Remembering is the hardest part…and the best

Before we officially move, I need to pack up some stuff that didn’t make it to Mom’s new home in the mountains. Lots of bric-a-brac, “frou-frou” in the Interior Design profession. Some clothes, linens…stuff like that.

And things sneak up on me, just like that photo of my dad at the river did on Thanksgiving at my brother-in-law’s house.

I found the rehearsal schedule for the only ballet recital I was ever in. I was in second grade.

There was a skirt / blouse ensemble that my mom purchased over twenty years ago from an exclusive dress shop in Roanoke. She wore it to work. Then I wore it to work. Then it went back to her closet, so she must have worn it to work some more.

Mom made a smocked dress for me when I was about six. Found that. And a yellow dress I wore for a portrait when I was a little younger.

Her high school yearbook from her sophomore year was in a box in a closet. I look at those pictures now and think it looks like they were taken a hundred years ago. Then I look at my own yearbooks, stacked in the floor in my living room, waiting to be boxed up, and think the same thing.

During high school, then again in college, my piano teachers would pull out some old nasty-looking piece of sheet music they’d played in college and give it to me. The pages were always brown, torn, held together by pieces of dried Scotch tape. My own music from college looks just the same.

I stumbled upon a pink dress box, lined with tissue paper, containing a few Christmas ornaments left from the ones we used when I was little. Always on a cedar tree from a farm somewhere. And,  in the same box, genuine icicles. The long stringy tinsel things we used to put on the tree after it was all decorated to make everything sparkle. Then a cat or dog would pull a few off the tree, chow down, and make the yard sparkle all year long!

Dress patterns for dresses my mom make for me to wear to school. Some of them are hilarious; others could be made and worn today and no one would know they were 30-year-old patterns.

Other craft patterns: for a red sweater mom knitted for my son when he was a toddler. It has owls on the yoke; for slouch bags she sewed, and taught Domincan women how to sew. Doilies. Lots of doilies.

Cassette tapes, from Country to Classical. All outsourced now, to CDs and MP3s. Even a few LPs, being revived by new gadgets w/ USB connections so you can record your old LPs onto your computer, scratches and all, I guess.

Picture frames, bowling balls, carnival glass my Grandmother won at fairs over the years.

Stuff. Individually, all these things are just stuff. The neat thing is that I can pick something up, hold it in my hands, and remember. “Oh, that was real! I thought I’d dreamed it, or imagined it. But here’s proof!”

Individual pieces of my history, boxed and stacked and spread out all over the place.

But when I add them all up, they amount to, well, LIFE.

Or lives actualy.

My grandparents; my parents; me; my children.

And one day, their children.

And their children.

Today I’ll wander back into the past, remember, reconcile and take another step into tomorrow.

 

in the crowd

Wubby is graduated, and lived to tell about it. He almost didn’t because his grandma and mom and dad just about cleaned his clock before we left home Saturday morning. For some reason he just wasn’t in a hurry, even though he was supposed to be at the church auditorium where the ceremony was held AT LEAST 1 HOUR before things started. We left 90 minutes early, to make a 15 minute drive that took almost 30 minutes because of traffic (everyone else going to graduation), arrived to find an almost full parking lot and a line of parents, grandparents, siblings, etc. wrapped around the building. We headed for the crowd as Wubby joined his classmates inside.

As we stood in the crowd waiting for the doors to be opened, I noticed an old acquaintance of mine in the crowd ahead of us. Actually, he and I used to work together. Our sons were born about three months apart. Later in my career I worked FOR him. Then I left and went to work for another company two blocks over. He’s still at the same place; his job went from programming to managing to outsourcing. I guess he’s one of the few, maybe only, people left in the systems area. I wasn’t surprised to see him there. I knew his son was in Wubby’s class; they just didn’t run in the same crowds. But I was really surprised to see how he had aged since I’d seen him last. I like to think I don’t look my age (don’t burst my bubble here, please!), but he and his wife both seem to have aged way past their late-40s / early-50s actual age. I suppose outsourcing your friend’s and co-worker’s jobs could have that effect on you. Thank heavens I don’t know about that.

Once the actual ceremony began the teachers all came filing into the auditorium wearing their black robes and graduate hoods (those that have advanced degrees…) and another face in the crowd caught my eye. Another co-worker, from the same company and systems team, now teaches math at the high school. Again, I knew this. But seeing him, wearing the robe (no hood) on the faculty of the school where my daughter will be starting in August, threw me. He and I, how to say…….well, we worked together. Our families were friendly for a while. The working relationship, the family relationship, both, ended badly in that, hubby and I will not allow our daughter to be in any of his classes. He looked old too, and I’m older that he is.

