Tag: depression

Hi Lo

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Pics1 Comment

It’s been a spectacular summer day. Lovely breezes blew through all day long, keeping the brightest sun from feeling too hot. For me personally it was a day in which I completed a major phase of an outdoor beautification project, is was a day in which I met some wonderful and kind neighbors, plus this evening I got a call from an old friend whose voice I hadn’t heard in nearly a year. All in all, the day was full of good things. Sunshine, walks through gorgeous gardens and promising young vineyards, meeting of friends new and old, and touring of other people’s homes. One very pleasant day.

Yet at the end of it all, not sure whether it’s the $20 someone stole out of my Eggs of Hope bin at the side of the road (I’d finally left generous change for my weekend customers), the first glass of wine I’ve had in a week, or the general sense, once again, of missing what it is to be a part of a larger network of friends here in my town – I dunno. But now, moments before bedtime, I’m feeling a bit deflated in the wake of my day. For no apparent reason, all of a sudden I’m feeling a bit down.

Maybe cuz I’d really like to just go out on a date with someone whose company I enjoy. Maybe because doing the town alone doesn’t appeal anymore, yet I wouldn’t mind going out. But where? With whom? Maybe five years is enough alone time. I know that’s not all of it, but part of it for sure. Tonite, for God’s sake I’m almost feeling weepy. Like something’s just missing. (And I know it’s not my period – cuz I don’t have one anymore!! Gone is the most probable culprit for my inexplicable mood swing!)

I realize that the local drunk who stole my $20 probably needs it more than me. It’s just that I turned in my friggin coin collection to get enough change for customers. It makes me very upset. I’m trying to plan my life and get my bills paid; I’m following all the rules and being a good person. ‘Must you do this to me? Really?’ I ask this lonely bicycle rider in my head. I begin to imagine the conversation I’d have with him if I ever caught him red-handed. I begin to taste the justice… But then I stop. While part of me dearly wants to catch him in the act and to shame him for what he’s done – a part of me also knows that if he’s in such a state that he has to steal from a kid’s side-of-the-road egg business in order to get some relief from this difficult world, then his life has got to be a very sad one indeed, and I must have mercy and compassion for him.

Yeah. I can see both sides. I just wish he’d ridden his bike down my driveway (as he’s done before, reeking of beer) to ask if I had any small jobs for him to do. I’da given him something. Hell, I’da paid him $20 if he cleaned out the coop for me! I just wish he’d asked. I woulda found some something for him to help out with around here… But he took the wimp’s way out. It’s not like I don’t understand, I do. I know what it feels like when you can’t see any other options. I know what it is to want to feel better. Happier, more at peace. Kinda like the peace I feel I’m missing right now, actually. Yeah, I really hope he was able to take the edge off with that $20. And I hope he’s deep in a dream right now, far from the cares of this relentless world… I hope that tonite he has a tiny respite from the uneasy state in which he lives most of his life. And that somehow, tomorrow he awakes with a small germ of hope growing inside…

There’s no doubt that I got it all. Lucky gal am I. Not sayin it sarcastically either. Really. I’m just experiencing another little blip on my emotional EKG tonite – but it’ll right itself soon. And I know that I’ll start over fresh and optimistic tomorrow morning. Plus I look forward to the many dreams I’ll have before that time, cuz they’ll bear me away from here long enough to refresh me and make tonite’s low-grade gloom a mere fuzzy memory.

Many elevations on this roller coaster ride of life; may tomorrow’s ride end on a hi and not a lo…

moi 023

…And Found

Posted in An Ongoing Journal...1 Comment

Guess I indulged in a bit of old-fashioned self-pity yesterday. Thanks to Jim for so candidly suggesting that perspective. Had me stop and re-assess for a moment. As I said before, I do know things are ok. I’m at a fine place in my life. And I can’t compare my current life to my old one, because it’s an entirely different set of circumstances –  and that’s really as it should be. One’s life at 50 shouldn’t look too much like one’s life at 25 –  at least not if things are moving along as they should be. And hey – if my life was simply puttering along without a whole lot of new experiences or opportunities to learn, I might be whining for different reasons. ! Very likely I woulda been. Cuz while I crave solitude and a somewhat consistent routine in my daily life, I also need new challenges to keep me intrigued and happy about waking up in the morning. Ok, so maybe this last life-changing round of challenges was a wee bit more than I might have bargained for, but I can’t change it. All I can do is keep going. A sense of humor helps, and so does a mind open to the potential lessons disguised as a crappy situation. Personally, I feel that difficult chapters in your life give you the chance to get some new skills under your metaphoric belt. That might mean learning to identify feelings of guilt and letting them go, learning how to forgive someone a painful transgression, or it might even mean learning to make simple fixes around the house without calling a handyman. Unforeseen situations really do open some interesting doors.

Lest I sound like a proselytizing pitch-man for a series of self-help DVDs – I want to make clear that while I do believe it’s usually wisest to roll with the punches of life and get right back in the ring, there are just some times when the room spins and I see stars, and I don’t have the oomph to get back up. You know, like yesterday. It was the second such day of a low and dark mood, and of course it was natural to me that I write about it. Maybe I sounded a bit too pitiful, but the writing here in this forum is by nature exposed – and very much about the experiences I’m living – while I’m living them. I hope you’ll forgive me if from time to time I lose my good cheer. Certainly we all lose it every now and again. In the wake of my post I heard from old friends, received an amazing and unexpected gift, plus of course there were comments left here, and personal emails too. It’s easy to forget anyone’s ‘out there’, so thanks for reminding me once again that I’m not alone. How blessed I am to have the love and support of friends. I send you all my love right back. If ever you should need my help, please seek me out. I would like to return the favor some day.

Ok, I’m gonna quit my bitchin now. Cuz I know that I got it good. Was lost, but now am found.

