Loss in the Family ~ the Man born on the July 4th

"I alone am left on earth!

To whom nor relative not blood remains,

No! not a kindred drop that runs in human veins."

~ Campbell

 Her brother passed away last week.  He was 81 and she turned 84 today.  He called his older sister (my Mom) just before he died to tell her he loved her.  It took her by surprise.  She answered "Brother, I'm suppose to call you.  I always say I love you first.  We've had this conversation every day for almost 7 decades. He laughed and said 'yes I know, but this once I wanted to tell you first'.  She was so deeply touched she could only mumble 'thanks' and 'good bye'.   He then rolled his wheel chair into his room, asked for assistance to get into bed and there, not five minutes later~ he took is last breath.  His heart stopped and he passed on into the night

She and I sit on the patio in her desert home and review that simply conversation many times a day.  Sometimes she can not quite grasp her loss and when she does, her heart shatters again.  Her memory recalls him as a boy.  She and he were the middle children in a family of four kids ~ they have been as 'thick as thieves' since childhood.  She taught him to speak and walk...no doubt it is why she went on to be a talented instructor of English grammar.  She recalls, that although they could have fierce arguments, it always ended in "I love you".  She is and he was the most formidable and stubborn human beings I've ever met. Now there is one.  She seems quite lost without her sibling.  Her memory is failing her and locks her in her grief anew...many times a day.  She asks me to tell her one more time what has happened. Each time I brace for that shutter of sorrow that engulfs her.  Slowly, oh so slowly she begins to comprehend that he is no more.

Oh, God! it is a fearful thing

To see the human soul take wing

In any shape, in any mood!"

~Byron

Good bye Uncle.  You are mourned here.  You have joined  your Parents, your older Sister, your nephew...my Brother, and your friend, my Dad.  We few who remain shed tears and some soft laughter remembering yesterdays.  But most important of all, your sister whispers "I love you" quietly into the night.

Rekindling a Friendship

"Teach this triple truth to all:  A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity." 
 ~ Buddha

Spent the weekend with a friend in Oregon.  She and her husband have a lovely retirement home just south of Portland.   We had some serious catching up to do.  My friend is a well-educated and talented nurse.  She is also a talented crafts person.  Both she and her husband have a good eye for art.  Their home has a casual, creative charm.  She and I had not seen one another since that dang knee surgery last summer.  She lost her job in a political move that happens in health care and almost every where else these days.  We had to figure out if we could reach across the gulf that ensues the termination of employment.  As it turns out (to my great relief), we were able to start off where we left off.  

"No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of each other's worth."

~ Robert Southey

I wonder at the silent attributes of friendship.  In this case, we two women understand the determination it takes to face the challenges of caring for frail elders: we know the difficulties of dealing with families riddle with guilt, the suffering of their frail aged, the demands of health care corporations and quirks of regulatory folks.  Still we laughed.  In the heat of late summer (it was nearly 100 F) we found a shared humor and embraced it.

There is a comfort in knowing that time leaves the gate ajar.  The value of personal kinship outweighed corporate decision-making.

the 11th

Remembering

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRMz8fKkG2g&feature=player

The Brenda Photo Contest: the Dog Days of Summer

"The Dog Constellation Canis Major is a Companion to Orion

The Dog Days of Summer have been around since ancient times. The Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans and other great civilizations have all observed the rising and setting of the Dog Star Sirius in its constellation Canis Major, and its brightness in the sky, to predict the weather and other events."

Okay so this is past mid-August (someone out there in the wider world declared that it ends mid-August).  It is hot here in Western Washington.  We've had ,what, maybe three weeks of warmth but the great mumble has begun...we miss the rain.  I can hardly believe my ears!  'Miss the rain?'...have you all lost your collective minds???  In just a few short weeks we will un-bury the fleece, dig out the Vitamin D, check the bulbs in the light boxes and begin the LONG DARK RAINY SEASON!  I say celebrate these warm days.  I admit it does not hold a candle (a winter word if ever there was one) to the intense heat breaking records almost every where else ~ but it feels hot here on Puget Sound!

Here is my nod to Canis Major and the Dog days!

