Dumpsters

I have mixed feelings about dumpsters.

On the one hand, thanks to the rented dumpster that sets just outside the barn as I type: hundreds of boxes of "stuff" have been eliminated; the daunting task of sorting through all the "things" that Mom and Dad have carted around for the past fifty years (or more) is complete; my ToDo List is significantly shorter.

On the other hand, I can't help but visualize the local landfill where now, all of the umpteen photos, musty linens, broken picture frames, and ancient memorabilia I tossed into the dumpster are but tiny trivial specks scattered over the sea of who-knows-how-many-other-people's unwanted "stuff."

But back to the first hand.......thanks to the convenience of a dumpster, I imagine pieces of the electric blanket I used when I was five have been shredded by some enterprising sea gull and used for nesting material. That seems fitting.

But back to the other hand......I have a little trouble with the idea of voracious beetles gnawing away at the pages of my mother's fifth grade scrapbook, or the edges of that really old photograph of the unidentifiable-woman-in-the-really-great-hat. Then again, beetles have to eat.

Crazy Or Not So Crazy? That Is The Question.

Don't bother to remind me about how I used to crave silence. Don't even try to tell me about how I used to complain and gripe about Dad constantly engaging me in conversation. That was then; this is now.

Now.........I talk to my dogs.

A lot.

This afternoon, for example, I practiced a monolog from Titus Andronicus (I know. A bloody Shakespearean tragedy of all things) in front of a captive audience of one--one curiously-enthralled-but-ultimately-indifferent bulldog by the name of Emily.

Emily sat, and watched (Really, she did. She actually watched. See the photo of her at top of the post? That's exACTly how she looked!), and like any polite audience member, she remained sitting as I worked on the monolog, line by line, word by word, trying this inflection and that inflection. Sadly, like too many audience members, she sat expressionless, giving me virtually nothing by which to gauge my effectiveness, or lack thereof.

But back to my original point--the whole conversing with the animals bit.

So yes......I now chat with my dogs. I'm thinking (hoping?) this is normal. I'm thinking (hoping?) this is common. Let me be clear. I am NOT talking about a casual rhetorical comment thrown out to one or both dogs from time to time. Nooooooononono.

I'm talking about........a conversation.

I....have.....CONVERSATIONS........withmydogs.

Granted, they don't answer........in words.

But I HAAAVVVEEEE conversations with them.

I tell them what I'm thinking of doing that afternoon, or the next day.

I share my feelings about the movie I've just watched, or the article I just read.

Apparently they know that I'm addressing them.

They look me right in the eyes!

They cock their heads when I pose a question to them, rhetorical or otherwise. If they're paying attention, is it so wrong to engage them in simple conversation? I mean........we're not discussing world politics here. And it's not like I'm asking their permission to go anywhere or do anything (cuz that WOULD be a little crazy).

No, our conversations run more along the lines of, "Oh look at the carpet girls. It looks a little mufty (my word). Maybe I should vacuum. What do you girls think?"

Okay, okay, so maybe that WAS asking permission...

Or....."OK girls, I'm running out to the store. I'll be back soon. Do you need anything?"

oh shit.

Where's the Floppy Hat Man When I Need Him?

I watched a documentary the other night about Buddha. I'm not a religious person by any stretch of anybody's imagination, but I've been on a documentary kick lately--like I'm craving reality, facts, historical accounts. Go figure.

Anyway, there was this one part in the Buddha doc that talked about how Buddha spent x-number of years wandering around the jungle, or the forest, or the desert, trying to seek enlightenment, or the secret of enlightenment. What he discovered, and this is the statement that stuck with me, is that "enlightenment is in the moment."

This is not an unfamiliar concept--the idea of "being in the moment," "savoring the moment," "nirvana is now" (okay, I just made that one up, but you get the point.) For some reason, the way the statement was made in the documentary, coupled with the mood I've been in lately....it just had an affect on me. "Enlightenment is in the moment."

Then I reflected. I started reflecting a lot. Like.....about how angry I've been for the past several years. Like how.....I haven't been finding much enlightenment anywhere.

Then, I started having a bonafide "moment" of my own. You know how there are those life-changing moments in your life? This was one of them for me.

I put the documentary on Pause.

I thought to myself, "Okay, I'm tired of waiting for things to get better. I'm tired of waiting for when I'll be happy again."

I said to myself, "I want my 'better' to be right now. I want 'happy' to be right now. I want my enlightenment to be right now."

Then I asked myself, "What is my moment right now?"

