Tag: memoir

All The Little Pieces

You, old man –
silent onlooker,
career behind you,
motivation stymied
senility lurking –
You are a part of me.

You, grandmother –
chronic caregiver,
stiffly puttering,
good intentions,
punctuated by pain –
You are a part of me.

You, young woman –
heart full of passion,
longing to embrace life,
confined to a wheelchair
dependent independent –
You are a part of me.

You, little child –
running with emotion,
driven by discovery,
curiosity cancelling reason,
needing protection –
You are a part of me.

You, young man –
cold-hearted and reckless,
menacing and lawless
cruelly harrassing,
angrily destructive –
You are a part of me.

You, responsible one-
struggling to do it all,
holding it together,
rescuing the lot,
refusing to let go –
You are part of me.

You, my many pieces –
bound by disease,
beaten by hardship,
silenced by fear,
abandoned to rot –
You are a part of me.

I, shattered into pieces-
overwhelmed, and repulsed,
have not lost compassion,
will regain my fight,
hang on for salvation, because-
You are a part of me.

Presently Seeking Peace

Life is transition,
and when disability presented,
I brought along my social self –
optimistic, friendly, upbeat.

And I brought my spiritual self-
child, maiden, mother, crone.

The possibilities seemed endless,
and lined with “would”s-
reconstructions needed, projects abandoned,
work attached, room for the old.

Drama entered and theatrically
walked out, “I’ll have none of this!”
Apologetically, I asked for the parameters-
“All doable!” I thought.

Severe debilitation appeared,
sleek and menacing as a cat,
puncturing my self-confidence
raising my ire.

I did not choose this existence!
I can only decide how to proceed.

So I simplify,
cut back my expectations,
seek purity in deprivation.

I am almost there,
but there are so many loose ends –
work to complete, messes to clean up,
questions to answer, justifications to make.

I uncover the consequences
of well-intended, but not followed through
promises.  Garbage, garbage, everywhere,
and me, with no energy to dispose of it.

Charity nourishes me,
compassion fills the gap,
and though I want to reward it –
extend my gratitude –
disarray gets in the way.

And I cycle back

Life is transition,
and in the end,
death.

I can enter willingly,
with grace and peace,
resigned to my tribulations,
free from entanglement.

Or, I can rail against it,
mired in the smut of criticism,
pretending perfection,
oblivious to the blessings.

Life, my dear self, is transition,
and we are being moved along,
whatever our preconceived expectations.

Open yourself to the process
and be willing give up the delusions of the past.

There is peace to be had.

Damn you, Hindsight!

 

It’s my final year of high school, and while I should be focused on earning scholarships and preparing for University, I am head-over-heels in love. A year my junior, Bob is a dreamboat: quarterback on the football team, downhill racer during the winter season, and lead actor in the school play!

I rush to his locker after football practice, having wiled my time in the library with the pretense of studying. He is surprised to see me, asking why I didn’t go off with my friends after school.

“Because I wanted to be with you,” I purr flirtatiously, leaning in for a kiss. I hook my arm in his and lead him out to the parking lot, where the car I have been working to pay off, awaits.

It was all you, hindsight chirps in. He even said that that you should be with your friends. He tried to warn you, but you didn’t listen.

It’s a beautiful spring day and we drive out into the country just to enjoy it, and I wonder about our future, and if we’ll get married, and how soon I can have kids. He gazes out the window lost in thoughts that I cannot access.

“You should get a job,” I say. “ You know, to save for the future.” I’ve been working since I was fourteen. I enjoy the freedom having my own money brings.

“I have cash,” he responds and flashes me his killer smile.

From his parents! Hindsight yells at me. The boy still lives off his parents – How did you think he was marriage material?

I am seventeen, and full of romantic notions, and sure that I found “the one”.  He is handsome, and a good dancer, and plays the piano, and even held my head one day as I puked after drinking too much.  Isn’t that love?

After graduation, I move out, and find a full time waitressing job to pay the bills. University starts in the fall and I need to save. Bob gets a job and buys himself a sports car.

“He’s just a boy,” a co-worker tells me. “What do you see in that?”

It’s true that he wears racing gloves when he drives his car, and that seems a little foolish, but he’s my man, and I’m smitten, so I defend him.

And he spent every cent he ever made on that car and none on you, hindsight reminds me. You even forfeited a honeymoon so he could buy those racing tires! But you couldn’t see it!

Another year of our lives passes, and it is spring again, and I have just finished my first year of University and he is approaching his high school graduation and I ask him if he could ever see us married, and he says yes, and I ask if that means we are engaged, and he says sure, why not. And the plans are on!

