Sunday, January 15, 2012
streetrap: TO SIT OR NOT TO SIT, THAT'S THE QUESTION
streetrap: TO SIT OR NOT TO SIT, THAT'S THE QUESTION: Fessing up to reading my parent's copy of the latest AARP newletter is not the most embarrassing admission of the day. The fact that I was ...
TO SIT OR NOT TO SIT, THAT'S THE QUESTION
Fessing up to reading my parent's copy of the latest AARP newletter is not the most embarrassing admission of the day. The fact that I was seated, while reading, is the most heinous fact...or so the AARP article would have me believe. The title was something like, "Sitting--the New Smoking !" I am only slightly paraphrasing,here.
Puleeze...Now, even sitting is a sin.
Gimme a break, people. Do we have to resort to the lowest common denominator? Always? Just to gather readers' attention? It's bad enough reading the local rags and seeing the Republican races, let alone how many things are eventually going to do me in. (The Republicans may actually accomplish the task.) Now, I find that I've permanently damaged what few years may be left, because of my writers' "lifestyle"--or my hours of painting--or my past-- as a teacher and a social worker and a group leader of children.
(I won't include the hours on the toilet...or sitting in a bathtub...or at meals...or a childhood in school behind a desk or in church, in a pew...or visiting relatives and "being quiet and good", on their various over-stuffed furniture.)
According to AARP, we should now begin to set up desks over our treadmills (those of us lucky enough to own treadmills at home or lucky enough to pay for the extra electricity to run the treadmill...). We should eat standing up. At our jobs (if we are lucky enough to have them), we should get up at least every hour and take a "small walking break". Forget lunch, unless you can scarf it in an upright position and then use most of the lunch hour (those of us who get a full hour for lunch--as a teacher, we get maybe twenty-minutes, if no one stops us en route to the restroom or lunch room or even interrupts us in our own classroom where we are trying to log in grades, answer e-mails AND drink coffee or assimilate an apple.) walking what you ate, off.
No t.v., unless you are rowing or running in place. No seated phone calls, cellular or otherwise. Family meals should be served upright, too, and probably end with a family run, instead of dessert. Two hour movies are out. Unless you are watching somewhere you can pause the film after fifty minutes and take a race around the block, then resume another fifty minute session. Speaking of sessions, what about therapy?
Yes, I know, most sessions begin and end in about forty-five minutes, these days, but if you are doing some group work, it is longer. I guess those sessions should be done on elliptical machines, in a circle. Same with couples counseling; interventions and all scout meetings.
Many prayer groups are either on their knees or worshipping on their feet, these days; swaying and raising your arms high over your head keeps the prayers aerobic, so that's okay. But if you are old and just sitting in a church or synagogue or any house of God, in silent adoration, you are incurring the equivalent of those folks smoking their lungs out in the parking lots, before services. (Bad, bad, bad parishioner!)
I think of the monks and nuns I know who meditate, in various spiritual and philosophic traditions. These folks are the epitome of discipline. They eat spartan diets. They work in gardens, in abbeys, and in the community, all day. They don't use any kinds of luxury items in their lifestyles. But when they sit to meditate, they do so, for hours at a time. (Never mind the week-long retreats a few times a year!) Does this mean they are all on the road to early death?
You think I'm being facetious? You think that the article meant if one was a total couch potato and NEVER excercised, for weeks at a time, or years, even, then this would apply to that person. Or, if someone was not enrolled in a gym, or walking the family dog, or running a marathon a couple times a year, this would be geared to that kind of lard-butt, right? Oh no! The article goes on to mention the facts that this study took everything into consideration and found that even if you got the requisite hour of excercise in for three days a week, which is a general rule of thumb, or if you were a gym rat, it didn't matter.
If you drive to work, if you sit at a desk, if you remain seated at all meals or movies or read a book on the beach for more than fifty minutes at a time, you are doomed. You might as well be driving over the state border into New Hampshire to buy your cigarettes, tax free.
(I think about airline pilots. (Stewards are on their feets the whole flight, so no worries, but the pilots...) I think about bus drivers. Taxi drivers. Those of us who commute to work more than fifty-minutes per day (on good days with light traffic...). I think of search and rescue drivers, helicopter pilots and co-pilots, ambulance operators...anyone whose situation puts them in a "seat" where they don't have an option to take a five minute "break" every hour...).
What about people in wheelchairs?
Babies in strollers?
Farm workers on tractors or other big equipment operators?
Does this mean that we are all going to die?
Probably.
But isn't that how it is supposed to be? There's built-in time codes for everything on the planet, including the planet, itself, I believe. Does becoming a human hamster on a never-ending wheel mean that the planet will begin to host "layers" of hundred- plus year old humans? Will we be stacked on each other and roving over each other like colonies of bees, ants, roaches or other "never sitting" things?
How long do those creatures last? Compared to tortoises...hmmm. (But I guess tortoises never really "sit", do they?)
While I like the fact that AARP is so concerned for us "over fifties"--I would appreciate if they spent more time reminding Congress and the entire political system, that what we really need are jobs; better medical systems; more open minds and bigger hearts. Freaking us out about the stress relief that we do manage to garner, in our fractured lives, just isn't all that helpful. (What about last year's advice about "SLOW DOWN AND BREATHE"...or "learn to meditate and live longer"...?
But what do I know; I'm sitting down.
Puleeze...Now, even sitting is a sin.
Gimme a break, people. Do we have to resort to the lowest common denominator? Always? Just to gather readers' attention? It's bad enough reading the local rags and seeing the Republican races, let alone how many things are eventually going to do me in. (The Republicans may actually accomplish the task.) Now, I find that I've permanently damaged what few years may be left, because of my writers' "lifestyle"--or my hours of painting--or my past-- as a teacher and a social worker and a group leader of children.
(I won't include the hours on the toilet...or sitting in a bathtub...or at meals...or a childhood in school behind a desk or in church, in a pew...or visiting relatives and "being quiet and good", on their various over-stuffed furniture.)
