Finding Truth

During this time of griefwalking, I've been reading a great deal...all non-fiction, my go-to choice under stress. (I know some people escape into fiction, but I prefer to have the groundedness of non-fiction when I'm feeling ungrounded myself.  Fiction is just too intense!)

I'm reading various things from histories to self-help, but my current spiritual reading ranges from old classics like My Daily Bread and Introduction to the Devout Life to best-sellers like Tolle's the Power of Now.  I've had some people question how I can read both very traditional spiritual works and New Age material, sometimes at the same time. (Well, not the EXACT same time since I can't read two books simultaneously, but I do put one down and pick another one up.)

It's because of something I was taught many years ago by a very wise spiritual mentor: As long as I am secure in what I believe, in what I know to be my experience of reality, finding truth in new places is like picking up an atlas after having used google maps. The place I'm looking at hasn't changed.  The only thing that has changes is the lens through which I look.


In short: take what edifies and ignore the rest.

Take Tolle's the Power of Now for instance.  He has his own interpretation of Jesus and his teachings, along with some uniquely Tollean ideas about Buddha and other spiritual teachers as well.  I don't read his words as gospel (all puns intended), but I did find his underlying teaching, about the important of being in the present, in the "now" to be valuable: "Wherever you are, be there totally".

In fact, it sort of reminded me of Brother Lawrence who tells us to find God in the pots and pans and our daily activities:

Men invent means and methods of coming at God's love, they learn rules and set up devices to remind them of that love, and it seems like a world of trouble to bring oneself into the consciousness of God's presence. Yet it might be so simple. Is it not quicker and easier just to do our common business wholly for the love of him?

 Both of them remind me that as long as I try to live in either the future or the past, I'm going to be unable to find peace, surrender or the touch of the Divine. The rest of the examples of either a French religious who lived several centuries ago and whose life doesn't resemble mine at all or a New Age guru who hobnobs with Oprah and whose life doesn't resemble mine at all I just ignore. 

I take what edifies and leave the rest.

And that's how I can have wildly divergent spiritual authors sharing my nightstand!
 

The "Icon-ic" Life

A French friend of mine shared this iconographer's prayer and I find it particularly meaningful right now.

Come to my assistance;
May my life be an icon reflecting You.
Guide what I think, inspire what I do,
Direct where I go, illuminate what I see,
Put your Word in my mouth,
So that for You my life will become an art work,
a sacred work;
So that whomever looks at me will recognize You.
Blessed are you, Lord, to have made me your brush,
O You, who are the artist of my life.

Incidentally, I have "written" a few icons in a past life.  This one of John the Baptist is my favorite.

(Perhaps one of these days I'll finish the one of Mary Magdalene that I've started.)

Third times the charm?

This is the third post I've tried to write today.  The other two just went so far and then slumped like a punctured popover.

I tried to write about how much I've journaled since Mother died, but it just sounded silly.

I tried to write about how much fear I've experienced these last two months, but it sounds rather whiny and self-indulgent.

So this time I'm just going to say that while I still want a bona fide miracle like I wrote about yesterday, I'm more resigned to the idea that, for whatever reason, a bona fide miracle isn't going to happen...at least not anytime soon.

There still are two major areas in my life where I can do absolutely nothing to affect the outcome.  All I can do is wait on someone else's free will.  And that just plain sucks.  Not only the waiting, but the fact that the other people involved have free will.  They can do whatever they want and I have no choice but to accept their decisions. Did I mention how much that sucks?

In both cases, I do believe that what I want is in God's will.  Both involve restoration, a giving back of what the locust has eaten.  In both cases, I've done my best to say, "Your will, not mine," to God and mean it.  But I could be deluding myself that they are what God wants for me.  I've deluded myself before and I probably will again.

But I continue to pray that if these really are God's will that he will enter in and create the miracle that seems the only way out.

But nonetheless, having the decision lie in someone else's hands and having to wait and see what they decide sucks.

Yes, it really does.