Lost

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Mommy Mind8 Comments

Kid’s been gone over two weeks. Maybe it’s three by now. You’d think I’d know, but I don’t. Been busy, busy, busy, trying to get all the things done that I simply can’t during the year. I suppose now that he’s ten it’ll become easier for me to do things. He can get himself something to eat or entertain himself easily enough. It’s just that I always feel badly about digging into solitary projects like filing, organizing teaching materials or other time-consuming stuff when he’s home. Which is why I’m hitting it so hard now. But today I feel stopped. The sun is shining and the day is bright, yet I can’t shake this feeling that the world is passing me by. I’m here in my windowless basement office, going through boxes and files and papers that just never seem to end. And I wonder, as I have so many times before, how on earth do working people deal with all this crap? There’s never an end to things that need tending to, never an end to the drawings and schoolwork that needs to find a home, there’s never an end to the personal correspondence, the filing, the bills, the paper…. And yet, at the end of the day, when someone asks me “what do you do all day?”, I’m hard-pressed to properly explain myself. Which leads me to this very moment. Right now, I’m feeling tetherless and lost.

In going through my music closet, and in finally opening great manila envelopes marked “to look at and file”, my past spills out onto my lap in old set lists, cocktail napkins scrawled over with chords, laminates and other small, useless items that only break my heart today. I remember the feeling of hope that went along with that time in my life. Our lives seemed all yet ahead of us then. Yes, I can say that I knew I was enjoying a good time in my life, and I did enjoy myself. I loved doing what I did, and I never took it for granted. But there was always another show coming up, another project, another seed of hope… I was always swimming with a fast-moving current. There was never anything static about that time in my life. But my life now is very different. Aside from my beloved son, I have to admit to myself, there’s very little of that sort of hope inside me today. There just doesn’t seem to be any forward pull. Yes, I have my writing, I suppose. Dear friends and readers who check in to bear witness to our tiny adventures, but is that in of itself a destination? What, I wonder, as I hold the evidence of a life once fully lived and enjoyed, just what the hell is my ‘thing’ now? Mom? Part-time accompanist at my kids’ school? Goddam recess monitor? Man. So much hope, so much forward-looking energy in these old scraps of paper. Yet where did they land me? I haven’t touched my Wurlitzer in ages. I haven’t played in a band since I left Evanston. It’s been two years since I’ve sung a proper show. And I miss it all like crazy. I fully admit to flat-out jealousy when I see the Facebook updates of my friends who are still making music. How lucky they are to be playing. To be doing what they love. I do know that I’m lucky to be here, and to have this new chapter from which to learn and grow, but still….

I can’t make much progress as I feel right now. I have no food left in the house, and I’m hungry. My hunger is no doubt helping to make my mood even darker, and I’m trying to muster the resolve to do something about it. It takes some gas and time to get into town, and I just can’t find it in me to go. I’m almost out of cash now too, cuz kids don’t take piano lessons in the summer (I sure never did), but that doesn’t stop bills from coming. August is always something of a financial challenge, and especially now in the wake of our July trip and some small home improvements. I know this has been a great summer, and I was so blessed to have visited Chicago (and to have eaten all that gorgeous food!), but it seems the spark has worn off. I know things aren’t bad by any means. I do. And I’m doing better than I was a year ago. I know it. Plus I’m home, surrounded by things I love, by nature, by a beautiful summer day. Even so, in this moment I’m still not quite sure where I am.

Ponderous Planet

Posted in An Ongoing Journal...2 Comments

Life on planet Earth is certainly not for wimps. And while I may know only the mildest of challenges when seen in the larger scope of this immense world, the tiny events in my own life keep me ever-engaged in an unending process of disbelief, resistance, learning and acceptance. I try not to give my power over to these challenges of mine, but oh it’s tempting. Arthritis sneaks into my hands and begins to cause discomfort, an injury from some thirty years ago blossoms into a full-on nerve problem, low-grade poverty still makes it hard to sleep some nights, and of course, there are the familial concerns. The last Facebook flare-up of my ex and related responses has finally died down just in time for life to present some fresh, new dramas. Like my brother, who when faced with a family intervention for his alcoholism, bled the water line in my house dry, puzzling helpful neighbors and costing my mother several hundred dollars in plumber’s fees. Then there’s my father, who has in this past week decidedly turned a corner. Although he speaks in well-constructed sentences (and highly entertaining ones at that – his use of language still beckons an audience to listen) there is simply no point to his speech. He speaks in a conversational cul de sac, leaving even me feeling confounded and at a loss as to how to respond. Then there’s my mom, whose mobility is so much worse this year than last, and whose work load does nothing but increase – in spite of her having recently retired. And there’s Martha. The other matriarchal figure of the extended family who requires my brother’s help each day to assist with the most basic of tasks. She is not happy about this intervention of my brother’s. After all, if he goes to the hospital (which is highly unlikely at this time), who will tend to her?

This is a good month for my son to be gone. I’m not sure how it all would have played out if he’d been here. I even locked my doors last night for the very first time in my five years here – on account of my brother, and how enraged he became at our suggestion he admit himself for detox. Gotta give him props for his method of retaliation. He simply opened up both hoses and bled out the water line. Pump lost its prime, and without some serious manual intervention of said pump, no water was coming into the house any time soon. Good one, Andrew. It mighta made me laugh if it weren’t for the fact that it inconvenienced two neighbors and ended up costing our mother. Clever though, very creative. Better than a busted window I guess. (Yes, I did move the sledgehammer to a more covert location.) Now the clock starts. In a week’s time, if he still chooses not to be admitted to the hospital, mom will no longer let him use the car. Sure, she’ll ask him for the keys. That won’t do it, of course. So we’ve got our own means of enforcement, which I won’t go into here. Suffice to say the car won’t be starting for him.

Meanwhile, my house and garage are being painted. Which is fine – it’s great, actually (God bless my mom, once again she comes to the rescue) – but the folks doing the job must dodge a cranky goose and fresh chicken poop as they work. They’re a nice bunch, and really, they’re kinda like family. The dad of Elihu’s pal Keithie is running the show. But there’s a decidedly ‘Bad News Bears’ feel to the outfit; cigarette butts lay all over the driveway, and work in general seems a bit stop-and-go. But in the end there’s more ‘go’ than ‘stop’, so it’s all good.

