My Mom - The Terror of A-Wing

I am sounding out titles for my memoir in the wake of a phone call reporting that my 91 year old mom is misbehaving BIG TIME in her new "Level 2 Nursing Facility," aka a nursing home. Two weeks ago and more this would have thrown me into a tailspin of problem-solving and responsibility-assuming, which has been my life in relation to my mom for 69 years.

But recently I made a breakthrough in trying to sort out this most complex of relationships any of us ever has, the one with Mom. I let go of trying to make things better and to change my mom's very stubbornly planted bitter perspective on you-name-it. Since, I have noticed some curious changes in me. I no longer see the bus in downtown Montpelier with "Montreal" on the destination screen as a possible escape route and imagine just getting on and going wherever it goes. I no longer wake to an immediate dread about how my mom is that moment or what demands will come my way that day. I actually feel that I am the mistress of my time, my day, that I don't have to justify my choices. Today I stayed in my bathrobe until 11:30 and still had one of my most fun days ever just putzing around, finishing a Penelope Lively novel, weeding my birch island, having lunch with a dear friend.

Amazing. Everything has changed and yet it seems nothing has changed. I don't have to run away with the circus anymore, just as Circus Smirkus comes to town. I am making plans to go on a retreat in Ireland this fall, as a matter of choice rather than a desperate attempt to survive.  Mom is still in a nursing home and miserable. I still go to see her once or twice a week, down from five or six. But wait...I do have a more peaceful heart.

Don't get me wrong. I love my mom. She is a Force of Nature and she has been tireless in trying to be a good mother. Considering where she came from, she has overcome so much. Her indomitable will, often the bane of my existence, saw that my siblings and I went to college, an advantage she did not have. When we were young she taught us to present ourselves to the world in ways that helped to assure our success. She introduced us to the public library as soon as we could read. She spent Monday nights and Tuesdays during my early years ironing baskets -- plural -- of little dresses and blouses and shirts, putting my sister's and my hair in bobby pins nightly, and teaching us endless survival skills like ironing, sewing on buttons, and measuring solid shortening, that my own otherwise very accomplished daughter does not have.

She brought us up with a sense of service and community, something that influenced our choices of careers, which she did not have. She volunteered at school and especially at church, a tireless campaigner for people less fortunate. As a good friend has said, "She probably should have run a small country." Indeed, there are a few countries in this world that could have used her, still can.

She brought us up in the church, which we all eventually rejected, at least for some time. Our growing up years as the third generation in our family at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church meant among other things that we knew who we were, who we belonged to...and so did everyone else. That meant she would find out if we ever got out of line, which was never, with the possible exception of my little brother.

My mom gave me a sense of color, of organization. She passed on her values of honesty and loyalty and equity. She did not play with us much but we all remember the summer we were consumed by pinochle and euchre and she was our fourth at the table, between vacuuming and getting dinner ready, before Dad came home. And at one time you could really card around with her. She had a sense of humor that ran to slightly off-color jokes and when she was sour my dad could love her out of it with his. She hugged us and kissed us and I never doubted I was wanted and loved.

Now she is angry and bitter. She is blind from macular dengeneration and virtually deaf due to a series of insults going back to childhood and a mother who was doing the best she knew how to do too. She can't walk. She is grieving the loss of the love of her life, an earnest, playful, loving man she had for over 76 years, someone who asked her to marry him on their first date at age 15. She just wants to be loved and accepted...and young and physically able.

I can't do much about her age or her abilities except promise her I will make sure she gets the care she needs. And that is no small promise. But I can accept her in all her unhappiness and anger and fear and sadness. Just accept her with love, without judgment. Take her Hershey's kisses, rub hand cream into her hands, hug her and kiss her, brush her beautiful silver hair, and when I need to leave, say the Lord's Prayer out loud with her. Finally, it seems like enough to me. I am so grateful she lived long enough for me to learn this lesson.

Memorial Day Weekend 2013

Ever notice how even the teensiest thing can throw you off your game? Yesterday when it was cold and raining and not at all the kind of Memorial Day weekend I have come to expect, I wasn't a happy camper. It just wasn't right that this weekend, always important to me, was shaping up to be a colossal disappointment filled with wind and rain.

I couldn't find anything I was looking for. And when I did get information I sought, it was not what I wanted to hear. I knew I had packed my jewelry. I remember standing in my bedroom spending way too much time pondering which necklace to wear to a picnic tomorrow. It had to be here somewhere. Same with the knee brace I brought to shore up a tender tendon injured recently in a fight with a bag of potting soil. Same with the sports water bottle I had left here last time I was at Peter's house. It was here. I just had to open my eyes.

Couldn't find ANY of them yesterday. I tore through all the too-many clothes, shoes, coloring books (aka my activities cache), knitting, etc. to no avail. I was pretty sure I was going bonkers right then and there. AND I felt chilled and it seemed far too dark outside during the day.


I fully blame the missing-in-action sunshine that was supposed to highlight this opening-of-summer weekend. I spent a lot of energy being really annoyed about its absence, remembering Memorial Days with more heat and sun when our family set up the screened porch for summer. My dad listened to the Indy 500 on the radio while he painted and scrubbed and put the screens in place. My mom would put little pin-up lamps next to wicker chairs so we could read after dark. When a neighbor drove his boat past the house on his way to the river, my dad would joke, "Look at that fool! He's going boating and he could be painting his porch!"

