Snakeskin Journey

What is it about kids and bandaids?  Yesterday while delivering some photos to a photographer for whom I work on occasion, I got to greet his children.  He was at his home office so the kids were a bonus for the trip.  His daughter, the impish and delightful Lily, immediately spied the bandage on my hand.  ”What happened?  Did it hurt?  It is bad? Did it hurt A LOT?!”  We chatted about owies for a few minutes and then I left to find her dad.

My niece’s young son had a love of bandaids and so I sent a selection to him in Austria where they lived at the time.  I included a variety of sizes and also some with printed with Builder Bob and Curious George (I knew he loved to build things and was a fan of the famous monkey). Nessa assured me the package was a hit, and I added bandaids to boxes as inexpensive gift ideas for small children.

I have to wonder though, what’s the draw?  There is something almost magical about the power of a bandaid to vanquish pain and take away tears.  It must be this that brightens their little eyes and emboldens their speech when they spot one.  I wish I still had faith in the healing power of a bandaid…I’d be stockpiling them as we speak.  Oh for the days when all it took was a bandaid.

This past Thursday in anticipation of coming and much needed rain, the skies were overcast and gloomy.  The firewood pile was utterly depleted due to a month of truly frigid nights and mornings.  The yard where we replaced the broken sprinkler system earlier, but not early enough to get a lawn seeded due to the ground temperature dropping, was exposed dirt and needed cover from winter storms.

Thanks to my neighbor above, John, my sons were busy exercising their considerable muscles chopping logs into burnable pieces.  In answer to my question about where I could buy firewood, John had allowed us to cut a couple of dry trees in the recesses of his large property.  I am touched by his gift and thankful for the young men working to turn it into heat for my house.

My job that day was to spread straw—five bales—to cover the bare earth and protect it from washing away in the rains.  As I sectioned off the bales and shook them out, I gave thanks that I am not sensitive to straw dust.  My shoes and clothes were coated, the inside pocket of my hoodie filled with the stuff.  After the last bale was spread, I walked over to where dual axes rang in the air.  The wood stack was growing and I could almost feel the warmth promised in the piles.

It was a good, gray day.  Much was accomplished…so simple and yet so deeply satisfying to complete tasks that matter.

I hop out of my car at the main post office where I maintain a postal box for the business, after snaring a coveted parking space out front. Grab my phone, the box key and a nickel in case the meter needs feeding, and lock the door.  Before me sits a man, perhaps a bit younger than me but it’s hard to gauge, holding out a cap—shaking it a bit—and staring intensely at me.  He appears to be able, if a bit down on his luck…lean and wiry.

Saying good morning, I pass by and hear him mutter something, expressing his frustration that I did not give him money.  The tone is clear:  I owe him.  Trudging up the stairs, I wonder, do I owe him?  I come almost daily to collect my mail and each time there is someone asking for a handout…does the very fact that he is here mean I owe him?  (Lord, Lord, Lord.)

After collecting my mail and discarding the majority that is junk, I again pass this man who is drilling me with eyes full of reproach and thinly veiled anger.  I click my seatbelt, check the rearview mirror and back away into the street.  I feel my own anger rise at his bold challenge and am conflicted by my response.

Tomorrow is the 13th anniversary of my husband’s death.  Today as I cooked the wheat berries for the traditional dish—koliva—served at memorials, I reflected on my life as it stands.

In that odd way my thoughts combine, I found myself thinking of the pot I was using to boil the wheat.  I received the pot as a wedding gift some 35 years ago.  It is large, stainless steel, copper bottomed, and produced by the Revere Ware Company.  Our family had a close friend employed by Revere Ware and so we were fans and it was the type of cookware I requested.  I hear the product has gone downhill since, but my pans and pots are still functional, if the copper bottoms do go unpolished.

Looking at my pot I considered how “advanced” and complicated cookware has become.  How do modern brides or gourmet cooks ever decide what to purchase?  I know people discard items for newer, better ones (some folks may even wear theirs out with intense use—not my problem.)  And this thought leads me to my friend, Hannah.

Hannah has taken time off from her regular nursing job to travel to a tiny town in rural Honduras.  It is a journey back to her roots, for her mother was raised there by missionary parents.  Her grandparents and mother cared for the people there and now she is giving of herself in like manner.  Hannah has been good enough to share her considerable adventures in a well written blog, and one of the striking aspects she shares is the concept of “making do.”

