This Week’s Moment of Happiness Despite the News

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

I had a good bout of feeling sorry for myself at dinner a little bit ago. Michael was the cook in our family – I only know how to make a few things, and I don’t know how to make them for one person. My schedule is such that I normally teach until about 9:00 at night, and so when I come downstairs from my office or upstairs from my classroom, I’m ready for dinner, and Michael always had it ready for me.

Now there’s just me. And I don’t know how to cook. Nor do I have any real interest in doing so. One of my quirks, along with things like being terrified of birds and, you know, being a writer, is I don’t like to touch meat. It makes my skin crawl. This makes it really hard to cook.

So tonight, I had a break between clients and class, so I hustled down to the kitchen to figure out something for dinner. And the only thing I had time for was the can of Spaghetti-Ohs in my cupboard.

Remember Spaghetti-Ohs? The “neat round spaghetti you can eat with a spoon! Uh-oh, Spaghetti-Ohs!” Yep, those.

The can I had in my cupboard had those mysterious meatballs in it. I made it even better (worse?) by slicing up a couple hot dogs and throwing those in. And then I sat down to eat, by myself, at my island. And as I grumped about it, I took a bite, and you know what I remembered?

I freaking love Spaghetti-Ohs!

When I was a kid, my father was a bit…let’s say, picky with food. Some of it was positive, meaning that he would eat it. He’d build huge mashed potato mountains, similar to Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. He did the same with baked beans, and then loaded both with ketchup, running from top to bottom. He would take a Twinkie, then get out the can of Reddi-Whip, stick the nozzle into the Twinkie, and blow it up until the sponge cake was stretched to maximum proportions. Orange juice had to be a certain brand and a certain pulp, which he would drink at certain times of the day in a certain glass. The glass was never used for anything else. Oh, and he loved split pea soup, which he insisted we loved too, even as we gagged. I can’t even look at it to this day.

But some things weren’t so positive. He’d sit down to a meal we’d had millions of times before, look at it, and say to my mother, “What’s this slop?”

And there were certain things he would not eat. One of which was Spaghetti-Ohs. Also La Choy’s chop suey (another theme song: La Choy makes Chinese food…swing American!). And frozen banana cream pie.

My dad traveled a lot for his job, and whenever he was gone…my mother made all of these contraband foods. I remember her delight at just having to throw a can of Spaghetti-Ohs into a pot and heat it up, and set an aluminum pie tin filled with frozen pie on our table, to our cheers. No slop here. Easy to make.

And fully appreciated.

And so I wiped the self-pity away. I sprinkled my bowl of Spaghetti-Ohs with parmesan cheese, as if it was the finest spaghetti carbonara served in a fancy Italian restaurant. And then I ate it while humming the theme song. Too bad I didn’t have some wine to go with it.

What wine goes with Spaghetti-Ohs? Maybe I’ll pick some up for next week, along with a new can..

Now if I only had Jello 1-2-3 for dessert. Remember that? (Jello 1-2-3’s slogan: The only Jello that tops itself!) And, in my father’s memory, I could add Reddi-Whip.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

Check out the commercials!

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Last week, my daughter Olivia messaged me, saying she was having “a moment”. This is not to be confused with my Moments, but it’s what we’ve begun to call those times when we are suddenly overwhelmed with grief. Sometimes, it’s expected, like with the holidays. Most times, though, they come out of nowhere.

In this case, she was working on a paper for a class in grad school. She had to report on an art project she did, and also how she felt that type of project could be used in her future career as an art therapist. She’d just written a paragraph about how the project kept her distracted from thinking about how it was the first Thanksgiving without her father. But then grief leaped in sideways when she realized that her father would never see the artwork she made for this project, And in fact, he will never see her artwork again.

As we talked about this, I started thinking aloud, and wondered if this was the reason why I was having such a hard time working on my new novel.

“Really?” Olivia asked.

I thought about it some more. “I think so,” I said.

The new book is coming slowly. I find myself staring at the blank page more than I ever have before. I’m not blocked (I don’t believe in writer’s block). I know what I want to write. I know what I want to show. I know these characters, and I watch them run ahead of me in my thoughts, but when I reach for the keyboard, I just find myself frozen. Most of the time. Not all of the time. I just passed 110 pages of this thing. But at my usual level of work, I should be just about done with the first draft by now, and…I’m not.