Facing Fear

 I've always been a journal keeper, but since my mother's death, I've written pages and pages, more than any other time in my life.  Oddly enough, they aren't in a journal, but on scraps of paper, yellow pads, backs of envelopes...whatever seems to be near at hand.  The other odd thing is that I have always been nearly compulsive about writing with black ink, but every word I've written in the past two months has been in blue.

I don't know what that all means, if it means anything at all, but it is something I've noticed.

I've also been reading in great gulps, washed down with more journaling.  My reading list includes everything from spiritual classics like My Daily Bread to modern best-sellers like Tolle's The Power of Now, books on grief, books on new life, on change, on fear, on anxiety, on transformation, on change.  I prowl through the library listings, ordering titles to be sent to my branch library, downloading eBooks, visiting the hospice center bereavement lending section.  The volumes cascade along the sides of my bed, tuck beneath my pillow, slip under the seat of the car, back up on my Kindle. And always, along with the books, are the pieces of paper and the blue pen.

Today I took some time to go back and reread some of the pages.  One of the constant, reoccurring themes is an intense, at times almost overwhelming, sense of fear.  It drips off the pages, in the same way that it saturates my life right now.

Right this moment, there are no wild animals gnawing on my feet; no notice of foreclosure has been posted to my door; my refrigerator has bread, eggs and fruit enough for a meal and the electricity is still on, so I'm not in any actual danger.  The reality is that I am afraid of what might be coming next. 

With all that has happened recently, I find myself in an almost constant state of anxiety about the future.  It's not entirely paranoid, given that from the time my mother broke both her legs and that midnight hospital trip until now, almost every phone call has meant something new and painful that I have to deal with. I've been in a state of high alert for nearly two years and that much adrenalin pouring into my body all the time has to create the ideal petri dish for fear and anxiety.  I find my mind racing, trying to out think whatever new dread might be lurking, as if I could somehow outwit the future if I just imagine all the possible awful things that could happen.  And let me tell you.  I can imagine  A LOT!!

Now here's where a person who is a good example of faith would insert an uplifting lesson involving some pithy experience.  But as I admitted a few days ago, I'm really not a very good example right now.

There are a couple of things I can say, however:
1. Sometimes just getting through a day is enough.
2. Breathing is really important.  The more stressed and afraid, the more important it is to breathe.
3. Fear can be a great tool to dieting.

=

A Bad Example of Faith

Sometimes I feel like I'm a bad example of what a person of faith should be.

I read other people's inspirational works...heck, sometimes I even reread things I have written in the past...which are filled with positivity, faith, hope and a "Isn't God GREAT!" attitude, and think, "Is that what it means to be a person of faith?  To pretend that things are just spiffy whiffy wonderful when it's patently obvious that they aren't and things are pretty sucky?"   And because I'm not feeling like I can be all happy and perky and cheerful about my life, I'm a bad example of what a person of faith should be.

Now I do believe that God is Great.  I do believe.  I do have faith...waxing and waning, stronger at times and weaker at others, but I do have faith.  However in this season of my life, I am finding it extraordinarily difficult to be gushing about miracles in my life and how I sense God's presence with me all the time.

Because I don't.  

That's why I say I'm a bad example of what a person of faith should be.  Take today for instance.  I suppose I could write about how I saw a lovely flower in the median strip as I was waiting for a red light and how overcome I was with the absolute miracle of life springing up in the midst of concrete and lifelessness.  I could wax poetic about the sweetness of the blossom amid the pain of life and go on about how it was such a profound example of looking for miracles that I was moved to spontaneously sing songs of praise.

I could, but I won't because that's not what happened.

I saw the flower--a dandelion--and thought, "Why is it that 'weeds' are more tenacious than flowers?" and then the light changed and I was on my way.

What it comes right down to is that I want a realio, trulio miracle in my life right now.  Not one of the "if you look hard enough you'll see a miracle" kind of miracles, but one that makes my heart stop with the sheer shock of it all.  Not a small, everyday, seek and ye shall find miracle, but the kind of miracle that makes me say, "Wow! Nothing is impossible with God!!"

