Author: Kathie

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

When I started at Planet Fitness in January, I learned very quickly that I need to have something to watch while on a treadmill. Thanks to Netflix and Hulu, I quickly fell in love with the series This Is Us, and often had tears running down my face when I finished my workout. Other times, I watched Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, and the incredible music kept me bopping along. Sometimes, I just watched HGTV, though I found that hour-long shows were the best, providing me with nonstop distraction the entire time I was working away.

Then COVID hit and the gym closed down. Stuck at home, I ordered a small stepper and some free weights. I put the stepper behind the loveseat in my living room and then held on to the seat back while watching (and laughing) at Schitt’s Creek. I hated that stepper, but Schitt’s Creek helped to make it tolerable.

Over Memorial Day, the gym reopened, but I just didn’t feel comfortable. Sad, I canceled my membership. Then I bought a treadmill and rearranged a back room into a workout room. I still had my free weights and Michael and Olivia gave me a resistance band for my birthday. I prop my phone on the treadmill and watch shows.

It’s been a disorienting time for everyone, I think. Things that we used to do every day are gone. Things that we used to do without thinking now require thinking and planning, and sometimes, worrying for two weeks afterward, wondering if we’ve been foolish. I used to look out my windows and admire the views. Now, I look out the windows with hunger. I want to sit in a restaurant for a relaxing dinner where I am served. I want to go to a flea market. I want to wander the mall and get lost for hours in a bookstore.

But I stay at home. Do my job. Walk on my treadmill.

Recently, I started watching the Gilmore Girls. Old show, I know, but new to me. Within two episodes, I was thoroughly hooked and delighted.

A few nights ago, I was watching and tromping when, on the show, Lorelei, one of the main characters, comes across an abandoned inn. It’s called the Dragonfly Inn. But I immediately didn’t care what it was called. I almost fell off my treadmill as I yelled, “That’s the Waltons’ house! It is! That’s the screen door! That’s the furniture on the porch! That’s the barn and Daddy’s sawmill!”

Oh, The Waltons. My favorite television show of all time. I loved it in high school when I didn’t even watch it. Instead, I sat in my bedroom upstairs, writing in my journal while my family watched The Waltons downstairs, and on the show, John Boy was in his bedroom, writing in his journal while his family listened to the radio. I felt so much connection, I didn’t go down to watch, but let history repeat itself through me.

I loved it when I began to watch it for real, when I was pregnant with my first child. The Waltons allowed me to release hormone-heavy emotions every single day. And then I just kept loving it, to the point of being able to recite each episode by heart, owning pretty much every kind of Waltons memorabilia there is, and visiting the real Waltons Mountain in Schuyler, Virginia.

I will never forget being in the Waltons Mountain Museum, across the street from the Hamner House, where the real “Jim Bob” lived. I met Earl Hamner’s aunt, who was visiting that day. She saw me correct the tour guide (I was right!) and she came up to me afterwards. “Please,” I said, “can you show me a trailing arbutus? Grandpa Walton loved the trailing arbutus, and I’ve always wanted to see one.”

She took me by the hand and led me outside. Against the wall of the museum was the trailing arbutus, covered in bees. We stood there in reverence. I felt at home.

Now, on the treadmill on that night, I felt the Gilmore Girls fall away. Instead, there was only that house. I felt familiarity drape me like Olivia Walton’s quilt, when they spread it over her legs, affected by polio. I watched the screen door, expecting Mary Ellen to burst out in a fit of teenage pique. Or Grandma, grabbing John Boy’s hand and asking for a tour of the college he would attend. She would see a posting about a class called The Bible As Literature, and encourage him to take it. I would take it too, when I went to college. I expected the dog, Reckless, to come out of the barn and sprawl by the sawmill. In the sawmill, the writer A.J. Covington stayed in a small room and encouraged John Boy to give up the idea of writing his One Big Story, but instead to write all the little stories. I saw the tree where Olivia sat while John Boy read her the poem The Windhover for her birthday, a birthday where she felt old and ordinary and like there was nothing left.

Familiarity, in the middle of all this chaos. The Walton family stepped out of the shadows and wrapped me in memory, writing in my journal, weeping while pregnant, and everything else that came after. Getting through and getting through and getting through. History repeating itself.

I don’t think I have ever been so happy to see a house before.

Now, I knew, Waltons nut that I am, that the set with the house burned down in 1991. How was it here, in the Gilmore Girls, so many years later? Research once I got off the treadmill showed that the house was rebuilt, so that the Waltons could return for their reunion shows. I should have known that, but I didn’t.

But there it was, in front of me. All right, even after a fire. A miracle.

And yes, that helped. Oh, how it helped. Despite. Anyway.

 

 

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Someone on my Facebook page suggested that maybe my birthday would be my Moment this week. My birthday was yesterday, and I turned sixty.

Well…

Birthdays when I start a new decade have always been tough for me. I was okay with 20, but from that point on, 30, 40, 50 and now 60 have been hard. I don’t know why the number affects me so, except that it might just show the steady moving forward of time. I love and collect clocks, and the thing about clocks is that the numbers don’t keep unreeling. They go around the clock face, 1 – 12, over and over. There’s no end. With age, well, I’ve yet to see someone live to 200. Those numbers definitely reel out to an end.