According to AARP, we should now begin to set up desks over our treadmills (those of us lucky enough to own treadmills at home or lucky enough to pay for the extra electricity to run the treadmill...). We should eat standing up. At our jobs (if we are lucky enough to have them), we should get up at least every hour and take a "small walking break". Forget lunch, unless you can scarf it in an upright position and then use most of the lunch hour (those of us who get a full hour for lunch--as a teacher, we get maybe twenty-minutes, if no one stops us en route to the restroom or lunch room or even interrupts us in our own classroom where we are trying to log in grades, answer e-mails AND drink coffee or assimilate an apple.) walking what you ate, off.
No t.v., unless you are rowing or running in place. No seated phone calls, cellular or otherwise. Family meals should be served upright, too, and probably end with a family run, instead of dessert. Two hour movies are out. Unless you are watching somewhere you can pause the film after fifty minutes and take a race around the block, then resume another fifty minute session. Speaking of sessions, what about therapy?
Yes, I know, most sessions begin and end in about forty-five minutes, these days, but if you are doing some group work, it is longer. I guess those sessions should be done on elliptical machines, in a circle. Same with couples counseling; interventions and all scout meetings.
Many prayer groups are either on their knees or worshipping on their feet, these days; swaying and raising your arms high over your head keeps the prayers aerobic, so that's okay. But if you are old and just sitting in a church or synagogue or any house of God, in silent adoration, you are incurring the equivalent of those folks smoking their lungs out in the parking lots, before services. (Bad, bad, bad parishioner!)
I think of the monks and nuns I know who meditate, in various spiritual and philosophic traditions. These folks are the epitome of discipline. They eat spartan diets. They work in gardens, in abbeys, and in the community, all day. They don't use any kinds of luxury items in their lifestyles. But when they sit to meditate, they do so, for hours at a time. (Never mind the week-long retreats a few times a year!) Does this mean they are all on the road to early death?
You think I'm being facetious? You think that the article meant if one was a total couch potato and NEVER excercised, for weeks at a time, or years, even, then this would apply to that person. Or, if someone was not enrolled in a gym, or walking the family dog, or running a marathon a couple times a year, this would be geared to that kind of lard-butt, right? Oh no! The article goes on to mention the facts that this study took everything into consideration and found that even if you got the requisite hour of excercise in for three days a week, which is a general rule of thumb, or if you were a gym rat, it didn't matter.
If you drive to work, if you sit at a desk, if you remain seated at all meals or movies or read a book on the beach for more than fifty minutes at a time, you are doomed. You might as well be driving over the state border into New Hampshire to buy your cigarettes, tax free.
(I think about airline pilots. (Stewards are on their feets the whole flight, so no worries, but the pilots...) I think about bus drivers. Taxi drivers. Those of us who commute to work more than fifty-minutes per day (on good days with light traffic...). I think of search and rescue drivers, helicopter pilots and co-pilots, ambulance operators...anyone whose situation puts them in a "seat" where they don't have an option to take a five minute "break" every hour...).
What about people in wheelchairs?
Babies in strollers?
Farm workers on tractors or other big equipment operators?
Does this mean that we are all going to die?
Probably.
But isn't that how it is supposed to be? There's built-in time codes for everything on the planet, including the planet, itself, I believe. Does becoming a human hamster on a never-ending wheel mean that the planet will begin to host "layers" of hundred- plus year old humans? Will we be stacked on each other and roving over each other like colonies of bees, ants, roaches or other "never sitting" things?
How long do those creatures last? Compared to tortoises...hmmm. (But I guess tortoises never really "sit", do they?)
While I like the fact that AARP is so concerned for us "over fifties"--I would appreciate if they spent more time reminding Congress and the entire political system, that what we really need are jobs; better medical systems; more open minds and bigger hearts. Freaking us out about the stress relief that we do manage to garner, in our fractured lives, just isn't all that helpful. (What about last year's advice about "SLOW DOWN AND BREATHE"...or "learn to meditate and live longer"...?
But what do I know; I'm sitting down.
Friday, January 13, 2012
MELANCHOLIA
Blame it on the weather. This winter has been cold, gray and filled with rain. Sleet storms have replaced the October, early blizzards.( I got two de-icer key/lock hand-held devices in my stocking, for Christmas.) I have ended, ass up, under Tortuga, my trusty Subaru, twice. Unlike Dad, who totters but stays upright, in his crampons, as he heads towards the garage, I rush out in smooth-soled Uggs, or worse, Converse hi-tops, and flip onto my back. My butt gets soaked, my large muscle groups scream in pain, and I doubt I even want to get to Dad's 86 milestone, myself. All of these details, plus the employment situation, add up to a severe case of melancholia. Even taking Vitamin D, under a sunlamp, hasn't helped.
Today, I decided to put aside gray thoughts and do something "fun". I would search Facebook for old friends--really old friends. I would upgrade my profile and get rid of any extraneous "stuff". Social Network housecleaning: Mistake Number One.
My profile photo has been, since the beginning, a print of a self-portrait, painted a while back. I like the painting and think it accurately captures the "deer in the headlights" expression I had for my last eighteen months in Los Angeles--after the "crash". (I imagine a lot of abstract expressionists felt the same, around the time of the Stockmarket debacle in the U.S.) So, updating to my more "hope filled" existence, in New England, seemed in order.
Trying for a self-portrait while everyone else is not at home can be both liberating AND annoying. The digital camera didn't want to work. My cell phone camera is terrible. My computer camera looked like a Saturday Night Live sketch still. I ended up taking the most honest shot--and then proceeded to photo-shop it...avoiding the "insta-thin" app...Couldn't remove a big white speck on the middle of my huge chin, nor the elaborate flash "shine" on my Irish nose and forehead. At least the black hoodie gave me some street cred--or it makes me look like I'm a schmatta- wearing grandmother from Eastern Europe (no insults implied). I can't decide. Reducing the photo to black and white only increased the jail-house ambiance. So, I used the first shot and figured, that's "it", Folks. Truly.
Next mistake: looking up old "flames" to see if they are even around anymore. My "m-o" used to be dating people about two decades older than me--which is fine, until you hit your mid-fifties. Then, it gets dicey. Not that I'm an ageist, these days. Far from it. However, finding a kayaking seventy-six year old single isn't as easy as it sounds. Further, what does it say about me that all of my "exes" choose not to be using their birth-names and critical identifiers on Facebook? Are they dead? Evading the law? Hiding out from enemies? Family? Creditors? Or--gulp--are they afraid I might someday come calling? (This sudden realization shut me down for the day.)