At one point the small hospital had several patients needing traction without enough equipment, so the improvising staff raided old storage rooms hunting for options.  In the end they managed to complete the task.  The village goes without many things and so Hannah describes how every item is used to the fullest and then reused whenever possible.  This urgent necessity of making creative use of resources is a fact of life (and sometimes death) there.

And so back to my pot.  My useful old pot.  Thoughts drift through as I ponder the fact that my resources have severely diminished in the decade plus since Michael passed.  I am not happy about it but I understand that the general economy has much to do with it.

Yet I have to admit, have to swallow hard and confess, that my choices have played a large role in this drama.  My unwillingness to “make do” and concentrate on those things that are truly essential and important. Is it too late, I wonder?  Too late to live within my means, accepting life for the confusing, often wonderful, mess that it is?

I wash the pot, spread the boiled wheat across the table to dry as I have now for so many years, and let out a long breath.  There is only one high road here, I think, and as the saying goes:  it begins with one step.

I am no Job.  At my best I view life’s disappointments and setbacks through a humorous, if sometimes dark, lens.  I am not always at my best.

This morning when went I went downstairs to check on a load of laundry and stepped into water in the hallway, I did not lift my eyes to heaven and praise God.  As I said, I am no Job.  To my credit (as least in my mind) I did not swear either—does that count for anything?  The shower was backed up and flooding out onto the floor, filling the bathroom and now the hall and working into my carpeted office and bedroom.  I yelled for Jared and began to gather towels.

In the past month, my well has quit pumping, my in-house vacuum had a clog so thick we had to cut through pipe to clear it, the heater in a rental stopped working, one shower and toilet was not flowing only to discover not one, but two breaks in a septic line…and now this.  Am I missing something, or does this sound like a bit much?!

The drain guy, Phil, came and sure enough there was a clog but we also discovered a third break in the septic line.  (There are many obvious cracks I could make about all these septic clogs, but I will thoughtfully spare you.)  Three hours later, I had finally scrubbed the floors, cleaned the shower and put the last load of dripping towels into a hot water cycle in my washer.  The only task left was for me to stand beneath the warm shower wondering what could possibly happen next.

Perhaps I miss-stepped when I toasted my disgusted farewell to 2011 (did I set myself up for this joke)?  Is there some lesson I have yet to learn that I am resisting (I know the answer to this one…)?  Do I need a new perspective on what constitutes normal (cause I thought I’d been adjusting that one for at least a decade)?

I’m typing this with fingers so rough from scrubbing that they might be able to sand the jagged edges of my brutalized fingernails (I should have taken time to stop for gloves.)  I am not concerned about the rough hands…they will heal…but I am a bit worried about the rough start to this year and can only hope that I’m taking care of business on the front end of calendar.  Oh, and that I find that elusive sense of humor.

My dad was a cut and paste kind of guy.  He invested in glue sticks by the 4-pack.  His desk, tucked away in a corner of the basement storeroom, was stocked with scissors, rubber stamps, and glue sticks. Little snippets of paper littered the desktop and spilled onto the floor as Dad carefully cut out articles from magazines and newspapers and pasted them together.

Frequently I’d find an envelope in my mailbox containing a glued together story that he thought I should read.  And he followed up. What did I think?  Would I like more information?  Perhaps I could write a thoughtful note to the author?

This kind of thing drove my mother crazy, but I got a big kick out of Dad’s latest manila envelope stuffed with random love from him.

But back to the desk.  Being drawn to sift through it after his sudden death, I find mostly curious junk.  In the main drawer there is a stack of photographs.  The top picture is of my mother, taken in the house many years before.  She wears a good-natured grin and happens to be lifting her middle finger to the photographer, no doubt my father. (Dad could use his camera as a playful weapon, often eliciting groans from his victims.)

Chuckling, I grab the stack to see what else is there.  Fanning out the photos I realize that they are all the same—13 copies of my mother giving my dad the finger.  Now I am laughing out loud, delighted by my Dad’s kooky sense of humor.  I can just see him ordering multiple copies of this picture to have on hand to present to mother when the occasion arose.  Theirs was a complicated and often combustable relationship, one where every bit of goodwill and humor was necessary to keep a balance.

Before closing the drawer I draw one photo from the stack, wanting to remember Mom’s face…and that of the man behind the camera.

One of the peculiar things that developed in my father as he aged was a need for secrecy.  He liked to lock things and hide things, especially from my mother.  I think that his limited mobility had something to do with this…he was no longer able to easily access the downstairs where he had for so long maintained his computer and his coins and his clown collections and his books and his files of clippings and articles.  It was a lot to let go of, and even moving the computer to his bedroom was not quite good enough.  My recent visits to the house caused me to ponder just how much he gave up when he could no longer traverse stairs and finally, when he could not walk at all.

