Memorial Day and Book Club Selection - Becoming Mrs C.S Lewis

I call myself a wanta-be writer therefore I need to crank out a blog post whether I'm in the mood to do so or not. That's what writers do…no excuses, bang the keyboard until it squeals in protest. It's Memorial Day weekend but over the years I've written over twenty posts with that theme so I'm pretty sure I've covered not only the history of the holiday itself but all the years I've decorated graves of ancestries I didn't know, the years of going to lake parties with my husband's family, the two-day mini vacations my husband and I took along Lake Michigan and, of course, the first few years I was a newly minted widow back then I was one. In more recent years I've attended the memorial services put on by the residents here on my continuum care campus. I didn't go this year because 1) I have a doctor' appointment at the same time and 2) I was glad I had a conflict so my heart and head didn't have to battle it out over going, or not. I'm not proud of my country right now and singing patriotic songs would seem hollow and insincere. 

We have a lot of veterans living here and I've heard their stories----some poignant including a widow's whose husband was a prisoner of war during the Vietnam War and some stories almost apologetic because the veteran didn't see any action. The POW was in the same brutal prison camp as John McCain and another woman living here actually wore a POW bracelet with McCain's name on it. He wasn't famous back then but it's still an amazing story to tell. Even more amazing because she's a MAGA Republican and I've thought about asking her what she thought about 45/47 besmirching McCain's military record by claiming he was only a war hero because he got captured. "I like people who weren't captured," he said. To refresh our collective memories McCain was flying a bomber that got shot down and he was ejected from the plane, landed in a lake where the locals where waiting to take him prisoner. How would President Bone Spurs have escaped from that scenario, I wonder?

This past week I've become a recluse, avoiding all contact with my neighbors. Not for any particular reason other than I was involved in a couple of activities that were relaxing and satisfying. I was working on a custom paint-by-number of my great-great-nephew while listening to a book on my Kindle. It's a book club selection titled Becoming Mrs. Lewis by Patti Cathahan. It's a methodically researched, historical fiction about a friendship that turned into a love affair between C.S. Lewis (best known in America for his Chronicles of Narnia series for children) and poet Joy Davidson. I've never read anything by either author but I'm always curious about books that presume to explain a writer's methods, where their ideas came from and their work ethics. In this case there is plenty of documentation that Patti was able to access and after reading the Author's Notes in the back of the book I'm awed by the research that when in to this novel. Though in reading the reviews I learned that opinions of the book swing wide in book club circles. Our discussion comes next Monday.

If you've ever read the Narnia Chronicles to your kids I'm sure you would like this book on a deeper level than I did. Even so, it held my interest. Fans of his books and her poems will love the frequent quotes that Patti uses in their dialogues and the descriptions of the actual locations that inspired Lewis. Christians will also enjoy some of their discussions---she was an atheist at the beginning of the book and Lewis was well known for his apologetic religious writing. I didn't know what an "apologetic religious writer" was and in case you don't either here is how google explains it: "It involves providing arguments, both positive and negative, to support a specific religious faith and respond to objections or criticisms. Apologetic writing aims to make a case for the truth and value of a particular religious system, often using logical reasoning, historical evidence, and philosophical arguments." Lewis and Davidson were pen-pals for several years before meeting in person and they debated topics too deep for me to care about. But Patti Callkahan is a skilled writer who had a good sense of how much religion she sprinkled in the pages. I finished the book neither converted nor offended. Silly me, at first I thought maybe the universe was putting this book in my path to convert me before I get too old to know the difference between milk and orange juice. 

After finishing the book I tried reading quotes from The Chronicles of Narnia looking for some that might seem familiar, things that might have seeped into every day life the way lines from Lewis Carroll's children book Alice in Wonderland or Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz have. Do people of a certain age go around quoting lines from Narnia, I wondered, like I've done all my life with lines from Oz? If there is, I couldn’t find them.

Lions, and tigers and bears, oh my!

Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.

There's no place like home.

