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

Fix You (Coldplay)

Family vacation, July 2017, Cudjoe Key, photo credit: https://www.emileemcgovern.com/

It was a quiet, low-key week... Day-Quil-ing and Night-Quil-ing and Hall's lozenging, oh my!  I should have given you all a heads-up to buy stock in Kleenex... 🤣

It was also a strong emphasis on Radical Self-Care:  lots of hot baths, early bedtimes, catching up on TV shows (I finished Six Feet Under, at least as fabulous as I remembered it, if not more so):

"You think you finally get to the bottom of the feelings... and then there are more."

***

"I know.  I still can't believe it.  It's like... now we just go on with everything?  It's what people do."

***

"This is a hard day, and we're all very upset.  The loss of a young person is always a terrible blow.  But, in this case, it's even more cruel because [no spoiler!] was an idealist, and he struggled, all through his life, to be a good man.  He wasn't perfect; but then who among us is?  And he never gave up on himself, the people he loved, or even love itself, in all its vexing, beautiful forms."

***

"I forget how anyone ever gets over anything."

"...with time."

"...by remembering love."

"what the h*ll does that mean?"

"Slowly you fall back in love with whatever really mattered to you."

I started a WhatsApp Winter Wellness Challenge (in a no-pressure, no-guilt, no-stress definition of the word) for the month of December, inviting immediate as well as extended family members to join me in sharing (publicly or silently) their accomplishments... their stumbles... their affirmations... their words of wisdom... their get-up-and-do-it-again-amens... their memes... their goals, etc.  Motivate.  Inspire.  Encourage.  Today is Day 3 and it's already unbelievable lovely... 💖

I was delighted to test COVID-negative on Friday, meaning I could gather with Sarah, Colin, and Rob to decorate her Christmas tree that evening... as well as get back to the Hope garden yesterday.  "Oh patience" indeed... ॐ

SONG:  Fix You by Coldplay

BOOK:  Healing After Loss: Daily Meditations For Working Through Grief by Martha Whitmore Hickman

POEM(S):  Allium by Rosemerry Wahola Trommer

 

While I did not fix

the thing I most

wish to fix, and I

did not do

the most important

thing on my list,

and I did not save

anyone, and I did

not solve the world’s

problems, I did

plant the onion sets

in the garden,

pressed my fingers

into the dry earth,

knew myself as

a thin dry start.

Oh patience, good

self. This slow

and quiet growing,

this, too, is

what you are

here to do.

Shoulders by Naomi Shihab Nye

A man crosses the street in rain,

stepping gently, looking two times north and south,

because his son is asleep on his shoulder.

No car must splash him.

No car drive too near to his shadow.

This man carries the world's most sensitive cargo

but he's not marked.

Nowhere does his jacket say FRAGILE,

HANDLE WITH CARE.

His ear fills up with breathing.

He hears the hum of a boy's dream

deep inside him.

We're not going to be able

to live in this world

if we're not willing to do what he's doing

with one another.

The road will only be wide.

The rain will never stop falling.

QUOTE(S):  “You begin to cry and writhe and yell and then to keep on crying; and finally, grief ends up giving you the two best gifts: softness and illumination.” ~ Anne Lamott

“We think that the point is to pass the test or overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.” ~ Pema Chödrön 

"Our death is our wedding with eternity." ~ Rumi

"I held on to a thought about my boy that helped me face a future without him:  He had loved me his whole life.  That love is precious; and it's for keeps.  I will not waste it." ~ Hilda Bastain

(No One's) Singin' Along (Hymn for Her)

[thanks to Melanie for this absurdly-on-point graphic!]

Our Governor is ridiculous.  On Friday, he began to re-open the state, despite the fact it is incredibly risky to do so.  The statistics and articles below show that, but DeSantis is a Trump syncophant, and we know it's all about the money and the ratings.  Putting the state's economy over our health.  Covidiots.  


