Little Steps

I have appreciated the people who have taken time to respond to these musings. I write "what comes next" based on memory and inspiration and little else. It's that bubble in my stomach that somehow channels itself through my brain synapses and to my typing fingers. I have heard a range of responses from questions to not-so-subtle encouragement to get myself to the "here and now"; I've received beautiful and gracious notes or been urged to focus on positive things. I have included some dark experiences in these blogs while trying to maintain a sense of my own human imperfection because they too are part of life as I know it. I'll get to the 21st century somehow and sometime (Mom and Dad:). The next urgency I'm feeling is to write about the experience of "firsts", and how important they are to the direction of life's choices.

It's 12:22 am and I am tired, need to go to bed and am so tempted to stay up all night at this keyboard, but I will allow "it" to sit and grow because I need sleep. . . . badly. This has been a heckuva week, starting with a Monday that began at 3:30 am and slowed down at 9:30 pm when I arrived home. Tonight was my night class and I had to go to the pharmacy afterwards, so I didn't get home till 9 pm again (after arriving at work at 8:30 am). I waited till the last minute to get my insulin refilled and injected the last drops in sight last night. I am insulin-dependent, so. . . there you go.

I cannot believe it is only Wednesday. It's been quite a while since I've lived for weekends, but that's the story of my last year and a half in the job I do now.

I can only promise two things: 1) that I will keep on blogging, and 2) I will continue to go where the muse takes me while editing for sensitivities I think others might have--especially my daughters. Sometimes this is a tough place to be. I hope anyone who reads will be patient with me and understand that I have the deepest respect and love for the people who matter most to me--especially anyone who shows up to read what I'm trying to say. Good night for now. I'm thinking about that bubble bath that awaits. And thank you for reading. It means a lot to me.

Sista Deb

I cannot think about Debbie without smiling. I think that is probably the reaction many people have to her. I first came to know her when we were teenagers. We had both dated the same guy (not at the same time, and when dating really meant "dating"). Most folks in town knew him as a good looking, but wild guy of Native American heritage; girls loved him and guys gave their half-finished, warm beers his last name for his careless tendency to leave his that way. All had a good time with him, but said he was full of tall stories. He was. He had one brown and one green eye and was sweet, devoted and a lot of fun. He was my first high school boyfriend, and I was gullible as the day was long, so I believed a lot of things he told me, including that he had to leave to go live on a reservation in Florida. I cried for a day until I realized that there was no truth to the story. Whatever happened eventually, I have little memory of, but we broke up and went our own ways. I was too young for a serious relationship and he was old enough to be ready.

I don't know where he fit into Debbie's life. But she was then and is now loved by women and men alike. I have never heard her say a negative thing about anyone in the time I have known her. Our paths crossed again in high school when we went on double dates with Etch and B.J. It is possible that both guys were our first "real" loves. Then I had no idea that eventually I would become her sister in law or that B.J. would die violently from a car accident three months after I left for college. I just remember going places in "Etch's" car, sitting in the back seat with B.J., with Deb up front keeping things lively, laughing and chatting the night away.

Deb is one of those women who can make a room go silent when she enters because of her unique and ravenous beauty that begins with sea-green eyes, full head of nearly black hair, distinct style of dress--always a little fun, sexy and funky, but never distasteful. Her straight white teeth and giant smile almost finish off her face, but right next to her beautiful, laughing mouth, she has a triangle of beauty marks that no one can forget. Her physical make up is the stuff of heroines that grace covers of romance novels.

If Deb understands her beauty, she comports herself as if she is unaware of it. Her Grand Canyon heart and sweetness overpower the exterior. The room that goes silent is then engaged by her genuine kindness and charm. I really believe she loves everybody on their own terms, full of grace, generosity of heart and acceptance. I never felt any other way in her presence; this is so despite my awareness that she has had her own trials as her life's path has taken her many places.

After I left for college, I found Deb again one summer night back at home when I went with my sister to watch her sing in a band that my sister's boyfriend worked for as a "light man". That is the night I "met" my childrens' father, Deb's brother, who was also there to watch her sing. The way he tells the story is he asked for a chair and I said, "yes I'll dance". In retrospect, it is a strange convergence of events. The "light man" married my sister and they had my nephew together. I married the man who asked me to dance and became Deb's sister in law. Deb spent the evening singing on stage, entertaining a room full of genuine admirers with her throaty voice and beauty that shined through everything else in the room.

I had known of her brother in high school for his good looks and generally shy demeanor. He was a couple years older than me, so I'm not sure we even knew each other well enough to greet each other passing in the hallway. Deb knew everybody and everybody knew and loved Deb. She was elected homecoming princess. At our school, students didn't "run" for election, but those honors were bestowed by the collective faith of a general voting student body who recognized the beauty, light and kindness of that person. Deb deserved every vote and received the admiration of all who knew her.

After I married her brother, we shared holidays, simultaneous pregnancies, time with our babies, days at the pool or beach, and our entries into motherhood and marriage. There is no other woman my age that I shared all of it with. I had my own sister, but she would start her family later. I had other girlfriends, but they would start their marriages and families later. Our parents befriended each other, and through our family connections, I noticed Deb's special relationships with her brothers. She and my kids' dad shared a lot of loving banter and laughter about each other, and with her brother ten years her junior, a protective, nurturing and lively friendship.