I started to think about my late exploits--how I might feel if any of those folks just "bumped into me", on-line. Hmmm. Would I consider a re-union, even if it was only virtual? Would finding out how far their lives progressed (while mine seems to be a terminal cartoon--at least according to my family) be something I am even interested in discovering? Would the demise of some early connections be too much to bear--as the demise of so many friends was and continues to be, in the wake of AIDS, war and cancerdays in America?
Or, would finding out that everybody is married, except for Moi, cause my braincells to simply explode?
What might it be like to have everyone you have ever loved, intimately, gather together, in the same room, and meet? Would you want to be hosting the event, or merely observe, behind a strong wall? Would you choose to be a ghost? Would you rather avoid the conflagration, altogether? (I warned you--January is the most self-involving month of the year, at least in northern climes. There's a reason schools take a break...)
I once had a dream--maybe my best dream--that I died, and after a long serious walk through an old forest, came to a cottage in a clearing. It was a lovely day. There were birds singing, bees buzzing and butterflies flitting. As I came closer to the house, the front door was flung open. Virginia Woolf stood there, in her early glory, squinting and holding her hand to the bright sun. Suddenly, she broke into a radiant smile. Her thin arms opened and she beckoned me inside.
As she took my elbow and greeted me, we moved, together, into a large book-filled room, filled with every female author and artist I had ever loved or longed to know. A fire crackled in the stone fireplace. The scent of wood-smoke and whiskey and cigarettes and expensive perfume mingled around us, making me high and happy. Best of all, each woman greeted me,saying, "Minns, welcome. We've been waiting for you..."
Then I awoke--tears on my face, wanting to go back and to stay. (I never had a re-run of the dream.)
However, after today's little experiment in "cleaning up the past", perhaps if I had stayed on in the dreamplace, I would have found that they were all waiting for me to tell me the truth--that I've been deluding myself since I was a child; grow up; buck up; accept that I would never make it as a writer or an artist of any note...find a stable partner, get a reputable position, make a few sound investments, marry and be done with it. (Brrrrrr!)
In January, it seems, everything's a crapshoot, and we are all players.
Today, I decided to put aside gray thoughts and do something "fun". I would search Facebook for old friends--really old friends. I would upgrade my profile and get rid of any extraneous "stuff". Social Network housecleaning: Mistake Number One.
My profile photo has been, since the beginning, a print of a self-portrait, painted a while back. I like the painting and think it accurately captures the "deer in the headlights" expression I had for my last eighteen months in Los Angeles--after the "crash". (I imagine a lot of abstract expressionists felt the same, around the time of the Stockmarket debacle in the U.S.) So, updating to my more "hope filled" existence, in New England, seemed in order.
Trying for a self-portrait while everyone else is not at home can be both liberating AND annoying. The digital camera didn't want to work. My cell phone camera is terrible. My computer camera looked like a Saturday Night Live sketch still. I ended up taking the most honest shot--and then proceeded to photo-shop it...avoiding the "insta-thin" app...Couldn't remove a big white speck on the middle of my huge chin, nor the elaborate flash "shine" on my Irish nose and forehead. At least the black hoodie gave me some street cred--or it makes me look like I'm a schmatta- wearing grandmother from Eastern Europe (no insults implied). I can't decide. Reducing the photo to black and white only increased the jail-house ambiance. So, I used the first shot and figured, that's "it", Folks. Truly.
Next mistake: looking up old "flames" to see if they are even around anymore. My "m-o" used to be dating people about two decades older than me--which is fine, until you hit your mid-fifties. Then, it gets dicey. Not that I'm an ageist, these days. Far from it. However, finding a kayaking seventy-six year old single isn't as easy as it sounds. Further, what does it say about me that all of my "exes" choose not to be using their birth-names and critical identifiers on Facebook? Are they dead? Evading the law? Hiding out from enemies? Family? Creditors? Or--gulp--are they afraid I might someday come calling? (This sudden realization shut me down for the day.)
I started to think about my late exploits--how I might feel if any of those folks just "bumped into me", on-line. Hmmm. Would I consider a re-union, even if it was only virtual? Would finding out how far their lives progressed (while mine seems to be a terminal cartoon--at least according to my family) be something I am even interested in discovering? Would the demise of some early connections be too much to bear--as the demise of so many friends was and continues to be, in the wake of AIDS, war and cancerdays in America?
Or, would finding out that everybody is married, except for Moi, cause my braincells to simply explode?
What might it be like to have everyone you have ever loved, intimately, gather together, in the same room, and meet? Would you want to be hosting the event, or merely observe, behind a strong wall? Would you choose to be a ghost? Would you rather avoid the conflagration, altogether? (I warned you--January is the most self-involving month of the year, at least in northern climes. There's a reason schools take a break...)
I once had a dream--maybe my best dream--that I died, and after a long serious walk through an old forest, came to a cottage in a clearing. It was a lovely day. There were birds singing, bees buzzing and butterflies flitting. As I came closer to the house, the front door was flung open. Virginia Woolf stood there, in her early glory, squinting and holding her hand to the bright sun. Suddenly, she broke into a radiant smile. Her thin arms opened and she beckoned me inside.
As she took my elbow and greeted me, we moved, together, into a large book-filled room, filled with every female author and artist I had ever loved or longed to know. A fire crackled in the stone fireplace. The scent of wood-smoke and whiskey and cigarettes and expensive perfume mingled around us, making me high and happy. Best of all, each woman greeted me,saying, "Minns, welcome. We've been waiting for you..."
Then I awoke--tears on my face, wanting to go back and to stay. (I never had a re-run of the dream.)
However, after today's little experiment in "cleaning up the past", perhaps if I had stayed on in the dreamplace, I would have found that they were all waiting for me to tell me the truth--that I've been deluding myself since I was a child; grow up; buck up; accept that I would never make it as a writer or an artist of any note...find a stable partner, get a reputable position, make a few sound investments, marry and be done with it. (Brrrrrr!)