School was over, in effect, even though the teachers had to put up with us for another ten days or so. The Memorial Day marker meant we could start wearing our white clothes and shoes, a standard of sartorial propriety that has long since vanished. Parks and beaches opened for "the season" and stayed open until Labor Day. Mom made her patented potato salad to celebrate. The days were still getting longer. My birthday was coming.

Earlier in my life, when the holiday was also known as Decoration Day, I accompanied my grandparents to Aunt Nellie's grave for the spring clean-up and flower-planting. They lost her at age 27, pregnant with her first baby, decades earlier and were never the same. During the heat of summer they visited that grave every week, cut the grass, tended to the geraniums they had planted at Memorial Day. I remember seeing other families plant fresh new flags on the graves of veterans, not yet realizing just how lucky I was that my dad came home from war in one piece to help me grow up and give me my sister and brother.

Vermont this year could not have been much farther from those warm memories. Snow topped Killington Peak and Mt. Mansfield and yet another frost hit the fledgling gardens of those of us so eager for summer that we jumped the gun and planted before Memorial Day. No wonder I was discombobulated, cranky, unseeing, and more than a little bit resentful of my friends in the mid-Atlantic and the midwest who were actually enjoying a sunny warm holiday weekend.

At times like this, old-time Vermonters are quick to tell flatlanders like me tales of snow in June and other anomalies. They are never surprised or even disappointed by the weather. Only in our minds is sunshine something to count on. We get attached to an idea, maybe a slender hope, and hang on for all our might.

How scary it seems to let go, to have a Plan B, simply to be wholly present with whatever is. And yet, it is only in that letting go and letting be that we receive the gifts of sight (for finding those lost objects) and insight. That we find the gifts of treasured memories and gratitude for those who shaped us and those who served. For a chance to make one last fire and hope that tomorrow's forecast for sun comes true.

Wanted: Meaningful Work

When I stopped working last summer, the word "retirement" was bandied about, albeit with a necklace of caveats that dressed it up a bit and made it feel more presentable. Before I could cross the border into the land of "OMG--What have I done?" I left the country on my sister's shirttails to enjoy and find a way to feel useful in Armenia for most of three months (see DiploMom71.blogspot.com). When I returned just before Thanksgiving it seemed a given that no serious matters were going to be addressed until after the new year.

But now, a full five months on, I can tell I am definitely approaching the borders of "OMG--What have I done?" -- and without even a tourist visa good for 90 days, no questions asked. Maybe it was just the long winter here in Vermont this year, but I am feeling something has got to change here.

After the garden prospects, and landscaping changes, there was fun travel to consider. Researching the Western and Southern Cape of South Africa kept me busy and intrigued, but while it offers many and varied experiences and tons of natural beauty, it did not seem to meet all the criteria for "worth spending my own money on at this time." This is a high bar for me. If you have seen my 12 year old Subaru you already know this.

So I Googled "places to live cheaply overseas." Up came Cuenca, Ecuador, among other locales that appear to be charming American Boomers trying to live on their Social Security. Aha! This might do AND I could get back to that elusive goal of feeling minimally competent to travel in Spanish. With the enthusiasm of a Gold Rusher, I found language schools, apartments, restarted my Spanish with the aim of conquering indirect objects, located places I could do yoga, tried to find the symphony schedule for the fall, even found places I could volunteer.

While I was still in the rush of imagining Ecuador in the fall, along came a brief flirtation with going to Uganda to teach social work for a semester. Talk about whiplash! As flirtations go, it was wild. I went from facing up to my inordinate and lifelong fear of snakes to pondering life with intermittent electricity (i.e., reading by kerosene lamp) to thinking I could actually add value where it is needed. Turns out it is not going to work out for this year (see issue about spending own money above) but I am working on next year.

The piece Uganda has that other options haven't so far is the chance to do meaningful work again. That's what has to change. If not Uganda, then where? If Ecuador, then what? In the meantime, surely there is something that needs doing in Vermont.

The great thing thing about being a generalist in any field is that you enjoy a broad scope and have a wide-ranging portfolio of skills and eventually knowledge. After 40 years, you just know stuff. And hopefully you know how to integrate and synthesize. There is a bit of gravitas. So I know I have a lot to offer if I find the right niche. I don't have to be nor do I want to be "the boss." What I need is to be useful to others in a way that means something to them and to me.

So I am resting open, but there is a little sign around my neck that says: Wanted--meaningful work.

The Gratitudes

In the swirl of unthinkable events this past week I found myself gripped by fear and unable to move, physically lethargic and emotionally paralyzed for a couple of days. I know I am not alone, even thought I did not begin experience these events directly.
 
I think a lot has been piling up, all working toward an undesirable result, this paralysis. There was my dad's death and now trying to be a support to my mom, which feels something like being on a gerbil wheel most of the time. The State Department deaths in Afghanistan came next and then wham-bam! Boston and Texas.

It was more than two days before I realized I had been here before. Of course we all were here before with the 9/11 attacks. Some of us who are old enough remember when our president was killed. More recently in 2011 I was "there" when the U.S. Embassy in Kabul was under attack with my cherished daughter inside it. At that time, all I knew was that I had to get to a pond and paddle my kayak. I had a false start. Drove all the way to Curtis Pond without the paddle, but I knew I had to go back to get it. 

