Archive for the ‘Vicissitudes of Life’ category
Love Among The Shadows (slightly skewed to the right)
March 12, 2012First Day Daylight Saving’s Time – New Found Benefit (in Nightgown with Black Velour Skirt)
March 11, 2012
New found advantage of daily savings time: dawn’s early light.
Okay, maybe not dawn, but closer than midday.
I’m not normally someone who will get up and out at even at 7:30 a.m. on a Sunday morning, much less 6:30.
Oh, I’ll talk about how renewing it would be, but then I’ll pull my comforter over my shoulder and snuggle deeper into that little (big) depression I’ve formed in the good old memory foam.
But today–aha!–profiting from that extra (or rather subtracted) hour–I was up and out.
Sure, I wasn’t quite able to get dressed–pulled my only long skirt (velour) over my nightgown, hiking boots over sleep socks, down jacket over the whole assortment.
But I was up! And out!
And the light was blue and pale and fresh and kindly promising in just those ways of a somewhat earlier morning, and the coming day seemed eminently possible.
Hope yours is too.
One Too Many Days of February (Pasty Body/Soul Malaise)
February 29, 2012
I wake up today, the 29th, feeling subject to just one too many days of February.
When they said that you couldn’t have too much of a good thing, they weren’t talking about February.
Whose primary youth-formed associations (for me) are the birthdays of a couple of long dead, albeit great, presidents–cut-outs of red cherries on school bulletin boards; silhouettes of flip wigs and curved beards.
Yes, these days it’s also Black History Month, and there are some great celebrations there, I suppose, but for me, it’s still February, as in, extremely Grey wherever I happen to live.
The weather this month has actually been quite beautiful. (Evidence – photo from yesterday above.)
And yet, I still feel, not-so-deep in my February-frayed soul, my winter-pasty limbs, thick cloud, cold damp, and a malaise the color of sidewalk (with an occasional patch of stuck gum.)
And the big news of the day–Romney’s finally winning states he was expected to win up till recently–I’m relieved on one level, but it’s also hard to feel excited exactly–
Where’s the Pie? (Thinking of George on an Empty Stomach)
February 21, 2012
You Know Who and You Know What
When I was little, you could not get past George Washington’s birthday without at least a sliver of cherry pie. The crust might not be the flakiest, but the cherries were red, sweet and glutinous enough to get you through the greyest mid-week February. (We did not herd holidays to the nearest Monday back then.)
The sales ads all had little hatchets on them, not only in honor of chopped prices, but of HONESTLY chopped trees. (“I cannot tell a lie,” Crazy Eddy burbled maniacally. Yes, we knew he could probably be undersold, but it was still a good schtick.)
Fast forward to 2012. We have plenty of sales, plenty of chopped trees, lots of talk about honesty (and lots of flakiness too.) But what about the pie?
That’s what I want to know, and (since I haven’t had dinner yet), the sooner the better: what happened to all that pie?!???
Diabolically busy week continues….
January 25, 2012
apace.
One More Last Thing
January 11, 2012
Getting up very early in the morning tomorrow to go to my father’s cremation. This sounds so strange even as I write it. Perhaps I should say that we (my brother and I) are getting up very early to go to the cremation of my father’s body, corpse, remains. (Though it is hard not to think of what is left as my father, since it is the only physical bit still present.)
Going to an event like this may sound ghoulish or unnecessary. (We have already had a very lovely funeral.) And yet it feels important to me to do it; one last chance to do one more/last thing for and with my father, even if it’s only seeing a longish sort of box, maybe putting a hand on a corner of it, or a corrugated side.
Art Therapy (With Elephants)
January 9, 2012
As followers of this blog know, I lost my dear father last week. He had been declining for some time, but his death has still been very sad, especially for my mother, his spouse for over sixty years. The above is a collaborative drawing of my mother, myself, my husband and my iPad2 done during the preparation of the first dinner we’ve actually been able to cook since my dad’s death. (Doing normal everyday things like cooking is difficult after a death. In my case, this difficulty is compounded by the fact that my mom has an electric stove, and I’m an absolute devotee of cooking with gas.)
One activity that is quite wonderful after a death, however, or perhaps after any trauma, is the making of visual art–even not-such-great art like the painting above. There is something absolutely engaging about making images, one’s own world, a new world–a world that, if you don’t have complete control over your medium, is full of surprises, and yet still self-contained. It is probably more fun to do the art with paper and brushes, but those may be more dicey to whip out in the midst of food preparation.
As always, I recommend the Brushes App for those working on iPads.
Food, Mattresses, Eulogy?
January 7, 2012
Too-quick drawing of my sweet dad
It is hard to explain how much there is to do after a death. It is a crazy time, so rushed historically because of the fragile nature of the body, and now because of the difficult interplay of multiple schedules.
So what are some of the tasks?
Picking out clothes to take to the funeral home. Something nice, but perhaps not too nice. (You won’t get them back.) In accordance with family regulations, you must make any family member near the same size try on selected outfits first to make sure that any clothes chosen are not things that might have remained with the living.
Buying food. More food. Sandwiches? Shrimp? Is Champagne weird? If not, should we get the one whose name is like that of an old friend? (Yes.)
Calling people. Writing people. Sitting with those who come to visit. Accepting hugs.
Cleaning. Going into the decedent’s room and discretely taking out the more unpleasant reminders: rubber gloves–compressed oxygen.
Getting beds organized. Airplane tickets. Car pick-ups. Mattresses. Sheets. More food.
Cleaning out the fridge–Ensures don’t need to be refrigerated and space is needed for all that food.
Negotiating funeral program. Reading Bible verses. Considering non-Bible Verses. Hurriedly drawing sketch that can be printed on a small-town church printing system.
Music?
Of course, music.
Oh dear, music!
Photographs.
Helping to pick out clothes for the widow. Promoting the benefits of hearing aids. Assuaging grief.
Grieving.
Organizing more food.
And more clean up.
A eulogy.
Mattresses.
Long Day
January 6, 2012
Long day’s night. As followers of this blog know, it is the day after the death of my dear dad.
A lot to be done, a lot done. Not really done, but “arranged, ” i.e. set up to be done.
I find it very hard to use the term “passed away.” I don’t like euphemisms to begin with, but also the word “pass” just seems too casual for such a sober event–how can I use the same word for the death of a loved one as I might use for requesting a bottle of ketchup, a throw of a football or a whole bunch of more awkward things?
It seems to me that “past, away” would work better, the person being both suddenly past and away.
Those remaining behind become extremely tired.
The good part is that some of the normal nervousness and fretting about doing things, i.e. preparing events kind of disappears for a while.
You just do your best, can’t worry.
Besides, there is plenty enough else to worry about–that which has passed, and is away.
Not smelling one’s best
January 2, 2012
ManicDDaily 
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