Life in a Time of Corona Virus

Thinking about this moment of weirdness, of corona virus, I've thought about writing. I started something last week, but then, tiredness overcame me and I didn't get anywhere.  This morning - though actually, it was 2 pm -- I began again and realized something about this blog. I tend to process life's events after-the-fact. If you are someone who makes sense or meaning out of things, certainly, it's a logical way to go. But now,  in this moment, well...our "after" is a long way away. We are in the midst, and I need to readjust my lens.

The wave hits me; it's dread. I know dread. We're old friends. Someone told me a couple of days ago that now, I need to disinfect all my groceries and it set me off. 

"WHAT?! NOW I need to disinfect my FOOD???" I exploded.

Immediately, I thought: Screw that. I'm done. I'm not cleaning my damn groceries.

But of course, I gave in. Now, I'm wiping down my groceries.

This is about control, something we think we have, but rarely do. And the thing about this phase, for lack of a better word, is that what's throwing us off is the rapidly changing scenario. The best analogy I can compare it to is when I delivered my second child who came so quickly that there was no time for an epidural. There were waves of pain that I didn't expect, couldn't control, and it was terrifying. There had been a plan or at least, a basic idea, but life threw that out of the window.

And the thing about this moment?  I don't know what I am terrified about and I really, really resent that. We are living in this time where every person I know if doing as much as they can to be rational, considerate, helpful and honestly: creative...for which I am just in awe. And yet, there are these waves of dread.

When I think about getting sick, I am not afraid for myself. I worry about others, especially the phenomenal, superhuman heroes: the doctors, nurses, chaplains...and all those who are working on the front line of life.

For those who grew up in dysfunctional families, the abnormal is normal. This feels all too familiar.

We have an administration that takes dysfunction to new lows.  I'm not going to say any more than that. I am skipping most of the news because it serves no purpose except to hit me in the gut and I don't need that.

My favorite novel is Love in a Time of Cholera by Nobel prize winner author Gabriel Garcia Marquez. There are many reasons to love it but for me, someone who believes in perseverance against all odds, it is glorious. It literally IS about a man who loves deeply in a time of cholera an endures greatly to be with his love. As we say where I work: That'll preach.

I mention it because it feels resonant. I hold to the sense of what always draws me back to his glorious prose: that sense of wonder and joy after enduring.

SO, we are in the midst, friends. Our "new normal", as some say. There are waves that hit us, then break.

I am still here and I hope you are, too. Holding us all up in love.

Peace.

On Belonging

Over the last few weeks, I have experienced moments of transcendence at work. Yes, really. If you've been reading my blog -- or if you know me -- you know that I love my job. I am not Pollyanna about it. It's work and I know it -- and it's work I am grateful to be able to do. But in the last month, I have experienced moments which have taken my breath away to the point where I want to write to the Universe and say: Thank You. For all the paths I could have taken, this meandering, fuzzy-lensed one got me this place where I have been able to connect with humans meaningfully and do something that's made me say: This is what I was born to do.

There were many delightful moments, too much to document here, so I will offer two details:

1. I was blessed to be the organizer for The HDS Film Festival, and in the process, combined my love of connecting people with eye-opening films, conversations and future collaborations. My stand-out day was Friday, Feb 7th, when we showed Gay Chorus: Deep South and the Oscar-nominated film: Honeyland.  The Director of Gay Chorus -- David Charles Rodrigues -- was able to join us for a lunch conversation as well as the scrreening and I was literally brought to tears when people who'd wanted to see the film were able to finally see it. Google the film if you want to know more about i and I encourage you to see it, if you get the chance.