I know I should be content with the miracle of dandelions in concrete, but the truth is I want more.

I can't help it.  I just do.

I want a miracle.

The Growth Chart of Life

When we are younger, or perhaps I should say, when I was younger, I saw life as a sort of growth chart, in which the natural progression was for things to get bigger and better.  What was difficult today would be easier tomorrow.  The latter part of life was supposed to be the "Golden Years" where a lot of the struggles of daily existence were finally at rest.

The last couple of years of my life have pretty much wrecked that operating theory. I never, even in my most driven nightmares, could have imagined that I would be experiencing the kind of challenges at this point in my life. It has been, without exaggeration, the very worst years of my entire life.  In fact, if you put the "worst-ness" of these past few years on a scale against all the rest of my life combined, these years would tip the balance.

To be brutally honest, I don't much like it.  A friend said today that God must love me very much and think I'm very strong to give me so many challenges.  I didn't say it, but I thought, "I'd just as soon he didn't love quite so much, thank you very much."

The hardest thing about the challenges...and they have ranged from the long journey to the end of my mother's life to a major betrayal that I'll talk about once the criminal aspect is made public (and it will be soon) to finances to health and a whole lot else is that the accumulative aspect makes it hard to have hope for the future. And that's what my mental concept of the "growth chart of life" had been about--the idea that even when things were static or negative, it would get better.

Now I find myself wondering if things will ever get better. And fearful that they just might get worse instead.

I've read (and written) enough inspirational material to know that this is the place where I'm supposed to  give some uplifting anecdote about how God has answered a prayer recently and hope has risen up in my soul.  Yes, God has answered prayers for me, but the darkness is still thick and the struggles have not abated.  I'm still in the Dark Night and there are no streaks of light that indicate dawn anytime soon.

Perhaps, in a few weeks, months or years, I will be able to look back and say, "There was growth after all.  And things really did get better."

Until then, all I can do is take a deep breath and be grateful for "One more day. Just one more day."

First Time and Sunday Gratitude

This was the first holiday I have ever spent in my entire life without being with someone I was related to.  It was both harder than I anticipated and yet, perhaps because it was Easter, filled with a certain grace as well.

So today I am grateful for friends who allowed me to share their Easter with them, even though I was probably not very good company.

For ham for dinner.  I love ham, but don't fix it for myself.

For three daffodils that survived the snow storm.

For a chocolate bunny.  In an Easter basket I was given!!!  Dove chocolate bunny.

And for Elijah, who will be six soon, who came and sat on my lap and said, "Deene," very softly and touched my heart.

Jesus and the Garden...Not Your Standard Image

Yesterday I talked about how the sweat like drops of blood that Jesus experienced in the Garden was the result of severe, as in "over the top" anxiety and panic and how that is at odds with our usual view of Jesus' facing his impending death with serene calm and trust.

I was thinking about how one might rewrite the Garden story to reflect that and how different the image of Jesus would be.

So imagine with me that the Passover Supper has just ended.  The disciples are full of roasted lamb and vegetables and wine.  They are satiated and sleepy.  Jesus, however, is growing more and more anxious. His heart is beginning to race, the muscles in his temples are tensing and he feels a clutching wrench in his stomach.  However, he masks all these sensations and does his best to appear normal, calm, even cheerful.  But his anxiety is growing.  Try as he may, he knows that each minute is bringing him closer and closer to his fate. The images flood his brain and he licks his lips.  They are parched and dry. He takes a deep breath and sighs.  The disciples don't notice anything.  They are too content to notice that panic is overtaking Jesus.

He suggests to the disciples that they go to the Garden because he wants to pray. They are happy to accompany him.  Jesus often goes away to pray and besides, the Garden is a good place for a nap on a pleasant spring night.

Once there, the disciples blink to stay awake and Jesus withdraws. Before he does, he tells them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” In the middle of a panic attack, one both wants company and wants to be alone, so Jesus both wants to get away from his friends, but wants them near at the same time. He is now entering into a zone of complete terror.