Note how he didn’t even propose to you, hindsight interjects. Wasn’t that telling in itself?

I decide to let my education go, and he finds a job with a bank, dropping out of school just one month before earning his diploma. We work and save and make plans (well at least I do), and as the wedding day approaches, he gets fired.

“You don’t have to go through with this,” my Father tells me. “It’s not too late.”

“It’s not too late,” my mother assures me. “No one would think any different of you.”

I tell myself it’s just a bump in the road. We’ll get past this.

When my period doesn’t show up , my best friend asks him how he’ll deal with it.

“It’s her problem,” he replies, and walks out of the room, leaving me to break the awkward silence that ensues.

“You don’t have to do this,” she says.

But I do! My heart cries. You don’t understand! No one understands. He loves me. No one else will ever love me.

Oh boy, hindsight sighs. The writing was on the wall, and you couldn’t even see it.

Call it stubbornness. Call it willful blindness. Call it the stupidity of youth. I do marry him, and die inside every night as I climb into bed alone while he stays up with his guy friend watching movies until three or four in the morning. And I work two jobs, sixteen hours a day, while he sleeps till two and then moves from the bed to the couch where he channel surfs till I come home and make his dinner.

Even when you took in a boarder to help pay the rent, you just worked harder, never asking him to pick up the slack, hindsight reminds me.

“You are going to burn out,” the friend I had ignored for him tells me months into the marriage. “I just worry about you.”

“He just needs to find himself,” his mother tells me. “He doesn’t want to take just any job, he needs a career.”

So I seethe inside as I go from day job to night job, and pay the bills, and do the laundry and shop for food, and clean up after his posse of unemployed friends.

None of it should have been a surprise to you, hindsight accuses. It was your own desperation and lack of discernment that drove you there.

“He prefers male company to you,” my mother points out. “Doesn’t that suggest something to you?”

It isn’t that I haven’t notices, and when I ask, he says that it’s just that I am not sexy. He’s tried, he says, but I just don’t do it for him. It’s my fault, I think.  I am disgusted with myself. I start working out, but am too tired. I can’t keep up the pace.

It’s not till I discover his private bank account where he’s been hoarding money that I realize that the price for his dream is just too much, and two weeks before our second wedding anniversary, I kick him out.

“Get help.” I tell him. “Find out who you are and what you want from life.”

He moves in with another woman.

And I, broken, bruised and ashamed, push on.

Thirty-seven years ago today, I was about to be married, and despite all the counsel to not go through with it, and all the evidence that this was perhaps not the best decision – I did it anyway.

Damn you hindsight, for never being there when I need you.

Gridlocked

Far from home,
tired and spent,
feeling abandoned,
disconnected –

I am cut off.

Lacking independence,
damaged by betrayal,
I try not to need
and get tangled up-

cut off again.

The past haunts me:
a legacy of dead-ends;
abuse, addictions,
and mental illness-

cut me off.

Seek a higher road!
Spirit calls to me.
No! Stubbornness responds
I can do this myself –

But, I can’t.

Confronting shadow,
the nightmare is revealed.
Following Spirit
is the way –

I re-engage.

Day 262 Life Tests/ Lessons

6:30 am.  Thor’s alarm goes off.  Was I asleep?  It is still dark outside and like every other morning, I have nowhere to go, so I roll over, but my mind has already engaged, or rather re-engaged, stuck on the same LP track (a function of this disease) that has been running through my mind all night.  I get up, shuffle to the bathroom and while I relieve myself, take my mornings puffs of inhaled steroid to kick-start my lungs.

[Test  #1:  Can you find a reason to get out of bed when you’ve lost your ability to work, and no one needs or expects anything from you?

My answer:  The will to live is stronger than even I might have suspected.  Part of me wants to stay with the oblivion of sleep, and another part of me has things she wants to do – life to live  – so, yes, I am motivated to wake up each morning and embrace a new day.]

In the kitchen, I turn on the kettle and prepare my over-sized mug for the first cup of tea of the day.  Thor is already in work mode – checking his emails – coffee in hand.  Tea made, I shuffle back to bed where I start up my own computer and turn on the morning news.  I check for emails – mostly advertisements, some postings from blogs that I follow (which I’ll read later) – I am too out of the social loop to receive personal correspondence anymore.

[Test #2:  Who are you when many of your relationships have gone by the wayside?

My answer:  I am old enough to know that relationships come and go throughout life and while they help shape me, they do not define me.  A side effect of losing so many connections is that I am left with a handful of friends whose staying power continually warms my heart.]