2. On Wednesdays, we have a Noon Service, each hosted by a different group. Sometimes denominational, sometimes not, these services are occasions to experience "worship" (or not) as others live it.  (As an aside I will throw out the observation that what we have come to understand is that when you experience this, it can be both enlightening AND strengthing of your own beliefs -- not diminishing.) On the Wednesday after the film festival, I was part of the host group which was HDS Staff Members. We'd chosen a theme of "belonging", as a way to connect ourselves to the larger questions at the University -- who belongs? What does it take to feel like you belong? I offered a short reflection which follows. I volunteered myself for this because it is something I think and write about regularly, though I'd never had the chance to speak about it at HDS.

Below are some of my deepest truths.  I hope you find resonance.

Peace

BELONGING ~
Thirty years ago this summer, I went to a writers conference –and in the world of writing conferences, this one is a pretty famous. That August, I went to Bread Loaf. Set on the edge of the gorgeous campus of Middlebury College in Vermont, Bread Loaf is a ten-day opportunity for writers, editors, publishers, and agents to come together and do what we do – write, edit, brainstorm – as well as well as the real goal, which is schmoozing. I was 29 at the time, had just gotten an MFA in writing, and felt like I was part of something. I was stepping up. One unique detail about Bread Loaf is that there is a tiered hierarchy, among those who are accepted. There are three levels of attendees: those who are given full scholarships (usually those who have had some publishing success already) those who are given partial scholarships (writers with great potential but at Bread Loaf, must work off their scholarships, usually in the dining room waiting tables or working in the kitchen) and then there are the rest, who pay full freight to go. 

I was...in that last category. 

So there I was. And it was on the second or third day there -- everyone was still sizing each other up --when I was walking towards the “Barn,” where I was staying. I noticed a middle-aged man coming towards me on the path. We were just about to cross each other when he stopped, pointed to me and asked: “Hey are you someone?” I choked out a laugh, shook my head, and assured him that I was NOT. You can argue that I should have stood up tall and announced that of COURSE I was...and if a similar event happened now, I probably would. But. 

I have thought about that moment over the years. The desire, of course, was to be someone, someone with a certain amount of fame, part of that elite group. I knew that I did not belong to that club. I look back on it now, both appalled and unsurprised. It was a total set-up. But the thing about Bread Loaf – and I am absolutely serious when I say this – it really IS an honor to be invited to go, even if you pay. It didn’t believe it then, though.

When we have Orientation here at HDS each fall, something the Dean of Students makes a point of saying to each incoming class is: You belong here. The first time I heard former Dean, Maritza Hernandez, say it several years ago, I just about fell over at its beautiful truth . “We didn’t make a mistake accepting you,” she said. “You may think that everyone else belongs but you’re the exception. It’s not true.” 

Like many of you, I think about privilege a lot. I think about marginalized people a lot. I know I am unbelievably lucky in my job. One of the many blessings of my position is that I get to know students and hear their stories. I meet some who have lived through circumstances, have grown up with situations, and have been limited by factors that I haven’t experienced and couldn’t imagine. 

Feeling like you belong takes trust. Trust is earned. Each of us knows what it’s like to feel like you can’t trust or don’t belong. And the country, the world? It’s so, so much. 

But. Sometimes, change does happen. Last November, Bread Loaf announced that it was ending its Wait Scholars Program, which is what that tiered system was called. The New York Times reported that the conference was “changing its aid offerings after attendees raised concerns ranging from sexual harassment to racism to cutting into the seminars they came for in the first place.” 

A Wait Scholar from 2016 had written a blistering piece that finally, FINALLY, got the dinosaur to move. The following year, the assistant director, the conference’s -former director and the poet Michael Collier met with the waiters. One waiter said “All of us wept as we told stories of our working-class backgrounds and stories of racism and sexism and how this experience brought up those issues.” 

Of course, it did. 

Someday I’m going to get a shirt with the words emblazed on it: TELL ME YOUR STORY SO I CAN UNDERSTAND. To me, part of belonging means being seen and being heard. Each time someone tells me their story, where they come from, what they hope for, I know that I am being trusted with a connection. 

