Edge of the Ocean (Stick Figure)

Today I Feel Like... indeed. March 26 is the six-month mark of Eric's death. All the feelings. Ack. I have watched this lovely 6-minute video created by John Teeto and E's other friends three times today, and I thought it might bring some comfort and joy here as well. We miss you so much, buddy... ❤️

I seem to have lost my concentration/focus for blogging.  Perhaps that means I'm experiencing healing to some degree, and don't depend on it as a coping mechanism as much as I used to?  Bereavement group every Monday sustains me, as does therapy every other Monday (I am making great strides sharing my honest thoughts as well as with EMDR).  I continue to express my gratitude for the best family-and-friends support system ever.  Regular get-togethers with Eric's pals (whether IHOP breakfasts or Bob Marley movie viewings) are lovely as well as comforting.

I am getting out of the house and engaging with others more often; still setting boundaries, being more discriminating as to how I'm spending my time, and not allowing myself to take on more than I can handle.

Besides the trip to see Dar Williams in Key West (early-February), I took another road trip with Nancy last week (this time to Brooksville) to visit our long-time friend Peggy-now-Maggie, who moved to Sweden many years ago and now resides in Finland.  We took her out to dinner, convinced her to spend the night with us at our hotel, and stayed up quite late talking.  Much hilarity as well as sadness ensued (her son William overdosed in 2020, so she "gets it").  I also gave her a pouch of E's ashes, as he has never been to Scandinavia... 🤣

Returned from there Wednesday night, went to Gary's Celebration of Life (he was a church friend, ran sound for the Labyrinth Cafe the last two years (2018-19), and coordinated the A/V at Eric's service.  An unexpected and altogether-too-sudden infection and death... 💔

Then Chico, Sarah, and I drove to Pensacola for my friend/college roommate Linda's daughter Rachel's (confused yet?) baby shower (a very long drive but well worth it).  We've stayed close over the years, and of course many memories were conjured, especially Sarah and I driving to Pensacola three weeks after Rachel was born, to meet her and to keep Linda and Craig company.  The Circle Game... 😍

An extra perk was that, on our way home, we stopped in Tallahassee to meet up with Melanie (Nick is in Texas tiling a bathroom!) at a local coffee shop for hugs and catch-up conversation... 💜

And now for Unpacking and Recovery!

P.S.  Eric's friends alerted me that Stick Figure was one of his favorite bands, and they are getting a group together to see them in August.

SONG:  Edge of the Ocean by Stick Figure

BOOK:  Walking Each Other Home: Conversations on Loving and Dying by Ram Dass, Mirabai Bush

POEM:  Somehow by Dorothy Chan

For Norman

You visit me in a dream after passing,

            after I’ve been awaiting you for weeks,

because Chinese belief teaches us our

            loved ones will appear when we’re asleep.

It’s real when I enter the hotel restaurant

            in the middle of nowhere town I live in,

as the Midwest architecture transforms

            into Kowloon at evening time. We eat

bird’s nest soup, and I remember the time

            my father ordered me this four-hundred-

year-old delicacy at Hong Kong airport.

            Out comes the Peking duck, and I ask you:

“Why did it take you so long?” You answer:

            “I arrived once you were strong and ready.” 

Not to Make Loss Beautiful by Gregory Orr

Not to make loss beautiful,

But to make loss the place

Where beauty starts. Where

the heart understands

For the first time

The nature of its journey.

Love, yes. The body

of the beloved as the gift

Bestowed. But only

Temporarily. Given freely,

But now to be earned.

Given without thought,

And now loss

Has made us thoughtful.

My Son the Man by Sharon Olds

Suddenly his shoulders get a lot wider,

the way Houdini would expand his body

while people were putting him in chains. It seems

no time since I would help him to put on his sleeper,

guide his calves into the gold interior,

zip him up and toss him up and

catch his weight. I cannot imagine him

no longer a child, and I know I must get ready,

get over my fear of men now my son

is going to be one. This was not

what I had in mind when he pressed up through me like a

sealed trunk through the ice of the Hudson,

snapped the padlock, unsnaked the chains,

and appeared in my arms. Now he looks at me

the way Houdini studied a box

to learn the way out, then smiled and let himself be manacled.

QUOTE:  "It isn’t always easy to hold on, especially when the world keeps spinning, but it is easier if we hang on together. That way we are connected, linked together, and stronger than any one of us could ever be alone. It does not matter that we are from different backgrounds or different faiths: what matters is that we care with and for one another. The unraveling of reality only occurs when we let go, let go of our hope and our vision. When we hold on to what we believe, our diversity becomes a bond that cannot be broken. So if you feel like you are hanging on, you are, but never alone. Thousands of us are holding on with you." ~ Steven Charleston

"It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them. I was so preposterously serious in those days… Lightly, lightly – it’s the best advice ever given me… So throw away your baggage and go forward. There are quicksands all about you, sucking at your feet, trying to suck you down into fear and self-pity and despair. That’s why you must walk so lightly. Lightly my darling…" ~ Aldous Huxley

Meet on the Ledge (Richard Thompson)

Whew!  I seem to be totally off my game/schedule/agenda.  What had been an every Tuesday and Friday posting plan has morphed into Whatever.  It's obviously okay (First World Problems, right?) but I always do better with structure... so here's an attempt to get back on track, beginning with updates of the South Florida Folk and Acoustic Music Festival (what a mouthful!) as well as the road trip to Key West to see Dar Williams (both absolutely amazing, as you can well imagine!).

2/2-4/24 - SFFAMF (copied-and-pasted from Facebook):

The South Florida Folk and Acoustic Music Festival 2024. What a weekend (major understatement). Highlights, knowing I'm bound to inadvertently leave someone/something out (sorry in advance):

One-on-one special time with friends pre- as well as post-fest. Amy Carol Webb Friday night. Herding cats for a Friends of Pam photo. Staffing an informational table with Claire for The Caring Community (so many teas, so little time!), right next to Cynthia's Flurban Paradise freeze-dried cookies and fruit, fire cider, energy balls. So Many Hugs! Jennings & Keller. Wearing the necklace Melanie gave me at last year's festival (which meant she was here in spirit *this* year). Honored to be a songwriter competition judge; so many great songs that it was truly challenging to narrow it down to a top three. Multiple meals from The Garden Diva; those pizza empanadas were scrumptious. The reunion continues, until I end up with bar voice. Dragonfly earrings from SusanP. Brian's song circles, complete with my Circle of Friends "campfire".