In January, it seems, everything's a crapshoot, and we are all players.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Deus De Machina
The Christmas Tree is Dad's favorite thing in the world--maybe even topping whiskey. Now that he's sober these past few years, the tree is most decidedly his favorite thing. Unfortunately, in this house, everyone else would like to slip by with an artificial tree. Hang an attached plastic string of lights and other fancies, and call it a Yule Tradition. (Well, almost everyone else..).
For the second Christmas in a row, Dad has gently elicited my help in trimming and watering "a real tree". Kev and he go out to the same local civic organization lot; haggle; pick out the tallest tree there; haggle; tie it to one of several vehicles; haggle; lop of the top three feet--usually leaving a piece of trunk the size of a tangerine, which then needs "whittling down" to fix the star at the top. Then, still haggling, they get it smushed into the living-room, jammed in a tree stand that screws in four pieces of metal and sets the wet tree in a pot of water. Covered in pitch and sweat, Kev grabs a beer and exits, cussing under his breath. Headed home to his own smells of warming plastic and no fallen branches.
Then, Dad goes into his secret workroom in the cellar.There, he uncovers myriad hoards of boxes, which he has been collecting through the decades--and protecting from filching by his children, his grandchildren and his spouse. He is an organized collector, though. Each box is lovingly marked with dates and contents. Each ornament--whether it be plastic or blown glass, is adoringly wrapped in parchment-like kleenex. Dad even saves the tinsel.
"He what?!" I asked on the phone once, years back, from California.
"He's been taking each strand of silver tinsel off the tree, before he hauls it to the curb, after Christmas. Then he uncurls each piece and puts it in a special box..." Kev informs me.
I thought he was exaggerating--still a bit sore from the tree installation at 88 Maple, each year.
No hyperbole. Dad carefully unwraps the tinsel and proceeds to lay it on the couch. Then, while Mom and everyone else (our house has an unremitting stream of relatives and visitors--all the more intense, this year, as Dad lost his bid for the city council and people are still coming by to wish him adieu.) are out shopping, Dad begins, in the silence of a little boy with his fingers inching towards the forbidden cookie jar, to decorate the tree. And because, as the "squatter" and "returned Cartoon-from-California-artist", I am his "go-to" accomplice.
"They laugh because I saved the tinsel, but you know, the factory that makes this stuff closed down. You can't get it anymore!" Dad points out, as he uncurls a static-clinging strand from his thumb.
Dad has no sense of design. He's an amazing workman and can jerryrig anything from nothing--but his artistic touch is sadly lacking. He's the first to admit it, too. So, he engages me. And let's face it...though I abhore the death of the living tree and would have continued to buy one that could, after the season, be transplanted, somewhere, as I did every year in California, this is his house and I love the long-standing tradition of the evergreen in our midst, during Solstice Season and beyond. The pure, clean scent, rising above the holiday odors of cooking, the after-shaves and colognes of visitors, the washed-dog wet smell of Maeve; nothing comes close to the pine tree. No matter how cold or long I've been outside shoveling snow, or shopping in frenzied malls, that first "hit" of Christmas Tree revives me. So,we begin.
This is not an easy process.
Three to four hours later, with no breaks (neither for sustenance nor for the bathroom...)we are still putting ornaments on the tree. Some date back to my dead grandparents, on both sides. Some have been made by my siblings and myself--others are newer--created in classes attended by the grandkids. There are ornaments the uncles and aunts and cousins look for, amid the scraggly branches and falling needles, every year. There is a bi-plane for Uncle Bobby; a blown-glass nurse for Ann; about ten variations of Maeve--from photos in Christmas wreaths to clay-carved likenesses; there are the "Best Grandparents" sets in triplicate; there is even a silver bell I've hung every year I've been alive and could pick out my own favorite. It is a living history of our family during holidays. (It doesn't look half bad, either.)
Until Dad hangs the LED lights.
Kev and Ann insisted he replace the aged glass and material -cord electric strands, held together with duct tape and prayers, which we have had since before we moved into this house. (I can remember the lights getting so hot that we were admonished, as kids, "not to get near the tree when it's on"--as if it suddenly became infused with Evil.) I know that part of the thrill of Christmastime was all the stories of houses going up in flames because of bursting Christmas lights and dried-out branches...So, Dad caved, but he hates the lights. They aren't bright enough for him. (I think, secretly, he also liked bragging, that in all of his years of decorating his trees, not one had burst into flames!) Now that that threat has been extinguished, it just ain't the same...sigh.
So, he makes up for them by hanging three times as many strands and plugging in four extension cords and the brightest star he can find. This year, the tree weighs as much as I do, easily.
He allows Kev to come back and put the star up--with reluctance on both sides. Kev is in a hurry and not the best mood. (Ann is upstairs with niece Mer, wrapping gifts.Mom is listening to Bing Crosby in her room.)
Dad and I are admiring our finished creation. Dad is sipping his Ensure and I'm drinking a diet Coke. All of a sudden, in deep silence and gently, the entire tree begins creeping towards us!
Down, down she leans in her glory! (As if she's bowing in recognition--not in the least angry--just moving, alive, shocking us backwards.) Then, when the plastic tree- stand, with the ten gallons of water and the four steel rods pinning the trunk down, bends--the water in a mini-tsunami all over Mom's braided rug and the extension cords (egads!)--there is a popping and a tinkling and a crash of smashed glass and tinsel and sap and needles covering everything.! Maeve careens downstairs, yelping a warning--as if she has come to us after all these years of fire danger, only to be confronted with a fainting tree--but warn us, she will!
Giving me the "sssshhhhh" sign, hoping Mom won't hear (and she didn't, deaf in one ear, the other focused on Bing Crosby's wails, behind her bedroom door), Dad pushes me into the mess of tree and ornaments.
Together, we haul it up. However, without water, the skewers can't hold; they twist out of the bark. By now, Dad, who is a spindly little man in his dotage, can't hold,either. I am at a right angle, my glasses below my nostrils, keeping the tree and its remaining lights, decorations and tinsel, from crushing my father.
Mer bolts down after the dog. Ann yells behind her. I hollar, "Call your father to get back here, now!"
Kev finally arrives and helps us re-right the tree.
It goes down again, causing as much damage as the first time. Ann has a laundry basket and additional cursing, picking up shards of our grannies' ornaments out of the braided rug, and trying to keep Maeve from dancing on them--or worse, getting an ornament "hook" in a paw. Mer doesn't know if she should cry or laugh. (We send her up to keep Mom busy, and from coming down to see what is going on.)
