Another Saturday at B&N

Here I am again between yoga and NIA classes, waiting for Doug to have some coffee with me. It is fall, but warm.
On Monday we visited the ruins of the home in Wallstreet, and It really was a relief to be able to burst into tears looking at all those ashes and charred remains and seeing Richard's hopefulness. He will have lots of help in that rebuilding no doubt, and he does look ahead to that. But he was also hoping to sift through the ruins to find anything left of his mother's things or our time in Guatemala.
Here is a picture I took--worth a thousand words, as they say:


What do you see among those ashes, Laughing Buddha?

 Also spent time with old friend, Annie in Salina. Would love to be back in Fourmile. I wonder how that can happen? See the Cedar house?  I'd do it for that.

Andrew now living with us--going on a month now--he is easy and high maintenance at the same time, if that makes sense--it's because I want to make sure he has what he needs, support him in his search for a job, keep his spirits up, give him privacy, share the bathroom with Doug, and sqeeze into our 1000 square feet. I would never NOT do this!








How long has it been? A Saturday at B & N

Niko and I hardly meet any more for writing on Mondays, but it would be so good to starts that again. There's first one thing and then another. Her head injury--I think is much better. Her care for her mother, the children coming home, the summer. The urge NOT to write--whatever is that about?

And so, my 71st approaches--and what it turns out to be, really, is a year like any other--hope and tragedy intertwined with the normal and boring, the mundane, often hoped for in times of turmoil.

And since I last posted? Let's see:

The most destructive wildfire in Colorado history, the Fourmile Canyon fire, destroyed 160+ homes, including the one Richard and I bought in Wallstreet when Andre was 2--the one we raised him in, the one where he was married, the one that Richard continued to live in , continued to work on, turning the gold mine into a wine cellar, installing in-floor heating, creating an aviary (I don't have the heart to ask about the birds). That house was Richard's major relationship, no doubt, and he is inconsolable. Andre watching him carefully.

Right before it was engulfed, as Richard was leaving

We have friends whose homes were destroyed and friends whose homes are standing, and that's really awkward, isn't it? But those amazing children of ours--the ones we raised together 30 years ago, have been returning to that burnt-out place, coming home to their parents' houses, taking care of them, Andre and Melvina--both of them having lost their childhood home--Megan and Gaylan, Pierce, sheltering and helping parents whose homes were saved. Harmony and countless other of our children, sending heartfelt condolences to Andre. We raised those children well, and they are the ones rising from the ashes, coming to the weary and heartbroken parents.

So, of course, all else that has happened seems miniscule--but things have happened--of which I will post separately

The House

Once again at B & N--in between yoga and NIA

     I'm not certain that I've mentioned Niko's fall and brain injury, but surely I have. She feels much on the road to recovery now, as she reported when we met for coffee on Weds., but we have not been doing so much yoga, so my Mondays With Niko postings have fallen away. So now it's a Sat at B&N between classes at the Y, sipping a coffee and eating a bar--a Kashi bar.
     Doug is 3 weeks into his rotator cuff surgery, and I think, doing well. Three more weeks in a sling, however, then we'll see how he rehabs. Has a PT appointment this week. But in three weeks, he should be ready to drive and more independent, although he is busy checking out bus schedules and the like.  He is in so many  ways the ideal patient, positive about recovery, staying on top of pain, following Dr's directions. But, of course, there has been the downside, the strangest of which, really, is that we go our separate ways at night, me on the futon (usually with Miranda, whose choice of beds has to do with where I'm sleeping) and Doug, sling on, in our queen size. It's not altogether bad, but does feel strange. I do get up in the mornings and make coffee and bring it to our bedroom, and we sit and talk--or sit quietly because I like for the day to come on slowly. The sling is large, because it has about a 4" foam block that curves into his torso to keep his arm stable, so there is the fear that he would either turn over and whop me, or that I or Miranda, who would surely follow me back into our bed, would toss around and injure him.
      We have spent some deliciously quiet days together, however, and take evening walks. Yesterday, we decided to watch a Netflix right after lunch: The Best Years of Our Lives, which was my idea after we watched series 5 of  Foyle's War, a great PBS mystery series set in England during WWII, and much emphasizing the price we pay when we send young men off to war, not matter the cause and the perceived "rightness" of it. I remembered The Best Years of Our Lives, (1946), although I'm not certain when I first saw it, but thought it was rather stunning to see a movie so soon after the war that itself dealt with the psychological consequences of homecoming--of the great disconnect between what these men had been doing for the last 3-4 years and the expectations (theirs and their families and loved ones at home) of the culture they find themselves back in.
     And just in case we buy into the myth that Vietnam was our great shame in our treatment of vets, William Wyler, the director, takes special care in exploring the range of responses of civilians:
--I just want you to know that we have no obligation to reinstate your job.

