SILVER LININGS AND POTS OF GOLD AT THE END OF THE RAINBOW

Ok, I will not lie.  I should be studying Mendelian genetics, epistasis and other patterns of genomic inheritance.  I know this.  My professor giving the exam Monday knows this.  My husband (yes, my husband... yes, I'm pretty sure I did mention it somewhere) would know it as well if I weren't over here pretending that I was studying avidly.  So please don't make me feel more guilty than I already do even contemplating writing this. But as you all are well aware (and if for some reason you missed my previous muse on this topic, you can brush up in Part One here) when turmoil arises; when strong emotions arise; even when overwhelming indigestion arises, I find my center in words.  

4 years and one week ago I posted a blog about the roller-coaster of life.  And it hit me tonight, as I read the words of my 36-year-old self, how much we grow, and how much life continually teaches us if we actually bother to listen to the lessons and search for the silver linings hidden in the adversities we face.  That woman writing 4 years ago had an inkling of how her mother's illness would change her.  She had already begun re-evaluating life, making changes, starting to live actively rather than passively.  But she could never have guessed that out of such a cloud of grief and heartbreak that was the illness consuming her mother, there could be hidden a beautiful lining of silver.  Maybe she wasn't supposed to know.  Perhaps it would have been easier in some ways if she could have guessed. Perhaps it wouldn't have made the slightest bit of difference.  But today, as my 40-year-old self had a conversation with a new acquaintance about the deep lessons of life, I was able to articulate to her just how powerful it is to know that out of adversity can come things that may never have come otherwise.  

A case in point: my father.  Dad and I have always had a rocky relationship with a seemingly impenetrable wall that kept us from having a really meaningful relationship.  Perhaps it was the impasse in our ideologies and our collective stubborn inability to let go of differences in life philosophy, religion and politics.  Maybe we just didn't know how to find common ground upon which to relate to each other.  Whatever the reason, I never imagined having a truly meaningful relationship with my father.  A sad thing to admit, but the truth nonetheless.  

And then one day - I believe it was not long after I took Roy down to Florida to meet everyone for the first time - my phone rang and it was my father.  My heart immediately hit my stomach, because I knew something was wrong.  For my dad to call me, out of the blue, most certainly meant something at least close to approaching bad.  The first words of my mouth were along the lines of, "Dad? What is wrong? What happened?"  "What?" he said, "Can't I just call to see how my daughter is doing?"

For the first time in my memory, my dad called just to talk.  To actually talk.  To me.  And not even about anything in particular.  I kept waiting for the motive to reveal itself, but it never did.  The phone call simply was. 

And in the intervening years, the phone calls became more and more frequent and amicable as we actually began really talking TO each other - not AT each other.  The more my mother slipped away from us, the more I found solace in my connection with him.  He knew.  We shared that great love for my mom, each in our own way, but each as powerful and true as the other.  We finally shared that common ground, my mother being the platform upon which our relationship was sown.  It is a gift that I may have never found if we had not ever had to lose my mother.

4 years ago I wrote:

One of my aunts cares for her [my grandmother] every day and she has one of the most beautiful attitudes of acceptance about it that I've ever heard. I'm sure that she went through this initial roller-coaster of emotions, but it is the place she is on the other side that I look at and hold up as a light. My aunt said to me, when talking about it, that even though her mother doesn't know who she is, she is one of the neatest old women she knows and she loves being with her. I can't wait to reach that point, because just thinking of that inevitability - acknowledging that my mother, the woman who holds me always as her child, who knows all the countless hurts and boo boo's, the childhood triumphs, the only person in the world who holds my entire existence in her mind and heart, will look at me one day in the not-to-distant future and not see ME...

I wanted to find that place, but I couldn't imagine getting from there to here. Mom died August 8th, almost 2 months ago. And the most precious moments I carry with me are those moments when I did make it to the other side. Those moments when my mother looked at me, as I helped her in the bathroom, and said thank you. That moment when I fixed a long towel around her neck because she wanted a cape and she looked me in the eye and asked, "Does your mother know where you are?"

"Yes, she does," I replied, "and she wouldn't want me anywhere else."

"Really?"