Returning Sunday a.m., barely able to speak above a croak. More Hugs! Songwriter winners in-the-round (Sarah McCulloch, Jane Fallon, Lynn Biddick); hearing their additional songs validated our choices even more. New discoveries as well as long-time favorites. Friction Farm! Sharing butterfly pea flower tea at our TCC table. Never managed to make it over for a chair massage... 😢

Boundless thanks and love to Bill, Lisa, Laurie, Elyse, Peter, Grace, Bruce, and all the volunteers who made this festival happen. And gratitude that, when it started pouring down rain early-afternoon yesterday, we were under cover... 💖

2/6-7/24 - DAR IN KEY WEST (copied-and-pasted from Facebook):  

When last we left our SheRa, she was packing snacks and heading out the door to pick up Nancy to head to Key West for a concert.  If you're all about the 45-words-or-less version, you can stop here.  Otherwise, keep reading... 🤣

Driving down the Overseas Highway, you soon realize there is a huge differential between miles and minutes; time goes very slowly in the Keys, basically one way in and one way out, a solo lane in each direction, with two lanes appearing every once in a while to allow for a few minutes of passing.  It.  Just.  Is.  You are forced to be peaceful and relaxed, until you become so, due to the stunning views both east and west the further south you go.  Water as far as the eye can see, varied striations of cobalt/turquoise/sky blue, sometimes choppy, sometimes smooth, sporting silver tips when the sun is shining just right.

The Dar Williams show at the Studios of Key West started at 7 p.m. and we arrived at the very cool Ibis Bay Resort (with a coral rock wall *in* our room!) about 5:15, and knew we wanted to eat dinner near the venue beforehand.  Nance and I quickly got ready and, convinced by the front desk that traffic is horrible and parking is limited, we called a cab, which arrived immediately.  One of Nancy's co-workers used to live in Key West and, when Nancy asked for her recommendations for vegan-vegetarian food, she recommended The Cafe.  Yes, The Cafe!  It was a superb menu, and we split the spinach gyoza dumplings and the stuffed butternut squash, both amazingly delish.  I wanted a piece of vegan key lime pie too, but we were cutting it close.  Made it to the show with 5 minutes to spare, ended up on the second row... 💥

Dar continues to amaze me!  Having heard her dozens of times, she *never* tells the same story twice (maybe a kernel of thought interjects but, mostly, nope.  All new, out of her quirky-yet-brilliant brain).  Her voice was perfect, as was the setlist, a handful of songs from her newest CD, many long-time favorites, and even an as-yet-unrecorded song (Hummingbird Highway - beautiful!).  I thank-her-very-sweetly for dedicating Over the Rainbow to me, the Pete Seeger version where, instead of "why oh why can't I?" he substitutes "why can't you and I?", always looking for the inclusivity angle... 💗

Dar toggled between two encores and, after we all begged, she did them both (When I Was a Boy and Iowa), the second of which Nance and I whipped out our phones to access the flashlight app (Dar:  "oh, fireflies!); the tradition got its start at the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, and a few others in the room joined us.  I never get tired of singing/yelling out the "And I'd do it again!" lyric, and Dar actually got quiet for those of us who knew it was coming... 🥰

Dar came out into the lobby after the show, so we could all hug, chat, and get this fab photo (thanks to Fred, the sound guy!).  The fourth is Patty Romanoff, Dar's manager/tour companion who I've also known a very long time.

Nancy and I may have gone back to the room to eat sweet-and-spicy popcorn and drink sparkling wine.  We definitely enjoyed the free continental breakfast the next morning, before heading south on the island to a public beach with a pier where some of Eric's ashes may have been spread.  We may have also stopped at a Mexican restaurant halfway home because I was craving refried beans.

No doubt Nance (Road Buddy Extraordinaire) and I shared another adventure "that couldn't be beat", just like old times (Lucy and Ethel?  Thelma and Louise?), arriving home about 5 p.m., 36 hours of non-stop conversation of the hilarious as well as heartfelt variety, shenanigans, and soul-refilling music.  There is a hot bath and an early bedtime in my future... 🕉

P.S.  credit to Dar for my song title... 🤗

SONG:  Meet on the Ledge by Richard Thompson

BOOK:  The Cure for Sorrow: A Book of Blessings for Times of Grief by Jan Richardson

POEM:  Don’t Hesitate by Mary Oliver

If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy,

don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty

of lives and whole towns destroyed or about

to be. We are not wise, and not very often

kind. And much can never be redeemed.

Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this

is its way of fighting back, that sometimes

something happens better than all the riches

or power in the world. It could be anything,

but very likely you notice it in the instant

when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the

case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid

of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

Blessing for the Brokenhearted by Jan Richardson

"There is no remedy for love but to love more."

—Henry David Thoreau

Let us agree

for now

that we will not say

the breaking

makes us stronger

or that it is better

to have this pain

than to have done

without this love.

Let us promise

we will not

tell ourselves

time will heal

the wound,

when every day

our waking

opens it anew.

Perhaps for now

it can be enough

to simply marvel

at the mystery

of how a heart

so broken

can go on beating,

as if it were made

for precisely this—

as if it knows

the only cure for love

is more of it,

as if it sees

the heart’s sole remedy

for breaking

is to love still,

as if it trusts

that its own

persistent pulse

is the rhythm

of a blessing

we cannot

begin to fathom

but will save us

nonetheless.

