ADDRESS UNKNOWN

I’m going to tell you about the dumb thing I did recently. I ordered a gift through Amazon for my sister-in-law and since I was in a rush and on my iPad, I wasn’t paying close attention to where I was shipping the gift. I have a list of addressed in Amazon of family and friends who I may decide needs a coloring book or nectar rings for feeding hummingbirds. I just selected the address for James R. Graham and placed my order. It was only later after I knew it had been delivered and I never heard from Katrina about it that I started to suspect something. James R Graham is my brother’s name. It’s his son’s name and son’s son’s name. I’m pretty sure if that son and his wife decide to have a baby and it’s a boy, that kid will be a James R Graham. James R Graham was also my dad’s name.

I sent Katrina’s gift to my Dad. In Collinsville OK. To a house that we no longer own because my dad is dead.

After some interweb sleuthing, I tracked down the young man who bought the house when Mom sold it and messaged him through Facebook. He was very kind and had been trying to figure out how to contact the family because he recognized the name. I don’t think he opened the package and I’m pretty sure it’s weird to receive a package delivery for a man who has been dead for almost then years. Mail is not so unusual. I still get mail for Chris all the time. But a large box containing a glass hummingbird feeder is an unusual gift for a dead man. I was able to connect him to Katrina and she was able to retrieve her gift.

My dad had an almost zero online presence. He appeared in pictures that we posted, but he didn’t have a Facebook page or Twitter account. He never sent texts and had the most basic cell phone he could possibly have. Dad was not tech savvy, but also did not require a tech savvy person to ‘fix’ something like a printer connection or run a software update. Because of his lack of online activity, it never really dawned on me that there would be internet things of Dad’s that I would need to clear out or download, like what I had to do with Chris. There’s a whole external hard drive in my file cabinet that contains all the content of Numskullery.com, as well as pictures and word documents of started projects. I weeded out so many domains that he had purchased but never used. I still have Dad’s phone number saved in my phone (as well as Chris’s).

Apparently, I still have his address stored in my gift list.

In my explanations to the young man and Katrina about my shipping snafu, I said “I don't know what happened.” I also called myself a ‘dope’, but to be honest, I’ve had Dad lingering around me ever since I started planning our moose hunting trip. His silly jokes just randomly bubble up out of my own mouth. It is not unlike Whoopie Goldburg’s character in Ghost where she plays a medium for spirits to speak to the living. I keep thinking about how his prize for anything was always a fifty cent piece. Always. Inflation had no effect on this. Sort of like the five dollar bill Grandmother put in my birthday card every year until she died when I was in my twenties. I have a small stash of fifty cent pieces, but they were not won by being the first to spot anything. The Tooth Fairy left those and I have saved them all these years.

And I can’t believe I am just now realizing that the Tooth Fairy was my dad.

I haven’t been back to the house where we lived since Mom sold it. I almost asked Katrina how the old house looked, what had been changed, what was the same. I don’t think I want to know. One of the ways I figured out I had tracked down the right person was through his photos. He had a photo that had the old scary shed in the background. That shed was so full of old tools and crap. I don’t think I ever really went in two steps past the entrance. It smelled of dirt and old oil. There were always wasps. But it was something I could still recognize. I don’t know about the rest of the place and I prefer not knowing. I prefer to think that the front brick entry way looks exactly the same as it did when we all as a family would stand there to pose for Easter pictures, Mom’s irises blooming all around us. That place will be forever in a state of Spring in my memories. Maybe summer too when it would be so hot, tar in the road would bubble up. We’d ride over the bubbles with our bicycles and laugh at the popping sounds.

If I delete the address, do I delete the memories?

That address was one of the first things I was forced to memorize and I’ll remember it always, burned into my brain deeper than any password or anniversary date. So, I will be going in and cleaning out the old address list and at the very least remove those who are no longer with us. Oh, and I’ll warn the guy living at the old place to keep an eye out for a second package.

Yeah… I sent two packages there.

RAISINS

I cannot remember what the Fortune Cookie journal prompt was on Saturday, but it had something to do with baking. It led me to write a story of Chris and I in my own bakeshop that specialized in cookies. The story began with Chris asking me what’s the worst thing you can put in a cookie and my response was immediate and swift. Raisins. This prompted Chris to start throwing out ideas for terrible cookies. With each idea, I argued that his ideas could actually work. Brussel sprouts could be caramelized with honey or shaved and treated like a carrot for carrot cake style cookie. Sauerkraut could be the ‘salt’ in sea salt caramel style cookie. Black licorice could be mixed with orange. I kept a notebook of cookie ideas and I paused our discussion to write down of these ideas. We laughed at his failed attempt to convince me that there was something worse than raisins.

Later in the day while running errands, I overheard a young dad trying to wrangle his toddler. “No son, you can’t have that tractor. We need to go find the raisins.” It took all of my restraint to not scoop the little one up and ask him if he was safe and do I need to call child protective services. Clearly he was being tortured…with raisins. Then I wondered if I’d written a short story to conjure raisins because they just kept showing up in random ways, sneaking into my day like my bad memories. The bad memories are those moments of regret that I keep buried in the back. Occasionally that box falls over and spills out, revealing moments when I was unkind and intolerant of Dad or that early time in my life when I was angry about J’s existence. Every fight and argument with Chris (the handful of them) gets rehashed and played over. And don’t think for a minute that this box is only for the dead. Nope pretty much every negative interaction comes up and gets picked apart. How could have I handled that better? I should have said this instead of that. I should have bought those groceries for that woman. I could’ve should’ve.

No matter how many times I try to pick them out like I do with raisins in a cookie, the bad memories never go away. They are also a bit of a surprise because they show up at random times usually when I’m feeling good, safe and secure. That’s my brain yelling out a warrior cry of ‘SABOTAGE!’. I am hard wired for self-sabotage. I will always be picking the raisins out of cookies and granola bars because that one time in high school, I said something mean about another girl in an attempt to fit in with another group of girls and I will need to revisit those actions every five or ten years. There are for sure to be raisins in that slice of carrot cake because of that one time I yelled at Chris for buying a metal desk. [To be fair, I was 100% right about that, but I didn’t need to yell at him. He knew he was wrong.] These bad memories pop up so that I can rehash them over and over again in an attempt to make them good memories or just not so bad ones. But they’re too much like raisins and I hate raisins.

I truly hate raisins.

It’s funny to me that I could take Brussel sprouts and sauerkraut and make them into a fancy cookie, but raisins are still the worst thing you could to do to a cookie. If I have the imagination to dream up a black licorice and orange cookie, than surely I have the imagination to make something good with raisins. I can take the worst thing you could put into a cookie and at the very least, make it interesting. What if you took raisins and apricots and blended them into a paste. Then you used that paste as filling in a vanilla oatmeal sandwich cookie?

That might not be so bad.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I have worked late three days this week and will be working late again this evening. My job has taken up the majority of my mental space. The leftover mental space has spent one day fretting about the gas light on my car, pondering the idea of taking a day off from work to clean out my house, and dealing with Bass Pro customer service regarding a birthday gift card that my brother never received. All of this has left little mental space for writing here.

Despite how busy I have been with all of the science, this week has been a really good week. I have done a thirty minute exercise class every day. Josephine and I have walked every day except for one because of rain. I’ve eaten lots and lots of green vegetables and I have been drinking plenty of water. There have been profound yoga moments and yoga teacher high moments. On Thursday, I was able to break away from work to meet my friend Shruti for lunch. It is a rare treat for me to leave the building to meet someone outside of work for lunch. I love my group and I thoroughly enjoy going out for lab lunches, but I need to socialize outside of work sometimes.