"Yes.  And in fact you look just like my mother."

"I do?"

"I think maybe you may be even a little more beautiful than her."

Remembering how my mom lit up, as she always had when I paid her compliments, how she laughed and said, "Noooooo" in a way that meant, "Really? I am?"  Remembering each smile that I could drag out of her, every single laugh, and knowing that even though she didn't know who I was that she at least really liked me... I realize that I made it to the other side.  The side that holds the joy in each moment of being able to help her, and hold her, and give back to her even just a fraction of what she gave to me.  That moment when she curled up on the couch in my arms like one of my own children, cape intact, and finally slept, when I could just hope that my arms were giving her a much-needed sense of peace and security and wish that I never had to let go.  I realize I made it.

Dad came to visit this weekend, and for the first time in 4 years, my kids got to be with their grandpa again, even for just a short time.  And for the first time in his memory, Kellen actually got to meet his grandpa and have the gift of falling in love with him - something he has missed being the youngest grandchild shoved away by a devastating illness that he cannot understand.  And I got to hang with my dad, just he and I, and take him to visit our close friends who remind me so much of the close friends my parents had all their lives.  And when I hugged him tonight and watched him drive away, to begin the last leg of his journey north on to my brother's house, I was shocked by the tightening in my heart, not knowing when I will get to see him again.  And realizing that I am at a place I never imagined I'd be in my life - a place where I actually miss being with him.  Perhaps one might look at this and ask was the silver lining worth the cost of the cloud from which it came, but I prefer to think of it as a silver lining that ensures that the cloud was not in vain. 

And I have no doubt that I will eventually find that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, either.

RITUALS

My mom and I had a ritual when I would visit my parents in their St. Augustine home.  Every morning, early, while the tide was low and everyone slept, we would slip off to the beach near their home, to walk together, collect garbage and search for shells.  Our route, at minimum, was 2 hours long, sometimes 3 if we happened upon large pockets of shells or tidal pools to distract us.  Over the 4 years that I visited her after her diagnosis, this was our ritual, and one that we talked about every phone call in between those visits.  

Last year she stopped walking with me as it became overwhelming and physically taxing.  But this last trip, the day before we left, 2 days before she died, I went on one last beachwalk, dragging her in my heart as I followed our route and searched for her.  The picture at the top of the my blog is from that last morning beachwalk and a day like the day I describe in my poem.  It is a very rough draft, but it has been niggling at me for two years now.  I guess having the shell in the poem actually reside back with me now has prompted this need to write about the moment.

So this may change drastically in the weeks/months to come, or it may not, one never knows.  Usually the end product is very different from the original, but even an imperfect piece of work needs to be shared should the opportunity never arise to perfect it.

THE CONCH

I walk ahead a little ways, scouting,

the surf frothy as whipped cream on hot chocolate

as the wind pounds the water down towards our feet.

It is warm, but you are wrapped tightly against the chill

you cannot seem to fight off anymore,

anxious as a child and pulling back from the water that creeps up

as the tide brings in the rising sun.

This week our beach walks have been full of conchs,

the only ones that really matter now -  the holy grail

of these early morning shell hunters we have become.

This is not a walk you want to be on anymore -

I know this, but this walk is my selfish salvation,

to be filed into my archive of memories;

one last attempt to stop time and just be with you

because I know the archive will soon be complete.

I loop my arm through yours, and we walk slowly,

scanning the water’s edge

as the surf marches in constant rhythm of attack and retreat,

looking for those telltale signs of the shell.

I encourage you to look, though you don’t really know

how to find them anymore, going through the motions

perhaps because you sense my necessity.

Tiny black conch after tiny black conch, charcoal

and beautiful, our bag is full of them

and you tell me how you wish you could find one.

Though we walked this path yesterday,

there is no evidence that we existed in this place at all,

as tomorrow we will again exist anew
when we walk this path once more.

The water pulls out and I see the division of sea, water

rushing out around something substantial,

and in the brilliance of the pink and orange sun

reflecting off the sand and the object

I guess that it is what you seek.

“Mom, look, go see what that is,” I tell you,

pointing towards the edge and gently guiding you to it

as you struggle to see what I see.

