Life is so strange

 So many things are happening in my life, my friends lives and the world.  

A friend died last month.  I had a dream and she was in it.  Not sure where we were, but she walked into the room and said to me "Nancy you look like you've seen a ghost"!   Well, of course, she's dead.

Three more friends are sick. One friend, who is 96, is feeling fed up and is ready to be done.  She cannot swallow very well, so all of her food has to be pureed.  She told me that she is incontinent.    She is in assisted living but wants to move to hospice so she can get the care she needs.

Another friend who is my age has a terminal form of cancer, but is involved in drug studies that she hopes will prolong her life.  She is very cheerful and upbeat about it all.

And a third friend is a woman about the same age as my daughter.  She has four children,  Two older kids  and two little girls around 6&8.  She has been in the hospital for about 3 months.  She is very sick.  Her husband says that there's nothing more that the hospital can do, so she is going home.   She has lost the use of her legs because of nerve damage.  Not sure what it's all about though.    Maybe I can go visit her.

My own path to motherhood started 44 years ago on February 25, 1978.   Yes, my daughter just turned 44.   I am not sure if I feel old having a child that age, or just amazed and stunned and in wonder.   The big "bump" inside me that I held my hand on for months.  Kicking me and making my stomach move.  The wonder that there was a life inside of my body.  And now she is grown and independent and lives thousands of miles away.   Of course the same sense of marvel attended all of my pregnancies', but she was the first.  The one who transformed us into parent.  A role of a lifetime and a life long role.

War is taking place in Europe.  Russia invaded Ukraine this week.    There are bombs and buildings being blown up.  And people seeking refuge and also dying.   A woman gave birth in an underground subway station/ bomb shelter.  It reminds me of the stories of the Norwegian "tunnelbarn". The babies born in the tunnels in Norway that were built as shelters.

Why is this happening? How ironic it is that many people are seeking refuge in Poland a country that was dominated not that long ago by the same people that the Ukrainians are trying to escape from.

Is this going to be the third world war? Is it a new Cold War? Will it go on for years, or will it be short lived?

Meanwhile a group of truck drivers are planning to descend on Washington, DC to protest against Covid vaccine mandates.

I could say what is the world coming to. That's what we say when things are not the way it is "supposed to be". But I don't know how it is really supposed to be.

I just wish for peace and health and all that liberal stuff. Yes I do.

I remember this poster from the days of Vietnam war protests:

To sweep or not to sweep?

 I just did a quick sweeping job in the kitchen.  No I didn't leave the floor clean enough to eat off of.  I just got the biggest crumb magnet- the corner by the stove where we seem to stand to make our sandwiches and toast.   There's almost always a little pile of crumbs there.  Oh, I did sweep up some of the dust bunnies here and there too.

The last couple of days I decided it was time to wash the sheets from all of the beds that were slept on since December.  Now that it's just Nick and me here, I can do that.  Then I made all of the beds.  And I had an ongoing dialog with myself.  In my head.  I was remembering how my own mother taught me to make a bed.  The top sheet goes on with the pattern (if there is one) facing down.  The top sheet is pulled up enough so that the hem can be folded over.   Once that hem is folded over, the covers (blankets) can go on- pulled right to the edge of where the hem is folded over.  Then that hem piece can be folded down over the covers and the wrong side is folded under and the right side is what shows where it's folded over the covers.    On the foot of the bed, first the bottom sheet is tucked in across the bottom of the mattress    Then on each side that bit that has been folded under is pulled up as a corner (also called a hospital corner) and tucked in   Repeat with the blankets.  If there's more than one blanket, tuck them in as one

Why do I remember this?  Why do I care, and why is it important to me?     It's not as if my mother sat me down and "taught" me - she showed me.  And I understood and remembered.   And so, it is important to me.  It feels like the right way to do it.  Orderly and neat.  And it looks nice.

Then I flash forward to my own children.  I think I taught them how to make their beds.  I can't remember.  But I know that they don't seem to have that same feeling of  satisfaction in the orderliness in making a bed that I have.

Is that a flaw?  Is it my flaw that I care?  Is it theirs (and Nick's) that they don't care?  I don't even think it's not caring, I think it is just genetically who I am.   It's peace to me to see order.    It used to drive me crazy when the kids were all living at home.  I took it personally - it felt like they didn't care about me or acknowledge my feelings.    But I don't think that is the case at all.   It really is not about me and has nothing to do with me.