My first husband wasn’t a writer at all. He wasn’t much of a reader either. When we were in marriage counseling, he was told that he really needed to show an interest in my work. His response to that was to come in and ask me how many pages I’d written. And once he told me he was a writer too, because he wrote computer programs.

Yeah.

Michael was totally different, of course, He was a writer himself. His first question when he came home from work every day, well, the first question after asking me how I was, was “What did you write about today? How’s it going?” And I would tell him. Late at night, after I was finished with all my student work, I would read to Michael what I wrote that day. He’d read to me what he was working on. We’d workshop. But it was the only workshop I’ve ever done where we held hands while we did it.

Michael heard every single novel, short story collection, essay collection, and poetry collection that I’ve written. But now, when I read aloud, I’m reading only to myself. This will be the first book that he didn’t hear in its development. He even heard my latest, Don’t Let Me Keep You, while he lay nonresponsive in the ICU. He told me later he heard every word.

Well, maybe he’s hearing this one too, as I stumble along with it. Maybe.

But the thing is, this afternoon, I sat down to work on the book.

Before I wrote, I played the song I’ve assigned this book, just as I’ve assigned songs to all the books. In this case, it’s “Hello” by Evanescence. And I hugged an orange foofball cat as I listened to it. She pressed her nose to mine and we swayed together.

When the song ended, I set Cleo to the side and then I put my hands up to my temples, as if they were blinders, like on a racehorse. It drew my vision sharply to the screen, and to the last words I’d written. It blocked out the rest of the world.

I looked at my words and I said, out loud, “I can do this. I am going to draw from everything I know, everything I’ve learned, everything I’ve done, and I am going to put that knowledge and experience into this book. I can do this.”

And then I lowered my hands to the keyboard and that’s just what I did.

I can do this. And I breathed a sigh of relief when I did.

I think, goofing off with pronouns here, that when you become a we, and you remain a we for a very long time, and it’s a very good we to be a part of, you forget that before you were a we, you were a me. And that me is still there, the whole time. Including when the other half of your we is gone.

I’m still here. I’m just learning to be simply me all over again.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Without a doubt, my favorite morning of the week is Sunday. Partly because my Sunday morning is almost always Sunday afternoon, and I relish the chance to sleep in, to not wake up until my eyes open of their own accord, rather than being slammed open by an alarm. Sunday morning is spent by first luxuriously stretching, then pulling on a pair of raggedy old pajamas and padding downstairs. A good strong hot cup of coffee is waiting for me (whoever invented the coffeepot with a programmable timer is a saint!), and so are a couple of doughnuts, purchased on Saturday from one of a selection of bakeries. The Sunday paper is waiting for me too. If we are in the cold months, I turn on the fireplace and grab a fuzzy blanket; if not, I open the windows. Then I settle into my recliner, coffee on one side, doughnuts on the other, Sunday newspaper in my lap, and I sigh deep and proceed to enjoy myself.

It’s different, of course, now. Michael used to be to my right. We have a reclining loveseat, and he was always on the right, and I was on the left.

Michael’s favorite advice columnist was Carolyn Hax, who appears in our paper on Sunday mornings, so I always read the column out loud to him, and then we’d discuss it. Carolyn Hax doesn’t suffer any fools, and we both enjoyed her tell-it-like-it-is attitude and acerbic sense of humor.

This morning started by my eyes opening, not on their own accord, but because Cleocatra decided that my orchid really didn’t belong on my windowsill. My window is about a foot away from my side of the bed. The clonk of the pot and the plant’s scream for help, along with the skitter as Cleo did her cartoon cat run-in-one-place before taking off had me sitting up and then out of bed in about three seconds.

The plant survived. The cat…well, we’ll see.

Once my heart returned to normal, I settled into my usual routine. Pajamas on, down the stairs, coffee and doughnuts served, fireplace on, even though it was close to 50 degrees outside, and then I parked myself in my recliner. It only took about five minutes for Cleo to tuck herself under my chin, asking for forgiveness, which I grudgingly gave. Oliver, sleek orange tabby, especially compared to fuzzball orange chonk Cleo, settled on the arm of my recliner. Ursula, 60 pounds too heavy to be a lapdog, stretched herself out on the floor.

And of course, Michael’s recliner remained empty.