I want to put it out there publicly, wear it on a shirt, because I know I DON’T understand. I have no idea what it means to be a person of color today, no idea what it means to be a Native American today, NO idea what it is to be Muslim, a trans person, an undocumented person – an anyone. Anyone, except myself, really. And just being in this place where I am trusted with your stories is an honor. 

If I don’t know your story, tell me. Tell me your story, so I’ll understand. What brought you here? What are you going to do next? What’s your cat like? Can you cook? Most importantly, what kind of M & Ms do you like?

Life can be heartbreaking. I don’t know what you’ve been through, but I promise you, when you stop by my desk for some M & Ms and tea, you are somebody. You belong.

New Year's Eve: 2019

Friends ~ I have been thinking about stuff lately, as in: there's so much stuff in my house. I was thinking about my relationship to the myriad of things in my house, only some of which I think of as mine, though I should probably be more honest with myself and accept the fact that as the person who owns this house, yes, really, all this stuff is mine.

It's a modern problem.

Marie Kondo has had a couple of big years with her ruthless cleansing. And I think she has a point -- up to a point. I am not now and will never be a minimalist. I have no desire to be. The thing MK gets absolutely right is her "spark joy". To me, "spark joy" translates directly to humans I love.  As I write this, I am sitting on my couch, looking at my Christmas tree. Each ornament has a story. It's all beautiful in a shiny, mismatched kind of way -- but more importantly, it's a lifetime of stories, displayed for a short slice of time. And when I take them out each year, I am reconnected to each person. That's the spark for me; that's what makes meaning.

But it's New Year's Eve. I am feeling the call to ponder the past, look towards what's next. After a month of socializing, tonight finds me quiet. Dog at feet, soup bubbling on the stove, listening to my beloved cousin's husband perform folk music via livestream. The perfect way to wind down this year. And yes, what a year.

I don't believe in New Year's resolutions, though I know that for some, solid goals are good. Right now, my personal aspirations -- whether attainable or not -- seem of miniscule importance compared to the greater needs around me. Another day in the news, another day with too many people being attacked, being killed, simply for being. I grew up in the 60s and came of age believing in human progress. I am about to turn 60 this year, and I'm not sure if that's still true. But as someone I knew years ago used to say: You have to act as if. As IF love were possible, as if progress were possible.

And here we are.

What will next year and the new decade bring?  The pessimist says that I'm not sure I want to know; The optimist in me thinks that surely cooler minds will begin to lead. To think about ten years is too much. Let's just work on tomorrow, and take it one day at a time. One relationship at a time. One conversation at a time.

My cousin-in-law is singing his song about Icarus:

Sun goes up, moon goes down
and you knew from the start
the measure of all things
is still the heart.

Truth.

I don't have resolutions -- but what I have is a prayer. I am praying for listening. We have to be patient; we have to be kind. Cruelty cannot be a way of life. We are interconnected species, all.

2020 has arrived. Holding us all up in love.

Peace.

(Note: for info about the fabulous Greg Greenway, here is the link to his webpage: https://c9tuning.wordpress.com/)

On Reaching Out

A couple of weeks ago, something happened to me that's never happened before. One afternoon, on a day when I was already recovering from a recent cold, I felt my chest tighten, the left side of my face being pulled by pain and I thought: my God, I think I'm having a heart attack.

It had been happening for most of that afternoon, but on the train after work, it became pronouncedly worse.  I wanted to go home and ignore it, but instead, I texted my son to say simply: Not feeling well. I'm going to the doctor. 

At Urgent Care, they discovered that my blood pressure was an alarming 180 over 130. Completely sky high for me, someone who doesn't have high blood pressure.  The EKG didn't seem to allay their concerns and they calmly suggested I let an ambulance take me to a hospital, at which point I burst into tears because as anyone who knows me knows that the first thought I had was: I don't have time for this. I am not someone who has heart attacks; I am someone who helps others who have heart attacks. 

Which -- I know before anyone says it -- is ridiculous.