It's all he can do to keep his breathing steady.  The muscles in his jaws are tightening and he feels a crushing pressure in his chest. His mind races.  His entire nervous system is flooded with adrenalin and his heart begins to pound visibly.  He swallows hard, willing himself to calm down, but the autonomic nervous system takes over.  He writhes inside with anxiety and fear.  His mind races.  He can almost feel the nails in his hands and feet and the thought makes him nearly dizzy with fear.  It's all he can do to kneel down and beg the Father, "Please, please."  His knees give out and he falls on his face, crying out, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will."  The last words are wrenched from a throat that is constricted.  For a moment, Jesus thinks that he might actually die right there, in the Garden.

But the intensity of the panic attack ebbs and he manages to get to his feet.  By now he's not thinking clearly. In fact, he's not thinking at all.  He gasps for air, steadies himself against a tree and goes back to his friends. They have fallen asleep.  Disappointed and fearful, he asks, “Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?” Couldn't they see what he was going through? he wonders.  Couldn't they see how much he needed them to be with him.

He turns to Peter and says, “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." Peter thinks Jesus is reprimanding him for falling asleep, but Jesus is talking about himself.  His spirit is willing to go through with what is coming, but his body is not.  His body has a mind of its own and it is in full-on panic mode.  The waves of fear start up again, washing over and over him until he thinks he either must go crazy or die. He runs his hands over his face, bites his lips, presses his fists into his chest.  He falls on the ground, nearly writhing with the mental anguish. The words come in ragged bits.  He wants to be willing, but he is terrified, utterly and completely terrified of what is to come. “My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.”

Jesus feels dizzy, absolutely wild inside. He wants to run, to scream, to die. He breaks out in a cold sweat, shaking from the sudden chill. In that moment, the anguish is so great that small blood vessels begin to break all over his body. He is covered with blood.  He looks at the drops falling on the ground in horror.  He tries to pray, but his mind is so contorted with agony all he can do it cry in anguish, "Please Father.  Please."

The first blood of the Passion has been shed.

First Blood of the Passion

My goal has always been to try to blog daily, but sometimes the best laid plans of (wo)men and mice gang agley as Bobbie Burns says. Mine have gone astray with yet more things to do with my mother's estate.  It sometimes feels like it will never end!

While I've been getting death certificates and financial papers in order, I've also been thinking about the upcoming Passion Week, the High Holy Days of Christendom.  In particular, I've been thinking about Holy Thursday and the events in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Like a lot of Catholics, for me Holy Thursday has been a day when the emphasis is on the institution of the Eucharist and the foundation of the priesthood. Gethsemane is sort of an "add-on" that happened, but not much attention is paid to it.  It's sort of like Gethsemane is the transition between the Last Supper and the Crucifixion, with not all that much happening.

Oh, yes, there's that whole "Your will not mine" episode and the betrayal of Judas, but those things often get sort of swallowed up in the following events: the trial, the scourging, the via dolorosa, the crucifixion and the burial.

That's why I think we need to take a new look at Gethsemane. The events in the Garden are, to my mind, exquisitely poised to help those of us who are living in these times cope with the stresses and pressures of our times.  A new kind of meditation, one that is centered on  Gethsemane, might be just what the modern world is seeking.

Let's begin with the first and perhaps most startling revelation I had.  It was in the Garden that the First Blood of the Passion was shed. We talk about the "Blood of the Lamb" in reference to the Crucifixion, but it was there, under the olive trees that Jesus first began the Passion. Luke 22 says, "And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground."