This is why I cannot think of Deb without smiling. She reminds me of happy times, familial love, the coming together of little children into the loving arms of their respective grandparents, laughter, sisterhood, and the bountiful affection for my daughters she bestowed on them. When you are with Deb, you feel like the only person in the world. That is her magic. She also reminds me of my adolescent years, coming of age and knowing what it meant to be a good person. She did not gossip about others or do any of the "mean" things that teenage girls tend to do to each other. She was her daddy's girl as I am, and the first born daughter in her family as I am. We both gave our respective parents their first grandchildren. Each of us had the support and love of strong (and ladylike) mothers who taught us good values and modeled strong parenting.

For reasons that don't need explanation, Deb and I hadn't seen each other in a little over twenty years until we met again at my first daughter's wedding, knowing that in the not too distant future, my first grandchild would be born. It goes well beyond words to explain who Deb is to me or how she seems to show up at the most meaningful times in my life. I had missed her more than I can describe, but had always asked when I spoke with my daughters or their father how she was doing, and always hoped she was okay. When her first born son was in Iraq, I worried through the universe that he would be okay. Despite our distance, the abundance of my memories of her are filled by no one else because we entered each others' lives when every dream was possible.The ways and times our lives criss-crossed can only be the work of God because there is no other explanation for that gift of a Sista like Deb.

My Seester

Somewhere along the way, Jodi and I started referring to each other as "my seester". I don't remember when it started or why, but it signalled a closeness as we became women, mothers and both had survived some rough times. My first memories of her are of me being the big sister by three years and she was a toddler learning to walk. She was feisty, determined, strong and didn't want much help. I have been told that I am too sensitive (and admit this is probably true), but her exterior is made of steel and genuinely felt righteousness.

My first memory of Jodi is trying to give her help when she didn't want any. I remember feeling hurt at the time because I wanted so badly for her not to be hurt, to protect her and for her to like me. We were in our backyard on Durkin Street on the patio and she had fallen down. I tried to help her up and she pushed me away. I thought nothing less of her (as if it would matter to a toddler), but felt helpless because I wanted and needed her approval, as I have all my life.

I wonder if she has ever felt helpless; I think so, but she rarely "goes there". This is how Jodi and I might be different. Where I am probably annoyingly open about my feelings, Jodi has a "let's go kick some butt" attitude toward life. She is also fervently loyal, smart with a quick wit, and not chatty as I am. Her words are like darts and are usually aimed at getting a laugh out of me, and she usually does. She is also a good listener and well tested mother whose homespun cooking and baked goods are generously shared with family, neighbor kids and anyone who shows up at her house.

When I went to summer school in about second grade, I asked her if she wanted to come with me. She said yes, and I was so proud to hold her hand as we navigated the sidewalk over the cracks, both of our long ponytails swinging with each step. We learned about pollywogs and reproduction. My teacher loved her, and I was elated until I found out that my mother didn't know she was with me. I assumed my mother knew and Jodi was brave enough to think she didn't need to ask or tell her. In those days it wasn't unusual for mothers to allow their kids to walk the two blocks to school alone. It was a different time. I loved her company. My mother was frantic, but relieved when she found out what had happened.

We were fast friends in hula-hooping, Easter egg hunts, swings, carroms, hopscotch, tetherball, dodgeball and all those kid games that easily happen in year-round sunshiny outdoor California weather. We were "regulars" at after school recreation programs, and it was a simpler time when neighbors all knew each other. Mothers would get together for coffee after the kids went to school and when we came home. We were sent outside to play till the street lights came on or dinner was ready. In all of this, Jodi was there, my faithful companion and fiercely independent sister.

When she learned how to ride a bike, at first she only stopped with her feet sliding on the sidewalk. It took her awhile to learn to use brakes. One day, knowing she could not stop quickly enough, she barreled in between two elderly women walking on the sidewalk, shouting "beep beep". The women were angry because one of them had a heart condition. My brother and I had witnessed the event and the women who asked Larry Stevens, the boy down the street if he knew who her parents were. He denied knowing her, though he knew all of us well. My brother and I fessed up and rounded up my father. When he came out to talk to the women, they angrily explained what had happened, my dad asked, "what do you want me to do, beat her?" and Jodi perked up to defend herself. "I said, beep beep!" I would have been melting to my knees with tears and apologies, but Jodi had moxie.

Jodi was tough and smart, so at middle school age, my brother and I made a significant error in judgement one night when were supposed to babysit while my parents went out. Mike and I were feeling our oats at the beginning of those "hanging out" at the local baseball park years. I wanted to go meet up with Foster Campbell, whom I had a crush on, and he had a girlfriend he wanted to see. We left Jodi alone at home with our friend Rusty McTague's phone number. He lived across the street, we trusted him and knew she was smart enough to pick up the phone and call if anything happened. We arrived home, and as Mike opened the garage door, we awoke to the horror of our parents' station wagon sitting there. Mike's first words were, "want to run away?" It didn't take too much convincing, but I suggested we ought to go in and face the music. We were in bad trouble and Jodi HAD been scared. She had called Rusty.

Despite whatever punishment we received, the worst part of the situation was knowing my sister had needed me and I had not been there. I really didn't think she would call Rusty. That day I learned that my sister could be frightened and it surprised me because I had never known that about her. She had such a fearless exterior. She beat up Bob Foster, who had called her a name. She stood up to two elderly ladies and she went to summer school with me without worry about what my mother would think.

