Terrapin Station

Friday Five: The Week in Review

Sally set this Friday Five at RevGals, but I wasn't able to do it then. Taking a quick minute to look within and see:

This week, what has

Encouraged you? The messages of support, particularly when we were stuck in the Tallahassee airport for 6+ hours on Thursday. Those are times when you need to feel less alone and the Facebookies came through for me!!!

Inspired you? The staff of the Tallahassee airport who went above and beyond to make us feel as comfortable as possible during the long wait. They brought out airport cookies, bottled water and ice...but also several boxes of Girl Scout cookies that I am certain were personally owned by one of them. They carried cookies around to the passengers in serving trays made of coffee filters. :) The airport kept the snack bar open for an extra 2 hours so we could get dinner, and the staff there could not have been more cheerful and helpful, given the unanticipated Friday night overtime.

Challenged you? Helping my mom get (as smoothly as possible) to the funeral of her sister, where there was significant potential for very nasty conflict, and staying centered and NOT in a place of fear. It all turned out well. God is gracious and oh, people are generally so gracious too.

Made you smile? Spending time with a cousin that I have never known well and finding a real kindred spirit. She is the daughter of my mother's favorite cousin. Wonderful symmetry.

Brought a lump in your throat or a tear to your eye in a good way? Seeing my only maternal first cousins (Aunt Nancy's children) again...it has been many years, at least 20. Hearing Mother Terri say those words at the graveside: "We are all dust, and to dust we shall return; but even as we go down to the grave we make our song: Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia."

Mother's Day, Not

My sweet husband woke me up with coffee and "Happy Mother's Day!" yesterday morning.  We went out to breakfast to mark the day. He wasn't feeling very well, so it was a quiet one. 

In the afternoon I got a text from the younger stepkid, saying, "Happy Mother's Day!"  and that he wanted to take me out to celebrate my birthday and this occasion.  It was sweet of him and it was sweet to my soul.  I didn't hear from the older stepkid. 

I don't expect it, really I don't.  Because here's the thing:  I am not their mothers (they have two different ones).  The younger one lived wth his dad and me, and I carried out mothering duties for him, from the time he was 9 until he moved out at 18.  So there's more of a bond there.  But, bottom line, there is another, real mother there for each of them.

Yes, yes, I mother and nurture lots of people in different ways. 

But, still. 

 

A Kind-Hearted Person Lives Here

There's a symbol in hobo language that means:  "A kind-hearted woman lives here." 

According to Kind Hearted Woman Gifts, "A century ago hobos traveled the land using a system of pictures to communicate with each other. These pictures would be carved on trees, fence posts or buildings or chalked on pavement near homes. The symbol of a smiling cat meant a 'kind hearted woman lives here.' Someone who would likely extend kindness and hospitality."

My mother has said that my grandmother probably had one of those signs up near her house, because often and often a tramp would come to the back door (always the back) and ask to work for food.  She always gave them work (giving out work was a specialty of hers), and then she always gave them a plate piled high with food, that they sat on the back steps to eat. 

My husband's office is in our home, so if people come to the door during the day, he's the one to answer it.  He has, over the years, hired many people for similar sorts of labor, folks who were down on their luck. 

Today I was reading and heard a knock at the door.  It was a man who said he was homeless and wanted to work - but for food, not for money.  I told him I'd ask Ken if he needed any help. 

Ken declined, so I went back out and told the man I'd be glad to make him some sandwiches but we didn't need any work done.  He declined, even when I tried to insist. 

I'm sorry about that.  But I'm glad that if there's a word on the street, it says that a kind-hearted person lives here. 

 

My Mother

For those of you who did not have a good relationship with your mother, or whose mother has died or ...well... for those of you who do not have happy associations with the topic of Mother's Day...

then please take this not as a Mother's Day post, but as my tribute to a really amazing woman who is my mother, on a day that is near the one about mothers. 

My mother is a great gift to me.  She knows me in ways I don't know myself.  She is a place of tremendous comfort and security and peace. 

I read yesterday that mothers were the scrapbook keepers of our lives.  I also read, long ago, a statement that "after my mother died, no one else ever listened to me with such perfect attention."  That's always resounded for me.  I could read the phone book and my mom would think it was amazing.  She is convinced that one day I will write books, although I cannot imagine this as I have nothing to say in book form at present.   But she is usually right, so we'll wait to see on that one.