I listened. All I could hear in the entire house was the gentle snoring of Emily, the bulldog, and soft breathing of Uma, the cocker. And I thought, "Enlightenment doesn't get much better than this." How perfect is that.

But wait, there's more...........

The next day, I decided to go for my usual 6 mile walk. This time, though, I decided I would walk with my new mantra in my head--Enlightenment in every moment, Enlightenment in every moment, Enlightenment in every moment....

This is big.

See, in the past, my typical walk looked like this--Me with my dark glasses on (so nobody could see my eyes); Me walking at a brisk, destination-oriented-do-NOT-get-in-my-way 4mph; Me with my iPod earbuds in; Me purposely NOT making any connection with anybody on the trail--NOT the annoying Audobon birdwatchers who inevitably ALWAYS blocked the trail but who always cheerfully said hello to me as I quickly power-walked by them in silence without acknowledging their presence (see, I told you I've been angry); NOT the ridiculous elderly gentleman with the floppy hap who regularly walks the trail and who voluntarily and unsolicitously comes up to me from time to time, chirps out a Good Morning, and then asks if I'd like him to join me on my walk even though I always firmly say No and keep moving past him while maintaining my 4mph pace; NOT the perky Eagle Lady who uses the trail to ride her bicycle out to the Eagle Tree to see if the bald eagles are perched at the top of the tree and who never fails to try and engage me in a running dialogue about how she has "ridden her bicycle all the way out to the Eagle Tree to see if any eagles are perched in the tree" and did I know that actual bald eagles perch in "that big tall tree down the trail" and have I seen any eagles today??? (Yah. I ignored her too.)

This was different. On this day, I walked with NO sunglasses and NO earbuds. Just me listening to every moment, and thinking over and over in my head, "Enlightenment in every moment, enlightenment in every moment." The first mile down my street was magnificent. Truly. Asphalt never felt so good.

Then, I made the transition onto the Discovery Trail. I passed several other trail-goers. I smiled (yes I really did). I actually even said, "How are you today?" to a few. It was pretty magnificent. For the first time in a long time, I was walking NOT to escape the world. I was walking.......to be part of the world. Armed with my renewed sense of being part of the the world, all I could think of was, "Bring on the Eagle Lady! Bring on the annoying Audobon Birdwatchers! Bring on the Floppy Hat Man!

Well.....I'm sorry to report that the birdwatchers were not out, the Eagle Lady was obviously doing something else, and the Floppy Hat Man never appeared. BUT.........did I let that deter me???

Oh no, no, no, no! I did manage to have a very pleasant exchange with a slightly muddy but sweet-faced elderly golden retriever. We made plans.

"Outside My Window"

My mother is not a photographer.

Dad is the photographer. Dad can bend your ear for hours about composition, and focal length, and aperture openings, speak all sorts of photo-ese. Dad has taken some amazing, beautiful photographs. I can't say that I've ever even seen my mother with a camera in her hands.

The other day, the A.L.F. in Pouslbo, where Mom lived this year from January to June, called to tell me that they had a photograph Mom had taken while she was there. Apparently a bunch of residents took photos one day and the A.L.F. entered the photographs into the Kitsap County Fair.

Mom's photograph, they told me, was entitled "Outside My Window."

It won an Honorable Mention ribbon, they said.

Could I come and pick it up, they asked.

Sure, I said.

Today I finally drove over to pick up "Outside My Window."

They handed me a large yellow envelope. I thanked them, took the envelope, gave them a quick update on Mom and Dad (because they asked), then left.

It wasn't until I got into the car, that I actually opened the envelope.

I pulled the photo out. And what my brain initially saw was this blurry, almost impressionistic image of some pink and red rose bushes outside a paned window, an empty flower pot on the lower left corner of the window sill. It looked like a painting. But, as I stared longer, I recognized the view--the rose bushes just outside Mom's window in her room in Poulsbo.

The photo had a weird, haunting effect on me. I sat in the A.L.F. parking lot just staring at it. After several minutes, something in my head decided I needed to frame it. So I drove to WalMart, bought a frame for Mom'a photo, unwrapped the frame in the car, and fit the matted photo into the frame right there in the WalMart parking lot. I still couldn't stop staring at it.

The thing is........I've spent so many years, and so much energy trying to figure out what was going on inside my mother's head. And somehow, this single snapshot, one she took just a few months ago, most probably the last photo she'll ever take, somehow told me so much about her.