--Don't talk about the war--just put it all behind you.

--we want to observe the GI Bill in our loan department, but we have to keep our lending standards the same (in other words we don't want to observe the GI Bill of Rights).

--You boys fought the wrong war (said to a double amputee, a star in this movie, but also a veteran who lost both arms).

--All our jobs are being threatened by all these GI's coming home. There's not going to be anything left for us.

No spitting, jeering, ir placards being held upas "the boys" returned--we were actually a far more polite society then, but still.

Yes, this is an incredibly kind film and Wyler, the master of the small gesture that contains volumes of meaning
--Virginia Mayo, slumped in a chair, pouting, and peeling off her false eyelashes when Dana Andres says they're not going our for dinner.
--Teresa Wright tucking Dana Andrews in her bed, after he cannot get into his apt. the first night home.
--Homer's father buttoning his son's pajama tops after Homer has removed his prostheses.
--Dana Andrews in a shabby civilian suit--a transformation that takes him from a dashing airman to an ordinary chump looking for a job.

My ideas for a new blog: A childhood of movies, books, and music--what I learned.about life.
    

We Are Losing Too Many Young Men

It has now become not unusual in this college town to open the paper--about once a month--to read an all-too-familiar story that goes like this, with some variation: Roommate returns home, tries to rouse sleeping roomie, finds him unresponsive (this year always a young man), calls 911, autopsy reveals accidental overdose of combination of prescription drugs, OTC things, and usually cocaine, a variant being drinking poppy tea. So I am talking with yet another mourning mother, who thought her son was doing all right for the past few years. A big funeral for him at St A's--many young people, including my own Carla, whom I have know since birth. And then, in our own family, a young man just out of rehab, another reporting (we pray) faithfully for UAs, a son of a nephew caught up in his own turmoil. What is this about, I wonder? Availability of all this stuff? Surely the world is not more dangerous than my own time as a young persom, when we thought the world would be blown up and completely destroyed by nuclear weapons.  No, it is not a more dangerous world, but we didn't have so many pharmaceuticals to deal with that danger then, although Valium has been around for a while. Sowhat? What are the answers--delayed adulthood? too many choices? seeking escape from...? Environmentally causes addiction? We are losing too many young men.

Home again--this time from Utah

How June just flits away and how I love returning to routine. So it's Sat morning, and I've finished yogalates and have this interim at B & N before going to NIA at noon. No sooner were we back in the country than we set out for our home in Utah--and also a farewell reception for the 10th Bishop of Utah, Carolyn Tanner Irish, who ordained me. That was quite wonderful, catching up with Utah clergy and sharing a long lunch with friend Mary at the Oasis in SLC.
Also good to connect with friends at our place, to arrange for some floor repairs, sleep late, not having to get up for early morning walks or Weds. Eucharist. Cleaning and throwing out things, which I'm trying to do in both houses. Then back to Boulder, where life catches up--not knowing what has happened to our mail, for instance. Mary Kate+ has had bike accident with a mangled finger, stitches in another one, bruises and pain, numbness. I move back in to St. A's duties, feeling a tug with wanting some moer time to go back and forth, stay at home, write, and watch the portulaca bloom.
Summer reading:The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie and the next one, something about a hangman's knot, features the 11-year old detective Flavia, a specialist in poisons, who has her own chem lab.  Can't remember the author's name.
Must get in contact with my Chartres group, have heard only from dear Annabel.
Portulace blooming, honeysuckle outrageously blossoming orange and theyellow columbine, must be 30 in all, up against that  bright color while the lobelia becomes a brighter blue in its yellow pot and the geraniums stubbornly refuse to put out any blossoms. Jupiter's Beard taking over the cone flowers in front, and some timid cosmos plants, small and lacey, try one more summer after being poisoned by grounds keepers last year. Lavender blooming and flox past its time. It's June in our yard--tomatoes planted once more in their bin, and we hope for the yield we had last year.
Doug scheduled for rotator cuff surgery on Tues--I manage my ulcers, and my eye checkup led my dr. to have me return in a couple of weeks for peripheral vision test re: glaucoma, since Patsy has it, and my original test showed some "thinning" of something. Just trying to keep above water here, re: the body--