I really don't know if I changed my behavior toward her because I entered those oh-so-selfish and active years of high school after our family had moved across town. We shared a room; her side was neat and clean, mine, a hot mess. She came home and sat down at the dinner table every night to do her homework. I sprawled on my bed with stuff all over, sorting through what I might need to get turned in. She never complained about my messes and most of the time let me borrow her clothes until I had ruined a few of them. Then she drew the line.

I lived my high school years with friends, dates, dances, cheer practices and summer camps. I worked at a local pharmacy for four years as a sales clerk. She never seemed to need anything, but I was probably too self absorped and occupied to notice if she did. Yet despite my inattention, in the stands at a football game, she overheard some of my peers saying bad things about me and gave them a few choice words to think about.

When I left for college, I didn't consider that she made a sacrifice to wait to go away until I finished. We did conspire, however on one of my birthdays around that time. She wanted a puppy after our beloved bassett hound Hector died. We went to the animal shelter on my birthday to pick out a puppy, and she told my mother it was my birthday present (though we both knew the dog was hers). After much protest from Mom and Jodi's stubborn refusal to return the puppy, Nikki lived at my parents' home and became my parents' faithful companion until she passed away several years later.

Over the passing years, Jodi has bought bikes and clothes for my girls when I could not afford them. She never missed remembering them generously on either of their birthdays or Christmas. She was there for Steffie through her college years in California. Though she and Steffie are bosom buddies because of those years and a certain "likeness", she has never stopped being there for both girls and treating them with equal love and respect.

No mother can deny the importance of a loving auntie, who holds her sister up when things are hard, stands up for her when she is not around, who gives and gets accurate information on the phone when my folks have things a little wrong, who is my emergency "go-to" person from states away when I have a situation that requires one. This list could go on forever, beginning with sharing a king sized bed with me because of a hotel snafu when Steffie graduated from USD, driving 14 hours with her family to attend Amanda and Todd's wedding in Ashland over the span of a short weekend, shopping for a bridal gown with my daughter when I could not be there, hand-crafting a cake tower for the wedding, spending countless hours sorting through to-do lists and plans with a nervous bride to be, sending me flowers on Valentine's Day or Easter or Mother's Day on a hit and miss basis because sisters understand.

Different as we are, I have never doubted her loyalty to me, rock-like support, practical good sense, and infinite love for my daughers as we grew from children to women to mothers to aunties to daughters who know they will be there for each other when either of us are in need or our parents need us more. That's a seester. That's my Seester.

Bigger than Me

I have studied language for about thirty years, and there are two things I know about it: 1) it is exuberant (says more than one wants it to say) and 2) deficient (cannot express all that one wants to say). This simple but remarkable insight came from sociolinguist A.L. Becker, whose work has influenced my views and understanding of language. I have also been writing academic work for the past couple of decades, and this site has been liberating because in academic worlds, I struggle to stay within a certain set of conventions, editorial comments and well researched claims and arguments. If not for publication, then I write for "public" professional situations in the form of reports and proposals, which are necessarily constrained to a "professional" voice.

I have diaries, but this work is different from those entries, which tend to be stream of consciousness details of daily thoughts, feelings and occurences. With a diary, there is an expectation of privacy. With a blog, there is an expectation of interactive responses. I have never written a blog before, so this is an experiment in writing what is true while being conscious that others may read it. That means I want to find the necessary sensitivity, thoughtfulness and care in it when there is a potential "audience" out there. I have given very few people this address with that in mind. And unlike other peoples' blogs, I am not hoping for a wider readership, but only for readers who are genuinely interested in what I would like them to know about the soul (and writer in me that is part of that soul) that guides my choices.

This writing process is far bigger than me. It is like a painter who cannot live without expressing him or herself on a canvas. The difference is that a different medium is used--paint, colors, shapes, lines, perspectives. My canvas is a blank white page and my medium is lived experience, language and some formal training. No painting is ever quite "finished"; the painter needs to cover something up, add something else and at some point, temporarily "arrest" what has been done to call it a finished product. When I write, the process is similar in that and I don't "write" as much as "experience writes me", and at some point I have an intuition to stop-for now. It comes out of deep places, old and new but the language channels where it needs to go, so writing is surrendering to a flow of truths that are being or have been lived.

Throughout this process I am making edits--taking words away, making conscious omissions, and leaving in other things that I believe are necessary for one sentence to work its way into the next one. This blog is more about an important process that is greater than I fully understand or can explain. It is much less about informational content than actually "doing" it. I have heard poets say that they don't write poems, but the poems "write them". I am trying, however inadequately to distinguish what I am doing here from writing a gossip column or "only" going through some kind of catharsis, regardless of how it affects others (I save that for my diaries, which my daughters can read when I'm dead and gone).

I am hoping to say serious things about marriage, womanhood, motherhood, tough choices, survival strategies and negotiating a professional life in the midst of maintaining those roles. I do not expect to get it all "right" every time, but do hope to post things that are as true and nuanced as life itself is.

No human being gets through life unscathed, without having made mistakes, experiencing regrets, great joy, or misfortune that is not anybody's fault, but simply a challenge that God has placed before us. I and others strive for a kind of goodness and integrity where who I am is consistent with what I do. But anyone who is human will always fall short of perfection. If I don't take the time to relect on my own shortcomings--especially with writing, then I may cause harms that I don't notice, are unintended and/or show up as blatant neglect of others' sensitivities. I am most vulnerable to those who matter most to me. I live in a world of about eight billion people, and it is clear to me that I am no more or less important than any other person.

