It was mourning weather - dreary, drizzly, gray - as Dave and I drove home from New Palz. We had not wanted to drive through Newtown. We’d planned to get off I-84 at Bethel, but the cars slowed as we neared that exit. The traffic was backed up well onto the highway. “I think there’s another exit before Newtown, right?” I said. Dave agreed so we continued on.
The exit sign came into view, white letters on a green background. “Newtown.” Silence. Dave reached for my hand, signaled right and turned the wheel.
We had stolen a quick trip to the Mohonk Mountain House, just one night at the reduced pre-holiday mid-week rate. We’d not gone last year due to my father’s illness, but Dave and I view this trip to the Victorian hotel in the mountains as our Christmas tradition, our present to each other.
So, early Sunday, we left the house. We’d avoided watching the news, reading the papers, or listening to the radio. Shields up. As is our custom, we stopped for lunch at the Main Street Bistro in New Palz. The place bustled with kids in dreadlocks, woolen caps, and bulky knitted ponchos, and the menu featured homemade soups, five veggie burger options, frittatas, and several tofu selections. We both ordered veggie burgers – the Hendrix for me, the Peacemaker for Dave.
Seated at the counter, we chatted with a young bearded guy - originally from a farm in Nebraska, now at college in DC - who was in New Palz for some vacation hiking in the Shawangunk mountains. He was intrigued by Dave’s burger, so Dave offered him a bite. He accepted…and finished off my pureed pepper soup as well. It was easy and companionable and I liked thinking of him returning to his parents on the farm with warm impressions of this encounter with the couple from Connecticut, who lived in the town next to Newtown. Most people are good. They are.
After lunch, Dave and I visited a few of the quirky shops on Main Street and picked up some stocking gifts – Christmas rings, hacky sacks, funky finger-less mittens. And then I caught myself…feeling normal, cheery even. How could I?
So I shifted gears, sobered up, and thought about Tucker and Casey at six. About Christmas presents waiting in closets. About how, if it were me, I would delve into the laundry hamper to find and hold and rock the pajamas worn the night before Friday….Thursday night. Just a regular night.
And I tried to send out loving white light to those lost and their loved ones. (Does it reach them somehow? How could this happen? Why would someone kill little kids?)
We’d left Mohonk after breakfast and wound up in Newtown center around 11:00. Rain fell on black-clad mourners waiting outside the funeral home. A man walked with a small boy, one hand firmly on the child’s shoulder. Couples stood on the sidewalk embracing or hand-in-hand. Across the street, a battalion of photographers strained for a shot, jostling and adjusting prodigious lenses for a solid zoom. Network vans lined the road in front of the general store.
But we also passed shrines of bouquets, stuffed animals, and luminaries lovingly arranged. And signs. Many hand-painted signs. Perhaps from people, like me, like any of us, whose wounded hearts yearn to give comfort even when comfort is beyond giving. So what do we do? Send white light. Pray. Write on a sheet draped between two posts our wish to enfold these grieving souls, “Newtown – we are all one family.”
Showing posts with label grieving. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grieving. Show all posts
Thursday, December 20, 2012
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
The Mad Pruner
We called Dad the “Mad Pruner” for his interest in yard work lay in weeding, trimming, and lopping. His library on gardening was extensive through years of birthday and Christmas gifts as his daughters, friends and wife sought to steer him toward planting and nourishing, but beyond flipping pages, the idea never took root. Removal was his passion.
In Weekapaug, when he was not reading in his faded, overstuffed chair in the living room, taking a lie-down upstairs, or poking around in the fridge for a snack, he would be barely visible, sweaty and white-shirted, somewhere in the hedge or roses, clippers in hand. Dead twigs, hydrangea canes, an over-zealous autumn olive, a pebble driveway gone to weeds – these suffused him with a mix of dismay and glee. They were offensive intruders, but they were the means to his beloved task.
He brought little knowledge to his work, and often a promising plant fell beneath his blades: the healthy, thriving, though not yet budding daisies I’d planted last August; a riot of vibrant magenta thistles deemed odious despite their beauty because “They are weeds.” Snip. Tug. Gone.