State coronavirus cases pass 36,800, and half of new deaths are in South Florida:  Florida’s Department of Health on Monday morning confirmed 819 additional cases of COVID-19 as restaurants and shops across the state, except in South Florida, opened their doors to customers for the first time in weeks. The state is now closer to hitting the 37,000 mark, with a total of 36,897 confirmed cases.  Monday’s total daily numbers is the highest the state has seen since Friday, when a weeklong trend of daily totals fewer than 1,000 was broken. There were also 20 new deaths announced, bringing the statewide death toll to 1,399.

As Florida starts to reopen, fewer than 2% of residents have been tested for COVID-19:  As major swaths of the state reopen for business Monday, about 1.8% of Florida’s population has been tested for COVID-19, according to a Miami Herald analysis, with percentages much lower in rural areas, including counties where nursing homes and prisons have become hot spots for the virus’ silent spread.

‘Who wants to eat in an empty restaurant?’ How Miami-Dade plans to reopen in a pandemic:  Miami-Dade residents might soon be able to dine out or visit a hotel when local authorities begin an expected gradual lifting of business lockdown orders. But when they go out, they’ll encounter a drastically altered leisure landscape.

An appointment to shop? How major retailers plan to reopen after coronavirus pandemic:  As the United States surpasses 1 million cases of coronavirus, major retailers are looking ahead to how they might reopen safely after the pandemic.

There’s got to be a better way to handle crowds at Miami-Dade marinas. Here are a few | Editorial:  Boaters started lining up Friday night at Black Point Marina in South Dade to be among the first to hit the water on Saturday. Hundreds of vehicles were backed up at the entrance. Boaters waited for hours long because only 10 vehicles at a time could enter. By 10 a.m., the marina had reached capacity and was shut down.

SONG: (No One's) Singin' Along by Hymn for Her

BOOK:  Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers by Robert Sapolsky

POEM:  Si Se Puede by Jose A. Alcantara

When I take my morning walk now,
I am Pancho Villa. I am Che Guevara.
I am an outlaw in a mask and dark glasses.
I am starting a revolution.
Power to the peonies!
¡Vivas to the violets!
We would rather die on our knees,
sniffing at a flower,
than live, standing in line,
waiting for toilet paper to arrive.
Quivering, I throw my heart out,
six feet in every direction.
All that creeps, crawls, slithers,
or flies, I love.
I lower my mask.
I fling wide my arms.
I kiss death full on the mouth.

QUOTE:  “Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing.  We think the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved.  They come together and they fall apart.  Then they come together again and fall apart again.  It’s just like that.  The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen:  room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.” ~ Pema Chodron

Resilient (Rising Appalachia)

As discussed previously, my family is writing in, and passing around, a journal as a tangible way to capture our thoughts, dreams, and fears through essays, drawings, poems, and songs.  Here is my entry from a few days ago:

I find myself in a pendulum between "this too shall pass" and "these are the end times" but, I am the MOTHER, so it is my Job to stay strong and hold it all together when everyone around me is losing their sh*t.  That is what I do, as at various times my family has experienced stitches and broken bones... MRSA hospitalization... an emergency C-section... prostate cancer surgery.  My default mechanism is to envision myself as the voice of calm and reason, their advocate and protector, asking the right questions, buffering between them and the healthcare system, sleeping in super-uncomfortable recliners.

Once the crisis had passed and things were back to "normal", I allowed myself to freak the f*ck out, finally able to fall apart with the tragic What-Ifs swirling around in my head, all the bullets dodged, the there-but-for-the-grace-of-god flipside scenario.  Poetry is one of my many coping mechanisms (thankyoujesus for Maggie Smith:  the poet, not the actress!).  Donning my She-Ra cape, rattling my Wonder Woman bracelets, and conjuring the Shield of Invincibility to keep my loved ones, and myself, safe throughout this storm and chaos.

SONG:  Resilient by Rising Appalachia (major thanks to Fred for the heads-up on this song.  Wow!)

BOOK:  Welcoming the Unwelcome: Wholehearted Living in a Brokenhearted World by Pema Chodron

POEM:  The Mother by Maggie Smith

The mother is a weapon you load

yourself into, little bullet.