Sixty feels odd to me. I think of sixty and I see Grandma Walton. Granny from the Beverly Hillbillies. Aunt Bea from the Andy Griffith Show. I do also see really classy and wonderful women too (not that these women weren’t), like Meryl Streep, Helen Mirren, Dame Judi Dench. And of course, I see many writers who I love and admire.

And then I see me. And I’m nowhere near where I wanted to be when I turned sixty. While I know I’ve accomplished quite a bit, the things I’ve accomplished were not necessarily my goals. Or more accurately, my one goal. The goal I set for myself when I was twelve years old.

Get on the New York Times bestseller list.

And as I turn sixty, that goal seems to be pretty much dead in the water. Yes, I know full well the story of Delia Owens and Where The Crawdad Sings. At age 70, she made the New York Times bestseller list with her first novel. It’s now being turned into a movie. But the hard fact is, as anyone in publishing will tell you, she’s an anomaly.

So for the most part, my birthday was not a happy one.

There’s this pandemic. I was supposed to be in Oregon, celebrating my birthday in my favorite place in the world. The place where I feel the most ME. I knew this birthday was going to be difficult, and I made the travel arrangements way back in January. Instead, I was here. Home.

So yesterday, I wandered to Pewaukee Lake, to a teeny beach I’ve never been to. I treated myself to some lunch and I found a picnic bench in the shade that was a distance away from everyone else. I had a good book, so I sat and read and glanced out at the small lake. It wasn’t the ocean, but it was pretty. The leaves rustled above me, and they were an echo for the waves washing up near my feet. Eventually, I closed my book and just watched the lake.

There was an island a ways out and I saw a few heads bobbing around on it. I wished I could go there, but on my own. There was a dock I wanted to walk out on, so I could sit surrounded by the water, but there was a group of teenagers there already. They climbed up onto the dock railings and did back flips and somersaults into the water. I hoped it was deep enough and remembered when I was that young when I never would have given a thought to if it was deep enough.

Two women about my age and a third woman who was likely their mother walked up and stood carefully six feet away from me. They watched the divers for a while.

The mother said, “I hope that water is deep enough.”

She had to be at least eighty.

After they left, I watched the teens some more. One young girl, brilliantly clad in a bright pink bikini, climbed up on the rail. She turned so she was facing the open lake. Then she stood for just a moment. The boys she was with fell silent. The sun fell around her in a golden and holy glow. Then she raised her arms to shoulder height, then brought her hands before her in a prayer. I couldn’t see fully, since her back was to me, but I saw the movement of her upper arms and I know exactly what she did.

She touched her prayered hands to her forehead.

Then to her mouth.

Then to her heart.

A few days before, I was at the amazing outdoor labyrinth in Regner Park in West Bend, Wisconsin. I kicked off my sandals and walked the labyrinth barefoot, connected to the earth. Before I began, I stopped at the stone embedded in the ground at the entrance. The stone is engraved with a sunshine and the word Believe. I raised my arms to shoulder-height, then prayered my hands. I touched my forehead, my mouth, and my heart.

I honor this place with my mind, with my words, with my heart. I give all due respect.

I stepped into that labyrinth and lost myself for an hour as I wound my way in, then back out.

This young girl stretched her arms over her head, hands clasped, and did a beautiful effortless dive into the sparkling water. When she came up, she was laughing.

When I stepped out of the labyrinth, I was smiling.

I stood and applauded her. She waved from the water, and we laughed together.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The main thing I’ve learned from writing these moments is that you don’t wait for happiness to come to you. You seek it out.

I found happiness at little Pewaukee Lake on my sixtieth birthday.

(But next year, I’d better be in Oregon!)

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

 

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Throughout this COVID Summer, I’ve been getting hit with reminders of what was going on during this time three years ago. That was Breast Cancer Summer. Facebook reminds you daily of what was going on during whatever date however many years ago, and my reminders have been filled with the day of the mammogram tanking, the day of biopsies, the day of diagnosis, and then doctor appointment after doctor appointment. I am coming up on the anniversary of the surgery, of being tattooed for radiation, of radiation starting and ending. I was scared three years ago. And I’m scared now too.

So one thing I’ve been trying to do since January, pre-COVID, is lose weight. I joined a gym and I sat down and figured out what I could realistically eat. I have Oral Allergy Syndrome, which is exacerbated by the cancer meds I’m on. I am allergic to all raw fruits and vegetables, to many seeds and many nuts. I’ve only ended up in anaphylactic shock once, and it’s not something I ever want to do again. There are epi pens on every floor of my home and in my purse. So for a long time, I was hung up on what I couldn’t eat – which feels like everything healthy – and so I just gave up. But then, in January, after being told by many weight loss companies that they couldn’t help me, even as they advertised they could help everyone, I sat down with my own knowledge from being a weight loss counselor for several years and I decided to focus on what I could eat, instead of what I couldn’t. I can eat cooked vegetables and fruit. I began to look at my carbs and my sugars and I cut down drastically. I still have some sugar, as I believe it’s unrealistic to expect to be totally without, but anything I have with sugar has to be below a certain number of grams. I joined a gym and started working out every night at midnight. And I loved it.