Yeah, I don’t have it bad by any stretch of the imagination. But each day has its hiccups. And I know that for all of our sunny and polite on-the-street greetings, each one of us is a damn lier more than half the time when we answer ‘good’ when asked how we are doing. Are we really doing ‘good‘? Are things all just going swimmingly at home? Ok, so maybe they are for the most part, but there’s always that other part. We humans are so adept at keeping up fronts. I suppose we can’t all just go into it everytime someone asks us how we are, but a part of me wishes we as a culture were a bit less undauntingly cheery about things. Not that I think we should all carry our burdens forefront in our thoughts, but rather that we should all aknowledge that while things might be going well for the most part, not everything is exactly easy. We are all such troopers here on this planet. So much to do, so much to learn, such challenges yet before us. And some days, just too much to ponder.

Hitched

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Divorce Diary, Mommy Mind11 Comments

Well, kinda thought it was coming. When I heard on my ex’s last visit that his girlfriend had recently “lost a ton of weight”, I thought I smelled a big day ahead. Women don’t usually just lose “a ton of weight” for no good reason. It’s most likely in preparation for some landmark event. Like turning 50. Or getting married. Whichever. So the idea had been spinning around in my head for a couple months. Not a new idea. But it’s funny how unceremoniously it was that I learned it had “just” happened. Whatever just means.

Elihu and I had finally caught up with each other yesterday, and tonite he called as I was making supper. As we usually do when we we’re apart, after all the urgent news has been shared, we default to a sort of ‘what are you doing right now’ sort of conversation. It’s more a means to keep the tunnel open to each other, more a way just to be with each other in the same room than to say anything new. He was telling me all sorts of little things about his day, and about how many hours they’d been on the road so far – nothing much of anything to tell – when he added, “oh, just so you know, it’s a little thing, but daddy and Jill had to get married. For a technical reason.” A year ago I might have reacted more acutely, but now, a year out, it didn’t quite knock the wind out of me. Didn’t even elicit a tear. But I can admit that I looked over to the microwave clock to note the time I was first given the big news, and I felt my chest contract just a bit. Elihu went on to say that he wasn’t sure of the details – and repeated that they’d done it because “technically they had to.” (I felt myself wondering why they didn’t “technically” need my husband and me to get divorced before they had two kids.)  Elihu told me they didn’t make it a big deal, it wasn’t a fancy ceremony with lots of people (I did manage to ascertain that Elihu had not been present for the big day) but that they were going to have a party later on. He just kept talking and talking, moving on to the next item on his mind, leaving me behind… silent , stuck in my thoughts, just the slightest bit dazed.

After nearly a quarter century together, and Fareed couldn’t have at least communicated this to me in some way? If not before, then maybe right after? Wow. If having children with two other women during our marriage wasn’t enough to show me the true colors of this man, guess this should pretty much seal it, huh. But bad behavior or not, I know that it is precisely because Fareed left that our lives have become so magical now. As our lives were destroyed, so too were they improved. A queer mix, but true. I realize that none of our wonderful new life would have been possible if Fareed hadn’t left. I remind myself this, because I can feel sorrow beginning to grow in my chest. Stop, Elizabeth…remember our new life here… We would never have known our blessed Waldorf School, we would never, ever have known what it was to have homing pigeons, to release them into the air and watch them return to us again…. We wouldn’t have known dear Timothy, our red golden pheasant, the chukkar partridges, ducks Joseph and Josephina, the many chickens, our dear button quail King George – or even our beloved goose Maximus – none of this would be part of our story today if Fareed hadn’t decided that he needed out of this marriage. Yeah, I know. But it still feels unjust, somewhere in my heart I still want answers; I want my husband, and the family that never really was – back. Tears come now. Seems the last time I cried it was over him too. That last, blow up of a visit. Wasn’t this done already? Guess not. More tears. More disbelief. I try to reconcile the dream of us in our Evanston home with this beautiful new life here in the country. We have a wonderful and full life here! We have grandma and grandpa next door…. So why am I still so sad? I certainly can’t say that I didn’t see it coming! Maybe this is why he didn’t tell me himself. Cuz he knew I’d cry. Asshole.

I already had a cold, so when I called my mom up to tell her the news, my stuffy nose didn’t give me away. As I’d expected, first I heard her initial expression of outrage and anger, but then she surprised me – as her tone uncharacteristically softened. She expressed sympathy. She became tender for a moment, as we both silently considered it all over again. Yeah, even with everything that’s happened, it was still sad. But we shook ourselves out of our lull by reminding ourselves that even if things were different, I would not want him back. Absolutely not. So. There it was. We both sighed a “whatcha gonna do?” sort of lament, and a beat passed.

I wonder about the two of them. They seem to have a good relationship. Certainly not the lustful, magical thing it might have once been, but they’ve managed to handle their two kids – plus two ‘others’ – as well as her going to school and his insane schedule – and they’ve logged some seven years now. (That includes two years I thought he was still my husband. !) Who knows. I have lots of friends tell me they’d put money on it not lasting ten years. Some think five, tops. Some speculate he’s cheating on her already. I don’t go there, cuz I just don’t know. And even though I am saddened that my old friend chose not to tell me about his marrying, I still don’t wish him any ill. In fact, I pray she’s still around to tend to him as he becomes an old man, because I can’t do that now. But someone has to. I hope she’ll stay on for the job.