Still, the work was taxing, and scratched, bruised and bleeding, Dad would lumber into the house, waving aside offers of Neosporin and Bandaids – the returning warrior with no time for fluttering women. Over the past few years, once he was diagnosed with myelodysplasia, the bruises did not go away. “Your mother won’t let me out of the house without a long-sleeved shirt,” he’d grumble. But there was almost pride in the way he’d roll up a sleeve to show off the purple blood pooled just beneath his skin. Battle wounds.
Last summer, as if knowing it was time to store images, I took pictures of Dad: sitting on his fold-up garden bench, his back to me, arms deep in the rose bushes. Unheeding of prickers, joyously jerking out jewel weeds which grew tall and plentiful, but gave way with the slightest tug. Kneeling on green foam pads at the edge of the lawn scratching up weeds with a three-pronged tool, his hands encased in leather garden gloves.
Two weeks ago, Dave and I went to Weekapaug for the first time since Dad passed away. What would it be like, I’d wondered, to be there without him?
We’d spent the previous night in Boston with my son Tucker and his fiancé, Lisa. We’d watched my in-laws’ nephew, Alex Cobb, pitch for Tampa Bay against the Red Sox on Friday night and, on Saturday, tasted cakes for Tuck and Lisa’s wedding. So our mood was buoyant when we pulled up to the gray-shingled house Saturday evening.
It usually takes me several tries to unlock the door; too many of my keys have the same triangular head and heaven forbid I should label them to make things easy. Anyway, this time, the first try worked. Right away, I went out to check the screened porch.
During the winter, perhaps in January, the month Dad died, our house-sitter, Jan, heard a flapping noise when she came to check on the house. It was not the rhythmic sound of a windblown curtain or shutter, but that of something alive. Unnerved, she peered into the basement and glanced hesitantly into the dark rooms. Ultimately, she discovered a large white owl trapped on the porch. An owl…
The weekend of Dad's death, numerous incidents occurred that appeared to be signs: lights blowing out, orbs in photographs, a needed address written in Dad’s hand appearing at the right moment. Mediums say spirits often appear in the form of birds. Might Dad have chosen an owl? I’d love to think so.
When later I spoke with Jan about the incident, she described her fruitless calls to the police and animal control, where she got the “Sorry, Lady. We can’t help you,” line. Eventually she and a neighbor were able to slip onto the porch, open a door, and retreat to the lawn where they kept watch until the owl flew free.
After noting the jagged tears the bird had ripped in the screens, I wanted to see if I could sense my father in the house, so I took my suitcase upstairs and went right to my parents' room. I imagined him lying on his bed on the white and blue striped coverlet, looking over as I entered, saying, “dearest child.” It was so easy to call him up before me. Oh Dad.
After the afternoon’s cake-tasting sugar load, we’d planned on a light salad for supper. Once we’d unpacked, we tossed lettuce, avocado, trail mix, tomatoes, mozzarella, lemon juice and olive oil. I lit candles as Dave turned off the lights and poured a glass of red wine for me and a tumbler of Goslings gold rum over ice for himself. Dad would have approved. It seemed we both needed to spend the evening with Dad, so we raised our glasses in a toast and reminisced. We recalled Dad’s full-out, body-shaking, eyes-squeezed-shut laugh: it had been a while since life dished Dad a morsel to trigger that.
After dinner, we curled up together in Dad’s chair in the living room. The navy blue slipcover is faded, the springs broken from the many times Dad flumped into its arms. It was tight for the two of us, but it was where we wanted to be. When shredded wads of tissue proved no match for our tears, we passed Dave’s damp red bandana back and forth.
Sunday’s weather was uncertain until late afternoon, so Dave and I spent the day doing yard work. The koosa dogwood was a cloud of blossoms, the hydrangeas heavy with buds. Dad would have shaken his head with disgust at the weeds flourishing between the flagstones on the patio. He would have threatened a good dose of “Round-Up,” and my sisters and I, concerned about herbicides near the wetlands, would have shot down the idea. He would have sighed dramatically, pulled on his leather work gloves, fetched his green sponge knee pads, and lowered himself laboriously to the ground to poke at those unwanted plants with a forked tool.