But I went. Without going into all the details, there were many EKGs, bloodwork to check enzymes and a stress test. I stayed the night, met with a wonderful cardiologist from Australia and in the end was given a diagnosis: stress.

It was *not* the heart. It was a panic attack.

While on one hand, that's "good" -- no surgical intervention required -- the body was telling me something, something I was being forced to notice. And worse than that? The body was forcing something that now OTHERS would notice.  In my mind, there would be shaking heads and rolling eyes. A heart attack was bad enough -- but a NON-heart attack?? I felt ridiculous. I felt embarrassed. I was ashamed.

BUT...friends. There are friends. I have friends, and in all honesty, to paraphrase Lou Gehrig, I am the luckiest woman on the face of this earth.

What brought me back home to my mind *and* in my body were my friends.  They talked and texted me, telling me that whatever was going on with me was okay. REALLY okay. I felt chest pain and acted on it? GOOD CALL. I felt chest pain and learned it was a panic attack? GOOD CALL.  No differentiation, no judgement.

My guardian angel-across-the-street came right to the hospital with a phone charger because -- of course-- my phone was almost dead. She sat and talked, literally talking my blood pressure down, announcing the lower numbers as they dropped.

She was also the one who told me the next week that coincidentally, a male friend of hers casually came into her office and told her that a few days before, he'd thought he was having a heart attack.  He went to the emergency room, stayed overnight for tests and learned it was a panic attack. No big deal. NO big deal, she said. He wasn't ashamed; it was just what happened. He'd gotten information and was glad he did.

It is in that spirit that I wrote today's blog. I have been thinking about it for the last couple of weeks. I have been open about other life events in the interest of demystifying them and validating experiences, particularly around those that women historically don't talk about: miscarriages, post-partum depression.

I routinely tell new mothers to reach out immediately if they think they aren't feeling "the way they should" which is a pretty big sign. I realized that for mental health issues, it isn't as obvious. There may not be a "baby" to prompt the conversation.

SO I am putting it out there. I was caught off-guard by my body's response to life's stress. Once I got it, I responded and am responding in appropriate ways -- care from doctors and therapist, accepting compassion from friends and family, and most importantly; paying attention to my mental health.

My Irish angel IS right; there is NOTHING to be ashamed of.  Nothing.  

Your encore for today? Check in with yourself. Feeling pain, whether a broken bone or a broken spirit, it's all valid. Talking this over with my co-workers, I said something that they said I should embroider somewhere: The body doesn't lie. It's truth.. You may not need a stent or bypass surgery. That doesn't mean you don't need care. You deserve care, no matter what.

Peace.

On Cars

I am in the process of buying a car. Not a new one -- "pre-owned", as they say. New to me. So ordinary, I know. And yet.

This is the first time I've ever gone car shopping by myself. On the cusp of 59, I went for the first time into a dealership and took the test drive I'd arranged the day before. I knew it was the one, knew it the minute I read the stats and saw the picture. All it had to do was run and not sound like there was a jet engine down by the muffler. Just get me from Point A to Point B, reliably. All the car had to do -- really -- was not disappear before I got there. It hadn't, I drove it, and I immediately put down my deposit.

And yet.

Though this is my first solo car, that's not the "and yet" of this story. It's because I'm not getting a car. I'm saying good-bye to a car.

My car: my loyal, problematic, ugly-as-sin car finally, (FINALLY! my friends and family are surely saying) reached the point of no return.  It's 21 now.  I used to say "It's old enough to vote but not old enough to drink" -- but now, well, it can do that, too.

When my mother died in 1999, she'd only had it for a few months, and it came to me. I'd never thought about an SUV and wasn't quite sure when I first took the wheel. But being a person barely five feet tall, I found the height incredibly useful and its ability to handle snow comforting. We hit it off.

