hi-ber-nate (verb): to pass the winter in a dormant condition

I've been ruminating on the idea of what it truly means to hibernate, and it seems that it is not quite the simple withdrawn and shiftless act as it may initially appear, but in fact is quite complex and is an act of sheer will to survive. It is indeed an action, and winter can have a variety of definitions in any one persons life.

I have not written a post to this blog since the week of my dads funeral, which has now been 4 years. It doesn't seem that long, and it seems like an eternity. I can't believe all the things that have happened in 4 years...and all the things that have not happened. My mom has recovered she moved off the beloved farm, she had a heart attack, and then recovered again. I went through a divorce (which is surprisingly not unlike being tossed through a plate glass window, 100 stories off the ground). I moved from a large international company to a small local company. My daughter is now 4 years older. I am now 4 years wiser. I now have a dedicated art studio in my home, which still gets used more often for sorting laundry than creating masterpieces, but it is progress. It's all progress.

I tend to be a lick my wounds in private kind of person, and needed to grieve offline. Not unlike the bears that have crawled into a cave and dug deep into a frosty sleep, I needed these four years to transform. While hibernation is sedate, it is also an active means of functioning. The bears job is to live through the winter, sustain himself on what he already has, pull all he has close, and do without so that the spring is that much richer. Emerging from the cave is the reward for doing the work.

I've been spending time studying vintage images on Pinterest, the National Archive website, and picking up random photos of strangers at flea markets and estate sales and considering the idea of passage of time. I am absolutely fascinated by the human story that resonates through these photos from the Great Depression, the dust bowl, the Vietnam war, the roaring 20's, the swingin' 60's, the poor sharecropper to the glamorous showgirl. Vintage mugshots and photobooth images are especially interesting to me. The faces all have a story. Thousands of stories. Stories that are painful, and unique, hilarious, and familiar. My emotions in the last 4 years are perhaps not that different from the woman standing in a field in 1932; worried about her family, thinking about what she's going to make for supper, wondering why she was put here on this dusty earth, and hoping someone still finds her beautiful. There is a sameness that is haunting and refreshing, humbling and incredibly moving. I am so grateful to the photographers who had the insight to document these periods in our history, and capture the faces and scenes that make up the narrative of who we are as humanity.

I've decided to take these images as a point of inspiration, and try my hand at both painting and reinventing these images, as well as developing a fictional backstory to the character. This seems like a good forum to share those experiments. My good friends Mary and Sara have been the litmus test to most of my quirky tales to date. They have been with me on numerous occasions as I pull a photo from a random box while sitting on the floor of an off the beaten path antique shop, and usually with a snort and a chuckle, put the image in my "goody pile" of finds for the day. Yes, it's true, I have a whole box of accumulated strangers in my basement...well, ok, their photographs. Family is not immune to my character development, although I feel a bit more guilty turning great, great, grandpa into one of the seven deadly sins.

This is my favorite photo of my Grandma, Alida, circa 1936. I keep it in a frame on my desk. She looks so tired, but still has stockings on and her hair neatly pulled back. You can still see she is a striking woman. Three children already, most likely my mom in her belly, and my uncle picking his nose captured for posterity. How precious. They lived in the shack behind her in the photo, and probably had to come up with meals based on what she had in the garden, and had to buy the remainder of supplies with the pennies they didn't have in their pocket. She was a powerhouse. A fighter. Amazingly spiritual. Her strength still resonates through our blood. This one image is full of stories.

So, as we enter literal winter here in Wisconsin, I've given myself permission to take this time to be cozy. Read lots of books. Look at lots of photos. Daydream. Make up characters and the fiction behind them. Wonder. I'll be sharing that with you here through the coming months

Can You Hear the Laughter?