Easter is a holiday that is full of memories that prickle. Those memories are filled with moments of when my family was whole. Recently, a friend of mine retweeted a tweet about someone looking at their childhood home in Google Street View. In the moment the image was taken, there was light on in one of the bedrooms and the person said that they could imagine their mother sitting on the bed in that room. I was so struck by this imagery that I went to Google maps and looked up my childhood home. I have not been by the place since my mother sold it when Dad was put in the VA home. The street view in Google maps was taken before Chris got sick, before we knew that Dad was not well. The antique milk jug holding up a street sign that read “Graham St.” is still marking the end of the driveway. The pictures were taken in what looks like late Spring. I say this because Mom’s azalea bush is in bloom, but her irises look like they have already bloomed and died off.

The steps of what was always referred to as the main front door, a door we rarely ever used, was the place were all of us would gather for family photos. Every Easter. Every graduation. Every monumental moment. We stood in layers on the steps while Randy set up his tripod and camera. As I see those pictures in my head right now, they play through the years and I can see my family grow and shrink with time and it is enough to make my heart crack open. There was a moment in time when all of us, every single one of us, were gathered on those front steps. So I look at the Google street view and burn the image of those steps into my brain. Then I close my eyes and I overlay that image with that moment.

I am thankful for the memory of the time my family was whole.

I SEE A GIRL, SHE'S ROLLER SKATING

Skating

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I don’t remember when it started or when it came to an end, but I remember the window of time where I lived on roller skates. I remember watching early episodes of Facts of Life and thinking that Tootie was the coolest character on that show. She went everywhere on her roller skates and she was cute, funny and clever. I wanted be just like Tootie. When I inherited my sister’s hand-me-down roller skates, I never wanted to take them off. They were white and I had made pink pompoms for the laces. I roller skated down our street on the rough asphalt. I roller skated in the garage on the very few occasions that the garage was clean and the floor space was empty. Mostly, I roller skated at the local roller rink. The closest roller rink was in Owasso. Rick’s Roller Arena was the place to be. Church outings, birthdays, school outings. Every Tuesday night was American Airlines night which meant that AA employees and children got in to skate for $1.

Mom would drop us off and we’d skate for hours. We’d speed skate, racing each other around the rink or dance along to the music while we skated. Of course, there would be boy watching and that awkward pre-teen couples skate where you hopefully ended up holding sweaty hands with a boy who could actually skate. We’d take a break in skating to play a few rounds of skee-ball and then jump back onto the rink in time for a game of Limbo. We all did the hokey pokey. When I said that to Michael, he said “You did the hokey pokey on roller skates!?!” and I laughed. It was the only time I ever did the hokey pokey. I didn’t even know the hokey pokey was done outside of the skating rink. Hard wood floors. Disco lights. Hits from the 70s and 80s. The slight breeze you generated as you swayed your way around the rink floor. It was all bliss.

It has been ages since I was on roller skates. Maybe it was my thirtieth birthday. I think I talked Stephanie and Cati into going roller skating with me. Cati was still little and I spent more time keeping her from falling down than I did actually skating. I was terrified she’d fall and break a bone. That was the last time I wore a pair of skates. That was fourteen years ago. The Cabbage is now at that age where she likes roller skating, so that was our family outing on Saturday. Her skating method is still a work in progress and she has falls, but she’s independent. She’s self confident enough to not need me skating with her and I had the time mostly to myself. I put on my rental skates and did a tentative run around the rink. It was an unsteady run and I knew something wasn’t right. I exchanged my skates for a size smaller and everything fell right back into place. I spent my first two or three laps tense and panicked over crashing into falling children (they were every where). Then I found an opening in the crowd, relaxed and just skated round and round and round.

Then I took a break to play skee-ball.

MEMORY LANE

Old stomping grounds

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Thanks to many 4-H trips and various camps, I had a pretty good idea of what it would be like to live in a dorm room. Every Spring, 4-Hers from all over the great state of Oklahoma gathered (or gather…I think they still do this) on the Oklahoma State University campus for three days of speech contests, elections for state officers, rallies and the novelty of having pizza delivered to a dorm room. Pizza delivery is a big deal for kids like me who grew up in rural America, where there is no pizza delivery. They always housed us in what was probably the most run down dorm on campus, with two to a room and large communal shower/bath on each floor. It was gross, but it taught me a very important lesson when it came time to shop for a university.

Look for campuses that have better dorm rooms.

Of course, curriculum is important too. And atmosphere. If I had to give a kid a list of things though, I would put ‘nice dorm rooms’ on that list. If you think about it, living space is incremental to academic success. So that should be pretty high on the list when considering colleges. The University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma (USAO) had two dorms: Sparks Hall, the guys’ dorms and Willard Hall, the girls’ dorms. They were located at opposite ends of the campus from each other and there were strict “no boys after midnight” rules for the girls’ dorm. The girls dorm rooms where set up with four girls sharing a bathroom in sort of suite. Willard Hall is closed now with “NO TRESPASSING” signs pasted to all the doors. Several years ago, USAO gutted Sparks Hall and renovated it into coed dorms. They also built apartments on one side of the campus. Willard became obsolete. Buildings that were empty and boarded up when I attended school there are now repurposed and functional. I am sure there are plans to bring Willard Hall back, just maybe not as dormitory. For now, it sits eerily empty with a plaque out front that tells the history of Willard Hall from it’s beginnings in 1920 as a residence hall for the women attending the Oklahoma Women’s College to it’s brief home for children attending the Jane Brooks School for the Deaf. It reverted back to a women’s dormitory in the 60s.

My Freshman year, I lived in room #227 (no lie) with three girls, one of which lasted only two weeks so I don’t remember her name. Karen and Jenese and I shared that space for our first semester. Then it was just me and Jenese until I became a resident assistant (RA). Being an RA entitled me to my own room, no shared bathroom or nothing. It was a pretty sweet gig except for the occasional crazy stuff that would happen like the occasional fight or boys in rooms after hours. There was that one time a fire started in the basement. The girl living in the room right above the fire had snuck her boyfriend in for the night. He stayed hidden under her desk when we evacuated the building. Once we were all outside and the firemen were on their way in, someone said something about so-and-so’s boyfriend. Four of us RAs went running back into the building, shoving firemen out of the way so we could drag that boy out of the building. We were lucky. No one was hurt and the fire was caused by a faulty boiler and easily put out. It didn’t cause any damage to the rooms. That girl and her boyfriend had to go to student court and I think she ended up being kicked out of the dorms.

There was a plague of crickets one summer and we were all pretty much convinced the place was haunted by the ghost of Nellie Sparks, the daughter of the rancher who donated the land for the school. But it was our home. It was our first taste of independence and the beginnings of adulthood. We had the freedom to explore and figure out what kind of people we wanted to be. Willard Hall was the first mold for the casting of the woman I would one day become. Sure, I got a little misty eyed when I walked up to that building over the weekend and peeked into my old room. I briefly thought about all of the times Chris walked me to that door. But then I thought about all those moments living in the building with women who would become life long friends. Later on, after posting that picture, the comments started rolling in. “Hey, remember that time…” We all have memories of that place, good and bad and silly. Living in the girls dorm was like attending the longest, weirdest slumber party.

I made a number of valuable friendships in that dorm.

THE BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT OF THE WEEKEND

Foggi Ice Cream

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I sat at the dining room table while eating my breakfast of cottage cheese with chia seeds, walnuts and honey and flipping though unread emails. I don’t read emails on the weekend or I don’t clean out my inboxes on weekends is really how I should but that since a majority of my inboxes are filled with junk. My eyes flashed by one subject line that read “Happy National Ice Cream Day!”. I paused and looked at the sent date. It had been sent out the day before. I missed National Ice Cream Day. Sunday came and went without one lick of ice cream.