But he wasn’t there to do it.
So Dave and I rummaged among Dad’s tools in the garage, selected the necessary supplies, and set off to our chosen projects. With electric trimmers, Dave tackled the overgrown hedge of holly, while I pruned and weeded around the row of hydrangeas lining the house. Wearing my father’s work gloves, I felt the grit in the gloves’ fingertips as he must have, and enjoyed the quiet in the bushes as I pulled grasses and jewel weeds, then shook loosened dirt free of the roots. As Dad would have, I breathed in the whiff of roses, the soft breeze there in the shade. I relished the birdsong and muffled roll of distant waves.
I imagine Dad liked the peace as much as the work, the respite from worrying women telling him what to do, telling him to be careful, telling him what to weed, what not to weed, what to clip, what not to clip, and how long to do it. As I snipped hydrangea limbs that bore buds, I felt a twinge of guilt. How many times had my sisters and I insisted to Dad - firmly, sternly – that budded boughs be spared? But I wanted to open things up a bit, separate the overgrown bushes, and grant the daisies breathing space. I talked to Dad as I trimmed, grinning at my daring in pruning as I wished, picturing him amused, maybe even proud, of my boldness.
Dave worked on the holly for hours, his face flushed and dripping. The two of us laughed as we stood back to admire the tamed hedge, knowing that if Dad were with us, he would have commented on the few stray twigs that escaped the trimmer, saying, “Dave…you missed a little something.”
Gardening is about soil, weeds, plants, and twigs. Should that limb stay or go? Is that blossom worth blocking the view of that boulder? It is an astonishingly successful route to staying in the moment. I hope, despite his shortness of breath and bruised skin, it had done so for Dad.
In Weekapaug, when he was not reading in his faded, overstuffed chair in the living room, taking a lie-down upstairs, or poking around in the fridge for a snack, he would be barely visible, sweaty and white-shirted, somewhere in the hedge or roses, clippers in hand. Dead twigs, hydrangea canes, an over-zealous autumn olive, a pebble driveway gone to weeds – these suffused him with a mix of dismay and glee. They were offensive intruders, but they were the means to his beloved task.
He brought little knowledge to his work, and often a promising plant fell beneath his blades: the healthy, thriving, though not yet budding daisies I’d planted last August; a riot of vibrant magenta thistles deemed odious despite their beauty because “They are weeds.” Snip. Tug. Gone.
Still, the work was taxing, and scratched, bruised and bleeding, Dad would lumber into the house, waving aside offers of Neosporin and Bandaids – the returning warrior with no time for fluttering women. Over the past few years, once he was diagnosed with myelodysplasia, the bruises did not go away. “Your mother won’t let me out of the house without a long-sleeved shirt,” he’d grumble. But there was almost pride in the way he’d roll up a sleeve to show off the purple blood pooled just beneath his skin. Battle wounds.
Last summer, as if knowing it was time to store images, I took pictures of Dad: sitting on his fold-up garden bench, his back to me, arms deep in the rose bushes. Unheeding of prickers, joyously jerking out jewel weeds which grew tall and plentiful, but gave way with the slightest tug. Kneeling on green foam pads at the edge of the lawn scratching up weeds with a three-pronged tool, his hands encased in leather garden gloves.
Two weeks ago, Dave and I went to Weekapaug for the first time since Dad passed away. What would it be like, I’d wondered, to be there without him?
We’d spent the previous night in Boston with my son Tucker and his fiancé, Lisa. We’d watched my in-laws’ nephew, Alex Cobb, pitch for Tampa Bay against the Red Sox on Friday night and, on Saturday, tasted cakes for Tuck and Lisa’s wedding. So our mood was buoyant when we pulled up to the gray-shingled house Saturday evening.