You bend down, hands shaking with palsy

and pull the dark shell like a child,

eyes wide and face ecstatic as the conch emerges,

perfect, slate grey and flawless, and

larger than both your hands put together.

“Oh Mom, look what you found!” I whispered,

for it suddenly seemed a moment as reverent

as any to be found in a church.

“I can’t believe it,” your words slur as your brain

struggles to put them together in the right order

and you clutch the shell tightly to your chest.

“Thank you,” you smile and we set off again,

my arm through yours as you hold this treasure,

determined to finish our habitual route even though

the prize we sought has already been found.

And when we turn and head back we see our prints

already being erased by the rising tide,  

the shell and our memories – the ones I hold for you,

the only evidence that we ever existed here.

- C. Black Johnson

Sept. 18, 2011

Honest, constructive criticism is always appreciated!  (you english people know who you are.)

"The wound is the place where the light enters you." -- Rumi.

My last chance at sleeping in and here I sit, too early in the morning to even think about looking in the mirror, let alone brushing my teeth.  So yes, the dragon breath is mine.  It seems there is no rest when the words kick up like a mad tornado in my head.  I often wish I had some sort of pensieve so that I could simply draw them out like so many strands and deposit them in a dish for later evaluation and revision.  But alas, they haven't invented that yet, so I just need to type fast and capture as many of the thoughts I can.

These posts, they come on the heels of so much grief that it is even hard for me to find the humor that typically gets me through the rough patches.  Bear with me, I am certain they will get less heavy as time progresses and I will find my voice again.  It may be a little deeper, but surely it won't have completely lost its mirth.  Life's too short not to laugh about it, I think.

Yesterday, when I started to write, I was thinking about the ways in which I have defined myself, and my life.  I got part way there when I found some other path and completely forgot where I was supposed to be going in the first place.  Go figure... it must have been the valium (and yes, it is a valid prescription which I take AS PRESCRIBED by my doctor to make sure that I actually do get out of bed in the mornings.  Just a shame I don't stay there a bit longer).

For the past month, I've found myself defining myself in terms of my mother.  I feel compelled, when I talk to anyone about my career path, to mention that I am going into Alzheimer's research, and, oh, my mom died from it.  Everything I am right now, it is from the perspective of my mother's role in my life.  It is odd - I did not expect this.  I am my mother's avenger, I am my mother's keeper, I am my mother's memory.  The only thing I could not be for her was her angel of mercy.  But that is another story entirely.

I did not know that grief could effect one like this.  I have lost people I loved and I have certainly been challenged in ways I think is really slightly unfair for just one person, if I do say so myself.  But at the end of the night, I close my eyes and I just pray for the strength to get through this - all of these things that seemed to culminate in my life in a single moment.  I will bear it, like I will bear anything I need to, because I can and that is who I am.  I am my mother's daughter afterall.  But I am simply ready for the light to enter this wound, and begin filling it with something other than this heaviness I feel.

Ann and Carrie Ann, Christmas 1971

Ann and Carrie Ann, Graduation 6/1988

I know I am not the first person to feel this, and work through this, and I will certainly not be the last.  It happens that I lost my heart's closest friend the same week I lost my mother and those two things together have dropped me to my knees.  The pain of Kellen's struggles culminating almost in unison almost seem to much to bear.  And these tears, and these words, they make me feel weak, but they are the only way I know how to find my strength again.  Even if there isn't a soul that reads them, when I write, therefore I AM.  And right now I need that reassurance.

DISCORDANCE

I should not be sitting here doing this.  In fact, I should still be in bed, Saturday morning, and my chance to recenter (in bed, sleeping… yes, this does help me recenter).  But this morning as I lay in bed with a small dog on my head, it was words that swirled around in my brain, not letting me rest.  I know I am in a time of discordance when the words won’t stop forming themselves into sentences because words are my solace when I have nothing else to turn to.

And if I am not in bed, then I should be doing one of the million other things that hang over me like the sword of Damocles, but instead of being paralyzed by fortune, I am simply paralyzed, afraid to move for fear that the balance will tip and the sword will fall and I will lose my precarious grasp on sanity.