 Now for most of my life, I sort of assumed that this bloody sweat was unique to Jesus, but it isn't. Other people, most notably a young girl terrified of the World War II air raids in Britain, have experienced it as well. It's called hematohidrosis and according to wikipedia:

Dr. Frederick Zugibe (former Chief Medical Examiner of Rockland County, New York) stated: "The severe mental anxiety...activated the sympathetic nervous system to invoke the stress-fight or flight reaction to such a degree causing hemorrhage of the vessels supplying the sweat glands into the ducts of the sweat glands and extruding out onto the skin. While hematidrosis has been reported to occur from other rare medical entities, the presence of profound fear accounted for a significant number of reported cases including six cases in men condemned to execution, a case occurring during the London blitz, a case involving a fear of being raped, a fear of a storm while sailing, etc. The effects on the body is that of weakness and mild to moderate dehydration from the severe anxiety and both the blood and sweat loss."

The key here is severe mental anxiety. Jesus was so terrified of what was coming, his blood vessels hemorrhaged. I don't know about you, but I've never considered that the calm, in control Jesus that we always portray going to his death experienced such "severe mental anxiety" the night before that he, quite literally, panicked. And in his panic, he shed the first blood of the Passion.

This seems to me to contain a powerful lesson and example for us.  Stress, anxiety and panic are so common that millions of Americans take drugs every day to cope. To think that Jesus was subject to the one of the greatest maladies of our time gives me pause. 

I have more to say about this tomorrow, but for now, just consider for a moment that of all the events of Jesus' Passion, the one that we can relate to the most in our day and age happened in that time we so often gloss over--in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Sunday Gratitude for the end of March

Sundays are hard for me. I used to spend them with Mother and so the emptiness is more intense than on other days. And then there are old memories of other parts of my life that seep into Sunday as well, making the day just plain tough.

That's why I decided to use Sundays for listing gratitude.  When I'm feeling my darkest, it makes me look toward the light.

1. Blue nail polish.  I've always liked nail polish and for some reason blue polish just tickles me.

2. Half and half.  Yeah, so it's hard on the arteries and skim milk or soy milk is so much better for you.  But in a cup of coffee, real half and half can't be beat.

3.  My son.  I got to talk with him yesterday and that always brightens the greyest of days.

4.  The public library.  I love being able to browse for books that I might not have ever thought about reading, either electronically or physically.

5. Wifi.  Of all the recent inventions, wifi has got to be one of my favorites.  Sitting anywhere in the house and being able to access the internet and email is magical.

Reflections on Poverty

 Parts of this will be in my new book on Facing Adversity with Grace coming out later this spring.

I have to confess that I’ve long had a problem with those who prattle on and on about how poor Jesus was and how destitute the Holy Family must have been. Before anyone has a coronary, I agree that Jesus and the Holy Family were “poor,” but their “poor” and our “poor” aren’t quite the same thing. First of all, in first century Palestine, in fact, in first century almost anywhere, there were only two categories—rich and poor. The  “middle class” didn’t emerge until quite recently in history. Jesus and his family certainly weren’t rich, so by default they were poor. But being poor wasn’t the same as begging at the gates of the city for scraps and even first century Palestine had its share of beggars. Poor was what everyone (except the rich) was. Poor was average.  

To say that the Holy Family lived in abject poverty seems to me to be quite insulting to Joseph. He was a tekton, a skilled workman more along the lines of what we would call a contractor. He wasn’t whittling the occasional little bench or stool for his neighbors in exchange for a handful of grapes. He probably was involved in much larger construction projects, possibly even working in the nearby Roman city of Caesarea where massive public building was going on. If he was unable to adequately provide for his family given his talents and abilities and if they were reduced to begging for handouts from their neighbors, which is what the truly poor had to do, then he shouldn’t be held up as a model for husbands and fathers. The same goes for Mary. If she was such a poor homemaker, unable to manage with what Joseph provided, that the family was the poorest of the poor in their region, then why do we look to her as our role for ideal wife and mother?  

