The paralysis of being 2 years out

Because words don't seem to be today's thing:

Mama,

I love you. I miss you. My heart feels clogged and stuffy when I allow myself to notice that you are no longer here.

I feel your presence in the very core of my being; you are in everything, you are here and present even as time marches farther from your physical manifestation.

And so I feel supported and loved as though nothing has changed, until I stop for a half a second.

Until I think of something perfect I just know you'd love to hear.

Until I find news that may help you somehow.

And I can't reach out to share.

I can't call, or text, or talk your ear off as I always did.

I can't hug, or tease, or comfort you and I can't subject you to my latest culinary experimentation...

In those moments, in those moments my heart breaks.

Part of me doesn't want to thrive anymore. Part of me wants to just stop and go find mom. Part of me thinks it's unfair for you to miss the best parts of my life, so I shouldn't strive for more than the wonderful things I have now.

But I also know that the part of you that refused to die because "Kate won't be Ok" would be hurt beyond belief if I gave up. That the part of you that gave up so much in the name of motherhood and giving your kids the best life had to offer would be offended, that your determination to do everything well would feel betrayed, were the child you raised to stop striving for her own goals and dreams, didn't jump at opportunity...

And really, I don't want to stop, I don't want to settle or lose my connection to my own children, even if they are harnessed to the breakneck speed of life and there is no looking back. 

But I miss you something fierce, mama, and I wish I could still have you here with me, and we could get to see the kooky old lady you were always supposed to become.

Mom & Hazel

Heartbreaking and deeply philosophical, unanswerable question from Calliope

Is it gonna be a new day, when we die?

Once Upon A Death

Mom left this for me to find after she was gone.

Last night, my mama visited me in my dream.

I don't mean I got some divine message from her or anything, but last night my dream was of an old wooden house, filled to the brim with activity - kids, family, chaos, lost socks...The place seemed new, and perhaps unfamiliar, but we were settling into it with the intention of letting it become a safe place for us.  And mom was there, too - it was a dream beautiful in its banality, we were just spending time together, like a family trip home for vacation.  With one notable exception: we all fully acknowledged that mom was dead, but that just added to how wonderful this brief time we had together was.  I think we knew it was just a day or so, and it seemed implicit that this would happen every so often, these visits... It was so surprisingly nice to get to talk to her about how hard this year has been, and how much we miss her...the same old comfort from mother's counsel that I could always count on.  No drama, just an acknowledgment of "Man this sucks.  It's really hard.  I'm so glad I have you to talk to about all of this." Plus jokes and laughter, and...it was just such a nice visit.

Up until today, I have been able to explain away my forgetfulness, my wistfulness, my loneliness, my tears. "My mom just died." But now there are only a few hours left wherein her abscence is "novel." Moments in the turning of the seasons that I have not previously experienced without her. Starting in mere hours, the time will begin to overlap. I will have experienced this moment in the cycle of time without her once already... Just last night, the darkness fell without her on an October 26th for the very first time. But tonight, the darkness will fall on an October 27th for the second time.

And somehow I find this one even harder to fathom.

The first year was somehow built into the event of death; you lose someone, part of your heart goes with them, and you spend a year mourning in an emotional darkness. 

But what do we do now, at the advent of the second year? 

Another trip around the sun without mother? This is no longer the fresh wound, understandably bleeding. This is now the old injury that doesn't fully heal, aching under gray skies, no longer obvious to passers by. A silent, private pain, devastating, but to the outside eye, invisible.

Mom's amazing laugh

I am used to invisible pain, though. All through my teenage years, I struggled with a chronic pain disorder called Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy.  While it is (thankfully) mostly in remission now, I learned a lot from my experiences with it. One of the hardest things I learned was that sometimes, the things that hurt the most are the very things you need to do in order to continue on as a whole being.  Giving in to the pain can lead to atrophy and eventually the loss of the limb...or worse, it can spread and consume your entire body.

And so I find inspiration here.  I know that hiding from this pain won't help me find a path through it, and I know that the world at large isn't going to hold my hand while I try to find my feet, and so I dive into it on my own in the dark, quiet nights when my family is safely sleeping.  I write, I sing, I imagine, I explore, I cry...

Earlier this year, I performed an aerial silks piece that I created in honor of my mother, about the experience of losing her.  I haven't shared it because it was underrehearsed and not at all up to my own standards, but last night's dream really drove home that she would be saddened by my decision not to share it, and if I really want to honor her as I meant to, I should put it out there anyway.

So this is for you, Mom:

This song hit me square in the gut last fall as we prepared for your departure. Everything about it spoke directly to how I felt.  And though I knew we were heading towards goodbye, I knew that I would never stop wanting you back.  That there will always be a huge place for you in my heart. It spoke to the little kid in me that will always be looking for you out the window, waiting for you to come home.  It was very clearly written about a lost lover, but that didn't matter, the sense of loss and longing at the point of departure, the calm acceptance that this was happening even if we didn't want it to, the sense of strength in the face of huge change, and the preservation of the love...it all hit so close to home.  The chorus became my wish for you to have an easy, peaceful death, and no more promises became my way of releasing you from feeling like you were letting us down by leaving too soon.  And never loving again was simply never getting over this loss.  The song became the anthem of that time for me, and helped me, hugely, to grieve.

"The sky looks pissed

the wind talks back

my bones are shifting in my skin

and you my love are gone.

my room feels wrong

the bed won't fit

I cannot seem to operate

and you, my love, are gone

So glide away on soapy heels

and promise not to promise anymore

and if you come around again

then I will take, 

then I will take the chain from off the door.

I'll never say

I'll never love

but I don't say a lot of things

and you my love are gone.