The heat is as unkind to the weeds as it in to the lawns:

But there is still fun in the air!

Ah summer fairs:  hot, sticky, delicious and memorable.  I saw and listened to Gene Autry for the first time when I was a young girl at a fair and rodeo in Utah!  Here's a Youtube link for those of you who have no idea of whom I am write! :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6dx8AfTmQk

and finally.....

Food booths prepared for hot, hungry crowds!   

Kettle Corn please!

Waning Days of Summer

"Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams..."

~Percy P Shelley

Drove up to the White River National Forest over the Labor Day week end.  Rainier looms over the landscape.  This magnificent volcano is still covered with snow.  We who live ibetween the shadow of this mountain and on the edge of Puget Sound have had little summer this year.  This week will be hot (in the 80s and 90s) during the day but it cools down nicely at night.  We awaken to summer flowers and 40F temperatures.  It gives summer a dreamy quality.  The lower mountains still have patches of snow.  The bit of snow in the photo above was found at 3500 feet of elevation.  Mt. Rainier at it's full elevation (the Columbia Crest) is 14,000+ feet.  There are several glaciers on the mountain ~ leaving the mountain snow covered year round.

The road side was littered with colorful wildflowers.  It gives lie to the terrible summer the rest of the country has had.  We are lulled.  Surely nothing bad will ever happen here.  Another siren's song!  Still there is comfort in golden yellow and delicate purple.  

I love the sight of the mountain in the distance, perhaps more so on this visit to the Park because the Mountain seems even more impressive on a warm clear day.  It sits large and protective and for a few moments all feels safe.  Never mind that on the roads in the valley below the mountain there are volcano evacuation signs...in case Rainer blows his top.  :)  The fantasy of safety is to lovely to simply hand over willy-nilly to Reality.

"The summer dawn's reflected hue

In purple changed Loch Katrine blue,

Mildly and soft the western breeze

Just kiss'd the lake, Just stirr'd the trees..."

Scott

The Summer That Was(n't)!

There must be something in the universe that has taken a personal dislike of me.  I spend so much of the year yearning for summer and then when that precious time of light and warmth rolls around to my neighborhood something is amiss.  Three and two summers ago I was moving ergo packing, finding a place to live, blah, blah.  Then there was the tale of the knee surgery last summer.  The summer of 2011 roles into the parking lot and before mid-June one of my facilities goes to ... well, heck in a hand basket.  The much longed for months of midnight sun evaporated.  The summer turned into a series of endless 14 to 16 hour work days, 7 days a week.  The problems are beginning to abate just as summer is bringing sunrise at 6:30 AM instead of 4:15 AM and then sets at 8:10 PM instead of 10 PM.  Oh crap.  My sister asked me to cruise the Sound with her for a week and I can't.  I'm on call and the new DNS doesn't start until mid-Sept.  The golden vacation apple is just beyond my reach.  

So naturally, I am thinking I should winter in South American.  That has a certain ring to it.  Of course I have to learn at least Spanish.  But heck, I would apply myself in order to avoid dark days in winter on the Sound.  Oh and I would need to work...

DETAILS!

"Optimism and self-pity are the positive and negative poles of modern cowardice."   ~ Cyril Connolly

Not sure what that means to me yet but I'll figure it out after I map quest a trip to...Brazil (?)

a P.S. from Santa Cruz

Remembering back to the recent trip to Santa Cruz...I forgot to mention the sea lions that perch on the decks below the pier.

They seem to enjoy company and sun as much as the rest of us!

These sea creatures seem at peace here.  Their cousins in the Puget Sound have alienated fishing boasts by eating the same salmon that humans wants.  In the Northwest sea lions are being shot by angry frustrated fishermen.  The Salmon War has only one armed side.  You would not know that in Santa Cruz.

Week -End Drives

The above photo is a view of Mt. Shasta from I-5.  Am planning a slower drive through parts of Northern Calif. and much of Oregon this summer.  

Quiet farm land always whispers 'peace' to me.  Am wondering if that is first cut hay peeking out of the barn door?

Playing ~ the Photo Contest!

Last week-end I escaped the long rainy season that Washington State called "Winter through Spring" to visit my youngest son who was graduating from a Master's Program at UCSC.  What a delightful visit.  Coastal Californians really know how to PLAY!   Their weather cooperates with their playful intentions.