My Pepaw would be so disappointed.

Ice cream is not a thing here. It’s kind of a thing, but it is more of a novelty, fancy thing. Ice cream places around here have flavors that include goat cheese and lavender. Those places are good; don’t get me wrong. I had an apricot goat cheese and honey ice cream cone just last week that was delicious. We went to a new place on Saturday where they put all of the ice cream ingredients into a metal mixing bowl and pipped in liquid nitrogen while the mixer swished everything around. Really neat and fun. It was tasty, but it wasn’t ice cream. There’s not a Braum’s up here or an equivalent to Braum’s. Custard. That’s the thing up here. People stand in line for cups of frozen custard with mix-ins like peanut butter cups or M&Ms and Reece’s Pieces. This is also good. It’s just that sometimes I just want ice cream. I want to peruse the ice cream counter, inspecting all the different flavors before settling on butter pecan praline.

This ice cream preference is genetically encoded into my DNA.

My mother tells a story about how when she was a kid, they made homemade ice cream every night in the summer time. They would put fresh fruit in it, what ever happened to be in season. Peaches. Blackberries. She said that my Pepaw would eat a huge bowl of it. Then they’d all go to the movies and he’d have another bowl when they got home. I can’t really think about this story without seeing a porch with my Pepaw seated in a lawn chair, leaning over a hand crank ice cream maker while a young version of my mother and Uncle Russel crowded around. I can’t hear or read these words without hearing that southern drawl that only comes out in my mother when she is around her brother. I can feel the hot steamy summer of southern Mississippi and hear the buzz of the cicadas. I can imagine Pepaw running a handkerchief across his brow as he passed his hand cranking duties over to one of the kids. They would all take a turn.

Pepaw came to stay with us when I graduated high school. I still had community college classes, but I would be home around three every afternoon. I’d pull my car into the drive and Pepaw would be sitting in a chair under the camper awning. He always stayed in a camper. I remember how he’d push himself up to standing as I pulled into the drive. He’d holler “Don’t get out! Let’s go get some ice cream.” and he’d come get in on the passenger side. I’d drive us to Tasty Freeze or Braum’s with him smoking out my car window all the way. He’s the only person I ever let smoke in my vehicles. He’d buy me a scoop of ice cream and then we’d head back to the house, him telling me stories and regrets all along the way. As I remember this now, I think about how rare it was to have Pepaw all to myself, just the two of us. We had family visits maybe once a year and that mostly included all of us, my brother and his family, my sister and her family. Usually it was all of us caravanning our way to Mississippi. But this time? This time it was just him and me and one of the Pennies. Pepaw was partial to Jack Russel terrier mixes that all looked identical to the one before and all ended up with name of Penny.

It’s funny some times, the things that trigger certain memories.

SALAD DAYS

Mators

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Last weekend, Michael and I stumbled upon the Lee’s Summit Farmer’s market by total accident. I yelled “STOP THE CAR!” and Michael found us a parking space. The first booth we went up to was selling mushrooms. They had a variety of ‘shrooms called Lion’s Mane that Michael and I had never seen before. We bought them for our camp dinner that night along with some asparagus and some heirloom tomatoes. We sautéed the mushrooms with the asparagus and sliced the tomatoes before sprinkling them with salt and pepper. The mushrooms were good, but it was after taking a bite of tomato where I thought “THIS! This is what I want to eat for the rest of the summer.” For years, I have watched my parents eat tomatoes this way and I never really got it. As a child, I found it down right disgusting. Then, it just became tolerable. Now, I want it every day.

There was a summer where I felt the same way about sliced jicama tossed with lime juice and cayenne pepper. The summer after Chris died, I lived on a shredded beet and carrot salad. Yes…everything was red. For weeks.

It just got warm around here. Or at least it has been for the last two or three weeks. It’s been the kind of warm muggy weather that makes you believe that it is Summer time. Today, not so much. A cold front moved through yesterday and the air has that feeling that it gets just when Summer starts thinking about Fall. But for a few days there, we had real summer days where I planned salads for almost every day of our meal plan. I pulled a salad recipe from our most recent Bon Appetit to go with our tuna steaks last night. Thinly sliced snap peas, cubed cantaloup, lemon juice, olive oil, salt, ancho chilly powder and sliced ricotta salata cheese. I threw in some arugula to stretch out the salad so I could have some for lunch the next day. We also could not find ricotta salata cheese, but the cheese person at Whole Foods pointed us to a good substitute that was not too pricey. I don’t even really like cantaloup, but toss it with greens, olive oil, lemon juice, salt and ancho and a good cheese and holy goats! That stuff’s delicious. We’ve also grown attached to an arugula, cherry tomato, avocado and red onion salad. The dressing is a simple homemade vinaigrette. Toss all that together and eat it straight out of the salad bowl.

As good as these salads have been, I still only want the salt and pepper tomatoes. But they have to be good tomatoes. Not those mealy flavorless things sold out of season in grocery stores. I want those bright red almost lumpy looking tomatoes that came from grandpa’s backyard. I am surprised by this new flavor attachment. My parents brought their southern Mississippi palates and tastes with them when they moved to Oklahoma and thats what I grew up eating. We didn’t fry our okra. We boiled it with tomatoes or pickled it. Nobody I know likes boiled okra except for me. Grits could either be sweet or savory, but usually sweet and creamy for breakfast. Michael and I were in a local diner for breakfast a long time ago. He ordered the cheesy grits. The waitress brought him a bowl of white instant grits topped with a slice of American cheese. I had to restrain myself from picking up the whole bowl and throwing it across the room. I ordered cheesy grits at a local hipster BBQ place once and they were crunchy because they didn’t cook them long enough. Michael politely told our waitress the grits were crunchy and we wanted to send them back. She replied “that’s just how we make them.” And I swear I felt all of my southern grandmas summersault in their graves.

Cornbread. Cornbread is not sweet like a cake. It’s made in a cast-iron skillet and should be eaten with every thing, but most definitely it should be crumbled into a glass of milk and then eaten with a spoon.

That first bite of that salt and pepper tomato triggered memories and smells of memories. Every hot Oklahoma Summer swirled into my head. All the summer days of bare feet and bicycles. Swimming in the galvanized stock tank my dad rolled into out back yard and filled up with the water hose. Sinking up to our knees in the mud as we played hide and seek in the corn. County fairs. Then there were the years where I’d only eat raw tomatoes if they were in salsa. The first time we took Chris to Colorado for a camping trip, we bought a giant tomato at the Boulder Farmer’s Market. When Mom sliced that tomato up to go with our dinner that night and then sprinkled it with salt and pepper, I was unenthusiastic, but I ate it. It hurts my heart a little to think about how much I under-appreciated that tomato.

Now I’m thinking about all the other things I may have under-appreciated.

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES

Puppy

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The best Christmas I can remember as a child was the year I got Odie. Odie was the most perfect beagle. In 2015, a beagle named Miss P won the Westminster Dog Show. Odie was almost identical in color to Miss P. His head might have been a little bit smaller and he did not have Miss P’s expression of bored indifference, but he could have run circles around her in the judges ring. For months leading up to that Christmas, the only thing I asked for was a beagle puppy. “What do you want for Christmas, Cindy?” someone would ask. My answer every time was “A beagle puppy.” I don’t remember what year this was or how old I was. It was sometime between broken arms and my sister was still young enough to get excited about the surprises we would find under the tree. The two of us, like most children, tiptoed carefully down the stairs at two o’clock in the morning to take a peek at what may have been left for us under the tree.