At Chartres as a Pilgrim

We arrived here on Monday where I'm doing a workshop and facilitator training with Lauren Artress--Living An Authentic Life. We begin  by doing a Greek dance, move into announcements and then morning talks, divided by a coffee break, then our small groups.
--yesterday a tour of the crypt, today a tour of the cathedral--Lauren says we are tourists before we are pilgrims.  Tomorrow we become pilgrims as we walk the labyrinth in candlelight--we will prepare for that tomorrow and then also have an orientation, then rest--then the evening walk which also involves the crypt, but I'm not certain how. Lauren said we should spend tomorrow afternoon as if we're preparing to go to the Temple.
We are staying in the shadow of Chartres--a simple room, with large windows that open out to green fields and roofs of houses, and let in the cooling breezes.
I think of how I have been called to Chartres--that humanities textbook, that I crammed to learn to teach the class--then coming with Doug and Pat and Charles--mainly to see the stained glass and to climb the bell tower--we spent the day here--and, as I was tired from the bell tower, I sat down on a chair, head in hand, gazed at the floor and saw that labyrinth.
That was about 10 years ago, and since then, the labyrinth has been in my life both in Utah and in Colorado, where we just constructed a new one. and here I am as a pilgrim. Doug awaits upstairs, so I will take camera in hand to I hope post some pix here.
Holy time.
And Taize this evening.

I am taught to use the WC Asian style

Bless that Slovakian woman. When I went to the WC yesterday at the church, I was dismayed to see the little hole in the floor at the bottom of a very shallow basin. we were at the trattoria and had ordered. I went up to path, stared at the last stall, opened another to find it was just the same, and didn't both with the third, but, instead, walked back to our table wondering how I was going to make it the 2 or so miles back to our apartment. Doug then checked it out, but of course men have no problem with this kind of setup. But when he came back, he said that I'd have to be careful if I went, because when you flush, the water runs all over the floor where, of course, you're standing.  that did it.
Then I saw the young woman at the next table walk that path and come back after a bit of time passed, suggesting she has actually used the WC, so I got up my nerve and went to her table.
Do you speak English, I asked.
Yes.
Could you show me.... (pointing at the path to the WC)
Yes, come with me.
Together we walk the path, and when we get to the stalls,  she asks,
--Are your knees good?
---Yes (giving thanks for the deep knee-bends I do)
--Then, she says, you need to squat down--use the napkin you brought with you. then get up. You need to walk out, then reach in and flush--don,t worry--it's clean water, but it comes all over the floor.
--Are you Italian, I ask.
--No, Slovakian, but I've traveled in Asia a lot'
--Ah!
--Don't worry, I'll wait for you.
So I go in and squat and use my napkin, step out, flush, and there she is down the path waiting--reminding me to wash my hands in the outside basin with cool, flowing water. we walk back to our tables together.
Angels unaware.




.