QUOTE(S):  “What is the meaning of life? That was all — a simple question; one that tended to close in on one with years. The great revelation had never come. The great revelation perhaps never did come. Instead there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark; here was one." ~ Virginia Woolf

“Be yourself. Try to matter. Be a good friend. Love freely, even if you are likely--almost guaranteed--to be hurt, betrayed. Do what you were created to do. You'll know what this is, because it is what you keep creeping up to, peering at, dreaming of. Do it…” ~ Tennessee Williams 

“Life exists only at this very moment, and in this moment it is infinite and eternal, for the present moment is infinitely small; before we can measure it, it has gone, and yet it exists forever.” ~ Alan Watts

February (Dar Williams)

"They say that February is the shortest month, but you know they could be wrong.

However more abbreviated than its cousins it may look, February feels longer than any of them. It is the meanest moon of winter, all the more cruel because it will masquerade as spring, occasionally for hours at a time, only to rip off its mask with a sadistic laugh and spit icicles into every gullible face, behavior that grows quickly old.

February is pitiless, and it's boring. That parade of red numerals on its page adds up to zero: birthdays of politicians, a holiday reserved for rodents, what kind of celebrations are those? The only bubble in the flat champagne of February is Valentine's Day. It was no accident that our ancestors pinned Valentine's day on February's shirt: he or she lucky enough to have a lover in frigid, antsy February has cause for celebration, indeed.

Except to the extent that it "tints the buds and swells the leaves within" February is as useless as the extra r in its name. It behaves like an obstacle, a wedge of slush and mud and ennui holding both progress and contentment at bay.

If February is the color of lard on rye, its aroma is that of wet wool trousers. As for sound, it is an abstract melody played on a squeaky violin, the petty whine of a shrew with cabin fever. O February, you may be little but you're not small! Were you twice your tiresome length, few of us would survive to greet the merry month of May." ~ Tom Robbins, from Jitterbug Perfume

"Glimmers" by Rachel Grant Art

Or, as Dar Williams sings:  February was so long that it lasted into March..."  Forgive me, friends, for I have erred.  It has been 2 1/2 weeks since my last blog post.  Any Catholics in the house?... 🤷

I have been verbalizing the following, and I am now officially putting it in writing:  For the months of October/November/December, I was in self-imposed hibernation, cocooning, roly-poly mode... which I very much needed as well as appreciated. Then... BAM... January and February.  Yikes!  Not to plead The Busy?Larabar (not Twinkie!) Defense, but... here was my overwhelming/non-stop schedule:

Saturday, 1/27:  Hope Garden 9-11 a.m.

Sunday, 1/28:  The Caring Community Volunteer Appreciation Day 1-4 p.m., gathering at Nancy's (to celebrate Judi's visit) 3-6 p.m.

Monday, 1/29:  bereavement group 12:30-2 p.m.

Wednesday 1/31:  lunch with Nancy, Judi, Suzanne 11 a.m.-2 p.m., Colin's soccer game 6-7 p.m.

Thursday, 2/1:  Hope Garden 9-11 a.m., pre-fest dinner (group of 10), spend the night at Sarah's, drive Colin to school the next morning (Sarah had an early workshop to attend)

Friday through Sunday, 2/2-2/4:  South Florida Folk Festival

Monday, 2/5:  10 a.m. therapy, 12:30-2 p.m. bereavement group, 2:30 late-lunch/early dinner with Brian

Tuesday, 2/6:  leave about noon to see Dar Williams in Key West (arrive about 4 p.m., concert at 7 p.m., spend the night, head back home about 2 p.m. (hopefully after walking on the beach with Dar!), home about 6 p.m.

Wednesday, 2/7:  Long-overdue Recovery Day, maybe?

Thursday, 2/8:  lunch with RobbyG, True North Project board meeting 7-9 p.m.

Friday, 2/9: cookie decorating with Kerrie and Cynthia 3-5 p.m., post-fest dinner with Jay, Jimmy, Nancy, Dave, etc.

Saturday, 2/10:  Hope Garden 9-11, more cookie decorating with Kerrie and Cynthia 1-3 p.m.

Sunday, 2/11:  breakfast with John and Andrew (two of Eric's friends and their girlfriends), Chico, Sarah and Colin, end-of-season picnic for Colin's soccer team 2-4 p.m.

Stop the world, I want to get off... 😱 😱 😱

And I did.  Whew!  Not much Pause happening in that chaotic-yet-joyful time period... but that used to be my life, and I don't want to do that anymore.  Backing up a bit... Pacing myself (another P-word; thanks, Melanie!)... boundaries and reprioritizing.  Ah.  Yes.  Inhale/Exhale... 찲 😌ॐ

P.S.  I grew up in the Southeast, so I never understood the crocus as metaphor until someone explained this song to me.  Big fat f*cking epiphany.  Dar is brilliant (but we already knew that!)

P.P.S.  More detailed posts about the festival as well as the Dar Key West road trip coming soon... 💞

SONG:  February by Dar Williams

BOOK:  Bearing the Unbearable: Love, Loss, and the Heartbreaking Path of Grief by Dr. Joanne Cacciatore, Jeffrey Rubin (Foreword)

POEM:  In February by Alice Meynell

Rich meanings of the prophet-Spring adorn,

Unseen, this colourless sky of folded showers,

And folded winds; no blossom in the bowers;

A poet's face asleep in this grey morn.

Now in the midst of the old world forlorn

A mystic child is set in these still hours.

I keep this time, even before the flowers,

Sacred to all the young and the unborn.

To all the miles and miles of unsprung wheat,

And to the Spring waiting beyond the portal,

And to the future of my own young art,

And, among all these things, to you, my sweet,

My friend, to your calm face and the immortal

Child tarrying all your life-time in your heart.