That day, as I hit the water with certainly vigorous and maybe maniacal strokes, I was grateful first for instantaneous communication and a daughter who thoughtfully let us all know before we even woke up to the news that she was sheltering in place in a hard building (of course, I wanted to hear from her every 15 minutes that this was still the case). I went on from there to feel gratitude for the U.S. troops defending the Embassy, for all their training and professionalism. To friends who hugged me in my initial panic. For my beloved kayak. I even felt gratitude for the opportunity to be reminded about what was important in life. By the time I paddled back to the put-in, I had a list of ten things I was grateful for. I was breathing again. Still very concerned (no cell at Curtis Pond meant I had to wait until I got closer to home to check my email and Google for the status of the attack, which went on for upwards of 20 hours). Still upset but not paralyzed. My stomach was not totally tied in knots anymore, even though my adrenalin was still running high.

My memories of the Kabul attack came back to me finally about two days after Boston and before Texas. And with them came this conclusion. The only way out of fear and paralysis is through gratitude and love. Very easy to say and know intellectually. Very hard to start moving in that direction from a fetal position while sobbing. At first, I just had to force it, something of a Goodnight Moon approach--kind of mechanical and not necessarily related to the events, per se. I had to acknowledge my gratitude for the books in my room, my comfortable bed, the way the sunshine was coming into my safe house, my family and friends -- the usual but no less valued litany -- before I could move on in a way that let the fear dissipate.

Only then could I feel wholeheartedly grateful for emergency responders and brave bystanders,  determined law enforcement officers, a cooperative public who responded to the request for leads. I could be grateful for the state of trauma medicine in this country (in no small part thanks to wars we shouldn't have been in), to the runners who kept running past the finish line right to the hospitals to give blood. I could be grateful for the restraint shown by our president and the governor of Massachusetts as they promised a just resolution (as opposed to "We'll get those guys."). And for the love and courage of ordinary Bostonians and others who remember, care for, and support those who were injured and the loved ones of those killed. And I remain grateful for instantaneous communication worldwide.

With my extended litany, my muscles slowly began to lose tension. I felt my heart opening again. I was not crying all the time. I could feel the golden light of love (like a teardrop at your heart's center, said a Buddhist nun recently) expand and send warmth and love throughout me and from me to the world. Powerful stuff. The gratitudes will get us through.

The Grief Thing

Grief caused by the death of loved ones is new to me. I am lucky that way. My "little" brother Bill died about two and a half years ago just shy of 61 and my dad died just six weeks ago at 92. The other day was my dear grandmother's birthday. "Ma" died in 1979 and this would have been her 112th birthday.

These losses all seem to be blending together. Maybe that's making the most recent one easier. I don't know. But I find I am crying more about the fact that I can't share something with my brother. I am half mad at him for not being here now in the wake of my Dad's death. On the other hand, I am glad my mom can imagine the two of them playing golf together at the Pebble Beach of  the Great Beyond.

At least I can talk to Ma about it on her birthday. Named Lillian (as in Easter Lily) for the fact that she was born a week after Easter in 1901, her birthday is always an occasion for remembering her and checking in with her. Of the many things I appreciated about Ma, I loved that she took things as they came. She was not a big control freak that I could see. She could do whatever she set her mind to and she was always full of good cheer. She definitely fit into the pro-Laughing Camp in the family. She avoided conflict and took great pride in whatever she did, including sewing some pretty amazing wool Easter coats for me and my sister or decorating a basket cake for a bake sale. She was big on Jackson & Perkins roses, but what I remember the most about her gardens was the patch of Lily of the Valley next to her back door.

Her first memory, probably from about age 5, was of standing on a chair, a big dish towel tied around her like an apron, washing dishes. Her young mother, already widowed thanks to an influenza epidemic, was trying to support Lillian and her little brother by cooking at lumber and other work camps. Ma always claimed to love washing dishes. I think she really meant it and I can guess that there may have been happy memories of being near her mother associated with it.

When I was a kid--before automatic dishwashers--after the Sunday family dinner Ma would organize the girls (naturally!)  into helping with the dishes. Now washing dishes is a lost art in the developed world. I am not complaining. Believe me, the person who invented the automatic dishwasher ranks right up there in my world view. But imagine the quiet time enjoyed by women who wash dishes. Everyone leaves them alone for fear of being roped into helping. They get to think all the way through a sentence without a child distracting them with a new demand, to integrate their day's experiences before moving on to the next of never-ending tasks.

Today on Ma's birthday, I wish I were back in her kitchen drying the dishes with her. I would ask her so many questions. What was it like growing up without a father? How did she bear the death of her younger son when he was only 29? How did she brace herself to go to the trailer park community center after my grandfather's death and find a card game to join? In so many words, how do I do this grief thing, Ma? I think we would have had a great conversation. Ma would have laughed a lot and she would have told family stories to steer me off the sad stuff (she was a Champ at Laughing in the Face of Adversity).

But it is not just about the answers to questions. Grief right now is lost opportunity for connection. Or, in my case, a stronger connection with people who shaped me, who gave me my bearings. And who left me with a treasure trove of memories to cherish and pass on to the next generation.

Negotiating with the Deer

I am getting ready--weeks ahead of the hostas--for the deer. Last year for the first time in 3 years, they came down the big wooded hill across the road and dined on my hostas, phlox, the tomatoes (!) and virtually anything young and green and full of nourishment. This is old news to many of my friends in Vermont. But I took it personally. Why me? Why now? Hadn't we had a nice relationship before? Why eat my plants just as I am really getting into gardening on this little lot?