And there is no better place to spend Memorial Day like the cottage where I spent the first 18 summers of my life. And that's where I'm going today after I finish this post. We'll grill hot dogs, eat potato salad and apple pie followed by the Opening Volley of Summer---putting the dock in the lake. How was your Memorial Day weekend? ©

                                       

Tales From the Grim Reaper Zone

 

The past few days I've been weaving myself into a basket full of depressing thoughts but in my defense, I didn't really know or acknowledge the state of my mind until this morning when I re-read some stuff I'd written about past Memorial Day Weekends. Those weekends were more about day trips along Lake Michigan or get-togethers with family than honoring loved ones that the Grim Reaper snatched from my world. Don’t get me wrong, I've done more than my fair share of grave decorating over the years but what is missing now is the counter-balance to the duties of Memorial day---the fun stuff. The picnics and pot-lucks. The mini day trips that included the feel of the sun and sand, the sound and the smell of waves hitting the shore. That sense of being part of something bigger than just myself is easier to feel at the Big Lake where its water touches the sky and fills the entire horizon, or at family pot-lucks where more often than not I used to bring my mom's version of marinated four bean salad.

I did this re-reading of past holidays instead of going to the Memorial Day event here on campus that was organized by our resident, self-appointment Veterans Committee of one. Given the ages of my fellow residents it's no surprise that anytime he puts a program together to celebrate or honor veterans it's well attended. But I couldn't bring myself to go this time for two reasons. One, because he planned to read the entire Constitution and I'd have a hard time hearing it from the lips of a rabid Trump supporter. And two because last year I felt like a fraud singing along with all the patriotic songs when I was not (and still aren't) all that proud of our country. Sing-asking God to bless our "Great Nation" is not something I felt I could do again, as if we are still the same glorious beacon of freedom and hope we used to be.

But my negative mood was about more that just not wanting to go to that event. I was dog tired from something that happened the night before. It started when a man parked in our guest parking area and walked to a bench in our green space. I didn't think anything of it at first, but eventually I realized that he was wearing mismatched shoes and he looked to be crying half the time. Turns out he was. I didn't recognized him but it also turned out that he lives here and he'd just come from being with his wife down in the assisted living building. The grapevines says she gives him a hard time and blames him for her being moved down there---temporarily if she plays her cards right. She had her leg amputated last year and just broke her good leg and caring for her was more than he could handle. He himself lost all his toes to diabetes.

After an hour of keeping an eye on the man I called our security guard and asked her to go check on him. It was her first day on the job and she was rattled. Long story short while I was on the phone the guy walked over to my building and sat on a bench not more then 12 feet from my open window. I still didn't recognize him---he looked so rough and he had his back to me. Another fifteen minutes past before anyone approached him and it was another resident who was coming home from seeing Wicked and was pressed into helping. The two guys sat on that bench a half hour talking and praying together. Finally Resident Two got Resident One up to his room. By 2:30 AM I was just dosing off to sleep when the fire department showed up and an ambulance took him away. I got two phone calls---one a half hour after the ambulance got here and one in the morning---updating me on this stuff.

This Memorial Day made my loses hurt more, I think, because I went into it thinking a lot about my husband, my brother, my parents and even the dogs that have passed before me. I miss having a close bond with another being. Because I was in an antisocial mood, I spent the whole four day weekend avoiding everyone on campus while licking my wounds. Woe is me, I had no one to hang out with and like it or not, I have no one to blame but myself. If you move into a continuum care complex---like I did---with a goal of not getting close enough to anyone that their dying would hurt, then you pay a price. Mistake or not, it's too late to unwind it.

At the mailbox this morning a woman ran up to me to talk about Resident One, the guy I called security about. She was visibly upset and she said, "This is when the shit is starting to hit the fan. It's so hard to see people go downhill so fast." Then she named three couples who started out together in our independent living buildings but one recently had to go one down the road to a higher level of care. "That's what they signed up for and knew could happen," I rationalized. "I know," she replied, "but it's happening faster than I thought it would." I didn't say it but I was thinking that we're living in the Grim Reaper zone and sooner or later he will get us all. 