The two of us were about half way down the staircase when I heard a whimper. I forgot all about being stealthy and quiet, instead I ran down the stairs with the heavy un-lady like footsteps of a troll. An open box sat under the tree with the tiniest saddest little puppy, begging for company and love. I scooped him into my arms and took him back to my room. When we cleaned out the family house and started sorting through the multiple containers of pictures, we found hundreds of pictures of Odie as a puppy sleeping on someone’s lap, curled up on a boot, tucked into a cushion at someone’s feet. He was impossible to potty train and ended up leaving a big stain on my mom’s hardwood floors. But his worse offense was chewing up the rungs of Mom’s dining room table. That banished him to the outside for good. He was still the best dog, to me anyway and he lived a really long and happy life. Odie set the bar for any future dog that would come into my life.

That was the best Christmas not just because of Odie, but because I think that’s the last Christmas I can remember where I still felt that spark and excitement of Christmas. Maybe I knew that Santa was not real, but I believed in him any way. In fact, I still believed in all things magical and mystical, but it was an age where I still got excited over the whole gift thing. Not just the surprise of what I was going to get, but seeing the faces of joy as others opened their surprises. It is the last Christmas I can remember that didn’t include a layer of sadness or an awareness of the sadness of others. That is not to say that Christmases since then have been bad. It’s just that Christmases have an underlying layer of sadness in general. It is a time when memories, good and bad, swirl around our heads and we can’t help but miss the ones no longer with us to share in those memories.

Do you know how many times my Mom told us all the story about the time my sister woke up before everyone on Christmas morning and then opened ALL of the presents? It is a story of legend. My Dad would laugh every time. One year we all decided to change the Christmas tradition of ham or turkey for our Christmas meal and instead have what we all loved to eat, fried oysters. We would all end up in the kitchen at some point. Dad was always our unofficially designated food taster. J would make the cocktail sauce, stirring in horseradish to a bowl of ketchup like a science experiment. Remember that year Randy caught a shark? Katrina brought a fondue set and we all stood around it dunking bits of shark and then everything into hot oil. Fondue became known as fundue. There was the Christmas when Chris surprised me with a pair of earrings that I had been coveting. It wasn’t the earrings that made the surprise so special. It was how he had to sneak over to Eureka Springs with out me knowing it to get the earrings. Which he managed to do in glorious Chris fashion.

Whenever those memories get too overwhelming, I grab Josephine and cradle her like a baby while scratch her belly. I put my face to her face and tell her what a sweet puppy she is and how much I love her. She’ll lick my cheek and then every thing’s alright. Because just like at that Christmas when I got Odie, puppies make everything better.

THINGS I'VE TAKEN CARE OF

Te Ata

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Some times, as I make that long drive from Oklahoma City to KCMO, I start sobbing. I say some times because really I only do this when I've made the trip alone. It's just too many hours of endless road time trapped with my own thoughts. I know that I could listen to books or podcasts, but my brain still wanders off. I start crying. I cry about how much has changed. I cry about how much has not changed. I cry about how I never feel like I spend enough time or see all of the people. I cry because I feel guilty for not making enough of an effort to see all of the people. I cry because I'm tired and probably slightly hungover. I cry because I've stretched myself too thin. I cry because Chris isn't with me. 

Old life. New life.

I spent a weekend visiting friends in OK recently. I drove all the way down to Chickasha first, helping Misti with the finishing touches for the Listen Local event at our college and meeting Amy for dinner. The trees on the oval are now towering beauties. Buildings that were once closed are now open. I don't recognize any of the professors in the biology department. I ran into my old chemistry professor by chance and he told me he had retired. He new me instantly, told me I still look the same. Maybe that's what happens when you step back onto the campus. You morph back into the person you were then. I certainly saw everything as it was then. Same sidewalk Chris and I walked  a billion and one steps on as we traveled back and forth between dorm rooms. I spent most of that weekend with friends I would not have had if it hadn't been for Chris. Friends that Chris made into our family. He's the glue. I've noticed places where that glue has started to weaken and I feel responsible, like I need to reenforce those weak spots. I could be better at that some how. 

I am a filer. I talk about getting things organized, but I already have things organized. I just feel they could be organized better. My photos fall into the need better organization group, but if you ask me for the instruction manual to the fridge I can pull that right out of the filing cabinet for you. I like to compartmentalize shit. I don't just do this with the tangible. My life before Chris, my life with Chris, my life after Chris...these all have their own shoebox stacked inside my brain. Things happen, like earthquakes or bicycle wrecks, and boxes get jumbled and messed up. That shit spills out. [Off topic but speaking of earthquakes. I either had an encounter with a poltergeist or an earthquake while I was sleeping over at the Jens.] Some times the things I put into boxes do not stay in their boxes. Compartmentalization is hard. Thus the sobbing.

I came across an envelope containing Chris's driver's license and a death certificate as I was cleaning out the mail catcher on my desk. They were gathered in one place with the intention of fixing his Facebook account. A year went by. Then another. Time passing. I picked up that envelope and thought maybe I should finally do something about that. So I did. Chris's Facebook page is now a memorial page. This is me, trying to reenforce some weak places. 

AUGUST FIRST

Instagram post by Cindy Maddera * Aug 1, 2018 at 5:06pm UTC

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It's one of those days where I spend my time holding my breath in anticipation of horrible news. I keep thinking that I'm going to wake up on some August first later on in the future and feel normal. I'm not going to have flashbacks of being in pigeon pose on my yellow yoga mat and Chris walking in holding the phone and saying "Your mom is on the line and something's wrong." I won't remember the sound of my mom's hysterics or how she was incoherent. I won't remember calling Katrina's number and talking to our friend Cindy, listening to her explain to me what had happened with J. I feel like it is a trick of my brain that I can remember all the details of that moment. I can even tell you that I was on my left side in pigeon pose. 

My yoga mat is now a gray/blue color. I will probably never again buy a yellow one. 

As I scrolled through my Facebook feed, I noticed several 'friends' posting memories for loved ones lost today. Sentiments of "I can't believe it's been three years" or "we miss you." lined the page. Time doesn't matter. Three years or thirteen years. Any amount is unbelievable. You will always miss them. Often the traumatic memories are the first to surface. In this case I image what it was like when J died. I've seen too many movies and too much TV, so you know that those imaginings are brutally graphic and horrific. It's one of the many ugly side effects of grief, seeing the one you lost in the worst way. Sometimes I see, in my head, Chris's face the day before he died. His face is slack and his eyes are unfocused. He can't form words. That part is the oddest part to me. Chris was a word smith and in the end he couldn't form a coherent thread of words. These are the memories and images from the blunt force trauma of death. I have to close my eyes and shake my head to rid myself of the thoughts. 

As I was cleaning out the herb garden this spring, I decided to plant a few sunflower seeds. I'd come across a packet of them in the garage while gathering my gardening tools. Only one of those seeds sprouted. Each day it has grown taller and taller. It is about waist high now, still no flower. One day a few weeks ago, I went out to feed the chickens and noticed that the top half of the sunflower had been snapped almost completely off. It was still attached, hanging there like a broken bone. I frowned at it and thought about pulling the plant completely out of the garden. But I left it. When we got back from Portland, the top portion that had been dangling was now lifted up. A branch from a lower portion had grown up to support the broken portion. The plant had grown new tissue around the broken part. You can still see that the sunflower was broken. The plant dips obviously to one side before stretching up. There's a scar left from the break, but other than that, the plant looks healthy. It's thriving. You can watch it follow the sun every day. 

Broken yet thriving. 

We are all a little bit broken yet thriving. 