Those who want to call attention to how poor the Holy Family probably aren’t imagining that they lived under a palm branch at the city wall, digging in the garbage for their food and wearing cast-off rags, which is what the truly poor would have been doing. I know that people claim as proof of their destitution the fact Mary and Joseph offered a dove instead of a lamb in the temple at the time of Jesus’ birth. Again, I’m not so sure that’s proof positive of poverty. I personally think it’s more common sense. If you could get the same blessing for buying a dove instead of a lamb, wouldn’t you buy the dove? I may be wrong, but I’ve always thought of their action as more like buying “generic” instead of “name brand.” In addition, I have the hunch that the only people who bought lambs were those who wanted to show just how important and wealthy they were. Mary and Joseph had no need to show off, even if they did have an idea that their son would turn out to be someone quite special, so they didn’t splurge on a lamb.

It seems to me that instead of calling them “poor,”  it is much more realistic to think of the Holy Family as “average,” not the elite with their marbled baths and hummingbird tongue banquets, but a family who had adequate food, sufficient clothing and a satisfactory dwelling to be able to live a normal life. In other words, the Holy Family was pretty much just an ordinary family doing ordinary things. If you are still questioning this, then consider that when Jesus was 12, they traveled to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. It wasn’t cheap to travel now and it wasn’t then. They had to pay for the caravan, their food, the temple sacrifice and all the other expenses that come along with a “vacation.” If the Holy Family were truly the poverty-stricken beggars of Nazareth, they wouldn’t have been going anywhere, much less to the capital city for the biggest festival of the year when all the prices would have been elevated to make a profit off the visitors. 

Or think for a bit about the Wedding Feast of Cana. If the Holy Family were the truly poorest folk in the village, why would Mary even presume to talk to the wine servers? She would have been grateful to be allowed into the festival at all, much less get involved with the matters of what was being served. She wouldn’t have been calling attention to herself or her son, but probably sneaking a few morsels into a bag for the next day’s meal. 

As for Jesus himself, it is true that he said he had no place to lie down his head, but again I think he said that for emphasis’ sake. After all, he did have a mother and family back in the old hometown and I’m pretty sure they would have found him a bed and a blanket if he knocked on the door. Moreover, the women who accompanied him and bankrolled his ministry, like Mary Magdalene and the Johanna, the steward’s wife, were wealthy. I can’t imagine that they didn’t provide more than adequately for his needs and those of his disciples. Why else would the gospels make a point of telling us that they were rich?

Jesus might not have had much money of his own, but his ministry was well off enough that he and his disciples had money to give to the poor, since we are told that Judas complained about spending money that could have otherwise been donated. If the disciples themselves actually were the poor, they would have been receiving money, not giving it away. In addition, they had sufficient funds to rent a place for the Last Supper and eat a full-blown Seder meal. Even in those days, the absolutely poverty-stricken couldn’t afford a lamb, much less the rest of a Passover meal. Jesus and the disciples had to have had sufficient funds to afford what amounted to a catered dinner. Finally, the robe he wore to his death was so well made that the soldiers cast lots for it. It couldn’t have been the rags of a beggar or they wouldn’t have bothered keeping it.

I expect some people will be shocked and even angered by this, but my point is not to say that Jesus was rich; he wasn’t. My point is to show that suffering from severe financial hardship doesn’t have to be considered a goal of our lives just because we have been taught that Jesus and the Holy Family were “poor.” Jesus said he came to bring us abundant life, not neediness and poverty. Moreover, being poor and in debt doesn’t automatically create holiness. If it did, the crime rates in slums and inner cities would be lowest anywhere. Of course, wealth brings its own set of temptations and struggles, but the reality is that even saints need money to do their good works, even if they merely have the money long enough to give it away. The only time that poverty is a true blessing is when it is voluntary. Having to worry about where the next meal comes from is suffering, not grace.

The Mind Killer

 I've always loved this quote. Now, when I face fears I thought I had vanquished, it is even more meaningful.

“I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.”
Frank Herbert

Accepting New Normal

Today, the beginning of Spring, much of the US swelters in a heat wave.  Here in Oregon, we are having a new Ice Age. It's been several years since we've had this much snow...and to have it in March just isn't right. I mean it's REALLY NOT RIGHT.

I was completely snowed in this morning, and without internet, phone or tv. Cell coverage was spotty, only allowing for the occasional text  message to get through. Plus I have a horrible runny nose, itchy eyes and cough.  I'm not admitting to it being a cold, but it bears a certain resemblance to a cold.

