18 Months Ago

Natalia died 18 months ago today.  I can usually comprehend what I read.  But even in print, I cannot grasp these words. 

I’ve written quite a bit about the grief of losing a child, just very recently.  But I have not yet decided whether or not to post those attempts at description.  But I can say here that I have not experienced that sudden nausea today.  The one that comes on instantaneously and without warning, the same way a flash flood does.  My body has not shuddered involuntarily today.  But I have no ambition, no self-discipline.  Allan is helping our son-in-law build a fence.  So I am alone.  And I think that is good.  I need some thinking time.  Some time of almost complete quiet.

It is a gorgeous day.  It is at least 70 degrees.  The sun is at its absolute brightest.  There is a mild breeze.  I can call it gentle.  It seems appropriate that I can do so.  I abandon all work, and even the pretense of being interested.  I go sit outside on the deck with a book.  Our back is relatively isolated and affords mostly privacy.  I don’t see the big heron in the creek, but he was probably here earlier this morning, standing at attention in the creek’s middle.  

Trista sends me a text from work.  She is hanging in there and wants me to assure her I will get some fresh air.  I send a reply text telling her where I am and what I am doing.  She responds, saying she is glad.  I pick my book up.  My usual habit is to read two books at a time, one fiction, and one non-fiction.  I pick up the fiction.  Probably a better choice for today.  I don’t care if I learn anything.  The plot has just taken a twist.  But I soon lose concentration and just sit for a while. 

At the end of last week, I started the book “Same Kind Of Different As Me”.  By page 17 I have felt a hot anger in my stomach and then cried.  My passion, if I have one right now, is how we treat each other.  Or, to my way of thinking, it is more accurate to say how we are alienating each other.  I’ve been thinking a LOT about that lately. 

I wrote something, most likely suggested subconsciously to me by my current reading selections.  But before I share it, I should tell you that I found several new cookie cutters, ones having to do with Spring, and I purchased them.  When I got home, I found my purchases resulted in a duplication of one cutter and gave me cookie cutters for two different kinds of flowers.  I set the new ones aside, ready to return them to the store.  But I kept thinking about those cookie cutters.  I decided I wanted two of the same one, even if I never use them.  And having the cutters for two different flowers seems necessary.  Yes, necessary.  I love the symbolism.  I need the symbolism, I think.  Eventually I began to think about grandmothers and little granddaughters making cookies together:

Across the world, how many little granddaughters are in the kitchen with Grandma? I envision it.  The cookies they are making may not be chocolate chip, our American favorite.  Or they may not be making cookies at all.  But that doesn’t matter.  Because everything else I see is identical in the various kitchens.  I see some form of flour or meal all over the place.  I see another ingredient falling to the floor.  Probably an egg, of course.  And/or something spilling.  I can hear each and every grandma saying that is OKAY!  I notice that the giggles I hear sound exactly the same.  Two little girls from opposite ends of the globe could trade places and there would be no recognizable difference in the giggles at all.   And you know what else?  I see each Grandma looking at those little faces, faces that might be different shapes.  And either darker or lighter in color.   Maybe the eyes are different.  But each and every Grandma is pausing and kissing the happy little faces, loving them with all her heart.  Kind of sounds like that idea, “same kind of different as me”.

As I paint these pictures in my mind, I have to ask, “If we could, whether we be mommies or daddies, or grandfathers or grandmothers, remember to look for the MAJOR similarities, how could it NOT change our approach to many, many issues?  Knowing what is happening in each other’s kitchens.  Wouldn’t that force us to live with more appreciation for each other? 

I’m just saying. 

Comments

Note:  This post is a result of two very nice people I do not know at all, Grace and Hayden. I assume since they both left comments it is okay to mention names.  If not, please let me apologize and ask you both to forgive me.  But if you keep reading, I hope you’ll see this blog is, in reality, a testimony to people like yourselves.  

Okay.  I’m afraid.  I admit it.  I’m afraid of comments.  But not at all for the reason you might think. Let me try and explain.  But, as with all things emotional, it might be difficult to make others understand.  And to attempt to share and make others understand something I, myself, do not understand in any way?  How do I do that?  I’m absolutely clueless, but here goes.

Remember my second blog post, “Yearning”?  I explained that my blog is the record of a personal journey.  A journey to figure out what seems to me a Twilight Zone-like world.  (Actually, at times I think the Twilight Zone would be easier to understand.)   I said that comments would not help me at this point in time.  I really thought that was true.  And, maybe to a certain degree, I still feel that way.  Because since starting the blog I have found I feel so much better after I have written something.  It is helping me.  I’m finding it therapeutic.  I don’t want that spoiled.  I need it. 