I felt empowered until March, when COVID hit and the gym closed. But I kept moving forward, buying a small stair-stepper and absolutely hating it, and using free weights. The gym reopened over Memorial Day weekend, but with limited hours. After attending a few times, I just felt nervous and stressed, so I canceled my membership, bought a treadmill, and set up a work-out room in my home.

The weight is coming off, albeit slowly. I’m 26 pounds down. I feel a lot better, though not as good as I expected. The cancer meds cause joint and muscle aches, and now I’ve added working-out aches to that, and so there’s a lot of pain. But I work through it.

Now here’s something that most women will know, and most men won’t. When the female body loses weight, guess what loses weight first. It’s where there’s a lot of fat storage, of course – the breasts.

Because I had a significant partial mastectomy, my right breast was already obviously smaller than the left, because a big part of it is missing. My surgeon encourages me to have reconstructive surgery every time I see her, and every time, I say no. I’m not a fan of elective surgery. But I will admit, it’s taken me a long time to adjust to my new appearance. I tell myself it’s okay, I’m going to be sixty, not twenty, thirty, or even forty. I have a partial prosthesis for when I do public events.

But you know what? Now that I’ve lost weight, that breast is even smaller. And it’s growing smaller faster than the left breast. Even wearing the prosthesis now, there’s a difference.

Well, isn’t that just a fine how-do-you-do.

I’ve been more focused on this as we move steadily toward the anniversary of the surgery, and those last moments when my breast was whole and looked like it was supposed to. I had surgery on July 25, 2017.

Last night, after I stomped on my treadmill for an hour and then hefted the free weights, I went upstairs to take a shower. Right before I stepped in, I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror. I turned and faced myself, full frontal.

Yep. All there. Left breast, present and accounted for, smaller with weight loss. And  the surgically smaller right breast, determined to lose weight faster than the rest of my body. Still misshapen. Still odd. Still…well, still there, isn’t she.  Battle-scarred.

A survivor.

“You go, girl,” I said to her. “Keep up the good work.”

And I got into the shower, feeling just fine.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

 

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

When the vice-principal of Waukesha North High School called me over my lunch hour on Tuesday, I had that immediate visceral reaction we all get when a vice-principal calls. All four of my kids went there, my three big kids graduating in 2002, 2004 and 2005 and Olivia just last year. I graduated from there in 1978. And so my first response was to duck.

“What’s wrong?” I said.

“Nothing,” he said. “You don’t have kids here anymore, Ms. Giorgio.”

Then he went on to tell me that “many people” nominated me to be inducted into Waukesha North’s Wall of Fame. The committee agreed that I should be there. To be put on the Wall of Fame, you “must have graduated from Waukesha North at least five years go and you must have demonstrated citizenship during and after high school, and must have made a significant contribution to the community and society.”

I laughed in response, that same laugh of surprised joy as whenever my teachers there told me I’d done a good job.

It’s easy to pick the Wall of Fame as my Moment this week. But it goes deeper than just getting an award.

Waukesha North was the third high school I attended. My father worked for the government and we moved frequently. I attended schools in Berkeley, Missouri, Esko, Minnesota, Stoughton, Cedarburg, and Waukesha, Wisconsin. I don’t remember much about Missouri, I was only there for kindergarten. But in Minnesota, the teasing started. I was born with a condition called strabismus, making my eyes cross in to my nose. My first surgery was at 16 months, then two when I was eight, and two when I was fifteen. I no longer see out of both eyes at once. My eyes aren’t straight, but they’re as straight as they’ll ever be. Unfortunately for me, in 1966 when I was in first grade, a TV show called Daktari premiered, complete with a cross-eyed lion called Clarence. I was immediately branded as Clarence, and Clarence I stayed until I moved to Cedarburg for the first semester of my junior year, a few months after my final surgery.

The teasing was about more than my eyes. I was a quiet kid, introspective, much preferring to be on my own as opposed to in a group. I spent most of my time with my nose in a book, or scribbling my stories in a notebook. I wore my hair long, down to the backs of my knees by senior year, and I curtained it over my face to keep the world out. Which meant I was an easy target. When I was in Minnesota, the school system had only just started allowing girls to wear pants to school, and only on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They couldn’t be jeans. So when I moved to Stoughton in 6^th grade, I wore a polyester pantsuit on the first day of school. Where everyone wore jeans and t-shirts. I just didn’t have a chance. My eyes, my clothes, my withdrawn personality – once again, easy target. Many years of misery.

Remember Ally Sheedy’s character in the Breakfast Club? I could have played that part without acting.