May 20: At Lake Como and Recovering

Actually we left on Monday, going first to Paris (arriving Tues), spending one night there, then forging onward to Milano, then grabbing a train to Como, then boat to Lenno, close to our village of Ossucio. I will soon (maybe in about 15 minutes, but I'm sleepy right now) post pictures of our 3-floor apt that overlooks Como. It is elegantly comfortable and our terrace looks right out onto Como. Today is our first full day of not having to get up early, not having to board some public transport vehicle, so we slept late, drank coffee with a nutty, brown, crunchy bread we bought yesterday at the town's super mercato. Our activity for the morning was to hike to the Santuario Beata Vergine del Seccorso, seeing the 14  little chapels along the way, constructed, to my best understating, between 14th and 17th centuries to counter the effects of the Reformation and display the mysteries of the rosary.  These are small chapels, unfortunately closed, but one can peak in the window to see surprising beautiful sculptures and frescoes depicting Christ's life from the Annunciation to the Assumption of Mary into heaven.  The trail is steep, and the chapels are scattered alongside of it.  Here is an example:

I took this picture through a barred window; it's Jesus as a child at the temple. Each chapel is sol elaborately outfitted, and as we drew nearer to the church, 400 m above sea level, we saw that at least two of them were in the process of being renovated. They are absolute jewels, and I do wish they would open. Dust clings to the statuary, the floors are crude. I have no idea who the artists were-will try to look that up.
At the top of our steep climb on this warm day, we find the church, but, according to a sign, I am not allowed to enter because I don't have on a skirt, although I am modestly dressed.
We sit in the warm sun for a while, then walk over to the trattoria for lunch, and I go to the WC, which, to my dismay, is a small hole at the bottom of a shallow basin--and that is a story that turns out wonderfully well, thanks to a young woman from Slovakia who speaks English, there with her Irish boyfriend, husband--that will be for the next post.
Health is holding up--sleeping excellently well. Off to Bellagio--the real one.

Excuse me! Stomach Ulcers???

When son Daniel, for whom I am the wicked stepmother, suggested that my stomach pains were probably "old age," I thought it was just another way to insult me. But, then, I though--well, yes--a 38-year-old would think that old age is a disease. For him, it was a statement of fact.
The people in the emergency room were wonderful, the pain excruciating to unbearable=my own emotional state going from "Do I have my affairs in order?" to "I'll probably wake up in the morning minus a gall bladder."
But no, after CT-Scan, x-ray, ultrasound, ekg, and endoscopy, I have 2 ulcers, not caused by NSAIDS or H Pylori. So I take all that medication that I've often scorned--why don't people just eat right--like me--I eat right.
Well, there you have--Daniel, dear stepson--diagnostician--Old age????

Springtime and Grieving Friends: Another Monday with Niko

     Once again at the cafe, sipping coffee at an open window, looking out onto a resounding splash of orange tulips, getting a little past their prime, but that makes them all the more beautiful (said by someone certainly past her so-called prime). So these orange tulips have wide open petals, not forming those tightly closed ones that we imagine when someone says "tulip." These orange tulips--and, really, orange is the only name for them--there is no subtlety here--look like ever so many Tibetan monks, arms spread wide toward the heavens, and I know if I listened closely, I could hear the earthy "ooooommmm." Buddhist monk tulips.
     I have just returned from Reno, visiting those friends I wrote about here last fall. Their son, a young man I had known since he was a child, died at age 30. When I contacted them then, offering to visit, V. replied, "Thanks, but no thanks--we are seeing only therapists and lawyers, but I will let you know when, if ever, we are able to see anyone." That when was about a month ago, when I received the email.  "know your lives are busy, but would appreciate a visit," sent to me and our other friend, Elise. And we got right on it.
It was a hard weekend in so many ways--there are no words of comfort, as we know, for someone who has lost a child--an only child.
     There is nothing to offer in terms of words, so we offered our presence. Listening, asking a few questions, backing off when we heard, "I don't want to talk about it." We went for short walks, played frisbee with the dog Blue, saw Pyramid Lake, saw V's paintings, ate vegetarian minestrone and E's fresh bread, and went to a thai restaurant our final evening. We spoke of many things, but, especially with V., they all circled back to the lost son. And so, with fruit trees in bloom, tulips past their prime, leaves on the big trees finally emerging, slowly, as if to be cautious with their entrance, making certain it's dramatic, with people tucking into yogurt and granloa, burritos, muffins, and cappuccino, and a cool breeze coming in through the open window, on this mild, sunny day, we know that grief lives in this world, and that no matter how much we mistakenly want to see spring as a symbol of ressurection (But Jesus is not a tulip! protested my bishop), as uplifted as we all feel with warm weather, it is small comfort, if any, for those who mourn.