All together, we wrangle the tree, again. This time, Dad's had it.
"I should have wired it to the wall, like last year! I told you!" He heads to his workroom. He emerges with piano wire, clippers, pliers, hammer and eyebolts. He finds the holes he made in the woodwork, behind the lace curtains Bev lovingly hangs each year, and puts eyebolts into the windowsills. Now, with wiring worthy of the San Francisco Bay Bridge, the tree is upright and majestic, if a bit denuded. Dad is more than satisfied.
He picks tinsel off the dog. Himself. Me.
He straightens the silver strands out and begins to rehang them, piece by piece.
Ann hides the broken ornaments.
Kev Krazy Glue's the Christmas star and reboots it, back on top.
When Mom finally comes down, she notices Maeve won't sit anywhere near the tree--even to get to her bone. Bev is suspicious, b ut Maeve keeps our secret--just dreaming with one blood-shot eye on the tree
at all times.
"Well, at least those new lights won't burn us to death in our sleep..." Mom sighs. "It is a nice tree, all in all."
I pick a pine needle from my teeth and breathe in.
Dad merely smiles.
For the second Christmas in a row, Dad has gently elicited my help in trimming and watering "a real tree". Kev and he go out to the same local civic organization lot; haggle; pick out the tallest tree there; haggle; tie it to one of several vehicles; haggle; lop of the top three feet--usually leaving a piece of trunk the size of a tangerine, which then needs "whittling down" to fix the star at the top. Then, still haggling, they get it smushed into the living-room, jammed in a tree stand that screws in four pieces of metal and sets the wet tree in a pot of water. Covered in pitch and sweat, Kev grabs a beer and exits, cussing under his breath. Headed home to his own smells of warming plastic and no fallen branches.
Then, Dad goes into his secret workroom in the cellar.There, he uncovers myriad hoards of boxes, which he has been collecting through the decades--and protecting from filching by his children, his grandchildren and his spouse. He is an organized collector, though. Each box is lovingly marked with dates and contents. Each ornament--whether it be plastic or blown glass, is adoringly wrapped in parchment-like kleenex. Dad even saves the tinsel.
"He what?!" I asked on the phone once, years back, from California.
"He's been taking each strand of silver tinsel off the tree, before he hauls it to the curb, after Christmas. Then he uncurls each piece and puts it in a special box..." Kev informs me.
I thought he was exaggerating--still a bit sore from the tree installation at 88 Maple, each year.
No hyperbole. Dad carefully unwraps the tinsel and proceeds to lay it on the couch. Then, while Mom and everyone else (our house has an unremitting stream of relatives and visitors--all the more intense, this year, as Dad lost his bid for the city council and people are still coming by to wish him adieu.) are out shopping, Dad begins, in the silence of a little boy with his fingers inching towards the forbidden cookie jar, to decorate the tree. And because, as the "squatter" and "returned Cartoon-from-California-artist", I am his "go-to" accomplice.
"They laugh because I saved the tinsel, but you know, the factory that makes this stuff closed down. You can't get it anymore!" Dad points out, as he uncurls a static-clinging strand from his thumb.
Dad has no sense of design. He's an amazing workman and can jerryrig anything from nothing--but his artistic touch is sadly lacking. He's the first to admit it, too. So, he engages me. And let's face it...though I abhore the death of the living tree and would have continued to buy one that could, after the season, be transplanted, somewhere, as I did every year in California, this is his house and I love the long-standing tradition of the evergreen in our midst, during Solstice Season and beyond. The pure, clean scent, rising above the holiday odors of cooking, the after-shaves and colognes of visitors, the washed-dog wet smell of Maeve; nothing comes close to the pine tree. No matter how cold or long I've been outside shoveling snow, or shopping in frenzied malls, that first "hit" of Christmas Tree revives me. So,we begin.
This is not an easy process.
Three to four hours later, with no breaks (neither for sustenance nor for the bathroom...)we are still putting ornaments on the tree. Some date back to my dead grandparents, on both sides. Some have been made by my siblings and myself--others are newer--created in classes attended by the grandkids. There are ornaments the uncles and aunts and cousins look for, amid the scraggly branches and falling needles, every year. There is a bi-plane for Uncle Bobby; a blown-glass nurse for Ann; about ten variations of Maeve--from photos in Christmas wreaths to clay-carved likenesses; there are the "Best Grandparents" sets in triplicate; there is even a silver bell I've hung every year I've been alive and could pick out my own favorite. It is a living history of our family during holidays. (It doesn't look half bad, either.)
Until Dad hangs the LED lights.
Kev and Ann insisted he replace the aged glass and material -cord electric strands, held together with duct tape and prayers, which we have had since before we moved into this house. (I can remember the lights getting so hot that we were admonished, as kids, "not to get near the tree when it's on"--as if it suddenly became infused with Evil.) I know that part of the thrill of Christmastime was all the stories of houses going up in flames because of bursting Christmas lights and dried-out branches...So, Dad caved, but he hates the lights. They aren't bright enough for him. (I think, secretly, he also liked bragging, that in all of his years of decorating his trees, not one had burst into flames!) Now that that threat has been extinguished, it just ain't the same...sigh.
So, he makes up for them by hanging three times as many strands and plugging in four extension cords and the brightest star he can find. This year, the tree weighs as much as I do, easily.
He allows Kev to come back and put the star up--with reluctance on both sides. Kev is in a hurry and not the best mood. (Ann is upstairs with niece Mer, wrapping gifts.Mom is listening to Bing Crosby in her room.)
Dad and I are admiring our finished creation. Dad is sipping his Ensure and I'm drinking a diet Coke. All of a sudden, in deep silence and gently, the entire tree begins creeping towards us!
Down, down she leans in her glory! (As if she's bowing in recognition--not in the least angry--just moving, alive, shocking us backwards.) Then, when the plastic tree- stand, with the ten gallons of water and the four steel rods pinning the trunk down, bends--the water in a mini-tsunami all over Mom's braided rug and the extension cords (egads!)--there is a popping and a tinkling and a crash of smashed glass and tinsel and sap and needles covering everything.! Maeve careens downstairs, yelping a warning--as if she has come to us after all these years of fire danger, only to be confronted with a fainting tree--but warn us, she will!