Here, I have tried to focus on a "present" defining moment, this empty nest, and other definining moments that guided me into a life in academics while negotiating parenting and womanhood. I am trying to write this life in a way that is sensitive to others while still telling the truth. I am finding that this is a hard line to negotiate. I could do "creative writing", drawing on fictional characters grounded in life's experiences, but as I have gotten older, I find I get more out of documentary films, biographies and "true life". I could also write only of happy times, but we only know light because it is sometimes dark, and only know happiness because difficulties arise that prove to create unhappy or unjust outcomes, depending on whose point of view is at stake.

All I am asking from anyone who chooses to enter this space is thoughtful reading, patience and understanding. In return, I hope there is some gift of insight, identification with an experience, a reader's location of meaningful memories that had long been forgotten, or some human lesson taken from details that "ring true" and can be shared, ultimately connecting one's humanity to another's.

None of this may square with people who know me "live"--yet I am this person--serious, inwardly guided, constantly thinking, and that one, too, whomever you think she is. My life has been bigger than me, more far-reaching than I have been able to make sense of, and burdened with self-doubt, detailed memories, and painful mirrors of silence that speak loudly of a need to be recognized and acknowledged in ways that others may not be able to imagine.

Finding My Feet

An earthquake doesn't happen overnight. It is a culmination of the earth's fissures that hiss and crack quarter inches at a time over years as one tectonic plate moves slightly northward while the mainland sustains its place. The ground of my happiness was moving without much awareness on my part as I had one foot in a marriage that was sliding northward and a life at home that began to show deep cracks in its foundations. I was happy waddling around with my second pregnancy, sharing days at the beach, in backyards and sideyards with my sister in law and other young mothers starting families. We drank wine, fresca, diet pepsi and packed picnics, visited our families in town, compared potty training stories and managed to socialize between naptimes, errands and visits from loving grandparents, aunties and uncles.

It was a time of sunshine, swimming pools and barbeques, playhouses, fisher price musical instruments, trikes, foggy mornings and occasional rainy days. My daughters were happy girls and I was an ecstatic mommy, finding pleasure and humor in simple things--attending church, going to aerobics--and their blooming personalities. Steffie loved her baths and being in any kind of water. She was like a round little buoy, bobbing around in jacuzzis, bathtubs and swimming pools--concrete ones and plastic blowups, a garden hose or sprinklers. Amanda constantly donned belts, snowhats, two different shoes, purses and costume jewelry while showing great skill in taking things off and putting something else on with each trip to her room or toybox. Her curiosities were boundless. She was about thirteen months when I left my job and did not enter day care except into the loving arms of family members until she entered kindergarten. Stephanie was almost three.

Throughout those easygoing days and joyful routines, I began to notice cracks in my marriage marked by silences, my own growing dis-ease and sudden spurts of great distance that created an internal conflict between the real happiness of my days and shadows that crept over our ties as he worked harder and I hung on by my fingernails to the man that I loved. I could not reach him, but could feel a groundswell of necessity growing that led me to consider ways that I could bring income into the home. When I was eight months pregnant with Steffie, I applied for a job as a department store Santa, but was told that my voice was too high for the position.

I spent the next year in ignorant bliss and my first step toward self-liberation when I bought a forty dollar double stroller so I could take walks outside with both kids, whose little legs could only take them so far before they needed to be carried. I did not want to return to the insurance company, so began to consider options for making a living while being available to my daughters. I settled on the idea of going back to school to qualify myself to teach--only imagining myself in a high school or middle school, but found out that it would take one year less to become qualified if I just earned a Master's degree to be able to teach Public Speaking at local community colleges.

I started slowly, signing up for one class as a non-matriculated student. I barely got off the ground, having to drop the class when I ended up in the hospital bent over in severe pain, walking as if I had a lawn chair glued to my backside, only to be admitted to undergo surgery for kidney stones that would not pass on their own. While I was in the hospital I noticed the first serious crack in family unity. I pleaded to see my kids after several days in the hospital, only to wake each hour to an empty room and my maternal need to see their cheerful faces.

After returning home, I was in a weakened state and what happened next does not bear repeating. It is enough to say I was alone, without money, job, groceries or knowledge of where my husband was for weeks. I borrowed twenty dollars from my parents to sustain us for a short time, but something had broken that could not and would not ever quite be repaired. We had bumped up against our limitations of tolerance, understanding and meaningful communication. There was a giant billboard staring me in the face with a message that I needed to engineer the start of a motor that would spurt and pop and then die. In order to sort things out, I made an appointment with a counselor and I remember telling her that I didn't quite understand what was happening. I wasn't sleeping well, had two beautiful children and a husband who loved me. What was wrong?

After I regained my physical strength, I found a waitressing job with perfect hours to pay for my school without leaving the kids during the day. I worked a 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. shift four or five nights at a local seafood restaraunt. The conditions of reconciliation with my husband consisted of counseling, eight months of virtual strangers passing one another long enough to hand off the kids between work shifts, my re-entry into school on the weeknight I didn't work and my husband's periodic disappearances marked by nothing I was aware of and/or a hand-scribbled note in my mailbox ending our marriage.