Even bikes can relax after playing on the pier in Santa Cruz!

Sailors out playing on their boats!

Many people out playing volley ball in the sand!

My personal favorite... Kayaks waiting for me! :) 

Dancing with Time and Feminism...Again

"Nothing's ever done.... No matter what you do, or what you pretend, the past is there. You can't ignore it"

~JOHN SAUL, When the Wind Blows

"Men - their rights and nothing more; Women - their rights and nothing less."

~Susan B Anthony    

"You do not have to be anti-man to be pro woman."              

  ~ Jane Galvin Lewis                                                        

It was not my intention to ease-drop but the truth is, that is exactly what I did.  Then I interrupted a conversation ... it was an invasion of privacy.  It was Friday and it had been a long, stressful day.  Two managers (one a man who is a nurse supervisor and a woman who is a social worker) were sitting in the conference room that connects to the office I had borrowed to finish the day's paper work.  As I scanned a new batch of applications for the 3-11 nursing position that had just opened, I heard the deep male voice say, "my old boss (Director of Nursing) only hires men into management positions because she thinks women with power are too catty."  The woman murmured her agreement.  I groaned...'not this old conversion again!'  There was no choice...I had to join the conversation.

"Sexism is a social disease"  

~ Author Unknown (ergo, probably a woman)

I was the uninvited guest in this later afternoon salon.  I immediately asked if he thought his old boss was discriminating against womenx?  I pointed out that the person who made the decision to hire only men was a woman.  Did that seem inconsistent or odd in anyway?  What did she mean by catty?  Did he agree with that definition?  Did he ever think about why women might engage in mean spirited talk. Did men ever engage in mean-spirited talk?  Did he think all women were catty?  I wanted to know how he planned to supervise the women nurses whom he managed.  What were his plans to assure that people with talent would rise through the ranks ~ regardless of gender.  Before long we had discussed everything from the different ways in which men and women compete, to who becomes a nurse in the first place. I find him to be an intelligent man who is steeped in stereotypes.   When he is working the nursing unit he is kind and compassionate to of all his residents. The jury is still out on how he manages his staff...mostly women.  He probably wishes he'd said nothing for now he is engaged in an ongoing conversation with his boss's boss.  Oh well, there are worse things to be sure.

"The test for whether or not you can hold a job should not be the arrangement of your chromosomes."

~ Bella Abzug

 

Bella!

The more things change, the more (some) things stay the same.  I wonder what Florence Nightingale would have made of this conversation?   Would she have wondered that there were men who were professional nurses and not  doctors?   Would she have been taken back by a woman who supervised those men who were nurses?

Florence Nightingale





"All tradition is merely the past." 

~JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI, Krishnamurti to Himsel

Love vs. Compassion... etc. And Rentals

                                                                                 

"Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn, or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude. “
~Denis Waitley

This past week I learned that my landlord has reconsidered and is extending the lease on the house I’ve been renting…one more year ~ a reprieve!  I feel happy but I doubt that in the moment that I got the news  I was living life with “love, grace, and gratitude”.   Although, be assured, that I am grateful  that he and his wife have changed their minds.  The pressure to move has been lifted and the need to pack up is gone.  It frees my mind to ponder questions such as:  what exactly is “living every minute with love, grace and gratitude”?    Every minute - is that even possible?  Sounds like a rather  lofty goal - something one would put in a mission statement for a not-for- profit business.

 

“You are also caught with the fact that man is a creature who walks in two worlds and traces upon the wall of his cave the wonders and the nightmare experience of his spiritual pilgrimage”

~ Morris West

My blog forms the ‘walls of my cave’.   It allows me a place to post the good, the lovely and thrilling as well as the bad, the ugly, painful and unpleasant that I see when working as a nurse and observe as just another human being on this road called life.  My good hearted landlord would be happy about this Internet device as my having a blog undoubtedly prevents me writing out these stories on the walls of his rental or at least writing on sheets of paper and tacking them to the wall while I pondered what to do with the words. 