THANKFUL FRIDAY

My sister and I are not close. I mean, we love each other and all, but we don't have that big sis little sis relationship where we do things together and rely on each other. You know, like the kinds of sister relationships you see on TV and in the movies. Our age difference was just wide enough to put us into different orbits and I was just little enough to be too little to tag along. We never really seemed to fix the gap even when age was no longer an issue. Our personalities are just too different. She has always been more of a free spirit while I was the more serious and practical one. We often tried to kill each other when we were younger. Then Janell became a teenager and started doing all of the teenage kid stuff. We stopped trying to kill each other because we'd moved passed our murderous stage in life. 

I was left with just hoping to be included in whatever cool thing she was doing at the time. I was thrilled anytime she said "Hey! Let's go for a bike ride!" and we would end up riding for miles and miles. I remember feeling like the most important person in the world when she and her friends came to the elementary school for lunch once and sat with me in the cafeteria. Some times she would just show up as school was letting out either in her car or some boyfriend's car and take me to Sonic. There was one summer when she was a carhop at Sonic and she had to work the late shift on the Fourth of July. She told me to wait up for her and we'd set off fireworks when she got home. She said "I promise." I fell asleep on the couch waiting for her. Finally around one AM, I felt her tap my shoulder. I remember cracking open my eyes just enough to see her face right in front me. I heard her whisper "Get up! Let's go shoot off fireworks." 

We stepped out into the July night with every star shining in the sky. The wind had picked up but we ignored this. My sister set up the first of our big fireworks in the street and lit the fuse. She ran back to stand with me in the drive and we watched as sparks shot up into the air. Then the wind shifted so that the hot ash that fell down from the firework, started to rain down on our bare arms and legs. We screamed and laughed as we ran for cover. Then we saw the light go on in our parent's bedroom and we called it a night. I woke up the next morning with the taste of sulphur on my tongue and scrapes on my knees where I had banged them on the drive in our scramble from the hot ash. My sister was always the instigator for recklessness. I think about that now that we only seem to communicate through Facebook emojis. I think about how I tended to do the most dangerous stunts through my sisters goading. Once, she convinced me to walk out into the center of an abandoned rail bridge so we could jump into the lake together. We got in so much trouble, mostly because we left J alone on the swimming dock. But it was terrifying and thrilling and... everything. 

My sister's birthday was yesterday. She shares her birthday with our Dad. This has got to be a bitter sweet feeling for her. I remember how they fought when she lived in the house, our reckless years. The house was always filled with yelling either between Mom and Dad, my sister and Dad, my sister and Mom, or all three of them at once. My sister moved out right after her high school graduation leaving me alone with only Mom and Dad yelling at each other. That was a rough summer. I spent most of it at my brother and sister-in-law's house. J and I would walk down to the community pool every day and then come home to watch hours of MTV and eat 'grilled' cheese sandwiches. My parents stopped yelling at each other for a while and I went back home to start my freshman year of high school. I talked to my sister on the phone the night before school and I told her that  I was scared. I had heard all kinds of terrible stories of things done to freshmen on the first day of school. At the end of that first school day, I looked up to see my sister walking towards me in the hallway. She had come to check in on me, to make sure my day had gone okay. 

I've probably just told you every moment we had where we played our TV roles as Big Sister and Little Sister. Things are so different between us now. Distance and differences have placed a chasm between us, but I am thankful for those reckless years. They are the years I learned to be brave and take risks. My brother drilled the importance of going to college into my brain. He fed my scientific brain, but my sister taught me to be a little bit reckless every once in a while. So...I'm thankful for that. 

And I am thankful for you.

747

See ya Kansas City

3 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "See ya Kansas City"

CBS Sunday Morning had a segment about the 747 airplane being retired from commercial use last week. It's not the first story I've seen or read on the subject. The New York Times ran a nice article about the Early Days on the 747 back in October. The segment on CBS Sunday Morning also talked about the early days of this plane and how no one believed it would be able to get off the ground. It talked about different airlines competing to have the most interesting lounge in the upper deck with bars and even a piano on an American Airlines 747. The 747 was the cruise ship of the skies. 

Way back when I was little and we took that first trip to Hawaii, we flew on a 747 across the Pacific. The memories of that trip are hazy, particularly the actual travel parts, but I do remember being really excited about flying in a 747. I was wearing my nicest church dress. It was one Mom had made for my sister as a Christmas dress and had a layered ruffled skirt. As would be the case with most of my clothes, the dress became mine after my sister out grew it. Mom replaced my sister's dress with a matching dress of the same style, just a different color. Dress clothes were required attire for flying on the stand-by list because you never knew if that open seat was going to be somewhere in coach or up in first class. This was the late 70s, early 80s. People still dressed nice in first class and people still smoked on airplanes. Airlines started phasing out the lounge part of the 747 in the late 70s in order to make room for more seating, but this particular plane still had it's lounge. 

I have fuzzy memories of my sister holding my hand as I followed her down the long isle to the spiral staircase that led up to lounge. The stewardess standing at the bottom of the stairs looked at the wings pinned to our pretty dresses. We always got new wings whenever we flew, even though pins were only meant for first time flights. There was always someone working on the plane who knew Dad, either a pilot, co-pilot or stewardess. Dad knew everyone. There were benefits to that, like wing pins and extra peanut snacks. One time while traveling in first class, my Mom admired the salt and pepper shakers and the stewardess wrapped them up in a napkin and gave them to my Mom. The stewardess on this trip bent down to eye level to talk to us and then pointed up the stairs. She was letting us take a peak. I trailed behind my sister up the spiral stairs and we peaked through the rails. I only remember seeing feet. Shiny loafers. Black dress heels. Fancy cowboy boots. The lounge was dark and filled with cigarette smoke. I remember hearing music and the clink of glass. All of these images where absorbed in seconds before we hurried back down the staircase, giggling, running back to our seats. 

Really, I don't remember a single thing about our flight back home from that trip. I only remember the flight over and I don't think I ever again flew on a 747. The plane Mom and I flew on from Chicago to Heathrow was a big plane, but it was not a 747. It's a shame to see it go. It's a shame they got rid of the lounge. I don't miss the cigarette smoke though, but the whole idea of a lounge on an airplane seemed to make travel a decadent treat. Not the hassle it has become with long lines and very little leg room and the feeling of being squashed into a tin can. The 747 is one of those planes that made the traveling to the destination part of the adventure. I wish I could have ridden on one just one more time. 

THANKFUL FRIDAY

The weather has turned crisp with temperatures low enough that we had to turn on the furnace. My morning loops outside have left me with apple cheeks and a runny nose. It is the kind of weather I first experienced on a trip that I took to Seattle with Chris ages ago. I am reminded of that trip ever time Fall rolls around here. I remember that first morning in Seattle when Chris and I walked to the REI mother(ship) store. We hadn't packed coats, only light jackets and sweaters. My hands were so cold. By the the time we reached REI, the tips of my fingers were numb. It was too early for the store to be open, so we ducked inside a coffee shop just across the street. It was our first time in a coffee shop where each cup of coffee was made individually.  We'd never seen anything like it. Now these coffee shops are our norm, dotting every neighborhood and branching into the even fancier drip coffee. I bought thin cotton gloves at REI.

We experienced similar weather on our trip to Portland, more so on the day we drove to Newport Beach. This is when Chris noticed something. He discovered it only later, while he was reviewing pictures he'd taken during both trips. It was something about my face whenever I was near the ocean. The images he captured of me both in Seattle and in Newport all capture a face full of genuine pure joy. There's no hamming it up for the camera or silly faces, just me being truly happy. The day we were on the beach in Newport, it was windy and cold. My nose was runny and by all accounts I should have been miserable because I hate the cold. But in the picture Chris took, my head is thrown back in laughter, my hands are overflowing with shells and bits of wood. I could have spent forever there and there was a time when I dreamed that I would do just that. Even though I am quite happily content with my current place of residence in the middle of the country, I am thankful for that dream. I am thankful for those moments where I was the happiest I could be and how those moments of joy were independent of who I was with at the time. 