The disappearances became unbearable as I had to explain the inexplicable to myself and the girls. The happier I got, the more frequent the disappearances occurred. It all came to a crescendo when I got my first teaching post--a part time gig that was an extension course run by a local community college to teach Public Speaking to non-traditional (mostly female) students. It was my second night of a once weekly class, and I had been with the kids all day. Something went terribly awry when the child-handoff began. It was the worst moment of my life to this day and my greatest moment of clarity before or since then. I realized I had no choices left. Any options I had dreamed or imagined were starkly, brutally, permanently stolen, forcing me kicking and screaming down a new life's path that I wasn't sure I wanted, but knew I had to fulfill.

As I drove to my second night of teaching ever in my life knowing I would arrive late, I gripped my steering wheel with all the care and concentration I could muster at the time, only to be brought to hysterical laughter and tears when a tailgating driver passed me angrily and flipped me the bird. That was the cherry that topped the day. I made it through that class on autopilot and found my children at home with their grandfather, safe and sleeping in a crib and a bed as I hovered over their peace, wrought with concern about how I would do what was needed but knowing that as their mother, I would find a way.

There are two sides to every story and I am wary of this post, having tried to convey the struggle I experienced while trying not to demonize or speak for my husband, who was then and is now a good man who loves his daughters. I have attempted to convey my confusion because I never stopped loving him, but was unsuccessful in finding a way to learn why he disappeared or where he went, understand what was never explained to me, or to be able to pretend that what had just happened did not. Couples who can talk to each other would have been able to sustain a marital longevity I had expected and longed for. It's not possible to do "better" when what you're doing wrong or who you are to the other is a complete mystery.

A California Earthquake

I will not write about the earthquake that shattered that time of great happiness at home with my daughters. It would be about events that took place within the sacred bond of marriage and an account of things that shattered everything I thought I knew at the time. It is enough to say that my whole world was rocked to the core in the way that a structure of a building affected by an earthquake becomes uninhabitable when its foundations are shaken. I post this not to inspire curiosity, but to explain this gap of written memories, demonstrate respect for loved ones and hopefully, live out my integrity as woman/wife/mother of many years ago. Mothers have to keep many things in their pockets to help the people around them stay strong and happy, and this is one of them.

Iguana Dreams

I don't like reptiles, but this post gets its title from the iguana because it changes colors to blend in with its surroundings for survival. Dreams are the stuff of both sleep and waking imaginings that keep a person moving forward. They are the big and little aspirations that futures are made of. When I was a girl, I dreamt of being a world class tennis player. As a teenager, to get through college, as a college student, to be smart and have fun, as a waitress, to not have to work at Sambo's on the graveyard shift and as an assembly line worker, to do something besides move my hands and arms in the same motion from 8am till 4:30pm as I listened to my mostly hispanic co-workers tell off-color jokes that I didn't understand as they also dreamt about their weekly paychecks, getting new carpeting and having better cars.

After I finished college, I dreamt of getting a good job and marrying for love. I wanted to enjoy the spoils of summers spent waitressing to help my dad pay for books and tuition that my scholarships didn't cover. I married for love and got a job with a good company and a less than satisfying role for the more creative sides of me.

For three years, I spent my days authorizing payments to people who had injured themselves on the job; some were malingerers and others had devastating lifelong conditions that limited their abilities to fulfill great aspirations. Money was their compensation, but I'm not sure it ever made up for the physical limitations that affected their lives. How can 500.00 replace a baby finger and 2,000. make up for the loss of a thumb?, or 200,000. make up for genitals lost in a farm machine accident and permanent loss of consortium with one's wife? I spent those days in an orange cubicle with large file folders, a telephone recording device to secure an account of how injuries happened and a ten thousand dollar settlement authority to make people I'd never seen face to face go away when the company had met its obligations under California law.

I dipped my toes into legal depositions, court trials, property losses and gin and tonic lunches with attorneys who represented our company. I considered going to law school at the time, but the sides of the law I had seen were full of delays, "sub rosa" contracts (private investigators with video cameras spying on people claiming injuries) and a kind of proffering that didn't sit well with me.

I learned a lot, but wholeheartedly disliked the workplace and all but a few people I worked with. Nobody "dreams" of working for an insurance company. I think everybody that ended up there did so out of chance and opportunity. The culture of my unit was cohesive to the extent that claims adjusters would clock out precisely at 11:30 to go to lunch and be back minutes before 12:30. These excursions were often to the Pizza Cookery where they served hot rolls made out of pizza dough till our salads came. My mid-life female companions used to fight over who was taking too much butter. That was one of many clues that I might want a change of course. We were salaried employees, but bound to ticking clocks, productivity numbers, unpaid overtime because we were salaried, three weeks of required training and company dress policy (if you go to the "home office" in San Francisco, suits are required, and only in gray, navy or black; no brown allowed).

My husband and I had our first child my second year into that job. I was nearly grateful I had delivered her by c-section because I got twelve weeks to be home with her before letting her infant self experience "day care." If I had delivered "naturally," I would have only gotten to be home for six weeks. In my marriage I was expected to bring income into the household. We placed her into the home of what seemed like a good woman and nice family for about three weeks until I witnessed the seven year old carrying her around, only to seat her on their big dog as if riding a horse. Frantic at that sight and other things that concerned me, my maternal instincts snatched that beloved child out of that home, breaking our contract while keeping my commitment to this beloved child to ensure her a loving and safe environment.