I poked around in his desk downstairs, looking for nothing in particular but pausing on the many familiar items still left there.  I picked up the odd containers he used to store small nails and screws, savoring his handwriting on the sides.  With my sister, I dusted each clown on the shelves that filled one long wall, smiling at a few I remembered giving him over the years.  I thumbed through books by Studs Terkel, some of which I had searched out to send to him, and considered the wide variety of subject matter he had gathered.

He had locked safes stored, filled with who knows what.  The key ring for those I knew was upstairs, but I didn’t bother to fetch it.  What I was trying to find was a missing key to a drawer in Dad’s dresser.  The dresser had two small drawers on the top surface and one of them was locked with no key with which to open it.  It had been the subject of a number of conversations with Dad, and now that he was gone my mother wanted to see what had been so important to lock away.  I could not find it and neither could she but she came up with a good idea.  Why not take the other drawer, the open one, to a locksmith and have a key fitted for it since they were sure to be a match.  She and I did this, paid for the expensive key, and drove home in anticipation of solving the mystery.

I wiggled the key around trying to find the correct position (the lock had been fiddled with by Dad in his effort to open it) and finally got it to open.  Pulling the drawer out, I burst into laughter.  It was stuffed with shoestrings and plastic combs and a few emblems for the Southern Illinois University team, marked down to a bargain price (oh, and a couple of buckeyes and bandaids). Dad had fretted, Mom had wondered, I was curious…all for this odd assortment of “worthless” junk.  Mystery solved.

While the contents of that tiny drawer did not produce any great treasure, the search for a lost key and the time spent with my mother getting a new one yielded unexpected memories and sweet moments. I found the treasure and it was in the hunt.

I realize many people are in celebration mode, gearing up for New Year’s after the Christmas packages were opened, cookies and fudge consumed.  These seasons deserve to be observed with festive spirits…hearts adorned with thanksgiving and good cheer.

I find myself sitting on water-worn stone at the edge of a sparkling ocean thinking of pruning.  Soon the orchard will be needing its yearly shaping, and the roses—which missed out entirely in my absence last year—are looking scraggly and forlorn.  The rosemary, which in fairness deserves to be torn completely out as it has long since outgrown the beds where I planted it, will live to see another season if I can aggressively chop it.  I can’t face replacing it just yet.

The real task, the real pruning I’m contemplating, must take place within myself.  I recognize the signals, ever more urgent, calling me to take up my shears and cut away the dead wood.  I’ve been clinging to old hurts, old thoughts, old struggles and they are hindering my heart and choking off my mind…adding unhealthy weight to my stock, holding me down and hampering new bloom.

This isn’t just the lingering sadness of losing my father or concern about my mother’s difficult health problems, coupled with an inability to be physically present to help her.  No, this is old growth:  fears and failures that I’ve been beating myself with for far too long.

It is time to follow the timeless advice that so easily drips from my lips to others—one foot in front of the other, deal with things as they come, let go of things you cannot change or fix, work on the opportunities as they present themselves, do what you can, take time for stillness.

Of course there are huge decisions to make (here comes that fear factor again) and of course I’ve made some poor ones in the past (here comes that beating stick).  Thus the pruning, the clearing away of old tumbleweed blowing hither and thither, to make room in my heart and mind for a colorful bouquet of fresh growth.  ’Tis the season.

I did a senior high photo shoot and this is one of the images from the session.  I suggested she leap with the joy she feels regarding the upcoming graduation…turns out she’s quite a leaper!  Here’s to jumping with abandon!

I’m flying blind, hoping I can make a safe landing for Christmas.  As much as I am filled with gratitude for a Thanksgiving with my family, the death of my father two weeks later from an operation that should not have taken his life has left me adrift.  No, I’m not wandering around in tears (he was 86 years old and had expressed the desire on many occasions to leave this earthly plane), but I dearly miss our daily conversations and the “routine” of having him in my life.

I know this feeling of detachment.  I know that it requires time and process.  I know I will get there.  I’ve done this before.  I won’t get there, however, before Christmas…and that will have to do.  I’m counting on the wise men showing up with their gifts, the shepherds quaking with awesome fear, the angels filling the sky with triumphant melody, and the baby nestled in the cave.  Bells will ring, presents will be given and received, delicious foods will be consumed, arms will outstretch as glasses clink.  And I will lean into it all, participate as I can, and await the coming of a new year.