Laundry is another thing that matters to me.    I know that Nick would do the laundry if he needed to or if I asked him to.  But again, I have made is mine.    I am very particular about how everything is folded and put away.    I know that as a teenager I was as sloppy as anyone.  But I also know that I made dividers in my dresser drawers to separate my socks from my underwear. My long sleeved shirts from short sleeved.     

 I used to make seven piles of clean laundry on the family room floor.   They were sorted by age.  And actually, each pile was sub-divided.  Socks;  underpants; undershirts; short sleeved shirts; long sleeved shirts; long pants and short pants.   With four sons all wearing the same type of socks it could be challenging.  So I used a sharpie and put their initials on the bottoms of their socks.   

And of course there were the diapers.  Cloth.   Washed three days a week.  Folded fresh and warm from the dryer.  If nothing else was done, by the end of the day there was clean laundry and a pile of fresh, white diapers.      On Fridays I tried to change beds and wash all of the sheets and towels so I wouldn't have anything to wash on the weekends.

I know that as a stay at home mother with a big tribe I got frustrated and overwhelmed.  Life would often get in the way.  One kid or another had an after school activity.  Someone would get hurt and need my lap, or kiss, or occasionally a trip to the hospital to have a bone set or get stitches .

And now it's just the two of us and Buddy the dog.  We make little bits of clutter here and there.  Magazines and newspapers pile up  My knitting spreads out around my chair.    Nick does the shopping.  I do the laundry.  Once a week now usually.  Two loads- one of dark and one of light clothes.   

With the pandemic now our calendar is practically empty.  No social get togethers.  No dinners with our monthly dinner group.  No in person La Leche League activities.    Nothing is really urgent - unless it is.    

I wrote a paper called "The Zen of Sweeping".  I hope I find it again one day.  It was a college paper in my Creative Writing class.  I was already staring to be an empty nester, so it was a reflection on being a mom .

I find myself feeling down a lot lately.  Depressed I suppose.  I am sure that the pandemic is a big contributor.  The self imposed isolation. And the reality of getting older that includes losing friends more and more often.   If I live long enough, like Nick's grandmother used to say, they will all be gone.

Having all of the kids here for Christmas was wonderful, exciting, exhausting and busy.  We ran the dishwasher three times a day.  Now we run it every other day.    How did we do it with all those kids and their friends?   I guess it helps that we were younger and more resilient.   

I used to sit on the floor just because.  No reason, I just did.  Often with kids climbing on me. Now, if I drop something on the floor, I have to decided how badly I want to pick it up.  Then I have to strategize How I will pick it up- or if it's even worth it! 

Oh, here's my last thing for today.  I gave everyone these sticky- slingshot type chickens as stocking stuffers.  The kids shot them all over and some stayed stuck to the ceiling .  Nick used a pole that is for changing lightbulbs and was able to reach and remove the chickens!

And then there's this!

 My passport is expiring in a few months, so we decided that I need to get a new one.

I went to the drug store Walgreens where they have a service of taking passport photos.  When I  first saw the picture, I thought it was really a pretty good picture.   And then, the more I look at it, the more I think about Erma Bombeck (1927-1996).  She was a writer and comedian.   She once said "if you look like your passport picture you are probably too sick to travel".

So, here I am.  I think look a lot like my grandmother

Let sleeping dogs lie.

        

I was working on changing the sheets on all of the beds - lots of beds.  Four beds upstairs were slept on and two in the basement.  Plus all of the towels. I had made a pile of the sheets and while I was doing other things Buddy decided that the sheets were there just for him to lie on.  He really has become our baby.   

When Buddy hurt himself in November we didn't know if he would ever walk normally again.  He's still a little bit wobbly and can't really go up and down steps.  He cannot jump up onto the couch or bed anymore.   

I've been feeling blue lately.  Friends dying.  Friends with cancer who are not likely to recover.  Pandemic.  Being overweight.   Aging.  Boredom maybe.

I knit which is something that is so good for me I am happy that I can do it.   And I just re-discovered making potholders.   

Two years into a global pandemic and the whole world has changed.  People have changed.  I miss people. I miss being able to eat in restaurants.   I miss meeting with friends and La Leche League meetings.

I do look forward to the world getting "back".   I want to travel and visit friends and family.     

One of these days.  I can't wait!

 

Snow

 It started snowing early this afternoon.  It was not cold enough for the roads to be treacherous yet, but now that the sun has set and temperatures are falling things will probably change.

There are predictions of a huge snow storm all along the Eastern seaboard of the US.    Austin is still here in Virginia with us, but he is planning to go home to Maine on Monday.  We'll see what he decides.