I am fairly certain that God and fate intervened with Sirvart, a middle-aged Albanian woman who was expensive, but only took children ages two and under. My daughter received her first "socialization" in a gated room empty of furniture, full of learning toys and five little friends. She had regular naptimes and diaper changes, and when ready, healthy natural lunches made of delicious vegetable and chicken stews Sirvart served lovingly to the babies lined up across her kitchen in six little high chairs. There is something about "knowing" one's child is okay that makes it less excruciating to work away from home, despite the unpeaceful rumblings in a mother's heart that go with handing any child over. I never liked it and felt pangs of worry and self-consternation that continue to this day.

A set of circumstances converged to change that course and give me relief, radical clarity and newfound happiness. The company was "downsizing" and rumors spread like a game of telephone in our office of roughly 200 people. Line managers who had spent nearly 25 years with the company were to be let go. My line manager was pregnant in her late thirties with her first child and worked up till the day before her child was born and returned to work only two weeks afterward. Two male line managers who were married with families got wind of the layoffs; one of them drove his car off the cliffs at Mugu Rock into the Pacific ocean, and another shot himself in the chest on a weekend in the office building attached to ours. No job is worth taking your own life. And no job is worth sitting at your desk until labor starts. As remarkable as this all sounds, it is true and this diabolical cluster of "adult" decision making gave me the permission slip I needed four months into a pregnancy with my second child to leave without so much as a glance back. I would be home with my first daughter for several months before my second was born, and I would be free of the dark energies in that place that consumed people's vitality and hope.

The only person who wasn't happy about my decision was my husband, who worked overtime tending bar to pay the bills. He never said too much to me about it, but grew more angry with each passing former payday. He was under substantial pressure to provide for us and was probably too tired and dumbstruck about what to do about it that he simmered through the birth of our second child and my neediness for adult company when he came home. Ironically, I loved that time with my babies.

They did new things every day, cracked me up and made every second worth it when they smiled. I bathed and powdered them, dressed them in adorable clothes, handed them over to their grandpa when he popped by allegedly to see me (only I knew better!), enjoyed their naptimes, mealtimes, new discoveries, imaginations, speech learning, first steps and endless hours with Runaway Bunny, Dr. Seuss and the "B" book that I think I have memorized to this day.

My first born loved men, strangers, friends, relatives and talked it up with all of them. She was also Daddy's girl; he called her "pea pod" and held her in the crook of his big arm as she found comfort in feeling his five-o'clock shadow, playing with his ears and hair and testing her leg strength on his leg. She moved quickly and constantly, watered my carpet through the open sliding glass door with a water hose, checked for a moon every night, changed shoes and clothes several times a day and paid attention to every detail of everything around her. She noticed ants, pill bugs, fresh paint and curling irons. She wanted to see and touch it ALL.

Baby sister posed new challenges and lessons in parenting. She didn't like everyone and made that clear when someone she didn't know entered the room. She loved sitting in one place and arranging things--a farm house with animals, magnetic alphabet letters on the refrigerator, and doing things carefully with sustained concentration. She, too, loved the crook of her Daddy's arm as they sat quietly, in harmony with each others' character and style. She was quiet except when she chose to exercise her lungs and vocal power. She knew how to walk well before she showed anyone she could and when she began to speak, it wasn't in the garbled language of her own, but in clearly pronounced words or full sentences others could understand. She accepted the frequent hugs and direction of her older sister, knowing that they were companions at bathtime, mealtime, bedtime and naptime.

I lived a dream in those days, full of familial love and intention. I could have continued living that way for a very long time, but an earthquake of magnificent proportions created a time for new dreams and practical solutions to be conjured, leading in new and unexpected directions that would change all of our lives forever.

Rooted Spirituality Without Walls

I work at a midwest Jesuit, Catholic institution. I came here from Salt Lake City, Utah, famous for its Temple, Tabernacle Choir and a child to adult population ratio among Mormons that rivals marginally developed nations. I grew up near the Southern California coastline, which is dotted north and south with Spanish style Catholic missions settled earlier by Father Serra's peace seeking Franciscan monks.

My childhood church life was spread between Trinity Presbyterian in Camarillo and several Southern Baptist places of worship in California's Central Valley. Presbyterians are muted, sedate and reserved in their worship. The minister reads from the Bible and speaks in metaphors, informed by book learning and life's experience. Southern Baptists sing with every decibel of vocal power inspired by a hymn's messages, people file to the front of the church to surrender to their faith in God and and publicly ask for grace. And Preachers dunk the most faithful, fully dressed, dolled up followers head to toe in clean, blessed water. I'm fairly certain Aunt Bea, Aunt Nea, Aunt Wanny, Aunt Chick and Aunt Gay had their sins washed away at some time in their lives, but I can't think of anything they had ever done that was sinful. Whichever way it goes, I have never heard voices so loud in praise or song as my beloved aunties.

When I went to church with Mom, I remember three things--that she looked pretty, I sat between my brother and sister, and we had trouble keeping ourselves from laughing--mom included. I know more than that happened, but those experiences connected faith to putting your best foot forward, being surrounded by people I love and laughter.(Dad didn't go because he was watching "game films" or believed he had enough church during his youth to last a whole life).