It usually takes me several tries to unlock the door; too many of my keys have the same triangular head and heaven forbid I should label them to make things easy. Anyway, this time, the first try worked. Right away, I went out to check the screened porch.
During the winter, perhaps in January, the month Dad died, our house-sitter, Jan, heard a flapping noise when she came to check on the house. It was not the rhythmic sound of a windblown curtain or shutter, but that of something alive. Unnerved, she peered into the basement and glanced hesitantly into the dark rooms. Ultimately, she discovered a large white owl trapped on the porch. An owl…
The weekend of Dad's death, numerous incidents occurred that appeared to be signs: lights blowing out, orbs in photographs, a needed address written in Dad’s hand appearing at the right moment. Mediums say spirits often appear in the form of birds. Might Dad have chosen an owl? I’d love to think so.
When later I spoke with Jan about the incident, she described her fruitless calls to the police and animal control, where she got the “Sorry, Lady. We can’t help you,” line. Eventually she and a neighbor were able to slip onto the porch, open a door, and retreat to the lawn where they kept watch until the owl flew free.
After noting the jagged tears the bird had ripped in the screens, I wanted to see if I could sense my father in the house, so I took my suitcase upstairs and went right to my parents' room. I imagined him lying on his bed on the white and blue striped coverlet, looking over as I entered, saying, “dearest child.” It was so easy to call him up before me. Oh Dad.
After the afternoon’s cake-tasting sugar load, we’d planned on a light salad for supper. Once we’d unpacked, we tossed lettuce, avocado, trail mix, tomatoes, mozzarella, lemon juice and olive oil. I lit candles as Dave turned off the lights and poured a glass of red wine for me and a tumbler of Goslings gold rum over ice for himself. Dad would have approved. It seemed we both needed to spend the evening with Dad, so we raised our glasses in a toast and reminisced. We recalled Dad’s full-out, body-shaking, eyes-squeezed-shut laugh: it had been a while since life dished Dad a morsel to trigger that.
After dinner, we curled up together in Dad’s chair in the living room. The navy blue slipcover is faded, the springs broken from the many times Dad flumped into its arms. It was tight for the two of us, but it was where we wanted to be. When shredded wads of tissue proved no match for our tears, we passed Dave’s damp red bandana back and forth.
Sunday’s weather was uncertain until late afternoon, so Dave and I spent the day doing yard work. The koosa dogwood was a cloud of blossoms, the hydrangeas heavy with buds. Dad would have shaken his head with disgust at the weeds flourishing between the flagstones on the patio. He would have threatened a good dose of “Round-Up,” and my sisters and I, concerned about herbicides near the wetlands, would have shot down the idea. He would have sighed dramatically, pulled on his leather work gloves, fetched his green sponge knee pads, and lowered himself laboriously to the ground to poke at those unwanted plants with a forked tool.
But he wasn’t there to do it.
So Dave and I rummaged among Dad’s tools in the garage, selected the necessary supplies, and set off to our chosen projects. With electric trimmers, Dave tackled the overgrown hedge of holly, while I pruned and weeded around the row of hydrangeas lining the house. Wearing my father’s work gloves, I felt the grit in the gloves’ fingertips as he must have, and enjoyed the quiet in the bushes as I pulled grasses and jewel weeds, then shook loosened dirt free of the roots. As Dad would have, I breathed in the whiff of roses, the soft breeze there in the shade. I relished the birdsong and muffled roll of distant waves.
I imagine Dad liked the peace as much as the work, the respite from worrying women telling him what to do, telling him to be careful, telling him what to weed, what not to weed, what to clip, what not to clip, and how long to do it. As I snipped hydrangea limbs that bore buds, I felt a twinge of guilt. How many times had my sisters and I insisted to Dad - firmly, sternly – that budded boughs be spared? But I wanted to open things up a bit, separate the overgrown bushes, and grant the daisies breathing space. I talked to Dad as I trimmed, grinning at my daring in pruning as I wished, picturing him amused, maybe even proud, of my boldness.