Port Lavaca Main Street Theatre

Just got home from there--the PLMST--who did my breast cancer play, "...And Sarah Laughed." I think there's nothing remarkable about this play that I wrote 19-20 years ago. Fresh from my own breast cancer, angry and scared, I was trying out what I thought I knew about playwriting. But this cast and their director put their hearts into this little play, which they did love and did inspire them. In tiny Port Lavaca theatre, my heart was filled with the poignancy of seeing such hard work on the stage---and the excitement and nervousness because I was there. All cast members are either survivors (Sarah, played by Rebecca, three years out from breat cancer; the doctor, in real life, stage 4 colon cancer)--a whole bunch of survivors and caretakers here. And after the play, I get this beautiful hand-sewn beach bag filled with mementos and some good Tex-Mex.

I'll upload a picture soon--of Betty and the cast and that refurbished movie theatre called Port Lavaca Main Street Theatre.

Texas Spring on a Monday with Niko

Have you ever been to Texas in the spring

Where bluebonnets bloom

And birds or on the wing?

And if you haven't been to Texas in the spring, then you need to get yourself there. That's where I was the last weekend--and the 175 miles from Austin to Port Lavaca were riot of color--fields and hills of bluebonnets, then bluebonnets and paintbrush, then giving way to paintbrush only as we got nearer the coast. Sprinkled here and there were what Texans call pink buttercups, but the rest of the world calls evening primroses. Then these bright, bright yellow small daisy-like flowers and bunches of yellow blooming wild alfalfa. If you saw it in a painting, you'd think the artist had exaggerated. But this artist--is known for flamboyant exaggeration, no more obvious than in a Texas spring. Get yourself there, all ya'll. As I sit here in this Colorado cafe, I'm happy to see tulips in bloom--and some trees trying their best to spring into leaf, but it's pretty grey and brown here. This is the time to be in Texas.

Feeling older than 70 and far from Grace

It really is just one of those mornings. DST has a lot to do with it-I stay up way too late, but need to get up at same time in morning--it will take me about a month to find the rhythm I need. Until then....
Here is a copy of an email I just wrote to my friend Ellen--It's the other reason I'm feeling far from grace. It clearly makes me sound like an ungrateful, self-centered priest, of all things--and the wicked stepmother that I am...but nonetheless--might I just point out that what I'm describing below has been going on for 20 years. Might I also add how worn down (and selfish) I'm feeling this morning?
I need to unload. I'm sitting in Barnes & Noble now just because I need to get away from home. Yesterday I had a huge day because Mary Kate was at the church in Aspen. So I did 3 services, adult ed, and a confirmation class. Fit a lunch in for AnnaMarie for being received into the Episcopal church. She's our friend with lung cancer, although she is doing quite well now. Doug understood what a big day it was for me and how I was looking forward to coming home after 5 pm service and winding down.
You know where this is going, don't you? I was home for 30 min when Dan called and wondered if he could spend the night and wash some clothes. We have had a strict rule about his not staying with us at all, but I heard Doug saying on the phone, "I guess that will be all right. Let me ask Kay." How's that for setting me up as the wicked stepmother? I just looked at him, then he said "That will be all right, but you'll need to leave first thing in the morning."
Doug then pranced off for 3 hours to his Renaissance group and I was left with washer and dryer going ALL that time (the washer set on Hot), the smell of chicken cooking in the kitchen, and having to rescue my toothbrush and other stuff from the back bathroom and searching for the cord to my computer, which I found that Dan had taken in the back room to hook up the old computer to. I could have cried--for one reason, I was just so tired--especially with interacting with people all day. Second, I have this terrible sinking feeling that we're moving back in the groove of taking care of Daniel again. He showed up 3 times last week. We have given him more food cards. One more phone card  And now, this morning? I have no idea. I left at 8:45 with both men sleeping and decided just not to go back until this aft some time. I give up.
I have decided:
1.  to come live with you and take that little church in Cripple Creek.
or
2. To sell the Cedar condo and go in with you on a condo here where I might be able to get some peace and quiet
or
3. At least, come up to see you for a day or 2.
I'm feeling really discouraged, but I know it's also the time change that is so disorienting for me as well.
Thank you for letting me yell.
Love,
Kay
NIA this morning made a huge difference--we did dome different and healing moves--what would I do without it and without dance in general. I often tell people I'm off to my Latin class--and then have to explain--no, not the language (I've done that), but the dance for heaven's sake.
Niko still recovering from head injury. Last week, instead of writing session, we got together with Meg to talk about recovering from brain injuries, and it was good to hear the two of them talk about conditions, feelings, sensations that only those with these kind of injuries can relate to.