When I went to church with my aunties, I was delighted for their attention and embarrassed by the way that everyone could hear my Aunt Wanny's baritone "Amaaaazing Graaace. . ." above every other pew's chorus members' and the preacher with the microphone. There, too I had trouble keeping myself from laughing, though I know and respect that for "insiders" it was then and is now serious business.

These experiences shaped me as a "person of faith". I joined the Presbyterian church sometime between the age of ten and thirteen--much too early to know what or how much I was committing--yet I still identify with that church and Presbyterianism. I identify with my aunties and Granny through their deep faith in God's principles and lived devotion to them. I do not believe it is any accident that in my work life I have landed in places where faith and spirituality are supported.

In rare instances, strangers and family members alike have tried to influence me into some kind of religious "conversion". Yet in eighteen years at a Jesuit-Catholic institution, no one has ever offered to convert me or tried to. Despite that, I have been invited to mass, spiritual retreats and an immersion trip in Mexico, all of which helped me connect my work to faith. I am fully accepted, in fact, welcomed lovingly here and do not feel pressure to make any kind of conversion. I wouldn't if I did, anyway. I am a person of great faith in God--the One who belongs to everybody--not only "true believers". I pray all the time, especially when I have an issue that's twisting me up. I know that in due time, that prayer will be heard and answered in a way that will only make sense in retrospect. I feel like I receive God's grace all the time. I am contented in this universe of spirituality without walls, weighted in place with lessons of love, devotion, song, humility before God, patience, laughter and unreserved acceptance.

To be continued. . .

So I have resolved to find ways to fill the void I inherited through life's natural seasons. I went to Jamaica three times this year to be alone and escape being lonely. I love the beach, sunshine and people of the island, but did not expect to find anything but a good book, clear ocean swims, a rum drink now and then and time. I needed days without a watch, car, cell phone, dean's attire, helicopter parents, young people with unreasonable expectations and faculty who act like the young people they are supposed to be mentoring. I needed a temporary "retirement" to allow what I have lived work its way through my heart and muscles and under-fit body. I discovered that Jamaican men love a round woman like me. Neville the chef discovered me and became a magical distraction from everything that hurts with a red motorbike, fresh air and solitary Jamaican roads into hilly areas of Negril. We lost ourselves in reggae blasting pool halls, a clear and isolated waterfall, salted fish, beef patties, fresh fruit, plantains, rum drinks, red stripe and laughter.

I lost myself in the rhythms of his Jamaican expressions, "good vibe," "what's up, sweetie," the speed of his movement and speech, and my own need to be myself for no one but me. I'm not very good at it yet. I have spent decades setting aside want-to's

for have-to's, though my mother would probably disagree. I am spent with restraint, delayed gratification, shame from my own failings and others' deep cruelties endured. I have run myself into this wooden fence of brokeness because I have not allowed the time or space in my life to feel it all. There is no singular source of this shattering, but splinters of motherhood, diabetes, professional demands, broken promises, gut twisting betrayals and genuine misunderstandings. In e

ach of these splinters, dreams were lost and new ones were conjured. God and my cigarettes have carried me through, but I only want to let go of the latter. I haven't quite found anger or forgiveness because I don't know the places they should be directed. All of that said, I have lived as fully as a woman could possibly live. I have had happiness beyond measure, and loved and been loved in ways I cannot imagine doing anything with but cherishing. I have my "place" in this world and yet I do not feel it. I want to be a presence for myself and only then can I be the kind of presence for someone else that I would like to be someday.

A New Day!

Just when I think I will never feel well again my old, tired bod surprises me. I survived the chills, fatigue, hours of sleep and basic crappy feeling. Also made it through an appointment with an orthopaedic surgeon that I needed to see about my knee. The word orthopaedic doesn't scare me, but the word surgeon does. I held out as long as possible, but escaped with a prescription for six weeks of physical therapy and a good prognosis. These things just take time. So I took my 25.00 off coupon to the shoe store and bought a couple pair of flats. I have to "dress" for work and I've been seriously limited lately. I have one pair of "flat" work shoes and they're black and white plaid. They can only go so far. . ha!

So. . .dear ones, this will be short; it is late, I need to go to bed and Dana Carvey is on the Tonite Show. He's so funny it's difficult to focus. And it's a good way to let my brain rest before the morning comes. TGIF tomorrow! Back to life, philosophy and blazing a new trail another day.

Blecch. . .

I am a very bad invalid. I have been down with a flu for four days. I am weak, cranky and worried because despite the rest I've been getting, my knee is still not getting better. Ortho's office tomorrow and back to work Thursday. I have been living on shredded wheat and soup through this clamminess, fatigue and sensitive stomach despite my faithful use of vitamins and gallons of liquids. I hope I am getting to the other side and just don't know it yet. ick. Better days ahead, so do not worry dear daughters:) Love, Ma

Going Back to Go On

When I got married, I was absolutely, totally and completely in love. Both of my daughters were born out of that love. I know I married the right man for me and for them at the time and still believe that now. It is possible (however sad) that I never remarried because when I took those vows, I only expected to take them once in my life in front of God and the rest of the world. Things change, people change and it's ancient history and almost irrelevant what happened to separate us from each other emotionally and physically.