The daffodils are just emerging. They are maybe 3" high right now. Usually deer ignore daffodils so I am not in a panic yet. But then I remember they ate the phlox and who would have expected that? I think it is time to take some steps.

Everyone has a sure-fire solution to preventing deer from dining in the yard. They all probably work, at least until the deer get wise. Coyote pee was popular when I lived in West Virginia. The idea is the deer sense a predator and move away. But then it rains and you have to spread the stuff again. And it is expensive. I am going to lean toward the do-it-once-and-hope-it-works kinds of solutions.
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First, fairy lights. I happen to have an abundance of little white lights (it's a long story). I don't begin to use them all on my Christmas trees. So I already have in inventory one weapon in the category of do-it-once. My plan is to skirt the beds with these strings of lights--just lay them on the ground at the edges of the beds. Plug them all together and into the big orange extension cord and then into the outlet on my little front porch. Bingo.

The back-up plan is Irish Spring soap. I have to figure out how to rig this up, but basically a chunk of the strong-smelling soap will hang from a string on a stick next to every possible plant of interest. When it rains, a little soap will wash off but if you have ever used that soap, you know the smell will live on, unlike the fake predator approach. For right now I am not going to get too obsessed about environmental impact.

We'll see what happens. It's not that I don't like the deer. I do sort of like knowing they are close (the neighborhood bear is another story). They are quiet and graceful and always look so startled when I drive down the driveway at night and find them hanging out. But there are limits. When I decided to move toward an edible landscape I also started to get more possessive about the plants. Now it's my food we are talking about.

Maybe this problem will just resolve itself over time. After all, the hosta lilies are not edible to me, so they will probably give way to something that is. Maybe I could move them to a spot where I can enjoy them but also go easy on the deer. After the initial deer repasts last year the hostas did grow back some. I did get to enjoy them eventually, a little. Maybe the deer got bored with them and that's when they moved on to the phlox and tomatoes.

It's just that in the early part of the spring, well, I am simply desperate to see something growing. I might even be open to a dialogue about the schedule. We could negotiate. Maybe the deer
could come by in August when I am starting to get sick of weeding and watering and help me out. I could be a lot more generous then. Heck, they could even have the zucchini by then. But, let's face it, when was zucchini a good bargaining chip? People who never lock their cars in Vermont start locking them in zucchini season for fear a friendly soul will leave some on the back seat.

No, I think I will just go with my two-part strategy. See what happens this year. Try to be chill. Put a big pot of pansies on the porch in the meantime to satisfy that need to see something growing.

Laughing in the Face of Adversity

My Aunt Helen has a gift. Her voice is sunshine. And then she laughs--a deep belly laugh. The kind you cannot fake. The kind that makes you laugh right along. That picks up your spirits right then and there. Cranky types might call her a Pollyanna when she exclaims her pleasure in the most mundane aspects of life--blue skies, a bubble bath, a delicious cooky made by a neighbor. These are the things that those of us in a rush or a rut sometimes fail to appreciate. Now in her mid-90s, Aunt Helen is still looking on the bright side. Like those gag gift birds that bob up no matter how many times they are pushed down into the glass of water, she comes right back.

I got to thinking about Aunt Helen's iconic laugh after a recent meditation experience focused on sound. The leader told us, "Get comfortable. Close your eyes. Trust your ears." He played some music on a stringed instrument and then on a flute. He chimed a brass bowl. All very chill. Then there were the people outside in the hallway talking in their "outside voices." Someone coughed. The person next to me was doing noisy yoga breaths. After about ten minutes the leader invited us to comment on the experience. As you might expect, there were many different viewpoints about what meditation is supposed to be, some of them ardently held. We commented on how the various sounds affected us. There was almost universal annoyance at those chatty people outside. Skilled Leader observed that annoying things come up in life. He asked us to think about how we respond to them. I realized that sometimes I can actually laugh at them.

That led me to wonder what would it be like to throw a few laughs into the sound mix for the meditation? Maybe one like Aunt Helen's. Or the infectious kind of laugh that bubbles out of happy toddlers. I think I know what would happen. Some people would be annoyed by one laugh or another, others would be unable to suppress their own laughs in response (which would probably really get to the already annoyed). I think I might be in the latter group.

In my family there are different opinions about laughter. There is the camp that thinks Life is Too Serious to be Laughing all the time. That laughing is just a way of looking at the world through rose-colored glasses or overlooking the harsh realities. The other camp thinks Life is Too Serious NOT to be Laughing all the time. They seldom find common ground.

I have been accused of Laughing in the Face of Adversity. This crime, both at the felony and the misdemeanor levels, is also known as not taking something as seriously as someone else wants me to, or just having a more light-hearted take on a situation. Sometimes when this happens I admit I am probably on the verge of hysteria. Like the time my family and I got off a train only to realize that it was not the station where we had parked our car outside Paris. Uh-oh.

Given the two Laughter Camps in the family, some of us thought it was a bigger Uh-oh than others. Our problem-solving assets included the shards of a 65 year old father's high school French, a 13 year old first-year French student (who bore up very well as the family's language lifeline on this trip), and my own spatial/map-reading skills. But these did not kick into gear until I had laughed to the point of tears. It just seemed terribly funny, like a bad movie about clueless Americans in France on vacation, which I suppose we were.Once I got that out of my system, I was able to help figure out where we were and what station we needed to get to. The would-be French speakers had come to the same conclusion going about it in a different way. Moments later we boarded another train. At the next station we found our car and went on our way. To this day when I put myself back on that platform, I start to laugh. And to this day, others who were present remind me We Could Have Been LOST in a Foreign Country.