When I was little, my mom was able to stay home with us, and then she started back to practicing speech pathology at the preschool where we went.  We couldn't have afforded the tuition there without her salary, I'm sure.  I remember one day I fell down and bumped my head.  The substitute teacher was taking me back to the nurse's office and instead I headed for the door where I knew my mom's classroom was.  The teacher was very confused!  I opened the door and sure enough, there was my mom, with a student.  She comforted me and took me home.  That's what it feels like to go to my mom:  she is always present. 

Things weren't easy for her.  She had 6 kids, 2 of them stepkids (really great stepkids!) and at one point our ages ranged from preschool to law school.  She was Girl Scout cookie chairman for many years.  She ran the junior choir and a kids' group at our church for several years that gave us wonderful opportunities to put on musicals, go camping, etc. 

When I was little, she was the funnest and coolest mom of all the moms.  She had this awesome face she used to make upon request and we would all shriek and scream with delight.  But, she could only make it once a day!  Way to keep your audience wanting more! 

Last time I visited, I went to wake her up for church, and I sat on the edge of the bed and said, "Mommy, mommy, it's time to wake up!"  She BOLTED upright (at eighty she doesn't usually move that fast!) - I think I must have caught her completely off guard, because I haven't called her anything but Mom or Mother for years. 

She always worked; when I was in elementary school & junior high, it was in in a back bedroom in our house; when I went to college, she got an office in a steel & glass building on Westheimer.  I was amazed the first time I visited her there and realized she was a professional.  Oh, yes, she was, and she had been all along.  I just didn't know it. 

She has a lot of physical problems, but she has more enthusiasm for life than any other dozen folks you meet in a day.  She was looking for a piece of jewelry to show to me last weekend and was frustrated that she couldn't find it.  Right before I left, she spied it hanging on a jewelry display and LURCHED toward it.  This caused her to almost fall over, but I caught her!  But, she was so excited to find it, that she forgot to remember that she can't be leaping around like she used to. 

She blogs, at West Texas Weaver Woman.  She is on Facebook.  The other day I checked in on Facebook as being at Spa Pedicures, and she commented, "You go, girl!" 

This is the hard part to write.  Because my mother and I are so deeply connected, and because she worries so much when I am in pain, the last year has been very hard.  I have been putting all my emotional energy into caring and being present for my husband during his illness, and I was not only physically unable to visit every month, as usual, but emotionally I did not have the capacity to be open to her.  I am not sure I can explain that.  But I am grateful that it is over, and I want to apologize to her for the pain I know it caused. 

I love you, Mom.  Thank you for always supporting and loving me, even when I have not responded in the ways I wanted to. 

Mary Bethie

Friday Five: Random

RevKJarla says at RevGals: 

Hi there~~
Happy Friday to all of you.  Today's Friday Five has no theme, other than randomness.
That's o.k., right?
So, just to get to know each other a little bit (even more) here is the meme:

1.  What is the first thing that comes to your mind (right now) that you want to share about yourself.  I just made an appointment for spiritual direction for the first time ever.  It feels very right. 

2.  What is your favorite piece of jewelry or accessory? Why?  I wear a silver chain with my Daughters of the King cross and a little turtle sitting on half the Mayan calendar.  Have not been able to determine the significance of that, but it reached out and grabbed me in Cozumel in January.  I always wear these.  Today I am also wearing some of my favorite earrings, little silver dragonflies:

3.  If you could have a starring role in a T.V. show/movie/series, which one would it be, and what would your character be like?  I'd like to be a hospital chaplain.   Note that I'm not a chaplain and I've never worked in a hospital.  Go figure.  But I'd like to portray the experiences that I've heard about from so many RevGal sisters. 

4.  What is one thing you will eat this weekend?  Ummm...salad.  Because, I always eat salad.  Also, pinto beans, because I've got some a-soakin'.

5.  How do you waste time? (If you do, that is...)  Facebook.  Read.  Sleep. 

And then this, from Richard Rohr:

Abraham Maslow points out in his “hierarchy of needs” that one cannot meet higher needs at any level of depth if the lesser needs are not first tended to. One cannot do an “end run” to levels of communion and compassion, for example, when one’s basic security and survival needs have not been met. As Jesus put it, when you are “worried about many things” (Luke 10:41), you cannot have faith. When you cannot enjoy the lilies of the field or the sparrows in the sky, don’t waste time thinking you can enjoy God. Start at the bottom; try to love a rock.

Otherwise, we end up trying to be spiritual before we have learned how to be human! It is a major problem. Maybe this is why Jesus came to model humanity for us—much more than divinity. Once we get the human part down, “stop slamming doors” and start loving rocks, God will most assuredly take it all from there. Get the ordinary human thing down, and you will have all the spirituality that you can handle.

