Getting What We Need ~ by Jay

It's been a busy and challenging couple of weeks around here (so busy that I missed my gratitude blogging yesterday) and we were looking forward to a weekend without much planned. Eve asked to go to the ice cream social at the JCC on Saturday evening - kids only! - giving us a grownup evening to ourselves. Low-stress.

Then my mother called and announced that she was coming to visit, arriving Saturday morning. Great for Eve, great for my mother (who is struggling right now) and not so great for our low-stress weekend. No alone time.

And then - poof! - the last-minute sleepover appears. Eve and her friend made this plan at school; friend's mom agreed to host and Eve just departed after a flurry of hasty packing. Eve is delighted and Sam and I have a night to ourselves.

I am grateful for Shabbat, and time alone with my husband.

Country Drive ~ by Jay

I live in a city, and I work in a suburb, and I don't have to drive very far before I'm in honest-to-Pete country. Cows, silos, large pieces of equipment trundling slowly along the road - that kind of country.

Today's home visit took me well into the country, up and down and around on the hills and through the winter woods. I'd started to think the GPS had led me astray because there were no houses in sight, but I went around one more curve and there was the mailbox and the house, tucked down in a little hollow and barely visible from the road.

My patient sat with her feet curled under her in the corner of the couch, looking out the window over the fields that dropped away into the distance. She told me the story of the house, how they'd bought the land 40 years ago and waited until they'd paid it off before they started building the house. They searched all over the country for salvaged materials, so that the room I was sitting in was built in 1974 from beams and floorboards first used in the 18th century. "All that time", she said, "I dreamed of sitting here, on this couch, looking out this window. Now I have time".

I am grateful that she did not ask me how much time she had, and that we were able to share that moment of peace in a room both new and old.

Know When To Fold 'em ~ by Jay

Sam sent me an article a few years ago that said that men who do housework have sex more often.

I pointed out that the benefits of that strategy might be reduced by his tendency to dump the clean laundry all over the bed and then leave it there.

I am grateful for clean laundry, an egalitarian marriage, and TiVo to watch while I fold and sort.

It's The Little Things ~ by Jay

Someone asked me once what surprised me the most about hospice work, and I said "the animals". I've had dogs almost my whole life, but it never occurred to me that "home visits" would include pets. In the past 3 years, I've met dogs, cats, ferrets, iguanas, birds, snakes, rats and one memorable Komodo dragon. I particularly enjoyed the parrot who had been taught to recite historical speeches. The patient said "Well, he was going to talk anyway. I figured he might as well have something interesting to say". A parrot-created mashup of the Gettysburg Address and the Preamble to the Constitution - now that's a surprise.

At the second of today's three visits, I was greeted in the driveway by two dogs. I wasn't concerned about the Lab, but the tiny yipping Chihuahua-ish creature made me a little nervous. I sat in the car for a few minutes and realized the nurse's car was in the driveway, so she must have survived the canine gauntlet; she would have asked the patient's family to put the dogs away if they were dangerous. I opened the car door and the Lab, true to form, came up to be petted. The other dog watched me suspiciously and barked even louder, but stayed on her side of the yard as I walked into the house. Clearly she didn't trust me or the Lab.

Something about those two dogs made me smile today. I am grateful for dogs, and in particular that ours do not yip.

Sunday Shopping ~ by Jay

Birthday present, associated wrapping paper, baby shower gift, random household items. It's Sunday morning at Target.

I went out of obligation and ended up giggling with my daughter over ducks and bears on the baby blankets and watching her make sensible choices about spending her Chanukah money ("I can get two of the shirts that are on sale, Mommy"). We were having a good time when we saw the three-year-old who was launching into a complete meltdown.

Eve made funny faces at the little boy, who stopped crying for a moment, if only out of confusion, and I shared a sympathetic smile with his mother.

I am grateful that my daughter is the kind of kid who makes funny faces at crying children, and that she is no longer three years old.

Unexpected Gifts, Mundane version ~ by Tigermom

There were a few today:

-34 minutes on the treadmill today. Roughly 3.5 mph once I warmed up. I forget the total distance walked.

-I watched the pilot episode of Nurse Jackie courtesy of thoughtful sister-in-law who got me the boxed set of Season One.

-Family birthday party today for a beloved relative and a quiet train ride both ways alone.

-Nice time with each kid tonight upon my return.

-Quiet time with Tigerdad side by side on our laptops.

Some gifts are unexpected. Some you have to plan.

Gratitude ~ by Jay

It's been a week, bringing conflict at work, adoption issues at home, nasty weather outside, technological malfunctions everywhere, and a dog with a bladder infection leaving little puddles where'er she walks. It's January - dark, no-longer-the-holidays, not-yet-springtime January, edging closer and closer to Rose's birthday. Grief and fear are bubbling just under the surface, challenging my ability to see myself as competent and skilled and deserving of my own forgiveness.

I know that's cryptic, but I realized as I sat down to write that telling the stories would only deepen my anxiety and keep hurtful conversations on an endless loop in my brain. I need to change the channel, shift my awareness and my attention so that I can regain my equilibrium and rewrite the story in my head. I need to make my own springtime.

So here's the blogging equivalent of a forced bulb: gratitude posting. I am making a daily commitment to focus on the myriad of blessings in my life.

Today I am grateful for Sam's restless energy, which led him to start to clean out the shelves in the back hall, and then to make space in the laundry room for the stuff that was in the back hall by dealing with some long-postponed washing of extra bedding, and thus to find the grocery bag on the laundry room floor that contained our portable DVD player (with several DVDs), Eve's extra iPod (a gift from my brother) and a few other things that I didn't even know were missing.

Unexpected gifts.

Wondering where I am walking ~ by Tigermom

I have posted several times a week now about my treadmill walks. I find the posting meditative and remarkably helpful in making me accountable for myself.

I want to walk for myself. For my body. For respect for the work my body does. For an investment in my body. For hoping my body will stay true to me and healthy for a long long time to come. For preventative maintenance.

But also for my mind.

Being plugged in so much of the time and listening to others so much of the time, I find the treadmill time a chance for my mind to literally unwind. This weekend, Tigerdad and the cubs and I hosted a large neighborhood party. At the end of the day, I climbed into bed and put a pillow under my feet. I could feel the fluids draining from my feet and back into the rest of my body. Back into literal circulation.

I feel like walking helps my thoughts drain out of my head and back into circulation, even if they flow back into my head, they have made a journey and have a new perspective.

How do you get your thoughts back into circulation?

The Way I Walk ~ by Tigermom

I did walk this morning. About 40 minutes or so.

Watched the beginning of Almost Famous. That movie is always fun.

SIL got me DVDs of Nurse Jackie which I look forward to watching.

But probably not tomorrow.