Giving me the "sssshhhhh" sign, hoping Mom won't hear (and she didn't, deaf in one ear, the other focused on Bing Crosby's wails, behind her bedroom door), Dad pushes me into the mess of tree and ornaments.
Together, we haul it up. However, without water, the skewers can't hold; they twist out of the bark. By now, Dad, who is a spindly little man in his dotage, can't hold,either. I am at a right angle, my glasses below my nostrils, keeping the tree and its remaining lights, decorations and tinsel, from crushing my father.
Mer bolts down after the dog. Ann yells behind her. I hollar, "Call your father to get back here, now!"
Kev finally arrives and helps us re-right the tree.
It goes down again, causing as much damage as the first time. Ann has a laundry basket and additional cursing, picking up shards of our grannies' ornaments out of the braided rug, and trying to keep Maeve from dancing on them--or worse, getting an ornament "hook" in a paw. Mer doesn't know if she should cry or laugh. (We send her up to keep Mom busy, and from coming down to see what is going on.)
All together, we wrangle the tree, again. This time, Dad's had it.
"I should have wired it to the wall, like last year! I told you!" He heads to his workroom. He emerges with piano wire, clippers, pliers, hammer and eyebolts. He finds the holes he made in the woodwork, behind the lace curtains Bev lovingly hangs each year, and puts eyebolts into the windowsills. Now, with wiring worthy of the San Francisco Bay Bridge, the tree is upright and majestic, if a bit denuded. Dad is more than satisfied.
He picks tinsel off the dog. Himself. Me.
He straightens the silver strands out and begins to rehang them, piece by piece.
Ann hides the broken ornaments.
Kev Krazy Glue's the Christmas star and reboots it, back on top.
When Mom finally comes down, she notices Maeve won't sit anywhere near the tree--even to get to her bone. Bev is suspicious, b ut Maeve keeps our secret--just dreaming with one blood-shot eye on the tree
at all times.
"Well, at least those new lights won't burn us to death in our sleep..." Mom sighs. "It is a nice tree, all in all."
I pick a pine needle from my teeth and breathe in.
Dad merely smiles.
Sunday, November 20, 2011
STROKE !
Something wakes me early...it's Sunday and I can sleep in--past the parents scrounging their breakfasts; past the sister doing her early morning on-lines; past the dog looking for attention and toast crumbs...I can sleep in till ten, if I want; but I don't.
Showered, changed, surprisingly alert before coffee--I am trying to remember the elusive details of a particularly pleasing dream when Dad falls into his easy chair, trembling. Ann is on his heels, coughing out a series of orders to us all: "I'll get him breakfast...sit,Dad! Ma, you didn't see what I just saw...get a blood pressure cuff...Karen's is better...Dad, just sit down and stay here until I get you something to eat!"
The dog is bounding at my feet, demanding I pay attention to her before anyone else. Dad is looking withdrawn and slightly sad...his teeth aren't in yet and his pj's hang on him like a second limp skin. Mom is yelling and running around and fighting with Ann that Dad is just dehydrated...or worn out from raking leaves all day the afternoon before-solo, as usual, refusing help in the yard--or it's an aftereffect of depression over the loss of his council seat...or...Ann ignores her and yells at her to shut up. Ann saw Dad go down while he was trying to get dressed and then almost go down again, while he unscrewed the peanut butter jar, for his toast. Now he's sitting quietly while Bev is upstairs, hunting for her blood pressure monitor.
I am keeping him company. He is talking in an upbeat mood. No words slurred. No pain and clutching of head or chest or arm...he tells me his legs are acting weirdly...going weak all of a sudden...but other than that, he's fine...looking forward to "60 Minutes" on t.v. and the football games of any Sunday afternoon. Ann calls me into the kitchen: "He won't listen...he needs to go up to the ER right now...look at his color...he's yellow! And Bev won't listen, either...I think he's having a stroke...Let me get some food into him, and then we can check his blood pressure and pulse...but I'm warning you, prepare for a shitstorm!"
I bring Dad his coffee. I put it on the little coffeestand made specifically to stand up by his easy chair. No more beer in his life, this "nook" is reserved for the black morning brew he prefers--or the occasional can of Coke. His hand suddenly karate chops to the side, cleanly knocking the coffee mug half-way into the hall between the living room and the kitchen. There is a widening puddle of dark liquid slipping down one wall. All he says to me is: "Better wipe it up before your Mother gets downstairs!"
I do, alerting Ann, who pounds back into the livingroom, admonishing him, and carrying some peanut buttered toast. "Eat this and we'll see how you feel in a minute," she tells him.
His hand can barely hold the bread, but he can bite and chew and swallow fine. He's also talking sanely to us, one eye on the morning news on the widescreen. The dog sits next to him...doggedly waiting for a hand-out. "We share breakfast every morning, don't we, Maeve?" he tries to lean over and stroke her head. She backs off, aware of the trembling, empty palm.
"Go get your blood pressure cuff, Karen!" Ann barks at me. I run upstairs, take it down, feeling eighty-four, myself. "I don't know how that thing works, you put it on him," she orders. I roll up his top and attach the velcro. The cuff keeps sliding down his arm, against his bone. He's about one twenty-five these days and the cuff cannot register his bp.
I try it on myself. It's fine. The whirring computer accurately reads my rising bp....I turn it off.
Ann takes his pulse.
"It's there, but we need to get you to ER, Pop," she tells him.
He looks like he's going to say "No", but I support Ann. I'm not the gruff and ready nurse. I am the flakey California failure--but I'm the oldest and closest to any of his "sons" in the house this morning, so he doesn't argue. "Dad, let's go...just to make sure nothing's really wrong, okay?" I try not to sound like I'm begging.
Mom is down the stairs with her bp monitor, which she is loudly declaring is "the best"!
I tell her we are taking him to the ER.