Next, I check my online Scrabble games to see if any of my random opponents have played their turn.  My brain, more specifically working memory and executive functioning, are affected by this disease.  Playing Scrabble is a recommended therapy.  Several games await my turn, so I play them.

[Test #3:  Loss of brain power:  brain fog, confusion, memory loss, etc.

Reality:  I lose patience with myself, especially when I make mistakes that affect others.  A sense of humour helps, but I do find that this challenge makes me withdraw more than anything.  Loss of mental capacity is very tiring.  ]

7:30 am.  Time to make breakfast.  What to have?  My go to is instant oatmeal, but on thinking back to what I ate last – sweet potato and a slice of chicken at supper – I think my stomach could handle a bit more.  I decide on gluten-free bread toasted with two slices of precooked bacon.  I take it back to bed with me and change to the CBC news, rechecking the status of my Scrabble games.

[Test #4:  What happens when you no longer have the energy to make optimal life choices?

Reality:  For four years I followed a careful vegetarian, dairy-free, gluten-free diet.  Every weekend I shopped for and cooked special meals to enhance my well-being.  Now I am unable to shop for food, and depend on Thor for much of the cooking, and as his name suggests he is a meat-atarian!  Limited energy equates with limited choices.   I have let this ball drop for the time being… to be continued.]

News today is all about the TTC strike, and since I don’t even live in Toronto, I decide that listening further is wasted energy.  I shut it off and turn to Facebook, reading about the trips my once friends, now acquaintances, are either taking or planning, what they’re making for dinner, or who they are partying with.  I switch back to Scrabble.

8:10 am.  Thor is dressing for his first morning meeting then stretches across the bed to visit with me for a bit.  We talk about his day.  I can feel myself getting sleepy.  As he gets up to leave, I will myself out of bed again, taking my dirty dishes to the kitchen, making mental note of the work that needs to be done there, then back to the bathroom where I relieve myself, brush my teeth, and think about washing my face, but now I am too tired.  I go back to bed instead, choosing a Sonza playlist for sleeping and setting it next to my pillow.

10:36 am.  I hear Thor come home, enter the bedroom and check on me, but I am still sleeping and not ready to get let it go.  I glance at the time, and notice the faint calling of my bladder, but give in to heavy lull of sleep.

11:47 am.  The insistence of my bladder is too strong to ignore now.  I get up, amazed that I have slept so long.  Thor, hearing my movement, calls that out that I have an appointment in two hours.  This time I do wash my face, apply some cream and brush my hair.  Sitting facing the dresser, I wonder what to wear and settle on the usual – yoga pants, a t-shirt, and hoodie – my uniform.

I feel renewed after such a long sleep – the best I’ve had in days – so offer to make lunch.  Normally, I would nuke a bowl of soup, but I know Thor prefers it heated on the stove, so I pour the pre-made soup into a pot and turn on the stove.  I clean up the dishes left from breakfast and complain that the soup seems to be taking a long time (I have limited capacity for standing), so Thor takes over.  Not wanting to go back to bed just yet, I sit on the couch and notice all the toys still left out from our granddaughter’s last visit.  I try to tidy up, but the movement makes me dizzy, so I sit back down – it will have to wait for my next little burst of energy.  Thor serves up the soup and we eat in silence.  Not much to talk about on my part; he is no doubt thinking about work.

Soup finished, I snatch an apple out of the bowl and go back to bed.

[ Test #5:  Living with restricted energy

Reality:  Setting boundaries and valuing the little energy I have is a difficult life lesson:  so much of what I do in a day is habitual or mindless.  Choosing to use my energy for something useful like writing, or spending time with loved ones is a happy choice.  Yet, I find it hard not to get lost in distractions, or worse, “shoulds” ( I should do some laundry, sweep the floor, tidy the table, and so on).  I still have lots of work to do in this area. ]

12:27 pm.  I listen to an audiobook: The Hare with the Amber Eyes.  Some of it is hard to follow, but the narrator’s voice is low and soothing, so I keep pushing forward with the story.

1:00 pm.  Esther calls on her lunch break and we discuss her weekend and their upcoming move.  She sounds very upbeat, and I hang up feeling good about the conversation – I don’t have to worry about her today.

[Test #6:  Worrying about others.

Reality:  An excess amount of idle time equates to surplus opportunities to think about others, and as a mother, to feel guilt and concern where my children are concerned.  Sometimes, my mind will dwell on past situations and I will spend days spinning over something I’m sure I’ve done wrong.  This is one of the reasons I see a therapist.  Unnecessary emotional spinning is a definite drain of energy.]