I stood at the end of the driveway on Tuesday, with my hands full of sympathy cards that I’d just pulled from my once lonely mailbox. I paused for a long time, reflecting on the events of the weekend. I buried my father. I had lived through the experience that I was sure I would not. I had walked through the pain of that day, and still I woke up in the morning. Life was somehow still going on all around me, but in my heart it felt like things had stopped. My grieving has been a long process, starting the day he was diagnosed with Stage 4 terminal prostate cancer. Coincidentally it was the same week that my precious daughter had her first birthday, an ironic scale and proportion that I always thought to be terribly unfair. I watched her grow, live, change, and of course get older. With every year that passed, and each new milestone that she reached in her spring blossom of life, my father was one step closer to his life falling into winter.

My father was a character! He had an infectious laugh that bubbled over, spilling into the room, starting with the twinkle in his beautiful blue eyes. I can still picture him walking into the kitchen on a cold day with his clunky boots untied. He’d stick his chilly fingers on the back of my neck just to hear me scream, and then of course came the laugh. The warm, loving, gentle embrace of his laugh. Like invisible arms wrapping all around you.

He was a generous soul. He loved the ones he loved. He was a private person, and a proud man. He was a fabulous craftsman and woodworker, and gave away many pieces to those that admired his work. He could never sell something he made; he just didn’t feel right about it for some reason. He was not particularly religious, but he did carry spirituality about him, especially in his later years. He softened. He found joy. He loved to share the fruits of his labor, in the most literal sense of the word! He finally had the land, the time, and the patience to have a strawberry patch. One year he single handedly picked over 55 gallon pails of berries, and gave them away. He said it was his cool drink of water.

I was told many times throughout his passing, he was a man among men. It was beautiful for us, his daughters, to hear all the ways he touched the lives of those around him. Some of the stories we knew, some we didn’t. There are a million stories of my own that I could share about my father, but I do have a favorite.

My father was a foreman at a large national meatpacking plant. I suppose my Dad represented “the man” for a percentage of the employees. One summer, he was dealing with a particularly hostile situation with one person. My Dad walked to work, and this gentleman met him just off company property with a baseball bat at the end of a shift. We were living under the veil of threat, never really knowing if something would happen. Thankfully, nothing ever did.

That summer, one hot evening just before dusk, I was with my Dad as he worked in the front yard. A baby mourning dove came bouncing down from the birch tree landing not more than 2 feet behind him. My Dad was so surprised, he held out his hand and it crawled right up into his palm. His big soft heart melted on the spot. The baby was still covered in down, fresh from the nest, and it looked up into my Dads eyes; they shared a common wonder about one another. It began to sing, and coo, telling my Dad all its secrets, locked deep in sweet conversation. It proceeded to crawl up my Dad’s arm resting sleepily on his shoulder. My Dad tried several times to put him back on the lower branches of the tree, and each time the baby would fly back to him. Insistent and determined not be without its new friend. The sun was going down, and my Dad couldn’t bear the thought of his new playmate being left out in the grass vulnerable to whatever may find it there. So he took off his hat, which was he could rarely be found without, and placed his new baby into the makeshift cradle and brought it inside for the night. The next morning, he put the baby outside and it flew away.

I’ve often wondered if that little bird was his guardian angel. My Dad wondered that too. That experience changed us both, and was something special that we shared. We didn’t talk about the significance of that event in our lives, but we both knew.

I held the cards in my hands, feeling the paper and the weight of the messages within. Something caused me to stop, and turn around. The leaves on the curb behind me started to dance and slide down the pavement. Twirling, tumbling, making music on the concrete as they floated towards me. Wrapping around my feet, greeting me softly, comforting me. It was like they had been pushed into the air by a gust of spontaneous energy. Like the beating of a heart, the flap of a wing, the whisper of a loved one. I could almost hear the warm, sweet laughter.

I miss you Daddy.

The Perfect Slice

Do you remember those choose your own adventure books from when you were a kid? I loved those books, the possibilities were seamlessly endless. The princess runs off with the pirate. A magic spell is broken. The mystery is solved. Although I have to admit I often cheated, scanning ahead to see which combination would bring about the storyline that I found most appealing. Sometimes I wish that I could apply one of those books to life, to look ahead and pick the chapters that make me the happiest. But life isn’t like that. Brilliant observation, I know.