He almost goes down again as we get him out of his chair and head towards the door. Mom is pulling on his jacket. Ann is telling him to take the Irish shaleighleigh he got on his trip to the Emerald Isle, so he won't fall on his face as I escort him out the backdoor. He is cursing and grumbling, but lets me take his arm. I am shocked at how chicken-thin he is...this ex-footballer and fear figure of my teen years. But, he lets me help him as he nearly stumbles to his knees, again. Finally we get to the garage. Ann pulls out the car. He and Ann are arguing as she tries to shuffle him too quickly and again, falls into that psychiatric barking nurse nobody better question me Head of ER state. Even as their medical proxy and ArchAngel daughter, this gruffness does no one any good. On the other hand, maybe it is his karma. God knows we all were held captive by his gruffness and my Mom's, when we were growing up...sigh.
We pull out of 88 Maple and head to the hospital. It's Sunday. Below us, the street is filling with older people about to attend the first morning mass at Sacred Heart. Our Church. The streets are wet and foggy. The cold of early November rushes past us. Ann navigates to the hospital, old hand that she is. This is my first trip with either parental unit there, but Ann has been doing this for years now. Still, this time she is grim.
When we pull up to valet parking there is no valet.
"Go inside and get a wheelchair..." Ann tells me.
"Don't I have to ask, first..." I am already out of the car.
"Just grab one. We'll put him in and then I'll park and meet you inside..." Ann answers.
I open Dad's door, readying him.
I enter the lobby. It's darkened and deserted. I pull out a waiting wheelchair, stunned at how unguarded everything still is in my little hometown. Far cry from the ER mornings in L.A. ! I take the chair out to the car. We practically haul Dad's bony ass into it and then, like I'm a kid pushing a grocery cart for the first time, I push my Dad inside.
We go up to the registration desk. He's got his medical info in a small wallet and hands it to me. I hand it to the nurse. She takes it. There is a young father with two croupy kidlets in front of us and some working guy who smashed his hand, with his drinking buddy. We are third. The nurse takes one look at Dad, has a mini conference with Ann, who has no arrived at our side, and they haul Dad from my hands and whisk him into the bowels of the ER. Chagrined, unsure of what to do, keyless, I sit down.
The little kids come up to me. They hold out crayons and an ER coloring book. They show me what they've done. I smile. Tell them it's great. They show me more. The young Dad gives me a wide smile, clearly relieved to have some help in the early morning. The two workmen get up when the registration nurse returns. She tells me nothing. She takes the kids and the father into another closed off room. The workmen follow and turn off where she points. I am left in silence with only the fluorescent lights for company. I sit.
No magazines.
I pick up an abandoned crayon. It's tip is worn round. Crayola. Crimson. I begin to color where the two kids left off...
Showered, changed, surprisingly alert before coffee--I am trying to remember the elusive details of a particularly pleasing dream when Dad falls into his easy chair, trembling. Ann is on his heels, coughing out a series of orders to us all: "I'll get him breakfast...sit,Dad! Ma, you didn't see what I just saw...get a blood pressure cuff...Karen's is better...Dad, just sit down and stay here until I get you something to eat!"
The dog is bounding at my feet, demanding I pay attention to her before anyone else. Dad is looking withdrawn and slightly sad...his teeth aren't in yet and his pj's hang on him like a second limp skin. Mom is yelling and running around and fighting with Ann that Dad is just dehydrated...or worn out from raking leaves all day the afternoon before-solo, as usual, refusing help in the yard--or it's an aftereffect of depression over the loss of his council seat...or...Ann ignores her and yells at her to shut up. Ann saw Dad go down while he was trying to get dressed and then almost go down again, while he unscrewed the peanut butter jar, for his toast. Now he's sitting quietly while Bev is upstairs, hunting for her blood pressure monitor.
I am keeping him company. He is talking in an upbeat mood. No words slurred. No pain and clutching of head or chest or arm...he tells me his legs are acting weirdly...going weak all of a sudden...but other than that, he's fine...looking forward to "60 Minutes" on t.v. and the football games of any Sunday afternoon. Ann calls me into the kitchen: "He won't listen...he needs to go up to the ER right now...look at his color...he's yellow! And Bev won't listen, either...I think he's having a stroke...Let me get some food into him, and then we can check his blood pressure and pulse...but I'm warning you, prepare for a shitstorm!"
I bring Dad his coffee. I put it on the little coffeestand made specifically to stand up by his easy chair. No more beer in his life, this "nook" is reserved for the black morning brew he prefers--or the occasional can of Coke. His hand suddenly karate chops to the side, cleanly knocking the coffee mug half-way into the hall between the living room and the kitchen. There is a widening puddle of dark liquid slipping down one wall. All he says to me is: "Better wipe it up before your Mother gets downstairs!"
I do, alerting Ann, who pounds back into the livingroom, admonishing him, and carrying some peanut buttered toast. "Eat this and we'll see how you feel in a minute," she tells him.
His hand can barely hold the bread, but he can bite and chew and swallow fine. He's also talking sanely to us, one eye on the morning news on the widescreen. The dog sits next to him...doggedly waiting for a hand-out. "We share breakfast every morning, don't we, Maeve?" he tries to lean over and stroke her head. She backs off, aware of the trembling, empty palm.
"Go get your blood pressure cuff, Karen!" Ann barks at me. I run upstairs, take it down, feeling eighty-four, myself. "I don't know how that thing works, you put it on him," she orders. I roll up his top and attach the velcro. The cuff keeps sliding down his arm, against his bone. He's about one twenty-five these days and the cuff cannot register his bp.
I try it on myself. It's fine. The whirring computer accurately reads my rising bp....I turn it off.
Ann takes his pulse.
"It's there, but we need to get you to ER, Pop," she tells him.
He looks like he's going to say "No", but I support Ann. I'm not the gruff and ready nurse. I am the flakey California failure--but I'm the oldest and closest to any of his "sons" in the house this morning, so he doesn't argue. "Dad, let's go...just to make sure nothing's really wrong, okay?" I try not to sound like I'm begging.
Mom is down the stairs with her bp monitor, which she is loudly declaring is "the best"!
I tell her we are taking him to the ER.