I'm not saying that dream of living on a coast is gone for good. Who knows what the future holds or where retirement will take me or us. Dreams change and shift. What I do know is that joy can be found easily in something as simple as a walk on a beach. 

PICTURE PAGES

Found print

5 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Found print"

I started a project early this year that involved organizing my pictures into some kind of an album with notecards and descriptions. I did four pages and the set all of it in the roller cabinet under the TV. It's been sitting there ever since. Meanwhile, the pile of pictures that need to be organized just keeps growing. Sunday morning, I got up and went through my usual Sunday morning routine: breakfast, CBS Sunday Morning, laundry. Whenever I would settle into the couch with a mug a of coffee, I'd end up with animals laying on me. Not such a bad thing, but they made it difficult to want to move. It was raining and dreary outside and it was just easier to turn the couch into a raft and play a movie. So that's what I did, but I also pulled out the photo project and worked on it some while I watched the movie. 

I started with a stack of pictures I had found while cleaning out the attic of my childhood home. They had been in the bottom of a box lid that was inverted and holding old bits of notes and mostly trash. I started to just toss the whole lid into my garbage bag when I paused and decided to flip through the debris. I was surprised to find these particular pictures in with a pile of trash. There was an old picture of my Grandmother, Nellie with her sister and one of Pepaw in his Navy uniform. There were several old square black and white prints of my brother when he was a child and three photos from his wedding with Katrina. There was one of all of us sitting around the dining room table. My Dad's parents, Mom, Janell, Randy and Katrina. This was before J and it looked like Thanksgiving. I recognized the Pyrex dish of sweet potato pie and the tan Tupperware pitcher that I am sure was filled with sweet tea. The table was blanketed with the red calico tablecloth that always adorned that table. It is present in the picture of me blowing out candles on my third birthday cake, another picture from the stack of salvaged pictures.

Then I came across a picture of no people. There's nothing written on the back to hint at where or when the photo was taken. I took a photo of it for Instagram and my mother later commented on it saying that it looked like the lake Pontchairtrain Bridge. When she said it, I knew that she was right. I figured that someone had taken it the year we traveled to New Orleans for Randy's senior trip. I have no memories of that first trip to New Orleans. I was way too small to form lasting impressions. Not like Disney Land. I was small then too, but I still have hazy images in my head of the Dumbo ride and our odd encounter with Donald Duck. I only have memories of stories told to me of that family vacation. My mother tells a story of how she made me a harness with a leash so she could keep track of me. She said that some old man yelled at her and gave her grief about putting her baby on a leash. He followed her the length of the French Quarter Market before she turned around and yelled back at him to leave her alone. 

That's the only story I know from that trip. I remember coming across a picture of the my brother, sister and I posing next to a cannon. My brother is sitting in the photo, his long legs made longer by the bell bottom jeans he's wearing, and he has his arm wrapped around my middle. It is obvious he has been put in charge of holding the toddler still for the picture. I know this picture was taken in New Orleans only because at the time of finding the picture, my mother looked over my shoulder at it and said so. Yet the picture tells more of a story than that. I suppose that is why I am drawn to photographs. Each one tells more of a story than just "we were in New Orleans" or "that was the time we visited your great Aunt in California."

I suppose that is why I feel such a need to get my photographs and stories in order. 

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Hopper

8 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Hopper"

I know that I have not talked much at all about our garden this year. I created the kind of garden that could get neglected and I have seriously neglected it all summer. We went through the lettuce and arugula early in the season. I've been eating on the kale that's starting to peter out. We've just now started to get tomatoes from our tomato plants and most of those are still green. The other boxes were devoted to purple hulled peas. We've already had one harvest of peas, enough to have a whole meal with stewed tomatoes. For weeks I've looked at the vegetable garden and noticed that there was another harvest of peas coming but I've been to lazy to fight with the mosquitoes and ants for the peas. 

Tuesday evening, I came home to an evening on my own. After eating a doctored Trader Joe's frozen pizza and sharing my crust with the dog, I pulled on my garden gloves and got out the weed eater. I managed to cut down one and half weeds when the line ran out. I swore and then got out the extra weed eater line and some scissors. The line was replaced in a short few minutes and I was back at it, fighting the weeds around the outside of the house and then inside the garden. I pulled up the over grown arugula, found three red Roma tomatoes (from plants that sprouted up from last year) and two bell peppers. I harvested the last of the kale and then started collecting purple hulled peas. By the time I was done, my arms itched with bug bites and my nose was running from allergies. After a quick shower, I spent the next half hour or so shelling purple hulled peas. 

I can remember sitting on the tailgate of my Dad's blue pickup and shelling purple hulled peas until the tips of my fingers were purple and tender to the touch. In fact, for some reason or another, that tailgate was the spot for all of the garden harvesting chores from snapping green beans to shucking the corn. My Dad's blue pickup takes up a lot of space in my folder of childhood memories. I can still feel the bare skin of my sister's leg pressed against mine as the four of us (Dad, Mom, me and Janelle) sat in the cab traveling to our next camping adventure. I remember the time that truck broke down while we were visiting the Puye Cliff Dwellings in New Mexico. Janell and I ran around the ruins at the top of the bluff while Dad tried to figure out a way to fix the truck. The truck looked so tiny from our vantage point of standing on the ruins. As the day wore on, I remember sitting inside the home of the guide/caretaker while we waited on Dad to get back with a part to repair the truck. The guide was a Native American and his home was filled with traditional Native American pieces. He had a row of carved animals sitting on a table. His hair was long and he wore a park ranger uniform. I remember being little in that truck. 

It's funny how some things trigger a memory and the more you think about it, the more vivid the details. When I finished shelling this latest harvest of peas, my fingers were purple and tender just as they were those many many summers ago. I am thankful for that tender feeling in the tips of my fingers and I am thankful for that purple stain of my skin. I am thankful for the memories that those things triggered. I am thankful for the harvest from our little neglected garden. We have probably two more rounds of purple hulled peas coming. The tomatoes that are now so green will eventually ripen even if we have to line the windowsills with them to get them to do so. These are good things to be thankful for this week. 

I am fortunate.

My tithe this week has gone to the Holy Spirit Episcopal Church in Houston and the American Red Cross.  Please give if you feel so inclined. You can also buy something from the Hurricane Relief Amazon Wish list. When you start the checkout process, you'll see a listing for Merritt Law Firm LLC Gift Registry address. That's the address you'll select for shipping. I just sent a large package of baby soap. 

THE GREAT SPARKLER

Our neighborhood sounds like a war zone

5 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Our neighborhood sounds like a war zone"

I am not sure that I will ever really get used to the firework situation that happens here every July. I did shoot off fireworks when I was a kid, but we lived outside of any city limits. It was not illegal, just highly frowned upon (mostly by Dad). You certainly did not set them off within city limits. I know of some cul-de-sacs who would pool their money every year to pay the fine for shooting off illegal fireworks, but I never witnessed the firework displays like I have seen here in my current neighborhood. For one thing, most of the fireworks from last night are not even sold in the state of Oklahoma. Every year since I have been here, a public service announcement goes out reminding people that fireworks are illegal. Every year the PSA is ignored and my neighborhood ends up sounding like a war zone and a smokey haze fills the sky. I don't mind. It is probably the only time of year where I am winning our game of Gun Shots or Fireworks (I pick fireworks every time).