So, as I have been sitting here, feeling a wee bit sorry for myself, I've been contemplating what I call my "new normal."  New normal is what happens to you after (or while you are in the midst) of a major shift in your entire life.  For me, it began with the death of my mother, or more precisely, a year before when she broke her legs and we started on the long journey home.  In these past 15 months, everything that I had thought was "normal" has been upended, from my role as her daughter and caregiver to finances, to becoming involved in a criminal investigation (not my own!) to spiritual shifts to...well, nothing that I had considered "normal" a year and a half ago now is the same. 

I've been bucking and snorting at the enforced changes. I don't like any of them, thank you very much.  I want to go back to the way things were...when I knew what normal was and could plan for my future. 

As if any of us can truly plan our future.  We might as well try to plan the past.

Which brings me back to "new normal." I have come to the conclusion (insert much bucking and snorting) that it comes down to one of two choices:  live or die.  I either have to accept what looks like will be normal from now and continue living...or fight it and die, either figuratively or literally.  Them's the only choices available.  Live or die. 

So what does "new normal" feel like?  For starters, it's very alone.  For my entire life, I had my mother with me and now I am truly and utter alone.  (Nefer and Basti would beg to differ, but feline companionship isn't quite the same thing as human.)

For another, it's scary. I never used to fear adventures or insecurity, but now everything from financial issues to fallen tree limbs from the snow feels frightening. The future, which used to seem rather far away, now skitters around the edges of my consciousness like a very nervous rabbit being chased by a starving coyote. It's easy to slip into full-on panic mode about tomorrow and the day after and the day after that.  In my imagining I'm living in a cardboard box, sleeping on a urine-stained mattress, eating cat food out of a dented can while dying from cancer because I can't afford treatment. (See Anxiety Girl.)


Finally, "new normal" doesn't feel very normal. Which makes the aloneness and the scariness of it even harder to accept. But it is what it is, as a friend tells me, and until I can come to grips with the fact that my new normal contains these elements, I'm probably going to be creating more of both the aloneness and the scariness. 

So today, as the snow starts to fall again (in March!!!), I am taking a few deep breaths and telling myself that what is now my life contain both both solitude and fear.  But I'm also telling myself that perhaps, just perhaps, once I embrace these two and invite them to warm themselves by the fire, that some other parts of "new normal" will also manifest themselves.

Like peace. 

Or, who knows, maybe even hope.

Fear, Excitement and Chemical Soup

A friend asked me today what was making my griefwalk so challenging.  I had been thinking about that myself and so I had an answer, or at least part of one.

For as many years as I can remember, back to my childhood, my mother was always the most significant figure in my life.  As she aged, and I took on more and more of her care, that central role became more prominent.  Now, at her passing, it's not just her death that I grieve, but a radical shift in my whole life.

My friend commented that such a place to be could be a bit scary.  And yes, it is.  For my entire life, I had one constant--mother, her needs, her wants, her presence.  Now, all of sudden, she is gone and there are possibilities and challenges opening up that I never even considered before.

I learned in a seminar that the chemical response to fear is only one molecule different than that of excitement. That's why things like roller coasters that terrify me can be thrilling to someone else.  In their chemistry, the experience is processed as exciting; in mine it comes across as terror. They think, "Woo Hoo. This is a blast!"  I think, "OMG, I'm going to die!"

Right now, my chemistry is looking into the future with terror, not excitement.  My heart pounds, not with the thrill of new horizons, but as if a rabid wolf who hasn't eaten in a month is right on my heels. So last night, I tried something.  I tried consciously to shift my feelings from fear to anticipation.

Now I'm not going to say that it was a resounding success and that I flashed from one state to another, but I did sense a tiny little shift in the chemical soup that is coursing through my veins.  It was if I could see that fear and excitement are truly close and that maybe, with practice, I might be able to create and hold that shift for longer than a nanosecond.

It's worth a try.