Once, shortly after Fareed had come clean about having a pregnant mistress and wanting to be with her instead of me, we stood in the kitchen drinking gin and talking about things we’d hardly ever talked about before in our twenty-two years together. I asked him how he saw things now. Could he see himself with Jill at the end? I mean, we’d been together long enough that I’d always known how we two would die; one in the company of the other. But now, that sacred plan had been changed. I wanted to make sure he wouldn’t be alone. I told him he could always call me. But he shrugged me off and laughed. He told me that he fully expected himself to be alone as an old man, living in a fifth floor walkup in Manhattan somewhere, practicing his guitar. And he said he’d probably end up dying alone – of AIDS, he added rather dramatically – and no one would care, but he’d be happy. Yeah, he probably would be. In a perfect world, a spouse and family are probably the last thing Fareed would ever need or want. Instead, the life that would suit him would be one of privacy; hours and hours spent playing his guitar, hours in which to write, to read, to enjoy a meal alone, a glass of wine alone, to do all this in the coziest of apartments, while far below the bustle of the street continues on, oblivious to the old man playing guitar in the window….

But for now my ex has hitched his wagon up to his lady’s for the long haul, and it doesn’t appear he’ll be living the life of a classical-guitar playing hermit anytime soon. But ya never know. After all, this was a man who told me in no uncertain terms that “divorce was not an option.”  Yup, plans change sometimes. We’ll just have to wait and see….

System Failure

Posted in An Ongoing Journal...2 Comments

After months and months of phone calls, emails, forms and faxes, today was the day. It’s been a veritable part-time job. Making call after call, inquiry after inquiry, figuring out my way through the maze turn by turn as I searched for a legal way in which to intercede on behalf of my brother. A dry drunk no longer, he threatens more than his own life as he drives home each day from helping Martha with her nightly routine. Finally, in what feels to me like the eleventh hour, Andrew managed (with the help of the only friend he has in town) to get himself to the local mental health facility at the hospital for an appointment that I’d set up for him (he thinks our mother did it. If he knew I did, he certainly would not have gone). In spite of being the one person who made today possible – in spite of my being his only proactive advocate – I cannot be given an update. Legally, as a protective measure (how this protects me or Elihu when Andrew flies into a violent rage or prevents him from taking someone out as he drives drunk along a country road is beyond me) I cannot be told a thing. Yeah, I knew to expect that. I get it. So then I call the hospital. I hope to find his name in patient information. But no. He has not been admitted. Shit, shit, shit. My spirits sink to my shoes to learn it. Now what?

I understand that he’ll go back next week for another meeting with this woman. I’ve spoken to this counselor myself, I’ve given her some background, and for all the many people I’ve met throughout my life in the mental health field, I like her more than many. At least I got a good impression. The feeling that she understood the futility of the system; how it got in its own way, preventing the very help it was established to provide. Yeah, I had a pretty good amount of hope in my heart this morning. But now, it’s just gone. How the hell can a depressed drunk get better when faced with a filthy house, no income to speak of, no friends and daily access to a full liquor cabinet? I don’t think it’s possible. At least not for my brother. As self-determined as he can be, this is one thing that I don’t see him doing for himself. The last time he sobered up, it was under peril of possibly never having his driver’s license returned to him. And the next time it happens? He will never drive again. And more than likely, he’ll be locked up. No joking.

I have a feeling he’ll make an attempt to cool it. At least before he drives. But he can’t sustain it. No way. He lives in absolute filth (think the worst episode of the cable show “Hoarders”). He has no reason to live. Really. He is chronically depressed, blames the whole goddam world for his misfortune and just jumps at the chance to corner someone and talk their ear off about the whole mess. I know he’s my only sibling, he’s my brother, I love him and shouldn’t talk like this, but right now he hasn’t got a whole lot of reason to be here on the planet. He could, but right now he doesn’t. And reaching him will take finesse. I sure hope he comes to like and trust this counselor and finds himself on the start of an upward path. Goddam it! I wish I could help, but I’m nearly as stuck as I was at the start of this whole thing.

Mental illness is a fucking hard issue to tackle in this day and age. The laws bind your hands to help, and for as hip and understanding a culture as we think we are, the stigma continues to exist. The field of mental health is not sexy. One look at the waiting rooms in just about any mental health facility will confirm for you that this is not a money-maker for the health care industry. And we all know it’s a business. Don’t we now?

Sometimes the system absolutely sucks.

New Normal

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Divorce Diary, Mommy Mind, Pics7 Comments

Dad, Elihu and planes

Met Elihu and his dad at the train last night. We three had a nice, leisurely supper. The guys made some paper airplane models at our table while I enjoyed my very first experience with Angry Birds and was easily sucked into more than a few games on dad’s Iphone. At some point during dinner Fareed and I got to talking about my cable bill, and how I might get creative about changing up my house systems, and how I might save some money. Our tones must have become much more serious, because I looked over at Elihu to see his face beginning to scrunch up… “Hey, what’s the matter?” I asked him, and no sooner had I shown my concern than he began to sob. “It just feels like you guys are not happy with each other. Like you’re fighting. You both sound angry.” True, I suppose the tone was perhaps a bit more business-like than conversational-friendly, but we were not fighting. Far from it. Fareed and both I jumped in and assured him that we were not arguing – that we were just talking about a problem we needed to solve… “Sweetie” Fareed began, “your mother and I are best friends. We will always be best friends.” Then he looked up at me for confirmation. I met his eyes only briefly, as this was the first such declaration of this kind I’d ever heard from him since this whole thing began years ago. It caught me off guard, and I had to assess how this felt in a mere nanosecond. I felt I needed to answer positively, for the sake of my son. In an instant, as I considered the way this statement resonated with me, I could feel my  heart softening towards him, yielding to him… and yet there was reservation, maybe even a faint sense of being deceived… “Yes, of course” I confirmed, so that Elihu might feel some solidarity here. The gravity of the moment quickly disappeared as Fareed and I attempted to lighten the mood in a manner that had come to us naturally for decades… we smilingly morphed into a Monty Python-esque sort of bit along the lines of ‘oh you think that’s an argument, I’ll give you something to really get upset about…’ and Elihu smiled too. Soon he was laughing along with us, but his tears took a little longer to stop altogether. Can’t say this was surprising. I sensed that once again he was feeling the stress of the ‘handoff’, and this was just another natural expression of the transition taking place. An expression of the evidence before him that he lived, ultimately, in a family divided by half a country. A one-parent-at-a-time family.