Michael bought the Cabbage a whole bunch of fireworks yesterday. We walked around inside a big tent full of all kinds of fireworks picking out satellites and tanks and ground blooms. Of course our bag filled up with sparklers and snaps too, as well as some fountains and missiles.  Michael noticed a large display of the bigger fireworks, the kind you drop into a provided canon. They were on sale. So we ended up with three of those. At one point I had to leave because I could hear my Dad talking so loudly in my head about the money we were literally burning. He would also go on and on about the mess they make and how we had to be sure and pick up every scrap. Yet he never prevented us from buying them. We did have to roll the pennies we saved over the year, but he always threw in a few extra dollars. 

While I stood just outside the tent, I started thinking about the time Stephanie and I worked in a firework stand on the east end of Collinsville. That was the summer my nephew, Kolin, was born. He was early and sick and would only end up being with us for a few short weeks. I would get up in the mornings and drive to the hospital in Tulsa where I would put on scrubs and disinfect my hands up to my elbows just to go into a room to look at him. Then I would take J somewhere. We'd go to the mall or a movie. Someplace other than the hospital. Then I'd drop him off and head back to town for my shift at the firework stand. Stephanie and I spent most of our time at the stand trying to stay cool. We would sit in our lawn chairs, with our feet up on the counter and I would tell her about that morning's hospital visit. Then she would tell me about the crazy dessert stuff our boss had left for us to eat. 

One night, just before closing, a group of drunk guys pulled up in their pick-up truck and stumbled out. The swayed up to the counter and then started pointing at different fireworks with their lit cigarettes. "Whud about that one? Whuts that one do?" Steph and I took turns explaining the fireworks while reminding them to put their cigarettes out. They bought a small bag's worth of firecrackers and moved on. We both sighed with relief. Mostly though, it was a boring job, but a good distraction for that summer. We would be really busy for ten minutes with a flurry of people and then we wouldn't see a soul for hours. On the last night we were open, we had to do inventory. The owner could send back all of the unopened packages of fireworks and get his money back for them. We had to go through everything and tally up what was left, packaged or not packaged. Anything not packaged was ours for the keeping. Steph and I had an amazing 5th of July fireworks display. 

Our backyard fireworks display was pretty impressive. We even had an intermission because of rain. Still, I don't think it tops that 5th of July Stephanie and I had. 

MY RIGHT EYE JUST FELL OFF ON MY KNEE

Kansas

6 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Kansas"

It has happened more than twice in a period of one week. I find myself scrolling through my pictures, looking for something in particular, and instead end up lost. You know when I say that I should be more organized? What I am really saying is that I should have my photographs better organized. I don't tag anything or name anything or put anything into albums. The best I can do is try to remember what year I uploaded the picture. Good luck with that. So, there I am, rolling through page after page of pictures. My life moves backwards in a blur. Memories flashing by like a flip book. Sometimes I linger over one, but often I zip on by.

There's a small box on the bookshelf that contains some keepsakes. Old pictures. Christmas cards. For some reason I can't seem to toss the Christmas card that have family pictures on them. I was still looking for a certain picture when I opened that box. The picture I was looking for was not there, but instead I found pictures from our college days. There was one of Jen when we'd dolled her up for homecoming because she'd been in the running for homecoming queen. There was Amy and Chris and maybe Jen sitting at a table in the snack bar with their arms stretched out overhead as they all did their best impression of a snail. It was during one of those late night study sessions. I noticed a few snapshots from the UFO trip. Then there was a stack of wedding photos. God...we were so young and ridiculous. 

The next thing I know, I find myself scrolling through Chris's flickr feed. I don't even know why. I wouldn't find the picture I was looking for there. There is no reason for me to be looking at this space. I scroll through anyway. There are so many pictures of Chris because of all the 365 day projects. I watch him lose weight, gain weight, lose more weight. Occasionally there is a picture of him and Traci and it makes me wince. I still feel responsible, guilty, like I ruined it all for the two of them. I am sorry Traci. For what, I am not even sure I have words for. I am sorry even though deep down I know know know that I have nothing to be sorry for. Eventually I make it all the way back in his flickr feed when he is still wearing glasses. I remember how long it took me to get used to him without them after his eye surgery. Now it seems so odd to see him wear them. 

I am picking at scabs. That is what this is. It is a canker sore on the inside of my lip that I constantly poke with the tip of my tongue. It is because I have started writing a little bit here and there on an old story. A story no one will really want to read, but one I am afraid to forget. Also I am filling up with words. Their sharp edges are starting to poke me from the inside. I burp letters. Finding the time to do this seems impossible. I imagined the other day getting on the train and riding it to St. Louis or Chicago. I'd just get on the train with my laptop and sit and write while the country passes by. No distractions. No cleaning up after others. No demands or grabs for my attention. Nothing except for the occasional glance out the window. I'd get to the end of the line and just turn around and come back. I mentioned this idea to a friend at work. I said I'd get on the train with just my laptop and she said "and write!" before I could finish my own sentence. 

Maybe she could see the jagged edges of all the words poking out of me. Maybe it just seems obvious that I have stories weighing me down. 

MIMOSA MEMORY

Walk and roll

See this Instagram photo by @elephant_soap * 3 likes

There's a mimosa tree a few houses up the street. We pass it on our evening walks with Josephine. Most times I don't even notice it, but right now the tree is covered in pink pompom like blooms that look like something out of a Dr. Seuss book. Those blooms fill the air with a sweet green smell. That smell along with the cicada soundtrack of summer that was playing in the background, triggered summer time memories from a time so long ago that I'm not even sure those memories are real. They have that shimmery heat wave look to them, like those cartoon images of a mirage. I'm Droopy with a handkerchief on my head.

A mimosa tree grew on the southeast corner of my parent's property. I remember when the tree was small, but only vaguely. Mostly, I remember that tree as being big and tall enough to be my climbing tree and how I would spend hours sitting on one limb or another. If I wasn't in the tree, I was laying under the tree. If wasn't sitting on one limb or another, I was jumping off one limb or another. I remember one summer evening, sitting in that tree while watching a lunar eclipse. The land facing east was still undeveloped and the pasture there stretched on and on. The moon was at it's largest that night taking up more than half the eastern horizon. We were in the middle of preparing for Janell's first wedding and Mom was mad because we were all outside watching the moon instead of beating the carpets with a tennis racket. 

There was a brief amount of time after I fell from that tree and broke my arm, where I struggled with climbing it. The fall came from a moment of indecision. I could climb down the way I'd climbed up or I could jump down from the branch I was on. I turned slightly to go ahead and climb down, when my shorts snagged on part of a branch. The momentum of my forward movement halted suddenly by the snag yanked me backwards and I flipped over, landing hard on the ground below with my arm broken in two. After my arm was healed and the cast was gone, I would step up onto my first foot hold, a foot hold that was practically worn into place because I'd used it over and over, and I would pause. I would hesitate to go up any further. My confidence was shaken even though I know the reason I fell from the tree had nothing to do with my climb up into it. Yet, fear would still grip my heart even as I continued to climb on up into the tree and settle into my usual spot. 

But I still climbed up into that tree. 

That pasture that seemed to stretch for miles is now dotted with houses. The mimosa tree on the corner is now gone. Dad wanted to cut the thing down when I broke my arm, but I begged and pleaded for him not to do it. He got his way when I moved out of the house. I came home one weekend and my tree was just a stump. Dad mumbled something about diseased, but I knew better. Those things are changed or gone now, but the lesson never left me. If I'm standing on that ledge looking down into a crystal clear pool, no matter how tightly fear has wrapped itself around my heart, I'm going to jump.