I read my way through the comics. Then I moved into the Life section, which is where Carolyn Hax lives. I first read the Bestselling Books list and the calendar which shows which authors are visiting the area this week. I read about an upcoming one-man performance of Dickens A Christmas Carol, performed by an autistic actor, and I wondered why it was important to mention that the actor was autistic. If he wasn’t, would the article have said it was performed by a neurotypical actor? And then I moved my way to Carolyn Hax.

I glanced up at Michael’s urn, sitting on the top of my piano across the room. I started to read the columm, but then I glanced up at the urn again.

Setting my coffee down, taking a moment to pat two orange heads, I studied the urn. I looked again at the empty recliner to my right. And then I read Carolyn Hax out loud.

It was the first time my Sunday morning-in-the-afternoon felt complete in almost six months. Even without the discussion. Because I know what Michael would have said, and I know what I would have answered. Twenty-five years of marriage make that happen.

Earlier, I’d told my son that Michael and I, and now I, spend $43 a month to receive the Wednesday paper, which I never read, but it’s included in the subscription, and the Sunday paper. And I just typically read three sections: the comics, the Life section, and the Business section to see what homes sold in my area this week.

Forty-three dollars.

While talking with my son, I wondered out loud why in the world I spent so much for so little.

But now I know it’s worth it.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Yep, it’s late. I was out and about and actually having fun.

Two years ago, the Milwaukee County Zoo started having an event called Wild Lights. For the Christmas season, the entire zoo is bedecked in the most amazing lights. The first year, I went with Michael, my son Andy, my daughter Olivia, and my granddaughter, Grandgirl Maya Mae. Last year, it was just me, Andy and Olivia, because I’d sent Michael to Omaha for his Christmas and birthday present to visit with his mom and sister, who he hadn’t seen in years. In retrospect, I am so happy I did this. And this year, it was just me, Andy and Olivia.

For some reason this year, all of the animal buildings were closed. But the lights had been added to in amazing ways and were spectacular, and the favorites were there too.

I was excited to go, but this morning, when I woke up, my first thought was, I don’t want to go. I don’t want to go where I remember him being. And, in general, it’s been very hard to get out of bed. But throughout the day, I gave myself a pep talk, and when it was time to go, I was ready.

It was chilly, but not bad. Even right now, at 9:40 at night, it’s 45 degrees outside. The first year we went, we were in a deep freeze snap, with temperatures below zero, and wind chills even further. I bought a puffer coat just for the occasion, and that coat has become my new winter best friend. I am amazed at how warm it keeps me.

We walked through the zoo, commenting on the new lights, happy to see the old lights, and disappointed that we weren’t able to get into any of the buildings. I remembered Michael walking alongside me, and how often I’d lost him when he’d stop to take a photo and I suddenly found him missing. Tonight, I felt him beside me again, but I also felt a whole new kind of missing.

But I didn’t tear up until I saw the moose.

Michael’s favorite animal was the moose. And not because of the animal, really, but because of Bullwinkle of the old animated series Rocky & Bullwinkle. Michael owned all sorts of Bullwinkle memorabilia, and all sorts of miscellaneous moose too. Our first official date was to this zoo, and at that time, the zoo had a pair of moose. Mooses? Meese? Moose. I told him how the bull moose had been there for years, but the female was found wandering around a town, I believe it was West Bend, and when she was finally caught, she was brought to the zoo. That day, we spent a lot of time by the moose enclosure. I was especially charmed by a man who so admired an animal that many people consider ungainly and unattractive. It meant, I hoped, that he could love me too.

And he did.

So tonight, we saw the lit-up moose again, and Olivia said, “Dad’s favorite animal.”

Yes.

We kept on moving, and eventually, we came to the rhino. “Look,” Olivia said. “Isn’t that your favorite animal?”

We have several rhino Christmas ornaments. I have a rhino beanie baby. There is a brass rhino on my keychain.

“No,” I said, looking at the rhino. “It was our favorite animal. Ours together.”

“You had a together animal?” Olivia asked.

I laughed out loud. This was not a story I could tell Olivia when she was a child. But now, maybe, since she’s 24…

And I mentioned it in this blog the other day too.

It’s a little inappropriate, so if you have innocent eyes, look away.