But here’s another reason for wanting to avoid comments.  I’m afraid that what I feel about individual people might be shattered.  And I desperately do not want that!  People could not have been more considerate, more compassionate, more loving than what we experienced.  They were everything good we humans can be.  It’s amazing.  It doesn’t matter that people couldn’t take our pain away.  Or even lessen it.  But, there is something about knowing people care and they would do so, if at all possible.  I don’t understand it.  I just know it is a truth. 

Although I am naïve, I do know there are hate-filled voices out there.  A lot of them.  But, I don’t experience them individually.  I hear them often (not always) as the collective voice of various groups, organizations, etc.  In fact, that is part of what is so confusing to me now.  How is it that the sum of a number of individual voices can bear no resemblance to the voices on their own?   I don’t get that.

So, to hear a number of individual voices that are different from what we experienced would bother me tremendously.  I don’t know if I have the emotional energy to remind myself that several voices make the extreme exception.   I want to be able to defend the individual voices I’ve experienced for as long as I live.  Truly.

But... (There’s always that “but”, isn’t there?)   Not knowing what I am doing, I must have inadvertently allowed comments at some point in time.  And I received two comments, from two people whose individual voices were exactly what we experienced.   They were open, honest, encouraging, uplifting.  And that makes me more afraid.  Now I don’t want their voices sullied by any nasty ones. 

Here’s what’s happened.  Saturday night when I couldn’t sleep I kept thinking that I wanted to at least write one post and thank those two people.  I appreciated them and wanted them to know that.   I was seriously considering that possibility.  When I checked my email on Sunday my brother had sent me a message to allow comments; that I was missing out on some wonderful online friendships.  The conclusion I thought I was arriving at was echoed by his assertion.     

And here’s what I’ve decided.  How about I move slowly and cautiously?  (I did, right up front, admit to being a wimp, in “Yearning”.)  I’m going to take Grace’s suggestion and sometimes allow comments.  I know someone can then comment on any blog post whatsoever.  But it might be easier if I only occasionally have to think about anything negative.  And hopefully if anyone gets nasty it will be easily offset by some new online friendships.  I think my brother might be right about that.  (Wow, hate to have to put that in writing!  He’ll never let me forget it!!  But, you know what?  I think people like Grace and Hayden are going to be worth it!)

Thanksgiving Wish List

No.  I’m not crazy.  At least, to my knowledge, I’m not.  I know it is January.  I know Thanksgiving is in November.  But bear with me.  Maybe, just maybe I’ll be able to explain. 

If you’ve read “Why Don’t I Know The Answer To That?” you’ll know I was wondering a lot about what we’re thankful for, individually and collectively.  Then Christmas was coming.  And it seems we can switch pretty quickly from focusing on gratitude to what we want.   We hear about the wish list.  Commercials for jewelry stores tell men what their female loved ones are wishing for.  They tell children what dads really want.  Etc.  Etc.  And because I would have loved to be buying toys (educational, of course!) and a little “party” dress, I started thinking about how our Thanksgiving list (“The Personal List”) and our Christmas wish list should be a lot more related to one another.   Maybe really considering what we can be thankful for would change the wish list and/or make it a whole lot shorter.  

Christmas passed.  Then New Year’s was coming.  I gave resolutions up years ago, so no pressure here.  But, evidently people still make them.  For at least the first two weeks in January Pilates and Yoga class was really, really full!  Now…not so much.  I kind of wondered how many people look back at last year’s resolutions to see how things went.  If they do, does that have any impact on what they resolve to do this year?   

All of that “thinking” (I obviously use the term loosely.) somehow led me to mentally combine all three ideas:  a wish list that really would be my Thanksgiving list.  And since I would be making this wish list for next Thanksgiving, some things would require a resolve on my part.  A resolve to make sure I could, on Thanksgiving Day 2011, look back and say I was thankful for the things on my already created list.

See how I linked the three?  (If you do, you actually follow how my mind goes on these tangents, you might want to consider getting help.  Seriously.)  Well, doesn’t really matter, anyway, does it?  This is my personal journey.  And besides, wasn’t there a book years ago, something about “I’m Okay.  You’re Okay”?  Let’s go with that. 