Until next Wednesday when I promise I'll be in a better mood. ©

Memoral Day Hindsight and Ice Cream Cones

Memorial Day is fast approaching and I need to plan a trip to the cemetery to tend my husband’s gravesite which isn’t really a gravesite since he isn’t actually buried there. Part of his ashes are there and a stone that shows both our names and his birth and expiration dates. Expiration date, yup, if you have read the very first post I wrote in this blog you’d know why I’m using that word instead of saying the date he died. I can use it tongue-in-cheek now but back when he died this is what I wrote:

“Widowhood: Day one after the funeral. I made some calls today to notify people about Don’s passing. One was to the medical supply company that rented us his oxygen machine and the backup oxygen tanks to use during power outages that never happened. And the woman on the phone says, ‘And when was your husband’s expiration date?’

“Expiration date? I thought. We’re not boxes of cereal with expiration dates stamped on our bottoms! If that were true we could have planned our lives better! And that thought got me to laughing and visualizing poor Don's bare butt with an expiration date tattooed on one cheek. No doubt Ms. Medical Supply Lady thought I was entirely too happy, given the nature of my call. I wasn't happy, of course, but I'd already used up my daily crying quota by noon and it was 2:00 in the afternoon.” 

I have since come to understand that no matter how a person talks to a newly minted widow they can’t win the wordage war. “When did you husband die?” “When was your husband’s expiration date?” Tomato tomahto. Emotions are raw. Tears are close at hand and we’re on the lookout for targets to aim our pain and anger. My target came in the form of an old friend who wrote in a condolence card words to the effect that now I was free to go have fun. Say what? She was lucky she didn’t say that to me in person and I’m proud of myself that I didn’t write that in a condolence card to her five years later when her husband died. I’m not proud to admit, however, that I thought about doing it but tit-for-tat is for children I finally decided. And I’m not proud of how much space that single sentence took up in my head. It festered and grew until I finally came to the conclusion that as inept as her words were she looked at my 12 ½ years of caregiving my husband as a long suffering burden---which wasn't the way I defined that period of my life---and in my new widow's shoes she’d want to go on a Caribbean cruise as soon as the ink dried on the life insurance check. Did I mention that’s exactly what she did after her husband died?

If we did come with expiration dates tattooed on butts, what date would I pick? I’m not a proponent of the Death with Dignity Movement by any stretch of the imagination. It’s too draconian for my tastes and ripe for misuse and murder. Nope, I’m not going under that bus with a little push from God knows who including someone with selfish reasons to want to me out of the way. Also not going to ride an iceberg off into an icy sea in a noble gesture to save the tribe from caring for the elderly. Who goes next, the disabled? The unemployed? But if I could whisper a hint in ear of the universe I’d pick my expiration date to be the day after my 100^th birthday. How’s that for having a lofty goal for a Septuagenarian? 

Speaking of lofty goals, ohmygod I just did the math and if I’m going to finish reading War and Peace before I die I’ll need to read 73 words a day for the next twenty-two years! That’s so do-able if I could just get past the fact that I don’t care about Russian society or Napoleon’s invasion. If the main theme of Tolstoy’s tome is supposed to be that “family happiness is the ultimate reward for spiritual suffering” as one summary states why couldn't Leo have gotten that point across in less than 587,287 words? What I’m beginning to question why I'm still holding on to that grueling reading goal when another long-time, fun-filled goal gets overlooked. That one involves balancing an ice cream cone on the end of my nose before it drops on my chest and ends up on the sidewalk. (I was thirty going on twelve so don’t judge, but I still think I can do it even if I failed my first time out.) I’ve had the War and Peace goal for so long that I don’t remember how it came about but I’m guessing it has something to do with my dyslexia and coming to the doors of the library later than most---figuratively speaking. I should get real, admit that it’s a futile goal and model myself after a character in one of Pippa Grant’s romantic comedies who chants to herself: “Accept it and let it go. You are a river, constantly in motion, leave the past behind.” Never let it be said that you can’t find nudges of inspirational thought in trashy fiction. ©