We passed a couple of hours, chatting, goofing around, making planes. Then finally, especially as it was a school night, it was snowing and we had chickens to get in (not to mention a long drive ahead), our visit was winding to a close. Sometimes our visits end happily, easily. And while it seemed all the elements were in place for it to end so now, I felt the vaguest current of something unresolved, a tenuous energy unready for the final goodbye that lingered in the air… We drove daddy to the train station and got out for last hugs and kisses. We three stood in the snow, our arms around each other. Elihu clung to us both as we exchanged our ‘double smooches’… Elihu told his father one last time that he loved him, and Fareed responded in a low voice, “I love you too, more than you’ll ever know…” We waved til the car turned and his father disappeared into the darkness. Elihu began sobbing as soon as he was out of sight.

What happened over the next half hour I cannot repeat with the complete, word-for-work accuracy that I’d like. What Elihu had to say, and the way in which he expressed himself, was simply beautiful. His words would have been impressive had they come from an adult in a state of deep reflection, but that they came from the mouth of a nine year old boy, who spoke without any prior consideration of his words – that made it even more mind-blowing to witness. My boy, finally, was letting me know exactly how he felt about this whole divorce thing. Until last night, I’d thought I knew how he felt. But I had only part of the picture.

I knew transitions were tricky, but I’d always thought on the whole he was much less affected by our split family than I came to learn. He started to express himself by telling me that he deeply wished “the essence of ‘what happened’ could say it was sorry to him. He explained that he didn’t mean me, or daddy, or any one person in particular. He repeated that he just wanted the essence of the experience to say it was sorry.  Furthermore, he wished this ‘essence’ would acknowledge that Elihu did not deserve to be treated like this. A few moments of silence passed. During most of the ride, in fact, I said very little. I just listened as Elihu poured his heart out to the world.

“Why were you talking to each other like that?” he asked, and I was confused. “Like what?” “Like drones… you weren’t talking with each other. You were just talking… not like people who used to be married. Not like a family. Just like drones…” Wow. He did pick up on it – that restrained sort of vibe that’s always there when I’m with Fareed. I do know that I put up an emotional wall – it just feels safer that way – and I’ll be damned if the kid didn’t feel it. “Honey, I just need to be that way with daddy. If I weren’t, I’d probably end up crying and begging him to come back… I know it’s stupid, but I think that part of me still feels like that…” Was I admitting too much? Giving my son false hope? Hell, was this even really the way I felt about things? Even I surprised myself with this admission. This was a very honest moment between us, and I didn’t feel like modifying the truth for him, I didn’t feel like censoring what came out of me. I owed him that much. I’d helped screw up his life by not honoring my intuition and examining my marriage before it was too late. I had to be honest, there’d been enough deceit.

“I feel like I only just realized when I was eight that we were never going back.”  “Never going back, sweetie?” I asked, “what do you mean?” He hardly paused before he explained; ” I feel like it was you and me and daddy in our house in Evanston and then we took a little trip away. But somehow I always thought we’d go back to that life. I really did.”  I asked him how he could possibly remember Judson – he was hardly more than a toddler when we left – yet he protested that he remembered the feeling of that place, and that was the feeling he wanted to return to. “I guess I just kind of thought that we were just going to be here for a little while, and somehow, we’d go back to being our regular family.” More road, more darkness and snow. “And I’d have a sister too.” I thought back on my miscarriage. “By this July, your little sister or brother would have been eight.” I mused. “Yeah,” he answered, “that would have been perfect”. And we rode in silence for a while more, the windshield wipers smoothing away the big, wet flakes.

“It seems like everybody is always doing things with their fathers. They get both a mother and a father at the same time. And it makes me so sad to hear them talking at school about their family ski trips. It’s not fair. We can’t even do things together as a family. ” He mentioned one of his classmates, whose dad is my mom’s cardiologist. Even my own heart felt a tad bit of jealousy. They had three kids – and money. (I scolded myself for indulging in the thought and returned my attention to Elihu.) “It’s not fair that I don’t get my own daddy.” I asked Elihu if he’d ever talked to Fareed about all of this. He said no, because he was afraid of what he might say in response. “You need to speak to daddy about this, even if you are afraid. I was afraid too, sweetie, and I think that’s partly why we’re here now. If only I’d been brave and asked daddy where his heart was, maybe I could have saved our marriage. Maybe.” I was trying to show Elihu by example how important it was to face your fears and communicate, but I may have inadvertently given him hope… “Yeah, and maybe then we’d still be in Judson and I’d have a sister.” “Oh but sweetie,” I tried to comfort him, “honestly, there’s no way of knowing if it would have changed anything. It might not have changed anything at all.” Silence. This was a difficult situation. No one answer, no one perspective. “You can’t imagine your life without Charlie and Erie, can you?” I asked of his little brothers. “No” he said. “But I wouldn’t have known them, so I wouldn’t have known the difference. And I would have had a regular sister from you.” More road, more sadness. More unending what-ifs….

After a while he spoke up again. ” I don’t like the way Jill asks how my mother’s doing, like nothing’s wrong. It bothers me the way she does that.” What could I say? I have no idea what I would say to him if I were her… “Honey, all of us say the things we need to. None of us wants to hurt anyone, or to say too much, so grown-ups usually just say the littlest, most polite things we can.” Another pause. “She’s doing her best, I know” Elihu said quietly. There wasn’t much relief from the sadness that hung heavily about us both. But finally tonight there was anger too. “I feel like I’m on a huge string in between you and daddy. I’m in the middle of you two… and I’m just hanging there. And I don’t think daddy even knows or cares!” There was anger in his voice now, and I was rooting for him. Get mad, baby, I thought. “Daddy has never apologized.” Really? I thought. Honestly, he’s never apologized? My heart was breaking over and over for my son and now I was beginning to get angry too. Did Fareed have any fucking clue just what damage he’d done? Really? Did he? A moment of rage passed over me, and I let it go… I’ve learned how fruitless it is to get angrier and angrier… But I hoped that Elihu might remember this fire, and that he might finally speak to his father about it. “You do know the only way you’ll ever know for sure how he feels about all this, don’t you?” I asked. Good boy, he knew all right. He agreed that he finally needed to have that conversation with his father. And he would. Not just quite yet though, because he was still afraid. But soon. I didn’t say anything more. I hoped he’d get his father’s apology at the very least.