By the time I got to Waukesha North, in my second semester of my junior year, I was a profoundly sad, profoundly angry, wreck. But I found myself suddenly in a place with people who spoke my language, who heard it, who understood it. The arts were held in just as high esteem as sports. I kept hearing my name over the PA system during morning announcements for the things I did, right alongside the athletes. I joined the school newspaper and the school creative writing magazine. There was a creative writing magazine! I took classes that I never even knew existed: creative writing, journalism, Growing Up In Literature & Reality, Mystery & the Macabre, Science Fiction & Fantasy. And I suddenly had teachers who not only listened, they heard me. And I was no longer teased. No one knew me as Clarence.

And I wasn’t Clarence. I was just Kathie. I fit in, and I stood out, and I belonged.

Despite being in this safe place, or maybe because of it, I found the profound sadness and anger surging up. I didn’t know it yet, but I was three years away from being told that I was dealing with chronic depression. My creative writing teacher, my English teachers, and my psych teacher, along with the administration, were concerned and they called my parents several times, asking them to get me into therapy, or at the very least, allow me to see the school psychologist. My parents were firm believers that psychology and those practicing it were “shysters full of mumbo-jumbo and gobbledy-gook.” They “ripped hard-working people off, charging exorbitant prices, and putting all the blame on parents.” They said I was only looking for attention.

Which, of course, I was. But not in the way they said I was.

And so the teachers and the administration decided to take a heady risk. They got me in to see the school psychologist, without my parents’ permission. I was not yet 18; legally, I wasn’t allowed to make my own decisions. But that school had my back.

Waukesha North High School saved my life.

To this day, I am grateful for the amazing care and compassion of my teachers and staff.

So this being put on the Wall of Fame, to me, means I didn’t let them down. I’ve lived up to whatever it was they saw in me. I hope they’re proud. I’m pretty sure they are, as one of the letters of recommendation came from my high school creative writing teacher. It’s because of them that I’m still here.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

 

 

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

It’s been a weird week. Have you ever found yourself caught up in an externally driven moment, a moment where you’re doing something that you tell yourself will make you happy, because the world would expect you to be happy? And yet something in you is saying, Stop! This isn’t me!

I found myself immersed in that this week.

My 60^th birthday is coming up at the end of this month. I’d planned on spending it in Waldport, Oregon, in my favorite house in my favorite place in the world. I started putting the idea together in January, inviting my kids, reserving the house, getting airline tickets and a car rented. It made me look forward to a birthday I dreaded.

There’s just something about 60. I feel like I’m entering the final stretch, but that somehow, I missed some laps. I’m beginning to question if I will accomplish all that I set out to do, but in particular, the one life goal I set for myself when I was twelve years old, and still haven’t reached. I’m beginning to wonder if it’s impossible – or more clearly, if possibilities are disappearing from my life. If I was never capable of the goal to begin with.

Going to Oregon softened that for me. And then, of course, COVID took it away. I decided instead to go to an AirBnB on a lake in Illinois, but the city right next to it is now a hotspot, and so I canceled that too.

I think I was looking for a way to make my birthday special, and I was looking to the world to tell me what that could be. In literature, in television, in the movies, on Facebook and in other social media, people face momentous birthdays and they buy a car. A dream car. So I decided to trade in my cars and get a new one.

Here’s why this is crazy. I love my cars. My cars ARE my dream cars. I’ve written about my cars. I own a 2006 Chrysler 300C Hemi and a 2012 Chrysler 200 convertible. They’re named Hemi and Semi. And when I say I love them, I mean it.

I used to stop in the street and stare when a Chrysler 300 would pass. It always felt unreachable. About ten years ago, I reached, and Hemi came home. I call him my bodyguard. His seats adjust to me when I get in. The hemi engine provides me with great power. A little over a year ago, on the freeway, a car three up from me hit a deer. I didn’t see it because of an SUV in front of me. By the time the cars between me and the deer veered away, the only thing I could do was hit the dead deer. Hemi rode right over it. We felt the bump. But none of us were jarred or hurt. Hemi carried us smoothly to safety, and then he began to smoke. Most of Hemi’s undercarriage was torn apart. But my insurance company put him back together again. My insurance man called Hemi by name. I wept when I got him back.

Semi drove me back and forth every day to radiation. Top down, music up, he cheered me on as I went to each appointment, and he cheered me up on the way home. He was a four-wheeled partner through a difficult time.

And now I was trading them in, because it seemed like this was something that people do when they have momentous birthdays. They get a new car.

I found a beautiful BMW 430i. I drove my cars in one by one. As I handed over the keys, I sobbed. I told myself it would feel better when I drove home in the new car, complete with all the bells and whistles. Complete with the possibility for a new life, for realized dreams, for possibilities.

I didn’t feel better.

I drove the BMW home on Saturday afternoon. By Sunday, I was a wreck. I texted the dealer and I asked if I could return the car and get my own cars, the cars I love, back. And then I spent a sleepless night, waiting for their answer.

On Monday, they called me by 10:00. My cars were still there. I could have them back. That BMW couldn’t get me there fast enough. There was no Hemi under that hood.

After everything was exchanged, the dealer walked me out to the lot. The cars had been brought out and were parked, side by side.

“Oh, boys,” I said. “Oh, boys. There you are.”

And I drove them home. Several times on Monday, I looked out my window at Hemi. I opened the door to my garage and I peeked out at Semi. And I breathed a sigh of relief each time.