My Dad always had a formula for keeping cars. If you need work done on a car but over the course of a year you spent less that you would in year of new-car payments, then you're okay. That made sense to me. For years, nothing alarming happened.  Ten years went by. Fifteen. Work got done, sometimes annoying or costly, but it always stayed below Dad's financial threshold. Around year seventeen, more serious money got spent and it was then that I realized something true: no mechanic would ever say to me what the oncologist had said to us in 1999, that the end was near. It hadn't occurred to me that cars could literally live forever ...IF …. you wanted to spend the money.  The other piece, obvious to all, was that I didn't want to let it go because it was hers.

I know that people anthropomorphize things and cars, in particular. Occasionally, I imagined the car with a tail to wag, joyfully shaking its back end like a dog, but really, I had no illusions about it. There was no particular kind of mystical or spiritual energy. It just was. 

At some point in his youth, my older son told me that he wanted to drive the car when he got older. I remember telling him that I hoped he would but knowing he wouldn't.  Then in June, he began to drive. That kid, now an 18-year old man, was driving -- the car, that car. This past year, too much began to go wrong with it. When the kid began driving it, I realized letting it go was going to break my heart.

Initially, it was the final gift from my Mom. Neither of my sons ever knew her so in a weird way, having one of them drive that car felt like some kind of connection, even if it wasn't. But the truer piece is that twenty years later, I know the stories. When my boys were born, they came home from the hospital in that car. It went down to Florida and back. It has spent more time filthy than clean. The radio works but the volume can only be controlled if you kind of pull the knob out -- but not too much. I have carried loads of gear for trips, unknown tons of groceries, too many seedlings and compost for the garden, and on one occasion, a somewhat illegal number of teenagers, with two stuffed sideways in the back. But we made it.

I made it. I made it mine.  Twenty-one years and 166,000 miles.

My bumper stickers will need to be replaced, but that's okay. I have some good ones ready to go.

And your encore? Think about your purchases and make your connections. You may find them somewhere.

For those who are curious, I'm donating my car to our local NPR station this week.  If it can serve some good in the world, even in its state, I want to make that happen.

Peace.

On Endings and Beginnings

It is curious how things happen simultaneously. People often say that things happen in threes, but of course, that isn't true. It's fixed attention. We see what we want to see and find what we are looking for.

And yet.

Yet sometimes, there is a cluster of events that happen in a closer-than-customary proximity and forces us to observe the occurrence. Perhaps make meaning, perhaps not. But there you go.

The last three weeks -- for me -- has offered up an extraordinary amount of endings and beginnings. As I am writing this, literally, my best friend's brother's life is slipping away. Some of the drugs were removed this morning and he is in his final decline. The family is around him and it will be an ending. Today. Today at 11:54 am EDT the summer Solstice occurs. Summer begins. The end of spring leads to the beginning of the next season. My own mother died on the night of the winter Solstice in 1999, and though I do not make comparisons or draw conclusions, I observe. All during the month of May, my office at work prepared to move out of our building. Because I was the liaison for this process with people in my suite, I was hyper-focused on getting that ending done right. I had been at that desk in that weird, lovely, quirky space for fifteen years. My boss had been in the building for over thirty. It was a grueling process, saying good-bye to the familiar, the space which I had claimed and loved.

I finished up packing my own things on the day of Commencement ~ May 30th. Commencement: the day where universally, multiple meanings of endings, beginnings and going forward are addressed. On Monday, June 3, the move happened. I was the last person in our suite, which I had always jokingly referred to as our airport runway since it was a hall with offices like gates off to the sides. I shut off the light and cried. 

June 11th, my son graduated high school. My 18-year old, first-born son. So grown up: shaving, learning to drive, buying himself a new suit to go to prom with money he earned at his job. Am I proud? Hell yes. Did I cry? Of course. 

And on June 6th, I went back to my original name when my divorce was decreed. 

Graduations happen every year. People die, trees are cut down, people move. Of course.

I also became a home owner in the last three weeks. My house -- my sweet, small, garden-encircled, hot-water-challenged house -- is now my own. It is a beginning. 