There is something about snow. It makes everything softer and quieter.   It is so pretty.   I don't even mind being cold when there's snow falling and on the ground.

I probably have more pictures of snow than anything- well maybe I have more sunset pictures.

My kids

 I think about my kids all the time.   I know, they are not kids any more.   They are all adults- in fact, three are in their 30s and two in their 40s.   I want to say "how did that happen?".   Of course I know how it happened.  Time keeps moving forward and all of us do too.    But that's not the "how" I marvel at and question.    It is the perpetual question about life and everything .  "How"  maybe "why".  Nobody knows the answers to those questions any more that they know why people and animals die.    

But back to the kids.   Every day I feel like I am composing letters.  I want to write a letter to each of them and try to explain how it feels to love so much and so hard and so unconditionally.  Each one of them.

They all have such amazing qualities and passions.   They understand things that I never will.  Just like I know and understand things that they will never know or understand.   

How do I explain how much I loved them even before I actually felt them flutter in my belly?  Knowing that a wanted life is growing inside is an amazing thing.  The babies I lost.  The ones I had.   

I remember Nick's mother talking about how she dreamed of her kids as little kids- around eight years old.  I get it.   In my heart they are all my babies and my children.  Little kids with skinned knees.   Hurt feelings.   Happy and sad.  I know that they remember everything differently than I do.  Sometimes it's frustrating to me when I feel like they blame me for things that I honestly don't even remember.    And I wonder if they remember good things.   Like playing with playdough on the kitchen table.   Finger painting and coloring with the plastic table cloth on the kitchen table to keep is somewhat clean.

Do they remember me sitting at my sewing machine and creating various Halloween costumes and costumes for comic-con?    I hope that those memories are somewhere in their busy life brains.

Nick and I often reflect on all the times we drove this one to one thing and that one to another.  Nick has driven to Ohio, Richmond  and Maine to help the kids out with their moves or other needs.    I have slept on a recliner in a hospital room to be make sure my adult son got the medical care and attention he needed.

I am not listing these things as something we need to be thanked for.  We did them willingly and with love.   Not obligation.  Giving as a gift of self the thinking of it as giving but just as being.

I've been thinking about writing this for a while now and I am not really sure I am articulating very well.

And life goes on

 Even after your friend dies, even when your parents die, even after you die, the world keeps turning and life goes on.    

This past week, another dear friend told me that she was recently diagnosed with stage 4 mantel cell, Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

I know that the longer I live life will be full of more and more loved ones and acquaintances dying.   I am right this minute feeling sad about it all.   Missing people who I was not ready to lose.   Are you ever ready to lose a loved one?   

It's funny to look at the differences between Nick and myself.  Here I sit at my keyboard looking at yarn and knitting projects.   Fabric too.   I ordered myself a potholder loom and loops this week.    I have not made potholders since I was around 10.  Yet somehow I want to do it again.

Nick on the other hand, looks at travel websites.   He books cruises, sometimes in his imagination and sometimes he gets all of the information and tells me in all seriousness what he wants to do and how he is planning it all out.    I know that he would like me to go.  I hope that I can join him soon.  But for now I am worried about Covid and traveling.  And I am content to stay home with Buddy, the dog, and knit and watch TV.    And honestly I look forward to being at home alone.   No, I don't want to get rid of Nick and I hope it doesn't sound that way.

Nick's parents did a lot of traveling after they retired.  They told Nick to travel while he is able to.   Yesterday Nick expressed it in a way that really hit home for me.  He said that when his mom was lying in that bed, dying, she would have loved to be able to just get up and travel just one more time.  I have to respect and honor that.    If it is that important to him then it is important to me too.

I saw this cartoon and sent it to Nick- he has printed it out:  

Meanwhile, I had a little bit of an epiphany  I feel the lack of grandchildren profoundly.   I know that it is not my children's job or responsibility to have children to make me happy.   But it occurred to me that while aging is a reality call that life ends for everyone. Grandchildren are an affirmation of life.    They are a positive and glowing light to is life itself.

I got this picture from my daughter in law, Kim.  It's me at Christmas time this year.  It's not necessarily a beauty shot, but I really like it.  I look my age, which is not quite old but definitely not at all young.   Leaning more toward old and probably what my grandchildren (if there are any) will remember me as.   

It strikes me funny when I think back to when I was a little kid how young my mother was.  I always thought she was so old.  But looking back, she was not.   When I was 43, my daughter's age now, I had a 20 year old adult child.   Amazing.   No, I do not have any regrets about having any of my children.  I only have regrets that I was not more kind and patient and didn't work harder at having fun!

And so it goes