The mother is glass through which

you see, in excruciating detail, yourself.

The mother is landscape.

See how she thinks of a tree

and fills a forest with the repeated thought.

Before the invention of cursive

the mother is manuscript.

The mother is sky.

See how she wears a shawl of starlings,

how she pulls the thrumming around her shoulders.

The mother is a prism.

The mother is a gun.

See how light passes through her.

See how she fires.

QUOTE:  "I never said I wanted a 'happy' life but an interesting one. From separation and loss, I have learned a lot. I have become strong and resilient, as is the case of almost every human being exposed to life and to the world. We don't even know how strong we are until we are forced to bring that hidden strength forward." ~ Isabel Allende

John's Cocoons (Michael McNevin)

Yesterday's DailyOM:

Sharing Grief

Opening To Receive Comfort

When we experience something that causes us to feel shock and sadness, we may feel the urge to withdraw from life. It may seem like remaining withdrawn will keep us protected from the world, but during these times it is important to reach out to those trusted and precious people who care about us the most. Even with our best information and reasoning, we never know when someone else’s experience or perspective can give us additional information that we need. The universe speaks to us through many channels, and when we open ourselves up to receive its messages, we also receive nurturing care from a loving partner in life’s journey.

Grief is part of the human experience, and sharing our vulnerability is what creates truly close bonds in our relationships. Opening ourselves up in this way gets to the core of our being, past all of our defenses and prejudices. When life seems to crack the outer shell of our world, we are both raw and fresh at the same time. It is then that we discover who is truly willing to walk with us through life. We also see that some of those sent to us may not be the ones we expected to see. Regardless, we learn to trust in the universe, in others, in our own strength and resilience, and in the wisdom of life itself.

Sharing grief allows us to ease our burden by letting someone else help carry it. This helps us process our own inner thoughts and feelings through the filter of a trusted and beloved someone. We may feel guilty or selfish, as if we are unloading on someone who has their own challenges. Although, if we think about it, we know we would do the same for them, and their protests would seem pointless. Remember that not sharing feelings with others denies them the opportunity to feel. We may be the messenger sent by the universe for their benefit, and it is on this mission that we have been sent. By sharing our hopes and fears, joys and pains with another person, we accept the universe’s gifts of wisdom and loving care.

A friend sent me a "True Friendship/None of that Sissy Crap" essay yesterday - it perfectly suits our friendship as I feel he always "has my back"... :-)

Given my latest round of overwhelmedness/exhaustion/crises, I've allowed myself to do more cocooning than I think is healthy - I told him the other day I was in roly-poly mode (remember those bugs that would curl up into a ball to protect themselves from harm?).

I'm still grieving my mother's bad health, my father-in-law's medical woes and the mixed emotions of an aquaintance's recent passing - I'm also battling post-hard-drive-crash blues, most specifically my iTunes loss. I've been doing some research on the internet and there *is* a way to transfer songs from an iPod back to iTunes - Apple has discouraged an easy process, since they see it as piracy, however, most of my findings have been examples of people such as myself, losing their *own* data. At this point, we have the bird in the hand (over 2500 songs on the portable player) - I am terrified that, in my attempt to restore, I will not only *not* be successful... but will lose what there is on the iPod (godhelpme - fingers crossed... :-)

I know there are lots of positives in my life right now, but I'm also firmly entrenched in the wallow - I appreciate my friend giving me space... and also popping in often enough so as to assure me I'm still important to him... and I hope he knows the reverse is true...

SONG: John's Cocoons by Michael McNevin

BOOK: When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times by Pema Chodron

POEM: The Well of Grief by David Whyte

Those who will not slip beneath

the still surface on the well of grief

turning down to its black water

to the place that we can not breathe
will never know

the source from which we drink

the secret water cold and clear
nor find in the darkness

the small gold coins

thrown by those who wished for something else

QUOTE: "If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome." ~ Anne Bradstreet