On our first date, when we got to the rhino enclosure, there was a crowd. Many were laughing. Eventually, Michael and I worked our way to the rail. The rhino yard was split in two. On one side, the zoo’s new female rhino. On the other, the male rhino.

Who had the biggest, hugest, gigantic-est erection I’ve ever seen in my life.

Oh, wonderful, for a first date.

The female rhino was apparently not impressed, because she turned and walked away. In despair, the male rhino folded his knees and dropped to the ground.

Right on top of the incredible erection.

Every man in that crowd let out a groan that could likely be heard for miles. I think the rhino did too. And…so did Michael.

I burst into laughter.

And so the rhino became our favorite.

On this night, while Olivia looked horrified, I burst into laughter all over again.

What a hell of a way to begin a serious relationship. I could not stop smiling the rest of the way through the zoo, on that first date, or on this night.

So, I have to say, while working on these every day now, I don’t know that my sadness has become any less. But they are helping me to look back and relish good memories. And to remember Michael as he was, before January 17^th of this year. I am seeing him as him again. Hearing him as he was. Not as he was in the ER, the hospital, the rehab, the hospital again, and hospice. And in those final minutes.

But as him.

And I am hearing myself laugh again.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

The Moment will likely be late tonight. I’m going out for a special event tonight, and it will likely end up being my Moment, unless there’s something even more Momenty that happens before then. So don’t worry if you don’t see something until fairly late tonight.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

I just said yesterday that I really don’t like Christmas. And this year is harder than most.

The youngest of all of us is my granddaughter, Grandgirl Maya Mae. She’s been very quiet about her grandfather’s accident and death. She has six grandparents, thanks to my being divorced from her father’s father, and both my ex and I getting remarried. So she’s had an abundance. Michael is the first one for her to lose. Maya is eleven years old, very quickly moving on to twelve, and at times, seeming like she’s already an adult. She’s always been such a responsible kid.

When she was around two, and in the midst of potty-training, I brought her back to her house one evening, after I’d been babysitting her. I went to use their bathroom before going back to my house, and she asked to come with me. While I did my business, she did hers, on her potty chair. Then, to my amazement, she got up, emptied the potty chair, stepped up on a stepstool, washed out the bowl of the chair, dried it, set it back, and then washed her hands. When we left the bathroom, she hung up her jacket on the peg and headed upstairs. “Maya,” I called. “Where are you going?”

“It’s time to put on my pajamas and go to bed,” she said.

And she did.

A few years ago, in the pandemic, she was in, I believe, the first grade, and she handled the switch to online schooling well. She asked her dad to order her an alarm clock, so she could make sure she was up on time and ready to go.

She amazes me.

In Facebook memories a few days ago, the time came up that I took her to see Frozen II. Afterwards, we went to lunch and discussed the movie. We talked about how Elsa had to learn that she was strong and smart and could do just fine on her own. This confused Maya. Sitting across from me at McDonalds, she raised her bare arms (Maya always dresses Maya, and that winter day, she was in a sleeveless dress with a ballet skirt) and made muscles. “I knowed I am strong,” she said. Then she patted her head. “I knowed I am smart,” she said. She smiled at me. “I’m going to be just fine,” she said.

I was delighted. And I hope, as she moves into these stormy waters of adolescence, that she stays that way.

But now she’s lost a grandfather.

Last year, sometime in the fall, Maya was at our house. She and Grandpa were goofing around, and somehow, they came up with a story about a potato. A living, breathing superhero potato, mind you. I was working upstairs and I could hear them whooping with laughter as this potato’s adventures got bigger and bigger.

Later, when Michael was shopping for our Christmas meal, he’d already gotten in line when the idea hit that he should get a potato and put it in Maya’s stocking for Christmas. He said something about it to the woman behind him, and added that he’d have to load the stuff in the car, then run back into the store and get the potato.

She got out of line and ran to get one for him.

So on Christmas day, Maya found a potato in her stocking. You’d think it was a pot of gold. And it was their special thing.

I thought about that as I worked on my Christmas shopping list. I wondered if I should get Maya a potato this year. I wondered if it would make her sad, or if it would help to have a great and unique memory.

But I also wanted something that would stay. Not something that would either have to be cooked and eaten, or that would eventually rot and have to be thrown away.

And then I thought of Mr. Potato Head.