I explained as best I could that in the grand, planet-wise scheme of things we were very, very fortunate people. And he agreed. He listed all the many things that made our lives easy and made us happy. He even understood that he was lucky to have both his parents, loving and present in his life. He knew it all, yet still… I went on to explain to him the idea of a ‘new normal’. That this life – with his chickens, his helicopters and Waldorf – all of this was his life. No, it wasn’t a home with a father and a mother, a sister and a dog, no; it wasn’t in Chicago where all our old friends lived, no… But it was our life. And as everything stood, right now in this moment, this was our normal. Our new normal. And fighting it would only cause heartbreak. He made a ‘mm-hmm’ from the backseat. Nothing more was said until we got home.

Since then the air has lightened, and Elihu and I are back into our groove. But he seemed a little clingier than usual tonight after I turned out the light, and he asked me to please hold him. There are no more touching words that a mother can hear from a child… I held him until his breathing became deep and the sweet relief of sleep overtook him. Brave, insightful, loving boy. Welcome to your new normal.

Feb 2013 nose eggs dad 012

The Fourteenth

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Divorce Diary2 Comments

For no good reason that I know of, fourteen has always been my favorite number. It’s not that I aspired to be that age long before I was, nor that I looked back on that age with nostalgia after it was long gone. I have simply always loved the number fourteen. In my mind I visualize it as a verdant, deep green. It is a number that has just felt right to me for as long as I can remember. But a few years ago it took on another meaning altogether. On a day in which most people celebrate their love for those they hold dear, dark and horrible changes both big and small were taking place…

It was a gray winter day, in the middle of the afternoon, when a young man burst into a lecture hall in Northern Illinois University’s Dekalb campus and opened fire, killing five students and injuring many more before finally killing himself. (He had recently stopped taking medication for mental illness and had reportedly been acting strangely.) I heard the news almost immediately, as Fareed called me from NIU to let me know. I remember sitting in the kitchen, looking numbly out at the river that flowed behind our house… I was stunned, yes, but almost more stunned to hear him go on… He said that he was now worried about his girlfriend, that she was freaked out and he felt he needed to be with her… he wasn’t sure if he’d be home tonight. Crazy as it sounds, while she was now five months pregnant with their child, my husband still stayed at home with us – and still retired to bed each night with me. He would, however, slip away during the night to be with her, making sure to be back home in the mornings, for the sake of our son, he’d say. I was still so shell-shocked at what was happening that I followed along in a daze as he drew out the torture. I’d been fooling myself somehow during it all, thinking he’d come to his senses eventually and come home – that somehow we’d make sure this child was taken care of, and somehow, when this had all blown over, we’d find a way to go on with our lives again. Certainly this was crazy thinking, but it was a surreal time, and crazy was all over. And now this.

How could I argue – how could I indulge in my own petty concerns when people had just been killed? When true and real heartbreak was occurring, when parents were receiving the worst possible news they’d ever hear – when all this was going on, how was it that I could beg my husband as I did to please come home to his wife? I told him that family was of prime importance, and that this event must surely remind him of that. I was livid that this silly girl nearly half our age could manipulate him so easily. I found it hard to believe that she was afraid to be alone – for heaven’s sake she lived in a tony, suburban house with her parents miles from campus! What had she to be afraid of? What did she know of being left? Of truly being alone? I was furious, I was heartbroken, I was sick. I was also extremely confused.

Although he’d said nothing of it, earlier that day, merely through coincidence and not at all by design, Fareed had been served with divorce papers. He’d gone for months saying that he wasn’t sure, that he didn’t know yet what he would do… he wasn’t sure if he planned on leaving us or staying. His presence in our home gave my heart hope, but his girlfriend’s growing belly wasn’t unsure at all. I asked about divorce, but he wouldn’t commit to it. Finally, summoning the best fighting attitude I could, I agreed with my attorney that he should go ahead and serve the papers. They arrived that day, but Fareed didn’t mention it. I’ll still never know just how he reacted that morning at work when the agent knocked on his office door. I’ll never know if it caught him by surprise, or if he felt relief. Even after five years we’ve never talked about that day. I do still wonder sometimes.

In that he said nothing about the divorce papers, in the back of my mind I hoped they hadn’t arrived. That my husband would choose me over his mistress, that he would come home and everything would somehow heal itself. I was still fooling myself. Acting one way, feeling another, and thinking somewhere in between. Man that was one difficult Valentine’s Day. Not a lot of love to be found, and more heartbreak than anyone deserved. I could never have imagined in that moment that some five years forward I’d be ok. That I’d have more joy in my life than sorrow, that my gut wouldn’t be consumed with an unceasing ache. How can you tell someone in the midst of such pain – and make them understand – that it will not always be thus? Although I myself wasn’t able to envision a brighter future back then, I had to make that leap of faith and simply behave as if it was there waiting. I took the ‘fake it til you make it’ approach. It definitely took a few years for my heart to catch up and relax into this new life.

Honestly, I am still not completely reconciled with what happened to me or with the way in which my life’s course shifted, but I do realize that the trajectory of my life – and certainly my son’s life – was greatly improved by this fateful turn of events. By this fourteenth day of February on which things changed forever.