I look at the photo and I want to scream so many things straight into my keyboard. I want to take the photo to every person in my family, to every friend of mine who has patiently listened to me vent about how little I was ever able to understand my mother, and point to the photo emphatically and say, "See this? This photograph? THIS.........says so much about Mom!"

I mean....

It's so blurry!

But it's a picture of roses!

One stinkin' photograph.

One stinkin', blurry photograph........of roses.

Of blurry.........beautiful roses.

What Mom saw.......outside her window.

Off-White Laundry Basket

The off-white laundry basket

lived on top of the off-white dryer

in the laundry room

for seven years.

Dad would pile his freshly-dried clothes

Into the off-white laundry basket.

Clothes in the off-white laundry basket were

Dad's clean, dry clothes waiting for me to fold.

I asked Dad again and again,

"Please Dad, leave the clothes in the dryer.

If you put them in the laundry basket

They cool and get wrinkled.

I'll fold the clothes from the dryer. It's okay."

Dad always put the clothes from the dryer

Into the off-white laundry basket.

Dad's shirts were always wrinkled.

Today I moved the off-white laundry basket.

Now, the off-white laundry basket

Lives in the linen closet in the hall.

The laundry room looks bigger.

Spice Jars

My thirtysomething year old son who is far wiser than he knows (I think) made the most succinctly enlightened comment to me the other day. He and my nephew were visiting. We were going through all of the generic Stuff that my parents have been toting around for the last 68 years, from house to house, garage to garage. He, my nephew, and I went through at least a hundred boxes of....Stuff, carefully deciding (okay.....sometimes, maybe not so carefully) whether to "Keep It", "Sell It", or "Dumpster It."

I can't remember now what the object was that was in question. Doesn't really matter. But the three of us stood there, in the barn-that-is-now-more-of-a-gigantic-storage-room, and stared at the object while individually formulating an opinion about how to categorize it. I was the first to speak.

"Oh I have to keep that," I said decisively as I reached to take the object.

But my enlightened son stopped me mid-reach and said simply, "Why would you keep that?

Honestly, I had no answer. I didn't know why I wanted to keep it. It wasn't even for sentimental reasons. In fact, it wasn't so much that I wanted to keep it. I just didn't want to throw it out. And it was at that moment that I realized a profound truth: Keeping something simply as an alternative to throwing it out, is not a valid reason for keeping it.

Now...a week later. I'm on fire with the ever-present question that, thanks to my son, is now burned into my brain--Why would I keep that? I've successfully and happily de-cluttered countless drawers (all of those 50+ year old spice jars in the kitchen drawer--are poppy seeds still good after 50 years? I doubt it.), cupboards (Really. How many containers of Adolph's Meat Tenderizer does a person need???), and boxes (Why I had 27 prints made of my first winter in Michigan, I'll never know.) with the singular objective in mind--Why would I keep that?

It's like a little mental miracle.

A Recovering Caregiver

I'm now a Recovering Caregiver. My therapist (yes, I'm seeing a therapist--decided it was more desirable for a paid professional to hoist me out of my emotional sewer than imposing that awkward task on friends or family) says I'm grieving, that it's normal for caregivers to grieve when the subjects of their caregiving are gone (whether by death or by geographical relocation--in my case, it's the latter).

I'm not big on grieving. I have things to do. Allowing myself time to grieve is not one of those things. But, as my therapist explains, I must allow myself time to grieve.

I'm working on that.

I thought this would be an easier transition. Maybe a few bumps here and there but all in all, quick and easy. I was wrong. From the moment I get up in the morning, until the time I finally go to bed at night, I wage an ongoing battle against the continuous stressors and structure that USED to define my day. That USED to define what I did, how I did it, when I did it. That USED to define.......well, everything. Including me.

It's amazing to me that I am having so much difficulty in sliding into a life without caregiving. A life in which I take care of just.....me. I seem to have forgotten how to do that.

Don't get me wrong. I don't constantly walk around hanging my head, a wad of damp Kleenex in my hand, bloodshot eyes, unable to function. I'm doing as much work as my project manager will send me, I'm playing with my dogs (they still seem to be confused by this....), I cook, I workout regularly. On the surface, I'm the picture of health. But inside my head....that's where the real battle wages. My therapist says I need to allow that battle to happen outside of my head.

A tall order....

Roller Coasters

I'm up. I'm down. I'm relieved. I'm depressed. I'm motivated. I'm lost. I'm happy. I'm sad. I'm excited. I'm apathetic. I'm energized. I'm lethargic.

It's like a postpartum thrill ride for caregivers. WTH?