Because I'm more stubborn than brave. 

I BOUGHT A COAT

Flock

"Flock"

Michael and I were sitting in a restaurant a few weeks ago and Michael was all glued into his phone (this is ironically funny because he used to tease me about being on my phone all the time and now it's him that's on his phone all the time). He said "It's going to be twenty degrees colder next week than it was this week." This statement caused me to slump in my seat and frown. I looked at him and said "winters get harder and harder every year." He told me it's because as I get older my bones get closer to my skin. I just responded to this with a raised eyebrow. I doubt seriously that my bones are any closer to my skin this winter than they were last winter or the winter before that.

It's just that something happens during the winter solstice and a switch gets flipped in my brain. A melancholy sort of settles in like a storm system and I feel like I'm struggling to be positive and joyful. Maybe this is the year I start taking drugs. I say that to myself every year. At the very least, maybe this is the year I buy one of those therapeutic sun lamps or maybe this is the year I just become resigned to the fact that winter is hard for me. Winter represents the taking away of good things. Warm sunshine. Scooter rides. Bicycle rides. Comfortably being outside. Chris. It dawned on me today while I was in savasana that for the life of me I could not remember the sound of his voice. Could not. Can not. I can't remember what Chris's voice sounded like. The realization of this was an Icee in the face. I even gasped for air like you would do when surfacing from a frozen swimming pool. Moments earlier, I'd come up into Warrior I with a giant smile on my face. Now I was racking my brain trying to remember the last thing I heard him say (coherently) and struggling to breath.  Bipolar grief. 

Then I get angry and I start remembering the few things about Chris that pissed me off. Like how he would say that any time I asked him to do something, I was nagging him. So much of the stuff in the basement is garbage that Chris couldn't get rid of when we moved up here. Now they're things I don't know how to get rid of. I never told you about the dreams I had where Chris was really mean to me. He said hateful, awful things to me and I know it's irrational to be mad at someone for what they did in a dream, but I sure am mad at afterlife Chris for saying those mean things to me. I want to make the excuse that it's the cold that makes me disgruntled. It's the angle and distance of the sun from the earth that makes me cranky. Disgruntled and cranky are just alternative emotions for dealing with the memories that these are the months where everything turned to shit for a little while. For a long while. 

The other day, I found myself getting really irritated because someone in front of me wasn't doing something the way I'd do it. There is a stubborn I-am-right-about-everything streak that bubbles up inside me at times and I have to remind myself that I am not right. My way is not better. Their way is not wrong. It's all just different. In that moment I decided to stop being angry over choices other people make because those choices are their's, not mine. It's like being angry over spilled milk that you didn't even spill. What if I did that now? Applied that theory to winter and grief? I didn't chose any of the events that led to everything turning to shit. Neither did Chris. Those things just happened. Just because. It's the answer that you give every four-year-old after they've asked "why?" fifty bagillion times. Yes. It is an incredibly unsatisfying answer. We inherently want things to be more, mean more than "just because". Sometimes there is more than "just because", like finding my scooter key when I found it. Mostly there is not more than "just because". 

Friday, I let Michael talk me into buying a new winter coat. The coat I had been wearing was bought for Oklahoma winters. I had to wear an extra layer under it here and then the zipper went wonky during Christmas break. So, I grumbly agreed that it was time for an upgrade. I now have a coat that is more suited to Kansas City winters. It keeps me warm without adding an extra sweater.  And because it keeps me warm, I was able to take back something that winter likes to take away. I was able to comfortably take my walk outside. When the sun finally broke through the cloud cover, it may not have been close enough to physically warm my face, but it emotionally warmed my heart. 

THINGS I'D RATHER NOT

Barbara and the Snowman

"Barbara and the Snowman"

While Michael was out Saturday doing his Christmas shopping, I stayed home to put up the Christmas tree and make stockings for the pets and Christmasfy the house. First off, let me tell you about making stockings. This required me to use a sewing machine and we all know that my relationship with my sewing machine is not good. We don't care for each other at all. When I dragged it out of storage, dusted it off and plugged it in, I anticipated a large amount of swearing. For some reason, loading a bobbin correctly is the hardest thing to do, but after the second try and a little sewing on a test piece of fabric, everything seemed to be working normally. The next thing I knew, I was sewing along like I knew what I was doing, pulling pins as I went and storing them between my lips like my momma taught me. There was a brief moment when things were going so well that I looked around to see if any one was watching and I thought "who the fuck is this person using a sewing machine?!?!"

It took me longer to get the sewing machine out and then put away than it did to do the actually sewing. This was also kind of true for decorating the tree. It took longer to bring up the boxes than it did to put the ornaments on the tree. Michael and I had discussed before I even started that maybe I shouldn't put anything important out and on the tree this year. It's the first Christmas with a puppy and a cat. Josephine has already removed and destroyed one cardboard elephant from the tree, as well as tiny bearded gnome. I have sprayed the cat many times with a can of compressed air. It was agreed that by "important" we both were talking about my Babar ornament. I was totally amazed that Chris was able to find a replacement that one time. I could not tempt fate and expect to find Babar a third time. Most of my ornaments are plastic or paper or cloth, so I went ahead and just put everything except Babar on the tree. 

Every Christmas, since we've been together, Michael and I have picked out an ornament for the tree that is an "us" ornament. The first year, we picked out a Santa riding a trout. It made zero sense, but it was ridiculous and seemed to be fitting because we hadn't really been in our relationship long enough to have an idea of what represented "us". The second year we picked out a record player because I had gotten Michael's record player fixed and I had purchased a bunch of Dorris Day and Barbara Streisand records. Cleaning days were a mix of his records and mine, with me singing along to all of them. This year we had plans to get a VW bus ornament because that's all we seem to be able to talk about these days, but when we went to the store, they were sold out. We settled on an R2D2 and Darth Vader set because the new Star Wars movie comes out Friday and we have tickets to see it Saturday. (Buying Star Wars ornaments with Michael is a little I don't have a word for it, but he likes Star Wars a whole lot, just not on the level that Chris liked Star Wars and this is a completely other topic of conversation.)

As we were placing the new ornaments on the tree, Michael asked me about the ornaments already on the tree. He wanted to know how many I'd left off the tree this year because the tree was not loaded down with ornaments. I admitted that I'd really only excluded Babar from the tree and then I looked at him and asked "I have told you what happened to all our ornaments right?" He said he vaguely remembered, but asked for a refresher. I gave him a brief run down version of how the Grinch disguised as a mean dog with inconsiderate owners destroyed our Christmas ornaments. And they were not just a box of generic ornaments either. These were ornaments that we had collected over the years of our marriage, ornaments that had been from our childhoods, one of a kind irreplaceable ornaments. As I got to the part about how Babar had been turned into colored dust, I felt my throat close up and tears prick my eyes. I was surprised by my reaction to telling this story again, surprised that it still stung after all this time. Michael was appropriately outraged and I shrugged and said "I'm still building back my collection from that time."

We are building back that ornament collection. The Christmas tree is a blending of memories that grows every year. Chris and I managed to gather a small number of ornaments together after the destruction of the old ones. There's an Ecto-1 and a Wall-E on the tree to replace the Enterprise and Yoda. I've added in some new elephants and Chris did find me a new Babar. After a moment of hesitation, I took Babar out of the box and set him on a shelf along with my Abominable Snowman. It just didn't seem right, after all of that, to leave him tucked away in a box. Now Michael and I are adding our own ornaments to the collection. Sure, it's not much now, but give us a few more years and I bet it will be a spectacular collection.