Alright then, turning my attention back to that first quote - I am reminded of yet another quote (in fact one that I may have posted here before):

“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.   If you want to be happy, practice compassion” 

~ Dalai Lama

I find that practicing compassion can be difficult, sometimes nearly impossible – no, make that sometimes it is impossible to be compassionate all the time, at least for me.  Compassion makes more sense to me than aiming for happiness based on a life lived in “grace, love and gratitude”.  Each is something to strive for but in combination, I wonder that it can be done.   All creatures suffer and suffering for people creates human drama. "Drama" is a buzz word these days.  Not all drama is manipulative.  The old woman losing her cognition and repetitively asking if it is ‘time to eat’ is not trying to “bug” anyone.  She suffering from a disease that is killing her brain and she is suffering a complete loss of the sense of time.  The man down the hall who calls a young nurse a ‘stupid cow’ because he is in intractable pain from his colon cancer is suffering.   So was the new nurse who was trying to help and was insulted.   I wonder what Denis Waitley  meant by “love” “grace” and “gratitude”.  Mr. Waitley is a motivational speaker.   He has motivated me to understand where his prospective is rooted.  I wonder if he is a born-again Christian for instance…words like “grace” are suspect for me.  Does that make me a cynic?  In my opinion, however,  Mr. Waitley did get the bit right about what happiness was not!

 

"The mind wants to live forever, or to learn a very good reason why not. The mind wants the world to return its love, or its awareness... The mind's sidekick, however, will settle for two eggs over easy. The dear, stupid body is easily satisfied as a spaniel. And, incredibly, the simple spaniel can lure the brawling mind to its dish. It is everlastingly funny that the proud, metaphysically ambitious mind will hush if you give it an egg." 

~Annie Dillard

Okay, I'm done for now, but oh, by the way…I’ll have mine scrambled please!

Springing Forward with the Unwilling

Last week she put finger tips to keyboard to write a note to the land lord...had he considered renewing the lease. A week ticked by and finally the response appeared. They have decided to put the house on the market to sell it. Two homes have proved to much to carry right now.

She sat in the living room and stared at the book cases filled with books and wondered how many should be given away with this move: some, none, all? Packing up closets and dishes to difficult to even consider for the time being. For now the answer is not known. There are worse things than packing and unpacking. Even finding a rental that will take two dogs and has a fenced yard, while daunting, is not impossible.

Still, she would rather not move. This space felt like home. She had not even fully unpacked for fear of finally feeling settled and trusting that feeling again. Settled ~ hmmm, when did that last happen. 2001. Exhaling. Note to self: 1) be careful with trust, 2) avoid bookstores.

Measuring Time in Spring

Spring evening -  at 8:30 PM  -  2011

It is light until almost 9 PM.  Before long we will have light until nearly 11 PM.  The sky is light again just before 5 AM.  My favorite time of the year. Makes the winter rain and darkness seem very far away!  :-)  Okay, the rain is still here but not for much longer.  Brilliant flowers are every where and trees are completely leafed...these are the content recipients of the deluge.

"We all grow up with the weight of history on us. Our ancestors dwell in the attics of our brains as they do in the spiraling chains of knowledge hidden in every cell of our bodies."                       ~Shirley Abbott