So glide away on soapy heels

and promise not to promise anymore

and if you come around again 

then I will take the chain from off the door.

Then I will take

then I will take

then I will take

the chain

from off

the door."

I took that song and used it to create this piece.  I was going for a disjointed feel, where things seem backwards and upside down, at odd angles, and things that should be beautiful seem somehow awkward...all while looking skyward in search of something that is missing.

Unfortunately the video didn't come out very well.  It's dark, and all of the shape work I did in the fabric at the start is totally lost, and because it is in closeup a lot of the vertical dimensions I was playing with don't translate, so I consider this a poor documentation of it on top of feeling like it wasn't the homage you deserved...So it is only with the understanding that this is just a first step, and I will be holding you in my heart in everything that I do that I am putting this out into the world now. It may be flawed, but it is for you, mama, with so much love.

Once Upon A Death from Kat Stroot on Vimeo.

Maybe the chain is on the door to that old wooden house in my dream.  Maybe, every so often, you can come around again, and I will take - I will always take - that chain from off the door.

Love always,
Kate

The Lanyard.

If the whole service had been just this, it would have been more than enough.

Thank you, Kelly.  


Mom's Memorial reading: The Lanyard by Billy Collins from Kelly Zenn on Vimeo.

Remembering Nana

I know that I must have someone within my network who can put me in touch with the Coen brothers…Can ya hook a girl up?  I need to have a chat with them about how they have managed to gain control of my life. It seems as though they have been orchestrating painfully hilarious layers over every element of it lately.

Example: I write this update from our shelter while we wait for the tornado warning to end. There have been devastating tornadoes all over this region today, and while it seems that this particular twister is far enough north to miss us entirely, the sirens went off and we figure better safe than sorry. The kids are grandly freaked by the whole thing, and trying to keep our now-toddler from sticking her hands in weird stuff (like the ever fascinating exhaust pipe on my dad's motorcycle) down here is a bit stressful...

But, at least we have all (mostly...hopefully) recovered from the food poisoning that hit all five of us the night before mom's service. Two hours before it was set to start, I was genuinely worried that none of us would be able to make it at all. We spent a miserable night up every few minutes with someone in the bathroom...thankfully we were able to make it through the service, but my stomach was doing flip flops for soooooo many reasons.

I don't feel mentally capable of writing about the service, about my emotional journey, about…everything that I feel needs to be said, expressed…Gratitude, in droves, for everyone who has come out to help; devastation at the lack of her presence in my life; anger, creeping in dark corners, at the fact that this is all happening; fear, trying to take over, about how to carry on from here, frustration, reflection…pain…

I did want to share this one thing, though:  In the hour before mom's service began, when it looked like Cadence and Hazel were too sick to attend, I asked them if they wanted to say something that I could write down and share at the service for them.  I let them both talk together and wrote down what they said with the intention of creating a brief statement from each of them, but they feed off of each other so well, and they took the prompts I gave them (what do you want to share with everyone about her? what did you like to do with her? How did Nana make you feel?) and ran…the resulting dialogue was so perfect, I couldn't have written something better had I scripted it with a dramaturg and an editor.

Thank you, Cadie and Hazelnut, for this beautiful tribute.

Cadence: I liked playing guess who with her
Hazel: I liked playing Maisy with her. And playing dress up with her.
Cadence: And I liked playing the allowance game with her and Kelly.
Hazel: Going to the park!
Cadence: Going to the water park!  I liked when I read a whole chapter book to her, and I liked reading stories to her.
Hazel: I liked reading the Oops! book with her.
Cadence:  She would sometimes correct me when I read a wrong word…like when she reminded me that it was 'stargaze'.  Nana made me feel good.
Hazel: She made me feel special.  When I was cold she would warm me up.
Cadence: Oh yeah! She would warm me up when I was cold, too! She made me feel safe when the fire alarm went off.
Hazel: When the fire alarm went off, she took me and jiejie out of the building that's what made me feel safe.
Cadence: We played together, and I liked playing with her.
Hazel: I don't know what else, I just love her.
Cadence: I love her, too.

Endlessly thankful to Zoe Adlersberg for this amazingly wonderful photo.

Holding on

The last smoothie that I made for her - the one with coconut milk and mango and vanilla and honey - languishes at the back of the fridge. I can't bear to think of anyone else consuming it, yet I can't bring myself to throw it away. Not yet. Not yet. It's still to near, too fresh.

The last bar of chocolate she tasted sits neglected on the bedside table, the chunk we broke off to give her conspicuously absent as it seems to wait to fulfill its purpose. "No one is going to want to eat that bar," we said, and yet it sits.

We go through drawers and bins and boxes, we reminisce over jewelry and trade stories over half forgotten tokens. We wonder over artifacts of our mothers life, details and nuance now secreted away forever. And we can do this with a healing flair, a sense of love, admiration, honor, continuation...

But the dates she bought before she left, the yogurt only she would eat...these things I cannot touch. I know that they will spoil and they will die, but for now they represent the closeness of her life, the nearness of her very being, and I cant fathom the emptiness that will be left behind once the ever present presence of her has disappeared.

My Mother's Hand

The hand I held

to help me learn,

to grasp for comfort

to find life's pulse

The hand I held

to steady my walk

to communicate

to test and try

The hand I held 

to scale the heights

to share tokens

to mold my skills

The hand I held

to guide my way

to make amends

to build confidence

The hand I held

to leap away

to steady passion

to support my dreams 

The hand I held 

to reconnect

to retain

to rejoice

The hand I held

to welcome a love

to greet a child

to embrace a family

The hand I held

to share

to encourage

to care

The hand I held 

to comfort her

to brace her

to reassure

The hand I held

to steady hearts

to love

to send her off to peace.