Larder in Order

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Divorce Diary, Farm Life, Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind, Waldorf Life4 Comments

Don’t like to think of it as a New Year’s resolution, but rather a project that I’ve been putting off for a while now, one which just so happens to be starting in January. I am finally embarking on a diet. One that is well planned, one I have read about and researched, a diet that I in fact did myself years ago and lost 20+ pounds in a relatively short amount of time. (Then I had a baby and kinda undid all that.) This is a diet that just looks wrong at every turn. It is the most counter intuitive way in which one could possible approach food. Healthy inclinations must be ditched, quelled, ignored. This is the diet of protein and fat, the diet that hardly allows the meagerest ration of carbs in order for success: the Atkins diet. Can’t refresh myself with a peach, nor an apple, nor a fistful of blueberries on my cereal. And cereal – with milk, heaven forbid – that’s entirely out of the picture. Really, just what the hell is this diet about? Some may know well, others may have a faint idea. In a nutshell? Turn your body from a machine that burns carbs for fuel into a body that burns fats and proteins. Simple. And yes, it does work. But like I said, it sure don’t feel natural… there’s a tiny voice in my head the whole time saying ‘your cholesterol will skyrocket… what if it backfires and I end up gaining fifteen instead? Sigh. Only thing keeps me going is knowing I’ve done it before, and successfully.

So yeah, you simply deprive your body of ALL carbs (ok, maybe not ALL carbs, but maybe like 99% of the carbs you’ve been accustomed to eating for your entire life) and you honestly do force your body to shift it’s source of energy. Seems kinda sneaky to me. Kinda not right. But hell, it works – and although it’s certainly not a way in which I intend to live years down the line, for now, it’s just what I need. See, I’m turning 50 on May 7th, and by then, I’d at least like to feel good in a dress again. It’s been years since I’ve worn the dress of a real, grown-up woman. And that aint right. (Oh, does anyone remember my dresses? I remember gowns upon gowns in my closet – and yes, I most certainly enjoyed and wore them all!) So, enough pussy-footing around here. I quit the cigarettes in earnest, now it’s time to get back to the body I feel represents me. I’m still kinda dragging my feet on the working out thing. I just can’t seem to find the time… and I know that sounds like a huge excuse… but I’m working on it. Created an enormous to do list (which I add to moment by moment) so that I may know what I face and plan my life better. So goddam much to do! But I’m gittin there… If it kills me…

It began in earnest with a tidying up of my pantry. I realized that I knew where just about everything else in my house was, but my pantry was an unknown to me. If I was going to organize the way I ate, I’d have to organize my food first. Cans from the year we moved here still hid in the back, there were empty storage containers way, way in the back on tippy-top shelf… So I did it. Had a Sunday of domestic tasks (venting the birds was one) and so it was time. Pulled everything out, relabeled tins and tubs, and most importantly, got rid of the crap we’ve kept ‘just in case’. Plus got rid of things we had only the teensiest bit left of. I had two goals, the second of which didn’t even become clear until the first was met: feed the chickens. I didn’t have enough money to buy feed, nor gas to get there and back, and so had to become clever about how I was to keep the galls alive (and laying) for another day or two. Everything I found was boiled or just dumped into a couple of huge pots. Warmed and softened to a pleasing (it’s relative) gruel-like consistency, it was the perfect answer for our gals. They even seemed to be having fun, picking out favorite bits and running all around the hen house with large, choice pieces hanging from their bills. And lots of variety – and flavor. Mama added some salt, cuz it may as well taste good, right?

With all this purging of the ancient foodstuffs and all the identifying of containers going on, I began to get clarity. About food. What I had, and what I tended to use most…. I stood back and could see my pantry well-labeled, easy to see all shelves, all contents. A good, solid start. Every container was boldy and neatly labeled in sharpie so that even Elihu, with his limited eyesight, could find things for himself (thereby reducing my temptation when making him snacks.) Only problem is that 99% of my pantry was off my list. I needed protein. I needed fat. And here before me was a closet mostly full of white foods – rice, flour, pasta, sugar; all carbohydrates. The big no. My larder had no lard!

My new go-to food source will have to be the fridge. Lots of vegetables, meat, cheese, and – how fortunate for me – eggs. These little miracles of nature will really end up helping me out the next couple of months. Thankfully, I love em, and I enjoy savory things more than sweet. A variety of hot sauces and I should be good. It’s just the cost of the rest that worries me a bit. The main reason I chose the Atkins diet was because I could simply not afford the $150 fee for Weight Watchers (with which by the way, I have experienced the most weight loss – 55 pounds – and had kept it off the longest…that is, until Fareed made his big announcement a few years back). Atkins seemed doable, after all, we get food stamps, so that removes some of the burden. But only one week of shopping into the new plan, and I’m beginning to worry. Meat is expensive. So is produce. It’s gone faster than I’d thought, in spite of my conservative approach and waste-not consumption. (My second reason for Atkins, btw, other than cost, was that I knew I had a pretty good chance of knocking fat off quicker – and there’s just not a lot of time before my 50th to go slow and steady like WW does.)

In spite of my concerns about cost, I do feel pretty good about my prospects for staying the course. I have now a small paycheck from the Waldorf school which will help me cover the extra food costs, and I also have a new student starting next week. We’ll butcher a few of our chickens, and that will help a little too. And eggs, got those for sure. ! Having money helps, yet having hope is really what’s key here – I feel like I’ve lived with so very little of that these past few years. I have up moments, and I am grateful every single day for the amazing little homestead we have, yet being socially isolated and having nothing much on the horizon to look forward to has kept my overall mood since living in New York a bit down. So this is good. I now have a picture of myself effortlessly slipping on one of my old dresses. I have a goal. I’m beginning to get brave enough to dare to remember how good it can feel…  How good it feels not to be winded, to actually tuck in a shirt, to wear knit fabric…

Folks often say that you have to go through emotional pain, not around it, to arrive on the other side. Ok, I’ve done some of that. I’m doing a lot better than a couple of years ago. So onto the physical part of the equation… Ironically, it looks like I may have to consume the fat in order to ultimately lose it. Still seems all wrong, but I’m committed for now, and thankfully I finally have the resolve to push ahead. Onward and upward…

Twist

Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Divorce Diary, Mommy Mind, Waldorf Life6 Comments

I’d heard of it happening before. So I know I wasn’t the first. In going over some routine business through email today, I learned from Fareed that we were in fact – and had been since July 18th – officially divorced. Unexpected news. I still hadn’t heard it from my own attorney. In fact I’d recently written my lawyer a letter. I’d wanted him to know the process was waiting on one final dental procedure, that Fareed knew this too, and he could go ahead and ‘finalize’ our divorce after that. Guess it was a moot point. Another lesson in the never-ending ‘rules’ of divorce: if the insurance company isn’t told about the divorce (let alone the wife herself), you are still covered. Until they know different, things are as they’ve always been. That is to say, it’s all a friggin game. There’s some play in the rules. Things ain’t necessarily what you thought.