Dave worked on the holly for hours, his face flushed and dripping. The two of us laughed as we stood back to admire the tamed hedge, knowing that if Dad were with us, he would have commented on the few stray twigs that escaped the trimmer, saying, “Dave…you missed a little something.”
Gardening is about soil, weeds, plants, and twigs. Should that limb stay or go? Is that blossom worth blocking the view of that boulder? It is an astonishingly successful route to staying in the moment. I hope, despite his shortness of breath and bruised skin, it had done so for Dad.
Monday, May 14, 2012
Up the Water Spout
I am re-reading Robert Fulghum’s book All I really Need to Know I Learned In Kindergarten. Every cheery, soulful essay resonates and makes my nose prickle with near-tears. Be fair, be kind, clean up your own mess, and when you go out into the world, hold hands and stick together. Fulghum muses about how different the world would be if more people and governments lived by the lessons of childhood.
Another chapter humorously reports a neighbor’s encounter with a spider web and the resulting horror, shrieks and fright. Fulghum imagines the equally terrified spider and recalls that kindergarten favorite, “The Eensy Weensy Spider.” What a plucky lass, that undaunted arachnid, to dry off and try again every time the rain washes her down the water spout.
These upbeat essays have been part of my morning self-cheerleading regimen during a difficult stretch: I miss my Dad, my mother-in-law was hospitalized with pneumonia, and Dave totaled his car on I-95.
After Dad died in January, I wasn’t just sad, I was also fragile. A friend observed that when her father died, she came to see an added value to the old tradition of wearing black: not only was it a sign of respect for the dead, but it also showed others that one was grieving and might need greater gentleness. I get that. People who know about Dad have been so dear, dear in a way that I have not been for others. Until my father died, I did not realize, exactly, what it means to lose a parent, this person who is woven into so many memories, into the very person one has turned out to be.
Then, while sitting in the doctor’s office with my mother-in-law before taking her to the hospital, this fragile Lea received Dave’s call about his accident. Surreptitiously, I took deep breaths and thought, “What would a grown-up do?” I am a daughter who has lost her father, and fifty-nine or not, my grown-up self remains an elusive person who has not reliably established herself as a solid pillar. Once, along with my mother, Dad was that pillar. Dave stepped in a while back to help fill the role.
Every day as he heads out the door for his commute, my husband promises me he will drive carefully. He is a cautious driver, owns a Volvo, and I like to think the Universe watches over him and honors what should be his unbreachable encircling wall of good karma. Following Dad’s death, though, I’ve been poignantly aware of mortality, and this accident shook me. Dave was not hurt, but he could have been, and I have worked hard to eliminate that possibility from my mind.
In fact, I was bearing up well in the wake of these setbacks, sustained by others’ kindness and reassured by my unexpected ability to deal with hard times. Stronger than I thought, I’d reflected. Wishful thinking.
Early on Friday, the day after Dave’s accident and his mother’s admittance to Bridgeport Hospital, I got a call about a cell tower proposal. A company in Danbury thought a strip of land about 400 feet from our 1782 house-in-the-woods was the perfect site for a monopole. Across the swamp and up the rise, just over the old stone wall, it would be plainly visible from our backyard. What would the deer, turkeys, songbirds, and frogs make of this? Would they leave, the woods becoming silent and still but for the hum of the tower’s machinery?
My home was under attack, but I wasn’t sure I would be able to find the energy to do this – go to town hall to review cell tower regulations, rally neighbors, attend meetings, and protect my house.
Casey, my twenty-nine year-old daughter, was on her way to the gym, but decided to stay when she saw my stricken expression. Upon hearing of the tower, she was enraged, as much by the effect on her mother as the tower itself. “It won’t happen, Mom. I will stand before them, tell them about your cancer, and that will sway them…I tell you, it won’t happen. You’ll see.” She stood straight, tall, young, imposing, my warrior princess. She folded me in her arms…and I sobbed. When she left for work, I went to bed, curled up under a quilt, and wept.