Pears and Chocolate

I need to say thank you.  I need to stay grateful.  I need to remind myself of all the amazing support we have been getting over the past week.

Because this is hard.

It is so hard.  To be here, in this weird place, still new, where we don't know anyone well enough to fall back on, where we don't have favorite spots or trusted comfort zones...it is hard.  To exist in a little bubble of grief, when you know that no one nearby is mourning with you, it's isolating and lonely, and it is hard.

It is hard to find ways to feed my hungry family when my own interest in food has all but disappeared, my ability to think through a recipe hampered by the inattention my brain has employed to combat sadness, the very structure of our building making delivery confusing enough to become a deterrent, and anyway, allergies make ordering out a dangerous and stressful event best kept to a minimum.

It is hard to mourn alone.  James is here and present for maybe an hour a day, thanks to his 3 hours spent commuting on top of his full time job. He needs to get his rest in order to stay safe, riding his bike before dawn and after dark to get there and back, so I can't even ask him to stay up late with me.  Kelly has had friends with her throughout much of this ordeal, and will be leaving soon - which is good, she hates this place and I don't want her to suffer any more than she is already suffering, so she needs to go.  And the kids of course are always around, but they are kids and do not need the burden of holding such a grown-up loss on top of the loss they are already feeling.  If this was happening to a friend of theirs, I would be supporting them as they supported their friend...but who would be supporting them through helping me? 

I need to keep my children safe, and fed, and comforted, and inspired.  It is so hard to be kind to myself when skipping the dishes for a single night can derail an entire day and leave the house in such a state that I can't think except to worry that if anyone saw it, they'd take my kids away.  How can I be kind to myself when just getting through the day requires the kind of steel they build armor from, that leaves me capable of basic function but incapable of human emotion? 

This place does not lend itself to breathing.  It's so odd being here, in this new, not traditionally comfortable place.  We moved here for the ease of the day to day, for the quiet, the space...but they bulldozed the trees four days after we moved in, and now every window we have looks out on construction sites, and the building can't afford to provide the convenience they charge for, and we share every sound with the neighbors we don't know on the other side of the too-thin boarders between our space and theirs.

I can't mourn here.

But I can't get caught in the shadows.  I need to remember to focus on the positive the way I have done for mom for so long now.  To remember that our nearby cousin has offered to go shopping.  To remember that Liz came to me the day mom passed even though she probably didn't have the time.  To remember that we've gotten three boxes of pears, and two boxes of chocolates. To remember that even if no one is physically here, there are words of support flowing through this computer screen constantly.

So yes, this is hard...but in pears, and chocolate and love, we are rich.

In Memorium: Mary Ann Johnson

My mother, Mary Ann Johnson, as a child

My mother really wanted her obituary to be funny. I don't know if I will be able to be as irreverent as she would have liked, but I will do my best to keep it light.

She came from long lived stock, her grandfather was born in 1822, and did not sire her father until 1895 - and he had younger siblings, as well. So, upon her arrival in 1955, she represented just the third generation in 150 years, and I guess somewhere there are odds that suggest that somewhere along the line, someone would end up dying young...it would be just like her to take that fall for herself in order to improve the chances for long, healthy lives for her children and grandchildren.

She leaves behind two devastated but very proud daughters, Kate and Kelly, and three granddaughters, Cadence, Hazel, and Calliope. She also finally beat her older siblings, Peggy and Bill, in a race...though it wasn't one they knew they were running.

She married Scott Stroot in the early 80's, and their journey left her with amazing friends all across the country and throughout the world. Her work as a nurse allowed her to do what brought her the most joy in this life-caring for others.  She delighted in working through her first occurrence of cancer, saying that her own physical torment just made it easier to connect with her patients.

She spent the last year of her life unable to work, but finally able to live for herself.  In her final year, she traveled to Hawaii, swam with wild dolphins, took up yoga, jumped into a great lake, traveled to new places and made amazing new friends. She saw shows and flew in a hot air balloon, she laughed and cried and became a published author.  

She was one of the strongest, most genuinely kind people that have ever walked among us. To paraphrase Don McLean; this world was never meant for one as beautiful as her.

We love you eternally, mom.

My mother in the sun on her final vacation, about a month before her passing.  Thank you to Sandy for this glorious image.

A Post I Don't Know How To Write

First Jack-O-Lantern of the season.  A family effort, carved with love.

When I held her hand and tried to feel her energy two days ago, it buzzed in my bones.

Last night, stillness.

My mother is gone.

I was holding her hand, and singing Iris Dement's Let The Mystery Be when she stopped breathing. When I finished that, not ready to let go of that moment, I sang Butch Hancock's If You Were A Bluebird one more time.  When I got to the line "you'd be flying home," she took one last breath.

And then she was gone.

She slipped away peacefully, just as she had wanted.  The struggling sounds she had been making with each breath earlier in the day had quieted when I began to sing.  I'd gone through many songs before I noticed her breaths slowing. As understanding settled in, my phone buzzed in my lap... my dad sent a picture of Mom's beloved critters, Pepper and Jewels. Kelly responded to his text uncharacteristically quickly...all of their presences were had come together in that moment, and I knew this was her moment.  And she took it.

My friend Liz called just then, too -though I didn't answer for obvious reasons... Liz and I have now unwittingly contacted each other during two births and a death-and not nearly enough in between.