As I wrote in my earlier posts, my mom survived a ruptured aneurysm this summer. After intensive care, post surgical recovery, time in a nursing home, and then moving in with me for a short while she is finally “recovered”. What I haven’t told you is that my father is also dying. He was diagnosed with Stage 4 prostate cancer in 2003, and on top of that this past November suffered a stroke. While my mom improves, my dad is slipping away. The intersection of their respective situations is moving, perplexing, and fills me with emotions that I can’t reach yet.

My sisters and I put our lives on hold this summer to care for both of our parents, and it has been the hardest summer of my life. We’ve been living with cancer as a family for 5 years . . . and you do live with it as a family. It has affected most of the decisions I’ve made, and it has changed the dynamic of our family tremendously. Every moment, every holiday, every experience feels like it has potential to be “the last”. Then this happened to my mom. What I thought was the worst thing that could ever happen to me, losing my father, was trumped by the sudden and almost fatal loss of my mother. It has left me grappling for answers, for which there is no good response. Searching for reasons in the dark universe. Like pulling on a loose string, unraveling more questions with each tug. The biggest question of all, at least for me as it relates to this experience is, “What am I supposed to learn from this?” I hope that it is the realigning of my compass; putting me on the right path to the person I’m supposed to be.

I grew up in an extremely creative family. Both of my parents were saturated with artistic talent. Through the years, due to health and age, both of them have been robbed of the things they love to do. My mom lost a significant portion of her eyesight to macular degeneration. No longer able to sew, paint, or read her books. My dad finally realized his dream of the perfect workshop, now left to sit and look at it out the window crippled by his disease. It reminds me of that Twilight Zone episode with Burgess Meredith, ‘Time Enough at Last’ from 1959. A humble bank teller and book lover that finds himself the last man on earth after a nuclear war. He has all the time in the world now to read his precious books, but he breaks his glasses, and is left alone and without a means to access his passion. To quote his character, "That's not fair... that's not fair at all... There was time now.... There was all the time I needed! It's not fair". (Check out this link for the full episode) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6ClcI5nTs8

Is it ever the right time? Is there ever enough time? What does it take to inspire change? I’ve been thinking a lot about life, and it’s either my love of all things baked (I never met a donut I didn’t like), or it’s the years I’ve spent in an administrative role . . . but lately I’ve been looking at life like a pie chart. This percentage is spent on working to make a living or going through college, this percentage is spent growing up, this percentage is spent on responsibilities and obligations that are outside of our control. When do you get to that awesome perfect slice? Warm from the oven with a side of vanilla ice cream . . . when things are just as you want them to be. The part where the worries are small, the joys are large, the time is plentiful to do whatever fulfills you the most. There is urgency in my soul that has never been there before. An overwhelming fear that I’ll put off my goals and dreams too long.

I’m ready for a new pie . . . and a good book. If I don’t like the ones that life is serving up, I guess it’s up to me to bake my own, and write the chapters for myself. It’s true, some of the magic is already broken, and some of the mysteries are already solved . . . but there are more adventures, and there are more questions in need of answers. This time I get to be the pirate.

Stuck in Traffic

One thing that you should know about me, is that I am "navigationally challenged". I am a traditionalist when I drive, and straying from my known means of passage gets me a bit flustered. Actually, it makes me panic. Cold sweats, nausea, hot back . . . the works. I was once asked to drive to downtown Chicago for work, and it was like being asked to swim with sharks, set myself on fire, or drive nails into my own kneecaps. I might add, all those options sounded better than driving to Chicago. My sister, being a very smart woman and problem solver, bought me a Garmin 2 years ago and I can honestly say that it was like being given my freedom. While I can't say that I am now wildly spontaneous, it does give me some sense of power to go off in uncharted territory more than I ever would have. My husband on the other hand is a human compass. He could find his way out of Siberia after being dropped in blindfolded under the cloak of darkness, severely malnourished, with a pack of ninjas trying to prevent his escape. It could happen . . . I hear there are a lot of ninja's in Siberia these days . . . hanging around in packs . . . probably at Starbucks. But I digress, my point here is that driving somewhere new and alone for me is usually a stressful experience.