1:15  I play a few more turns of Scrabble.

1:26  Thor reminds me we have to leave soon.  I put my cellphone in my purse and go one more time to the bathroom.  We discuss whether or not to take my walker.  I don’t need it to get into my appointment, but I will if we decide to stop on the way home.  Take it, I say.  It gives me options.

It’s a beautiful sunny day, and as we drive across town I note that most of the snow has gone from the streets and sidewalks, with only the last black-crusted bits remaining.  I feel uplifted, hopeful.  Maybe I can get out more, I tell Thor.

[Test #7:  Keeping hope alive

Answer:  This is another wonderful function of spirit:  the ability to regenerate hope!  Hope springs from a sunny day, a friendly exchange, a thoughtful gesture, and in my case, a restful nap.]

2:00 pm.  The appointment today is my weekly acupuncture visit.  Usually I sleep during this visit, but after this morning’s rest I lie instead and think of writing this column, and whether or not I need to continue coming every week, or if I could use my energy for something else.

3:30 pm.  We decide to visit at a new Farm Boy on the way home.  I want to find some ready made salads I can eat for lunches.  The store is big and a bit overwhelming for someone who has been housebound for so long, so I choose a few aisles, adding some things to Thor’s basket.  Walking is slow, and I have to sit while studying products.  I feel my muscles straining, but push on, so excited to be out and about.  I see a former student, and stop for a quick chat.   When my my muscles start screaming, I ask for the car keys and head out to wait for Thor in the car,  but the sun is so bright and warming that I perch on my walker and soak in the outdoor air.  An elder gentleman stops to chat and tells me his wife is housebound and won’t come out.  We swap stories and sympathies.  When I can no longer sit up, I return to the car and put my seat back.

4:30 pm.  Back in bed, pleased by my outing.  Missed a call from Marie, but my voice is hoarse from the exertion of going to the store, a signal that means I need to rest, so I’ll text her instead.  I put the heating pad under my back and notice I am suddenly cold, so pull up a couple of blankets.  Low grade fevers seem to spark up with exertion too.

I work on the blog.

6:00 pm.  Thor asks if I want dinner in bed or at the table.  Bed is the answer –  my muscles are strained from the earlier activities.  I set my writing aside and prop up my pillows, anticipating dinner.  It is superb!  Almond crusted trout and waxed beans.  I turn on the news, a habit I still haven’t shaken – but tire of it quickly.  I have some prerecorded shows to watch and want to catch up on.  Even though I am only supposed to watch one hour of television per day (it’s too stimulating) I decide to have a marathon and watch three shows.

9:30 pm  Being able to fast forward through the commercials helps, but now I have a headache, and the images from the programs are locked in my brain – this is why watching too much is not a good idea – I cannot shake things easily.  Also, I noticed that I am very emotional and cried easily over every little thing – another sign that I am off balance at the moment.

10:00 pm.  Finish writing this blog, and text with my girls.  Ready for bed but wired.  Will check in on my Scrabble games and then maybe work on a jigsaw puzzle to quiet my mind.

[Test #8:  Compliance

Reality:  It will be days before I recover from the “extras” I indulged in today:  my muscles will complain and stop working, sleep will become elusive, and I will not have the energy to get out of bed.  I will become cranky, feel discouraged, and want to give up.  Then it will pass, and I will try again, and when I feel good, I will want to do to it all – that’s my nature.  (Not to mention that I am obviously a slow learner.)]

Life is constantly testing us – living with chronic disease only magnifies this universal truth.  Some days I am more conscious of those lessons, and able to learn and grow; other days I prefer to just exist.  Right now, I would say I’m passing with a C-:  lots of room for improvement.

How about you.  Are you acing life’s tests, or just getting by?

Pleas(e)

If you see me,
rapt up in battle,
wrestling a would-be assassin,
my life precariously hanging in limbo,
no professionals in sight,
please don’t walk away.

I am alone and tiring,
and my assailant is intense –
forcefully focused on bringing me down,
and I am fighting with a strength
I didn’t know I possessed,
and cannot depend on.

Am I shadow boxing?
Fighting a foe no other than myself?
Is this an act of futility
and I a fool for trying?
Should I lie down and play dead
and take my chances?

My spirit says “No!”
I’m not ready to die!
So I fight, and I fight
straining to restrain
my grip tightening
I dare not let go.

And I would not mind if you’d step in
and give me a hand
and take up the struggle with me
offering enough support
that I might call for help
now, when it’s really needed.