However, divorce is costly in so many other ways. Nobody wins, but when it needs to happen there is no question and no other choice. I've had friends on the verge of divorce at times and I've always said, "if you don't know 'for sure', then don't. If you need to do so, you will know it without question". But the fallout is huge. Everybody loses something, and it is not limited to the couple that finds they need to separate from each other. I "lost" a family that I considered to be mine for a very long time--not out of any loss of love for them all, but out of respect for their need to support their son and not to interfere with their loyalties. They have never been anything but kind to me. They and my family have a strong connection. Both of our parents lost each other for awhile. I never really thought about it till now, but he lost my family in a similar way, and they "lost" him out of a need to support me, yet they love him as the father of my children, and my dad lost a really fun companion. My mother lost bragging rights to her handsome and personable son-in-law.

Yet the children had us all, and we all nurtured the kids from our respective places in their lives with our best efforts. They still "lost" from that separation, but survived the differences and (I believe) are now able to give equal weight to both families and both parents. Despite the inevitability of their confusion, suffering or divided self-understandings, our daughters in adulthood have come to the best outcomes possible.

The only happy surprise (and it's a monumental one) is that the children borne of that marriage have kept us linked in the most important way. My husband and I both did stupid things out of immaturity, limited problem solving skills and very real differences in our life paths and personalities that neither of us probably fully understood until we reached ages that guided us toward our most important passions.

I believe in retrospect that we could not have succeeded in following those paths together in mutual support and understanding. We have done it side by side at a distance, coming together thirty years later with mutual respect and not having done more damage to each other along the way. I am very grateful to him for that and proud of myself. This may never have happened if we had not had our children, and that may have been a loss I wouldn't have known about if it weren't so. The kids are the "glue" that has reunited our families with great joy, genuine care and lack of resentment (as far as I know).

Thirty years gives a person time to reflect, gain perspective and a more mature understanding of others' lives. I did and said stupid things during that thirty years, but looking back I am grateful that none of it in relation to their father or his family was so damaging and/or unforgivable that it hurt the kids.

My daughters lived through my badly stretched responsibilites and our household of three where one child was bound to always feel as if they were not getting the love or kind of attention and understanding they deserved. In some instances that was a fact of their lives, and I don't know for sure, but possibly a fact of the life of every child, even in a two-parent household. There is no way to change it now except to hope in thirty years they may understand better.

At times I have been riddled with guilt for having brought them into a world of a two parent home and then we changed the rules. I also probably overcompensated at times for that guilt and subsequent choices made because I had to make a living somehow. I did not take an easy road, and they had no choice in the matter except to ride along with me. Paradoxically, I did it all for them--so I could make a living that allowed time to attend parent teacher conferences, concerts, swim meets and plays, and so they could live with a mother who came home happy from her work life. I was able to do those things and am proud of that. They also had a mother that grew stronger, more confident, self sufficient and probably a little less healthy than I would otherwise be because of the consistent, long lived strain. I know for a fact there were periods of time in my daughters' lives where I was overoccupied, too stressed and stretched beyond the confines of what one mother could possibly do. Now, I can only hope and plead and beg that they have learned something positive from my limitations and failings that affected them.

Time and life have shown me that no child grows up in a perfect home and no parents are perfect. Perhaps the greatest cost to children of divorce is an instability and longing experienced that parents who stay together don't impose on their young lives. The reward for those children may be a kind of self-sufficiency and resourcefulness learned out of necessity in addition to the extra effort dedicated to them out of parental guilt.

I needed to go back "here" now because I don't know how to go forward. I have given my whole life to kids and work, trying to create some stability in an unstable situation. For better and worse, I managed to do it. But now I live alone; I began living alone for the first time in my life at age 45. I think I spent the first five years of that experience in shock and awe, replacing that emptiness with work and sleep as my body began to show the costs to my health that the prior 25 years had engendered. So I spent time organizing my linen cabinet and experienced great surprise when all the towels were as I had left them. I spent time riding my bicycle because my kids had given it to me. I spent time adjusting to "visits" where I was no longer able to say much about comings, goings or curfews. I spent time being a more conscientious auntie because I had the time to remember every Halloween, Valentine's Day, Christmas, birthday and significant event in my niece and nephews' lives. I spent time hanging out with my parents, loving their company and having them get to know me "alone". When I brought the kids, I got to be wallpaper, as is generally the case (and much appreciated) with proud grandparents.

So here I am. When I got ready to start "living" again, I think I overdid it because of the pace I had been used to. I am looking forward to my first five consecutive days off that have not been spent traveling. The only time I have taken away from work, I have been ill or lugging a suitcase and boarding a plane to escape. It is probably time to sit still with myself long enough to "be" because no matter what, "wherever you go, there you are". I am here on this page, revisiting this woman-child who needs abundance, joy, connection, love and companionship. Those are the most meaningful and fulfilling experiences in life. I get them at work, but don't want to make 51 East Pearson my only place. I need my daughters more than they know because as much as I love my work, I will always love them more. Yet they both need at this time in their lives to have a primary connection with their husbands and my grandaughter. I don't mind riding in a backseat to give them every opportunity to make their lives work and thrive. Yet I am faithfully, always and will be forever their mother. And whatever and whomever they add to their lives, they will always and forever be my greatest, most abundant joy. They are a product of my love for their father, so any companionship I find will have the richness of that experience missing. I am open to new and different kinds of experiences, but when a ship has passed, the bounty of its vision and presence is forever, no matter how dim its shadows on the distant horizon.