Remember Mr. Potato Head? The big brown plastic potato with holes in it, so you could put in eyes and ears and a mouth and glasses and shoes and all sorts of things?

So I went on a search. The only ones I found were pretty  modern, or had too many potato people. I didn’t want the complication. I wanted just a Mr. Potato Head, the big guy, with parts to stick in him. Not pirate parts. Not Star Wars parts. Just big goofy eyes and a red nose and a big smile, and blue shoes and maybe a mustache and glasses.

And I found him today. He’s supposed to arrive here by the 12^th.

I’m still having second thoughts. Will it make her sad? I don’t know, because, as I said, she’s been quiet. But, as she moves into these teenage years, I want her to remember the gentle grandpa who held her when she wasn’t even a day old, who looked at her adoringly, who called her “Flirt,” to which she replied as a toddler, “I not a firt!”, and who spent an entire afternoon, making up an unlikely story with a potato hero.

Michael wasn’t her only grandfather, but she is our only grandchild. He adored her. And so do I.

It made me happy to find Mr. Potato Head, and to find a way to remind Maya of a wonderful afternoon. And how special even a potato can be.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Today is the 5^th of December. 20 days til Christmas. And my response to that is, “Blech.”

I used to be a huge fan of Christmas. My house was decorated from top to bottom, necessitating the moving of furniture and the packing up of everyday knick-knacks, followed by the hauling out of boxes and boxes of my collection of Santa tree toppers, and Christmas music globes, and doorknockers and wreaths and…you get the picture.

But somewhere around the millennium, that all went away. We still had trees and such, but during the pandemic, I just went out to Walgreens and bought a small tabletop tree and teeny ornaments and let it go at that. My Facebook profile picture became the Grinch. I was, and am, a very busy person. Christmas mostly became about work.

A couple years ago, Michael and I came across a six-foot tall, very skinny, rose gold Christmas tree. It fit exactly in the spot between my piano and the wall, and so it required no moving of furniture or anything else. Because the condo doesn’t have a basement to store things in, this was a huge plus. But truly, standing there, looking at this unusual color and its brightness, I was enamored. I also kept hearing Lucy from the Charlie Brown Christmas special, saying, “Get the biggest, shiniest aluminum Christmas tree you can, Charlie Brown. Maybe painted pink!” This tree wasn’t pink. Michael called it champagne. I stuck with rose gold.

We brought it home and it’s been up and decorated every Christmas since. I remember that first year, Michael looked at me as I sat in my recliner and stared and stared at the decorated tree, and he said, “Who ARE you?”

Well, that’s always been the question, donchaknow.

But this year is different. At first, I really wanted the tree, and all of the family ornaments. With Michael gone, I still wanted the familiarity, the joy, the memories that each ornament brings. I have an ornament for each first Christmas of each of my four children. I have ornaments representing our cats and our dogs, and ornaments representing Michael’s and my shared love of rhinos, which came from our first official date (that’s another story). It seemed really important to have these up.

But…there are these two cats. Young cats. Still kittens, really, though more adolescents now. And both orange, and I’ve been told that orange cats tend to be a little…crazy.

Oliver arrived in April, after first, my 14-year old cat, Edgar Allen Paw, passed away in February, and then my 20-year old cat, Muse, passed away the day after her birthday in April. I went to the humane society to find an older cat, but came home with a 9-month old kitten who needed me. His middle name quickly became Dennis the Menace, and I at times tore my hair out, wondering what I’d done. Then, a few months ago, I adopted a buddy for him, Cleocatra, who was…4 months old. Ohmygod, even younger. Oliver is now a year and a half old, Cleo, 6 months. Both orange.

At first, I thought we’d still do the tree. I schemed with my son, and we came up with a way to put a hook in the rafters above the tree and tie it, so it wouldn’t tip over.

But the ornaments. I could so easily see the cats getting on the piano and just batting the ornaments, one by one, off the tree.

I pictured the shattered mess. I saw my favorite ornament, one that was my grandmother’s, in pieces. I saw my ornaments from the Walton’s Mountain museum, broken. And the faces of each of my babies, on their first Christmases.

I realized I just couldn’t handle any more loss this year. So I gave up on the tree.