So much has been going on that it has been difficult to sort through much less note on a blog.  Violin practice continues a pace but am thinking of changing to the Irish whistle or perhaps the banjo (for all things country).  Arthritis is such a nagging drag ~ my neck complains about leaning to the left (so does my family but that is another story).  However the stiffness keeps my massage therapist gainfully employed.  Speaking of violin I should add here that I began learning this wonderful instrument because I so enjoy Celtic fiddle music.  To make a long story short, I've been on a journey of discovery about my family's genealogy.  It seems I have deep Celtic roots.  Ferguson's from Dundee, Scotland, Gavin's from Ireland and the Reynolds' from St. David, Wales.  Are those the strands of genetic code that whisper a love of the jig and reel?  I found relatives in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts back to the founding of the country...perhaps that is why I felt instantly at home in those places. Found one soul who fought the British  long ago and died doing so.  These generations of cousins were not nobleman but hard working folk who helped build a nation: mainly farmers but also miners, laborers and builders of homes and towns.  I've found myself reading some of their stories from letters and family histories as relatives moved across this nation. I've felt very proud of their courage and strength.   I also found Mormon and Catholic roots and two male cousins many times removed who were polygamists.   A female Scottish cousin married a Mormon minister after she converted in Scotland and followed him to the States.  Her first husband was a sailor who died at sea.  There are two cousins from almost 100 years ago who were nurses and midwives.  One of those brave women served her community in Utah when that state was a territory and her people live in dugouts.  She also cared for some of the Ute tribe and her husband's cattle and farm were never scarred during the war between the Settlers and the Ute...even after her husband died from wounds he received in those battles her home remained intact and cattle left alone.  She like so many women buried most of the children they birthed.  There are long lists of cousins who did not live beyond their first year.  One grandfather remains a mystery.  He was an orphan. He died in a mining accident in Utah.  He was possibly Navajo or Mexican or Portuguese. I know only that his father was from New Mexico.  His mother from Arizona but to date those great grandparents remain nameless.  If my half-brother were to decide to have his DNA tested we might be able to find out which human migration that side of the family is followed - for now that greatgrandparent's story is encased in silence.


The genealogy search was rekindled because I have been traveling back and forth between the Northwest and the Southern Utah desert to check on my aged Mother.  Her energy, memory, and heart are failing her.   Sometimes she can not remember why I've come to see her.  Sometimes she is angry that I'm helping her pay her bills.  Sometimes she is mellow and full of old stories.  She will not leave her home - she is frail but the whole of her being wants to be fiercely independent to her last breath.  Managing fiances and health care from 1000 miles away is daunting.  Have even driven down once.  I have to admit I love to drive and eventually will get back to editing the photos taken on the journey.   So my own mother is failing.  My children are developing their families and careers.  The youngest son completes graduate school in June and the eldest is teaching English as a second language at a university in Texas.  We are  living life as it unfolds.  For now life continues to be relatively calm...not without its sorrows but that is to be expected.  The ebb and flow of each day feels connected and 'normal'.   There is a pleasure in knowing I am moving through my 60s with family secrets unlocked.  I now hold information about my connection to the generations who went before me.  There is a promise in it all.   It all seems appropriate to the season. 


"I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world.  This makes it hard to plan the day."  ~Elwyn Brooks White

Learning Curve...

"Live as if you were to die tomorrow.  Learn as if you were to live forever." ~ Mahatma Gandhi

Life has changed.  It is calm.  There are some speed bumps now and then, but for this small moment, my little life is calm.  I am captivated by the struggle of learning  to play the violin ~ of learning to make music.  It absorbs me in the way that yoga absorbs and releases tension.  In fact without the music, yoga would not be used. It all calms the mind.  I wonder that 60+ year old fingers can still develop muscle memory and find their way to C# and so on.  That the 60+ is capable of knowing when a note is flat. I had no idea that I was capable of hearing the difference between between notes.   Slowly bits of a phrase begin to sound like a part of a whole.  The 60+ year old eye practices engaging with the brain to remember notes on flash cards.  I, who have found every excuse in the book to avoid yoga as a middle class fad and yet another form of proselytizing, find that some stretches are helping an old learner build strength in a bowing arm and assist in clearing a over-busy brain to settle and focus.  I would never have imagined that I would look forward to practicing an instrument.  Sometimes I record my practices.  The first recordings were painful to the ear. In fact my Lab would RUN to the back room the moment violin noise began to fill the living room.  He hid there until practice ended.  Now this music is less scratchy.   The dog plays with is toys in the same room during the practice.  While these notes are indeed still scratchy, there is an improvement.  That is that is an amazing relief. :-)  Progress!   And the progress is a simple joy!  Although the goal is to learn Celtic and Country fiddling, I hear more in all violin music now and I wonder at the beauty and mystery of different instruments.   When visiting the music store to browse through sheet music, I sometimes listen to the hallway outside the practice studios.  I listen to children and adults struggle with the learning of the language of music.  This business of being human and our ancient connection to music is fills me with awe.  What led us to that first note?