There was a relief in her passing, to be honest.  Relief in the form of devastation.  She had been totally lucid the day before, moreso than she had in a long while, and during that time she made it clear that she was ready.  Then she went to sleep, and if she woke, it wasn't to this plane.  I was scared because she didn't rouse to swallow the pills that would hold her pain at bay.  I was scared because there was a clerical error that meant we had no liquid morphine to ease her suffering.  I was scared because the nurse we called to rectify the situation was harsh and insinuated that she was in pain and would be for days on end. I was scared because I didn't know if mom was trapped, or merely loosening her grip on her physical being.  So while Kelly had dashed to get the medicine to provide her with comfort, I sat with her, and held her, and sang.  I was relieved to see her muscles relax.  I was relieved to see her begin to calm, and I was devastated, and relieved, to see her letting go, escaping the cage her body had become.

The last thing she did before she closed her eyes was to laugh with her oldest friend, her daughters, and to hug each of her grandchildren.

I found this on the living room floor after she had left us.

I cannot begin to describe the deep, primal despair that has taken up residence in my heart.  My brain won't let me touch it yet.  I know it is there, I can feel it, and I know its gonna hit me like a tidal wave and paralyze me...but for now I'm sitting in a clearing, listening to the stillness, trying to breath through the surreality I've landed in before the storm of grief fully hits.

Transitions and Trains.

Mom told me yesterday that she was visiting the atmosphere.  She is having fun, she says, because she is transitioning slowly, testing the waters - as she always does before she jumps in. She's exploring the atmosphere, then coming down to hang out with us in the physical realm for a bit, then flitting off again...

There are people in her room.  First she reported that James was standing by her bookshelf, out of the way, but that she "could feel his spirit caring." Alex was with him.  Then she noticed other people filling up the room...As she named all the people around her, sitting on her bed, stroking her hair, standing beside her, it hit me that these were all the people who love her, and have been sending love, good vibes, prayers, support...even people that I wouldn't have expected her to remember, that have reached out to Kelly & I...We decided that, since she was in a special place between our reality and a spiritual realm, she must be able to actually see their spirits being there for her.

"How do you feel about them all being there?" I asked her.

"It's very comforting" she said.

Later, she leaned  back and asked me "do they know how ok I am?  I am ok. Do they know that?  That I'm happy?  Tell them that this is a good way to go. It's pleasant."

She is not all here, but that fact is not all bad.

Granted, some of the conversations we have had over the past couple of days have been like reading a script from an absurdist play, but the ultimate takeaway is that, as long as she is not in pain, she is not troubled by her hallucinations or inability to follow a conversation.  The only time it seems to upset her is when she is afraid her confusion is confusing everyone else.  That right there tells you she's still there, the same old Mary Ann, wanting to take care of everyone around her and not burden anyone.

We have increased her pain meds and I actually got her to drink a smoothie (that the girls made! hooray!) of banana, oats, and greek yogurt, and I think the combination of the fuel and reduced pain made a world of difference.  She has been much more lucid and even came out to sit with us in the living room (briefly) with the help of a hospice-provided wheelchair.

She tired quickly and asked to go back to her room, but I heard her talking after she was settled and went in to join the conversation.  She was talking about how this is a trip, and when you travel, no two days are ever the same, and so she was just traveling, and that is how it is.  I piped up to ask if it was a good journey...I don't know who she had been talking to before that, but she gave me a look that made it clear that it was perhaps rude of me to ask such a thing, but answered that yeah, it was a fun journey. She backtracked to explain that this little compartment-her bed, commode, table, with her window, the beautiful flowers and artwork she has received and the clary sage wafting from the salt-lamp thing Kelly got for her- it was like a train compartment, and she was traveling, journeying from here to there.  A fancy, luxury sleeper train car, we agreed.  She was comfortable, and I thought she had drifted off to sleep, when she said something so suddenly lucid that I had to ask her to repeat it.  So she did:

"Tell them that its ok if they don't see me off.  This way I don't have to suffer through saying goodbye to every single one of them. Put it in the blog."

And so I am.

James snapped this picture for Peggy before she and Jess caught the plane back to MN.  Mom surrounded by "her girls"-My Aunt Peggy and her daughter Jess on the right, Kelly, me & my kids on the left.

The Price of Lettuce

I had to make dinner.

I had been in crisis mode and now I had a break from it and now I am faced with dinner.  But dinner was beyond me...the weight of that task hit me so hard I couldn't stand.  I have to make dinner.  How do you make dinner when your mother is dying?  How do we move forward-what does the mundane look like from here?  How will I take care of everyone, how will I clean, how will I go grocery shopping now?

"This is the price of lettuce," I thought to myself as I sat on the kitchen floor-not cooking.

So many amazingly wonderful people have come forward to offer love and support during this entire ordeal, and many of them have been here themselves, and, having survived, reach out to through a tow-line in our direction, to help guide us through it.

And for some reason, almost every one of the people who have tried to warn me about the patterns that grief follows have given me the exact same example of something seemingly mundane that can unexpectedly break you; The price of lettuce.

They are right, of course...It's easy to stare down a hole in your life and say "you are a hole, but you can't jump up and swallow me."  You can even taunt the hole, if you are staring directly at it, and soak in the absence that it is. Then you can feel strong, and capable despite it.

But when you're not looking at it, the hole can follow at your heels, one step behind you everywhere you go.  Then, when that little price tag makes its move, you see the numbers jump out at you, now perhaps higher, perhaps lower, or even just the same something ever present in your routine that you hadn't considered before, and you stager, which makes you step back, and down you go, right into the hole...waiting there, ready to swallow you when you falter, never needing to leap up expending energy of its own.

it is a hole after all.