So what did I learn from this?

We have to honor our own versions of happiness. I was operating on what I believed would make most people happy – a new, shiny, state of the art car for a momentous birthday. But that just didn’t fit with who I am…it didn’t fit with how I feel or what makes my heart lift or what makes me smile or weep with joy. I went with a world view, over my own view.

What made me happy? Walking out of that dealer and seeing my two cars, my Hemi, my Semi, who have driven with me through some pretty rough times. Both cars have wrapped me with heated seats when I’ve been chilled (Semi even with the top down!). Both have driven me through silent roads on dark nights. Both have caused me to whoop with absolute joy at the beauty of our earth as I’ve crested a hill or swept around a curve.

Oh, boys. Oh, boys. There you are.

Maybe, in almost sixty years, I’ve learned to honor myself and my own heart.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Boy, I have to tell you – when I was doing Today’s Moment Of Happiness in 2017, the year that I dealt with breast cancer, I thought it was just the hardest thing ever. But now it’s 2020, I’m only coming up with one Moment per week…but there’s COVID and everything else that’s happening in the world. This is not easy. Not only is it hard to find something to be happy about, my interactions with the world have shrunk. I am home most of the time. Days go by without my driving my car. I was getting out for walks, but attacks by red-winged blackbirds have made me leery of going anyplace where there might be birds. Which is everywhere. Everything I do is online – write, teach, shop,  read.

So this is difficult.

This is now July. When COVID hit in March, I thought, Well, this is awful, but it will be over by summer. Yet here we are and it’s not over. July is my birthday month. I will be turning 60 on the 29^th. And I truly wanted to celebrate by going to my favorite place on earth, a little house in Waldport, Oregon. But like everyone else, I will just be staying home.

Again.

So many things are canceled. Music festivals. County and state fairs. One of my favorite flea markets, held once a month during the summer months, is still going on, but I think I’m too nervous to go to it. Fireworks for the 4^th are canceled, except for a few select communities who are still doing them, and they are being flooded with thousands of people who still want to see fireworks despite their own being canceled. This morning, when I signed on to the internet, the first thing I saw was an article saying that Wisconsin’s state health department is begging people to just stay home.

Again.

A recent joy in my life has been returning to the gym. I joined Planet Fitness in January, and from my first day until they closed for COVID in March, I only missed three days. Since they reopened over Memorial Day, I’ve returned, but sporadically. I find myself happy while I’m there. And then absolutely paranoid when I get home. Did I touch something? Breathe something? What about that guy three machines over who sniffled? Gyms in other states have started closing again. Today, I thought I’d be going to the gym during the afternoon. But I’m not.

I’m going shopping for a treadmill tomorrow instead. While wearing a mask. And observing social distancing. And looking online first at stock so I have a pretty good idea of what I want.

And then I will just stay home.

Again.

Right before I came upstairs here to work on the blog, I said to my daughter Olivia, “I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to write about.”

She said, “Maybe take a break from it for a while?”

But that just filled me with grief. It felt like yet another loss, if I stopped the blog for now. One of the biggest things I learned while writing Today’s Moment every day for a year was that happiness doesn’t always come to you. Sometimes, you have to go looking for it. Sometimes, it’s not a miracle, but it’s a home-grown creation. Made with your own hands. Your own mind. Your own heart.

During this same passage of time 3 years ago, I was in the thick of breast cancer. What’s amazing to me is how the dates are branded in my brain, like my wedding anniversary or my kids’ birthdays. June 20^th, flunked mammogram. June 27^th, diagnosed with breast cancer. July 25, partial mastectomy. July 31, met with my medical team, all in one room at the same time, to discuss my future. Which was going to be fine. August 28, first day of radiation. September 25, last day of radiation. Every day since, still taking oral chemotherapy, for at least another two years.

All the way throughout, many of my blogs started with, “How am I supposed to find a moment of happiness in the middle of (insert horrific cancer detail here)? And you know what?

I always did it. I always found it.

And now I’m going to do it.

Again.

Happiness doesn’t always happen to you. Sometimes you have to go out and find it. What is the use of learning something, and learning it profoundly, if you don’t keep practicing it?

So one by one, I did the following:

Found Edgar, my big fat orange bowling ball of a cat. Hugged him. He purred.

Found Muse, my teeny tiny 5-pound mouse of a cat. Hugged her. She purred.

Found Ursula, my big 50-pound afraid-of-everything pitbull. Hugged her. She slurped my face.

Found my daughter. Hugged her. She hugged me back.

And then I sat down and wrote this. Beaming. Safe in my home. Surrounded by who and what I love.

Again.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

(I gave up on trying to photograph me with the cats. They went into hiding.)

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

When it comes to shocking moments in my life, being told that my child was autistic and would likely never speak and would look at me like I was a block of wood probably ranks highest. I remember the doctor telling me, and I looked back at him and said, “No, she’s not.” Olivia, playing at my feet that day, tapped the toe of my sneaker and looked up at me and smiled.

In her eyes, I was not a block of wood.