There are struggles behind the calm.  My work environment is pressured.  The struggles of the economy with its threaten as well as actual health care cut and the shortage of experienced nurses interested in working in long term care collide to make for a tense and unsettled stew.  In this arena one can only try to do one's best.  But for now, at least, when I come home, a rented violin awaits me.  It is a magic carpet and transports me to someplace peaceful.  Governments, health care  execs and staff can be put aside for a moment while an old gal learns.

Fiddlin' Around...

" Oh this learning, what a thing it is!"

~ William Shakespeare

Life has picked up speed these last few months.  Good thing, because it makes it easier to ignore the long dark of winter.  No sun rise here until almost 8 AM.  The evenings have improved though as it is not dark until nearly 5:15 PM.   A renewed interest in learning something new has been spurred by a desire to look just past the darkness that is  this very long winter.  This January finds me studying the Celtic fiddle.  What a challenge it is but exciting when something other nerve killing scratching issues forth from my student violin.  My Grandfather's family was from Edinburgh, Scotland.  So part of this feels a nod to part of my genetic code and family history.  Decided to take the course offered for adult learners at a local college's evening division.  There are 11 of us who meet one night a week with a wonderful and talented instructor who happens to know how to work well with adult learners.  The age of the group span from 50 to 70.  I sit comfortably in the middle range.  We learn by ear rather than reading music.  One challenge at a time seems to be about right.  

"That knowledge is great riches, which is not plundered by kinsman, nor carried off by thieves nor decreased by giving"

~ Bhavabhuti

Attended a day long Photoshop Elements class this week-end.  Ah, just what the doctor ordered ~ finally I can make use of this program.  It has reignited my passion for photography.  The instructor was wonderful.   He managed to be so funny for the entire 8 hours of class time and still meet all the course objectives.  No one was left in the cyber-dust as he seemed to know exactly who was lagging and gave each person some individual tutoring as it was needed.  Of course it helps to have 10 in the class.  I can hear a collective sigh of the cyber village  teachers who have been trying to make just that point for years.

"To improve the golden moment of opportunity, and catch the good that is within out reach, is the great art of life."

~ Johnson

This past Autumn some friends asked if I would join them for an afternoon at the Opera.  The day has arrived!  How very exciting as I have not been to listen to live Opera since leaving Boston back in what...2000.  Today we will drive to Seattle for a matinee performance of the Barber of Seville.   What a joy this is.  Wrapping oneself in a celebration of site and sound is a delight. 


Back to a work-a-day life in the morning.  But for now I can continue to celebrate the week-end and pretend as though I had the luxury of being retired.  :-)

Sunday Rain

"Life is the fire that burns and the sun that gives light.  Life is the wing and the rain and the thunder is the sky.  Life is matter and is the earth, what is and what is not and what beyond is in eternity"   

 ~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca

There is a dim gray light just beyond the window, peeping around the wooden blinds.  I can not hear the rain abut I know she is there.   It is nearly 8:40 A.M. and for the past 40 minutes the sun has been hinting that she sits just on the other side of the clouds.  Another sunrise that almost isn't.  This is not a complaint.  The rain here in the Northwest serves as a reminder of some other primordial time.  A time when forests were abundant every where.

"You pray for rain, you gotta deal with the mud too. That's part of it."  

 ~ Denzel Washington

Daily there is winter rain.  She is our constant companion.  The lawn remains green  ~ 1000 miles north of the California's Central Valley, the gardener continues to show up for work on Thursdays to mow the lawns.  Frost, Rain's significant Other, shows up now  and then as well but seems to toy only with the flowers.  The icy pansies that flourished on the Island in Puget Sound were transferred to this more in land home.  Although I thought they were destroyed beyond help ... severely frost bitten, somehow they regenerated.  Little purple and white pansy lion faces greeted me when I let the dogs out this morning.  The roses perished - lost.  Pots did not meet their needs nor offer sufficient protection from Frost's icy fingers.  But then that is the stuff that is composted and will serve other roses in some future Spring.  

"Let the rain kiss you.  Let the rain beat down upon your head with silver drops.  Let the rain sing a lullaby"

~ Langston Hughes

This slow motion, rainy day is underway.  Wet me, wet camera, wet dogs.  So be it.  The price of life here in the Northwest.