And mine found me at dinnertime.  I can run around and focus on being in the now, of caring for mom, for my kids, for my husband and sister and friends...but I can feel this hole already.  I am beginning to taste the edges of what it is going to mean to be 'without' even though now she 'is', and my heart slows in anticipation of the hurt.  I know that at this point there is nothing I can do but love and delight and BE,  but I think I am starting to see the edges of my grief in a new and honest light.

A hole, in the truest sense.

Mine sits on the island in the kitchen.

Waiting.

Photo by my godmother Pat, thinking of my utterly irreplaceable mother while in Amsterdam.

A sleepless night

I write this from the oddly dark, deserted (save for my sister and myself, with our smuggled food and rearranged couches...) neurosurgical waiting room...

The TV is preset and locked on the TLC channel, adding to the strangeness of this.  It feels, with the brightly colored chairs and couches, and the late night hour with my sister, equal parts college study session/sleepover, and ...something really intense.

I miss my babies (poor James is having his first solo night with all three...and Calli still nurses during the night, so I do not anticipate this being an easy evening.  And poor Carol, in from Boston, is supposed to be resting so we can switch out in the morning, but will be subjected to the Wrath of Calli all night as her world is JUST NOT RIGHT.  If you know Calliope, you know that she MAKES IT KNOWN when she is not happy...and methinks this turn of events will make her not so happy...)

I am not worried about mom.

I mean, I am, but...these past few days have been so wonderful. I mean, I know how hard that might be to believe...but the gift in all of this, this awful, horrible, unfair thing, has been the immense love that has been flooding our lives since this all happened.

Saturday, mom resurfaced from a place that seemed so far removed from our own that I wasn't sure she would want to come back.  But she did.  And we got to hold her, cry with her, talk to her, laugh with her...and I continued my physical comedy streak (the first installment being the concussion I received while in the ER with mom, and then being relegated to a wheelchair for the remainder of that ridiculous friday, following mom's gurney with my wheels...Thanks, Zoe.) by falling into a fountain. Yes, I did that, it really happened; I fell into a fountain and even now I can't think about the incident without falling into a fit of giggles...and thankfully it had the same effect on the rest of the family, too.

Most people would fall into a fountain, then get a concussion, then go to the ER...but not me.  I went to the ER, then got a concussion, then fell into a fountain...Hey, remember the time I found out my mom was dying and then got concussed by the medical staff and rounded out the evening with a nice dip in the local reflecting pool?

No one would believe my life.

Kelly said that her day after getting my message about mom's condition was ridiculous, and her friends wanted her to write a book about it.  Then, she told them about my experience of the same day, and they said we need to write that down...I am thinking this would be a great idea.  I think I'd call it Tales from my mother's death -or maybe Lemon Ball Happiness is a better one...but in any case, from the ridiculousness of the weekend followed by the profundity of these last two days...I think this collaboration may need to happen.

But I digress, (greatly...Did I mention it's 2:30am and I am writing to channel the anticipatory energy I have buzzing in my limbs?! oops, sorry...)

I can't even begin to explain what an amazingly wonderful day yesterday was. There was so much LIFE in that room...and mom seemed so GENUINELY happy for the first time in...ages.  None of us had seen her smile that much, or laugh that much...and yes she cried, but they were real, genuine, releasing tears...

And today, while less effusive in its existence, was so pleasant...and the last couple hours before she was actually taken for her surgery were so simple and wonderful...It was just Mom, Kelly and I, hanging out together.  We filled the entire time sharing all of the amazing messages we have received from friends and family from all over the world with mom...We read her poems, listed people who had sent love, prayers, support, listened to music, I gave mom a clary sage foot rub, and we talked about all of the amazing people we have in our lives...and when they came to take her down for the big operation, she was happy.

Mom's friend Jennifer posted a version of this song for her to hear before she went in; it was the perfect song for this moment, and mom was so touched and pleased- especially since this was an old favorite from the time Kelly was born.  I've posted the version we knew below:


Mom declared afterwards that she has no more angels to call, because they have all come to her already.  They are here, and all around us - Angels in the form of friends, of family, of acquaintances she didn't have a clue she had touched until they gave their hearts to ease her pain...Angels in the form of doctors, nurses, medical techs...New friends, strangers, friends of friends, friends of her children...In seeing her younger daughter's overseas boyfriend drop everything to come to her, in the friend of her older daughter who bought him the ticket to do so without batting an eye...In the new friend who dropped everything to take her on the two hour drive to her doctor when she was in trouble...in the many many friends who have come to her or will come to her, in the flesh or in spirit...Every tiny thought, every good wish, every ounce of gratitude and love each of these people has sent to her has hit her hard, and I can see it cradling her and giving her such peace.

This is a terribly risky surgery for so many reasons, but even if the outcome is not what we want it to be, we have been given such a huge gift...this, this time, this love and connection, has meant more to all of us than we will ever be able to express.

Mama, we love you...and I think you might be starting to understand that now.
Peace.

Lemon Ball Hapiness

Full set of Ladybugs

I wanted so badly to write a thorough, meaningful post about the past few days, but I am utterly exhausted and falling asleep on the keyboard, so suffice it to say:

Thank you, so much, so so so so SO SO much, to every single person who has reached out to us, prayed for us, sent us vibes, sent us love...

Today was a divine gift.  I will never forget this day that I got to spend with my mother...my sister, my daughters, my husband, and two angelic friends all gathered in her room under solemn pretenses, only to have those plans canceled and replaced by an entire day of laughter, tears, stories, hugs, silliness, accomplishment...LIFE.  If you had asked me on Friday, I would have told you honestly that I did not think such a day would be possible anymore...and yet, we had today.

We. Had. Today.