That I come to discover today that I’m now divorced is, in reality, very unspectacular. That I should even be moved to write a post about it probably seems silly. That I cried when I read the news should seem rather ridiculous. That I felt anything at all, it just doesn’t make sense. I kept going over it and over it again in my mind – why did this make any difference at all? Why should this news still jar my system, shake me up, break my heart all over again? I had to understand this. If I put myself in the shoes of readers for whom this drama dragged on way longer than it should have to begin with, and then appeared to have been over half a year ago… how would they feel about another self-sorry, virtual crying jag over this tired not-so-new news?

Just this afternoon I’d been at the eye doctor’s and was explaining that I could still make an appointment if it was before my dentist’s appointment – because I was still on ‘my husband’s’ insurance. I noticed how familiar it was to say ‘husband’, noted how many years I’d been saying it. I even noticed that in spite of the fact that it was soon to be different, I still liked to say that. “My Husband”. It felt like home somehow. To know that somewhere out there, I did really have a husband and his name was Fareed. He was a friend with whom I’d laughed, made music, and with whom I’d been around the world, and he was the man with whom we’d had one very planned and long-awaited child once, not too terribly long ago… Secretly, somewhere deep down, I liked that we were still married. While I knew all the reasons it was not a real marriage anymore, I still felt it kept us connected to so many things I wasn’t looking forward to letting go of. (And I don’t mean insurance.) So much history…  My mind flashes to a time when we lived in our tiny hi-rise apartment in Chicago. It was a time when I (and perhaps I alone) felt things were goin really good. Life was full then. Close to perfect. We were in love, our cats slept on the bed with us and we had coffee together every morning at the little corner cafe. So when I mourn our marriage, that’s one chapter of many that comes to mind. Just one. Of many.

But really, what the hell??? Married to a man who knowingly had another woman pregnant at the same time as me? Married to a man who now has two children with another young woman with whom he’s been in a relationship with for more than five years?? (And all this while he was still married to me; one wonders: is she patient or foolish?)  What, oh what, has changed that I can still feel such poignancy at the expected – and intended for – news? It’s not like I didn’t know it was coming. Divorce is just so, well, different from marriage. Marriage you plan – then you celebrate in a big, public and joyful party. Usually with good food. But divorce – it sneaks up on you quietly. Divorce backs up a moving van to your life, loads up all of your stuff, then drives off without leaving you so much as a box of pizza to soften the blow.

I’m lying in bed with Elihu tonite, we’re kinda thinkin about butcherin our roosters tomorrow morning, we’re kinda thinking about cool Nordic names, we’re kinda thinking about the crazy rules of this modern life. He wants to know what changes now. Now that I ‘really am divorced’. I tell him not much. Most of the hard changes have already happened. Lots of quiet follows. “I’m mad that we don’t have enough money”. Not sure the context, so I wait. “I’ve been thinking. Grandpa Riaz has money, right?”  “Kinda” I answer, as it’s complicated. Lots of real estate, probably not a lot of cash flow. “It makes me mad that we have to figure out how to pay for Waldorf and he doesn’t help one bit.” Obviously he’s been ruminating like this for some time. He simply wishes we had money. Somehow he is taking this divorce news to confirm our poverty. That’s what it is I guess. Hmm. Gotta turn this one around here…

I present to him my spin on things: how much more comfortable would his bed be if we had more money? How much more would he enjoy his chickens if he had more money? How much better would he play his drums if he had more money? And so on… He gets it, and I’ve made a good point, but he’s not stupid. Me neither. We both know that be able to heat the house before it gets super cold – and not to have to wait for assistance to kick in in November – that would definitely make things better. Not to run our of money for food by month’s end. That would definitely make things better. And realizing that both his Dad and his Dad’s family have exponentially more means than we do, well, that is no longer lost to a bright nine year old boy. I can comfort and justify only so much. His wheels are turning, and he’s seeing some inequities here for himself. For the first time.

But I can offer this: It is all an illusion. Nothing is what you think it is. Everything you know will one day change. And money can’t stop that. Money can’t fix your broken heart or make you healthy. So money isn’t what it’s all about. Not really. Only problem is, it also kind of is. I mean I want to be honest here, money is a loaded subject. I can be all Zen about it – and ultimately I want us to know what it is to feel good with what we presently have. Really. And honestly, for the most part, we do feel pretty good about what we got goin on.

But shit. Just think twenty thousand could do, huh? Git a little infrastructure taken care of around the crib and knock the to-do list down to nuttin but a grocery list. Can’t say that wouldn’t feel most exquisite. That’s some serious cash. So yes, money can make things better, easier. (The little voice within is yelling ‘dishwasher, please!’)  Life can be poor, rich, simple, complex, married, divorced. Kinda all at the same time with lots of blurry lines in between. There’s something to be appreciated about every situation and its flip-side too. The trick is feeling ok where you currently find yourself. And not to bitch too much about how it might be otherwise. Just relax, cuz whatever you think you know, or whatever place you might be in right now (mental or physical) – it’ll probably end up changing. So just try to be here and be ok.

Like my favorite soft-serve ice cream cone, twirling together lemon and raspberry (locals, I’m a Dairy Haus girl, if you must know) it seems the lives we lead are less about straight lines and more about the twists… and the surprising experiences that result.