These past few years have been a time of self-reckoning, a time of self-discovery, and a time of redefinition.  For those of you who followed Part One of this crazy adventure you know that I have maintained radio silence for a bit.

When I decided to become a full-time student over a year ago, I did not realize just how little time I would have for self-maintenance, let alone how I would again lose my words. My words were replaced by textbooks full of mitochondria, cells, chemical equations, logarithms and dead frogs. I am pursuing my passion of science, have discovered a great love of math, and generally am finally paying homage to my penchant for researching anything and everything I find of interest. For the past year, I have redefined myself in terms of my intelligence – something which I have never acknowledged or realized – as future Alzheimer’s researcher, as a woman who has the ability, the capacity, and the gumption to make a huge contribution to the world, so that others may not have to go down the path of hell that my family and so many families have gone done with this disease broadly categorized as Dementia in its many forms.

In just over a month, I have yet again been forced to redefine myself. This time, though, I do it in a way that I never anticipated and that I am having difficulty understanding on an emotional level. Intellectually, I understand it, but I am unsettled by it. I find myself defining myself in terms of my mother’s death, and her life. Beverly Ann Black was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s about 6 years ago at the age of 55. It changed my life in ways that I could never have imagined, and which I have explored to some extent in my previous blogs. On July 20th of this year, on my parent’s 43rd anniversary, my boyfriend of several years, Roy, and I exchanged vows with each other in a very small, private ceremony. I talked to her the day before, one of the last conversations I had with her, and told her that I was getting married the next day, on her anniversary. She whispered into the phone, 12 hours from me, “Isn’t that something?” and then she told me she loved me. As sick as she was, she somehow could always get those words out to me.

That night of my wedding, my father called to tell me that my mother was in the hospital. The next day, she was evaluated and admitted to hospice care at her sister’s home. One week before the end of my summer Chemistry class I took an incomplete, missed the final and drove to Florida to curl up beside my mother and whisper stories in her ear as she lay dying. Sometimes, as brand newborns, babies will smile and we quite often say it is just involuntary movement; reflex. I’ve always liked to think, though, that somehow they are responding to the contentedness and peace they feel, even if it isn’t a conscious thing. And as I whispered to my mom, holding her hand and resting my head in the crook of her neck, every smile that came, though her eyes were looking somewhere far ahead to a place I could not see, I liked to think that somehow those words, and my presence, gave her a peace when she smiled, much like those newborns.

Life forced me back home August 7th and at a little after one in the afternoon on August 8th, my mom finally left go. She had the gift she had always dreamed of – her siblings, her husband, her children and her grandchildren were all with her in the room the day before she died. If there is one thing that I will always regret it is missing being with her in those last moments but she knew that I had come. At least, I have that.

Two weeks later, a new semester has started and my physiology, genetics and pre-calculus classes wait for no man (or woman). K again had a rough transition going from summer to school and after a mad jump from a moving car after declaring he wanted to kill himself instead of going to school, and several days of physically manhandling him into school, my days have been spent rearranging life to try to get him the help he needs to find his center. They are filled with days of appointments, class, mad dashes to and from schedules, and, of all things, Special Olympics bowling team practice. He is blessed to have a bowling partner who is so similar to him it isn’t funny (except that his buddy seems to lack the pyromaniac gene, thank god). To see him finally interact with someone his own age, who gets him… it is a gift that soothes my heart.

Special Olympics Bowling Team Partners

To top it all off, Roy and I have a contract on a new home and hope to be moving at the end of September. It will give us the space our family needs to spread out and find ourselves as individuals as we move through this hectic time.

It is only with the love and support of a few close friends and my husband that I have managed to stay upright (sometimes kicking and screaming, but every once in awhile every one needs a little tough love). I could not survive this somewhat sanely without their love and care and I am amazed every day at the guardian angel who seems to make sure that at the times I feel I can handle no more, I find the strength.

These words, these memories, they are my therapy, and between the 6am swim practices, the bowling practices, the volleyball and archery practices, the homework, classes, and house packing, I will somehow find the time to capture the stories and the memories so that, when I begin forgetting, I can always find them again.