Mondays with Niko: Snow and Sun

     Yes, another weather report. After about three says of snow, we have a sunny, but below freezing day. The key word is sunny--so walking to coffee today, even the trees were elated that they could do some photosynthesis, and began throwing snowballs on the mall strollers below them. Gleeful trees--one aimed for me just as I walked under it and it landed with a tremendous plop, turning me into a thinly constructed snowoman. I could hear a faint chucking from deep inside the pith.
    We continue to struggle with the prodigal and had an agonizing weekend when we said NO to his late night plea to spend the night with us--it was a driving snow. Yet, he managed, still resisting the shelter, still resisting the help there for him, still wanting to be taken care of by his parents--almost 38 years old. So he slept in a 7-11 and rode the light rail and was dog-tired, but he coped, and we hope that if the choice is between that and the shelter, he'll find that place for a shower and a hot meal, a locker and a bed, and, actually, some dignity.
     We begin the 2nd week of Lent--and the mindfulness that goes with it--fasting, prayer, almsgiving. I am fasting, consciously under-eating,  dedicated to more writing, meditative, and planning the Lenten series. But I'm not off to a good start, lacking the discipline when my well-being is so disturbed by the worry and anger with the prodigal--and, really, a concern that he will not survive, that, after so long and so much trouble, he simply will not survive--that when all is stripped away except the love of his parent, he won't recognize that as love, but will remain furious with us for not taking care of him--physically taking care of him, which, truly, is our only function in his life.
     Is it possible to go a day, just one day without talking about him, being angry with him, not sleeping because of him, being frustrated by him. Agony in the garden indeed. Take this cup, indeed. How do we move from "Take the cup" to "thy will be done, with only a comma for punctuation. A comma of all things. What resides in those spaces before and after? Some great gift, some power, call it the Holy Spirit, that allows us to move forward in true obedience, in spite of the cup's not being lifted. How can we find that gift?
Is it through healing services? Healing and Taize and prayer and hope. How did that happen so quickly with Jesus in the garden--or did it?

Sunny, Cold Morning with Niko

So why am I measuring out these mornings with reference to the weather? Because we haven't had a break in cold--no January thaw--no "midwinter spring" being "its own season."  But, really, I've always checked the temp. to see how cold or hot I should feel.  But that's not the whole story, really. The whole story is my skin sensitivity to the slightest change in terms of heat, but not of cold. Now what is that about?  I keep a cold house--or, rather, a cool house. Doug will often try to surreptitiously punch the thermostat up a degree--one degree, mind you, or not turn it all the way down to 58 or 60 for the night (we do have a down quilt, after all). But that change can send me straight out of a sound sleep into a pouring sweat and a real mental, physical discomfort, as if I'd suddenly been transported to a sauna against my will or as if I was a lizard left writhing in a heat that I couldn't escape, such as happened to my own lizard when I left him in the window sill and went away for the day--third grade.
That lizard was my pal, and I proudly wore him on a little piece of chain pinned to my blouse. Daddy bought him for me when we were at the circus. I loved it when I was "wearing" him and he would suddenly move and people would say, "Is that a real lizard?" And I would proudly nod. But he wasn't just a showcase. He was my pal, as I've said, and I took careful care of him--giving him his lizard food and water--and placing him in the window, between the screen and the window, then shutting the window, so he could have his "freedom. I had all sorts of twigs and leaves in that window for him.
But the one time I was gone all day and the only time I'd left him there all day--I didn't know about the sun shifting--and lizards of course are cold-blooded and need sun, but they themselves seek the shade in the desert, and this one had not shade to seek.
I am often, more times than not, very hard on my mother. Neglectful. Should not have had children. Vain. Male-identified. So here's what that "terrible" mother did:
When I came in the house, she met me at the door to say that the lizard was dead. she was near tears herself. And then she told me that she had done everything she could to revive him. She had taken into the bathroom sink, and bathed him softly with cool water. But that did not work. I can still picture my mother there, in the bathroom, her curly auburn hair with sweat ringlets--this was, after all Corpus Christi in the summer and air conditioning only a far-off dream--her bee's kiss lips a bright red, her flawless skin, trying to revive my little lizard, heartbroken that she couldn't.
Sobbing and gulping, I told her that "the first person I want to see when I get to heaven is my lizard." (No question in my own mind that I would be going to heaven--no question about the lizard either), but my so-called terrible mother nodded in sympathy.  That not being her theology, she nodded anyway.
It was a grand funeral. pink satin in a jewel box, tiny white flowers, singing and making the sign of the cross we buried him under the Kumquat tree. And dug him up the next day to see if he was a skeleton yet.
We have long left the cafe, where Niko and I began talking as the woman behind her slumped over in her chair sound asleep, no doubt, with the aid of drug. Bright red strands of hair over darker ones, a red hat on, she slumped over as her friends, finished with their game of checkers, left. When she woke up, alone, she got up and put on hat and gloves, walked outside, sat down on a park bench, slumped over, and fell sound asleep again in the warm sunlight on a cold day, as shoppers and hikers passed by with their paper coffee cups, wide awake.