Over that weekend, we received calls from friends who had read about the tower in the newspaper. Just as my daughter had, they offered help, hands to hold out in the world. Dave came home from work in his bright red rental, a snappy FIAT Cinque-Cento. We had lentil soup, cheese bread, and wine for dinner, and watched funny movies. It is amazing what a difference fuel makes; fuel for the body, fuel for the spirit.
On Friday afternoon, I’d been a pathetic lump on my bed in the dark. By Monday, I was the spider, dried off, buoyed, and on my way to town hall.
Another chapter humorously reports a neighbor’s encounter with a spider web and the resulting horror, shrieks and fright. Fulghum imagines the equally terrified spider and recalls that kindergarten favorite, “The Eensy Weensy Spider.” What a plucky lass, that undaunted arachnid, to dry off and try again every time the rain washes her down the water spout.
These upbeat essays have been part of my morning self-cheerleading regimen during a difficult stretch: I miss my Dad, my mother-in-law was hospitalized with pneumonia, and Dave totaled his car on I-95.
After Dad died in January, I wasn’t just sad, I was also fragile. A friend observed that when her father died, she came to see an added value to the old tradition of wearing black: not only was it a sign of respect for the dead, but it also showed others that one was grieving and might need greater gentleness. I get that. People who know about Dad have been so dear, dear in a way that I have not been for others. Until my father died, I did not realize, exactly, what it means to lose a parent, this person who is woven into so many memories, into the very person one has turned out to be.
Then, while sitting in the doctor’s office with my mother-in-law before taking her to the hospital, this fragile Lea received Dave’s call about his accident. Surreptitiously, I took deep breaths and thought, “What would a grown-up do?” I am a daughter who has lost her father, and fifty-nine or not, my grown-up self remains an elusive person who has not reliably established herself as a solid pillar. Once, along with my mother, Dad was that pillar. Dave stepped in a while back to help fill the role.
Every day as he heads out the door for his commute, my husband promises me he will drive carefully. He is a cautious driver, owns a Volvo, and I like to think the Universe watches over him and honors what should be his unbreachable encircling wall of good karma. Following Dad’s death, though, I’ve been poignantly aware of mortality, and this accident shook me. Dave was not hurt, but he could have been, and I have worked hard to eliminate that possibility from my mind.
In fact, I was bearing up well in the wake of these setbacks, sustained by others’ kindness and reassured by my unexpected ability to deal with hard times. Stronger than I thought, I’d reflected. Wishful thinking.
Early on Friday, the day after Dave’s accident and his mother’s admittance to Bridgeport Hospital, I got a call about a cell tower proposal. A company in Danbury thought a strip of land about 400 feet from our 1782 house-in-the-woods was the perfect site for a monopole. Across the swamp and up the rise, just over the old stone wall, it would be plainly visible from our backyard. What would the deer, turkeys, songbirds, and frogs make of this? Would they leave, the woods becoming silent and still but for the hum of the tower’s machinery?
My home was under attack, but I wasn’t sure I would be able to find the energy to do this – go to town hall to review cell tower regulations, rally neighbors, attend meetings, and protect my house.
Casey, my twenty-nine year-old daughter, was on her way to the gym, but decided to stay when she saw my stricken expression. Upon hearing of the tower, she was enraged, as much by the effect on her mother as the tower itself. “It won’t happen, Mom. I will stand before them, tell them about your cancer, and that will sway them…I tell you, it won’t happen. You’ll see.” She stood straight, tall, young, imposing, my warrior princess. She folded me in her arms…and I sobbed. When she left for work, I went to bed, curled up under a quilt, and wept.
Over that weekend, we received calls from friends who had read about the tower in the newspaper. Just as my daughter had, they offered help, hands to hold out in the world. Dave came home from work in his bright red rental, a snappy FIAT Cinque-Cento. We had lentil soup, cheese bread, and wine for dinner, and watched funny movies. It is amazing what a difference fuel makes; fuel for the body, fuel for the spirit.
On Friday afternoon, I’d been a pathetic lump on my bed in the dark. By Monday, I was the spider, dried off, buoyed, and on my way to town hall.
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