QUOTE:  “While it is February, one can taste the full joys of anticipation.  Spring stands at the gate, with her finger on the latch.” ~ Patience Strong

January Knows (Open Book)

What a year indeed.  Thirty days in (or six thousand, one hundred and eighty-four, as referenced in the poem below).  After three months of self-imposed hermiting, cocooning, hibernating... January came in like the proverbial lion (two months early), and it's all just been sensory overload this month.  I feel like a mole coming out of its tunnel into broad daylight; I just want to go back in/down.  Trying to follow L's  recommendation, but there aren't enough Pauses in the world to acclimate me to so much brightness.  Blink.  Blink.  Blink.  Pass the shades, extra UV protection please... 😎

I've been meaning to share that I've fallen down the Northern Exposure rabbithole, now streaming on Amazon Prime.  I was obsessed on its first run, six seasons from 1990-1995 and, although it sometimes feels a bit dated, it's still clever, quirky, soul-filling:  whining Fleischman... Maggie and her opposite-of-Midas-Touch when it comes to boyfriends... Chris in the Morning with his raging pheromones (John Corbett in what I think was his first major role)... Shelley's earrings du jour, etc. etc. etc.  I realized tonight that my new mantra is WWMD (What Would Marilyn Do?).  If you know, you know, right?

P.S.  bonus video:  Today is January 739th by The Holderness Family

SONG:  January Knows by Open Book

BOOK:  Unattended Sorrow: Recovering from Loss and Reviving the Heart by Stephen Levine, Ondrea Levine (Introduction), Mirabai Starr (Foreword)

POEM(S):  Mnemonic by Brian Bilston

Thirty days hath September,

April, June and November.

Unless a leap year is its fate,

February hath twenty-eight.

All the rest hath three days more,

excepting January,

which hath six thousand,

one hundred and eighty-four.

To the New Year by W S. Merwin

With what stillness at last

you appear in the valley

your first sunlight reaching down

to touch the tips of a few

high leaves that do not stir

as though they had not noticed

and did not know you at all

then the voice of a dove calls

from far away in itself

to the hush of the morning

so this is the sound of you

here and now whether or not

anyone hears it this is

where we have come with our age

our knowledge such as it is

and our hopes such as they are

invisible before us

untouched and still possible

QUOTE:  “These memories of happiness are fleeting things, reflections in a stream, glimpsed all broken for a second and then swept away in the current of grief that is our life now. I can't say that I ever feel what it felt like then, when I was happy. But sometimes something will touch the place where that feeling was, a touch as slight and swift as the brush of a moth's wing in the dark.” ~ Geraldine Brooks

What Do You Hear in These Sounds (Dar Williams)

There's no late in blogging, right?  All my good intentions to post Tuesdays and Fridays oft go awry, right, Mr. Burns? (the poet, not Homer Simpson's boss).  Thus we end up with Thursday.  In the grand scheme of things, it's most certainly a First World Problem.

My favorite day is every-other-Monday, during which I have a therapy appointment with L at 10 a.m. and my bereavement group from 12:30-2 p.m.  By mid-afternoon, I am ridiculously peaceful and relaxed; Ectoplasm R Us.  "Oh, how I loved everybody else when I finally got to talk so much about myself"; Dar is brilliant (brilliant... 💖)

When I arrived this week to see L, I wanted to talk about brain blips; I've done the research, and shared on this blog that grief causes brain fog, as a result of trauma.  My recent go-to, when I hit a blank, is: "I know there's a word for that." Sometimes it comes to me, sometimes not, and often I find a paltry substitute knowing, with my obsession with semantics, it's not the *intended* word. Ugh.

Um, here's a tip for you:  multi-tasking is over-rated (shockeroo). For the last few years, I've just been trying to do one-thing-at-a-time well, instead of many things poorly. It helps.  Then there's aging. And post-menopause. I am a big fat f*cking mess and I have to be okay with that for now, trying to be gentle with myself while still attempting All. The. Coping. Mechanisms... 🤷‍♀️

An example:  Sunday about noon I headed to the pop-up market in Hollywood (FL) and somehow mis-entered the address in my GPS, inadvertently leaving off the fourth number (zero), so... I was led substantially farther east than I needed to be, and there was a drawbridge, and my trip ended up taking an hour rather than the usual 30 minutes.

And as I was regaling L with this tale... she stopped me, leaned forward from her lotus position on the couch, and shared one word:  Pause... and it was as if an electric current went through my entire body.  Yes.  Of course.  Quelle nouvelle.  And then she added Patience.

Not one to be left out, I added my two favorite P words:  Ponder and Perspective... not to mention my Word of the Year:  (Be) Present.  And, after all that, I need to make it a Priority to Practice (see what I did there?) being in the stillness to clear my mind.  Whew.  I have indeed been practicing since Monday, and it's made a big difference.  Phenomenal (silent P... 🤣)

The day after Eric died, I resurrected my blog (best f*cking coping mechanism ever!)... daily until the end of October 2023, and twice-weekly since.  In late-November I pondered making a Spotify playlist of healing songs... then realized, rather than reinvent the wheel, I'd create an ongoing journey, in chronological order, of all the songs I've used to title my blog posts.  To be continued; I will add this Dar song as soon as I Publish this entry...

[It hasn't come to fruition yet, but I found Eric's former tattooist (the ship and octopus on his right shoulder/bicep; on E's recommendation, he actually did the family compass on my upper back, and Sarah's flowers/dragonfly/butterfly on her hip)... and will be following up soon... 🧭

P.S.  Tomorrow is the four-month mark of Eric's death.

SONG:  What Do You Hear in These Sounds by Dar Williams

BOOK:  Finding Your way Through Loss & Grief: A Therapist’s Guide to Working Through Any Grieving Process by Christine Hopfgarten

POEM(S):  Let Yourself Rest by Jeff Foster

If you’re exhausted, rest.

If you don’t feel like starting a new project, don’t.

If you don’t feel the urge to make something new, 

just rest in the beauty of the old, the familiar, the known.

If you don’t feel like talking, stay silent.

If you’re fed up with the news, turn it off.

If you want to postpone something until tomorrow, do it.

If you want to do nothing, let yourself do nothing today. 

Feel the fullness of the emptiness, the vastness of the silence, the sheer life in your unproductive moments.

Time does not always need to be filled.