Snowy Monday With Niko

     We have not been together for a while for writing--and now don't often go to yoga. Niko's head injury (Dec 4) continues to show itself in ways that keep her from the so-called normal activity, like yoga, that she's so used to doing. Rest, careful rest. This has been such a year for falls--that I begin to think something, other than the ice and snow, is happening--a change in the gravitational field?   
      But today, we're in the usual cafe, looking out on bare trees, large rocks, a downtown mall, and snow gently falling. Return from the airport last night was a bit nightmare-ish, especially when the fluid for our wipers went out, and we were left having to peer under great swaths of ice and goop to see the road-or more helpfully, the tail lights of the car directly in front of us. It was one of those snows that was slushy and wet, the kind where, when you turn on the bright lights, you're blinded by the flakes coming out you like some shower of fireworks on the 4th of July.
    Lovely--a message from granddaughter Brett just popped up--so many people complain about all these modern ways of messaging and what it's doing to the language, blah, blah, blah--but when your granddaughter IM's you, saying that she has been tovisit her cousin Eric in Chicago, and if we still had only telephones, really only land lines, we wouldn't be talking --the expense, the difficulty with long distance. Measure that against the uplifted heart when I get a quick message from the granddaughter.
     I told her that I'm still dancing, which I am--and should be back in jazz classes either this week or the next--adding that to NIA and Latin. The body moves, continues to move, and even gets looser. Love it. Love to dance.
    I've just finished a book, "The Anatomy of Hope," and will write about it here. I'm also reading Marylynn Robinson's Home, started only last night, but already drawn into the narrative that provides another pov from the novel Gilead. How is it that so many years passed between Housekeeping and these later novels? I want to know what that's about. Home is a retelling of the Prodigal Son parable--couldn't be more timely.
   And now mt friend Julie has sent me a message about harps and healing, with a link to them. Something she heard about on NPR--
   
   