Adapted from Contemplation in Action, pp. 83-84

Prayer:
Teach me to hold the paradox
    of being contemplative in my actions.

Waving the Arms

Yesterday, it sucketh.  Yea, verily.  At least until after 5, when I met Valerie at the Rec Center for our new Thursday night tradition:  work out, then eat out. 

First we rode the recumbent bikes for a while, then we walked on the track (it's on the second floor...you can see it just beyond the climbing wall. 

We walked around and around and around while I waved my arms and emoted.  I wonder, if anyone was watching, whether they thought of coming to rescue her from the crazy woman she was with? 

 

The Meds Man

I see a great doc who manages my meds for depression and anxiety.  That's all he does, not counseling or anything else.  We just have quick checkins. 

When I went into his office yesterday I launched into a litany of my woes.  It was very frustrating because he kept asking questions about Ken's situation and the backstory.  ("We aren't here to talk about him, dammit! - this is about me!")

I get that he wanted the backstory, but seriously? this is a 15 minute meds check.  (Oh, so that's why he runs so late...when desperate folks like me show up, he takes the time he needs.  What a concept! so humane!) 

Yeah, so finally we got to me.  He really called me out on my unwillingness to leave Ken at home (except to go to work) due to guilt, even to do the things I know I need to do, like Jazzercise. Put your own oxygen mask on first, blah blah blah.  My head knows all those things.  My heart does not. 

So he wrote it on a prescription pad for me, Jazzercise 3x a week.  And he gave it to me with the other prescriptions and said, "you know, these pills will not work unless you do the exercise.  They WILL NOT WORK." 

I meekly agreed, and went to Jazzercise.  Afterward I stopped off at the bird-listening place.  The birds on the playbill were grackles, not always the most melodious, but I took the time to hear them.  Then a man with abeautiful yellow lab showed up and they played Fetch the Tennis Ball in the Pond. 

Good end to a weird day. 

Tin Can, BB's

So here's the thing: something's not right.

I mean, you knew that, and so did I.  Ken still feels moderately crappy most days.  It's tough to be going on with.  

But that's not new, and it's actually better than it used to be (because it was just hell, and now it's heck).  And yet...things seem to be deteriorating for me, cognitively at least.

I frequently tell people that my head feels like a tin can full of BB's and that someone is shaking it.  I realize that it's been going on a long time because I have mental pictures of a few rather startled faces...and some fairly concerned ones. 

I see the meds man tomorrow, perhaps he will be able to help.  I passed a student smoking today and briefly considered that as  a solution to my problems; however, I don't want to renew a rotten habit I managed to ditch 20 years ago.  Also, I'd have to get divorced, due to my husband's virulent distaste for smoking.  (With which I entirely agree, by the way.)

I'm going to try Jazzercise instead. 

It's getting hot. 

That's about all the news that's fit to print.

Friday Five: Birthday Edition

KZJ says at RevGals: 

There's a birthday for an adult member of my family today. I will admit, I'm not very good at celebrating birthdays. Sadly, the adults in my life have suffered from this affliction. I do manage to rally for my son (now age 7). 

I could bore you with my own personal history of birthday laments which may have led to this attitude... but I won't (you're welcome). Instead I'd love to hear your birthday memories.

1) What is the first birthday you remember? I think when I was six or so.  My birthday often falls around Eastertime, and my Aunt Lou had sent my Uncle Bill out to get my birthday gift.  What he came back with was a wonderful Easter Basket!  I had seen those in the grocery stores but had never gotten one before.  We hunted hidden eggs on Easter and that was the extent of our secular celebration of that day.  I LOVED it.  I thought it was the awesomest gift ever!  I think Aunt Lou was not all that thrilled about it, but what did she really expect?  :) 

2) Do you recall a favorite gift? When I was about 7 or 8 my sister Barbara bought me a Joan Walsh Anglund doll and I thought it was the coolest thing EVER.  Loved that doll.  

3) Has anyone ever tried to surprise you for your birthday? Did it work? Was it fun? Not for my birthday, but once I had a surprise going-to-Europe party.  It was fun but I had a hard time enjoying it because I'd been so mean to the friend (Andy V.) who was delaying/distracting me until it was party time.  :P
4) Do you have a favorite birthday dessert? Something chocolate. 
5) Describe what would be your 'perfect birthday'.  A day off to read, rest, work in the yard.