He almost goes down again as we get him out of his chair and head towards the door. Mom is pulling on his jacket. Ann is telling him to take the Irish shaleighleigh he got on his trip to the Emerald Isle, so he won't fall on his face as I escort him out the backdoor. He is cursing and grumbling, but lets me take his arm. I am shocked at how chicken-thin he is...this ex-footballer and fear figure of my teen years. But, he lets me help him as he nearly stumbles to his knees, again. Finally we get to the garage. Ann pulls out the car. He and Ann are arguing as she tries to shuffle him too quickly and again, falls into that psychiatric barking nurse nobody better question me Head of ER state. Even as their medical proxy and ArchAngel daughter, this gruffness does no one any good. On the other hand, maybe it is his karma. God knows we all were held captive by his gruffness and my Mom's, when we were growing up...sigh.
We pull out of 88 Maple and head to the hospital. It's Sunday. Below us, the street is filling with older people about to attend the first morning mass at Sacred Heart. Our Church. The streets are wet and foggy. The cold of early November rushes past us. Ann navigates to the hospital, old hand that she is. This is my first trip with either parental unit there, but Ann has been doing this for years now. Still, this time she is grim.
When we pull up to valet parking there is no valet.
"Go inside and get a wheelchair..." Ann tells me.
"Don't I have to ask, first..." I am already out of the car.
"Just grab one. We'll put him in and then I'll park and meet you inside..." Ann answers.
I open Dad's door, readying him.
I enter the lobby. It's darkened and deserted. I pull out a waiting wheelchair, stunned at how unguarded everything still is in my little hometown. Far cry from the ER mornings in L.A. ! I take the chair out to the car. We practically haul Dad's bony ass into it and then, like I'm a kid pushing a grocery cart for the first time, I push my Dad inside.
We go up to the registration desk. He's got his medical info in a small wallet and hands it to me. I hand it to the nurse. She takes it. There is a young father with two croupy kidlets in front of us and some working guy who smashed his hand, with his drinking buddy. We are third. The nurse takes one look at Dad, has a mini conference with Ann, who has no arrived at our side, and they haul Dad from my hands and whisk him into the bowels of the ER. Chagrined, unsure of what to do, keyless, I sit down.
The little kids come up to me. They hold out crayons and an ER coloring book. They show me what they've done. I smile. Tell them it's great. They show me more. The young Dad gives me a wide smile, clearly relieved to have some help in the early morning. The two workmen get up when the registration nurse returns. She tells me nothing. She takes the kids and the father into another closed off room. The workmen follow and turn off where she points. I am left in silence with only the fluorescent lights for company. I sit.
No magazines.
I pick up an abandoned crayon. It's tip is worn round. Crayola. Crimson. I begin to color where the two kids left off...
Monday, October 10, 2011
streetrap: LEAFDUST
streetrap: LEAFDUST: Autumn in New England is more than cold nights, fiery colors and rounded pumpkins. This year, the ghosts of Halloweenie are creeping around...
LEAFDUST
Autumn in New England is more than cold nights, fiery colors and rounded pumpkins. This year, the ghosts of Halloweenie are creeping around my homestead; coming in to visit. Perhaps it is because my Mother is dying of lymphoma (though she swears she will "be around for years to bother you all..." or because I am entering my second year of unemployment. (In 2011 America, I am not alone: I go to school almost full-time in my licensure program for my MA credential to teach AND student teach every day, from 7:00 a.m. to whenever the students and other faculty let me leave (smile), AND continue to write...however, none of these enterprises shows up on the radar because none of them are generating income. In America of 2011, it matters not if you toil from sun-up to sun-down; it only matters if you have created a "bottom line" that is taxable. So, I am technically one of the millions who are currently "jobless"...still.) Perhaps the ghosts are coming not for Mom, but for me? Hmmm...
Autumn in New England is a time of reflection and drawing inward. Though record global temperatures make some days feel like August, the nights have the snap and crackle of the stars beginning to crystallize. Perhaps not yet time for a hat, but definitely time for a hoodie or sweater. Summer ales are phasing out to Octoberfest brews. Hot dogs and hamburgers are being replaced by beef stews and crock-pot casseroles. When Dunkin Donuts begins pouring pumpkin flavored coffee, you know September has ceased and the true Fall has begun.
The ghosts know it, too.
Reading "Hamlet" in AP Seniors Literature class has affected my mood. The melancholic Dane joins his dead father in my dreams. I wake up answering to both. The Seniors in my three AP classes might make jokes about the dated verbiage of Shakespeare, but for me, his lines frame my nightmares. Howling rain against my windows only adds to the reality of the fright. Perhaps Hamlet's death becomes the ultimate peace--release from indecision; release from woe. Or, perhaps he only really wanted to follow Dear Old Dad and the lovely Ophelia, afterall? Hmmmm...
Like the Danish laddie, I feel caught in my thoughts. Afraid of my dreams. On the edge of my seat wondering what to do--if anything. Are we, in fact, simply pawns in the night, moved by an Angry God, out of boredom? Or, are the wonders to come blowing around us--hidden by the decaying leaves? Need we simply close our eyes to the blinding dust, for a little while longer?
Perchance there is still time to dream?
Autumn in New England is a time of reflection and drawing inward. Though record global temperatures make some days feel like August, the nights have the snap and crackle of the stars beginning to crystallize. Perhaps not yet time for a hat, but definitely time for a hoodie or sweater. Summer ales are phasing out to Octoberfest brews. Hot dogs and hamburgers are being replaced by beef stews and crock-pot casseroles. When Dunkin Donuts begins pouring pumpkin flavored coffee, you know September has ceased and the true Fall has begun.
The ghosts know it, too.
Reading "Hamlet" in AP Seniors Literature class has affected my mood. The melancholic Dane joins his dead father in my dreams. I wake up answering to both. The Seniors in my three AP classes might make jokes about the dated verbiage of Shakespeare, but for me, his lines frame my nightmares. Howling rain against my windows only adds to the reality of the fright. Perhaps Hamlet's death becomes the ultimate peace--release from indecision; release from woe. Or, perhaps he only really wanted to follow Dear Old Dad and the lovely Ophelia, afterall? Hmmmm...
Like the Danish laddie, I feel caught in my thoughts. Afraid of my dreams. On the edge of my seat wondering what to do--if anything. Are we, in fact, simply pawns in the night, moved by an Angry God, out of boredom? Or, are the wonders to come blowing around us--hidden by the decaying leaves? Need we simply close our eyes to the blinding dust, for a little while longer?
Perchance there is still time to dream?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)