You are enough, simply in your being.

Fierce Wild Joy by Beth Weaver-Kreider

May this year bring you joy

like crows rising from the fields

fierce

wild joy

yelling full-voice

into the wind

rowing through the tempest

with nothing but feathers.

In the Woods of Language, She Collects Beautiful Sticks by Valzhyna Mort

like a snail with a shell of sticks

    — she loads them on her back —

Like a camel with a hump of sticks

    — on her back, on her back —

Like a horse with a knight of sticks and a stick for a sword

Where is she taking this load of sticks?

    — on her hump, on her hump —

She has no house, where is she taking the house she doesn’t have?

    — in the fire she is taking it in the fire —

In the fire she is making a poem entirely out of sticks on fire and it goes like this

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////

QUOTE(S):  “Time does not heal all wounds; it just gives them space to sink into the subconscious, where they will continue to impact your emotions and behavior. What heals is going inward, loving yourself, accepting yourself, listening to your needs, addressing your attachments and emotional history, learning how to let go, and following your intuition.” ~ Yung Pueblo

“Death is our friend precisely because it brings us into absolute and passionate presence with all that is here, that is natural, that is love… Life always says Yes and No simultaneously. Death (I implore you to believe) is the true Yea-sayer. It stands before eternity and says only: Yes.” ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

"Not causing harm requires staying awake. Part of being awake is slowing down enough to notice what we say and do. The more we witness our emotional chain reactions and understand how they work, the easier it is to refrain. It becomes a way of life to stay awake, slow down, and notice." ~ Pema Chodron

I Heard an Owl (Carrie Newcomer)

Many of you may recall the blog post detailing my owl encounter four days before Eric's Celebration of Life on October 14, 2023.  I believed then, and, even if it never happens again (although I certainly hope it does), I remain convinced it was a visitation from my son.

Going forward, owls have been appearing everywhere (isn't that always the way things happpen?), on my own radar and stories from others; as I shared my tale with long-time besties Michele and Rox, they too offered up their past histories, neither of which I knew about.  My sister-in-law Pat, a wonderful potter (who is creating a new urn for E's cremains; no rush!), made me a beautiful owl pendant, which I have added to my keychain.

I am also more seriously contemplating something I spoke of in my part of the eulogy:

"So far, he's given us signs of rainbows... and an owl appeared to me that I am sure was a visitation.  And, even though I've declared a moratorium on tattoos ("seven is the number", sings Dave Carter), if I hear Eric's voice whispering in my ear that it might be time for more ink, one of you will be getting a call to accompany me."

It might very well be time (no spoilers yet, but I already have three contenders).  

This morning, when I was transferring last year's calendar dates over to the new year's clean slate of schedules/agendas/commitments... July 2023 jumped out at me (see images above and below).  We all know that July 28 is Eric's birthday, right?  Freaked me the f*ck out (and of course I had to share with M and R immediately!).

So, as my carefully-chosen Word of the Year is Be Present/Now... you can bet I'll be on the lookout for more owls to guide my path or, at the very least, keep me company.  I am mindful and comforted and grateful, oh my... 🦉

"When you see owls everywhere or they recur in your dreams repeatedly, pay attention," says Harmon-Luber. Mello agrees that if you continually see owls, they want to get your attention. "Our spirit guides are sending messages, and they'll keep sending you signs," she says.

"Have you ever stared into the owl's eyes?" ~ Robert Penn

Yes. I. Have... 💞

SONG:  I Heard an Owl by Carrie Newcomer

BOOK(S):  In Search of the Owl: A father's death begins a quest for a deeper understanding...of life. by Jean E. Sidinger

Crossing the Owl's Bridge: A Guide for Grieving People Who Still Love by Kim Bateman

POEM:  Owls by Liza Katz Duncan

And maybe this is all we get: a chilly evening,

           5:30 and the sun should still be out. Instead October’s

                      Full Blood Moon has come and gone

over the hospital parking lot. The crickets’ warning song

           has already begun. My body, we’ve learned, has forgotten again

what to carry and what

           to discard, like those owl pellets we dissected in the fourth grade:

                      here the jaw, there the shoulder blade of some smaller creature.

I imagine an ossuary blooming in my gut, a stone well

           of tiny bones, ancestors tunneling through the cartilage,

though of course I know this is impossible: ancestors

           are supposed to stay dead.

A graveyard forgets more than we know. Names obscured

           by time and weather, grass

                      grown over a stone. So, too, a body.

Mine has forgotten so much. Has forgotten

           rhythms: stars, bird calls. But as we pull in the driveway

that night, a Great Horned Owl, then another,

           chanting their duet—first the female,

then the male, slightly deeper. The evening carrying

           their song through our open window.

I will never be an ancestor. In a few days my body

           will miscarry for the fourth and final time. And maybe

                      this is just what we get: you, me,

calling each other in the dark. Love: the one,

           then the other. A book, two opposite pages

kissing. A glass house. Outside, constellations

           in a quickening sky. Owls finding each other in the dark.

Season of Owl by Beth Weaver-Kreider

This is the season of owl,

of winds that howl through the hollow,

the season of the sharp bark

of the fox, voicing longing in the bosque.

This is the season of bitter,

of fierce flakes feathering cheeks and hands,

the season of crystal, crisp and cutting,

of beauty that will slice you open.

This is the season of rising,

thin and pale, into the dawn air,

but also of burrowing, huddling deep

into the layers that hold you.

Walk the thin line of today with care,

one foot precisely placed, the other. . .

Perhaps you will notice,

when you raise your eyes for a moment,

how the line curves out ahead of you,

bringing you

always

back home.