We had an AWESOME today.

My Beautiful Mama's laugh.

Love is palpable, my friends.

peace.

Bad day. No really...

Really, day? 

Today was just...

Bad.

Jumped in the car after I got the call. Drove through a driving rainstorm and passed about 4 accidents. Arrived to terrible news.

Brain...

Hospice. If we can make it that far. But we should. So we hope.

And right after holding my mother through the news that she is dying, I stepped out the door to call my uncle only to get hit in the head by some large piece of medical equipment on wheels flying down the hall of the ER...

So then I was relegated to a wheelchair with a compress on my face, and the dr is saying something about two weeks of rest because it's probably a mild concussion...

Silver lining:mom was too confused to notice, so she didn't worry.

By the end of the day she was unable to follow a pen with her eyes and she proclaimed that today was the first day of the month 2013, in the year 2013.

James reported that there was ANOTHER fire alarm at home. The 6th since we moved in. Terrified children in the rain...cats...

Had to make some hard phone calls, painful declarations...DNRs, consents...

I am still dizzy, my head hurts a lot (nice egg on my forehead, too...) and I can't even drive home to be with my family because of it, even though I can't go back in to see mom until someone can stay with Calli...they kicked us off the ward once mom got settled - no kids under 12.

So I am here, very very generously put up by Zoe, mom's friend who swooped in to take care of us all, cuddled with Calli -who is now sick- and failing to sleep thanks to sorrow and the pain in my head.

So yeah. Day. Wtf? 

Thank goodness for Zoe, for Fred, for their cats-especially Boy, who adopted mom, and waited in her pillow all day, and who is curled with us now...saviors in 'human' ways. 

Farewell, Cinnaminimonmon

Goodbye, Cinni-mini-mon, our Cinni-not-so-mini, tigger tiger sneezy cat.

You have no idea how profound a hole the loss of your unassuming companionship has made in all of our lives. Your friendly, meowing conversations, the strange attachment you had to that pair of pink barbie underwear-short things, the way you would get yourself locked in the pantry closet and we'd find you hours later, perfectly happy, having chewed your way into the food bag.

The snakes you'd drag in to the dining room, the comfortable way you'd plop down and snuggle with (or on top of) us on the couch or in the bed. Your chattering, happy self, your adept moth-chasing skills, your inexplicable speed given your size. How easy it was to make you purr happily. Your amazingly tolerant disposition, and even the way you'd suddenly spring once your limit had been reached.

I hope you enjoyed your life with us here, because we sure as hell adored every second that we had with you. I could go on forever about you, your sweet, loving, feisty at times but laid back manner, your amber eyes that matched your awesome orange fur so well, and all the wonderful things you'd do, all the memories you gave us, all the joy and wonderful gifts you gave us over the years.

You left us all too soon, Cinnicat. We weren't done nuzzling you and begging you for company, watching your delight at every meal, greeting you in video chats from afar...

Rest in peace, babycat.

We love you.

And we always will.

Monstrous Mortality

They say that young children are more in tune with matters of the spirit; today I am convinced that it's true.

Cadence, Hazel and I arrived in Kentucky about a week ago. Cadence has taken to recreating the circus she put on with her class at the end of the year, and one evening shortly after our arrival she stopped mid-performance to ask me: "Mama, why did they put Puppalina in fire at the vet, after she was dead?" I was shocked; there was absolutely no context for this sudden inquiry into our beloved pup's cremation more than two years ago. She went through a prolonged phase of timid fascination with death about a year ago, but we haven't really discussed the subject at all in months - and she was literally mid-circus. "ladies and gentlemen! Let's hear it for the...Mama, why did they put Puppalina in fire at the vet, after she was dead?" I answered her, of course, and we had a decently long conversation, and then she went on with the show. Literally.

Cinnamon didn't eat anything that night.

A day or two later, we were all hanging out in the living room when Cadence suddenly got extremely sad, seemingly for no reason at all. When I asked what was wrong, she burst into tears and clung to me tightly and said "I'm really going to miss you when you're dead!"

I was again bowled over by this out-of-the-blue awareness. We talked for a while, about death and love, about life and mortality, and she even volunteered that when she grows up she's going to go off on her own but will come visit, and then, when I pass, it won't be the same and she'll be really sad, but she'll still have Hazel and hopefully her own family. She's not even 4 yet. She breaks my heart.

Our conversation concluded and tears dried, she bounded off once more to play. About 3 hours later, she was off playing with Gjon while I worked in the kitchen with Hazel when suddenly Cadence came running into the room with a devastatingly reserved look of pain on her face and threw herself silently into my arms. At that moment Hazel was very loudly screaming about some perceived injustice or other, so I hugged her and set her down to attend the screaming. My mom picked her up and she clung there, crying silently, until I got Hazel settled and could hear her answers when I asked what was wrong.

As I brushed the tear-soaked hair out of her eyes, she described seeing what it would look like when I am dead, and that it made her really really sad. What had inspired such vivid images? "I was playing with Gjon but now he laid down and isn't doing anything." (To be fair, Gjon told me later that she evidently 'stabbed' him with a light saber just before that happened.)

We talked again, and she admitted that she'd been thinking about death a lot lately, but she didn't know why.

It became clear shortly after this that our kitty Cinnamon was suffering from more than just a passing stomach bug.

Before heading out on Monday morning, we each gave her a kiss and some gentle pets, and told her how much we loved her. I can't express how insanely grateful I am for that seemingly simple interaction now.

Kelly took her to the vet before we got back that day. She was immediately admitted to the hospital.