You know what’s coming.  Surely, you do.  My list.  My Thanksgiving Wish List.  But first, a reminder, just like in the previous blog.  This is NOT political commentary.  It is simply my sincere attempt to understand a world that is dramatically altered.  And figure out, if possible, what do I do in that world?  I repeat the reminder because my list does, in my opinion, reflect “The Personal List” and elements of what I’d like to see on  “The Corporate List”, if we had one.  It was difficult to make my list concise but inclusive of all that is important to me.  But I tried. 

So, as we say, God willing I be here, the following is at least part of my Thanksgiving Wish List for November 24, 2011, in no particular order:

• A family that is healing. 
• Friends who will tell me what I need to hear, not what they think I want to hear.
• A new sense of purpose, whether a completely new purpose, or an additional purpose to what I already do.  Whatever.  But, clearly defined. 
• If the above is not entirely possible, at least some strong indications about my purpose; some framework or outline I feel sure about.
• That someone or several might be thankful I’m on the planet.  Not for any sad reason.  I pray that’s not the case.  But simply because I’ve lifted them up, encouraged them, made them feel good because they know I appreciate who they are.  (Totally convinced people need more of that.)
• That we love all children as we do our own.  So much so they we care about the entirety of their childhood:  hungry little tummies, excellent and equal education, and healthy, safe environments.
• To be as healthy as I’ve always been.  And to know I’ve continued to try to do more to help keep and even improve my health.   Physically and mentally.
• That I’ve loved others as I love myself.  So much so that anyone who needs health care of any kind but does not have the resources gets it.  Some examples to illustrate why I feel so strongly about this:

ü     Anyone who needs hearing aids, like I do, but can’t write the check, gets them.  And consequently their everyday life, and that of those around them, is drastically improved and enriched. 

ü     Anyone who needs cataract surgery on both eyes, as I did, has medical insurance that covers it.  S/he doesn’t have to write a $10,000 check (cost several years ago).  That those individuals will be as shocked and thrilled at such improved vision.  (Note: it always seemed to me that cataract surgery was for old people.  My friend agreed with me.  But, as she pointed out, there are exceptions to the rule.  And I was not only that exception, she said.  I was the youngest person to ever have the surgery.  She’s very knowledgeable.  I take her word for it.)

ü     Anyone who needs back surgery has medical insurance to cover the bill.  (2003 cost was $19,000)

ü     That anyone who has had a tragedy doesn’t end up with a bill that will take years and years and years to pay off.  (One friend has a bill for $25,000 she might pay off by the time she retires.  But there is a good chance that won’t happen.  Wish that were the only example I could give for people I know.  But I have way more than I like to think about.)  

• That we have learned to agree to disagree.  And thereby we have continued friendships and relationships and discussion.  (At the end I’ll share what has always worked well for me personally.  Might not for anyone else, but works great for me!)
• That “All or Nothing” thinking is not the general rule of thumb; but rather reserved for those instances and situations for which we can not, without violating our very core principles.  Religious, ethical, etc.  (I’ve learned that for me there are about eight.  Everything else I can go way more than halfway.) 
• I’ll include all the “givens”, like jobs, the end to the wars, etc.  I’m most certainly not minimizing these things in any way.  It just feels like they are already included, so to speak.    How?  It seems to me if I get the other things on my wish list, these things will be on their way to resolution.  There would at least be a start. 

If I’m still blogging in November 2011, I’ll come back and take a look.  This is one wish list of things I really, really want.

I promised to share what has worked for me to keep friendships going if and when discussion could lead to failed relationships.  I have a friend who, I suspect, might actually be on the opposite side of where I stand on a lot of issues.  Although we have been friends for years, I really can’t say, at all.  That’s because that friend tends to be more “excitable” (translation:  gets hot pretty quickly) in certain types of conversations.  Since this person has a booming voice, I’ll call said friend “Voice”.   My solution when conversation threatened to get heated in any way?  I would always say, “Voice!  Voice! Whoa!  Whoa!   Let’s just skip to the part where I’m right, you’re wrong; and let’s find another topic of discussion.”  Voice would burst out laughing, right in mid sentence.  I’d laugh.  And we’d move on.  Result?  We became good friends.  And therefore, I think, if we had to work on a serious issue on which we held pretty opposite points of view, we could do it.  And do it well.  I would say to myself, “ Voice won’t agree to that, but maybe I can get him to think about this alternative.”  He’d say to himself, “I know Regenia.  No way will she go along with that.  Let me think of something else.”  I once asked my husband if he thought I was right about this.  He agreed.  We’d get the job done.  And still be friends.