QUOTE(S):  "An owl sound wandered along the road with me.  I didn't hear it - I breathed it into my ears." ~ William Stafford

"You don't need anything but hope. The kind of hope that flies on silent wings under a shining owl moon." ~ Jane Yolen

"If we cannot sing of faith and triumph, we will sing our despair. We will be that kind of bird. There are day owls, and there are night owls, and each is beautiful and even musical while about its business." ~ Henry David Thoreau

"There’s always a hidden owl in “knowledge.” " ~ E.I. Jane

My Silver Lining (First Aid Kit)

Since 2008, it has been my custom each January 1 (a so-far-17-year tradition) to ascribe to Christine Kane's concept of choosing a Word of the Year to inspire/motivate/give me direction as to the tone/theme of my upcoming 52 weeks/365 days.  In retrospect, some of my previous words/phrases have been Release, Create, Let It Go, Health, Light, Follow-Through, Contentment, Forward, Stretch, and last year's Sage.

After much pondering (I had it narrowed down to three:  runners-up were Gratitude and Heart/Love), I decided on Now/Be Present for 2024.

If there is anything I have learned since Eric's fatal car accident on September 26, 2023... it is that *Everything* can turn upside-down in the blink of an eye.  Monumentally.  Irrevocably.  Unimaginably.  We think it's a cliche until it happens to us.  In fact, I'd venture to say we go through life thinking that it *won't* happen to us.  Strangers, yes.  Friends of friends, yes.  Sometimes even friends.  But we're still somehow One Degree of Separation from an actual tragedy.  Until it does.  No wouldas/couldas/shouldas.  No what-ifs.  No if-onlys.  Bam.  A family, a couple, a neighborhood, the world... is diminished by one.

For the past 90+ days, I have spiraled through anxious, needy, emotional, worrying, extrapolating, melancholy, self-destructive, desperate, scrambling, hyper-ventilating.  I was a big, fat, f*cking mess... and I had a good reason for being so.  My son is gone and, as many times as I write/say/scream it, that basic fact will not change.  I continue to replay in my head the phone call from his girlfriend (across state lines) that changed my life.  It was visceral.  My stomach flip-flopped.  The tears welled.  I haven't been suicidal, but I needed to figure out how to get out of the loop.

I now wake up every morning, and do my best to talk myself off the proverbial ledge.  I realize I hadn't been taking care of myself as well as I should; everyone else, yes... but not me.  Vowing (and following through) with taking my vitamins/supplements, eating more healthfully, moving my body, muting my phone and setting aside quiet time, maintaining boundaries.  The grief journey (there is no destination) continues, as does the healing.

What's done is done; I can't alter the past, nor can I control the future.  But Right Now, The Present, is within my grasp.  I will do everything in my power to honor E and make him proud of me... one thought, task, day at a time... ⏰

SONG:  My Silver Lining by First Aid Kit (and there is a f*cking owl in the video... 😲)

BOOK:  Be Where Your Feet Are: Seven Principles to Keep You Present, Grounded, and Thriving by Scott O'Neil

POEM(S):  

She walked naked

Into the New Year.

No definite plan.

No vision boards.

No intentions set.

No journals created.

No classes or workshops scheduled.

Only trust in the Great Mystery,

in Goddess,

to provide and direct

her Soul toward its destiny.

Dreaming the visions between

past and future lives,

She listened to the voice

of her Soul

as it called her forward

into love and grace and magnificence.

As it called her deeper into her purpose,

step by step by step.

With only an open heart

and the thrill of the journey,

She walked freely and open

into the coming year.

~ Arlene Bailey

Her Sacred Wild, Re-Membering the Wild Soul Woman 

The Only Prayer by James Crews

Because there was nothing else to do,

and the news frightened me as usual,

I took a walk on my favorite trail

in the woods, and because the snow

began to melt as soon as it fell,

everything was wet—the lichen a bright

lime-green on the bark of each fallen tree,

the leaves beneath my feet deliciously

soft as they squelched and sank back

into the arms of the earth that shaped them. 

I picked up one of the limp, gold-

toned beech leaves, pressed it to my chest 

then left my despair on a mossy trunk,

like placing a lit candle on an altar

and saying the only prayer that matters:

I'm here, I’m here, I’m here.

With Astonishing Tenderness by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

When, in the middle of the night,

you wake with the certainty you’ve

done it all wrong, when you wake

and see clearly all the places you’ve failed,

in that moment, when dreams will not return,

this is the chance for your softest voice—

the one you reserve for those you love most—

to say to you quietly, oh sweetheart,

this is not yet the end of the story.

Sleep will not come, but somehow,

in that wide awake moment there is peace—

the kind of peace that does not need

everything to be right before it arrives.

The peace that comes from not fighting

what is real. The peace that rises

in the dark on its sure dark wings

to meet you exactly as you are.

QUOTE(S):  “There is only one day left, always starting over: it is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk.” ~ Jean-Paul Sartre 

"This grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls." ~ John Muir

"We are so brief. A one-day dandelion. A seedpod skittering across the ice. We are a feather falling from the wing of a bird. I don’t know why it is given to us to be so mortal and to feel so much. It is a cruel trick, and glorious." ~ Louise Erdrich

Closer to Fine (Indigo Girls)

"There's more than one answer to these questions

Pointing me in a crooked line..."

Glimmers.  I've seen the word before in others' writings, and I've referred to it elsewhere in this blog.  It's so easy to get stuck, mired, enveloped in the fog of grief.  Getting out of bed each morning feels insurmountable... putting one foot in front of the other to get through the day is challenging... coming to grips that your loved one is gone forever is still impossible to fathom.  And for a while that's all you can see.  Darkness.  Yeah, I realize the irony.

Yet, every once in a while, glimmers appear.  Small, brief, barely recognizable... but they're there.  Like fireflies.  And they speak of possibilities.  

And it won't be the default anytime soon, but Fun is finding its way back into our MossFam dynamic... and Laughter... and Joy.  Rob uncharacteristically called a Family Dinner into action tonight (it's usually *me* herding the cats).  I picked up pizza on the way over to Sarah's.  The theme was "New Year, New Me, New E".  There was a heartfelt toast.  We didn't know what to expect, but it morphed into an evening with Willie Nelson, Bette Midler/Annie, Will from Stranger Things, a mermaid, Slash, Kris Jenner (and Kris Jenner as a blonde!), and a cranky Dennis the Menace who was not amused, had to be bribed with brownies, and even then snarled his way through our photo-ops.  And it was very good... 💖💖💖💖💖

"It's only life after all, yeah..."