In the garden at work, the seeds that we started in March are flourishing and producing food. 

I have begun to take my new space at work -- a God-awful mauve cubicle -- and make it my own. I am not sure what to do yet about all that mauve, but in starting again, I am finding myself delighted. Truly -- a surprise! I am truly delighted in both the process of figuring out what makes my heart sing, and the observation that yes: my heart can and does still sing. 

And the encore is just that: encore. Again. For the good and for the bad, take the next step. I have nothing more profound than that. Be alive while you are alive.

Peace.

Mothers Day: What I've Learned from Lilacs

The house I grew up in was built in 1858; it was an attached farm house, with a barn attached to our kitchen. On each side of the barn door were old lilacs -- purple on the right and white on the left. The purple, the larger of the two, was massive and towered over the edge of slate roof. The white one was never as gloriously large but produced reliably, with white puffs of sweet fragrance. 

As a kid, I always knew when it was spring because in mid-May, the lilacs bloomed, followed immediately by our lily-of-the-valley. Glorious spring fragrance. In school, they taught us that the purple lilac was the New Hampshire state flower, chosen because it represented "the hardy men and women of New Hampshire" and could live for hundreds of years. 

My mother loved our lilacs. She had grown up in the house; her dad had bought it in the 30s. In my mind, lilacs were synonymous with her -- hardy, resilient, tough on the outside but for brief periods of time, showing a surprising softness. That was my mom. 

When my brother and I decided we had to sell the house in 2004, it was a gut-wrenching decision. Three generations had lived there. The house along with the lilacs and maples -- had been there since the mid-1800s -- and we had to say good-bye to it. 

Before we left, I decided I had to take some of it with me. The soil by the barn turned out -- no surprise -- to be mostly rocks with some soil squeezed between. That the lilacs had not just survived but thrived made me respect them even more. Such tenacity!

But I was able to pry out two scraggly suckers. I worried about the roots but carefully wrapped them in damp paper towels then in a plastic bag for the trip to Massachusetts. 

When I got home, I planted them in two places. One got pretty much immediately mowed over by someone who didn't know plants. 

And the second... seemed to be in limbo. It didn't die, but it wasn't exactly giving me hope. For two years, it produced a few sad leaves, but that was all. In the third year, it seemed to make a decision. Like Morgan Freeman's quote in Shawshank Redemption: You either got to get busy living or get busy dying. The lilac decided to live. The next few years, it began to grow, really grow, but no flowers. I worried that mine would never bloom.

Finally...finally...one year, there were TWO bunches of blossoms. I was ecstatic. The next year: nothing. Back to gloom.

But then, dear Lord, then.... that next year: my lilac bush was a riot of purple. So many bunches that I couldn't count them. It kept growing, doubling in height. Sending out its own suckers. 

SO now, as you have guessed, my lilac is exactly what I knew and loved. A full, glorious lush explosion of color and sweet fragrance, making the bees -- and me -- crazy.

I am beyond words when I go out and spend time with it. Smell -- the most primitive of the senses -- triggers something, that feeling. I get that. I get that and more. It is my mom, clipping dead limbs, snipping a bouquet for the table. It is my grandmother, doing the same. It is me feeling like this flower is the most important flower in the world. And most importantly, it is me: wanting to recreate all of this for myself, not believing I could...but doing it.

Today is Mother's Day. At the Arnold Arboretum, they celebrate the day with lilacs. Lilac Sunday. Today it's raining so few will pack a picnic as they have been doing there since 1908, fifty years after my house was built. 

I have a bouquet of lilacs on my dining room table; the room smells like heaven.

And the encore for the day is one I come back to often and probably always will: tenacity. Take the risk; be tenacious. Yes, it's true -- sometimes people will mow over your lilac. But it's also possible that your sucker will sink its roots down into the rocks, find the nutrients buried within and decide to send itself up into the sky. You won't know if you don't try. 

Happy Mothers Day!