From Memorial Day to the Bachelorette Season 15

A few years ago I wrote a Memorial Day post and in it I said, “From personal experience I know that raw grief dissipates over time, but a tiny piece of my heart also goes back to grief from time to time in the form of wistfulness for what might have been.” I’ve been feeling a lot of wistfulness the past few months and I can’t decide if t comes from watching too many Hallmark Movies or if I’m watching them because I’m wistful. I miss love! I miss eye contact and hugs and the kind of conversations that happen without words because you’ve known the other person so long you can read each other like books. Your gestures, your body language, and the way your eyes turn different colors when you are happy or mad or sad. You can’t fool someone who has known and loved you for years. Sure, Hallmark Movies are formula driven but one could argue that actually falling in love and maintaining that love for years, is formula driven, too.

Speaking of formula TV, let’s talk about the new season 15 of the Bachelorette with Hannah, the former Miss Alabama. She started out with 30 guys to pick from and on the second show she had them in speedos walking a pageant runway. Do women these days really pick out their life partners by the size of their packages? In her case, it might be true. She sure has been doing a shocking amount of the full-body making out for so early in the show. I have a love/hate relationship with the Bachelorette and Bachelor franchises. They and American Idol are the only reality TV shows I watch and every year I say I’m not getting caught up in the “B” shows. But half the time, I still do. Maybe I'm pretending I get to pick from the 30 guys and, trust me, this season I wouldn’t have ANY trouble knocking 8-10 out of the running because of their “careers.” What is a ‘car bid spotter’ for example or a ‘roller boy’? The ‘pro-surfer’ plus the unemployed guys would be out the door by the second rose ceremony as well as the guy who just professed that he’s "already falling in love" with Hannah and “you can trust me.” 

If I was to wake up tomorrow young and beautiful like Hannah and was in her place, I’d make quick work of that show. It would have ended already because I’d pick 28 year old Tyler G., a psychology graduate student working towards getting his PhD in psychology to become a clinical psychologist. He has a side business in Dream Therapy Analysis and you know how much I like my dreams. All these guys have profiles on the Network’s fan page and his reads: “Tyler G. is a very laid-back guy with a go-with-the-flow kind of attitude. He avoids clubs at all costs and would much rather spend time reading, going to Soul Cycle or relaxing on his boat. Tyler considers himself a modern romantic and is looking for his equal match, who he says is a confident girl that isn't afraid to lay it all out on the table and is one that can make him laugh.”

But Hannah eliminated him this week, on the third show, because behind the scenes he was accused on a message board by a high school girlfriend of being "extremely misogynist" which just goes to show I make bad decisions based on first impressions and/or in this age of social media teenagers can never outgrow their past miss-behaviors. Hannah, however, kept the psycho-stalker last night when she threw Tyler to the curb. Go figure. There’s always a psycho-stalker type on these shows. A woman or man who cuts into other people’s time and who stirs up trouble because psycho-stalker can’t play fair in the sandbox. Am I invested in this waste-of-time show or what? And it's only week three!

I would argue that show (and Hallmark Movies) are not really a waste of my time. It’s a mindless diversion from watching too many political shows. It’s an opportunity once a week to throw popcorn at the TV screen (which the dog cleans up) and to remember what it was like on the dating scene before I met my husband. Not that the show is anything like clubbing was back in the ‘60s but reading the body language of these guys and trying to figure out if they are handing Hannah a line or if the producers are manipulating everything, or not, keeps me watching. She graduated magna cum laude with a degree in communications, she’s not stupid but Hannah sure seems too shallow at times. Her platform for her year as Miss Alabama was to “advocate for those suffering from depression and anxiety, something she battled with during her teenage years.” I once dated three guys at the same time and that filled me with anxiety and she’s trying to ‘date 30 guys at once? Nothing like jumping feet first into an active volcano.

