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.