A Weekend in Cedar City

    It's a rainy night in Cedar City, but we fully expect it to turn to snow later tonight and then on into tomorrow when we leave to return to Boulder. We'll see what that little KIA we rented will act like in the snow.
We have a home here,larger and more comfortable than our Colorado one, more space--more books, more things.
     We don't get here as often as we'd like--the distance is too great for a quick weekiend trip. But, being in great need of respite and a change of scene, and having some clear space in the week, we left on Thurs--so have had two full days, two half days--and some good coffee and dinner times with Julie and Danielle,  Andrew and Olivia.
    We come here ragged, sad, worn out, frustrated, angry, defeated and hopeful. Since mid-December, we have dealt with our son's incarceration, a sort of conclusion to a really terrible year for him, beginning last year at this time when he was arrested for drugs, assigned to Drug Court, and began a schedule designed to lift him out of whatever went so wrong and get him back on track. But for some reason, that was only the beginning--4 more incidents in 2009, the last one resulting in the lockup. We would not post bond. He was furious, begging, apologetic, resolved to change his life after having time to think, and on. We stood firm. Thinking he was getting out of one jail two weeks ago, he was surprised that there was a bench warrant out for him in another country, so he was merely transferred from one facility to another. But is out now until he returns in 2 weeks for a revocation of probation hearing, which means we'll be there, too.
     What are the hopes for a 37-year-old man to turn his life around? To say that he does not want to live this way any more? They are dim, but they are not extinguished. His father, who raised him from the time he was a small boy, has come to learn the hard way the difference between enabling and helping out. But that's a very complex issue--and still absolves the son for his own responsibility for his actions, in a way. The problems with and of this son have been the greatest threat and challenge to our almost 20-year marriage. But now I see his broken-hearted father--how he has aged over these confrontations, the son demanding, pleading, begging for money to get out. the firm "no." Watching him walk into the courtroom, shackled and in handcuffs, having lost the false bravado with which he usually faces the world.
   We have not heard from him since he got out. Nary a phone call.
    Tomorrow we go to our church here, see old friends, celebrate, and then head back.
    I am dancing still--having added "Latin Blaze" to my NIA classes and soon to resume jazz. I wonder how, if I could introduce liturgical dance into St. Aidan's? Our Taize healing service in Jan. was lovely. Prayer stations carefully draped in rich blues, reds, yellows; icons and pillows; candles; and a healing litany read while people moved from one prayer station to the next. Beautiful Taize music. We need to help people understand that healing is in the Episcopal tradition--to help them to seek out a healing service like this one.


   

Haiti: The Earth Trembles a Few Minutes, and The World Changes

:It has been almost a week now since that terrible news came in and all eyes were turned toward that small island of Haiti, already suffering from poverty (the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere) and corruption. We have all watched in horror the pictures that have rolled in from Port-au-Prince and have felt helpless in the face of those images of arms reaching through crushed buildings, seeking a way out, bodies in the street, utter destruction of buildings that lie crumpled as if they were pawns in a game of pick up sticks played by the giants, as if they were little plaster casts stomped on by an angry artist, pulverized.  As if they were twigs and branches that needed sweeping away before the garden can be planted. Except for those people, those bodies, that anguish.

I am not into competitive suffering; our personal anguish and the anguish of a nation are the same.
We are filled with grief, not matter the public or private level of the event that causes that suffering. But this one does touch home, so that we see face to face what grieving over the loss of city looks like, what anguish, grief, sadness, despair and hope can look like when they are registered on the face almost all at once, or at least like a shifting kaleidescope, so quickly do the emotions shift.

Jean-Hilaire has been in this country for just 2 months. He came here to marry Mary Kate--and it's quite a process to get Haitian citizens into this country--a process that took him 9 months, weeks of which were humiliating; we are so suspicious of people wanting to enter the US that we must expose every element of their personal like to make sure what they say is true--all love letters, no matter how steamy--emails, texts. Financial support? crucial.  And then, of course, appointments get canceledwithout notification, so a long journey into Port-au-Prince is for naught since "the computers have been down" or something.

But he did get here. He arrived to so much joy and celebration. The wedding was one of the largest we've ever had, and there were dancing and eating and drinking.

"I've been married only two months," the new bride says to me.

We know this: Jean-Hilaire's immediate family is alive; he has IM'd with a sister who says, "We need help." we do not know how many friends and relatives he has lost in Port-au-Prince.  Ironically, of course, since he has been in this country only 2 months, he's not allowed to leave this country. we know, of course, that he could get an emergency visa, but what can he do once there? What can they do? Right now, unless we are medical people, we are clearly not wanted there, where there are enough mouths to feed already.

What can we do? We can lament and we can pray. When Jean-Hilaire spoke yesterday, thanking everyone at church for their support and care, apologizing for his English, struggling with emotions, I began to weep and continued through the Eucharist. My weeping, thankfully, consists of tears streaming down my cheeks, which I can wipe away from time to time.

We can lament for Haiti.