This week I needed to drive to Vernon County and take my mom to her first surgical follow-up appointment (which went very well by the way!). My usual route north along Highway 14 has a serious detour this summer, so I opted to take a different course. I plugged in my trusty Garmin and set off on my adventure. The day was hazy and there were frequent downpours along the way. Then a funny thing started to happen, my Garmin continued to re-route me right back to Highway 14! I'm not familiar enough with this new route to simply ignore my navigator, and I could feel myself getting more and more anxious with every mile. My husband can attest to this as I called him several times asking "Do I really turn here?!? What's wrong with this thing!?!" . . . he reminded me that I could always read a map. Funny.

It struck me how much this parallels other life journeys. The "easy" path is always the one we are the most familiar with, even if it isn't the best route, takes longer, is full of potholes, detours, and delays. While there might not be a Garmin trying to pull us back to our old comfortable traffic pattern, it is pretty easy to return to a well worn trail. My mom is going to experience this now as she is officially a "non-smoker" after 50 years!

I stuck to my guns, swallowed hard, and kept pressing on down the highway, reminding myself that I would not actually fall off the face of the earth. Then I started to relax. Then I started to look beyond the road signs and see the most beautiful farms you could ever hope to see on a Wisconsin skyline. Pristine whitewashed barn doors. Time weathered silos against the misty corn fields. Rows of round hay bales, lined up and ready to be spun into gold. I came upon the windmills in Montfort, and they turned silently in the fog like ghosts in the sky. I could feel my pulse start to slow down, I turned on the radio, and enjoyed the rest of the drive.

I ended up at my destination, the rain stopped, and the sun peeked out from behind the clouds. It was kind of like a pat on the back for a job well done. A high five from above. A smile at the finish line.

I finally did drive myself to Chicago by the way, what a great city, I can't wait to do it again! Change is hard, but it's worth trying things another way sometimes. You just never know what you'll miss if you are stuck in the same old traffic jam.

Taking Flight

I don't think I'm unlike many women who walk through their busy lives, going about the daily business and wake up one day wondering . . . does this world intend more for me? My thirties have been difficult years, but I believe these are my teaching years, preparing me to come into my best self. It seems that I've spent endless hours in my own mind searching for the person that I'm meant to be. For years now, I've longed to live a more creative daily experience. Now is the time to be intentional about putting that into motion, and being the catalyst for my own change.

On July 1st, my beloved mother suffered an abdominal aortic aneurysm rupture. In a moment, life changed. She beat all the odds, and survived after a med-flight, surgery, and multiple days in intensive care. This beautiful woman, who I naively believed like a child would always be there, was nearly lost. Reality strikes again! As she is now recovering, we've had many conversations about things yet to accomplish. She's not done yet, and I know that I need to get moving too. It's time to become the person I want to be, instead of just wanting that to be true. I have a daughter of my own, and want to give her my best self, she deserves nothing less. My sister has been saying recently, you need to put your own oxygen mask on first. Great advice.

If my father is the body; the mechanics, the muscle, the frame, drive, the practical needs, ambition, life moving forward with the ground under my sturdy feet . . .

Then my mother must surely be the soul. The air in my lungs, the blood, the beat of my heart. Inspiration, music, prose. She is the warmth of the sun. She is the fresh smell of the earth. She is the light, the laughter, and the truth. She is the magnificent roar of angel wings in my ear. She is the golden thread of love that binds all things, knows all things, and sweetens my past, present, and future.

I spent the day yesterday celebrating my 10 year wedding anniversary at Sundara Spa. This is one of my favorite destinations, and always find a day of relaxation and meditation tremendously healing. I am fortunate to be married to a man who can appreciate this as well. I picked up a copy of Artful Blogging to read while lounging, and was inspired by the artist who have already taken this leap of art faith. I thought that this might be a good forum for me too, documenting the journey I'm on and keep me moving in the right direction. Fasten your seat belts, engines are now engaged . . .