Playing 'art school' with Cadence that afternoon, (I was dubbed 'teacher' and told "now you teach us to do art," which, if you now me, you know I find hilarious since, if anything, adults need to re-learn how to create from kids, but I digress) I gave her the assignment to draw or paint something that scared her. We talked about it as she worked; her creation was an intricate and very unique 'monster' which was sort of amorphously ball shaped, covered in long fur in several shades of green, and it had several big claws, each of with had a mouth filled with teeth, but otherwise this monster had no face or appendages. I was impressed. And slightly surprised that her awesome little mind came up with that; I'd been expecting either something more obviously related to a specific fear, or something or totally generic.

But then she took the assignment in a direction I did not expect. The news interrupted the art lesson. Cinnamon was in complete renal failure; her kidneys had shut down. If she made it through the night, there was some hope that she could come home later in the week on a very complicated care setup including regular subcutaneous fluids, and even then she would probably only have another 6 months or so.

Cadence, who still had her green marker in her hand, slowly reached up and began streaking her cheeks, deliberately, in a downward motion. "what are you doing?" I asked. "drawing tears" she said, "because Cinnamon isn't coming home."

Cinnamon did make it through the night, and mom and kelly were able to visit her. Some hard decisions were on the table; they decided to do another round of blood work to see how things were going. She was better, but not better enough.

She made it through another night, but she wouldn't take her medicine in the morning. Her condition was so poor I can't bear to think of how much pain she must have been in...This afternoon Cadence told me she wanted the doctor to give her the special medicine to help her die quickly and stop hurting, because she wouldn't ever get better enough to not feel miserable. The sound that came from her after that can really only be described as Keening.

Kelly and Mom came to the same conclusion. They were with her at the end. They brought her body back home to the only house she ever lived in, where the girls and I were waiting with heavy hearts. Cadence reverently rested her head on my shoulder, and Hazel declared jdeh-jdeh! (her word for kitty) and waved goodbye, then looked at me knowingly and bowed her head. We buried our beloved Cinnamon beside Ragamuffin under the rose bushes in the yard. We mixed Puppalina's ashes into the soil, so the earthbound forms of the three of them are now returning, together, to the next phase in the ever-present cycle of life.

We don't know exactly what happened to our poor cinni-kitty, but the most likely scenario is that she ingested some fragments of the tiger lilies that volunteered in the yard. Lilies are extremely toxic to cats, and even if we had taken her to the vet sooner, they mostly likely wouldn't have been able to do anything to prevent the fatal outcome. We are all devastated by her early departure; she wasn't even 10 years old, and was a mostly healthy and contented cat. We have always loved her dearly. And we always will.

Whatever the case, Cadence seemed far more tuned in to the presence of a life or death situation than the rest of us did. Even now, despite all the crying I've done, part of me is solidly in denial, I can't believe that she really isn't waiting for dinner in one of her favorite hiding spots; I'm surprised when I don't see her on mom's bed...

Perhaps Cadence could sense Cinnamon's spirit loosening itself from its fleshy embrace. Perhaps she was being haunted by the knowledge of transition, and as she felt her go she looked to us adults to understand our lack of awareness. Perhaps she found only ignorance, or suppressed understanding. I hope we aren't teacher her to doubt her instincts.

Farewells

One of my Grandpa Ed's paintings, one of my favorites. The original hangs in my grandparents' living room.

Fall is here, strong and brilliant. It's the part of the cycle that tugs at the hems of our heartstrings, reminding us that we can't ignore the less joyous parts of our lives forever, that there has to be sorrow in order for us to appreciate our joy, and that we will eventually have to let go of this world with all its named things, and return to a wordless existence that doesn't recognize petty ownerships, but perhaps does recognize love, spiritual tribute - those truths that extend beyond the corporeal, if you believe in such a thing.

The season is hitting me hard, this year. I have been, truth be told, enjoying the crispness in the air and the faint hints of changing seasons quite a bit, though thinking more of hayrides than subways while I do so. But today was a sad day, and brings together all the sorrows that have been lingering, banished some as petty, and betted others as necessary woes.

I lost my grandfather today. I don't know how else to put it...my heart hurts. But I am truly relieved that he is no longer suffering.

In June, he developed some symptoms that presented like pneumonia. It turned out to be lung cancer. An extremely aggressive, fast moving, and nearly asymptomatic type, which I am told has been more or less directly linked to Agent Orange, to which he was exposed while working as a medic in the vietnam war. He went from being fine, to thinking it was pneumonia, to finding out it was cancer, to learning that it had metastasized too much for surgery to be worthwhile, to trying chemo, to finding it was having no effect, to hospice care, all in a matter of weeks. And today he's gone.

I'm sorry that I didn't get to see him before he went. But I am also so glad for all the times did get to see him, and hopefully remind him of how much he meant to me. I am extremely grateful that Cadence got to meet him, even if it was a brief visit, while she was very young. He was always a steady, silent presence when I was young, intimidating in an almost thoughtful, curious way that reminded me almost of playfulness. I remember his hugs being strong, and warm, but somehow, like a gentle giant, like he could squeeze as hard as he could and it wouldn't hurt me. I don't remember him talking much, but whenever he would speak up it was with such interest in life it made me wonder why he was so quiet. I remember assuming he was very shy. But then he'd create these amazing paintings, drawings, and it was always so much an extension of himself, that he was sharing in some vulnerable way, but had so much truth in it I wouldn't know how to respond. I remember his art studio in the basement, how his smell lingered even when he wasn't there, and how it seemed like a scary, but magical place. I remember how he would encourage us to explore, to fill blank spaces, and always seemed genuinely impressed with our creations, which always, in turn, genuinely surprised and excited me.