Okay, I get that not everything is funny. When my mood is sour or I am feeling anxious, it's hard to dig down for a laugh. And yet, laughter sustains me. It can make very minor adversity--a grey day Vermont, for example--much more tolerable. It can help me not take myself so seriously. The late Art Buchwald, a Pulitzer Prize winning columnist, laughed in the face of serious adversity. His kidneys were failing and he refused dialysis. He watched funny movies and told jokes, spent months in hospice, then left, went back to his columns, and wrote another book. His kidneys finally got him, but not before he had the last laugh.

I hope if I ever have to face the kind of adversity Buchwald faced that I will be able to laugh. It would definitely qualify as felony level Laughing in the Face of Adversity. In the meantime, I intend to keep practicing at the misdemeanor level just to stay in shape. Aunt Helen would like that.

The Hell with Bucket lists

Being of a certain age I am noticing  a lot of attention to Bucket Lists. These are the "Before I Die" lists of places and experiences we want to see or have before we kick the bucket. We can only joke about this, of course, because it makes us nervous to think about our own death. Bucket Lists are a problem for me.  It's not that I am prepared to give up my aspirations about seeing South Africa. But the whole idea of another Big To-Do List before I die makes me tired. It feels too driven. I have the sense that I need to slice this some other way.

For one thing, it feels like a contest. I tend to shy away from contests. If it is a contest, I am happy for you to win. Go right ahead. Jump out of airplanes or bungee jump into a deep gorge. Through-hike the AT surviving on nuts and berries. Check off Macchu Picchu. Learn to tango. You win.

Most Bucket Lists I have heard about involve going and doing. Lots of planning ahead, creating memories to look back on. Not much about being. Now. Present. Aware of myself in this moment, in this place, in my life. They feel more like the going/doing evidenced in piles of slides I took maybe 30 years ago. Going through them, I was disappointed to find pictures of scenery I could no longer identify with precision. So I culled looking for photos of people I cared about. My daughter at age 8 dressed in a kelly green Izod skirt suit, ready to board a plane with me for our first big international adventure. The other slides--endless ancient temples, big buildings, bucolic countryside views, vineyards in the Mosel Valley--mostly hit the round file. I thought about all the effort, not to mention expense, that had gone into taking and storing and moving those slides for all those years. I felt grateful that at some point around the year 2000 I gave up scrapbooking my life and travels. I love the photos that show my daughter growing up, but I don't need them to remember her proud face after she successfully bargained for a peacock fan in Agra.


About a year ago when I was contemplating retirement (aka The End of Paid Work) I threw myself on the mercy of a way-too-young psychologist to sort this stuff out. Should I have a Bucket List? How was I going to spend the rest of my life? I had no shortage of ideas. But I was going in circles and my anxiety was growing. After two sessions she said, "Rilla, you have a lot of words (Bingo! Young, but not stupid.)  I would like to see pictures. Bring me pictures of what you hope for, not in the rest of your life, but maybe for the next couple of years."

What a great assignment for me. Get me out of my head, away from words. I went after it with gusto. I put away the item that said "Take a textile tour of India with my sister." I found pictures of women together, mothers and daughters, sweethearts, beaches, baskets, cloth, lush vegetation, people crossing a finish line, a kayaker on a quiet lake, yarn. I found a whole lot of pictures. Suddenly my perspective seemed more fluid, more horizontal. The possibility of mixing and matching became apparent. Within months, I went to Armenia with my sister for ten weeks. Not India, not textiles, not beaches, but extended time with my oldest friend discovering a new place, thrilling to fine music, making new friends. "Go to Armenia with my sister" would never have been on a checklist.

Rather than checking off Victoria Falls, I am looking for a chance to be with my sweet Peter in a place where we can hike, enjoy the arts, maybe even participate in the arts (Lord knows, I love a craft and indigenous art seems the fastest track to that in the world). Where we are not up to speed on the language and need to figure things out on the fly. Where we might even have a chance to speak something other than English, however haltingly. Where we can simply be for awhile. Slightly but tolerably edgy. Just outside our comfort zones. A chance to stretch, to get more acquainted with ourselves.

I feel more comfortable with this approach. I am not in a contest or a race. There are no must-dos or best/right answers for all time. Just embrace life. Live wholeheartedly. Every day. Wherever I am. If I learn to speak Spanish, so much the better.

Gardening-as-Meditation

The snow has melted from what-passes-for-grass in my yard and the annual winter toll on the house and driveway is apparent.It's time to think about taking action, starting with enlarging the front beds again to accommodate more edibles and yes, reduce the amount of area covered by what passes-for-grass. If this sounds contrary to resting open, I invite you to continue.

Getting rid of grass in my already smallish yard became something of an obsession for me last year as I neared retirement. In its first blush I aimed for the grass clumps between the stones in my front walk. Admittedly a tidy-up job, not unlike cleaning out the dresser, this effort led me to discover that the walk was actually two stones wide--half of them had been hidden by untended and out of control grass. Now they are connected by creeping phlox, the winner in a contest with creeping thyme. At least the phlox will be easier to keep cut back than the grass and it adds some contrasting texture.