SONG:  Closer to Fine by Indigo Girls

BOOK:  Grief Glimmers Grace by Betsy B. Murphy

POEM(S):  The Edge by Donna Ashworth

Standing at the edge of a new chapter can be scary. 

The desire to run back into the pages you know so well, 

is more than tempting. But you must keep moving. 

Chapters end, even the good ones. 

And if you linger in the past too long, 

your story cannot unfold the way it should. 

And you might just miss the most beautiful moments of your life, 

whilst grieving the ones gone by. 

It’s scary at the edge, my friend, I know. 

But just jump. You have so much ahead. 

And the good stuff behind, will always be there.

The Way It Is by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

Over and over we break

open, we break and

we break and we open.

For a while, we try to fix

the vessel—as if

to be broken is bad.

As if with glue and tape

and a steady hand we

might bring things to perfect

again. As if they were ever

perfect. As if to be broken is not

also perfect. As if to be open

is not the path toward joy.

The vase that’s been shattered

and cracked will never

hold water. Eventually

it will leak. And at some

point, perhaps, we decide

that we’re done with picking

our flowers anyway, and no

longer need a place to contain them

We watch them grow just

as wildflowers do—unfenced,

unmanaged, blossoming only

when they’re ready—and my god,

how beautiful they are amidst

the mounting pile of shards.

QUOTE(S):  "Without suffering, there's no happiness. So we shouldn't discriminate against the mud. We have to learn how to embrace and cradle our own suffering and the suffering of the world, with a lot of tenderness." ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

“Don’t get me wrong: grief sucks, it really does. Unfortunately, though, avoiding it robs us of life, of the now, of a sense of living spirit.” ~ Anne Lamott

"Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house, so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart, so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place." ~ Rumi

Father and Son (Cat Stevens)

New Month, New Year (technically two days ago but... 🤷) Eric left this world on a Tuesday (September 26) but I won't be counting weeks anymore.  It's too exhausting, too wrenching, like picking at a scab; my goal is still to post every Tuesday and Friday, and Tuesday's post *will* be somehow related to E but, in an attempt to, not move on but, move forward... Fridays will incorporate other content... less grieving, more healing.  Of course, today is Wednesday, so... all of the above is moot anyway.  Time is relative, right?  Ob-la-di, ob-la-da... 

Was thinking so strongly of Eric yesterday, and this photo popped up in my phone gallery; when we drove to Carrollton GA (our old college town) for my brother's wedding in early-September, we also spent a good bit of Monday touring the area to see what was still the same (hardly anything) and what had changed (mostly everything!).  There was still a record store where the former one had been, but new management/new name.  Had to buy something of course and, since we were going to be visiting Eric in Atlanta that evening, Chico and I decided on Cat Stevens' Tea for the Tillerman.  He put it on his turntable when we got there and, three weeks later, when he was killed in a car accident, Duyen (his girlfriend) sent us this photo that he'd been playing the album fairly non-stop.  Strangely comforting, right?

"During this season, for many the ache of losing a cherished soul rises to the surface. Time's relentless march lurks silently, assaulting one when least expected. And for some, when the brutal truth unveils itself, a fresh wave of torment crashes upon their being, piercing deep into the core, persistently reminding of their absence from the realm of the living. For some, It is not a solitary occurrence of bereavement, my friends, but rather an unending odyssey, an eternal pilgrimage that some never truly overcome if dwelt upon. Yet, through  determination of living in the present moment, one learns to navigate these treacherous waters, to remain buoyant amidst the ceaseless assault.

 Therefore, it becomes imperative to exhibit empathy toward those navigating this murky sea, for they have embarked upon an everlasting expedition, enduring the jarring shock that reverberates to their very core each time the harsh reality resurfaces: "there's an empty hole in life where a loved one once lived." It is not solely a matter of losing someone once; for some, it is the daily surrender throughout the entirety of their mortal existence.

In due course, time shall heal all wounds. Embracing the present moment offers the best chance to leave behind the anguish and sorrow. Now is the only time at our disposal, let us not forget those departed souls, but set aside the grief, anguish, and sadness that their departure has inflicted, by wholeheartedly immersing ourselves in the present moment... and be open to Love.

If we  can accept life as it unfolds, letting the grief come to the surface and experiencing it completely, and then letting it go will heal these deep wounds eventually, and you will know everything is in perfect order, as it should be." ~ Ram Om

SONG:  Father and Son by Cat Stevens

BOOK:  Because by Mo Willems, Amber Ren (Illustrator)  I purchased this book for Colin at the Miami Book Fair ($1.00 Books table) in late-November!

POEM(S):  Signs, Music by Raymond Antrobus

The first word my son signed 

was music: both hands, fingers conducting

music for everything – even hunger,

open mouth for the chew chew spoon

squealing mmm – music. We’d play

a record while he ate music when

he wanted milk so I pour and hum

a lullaby or I Just Don’t Know 

by Bill Withers because it’s ok 

not to know what you want 

and I want him to know that. Music

is wiping the table after the plates music

is feel my forehead for fever is whatever

occurs in the centre of the body, whatever

makes arms raise up, up. 

The second word my son signed 

was bird – beaked finger to thumb, bird

for everything outside – window, sky, tree

roof, chimney, aerial, airplane – birds. I saw

I had given him a sign name. Fingers

to eyes raising from thumbs - wide    

eye meaning watchful of the earth

in three different roots – Hebrew, Arabic,

Latin – I love how he clings

to my shoulders and turns

his head to point at the soft body

of a caterpillar sliding across the counter,

and signs, music.

Life After Death by Terry Pratchett

In the Ramtop Village they believe that

no one is finally dead until the ripples they 

cause in the world die away, until the clock

he wound up winds down - until the wine

she made has finished its ferment, until the

crop they planted is harvested.  The span 

of someone's life, they say, is only the

core of their actual existence.