Back to Memorial Day. It snuck up on me. The weather has been too cold to think about the beginning of summer which this holiday weekend usually signals. Or maybe that’s just an excuse for wanting to avoid going to the cemetery. I was there a month or two ago and it needs work, sod was taking over the stone. But I wasn’t exaggerating about feeling a lot of wistfulness and I’m not sure I want to pair that wistfulness with spending time digging up sod around Don’s grave marker. I’ll go but I want to do it on a nice, warm sunny day and if that warm day doesn’t come until July? I’ll probably not be able to find the darn stone! ©

Cemetery Run: Year Six

It was a bright, sunny day in the neighborhood when I got up and I had places to go and things to do including going to the cemetery to do some “housekeeping” around my husband’s gravestone before the Memorial Day weekend kicked into high gear. But first I needed to drop off my recycling at the transfer station what’s located along the way. I’ve been on a militant mission to recycle as much one-time use plastic, glass and metal as humanly possible. My recycling “come to Jesus” moment came after I posted the video back in April of a sea turtle with a plastic straw stuck all the way up inside his nose. I’ve always recycled newspapers, cardboard and pop cans but I didn’t think I was generating enough kitchen and household recyclables to make a difference. Boy, was I wrong. Before, I was going to the transfer station every 8-9 weeks but now I’ll probably need to go every 2-3 weeks and I’ve reduced the trash that goes out to the street for Monday pickup so much that it looks absolutely ridiculous in a tote big enough to hold 332.5 pounds. I’ve called around looking for a trash pickup service that offers smaller containers or once a month, rather than weekly pickups but they all seem to be using the same play book.

The cemetery was a busy place. Mowers and guys with weed whackers were working on the far side of the rolling, tree studded place and Boy Scouts were making their way down the rows of stones, looking for graves to put fresh American flags on. After I parked off to the side, careful not to encroach on any gravesites, I grabbed my long-handled shovel, a jug of water, scrub brush, plastic bag and garden gloves and I was surprised to see the tombstone looked better than it usually does when I do the spring the cleanup. Usually sod is attempting to take it over and the engraving in the marble is filled up with dirt. Others like me were parked here and there and as we worked the bees were buzzing, the birds were singing and the flowers were holding their faces up to the sun. A perfect day to be anywhere but where I was.

As I dug out the sod around the stone I thought about what I wrote in my blog last year---I had looked it up the night before. “This year,” it read, “is my fifth Memorial Day since Don’s passing and I could write exactly what I wrote last year: ‘I went to the cemetery on Saturday and had a talk with Don. I told him that I think of him often and that I’m doing okay even though he took a piece of me with him when he left.’” This weekend, my sixth Memorial Day of grooming his gravestone we didn’t seem to be on speaking terms and that may be because I had a half of jug of water left and I got side-tracked cleaning up a near-by grave of a veteran of the Korean War that looked pitiful and abandoned. I almost cleaned it along with Don’s last year but decided not to because I had just read another widow’s blog who had gone ballistic when she went to the cemetery to clean her husband’s grave and found it had already been done. She suspected his first wife did it and she was going to have a showdown over it. Dead and fighting over who gets to clean up after the guy! He must have been quite the prize. Anyway, I’m thinking if Don’s Korean War vet neighbor in the cemetery has a living widow around, I could take her down in a fist fight.

On the way home from the cemetery I got caught in a road construction maze. The street I usually go home on had been closed off permanently and the traffic light that used to be at that intersection was moved 200 feet down the road, at the exit ramp coming from the expressway. It’s not like we didn’t have a month of warnings. We did, but old habits are hard to break and thank goodness I didn’t make a left onto the exit ramp. (Someone's going to do it!) Turning around in the carpool lot so I could head back in the other direction, I found the brand new by-pass road that eventually connected to the road I needed. But on that road I ran into road block and had to turn around. AGAIN! I didn’t think I’d ever find my way home and I was running out of options. I ended up going way far out of my way but all’s well that ends well because that road took me to Starbucks and my Chevy Trax is programed to turn into their driveway.

As I jotted down notes for this blog entry I was sitting in their coffee shop, using the stainless steel straw I now carry in my purse---that’s how serious I am about doing my part to reduce was goes into the landfills and oceans. It was my first “granda Teavana shaken pineapple white ice tea lemonade sweeten infusion” of the season. They don’t tell you this, but ordering drinks at Starbucks is a senility test. If you get any one of those words out of order you have to start all over again. ©