Once the walkway problems were under control, my obsession led me to the notion that maybe a big swath of grass could go if I created a wide bed on the outside of the walkway, where some pretty sorry looking grass then stood. I envisioned a country-cottage-magazine beautiful path between beds that any visitor would find charming and also from which I could reach and tend to the edible experiments of front yard herbs, squash, tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant. My ambition exhausted me. Thank Gardener's Supply for my Cape Cod Cutter tool, decorated with a bright yellow ribbon so I could find it easily in the mess I was making.

What I did not intend (as in set out to accomplish), but what I noticed as I wrestled with the unwanted greenery and accompanying weeds, is that my body became intently focused on the physical task. My mind on the other hand was, well, utterly blank. Even if I did have a thought unrelated to my task, I could not hold it for long. I couldn't worry about anything or even ponder great questions because I was just too darned focused on ripping out that grass mat or digging enrichments into the soil.

I had stumbled onto gardening-as-meditation, a chance to free my hyperactive mind and simply tend the earth, the plants. Maybe I just needed a distraction from the scary prospect of retirement. My perspective changed. Time slowed down. I made friends with my plants and my birthday present Arctic Blue Willow tree. Yes, I talked to them, mostly encouraging them and nudging them along their own growth path.

Now the perennials are reemerging. Their juices are flowing and so are mine. I see an even wider bed now, perhaps bordered eventually by low-profile blueberry bushes, and divided unobtrusively by little walkways that will give me access to the center section that is too far to reach from either side. It's time to find the Cape Cod Cutter tool and wash my gardening gloves, get the hose out from under the house and put the snow shovels away.

But nothing is going to happen in a hurry. It is only early April. The hanging baskets won't even appear until close to Mother's Day and there is no way I am planting anything in the ground before mid-May except maybe spinach and lettuces. I can rest open for a while longer, chatting up the huechera and geraniums as they emerge and pondering what yummies I will plant among them.

Intention

Sitting comfortably at the beginning of a yoga class, I hear the calm, all-knowing teacher suggest that I choose an "intention" for my practice. My first wise-cracking thought is, "My intention is to get through it." But I keep hearing this invitation and gradually the idea takes hold. It helps when the teachers use examples, such as compassion, love, forgiveness. They mention the intention throughout the class. Tell me to check in with myself (like, am I still on track?). Finally, I get it. I can get what I want out of this. Now there's a breakthrough.And maybe a burden too.

But being a "big picture" type, I can't leave it at that. I begin to think about an intention for the DAY. My intention flows out of the end of my pen while I write in my journal each morning. I have no idea what is going to come out. I am amazed at how intuitive my pen is. After a day of beating myself up for being impatient, my pen tells me my intention for the day is self-love, compassion for myself. Forgiveness for not being eternally patient, grateful acceptance of a new day, another chance.

All this is well and good at 6:30 (or later, I admit) in the morning. But what about at noon at the stoplight in the middle of town when, just as I have a chance to turn, a pedestrian strays in front of my car? (Under Vermont law, pedestrians rule. Period.) Well, actually, it's an ideal time to check in with my intention. How is that compassion going? Where am I on that impatience meter? The idea is to recognize a chance to STOP, BREATHE (maybe more than once), and then CHECK IN.

It helps to figure out what might trigger a "check in." Red stop lights would be perfect in Washington or Boston, but in Montpelier we have only one stoplight. So in the absence of having a personal Yogi to toll a bell for me every two hours, I have been looking for other transition moments that might work. How about when I start the car? Turn off the car? When I move from one room to another (too hard to remember)? Whenever I use my credit card? When I step into the shower? Some of the above? All of the above?

My first thought was to "send" myself a chime message every two hours. I carefully selected the sound from those available. Great idea. But my iPhone and I are still discussing how to achieve this. We apparently disagree. No chimes have been sounded despite my efforts to set this up. Now I am just grabbing whatever I can. Unfortunately the credit card option seems to be winning. Lots of opportunities to check in there. So far, my "check in" has not stopped any purchases. But I am thinking maybe this could be a strategy for reducing thoughtlerss spending.

After all, this is all about being mindful. Intentional. Thinking about what I am doing. Giving myself a chance to reconsider what I am about to do or say. Checking the alignment with my intention. Recognizing and accepting how far off course I might have strayed since I last checked in. Feeling grateful for this moment when I can steer myself back on course.

A dear friend told me he thought this sounded like a To-Do list (God forbid). Au contraire. It feels like painting a backdrop for the day rather than one more thing to do.But I admit, it is work. And it seems to be working for me.

Resting Open is Not for Sissies

Some might call it coincidence, others "synchronicity." Maybe even the Holy Spirit. One thing is for sure, it happens. Things come together. For a reason, even if the reason is not always crystal clear in the moment.

Here I am cleaning out the dresser of my life, feeling grateful for the opportunity Lent gives me to pause, thinking I am working toward something that looks like both physical and mental space to create things, to work on ideas. Instead I watch one parent succumb to congestive heart failure and another parent face-to-face with an existential crisis.

They were married over 71 years and fell in love on their first date in 1937. As a survivor of two marriages/divorces, I feel like I am in the Mars Rover trying to decipher what life looks like on that planet. There is no way I can really get it. Their time sweeps from the Roaring Twenties through the the Great Depression, is marked forever by World War II. They have seen first party line and private line telephones come in, then direct dialing in the early 1950s, and now push-button and mobile phones that are as good as computers. They lived through the Cold War, the Viet Nam war, the onslaught of technology. They saw a world rocked by terrorism. Their time together included rearing three children who gave them a normal ration of grief but whose achievements and children made them proud and happy. And they suffered every parent's worst nightmare, losing a child before his time.