I remember how you could hear him snoring all over the house, even downstairs, and how that was somehow remarkably comforting - even though it was usually during the day, since he worked the graveyard shift at the nursing home.

I remember how on one level he always seemed like a fish out of water when he came to the city, or encountered new subjects, but on all the rest of the myriad levels, he was soaking in everything there was to absorb, and his apparent absent-mindedness was just his lack of attention to the superficial happenings in the room. We may have laughed, but I think that he was actually lost in the wonder of whatever it was he was discovering. Whether he ultimately liked something or not, he always let it affect him somehow, first.

I remember his laugh. I remember his breath, somehow always expressing things that were living within him, if not otherwise expressed. I remember how infectious his enjoyment was.

He was relatively young, and went so quickly...it's so hard to imagine my life without his presence. I've been so far away for so long, and yet, knowing that my grandparents - all my family, really - are there has always been a grounding feature of my life. I love them dearly, and I know that his passing is going to have a lasting effect on my life. As well it should, I wouldn't have it any other way; he meant enough to me that, were his passing to be but a blip on the radar...well, it wouldn't even be a possibility without entirely rewriting who he was, who I am, and how our lives intertwined.

I have always been proud of him. And that pride, and my love and respect for him, have not at all died with him. They will live on, into future seasons, germinating future life, and keeping him with me in spirit if not in life.

I think the best way I can honor him and his memory is to remember my own art, to press on with the exploration and filling space, and sharing those powerfully vulnerable moments that make artists artists, and to dedicate a small portion of that life to his love, encouragement, and his ever gentle, ever caring spirit.

My Grandpa Ed, my cousin Meghan and myself, I think we were around 4 in this photo. Note the corner of the painting behind us.

Goodbye, Grandpa. I love you so much, and I miss you, terribly, already.

Peace.

A Sunday Mourning

It has taken me more than two weeks to get up the courage to write this post, and I'm not even sure that I'm entirely capable now, but here goes...

Puppalina 

July 3, 1992-January 11, 2009

Two days before, she spent the majority of the afternoon in my arms.  It was unusual for her, she normally didn't like to be handled, but on this day, she would bark unless she was in my arms.  (And I was standing.  No sitting allowed.)

The day before, Cadence spent much of the day dragging me to the pantry and demanding milkbones.  When I'd deliver, she would seek out Puppalina where ever she was, and give it to her with a hug, nudge, kiss, pets...

Saturday night, we all went to the coffeehouse at our church.  Dad and James performed, Kelly was an emcee.  It was a great night, James even did an impromptu performance at the end of the night that we were all extremely proud of him for.  Afterwards, James, and I came home early to put Cadence to sleep.  Pup was in her Little House, then she came out, greeted us, was her normal self.  We said our goodnights, Cadence gave her a goodnight hug nudge as she always did, and we went into our room to put Cadence to bed.  When James and I came out a short while later, mom greeted us with tears in her eyes.  "It's Puppalina," she said "she's not doing well."

Evidently sometime between when we said goodnight and when Dad got home, she'd had a stroke and a grand mal seizure.  He found her on the step in the hallway, and gathered her up and was sitting on his bed cradling her when we went in.  She was more alert than she had been, and in fact continued to recover, at least in terms of strength, to the point where she didn't want to be held anymore.  We tried to make her comfortable in one of her usual spots, but she needed to walk.  She seemed perfectly fine, as long as she was walking, but she couldn't see, and would run into corners or other obstacles without being able to get out, and then she'd yelp and cry horribly.  For hours, she walked, and walked...she would take water, and she was fine as long as she was moving.  I tried holding her and walking, but she wanted to walk herself. We made a big circle in the living room, lined it with blankets, (and gave her access to her little house,) so she could walk in circles, free of danger or corners to thwart her journey.  We gave her some Tylenol and hoped she'd settle down, but she just kept walking.  I called the vet at 2am, and he said to try benadryl, but that did no good either, she fought the drugs.  She started stumbling more, but just kept going.

Around 4am, I had a glimmer of hope, she suddenly showed interest in food...in fact, she ate 4 whole pieces of pot roast - more than I had eaten for my own dinner - happily, and seemed to be her old self, as long as she was eating.  But after a good meal and some water, she resumed her travels.

I stayed up with her all night.  By dawn, I knew she was suffering far more than she deserved to be.  I called the vet when the sun came up, and asked if they made house calls.  They did.  Right after I made the call, Pup finally settled down, in the kiddie pool which we'd brought in and lined with her favorite blankets, towels, robes...I got in, too, and got to lay there, holding my sweet little puppy, for the last 45 minutes of her life.  

A husband and wife team, the vets arrived together that sunday morning.  It was very brief.  She went very quickly, very quietly, very sweetly, in her own house, surrouned by family.  There was nothing gross, nothing...just peacefully, finally, rest.  I had my hand on her...it was so hard to let her go.  I felt something from my throat and chest surge out and envelope her, going with her.

It is uncannily quiet around here these days.  It's amazing how much ambient sound she provided throughout the day...click-clacking down the hall, snoring from the other room...evidently she was a noisy breather, because I miss her sounds in every moment.  We've all heard phantom murphs and snorts.  Every morning James and I still look for notes from mom about whether or not she's had her pills yet that day.  The bench in the kitchen still has the grooves from her younger days, her claws marking the soft wood as she jumped up and down.  Cadence's nap no longer coincides with Pupup's afternoon outting and snack.  Seeing certain colors in close proximity sets me off.  Not having her here has left something decidedly hollow here.  We all miss her, terribly.

Pepper with Puppalina's ashes.

We couldn't get her to move or leave them.