But we all knew she was different. The inconsolable, out-of-control, constant crying when she was an infant. The touch sensitivity, the difficulty switching to table foods, the repetition of playing with the same toys the same way every day, only allowing in space for a new toy after the old toys were taken care of. The need for routine. The not speaking. The absolutely profound temper tantrums and meltdowns that left her physically and emotionally exhausted, and her parents and siblings right alongside.

The early years were difficult. There were times I had to put her safely in her room, shut the door, leave her to scream and throw herself around, and I would go sit on the couch and shake.

But you know what? Always, through all of it, there was the tapping on my shoe and the smile. There was launching herself into groups of people because she just wanted to connect so much. There was speaking, the incorrect words with emphasis on the wrong syllables, words learned through television, scripts repeated and repeated until she connected the correct words and she found that their meaning matched what she wanted.

And that smile.

Certain moments will always stand out.

Being told our daughter was autistic. (No, she’s not.)

The moment of acceptance. (Yes, she is.)

Telling her preschool teacher that we believed that Olivia would live a normal life, go to college, have a great job, do great things, and receiving a condescending pat on the shoulder and a “Well, we can always dream.” The instant and complete rage I felt at this woman who worked with Olivia for three years and still didn’t know who she was.

And the moment right after when I realized that the only thing that mattered was that we knew. And that “we” includes Olivia. We all knew who she was. We know who she is.

The kindergarten teacher who was the first to say, “My gosh, she’s amazing.” The first grade teacher who said the same thing. The second, third, fourth and fifth grade teachers who became her chorus. The aides. The special ed teachers. The occupational therapists and speech therapists.

The connection with her violin. Coming home after seeing an assembly where a quartet played and announcing she wanted a violin. No doubt in her voice. “I can play.”

The connection to writing.

The connection to art.

“She’s amazing.”

She is. It’s not that she overcame autism, or burst through it, or destroyed it. It’s just a part of who she is. She has dark brown hair, the most beautiful brown eyes, a smile that never quits, and she’s autistic. We don’t fight it. It’s part of the Olivia package. We incorporate it.

Olivia finished her freshman year in college this past spring. It was a year filled with excitement and possibility, then chaos and uncertainty as the pandemic set in. Yesterday, while I was on the phone with a client, she forwarded me an email from her college, saying that she made the Dean’s List. In her freshman year. In a chaotic, unprecedented, out-of-routine year for a young woman who thrives on routine.

Dean’s List. 3.9 GPA.

I was on the phone and I couldn’t shout. I couldn’t cheer. I couldn’t stamp my feet and clap my hands and just howl. Until I finished with my client.

I hung up the phone and shouted, “Michael!”

He was napping on the couch. “What?”

“Olivia made the Dean’s List!”

“Ohmygod!”

Olivia flew up the stairs. And there was that smile. She beamed at me and I said, “This is WONDERFUL!” and she said, “I don’t really know what it means.”

And I began to laugh and laugh.

This girl, this young woman, hit a difficult goal without even knowing she was doing it. She just did it. Just like tapping my shoe and smiling at me at the exact moment when I was told I’d be a block of wood.

“We can always dream.”

Damn straight. We always will. We know who she is. She knows who she is. And that’s the most important thing.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

So I was attacked by another bird this week. Another red-winged blackbird. A friend obligingly sent me a link to an article about these birds, with the very appropriate headline, “Red-winged blackbirds: Nature’s A-holes”. I wholeheartedly agree.

I was deliberately taking a walk away from Waukesha’s Riverwalk, where I was attacked two weeks ago. That attack was fast and furious – the bird approached from behind, dove against my right ear, and left. The Riverwalk is well-known for RWB attacks this time of year. People who run/walk/skate there wear helmets until mid-July, when the babies leave the nests.

So I switched to walking downtown, and through a few open areas in city parks that were nowhere near trees. On Friday, I hung up with a client and I had an hour and a half before the next. So I ran down the stairs, out the garage door, crossed my parking lot, crossed Walgreens parking lot, and headed down the little drive that connects Walgreens with one of our major roads. Very, very urban. Very city. And on the corner, far away from water, was one lone little tree. As I passed, I heard the RWB call and then saw him fly out from the little tree and perch on the street sign.

There was no escape.

I moved to the furthest side of the street and walked faster, but to no avail. He gave out an ungodly shriek and attacked my head. In a minute, I was in my worst nightmare. He was in my hair. I felt claws and beak. He kept shrieking. I shrieked too and swatted and then tried to duck and run at the same time. I lost my balance and went flat out and hard on the pavement.

The wind was knocked out of me and I couldn’t move. Still, the bird kept attacking. I finally got up to my hands and knees, crawled just a bit, and was starting to stand when I realized my phone fell out of my pocket and I had to backtrack to get it.

Cue the horror music. More bird attack.

I finally made it around the corner. My palms, elbows and knees were torn up and already starting to bruise. My knees and ankles and wrists ached. My back and stomach muscles clenched. I had to call Michael to help me home, even though home was only a few hundred feet away, because my legs were shaking so badly, I didn’t think I would make it.