Sunday Gratitude for mid-Lent

I know that listing the things one is grateful for is an important way to refocus.  Sometimes it's easy to find dozens of things; other weeks, not so much.  That's why I'm limiting my list to five.  That way if I have more than enough, I can pick and choose and if I'm struggling, I only have to think of five. 

So this week's five:

  1. Lemon water.  I really like lemonade, but in a pinch, water with a squirt of lemon, even from one of those plastic lemons is thirst-quenching.

 2. Clean kitty litter boxes. Freshly bleached. Self-explanatory.

3. A pellet stove.  When it's snowing in March, nothing makes the room cozier.

4. Enough ice cream in the carton for a nice sized bowl.

5. St. Joseph.  I really love him as a patron and tomorrow is his feast day.

A Message from the Other Side

I had been told that sometimes, when you are grieving, you dream of the person you've lost.  I've never had that experience...until last night.

Last night I dreamed (this does sound like the opening to Rebecca) that my mother visited me.  She was seated on a sofa and I was kneeling at her feet.  We talked about things I can't remember, but what I do remember is looking directly into her eyes and thanking her for coming back one last time to see me.

She then held out her hand with two Mass cards. (For those of you who aren't Catholic, a Mass card is card presented to a person telling them that you had a Mass said for them or someone they love.) The cards both had written on them very clearly "May 12," which is the date of my father's death.

I got the sense that she wanted me to have Masses said on that day, which I will.  Then, as I watched, she gradually got younger and younger, her hair growing darker and her features becoming more youthful until, she before she disappeared, she had long dark brown hair, just as she did when I was born.

And then I left my hypnogogic state and came fully awake.

Was it a dream? Or did my mother really visit me?

I'm not sure, but there's one more thing that happened yesterday that was unusual.  My mother was one of the most disorganized people in the world.  Everything was jumbled and tossed randomly and now much of it is in boxes in my garage.  Unsorted boxes which could contain anything from check statements from 1952 to the last napkin she used and stuck into her purse.

I felt compelled to go out there yesterday afternoon and, as I stood in the middle of the boxes, tears streaming down my face, I cried out:  "What is it you want me to find, Mother?"

I then opened a bag that had some keys and coin purse and piece of paper with her distinctive characteristically beautiful handwriting:

St. Jude Thaddeus, Known to help us and (I) pray that my daughter never lose heart when the way has so many pitfalls and God guides her step as she is shown the way....Let her know this will not be the true and final case....

I'm not quite sure what to make of it all, but I have the distinct impression that I've been given a message from my mother.

Tear Soup

Sometimes the best resources are written for children.

I went to a Bereavement Counselor today and read Tear Soup. 

I can't recommend it enough for anyone who is griefwalking.

Radio Silence Grief

I have discovered a new stage of grief.  I didn't know it was phase until a widow friend told me it was: the quiet time. 

I find myself withdrawing into silence, into myself.  I don't want to talk to people, go out, see anyone.  I just want to be alone...in my own inner being. I don't want to remember out loud or share.  I am griefwalking in radio silence.

It's rather odd, actually.  It feels like introversion to the nth degree and while I am an introvert at heart, this is extreme even for me.

My friend says that it's just a stage and it will pass.

I wonder what other surprise stages are waiting for me.

This is me.  I can immediately leap to the worst possible conclusion.

Pain in my shin? 
Cancer of the bone!!!

Higher than expected heat bill?
Foreclosure on my house!!!

Haven't heard from my son in a few days?
Dead in a car accident!!!!

It's a talent.

Sunday Gratitude

Just before my mother died, I was beginning to use Sunday's posts to list things I was grateful for.  I sort of fell off the gratitude stool into the grief pit, but today I'm making an effort to be grateful. It might not be bouncing up and down with whoop de do joy, but it's a start. 

And a start is the best I can do right now.


1. For primroses that survived since last spring.

2. For chocolate ice cream.









3. For a bit of sunshine today.

4. For the prayers of friends.

5. For Simply Lemonade.