Not exactly what I had in mind when I embraced Lent, but how grateful I am now for the clean dresser, the resting open, feeling if not strong at least nimble enough to respond. Every day delivers a new set of challenges, from the mundane and even ridiculous to the Big Questions of Life.

As the trustee for my dad's will, I am finding a whole lot of paperwork is involved. Faceless institutions have unique procedures for closing out a person's account at life's end. Who knew they cared?  Plus, Dad did not leave a tidy desk. Everything Mom ever feared about Dad's paper management is true. And it's also true that if she had her sight, things would be different. Just sayin.' The fact is they were a pair like many pairs, made up of a saver and a thrower.

The good side of this is finding the treasure trove my dad saved, including menus from their honeymoon to Chicago in 1941, where you could get a Delmonico steak at a swank ballroom restaurant for $2.95. There are photos and a championship ring from his semi-pro baseball career, his Pilot Log from World War II and what appears to be every single typed order he was ever issued. He wrote detailed accounts of key bombing missions over the Philippines and life on the base deep in the Pacific. On one mission where his plane came under potentially mortal fire, he acknowledges that he thought to himself that it was a helluva place to die. Happily for our family, his plane limped back to base that day and he eventually came home to live a full life and to die knowing he was loved dearly and that we all thought he was a hero.

Resting open is not for sissies. You never know what might come up. But no matter what arises there is some element in it for which I can be grateful. This one is easy. I am simply and profoundly grateful for my dad.

Rilla's Big Parking Lot of Life

I love a good list. In fact, it's my go-to way of coping when everything--absolutely everything--in my life is OUT OF CONTROL. Virtually anything can trigger list-making. A good list can go a long way toward reestablishing the illusion that I could be in control. In 1992 after being robbed on the street on a sunny spring day in Strasbourg, I found myself in a French police station. I wasn't happy. First, there was the robbery and then, because of it, our dinner plans were canceled.I was hungry. It seemed to be beyond very important in a French kind of way to report this crime. I was sitting there listening to my French-fluent daughter ask rapid-fire questions of the police on my behalf. Me? I started to make a list of what I thought was in my wallet before it left my purse. We still laugh about how we each resorted to character under stress--lots of questions from her, list-making by me.

Not all lists are born in crisis. Every day lists play a part in keeping me on track now that I can find myself in a room and not remember why I went there. And I even use my iPhone to make lists, especially shopping lists. There is no cross-out function, but I can delete an item--almost as satisfying. Imagine my best list--organized and prioritized, maybe even numbered in the order in which I plan to attend to the items.If it's a list of errands, it's even likely to be charted to be sure I don't waste time or gas and can accomplish the list most efficiently. You know, do all the Main Street tasks at the same time sort of thing.

At one time, I might have said a list could organize my life. Yes, there would be some things more important and/or more urgent than others. But every aspiration could be on the list. What I have realized of late is that some things--even things that feel urgent and important--don't ever need to get done or be on the list. Like Christmas cards or ironing pillow cases. But how about "doing something" with all the family pictures? What if I never cleaned out my under-deck storage?

These kinds of "shoulds" need to be dealt with or they just keep cycling back. For me it's best if I see them written down. That somehow forces me to make a decision to do, delay, or plan never to do. So now I have Rilla's Big Parking Lot of Life (BPLL). It's my list of things I have decided for now I will not do either because the thought overwhelms me or they seem unimportant.

The idea for the BPLL is borrowed from too many years of facilitating group discussions where we used a flip chart or a white board to make diplomatic note of pesky diversionary topics and ideas worth considering another day (but not today). I admit that there were occasions where certain items went to the parking lot to die. But others were gems that deserved at least another half-life of consideration.

My BPLL has both kinds of things in it.Right now, it looks like a random list. There is no need to organize or prioritize because I have no intention--currently--of doing these things.They are not lost. In the words of the immortal Fats Waller, "One never knows, do one?" But they are good reminders about what is not important in my life, at this moment, in this place. Where I can let myself off the hook. The BPLL makes it possible some days to rest open, to be fully engaged in right now.

Not a bad accomplishment from a humble list.

Give It Up or Embrace It?

Mention Lent and most people think deprivation. Fasting. Penitence. I get all that. But the fact is, part of my unique version of humanness is that I don't do well with deprivation or hair shirts. So Lent works better for me if I can reframe it as something I can welcome, embrace, and still go into the wilderness in some way.

For many years now, thanks to a beautiful young woman who is now an Episcopal priest, I have been "giving up" car radio for Lent (among other habits and practices that could use a course correction). But this year, it dawned on me that I could do so much more than give up car radio, which really amounts to whatever happens to be airing on Vermont Public Radio when I am driving.

I could embrace silence in the car. Easy for me to say. No kids in the back seat clamoring for attention. A pretty stale set of playlists on my iPod. Not a lot of other drivers in bad traffic to tempt me to yell. What I did not figure on was my own voice. Talking to myself.  Not exactly embracing silence.

Living in a small town means I usually have very short trips behind the wheel (NEXT Lent I might consider embracing walking more). But fairly frequently I also have hour-long drives on I-89, the postcard-beautiful highway where I regularly thank my lucky stars that I live in Vermont (as in "Oh my God, I am so lucky to live in Vermont!" said out loud with a little squeal and a big sigh). But I-89 is where the embrace-the-silence challenge comes in.