The end result? I was always afraid of birds. Now I’m terrified to be where they are. I tried to take Ursula out to do her business, saw an RWB fly from tree to tree near her favorite spot, and had to drag her back in, pottyless. I couldn’t take the garbage out to the dumpster. When I drive, I’m in a convertible, but at stop signs and stoplights, I hunker down low and watch the trees. My fear has spread to all birds, not just the RWBs. I’ve put a fake owl on my deck and hung balloons with holographic predator eyes that are supposed to scare birds away.

This is not good.

But then I was looking through some photographs of my previous trips to the Oregon coast, my favorite place in the world. And I found a photo of a pelican. A big, brown pelican.

On my visit to the coast in 2010, I was walking the beach one late afternoon. I was almost back to the house when I heard an odd whirring sound, and then…WHUMP! On the sand in front of me, a pelican fell out of the sky. And I mean fell. He didn’t land. He came straight down and walloped into the sand. If I’d been two feet further on, he would have landed on me.

We looked at each other. His eyes did not look angry or threatening. He just looked tired. I waited with him for a bit, but he didn’t move. My cell didn’t work at the house, but I ran inside and used the landline to leave a message at the aquarium in Newport – they did animal rescues. When I went back outside, kids had surrounded the pelican and they were poking him with sticks and tossing stones at him. He didn’t move. I yelled and chased the kids off. The pelican’s eyes were sad.

I sat down close by and stayed with him until it grew dark. Then I said goodnight and went inside. I hoped by morning, he would be gone, taking wing and flying away.

He was gone in the morning, but he didn’t fly.

When I went out to him, he hadn’t moved from his spot. But he was stretched out in flight formation. His wings were at full span and I was amazed by their width. His feet were straight back and turned sole-side up, as if his legs blew behind him as he soared. His eyes were closed. He didn’t look unhappy. But I wept.

I stayed in vigil with him until the aquarium guys showed up. They identified the pelican and marveled that he was not from the Oregon coast – he must have been blown off his migration course by a hurricane near Florida. They took him away. I smoothed out the sand where he’d been, pretending I was putting his soul to rest. I hoped he was flying beyond the sky.

Looking at that photo, I remembered the warmth I felt for that big heavy bird that fell from the sky, and nearly hurt me, but didn’t. I remembered the admiration, the sympathy, my need to protect him.

I can’t hate all birds. I can’t judge all birds on the basis of these two RWB’s, especially that last one that really, really hurt me. I’ve discovered that falling at (almost) 60 isn’t the same as falling at 50 or 40. But I shouldn’t hate all birds. That’s just wrong.

Isn’t it interesting that this realization comes at a time when we are being encouraged to realize that looters are not the same as peaceful protestors.

And at the same time that we’re being encouraged to realize that while there are definitely bad cops, not all cops are bad.

There are bad people. But not all people are bad.

There are birds.

I might just take a deep breath. And go out for a walk.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

For a while today, I thought I was going to have to skip this week. I was thinking about this blog as I went to bed last night and still thinking about it when I got up this morning. I wasn’t coming up with any moments. None.

Part of the point of this blog has always been to watch for the moments. To look for them. And to be aware that they might not be big. There have been many times I’ve really had to search. I honestly don’t know how I did it as Today’s Moment, every day for a year. Now I have a whole week to sift through, and sometimes, it’s really difficult.

Especially in times of pandemic. And especially in horrific moments in our collective history.

Every year, I have two big events that I really look forward to. One is the AllWriters’ Annual Retreat, which I’ve often described as my favorite weekend of the year. And the other is my own retreat, usually two weeks, and usually on the Oregon coast. I have often said it’s the only place where I feel fully like myself. I don’t know what it is about the little house I go to, in the little town by the great big ocean. But when I go, I don’t say I’m going on vacation or I’m going away. I say I’m going home.

And this year, both of these events are now canceled. In my Facebook feed, under the everyday reminder of Memories, I am being inundated with photos of previous AllWriters’ retreats. There are also reminders of posts, where I counted down the days to Oregon. My next book, a full-length poetry collection called No Matter Which Way You Look, There Is More To See, features a cover filled with the photograph I took the first time Olivia came to Oregon with me. She was seven years old and she was dancing with the ocean.

I am surrounded with reminders of what I’m missing.

We’re all missing something, of course. One by one, we’ve seen vestiges of summer set aside for at least a year. Summer festivals and fairs. Fourth of July parades and fireworks. We’re also adjusting to special hours and special methods for things and activities we’ve always counted on – the library, the mall, flea markets.

But the absence of these two things, the AllWriters’ Retreat and my own personal retreat, have laid me pretty low. They encapsulate, animate, really, the two great passions in my life. My own writing. And teaching.

So when I set out for a walk today, it was in a sad mood. The malicious red-wing blackbirds kept me away from the Fox Riverwalk, and so I wandered up and down the streets of our downtown area, through one park, down more streets, into another park, and then home. The first park holds my town’s bandshell. As I approached, I saw a man sitting there, facing the empty stage. His image struck me as poignant – we’re all looking at what we’re missing, and we’re all waiting.