‘Cause, strong as I seem
my control is clumsy at best,
and it is only by some strange miracle
that I am winning at all.
So please, before I am lost,
If you see me, struggling with life,
don’t walk away.

Day 260 “The Laughing Buddha”

At seventeen, my mother married an airman, hopped on the back of his motorcycle and travelled across Canada to northern B.C. to begin a new life. When they returned, after the war, it was to a tiny rural home with no running water or electricity, where she gave birth to twins. Two more babies would follow, as would the realization that her husband was a womanizer and sadist, taunting her with his conquests and beating her when she complained. When he finally left her, destitute with four children, she met and married my father, who brought with him a whole new series of challenges, and they had two more children together.

Illness followed her throughout her life, as lung failure in childhood, a broken back when we babies where young, and three rounds of cancer. Now in her late eighties, she lives out her days, cared for in a nursing home. She is frail, and constantly in pain, and yet, her essence remains.

Forever smiling and laughing, my mother embraces the good and bad in life without judgment. She finds delight in the smallest thing, and in every person she meets. I have rarely seen her feeling sorry for herself, and if she does, it is with a “this too shall pass” attitude.

As a teenager, I would cringe when she would engage total strangers in conversation in an elevator, stating the obvious “Let’s all stare at the buttons now so as to not look at one another,” eliciting smiles and chuckles all around. A trip to the mall would involve multiple asides, as she’d say “hello” to this one, or “buck up” to another, likely all strangers, and definitely all warmed by her open warmth.

Her days were spent hovering over the stove or kitchen sink, a tea towel over her shoulder and a song bellowing from her lips, punctuated here and there by a tap dance.

Everything about my mother exudes joy.

Even today, when I call her at the Home, there will be a flurry of activity in the background – staff and peers drawn to her light. “They call me Mom!” she giggles.

As I lie here in my bed, fighting off the demons of depression, I think of my mom, and all that she has endured and take a page from her book.

“We can’t do anything about the things that happen to us,” she might say. “But we can choose the attitude with which we face them. Why cry when laughter is so much better?”

So today, I dedicate this page to my mother: my Laughing Buddha.

Who is the inspiration for joy in your life?

Day 258 “Empires”

Scaly slate wings entomb;
morbid fear rank;
visions blurred by despair-
my father’s empire.

Manacled, powerless
an involuntary accomplice;
Mother’s words attempt to assuage
Her eyes scream: “Run!”

Rigidly erect the Emperor
regards us condescendingly:
sneering, denying culpability
while the dragon’s tail tightens its grip.

Prisoner of this desolate reality
I shrivel, and decline
withdrawing inward
my flame an imperceptible smouldering.

Until a whispering of possibility
planted deep within the rubble
pushes upwards, grows silently
constructing, perfecting armour.

Life or death uncertain
I face the tyrant
Call him out and hold steady
Against the roaring of the beast.

Time and perseverance
Slay the ungodly
reducing omnipotence,
to pitiful pleading for mercy.

Welcoming the sunshine
embracing peace
and personal freedom,
I grant him forgiveness

and pray from my place
of solitude and healing
that  my perceived oppressor
will, one day, forgive me.

retracting

shrivelled at my feet
begging for forgiveness

pining for kindness
disbelieving heart.

Day 255 “Take a Step Back”

I am living in my father’s house
with a man who said ‘I do”
then didn’t – at least not with me.

These walls, built with lies,
deception whispering in each corner-
betrayal bouncing off my lover’s soul.

No comfort is found here,
Expectations are beyond me
I am over my head.  Stop!

Take a step back.
The house is vacant,
past inhabitants now ghosts.

I have a voice.

I have a voice.

Here is not the place to use it.

Take a step back.
Walk away.
Victory is not the goal.

Take a step back.
Let it go.
These are but hollow, old walls.

Ostracized

Disturbances alarm me
an intentional bystander
burying my head,
avoiding conflict.

Strife spills over
butting up against
personal limitations
forgetting myself
I engage
finding unforeseen strength,
defying odds
then remembering
letting go,
deflated.

I feel targeted
displaced rage
threatens me, stalks
and I am helpless
vulnerable.
My pleas for help
unheard, unanswered.

My life is at stake here people!
Pay attention!

Expectations are high
uplifted by progress;
promising road ahead-
I am out of sync
missing opportunities,
losing my place
forgotten

disability
limits me
I have no strength
but I have needs

Life taunts me
within arms reach
yet inaccessible –
rights diminished.

I crave life,
sustenance,
connection,

in isolation.