It's hard to shut up. Focus on my breath. Love those views and feel grateful. Listen. Listen. Observe without too much judgment where my mind goes. Bring it back to the breath. It's my wilderness. Imagine an overactive extrovert in the desert. That's me in my quiet car during Lent this year.

Don't get me wrong. There is a great freedom in the silent car. There is a vastness to explore there, lots of ideas and other chatter to note and walk away from.Most of the time, once I break the habit of turning on the radio immediately after turning the key in the ignition, I actually feel relieved. Alone at last, I think. Maybe alone with God. But definitely in a space I seldom inhabit otherwise. I recommend it.


And oh--lest you be be concerned I am driving around in a meditative fog and not paying attention, I can only assure you I think it is no worse than usual.

Ashes to Go or Not to Go?

Those "In The Episcopal Know" may be so over this question. Others may not care one whit or just wish we could get over ourselves. But I think the question is worth pondering. It is about so much more than ashes and even Ash Wednesday or Lent. Or maybe even The Church. I think it is about love and I am really big on love.

Background: On Ash Wednesday this week some very prominent leaders in the American Episcopal Church decided to take ashes to the people under the rubric "Ashes to Go." The Bishop of Washington, DC, the Rt Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde herself stood at the Foggy Bottom Metro Station offering to make the sign of the cross on any comer's forehead and repeat the phrase, "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."

In fact, priests across the country--some in response to the urging of their bishops--did the same, some of them with very human trepidations about looking stupid, being laughed at or ignored. Others, including some who decided against doing this, felt a genuine concern about whether the rites of The Church were being offered up on the cheap, out of context, just a stunt. Sort of Humility Lite, in contrast to the traditional blessing of the ashes offered in the context of a whole service (see

http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/formatted_1979.htm) celebrating the beginning of Lent.

When I first heard about this outreach event, my Inner Cheerleader-for-Change came bouncing forward, pom-poms at the ready. Talk about Radical Hospitality. Not just welcoming people when they come through the doors on Sunday, but standing outside with the ashes on offer to anyone who might be walking by. I could hear the concerns, the worries about the church's sacraments, and I respect those concerns. One thing I have learned about trying to make change happen is that it is critically important to listen very, very carefully to the naysayers. But, I thought..."What is the absolute worst thing that can happen here? No takers? A few sneers?"

My two favorite anecdotes from surfing the Ashes-to-Go Stratosphere are these:

From The Reverend Kym Lucas, Rector at St. Margaret's Episcopal Church on Connecticut Avenue in Washington, DC--Twenty people stopped at St. Margaret's steps: some out of curiosity, some in gratitude, some not even sure why they stopped. A bus driver ran across 6 lanes of traffic; a harried traveler passed me by but doubled back to make time for a prayer and ashes. The weather held, and the liturgical context was made by the presence of the Spirit. And I realized in the process that I was being blessed.

From the recently ordained Reverend Auburn Watersong of Christ Church Episcopal, Montpelier, VT, the place I call home--I was expecting maybe 3 folks (rushing by during their lunch hour) might stop. 18 folks actually stopped for ashes - and my favorite: the 20-something gal who left the arm of her (slightly surprised) boyfriend as she exclaimed "I love Ash Wednesday!" then took one giant, enthusiastic step right up to me, looked me straight in the eyes and said "Lay it on me!" AWESOME.

My Inner Cheerleader is even more pumped than usual about Radical Hospitality. My head is popping with ideas for creating new paths to spiritual awakening, including my own. Ashes-to-Go was an outward and visible sign of love and welcome in some of the most unexpected places. Meeting people where they are. Giving them what we can of what they need. Upside unknown, but surely promising.

The Gift of Lent

Just about the time I don't think I can hug myself any tighter against the cold and dark that settled in about Thanksgiving, the light starts to change more dramatically each day and I feel restless to throw off the heavy coat of winter. It's Lent again, a chance to let in the new light and do a big tidy up.

For many childhood years "straightening up my dresser drawers" was on the weekly chores list. In my family, the rationale for this was to avoid the mortification that would surely ensue if we were suddenly taken to the hospital and someone needed to get clean pajamas from a messy dresser.

It seems to me Lent always comes at the moment when my "dresser" is at its messiest and I just can't take it any more. Forget about whether someone else could find my pajamas. The new light is revealing all the dust motes. I have bought yet another size 4 16" circular knitting needle and gone home to find two others. I have failed to pay one bill and paid another one twice. This year, my first since I retired from paid work, my head is spinning with alternate answers to the "What next?" question.I don't know whether I am coming or going. I choose to think this is a transition (as opposed to an utter and irreversible disintegration) and we all know that while transitions by definition come to an end, we don't know where, how, or when.

But here comes Lent. To the rescue. A time to take a big, deep spiritual breath. To rest open for awhile, waiting for that nudge that will push me toward new paths. I don't know who pushes the Nudge Button. Maybe God. Maybe God Within. Maybe the Great Spirit of the Seasons. Maybe none of the above. What I do know is that resting open -- heart, mind, and soul -- is a prerequisite to the nudge. I will not feel the nudge without it. I will not feel the nudge if I am hugging myself tightly against the cold dark.

What a gift this time is. Simply to rest open, to be open, to what will come. And to tidy my dresser while awaiting the call.