As I continued, I took deep breaths and I was grateful for them. It was a bad asthma day yesterday, requiring me to take two doses of my emergency inhaler. As someone with asthma, I am always deeply grateful for being able to take in the air I breathe. Something most people don’t hear about is that asthmatics often have trouble with the exhale as well. We feel like we can’t empty our lungs, which causes us to breathe in again, just so we can try once more to exhale. On my walk today, my breathing was easy.

My breathing was easy. And I thought about that as I walked up a hill, then up the slope of a picturesque bridge over another section of the Fox River, and over and down.

It wasn’t the first time I contemplated the irony of our two big issues right now. COVID-19 steals its victims’ breath, sometimes requiring ventilators. The victims can’t breathe.

And George Floyd, as he lay dying under a police officer’s knee, said repeatedly, “I can’t breathe.”

George Floyd said it. Victims in ERs and hospitals said it. Protestors chanted it.

And walking up and over a bridge today, and all the way home, I began to chant with each footfall, “I can breathe I can breathe I can breathe.”

I can.

I am so grateful.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so this week’s moment of happiness despite the news.

It’s weird being friends with a hibiscus. Like I said last week, I’m not a plant person. I don’t like digging in dirt. While I love looking at plants, going to botanical gardens, and I love the Domes in Milwaukee, actually caring for plants just isn’t high on my priority list. I tend to forget they need things. Like water.

But near the end of April, a hibiscus in a grocery store waved one of its leaves at me and said, “C’mere.” So I did.

This isn’t my first hibiscus. We moved into our home almost 14 years ago, after going through the painstaking process of having it built. We moved in on my birthday, July 29, 2006. The next summer, after we were settled in, I was out buying a few pots of flowers for the deck when I saw a hibiscus. I didn’t know what it was until I read the label. But its braided trunk and huge orange flowers caught me. I brought it home, and until last winter, the hibiscus first spent the warm months greeting students at our front door and winter months listening to students read their work in my classroom. Then, when I added a Little Free Library to the front niche, the hibiscus moved upstairs, to my third floor deck and spent the winters in my office. I decorated it at Christmas, with little lights and tiny Starbucks coffee cup ornaments. It listened to me work with students and read my own work out loud. It was company. And then, last summer, it died.

I left the pot sitting out on the deck and all winter long, I looked out at those bare branches.

So then, of course, the pandemic hit. In late April, I was making my way nervously into our MetroMarket. I doused myself in hand sanitizer and strapped on my mask. There were plants right outside the door and that is when the hibiscus flicked its leaf and caught my attention.

Braided trunk. And the most stunning pink flower. I stopped and looked. I think I said out loud, muffled by my mask, “Well, aren’t you pretty.” And I took a deep breath.

My mother always told me to never ever ever buy outdoor plants before Memorial Day. But that day in April, a hibiscus, and hope, rode home with me in the back seat of my car. And yes, we had frosts and freezes, so the tree was carried in at night, then carried out again in the morning if it was going to be warm enough.

And I began to talk to the darn thing.

Maybe it’s the isolation of Safer At Home. I’m not going out much right now and haven’t for months. I talk to my students and clients and family on screen or on the phone. I go out for walks sometimes on Waukesha’s Fox Riverwalk, but as I was attacked yesterday by a red-winged blackbird, I don’t think I’ll be going back there anytime soon. I think a lot about the baristas I used to talk to, and the guys at Planet Fitness when I went there at midnight every night. I think about talking to passersby and people in stores and, well, the whole world. Now, talking in person seems to be a dangerous thing to do.

So I talk to my hibiscus.

Whether it’s coincidence or not, she’s putting forth an amazing array of blooms. Her first few weeks, maybe in response to the cold, she kept her branches tucked close, like a Christmas tree that is still wrapped in string. But as time went by, she’s relaxed and the buds just keep erupting. This week, I figured out how to write outside on my deck – previous attempts at dimming the glare have always failed. But a sudden thought about putting my laptop into a box tipped sideways was all the brainstorm I needed. So this week, the hibiscus also listened to me reading out loud as I worked on what I hope is the final draft of my new book. She responded by giving me three more flowers.

I call her Hibby.

This week and last, unthinkable events that began in Minnesota added a layer of hate and anger to what was already layer after layer of stress and fear. Like many, I was left speechless with the shock that what happened to George Floyd could still be happening in this day and age, when I would expect the world to be at a certain level of kindness, compassion, and intelligence. Apparently, we’re not. Before, with the pandemic, every time I stepped outside, it was like walking into a fog of fear. Now, it’s a wall of anger.

And on my deck, the hibiscus keeps blooming. Every morning, I look outside to celebrate her blossoms. I carefully pluck spent flowers (I refuse to call it deadhead) and then admire what has come out wild and alive overnight. Wild, alive, and bursting with exuberance. If a hibiscus could dance, this little tree is dancing. And laughing. And saying, “Look, look, look! See it all.”

The hibiscus reminds me that there is still beauty in the world. With each new bud, I see hope. In her green leaves, I see health and robust joy. I talk to her. She listens. And then she blooms some more.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.