Music by Anne Porter

When I was a child

I once sat sobbing on the floor

Beside my mother’s piano

As she played and sang

For there was in her singing

A shy yet solemn glory

My smallness could not hold

And when I was asked

Why I was crying

I had no words for it

I only shook my head

And went on crying

Why is it that music

At its most beautiful

Opens a wound in us

An ache a desolation

Deep as a homesickness

For some far-off

And half-forgotten country

I’ve never understood

Why this is so

But there’s an ancient legend

From the other side of the world

That gives away the secret

Of this mysterious sorrow

For centuries on centuries

We have been wandering

But we were made for Paradise

As deer for the forest

And when music comes to us

With its heavenly beauty

It brings us desolation

For when we hear it

We half remember

That lost native country

We dimly remember the fields

Their fragrant windswept clover

The birdsongs in the orchards

The wild white violets in the moss

By the transparent streams

And shining at the heart of it

Is the longed-for beauty

Of the One who waits for us

Who will always wait for us

In those radiant meadows

Yet also came to live with us

And wanders where we wander.

QUOTE(S):  “In the dark times / will there also be singing? / Yes, there will also be singing. / About the dark times.” ~ Bertolt Brecht

"One good thing about music. When it hits you, you feel no pain." ~ Bob Marley

“Consciousness is the most stubborn substance in the cosmos, and the most fluid. It can be rigid as concrete, and it can change in an instant. A song can change it, or a story, or a fragrance wafting by on the wind." 

~ Starhawk

Auld Lang Syne (inspired by Robert Burns' poem)

Was going to blog tomorrow, but decided to weave together some thoughts to post now.  The last 48 hours found me segueing from a place of obvious and understandable grief:  no bereavement group for two weeks because it falls on a Monday:  Christmas Day and New Year's Day + no therapy since late-November because I had COVID and then my therapist got it (not from me, I might add!) = feeling abandoned/desperate/scrambling/extrapolating/melancholy/hyperventilating/anxious/emotional/needy/stomach flip-flops/heart tightness (in my best Mister Rogers voice:  "can you say ALL the feelings?), with no professional support during the hardest time of the year after losing my son three months ago (WTF?!?)

...to an unexpected melting and unstuckness as, two hours ago, I performed a saging ritual to clear negative/destructive energy and conjure positive vibes (and god love my husband for being such a trooper and participating).  I'd been puttering (my mom loved that word!) around the house all day, intentionally straightening/ organizing/decluttering in anticipation of the New Year (in less than four hours!).  And our space looks (mostly) lovely, and it certainly smells divine, and I've also been taking better care of myself (yoga! healthy eating!  being present!), which always helps, right?  

Happy (almost) New Year, my friends!  I remain grateful for your wisdom, hope, love, humor, support, and wholeheartedness these last three months (and always, actually).  And we persist; Onwards indeed... 🌈💗🌞

from Donna Ashworth:

No, 2024 perhaps won’t be your best year yet. 

Nor will it be the worst.

You see, a year is a mosaic of absolutely everything.

Joy, fear, heartache, loss, beauty, pain, love.

Failure, learning, friendship, misery, exhilaration.

Each day, each moment even, is a tiny shard of glass in this beautiful, confusing creation.

2024, like all the years before, will be another mosaic to add to your wall of art

A wall that shows the life, you are continuously gifted.

A wall that shows you are human.

A wall of survival.

I wish you many broken pieces of glass this year, my friends.

Because this is living.

And before you march on in to another year of ‘everything’, pause to look back, at the work you have created thus far.

It is quite something.

You are quite something. 

Now on we go, my friends.

Onwards we very much go.

SONG:  Auld Lang Syne, inspired by Robert Burns' poem (this, my favorite version, was used in the first Sex and the City movie... 💖)

BOOK:  First Year of Grief Club: A Gift From A Friend Who Gets It by Addison Brasil

POEM(S):  if 2023 was the quivering seed

2024 will be the raging bloom 

if in 2023 you were stuck in a box 

in 2024 you’ll tango on the moon  

in 2023 you shouted all your words 

in 2024 your voice will be morning rain 

in 2023 you were told you were broken 

in 2024 you’ll break the cycle of shame 

2023 was the year of the clenched fists

2024 will be the era of pardoned sins 

2023 was when tried to hide your light 

in 2024 you’ll feel safe inside your skin 

2023 wanted to divide us in two 

2024 feels like kindness will multiply 

2023 sounded like a rusty chainsaw 

2024 will be a soft midnight lullaby 

2023 is fading away like an old tire fire 

2024 is strolling toward your front door 

in 2023 we had more ammo than people 

in 2024 we’ll choose empathy over war 

my love, hold my hand so tightly

as the calendar year gently restarts

as 2024 arrives, let’s drop our armor 

and entangle all of our lonely hearts

~ john roedel

The New Song by W. S. Merwin

For some time I thought there was time

and that there would always be time

for what I had a mind to do

and what I could imagine

going back to and finding it

as I had found it the first time

but by this time I do not know

what I thought when I thought back then

there is no time yet it grows less

there is the sound of rain at night

arriving unknown in the leaves

once without before or after

then I hear the thrush waking

at daybreak singing the new song

QUOTE(S):  “Watch out for each other. Love everyone and forgive everyone, including yourself. Forgive your anger. Forgive your guilt. Your shame. Your sadness. Embrace and open up your love, your joy, your truth, and most especially your heart.” ~ Jim Henson

"As the year comes to a close, it is a time for reflection – a time to release old thoughts and beliefs and forgive old hurts.  Whatever has happened in the past year, the New Year brings fresh beginnings.  Exciting new experiences and relationships await.  Let us be thankful for the blessings of the past and the promise of the future." ~ Peggy Toney Horton

“May your walls know joy, may every room hold laughter, and every window open to great possibility.” ~ Mary Anne Radmacher

Someone asked me what is your religion? I said, “All the paths that lead to the light.” ~ Anonymous