As each of the 400+ graduates crossed the stage, he or she had an opportunity to “smile for the camera”, as the entire event was being professionally videotaped. Wubby was his somber, serious self. Other students gave various thumbs-up signals, etc. It was entertaining. More so were the various cheers offerred by parents, siblings, friends, etc. of the graduates. Individual applause was not allowed, but shouts of “Hallelujah!” et. al. were present in large numbers. The crowd favorite was a father who shouted “I love you!” as his son crossed the stage, then shouted even louder “Get a job!!!” as his son received his diploma. There were also families with kazoos and rehearsed cheers. The video should be a hoot.

So, for now, wubby is officially allowed to wear his cell phone on his belt if he chooses, go to the bathroom when he wants, without a hall pass, and various other things he couldn’t do in school. The class valedictorian recited an exhaustive list of these little jewels; I stole two of them. In addition, wubby has a job at the church, which means he’s getting paid to do something he would do for free. Except he did call me at home this morning to ask me something and prefaced his question with “I’m not trying to get you to do my job, you just know more about this than I do….” and then asked me to help him do part of his job, sort of.

At least he still asks.

Next week we’re heading to the Grand Canyon for a few days. Then it’s another 10 days and it’s off to teen camp in the mountains. Another three weeks or so and he’s off to college. And before we know it, his sister will be following right behind him.

But I can’t be this old!

 

T.G.I.F.!!!!!!!!!

Thank God it’s Friday!

Thank God it’s February!!

Thank God it’s FINISHED!!!

Pick one; they all work for me.

FINISHED: I am officially disabled, according to the Social Security Administration. It took 3+ years, 2 lawyers and 300+ pieces of paper, but my case has finally been decided. I’m not exactly sure what this will mean for the family, but for now it means that I can concentrate on getting better and learning to live well (w/ or w/out fibromyalgia) with less. Less money, less stuff, less stress. Funny thing, the first doctor the SSA sent me to, in May 2005, found that I was severely disabled. Severely. And the claim was denied, twice. That’s not really funny, is it?

FEBRUARY: I hate January. Hate it, hate it, hate it. It’s cold, dark, the after-the-holidays slump time. I haven’t been able to read, or write, or concentrate on much of anything. My birthday is in January and is always a non-event because it comes on the heels of my son’s birthday. From 2004-2007 I at least had a week in Santo Domingo to break up the January slump, but not this year. I did receive quite a few notes from the Dominican ladies this year, all sending get well wishes. As Eyeore says, “Thanks for noticing me.” Anyway, January is gone, thank goodness. Spring is coming.

FRIDAY: Friday is my favorite day of the week. Period.

I’ve been thinking about time, and timing, the past week or two. Since my SSD case has been decided, a 3-year waiting period ended and a 3-month waiting period begins. Those 3 months of waiting for income to be established will seem as long as the 3 years of waiting for a decision. It’s weird how time expands and contracts. When we’re children it seems like Christmas takes forever to come. As adults we turn around and Bam! it’s Christmas again. My son turned 18 last month. He can’t be 18! It’s not possible that it’s been 18 years since he was born, but it is so. Time moves, and we either race to catch up with it, or turn around to try and slow it down before it runs us over.

And timing….well, let me tell you. There was an article in the local paper last week about a 29-year-old who plead quilty to a sexual assault that occurred about 4 years ago. This man was already in prison, convicted of another sexual assault that occurred around the same time. Here’s the thing: this 29-year-old man was a member of our church as a child and early teenager. He has some diminished mental capacity, but attended middle and high school and graduated. When he was 12 or 13, I can’t remember exactly, he made very inappropriate sexual overtures toward me, at church. He was almost grown physically and could possibly have overpowered me. I was able to talk him into leaving me alone. Seeing his name in the paper, convicted of a second sexual assault, made me realize how close I came to being a victim myself.

Then there’s the murder case. I testified as a witness in a murder trial back in 1994. A local woman was kidnapped and murdered, her bank cards stolen and used to track the culprits’ movements until they were apprehended. I was behind the two men who kidnapped her, in a line at an ATM, during the first 24-hour period after her disappearance. I have a knack for being behind people who don’t know how to use an ATM and I remember thinking “Here we go again…” but something was different. These guys were trying to figure out her PIN. One kept trying the card while the other stood a distance away and was looking all around, very suspiciously. They gave up and left, I got my money and ran back to the car where my husband was waiting for me. I told him to leave, quickly, because something bad was happening. It was like I was super-aware of what they were doing and that there was bad karma in the air. I found out why a year later, when the police called me to look at a photo line-up.

Timing. I could have been attacked, if the timing had been just a little different. OR kidnapped, or worse, if the timing had been a little different. The letter from SSA came at the exact moment in time when I needed it most, when I was thinking that I couldn’t stand one more day of not knowing what was going on with my case, or my life.

Things are going to change, again.

And it’s about time.