Instead, I found a tabletop ceramic tree, with little lights all over it, and a silver star on top. It’s new, but it’s like the ones we all had in the 80s. It sits on my island, and can be seen in the kitchen and the living room. During this year, I visited St. Vincent’s, and I found an unusual and lovely nativity set, carved out of wood. Joseph was missing an arm, but that just increased the charm for me – I have a thing for giving damaged goods a home. Just ask my clocks. So I had that here, in my closet, and I brought it out and set it around the Christmas tree, even though I’m pretty sure there weren’t any lit evergreens in a stable in Bethlehem.

And I thought it would do, though it still made me sad to look at it, and then at the corner where my rose gold tree was supposed to be, with all its memories.

Then, I made a trip to Walgreens. As I left, I walked through the Christmas aisle. And I was drawn to a cone-shaped, tabletop, clear plastic beveled Christmas tree. It lit up. And while it was plastic, it looked bejeweled. I put it back on the shelf. But then picked it up again. And then picked up a matching mate. I brought them home.

At first, I put them around the ceramic tree and the nativity set. But they glowed brighter, and made the nativity look like a Hollywood set, complete with a disco ball. I drummed my fingers on the island, and then looked over at the piano, where Michael’s urn stands. Because of a little wall partition, that corner is pretty dark. The lights from the ceramic tree didn’t reach the urn, as the lights from the rose gold tree would have.

So I picked up the two new trees and placed them around Michael. He is now doused in Christmas light. Should the cats jump up there and smack these off, they weren’t expensive. They aren’t filled with memories.

But they surely helped last night, when I turned off all the other lights, except for the ceramic tree and the two plastic trees, and I sat and looked at Christmas.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

It pretty much just happened. I’m still glowing.

On Wednesday afternoons, I teach an on-site group in the AllWriters’ classroom. The group is called the Wednesday Afternoon Women Writers Workshop. Historically, this is the class I’ve taught the longest, coming up on 30 years now. It started at Waukesha Park & Rec as the first class I ever taught. Then, it was called SeniorScribes. It was on Friday afternoons. And as my very first class, it was the one that taught me that, while I might be the teacher, I’m also the learner. I’ve learned so much from this class.

Eventually, the class came with me when I opened AllWriters’. I switched it to Wednesday afternoons, and I took out the “senior” requirement, opening it to anyone of adult age. It was also opened to all genders. But as time went on, the class slowly became all women. I enjoyed it so much that when a man attempted to join, I pushed him off to another workshop and changed the name to the Wednesday Afternoon Women Writers Workshop.

I’m not sure what it is about Wednesday afternoons, but somehow, this class not only drew in wonderful writers of all genres, some just starting out, others with publications already under their belts, but it drew in compassionate, caring people. People who reach out to others.

Including me.

As I said when I decided to return this blog to once a day for the month of December, I am over my head in grief. Way over. And the thing is, it’s not just about Michael’s death, though I hate to put a “just” in that sentence. It’s about the trauma of how he died. It’s about the five months he spent struggling to come back into himself, ultimately to lose himself in his brain injury and then die. It’s about the absolute wrongness of what happened to him, yet knowing that the perpetrator was able to fork over $73 to pay for a single citation and then move on as if nothing happened. And it’s about how I have absolutely failed in trying to correct this. No matter what I’ve done, no one in authority listens, even though there are at least 4 different versions of what happened on that day.

Michael was the one person in my life (that I know of) who believed I could do anything. But I haven’t been able to do this. For him.

So just yesterday, I was talking with someone, and I told him that I felt like my energy was just totally gone. I said that it was even difficult for me to walk into or sign into my classrooms. “All I’m feeling is sad,” I said. “And like a really, really huge failure.”

And then I walked into my classroom today.

I have a new student in the Wednesday Afternoon Women Writers Workshop. An amazing poet who has absolutely no idea that she’s an amazing poet. She’s scared. She’s worried. But she knows she wants to write.

Today, she presented the opening pages of a book. “I’m only going to read 3 pages,” she said. “That’s all I can handle.”

And boy, did she handle it!

After class, she stayed for a few minutes. She looked right at me and said, “I just read some pages from my book to a whole room of women. To a whole room of women writers!”

“Yes, you did,” I said. “And you did it so, so well.”

We both cheered. The smile on her face…holy cow. If I could have taken a picture of it, I would have framed it, hung it in my classroom, and put a caption under it: “THIS is why I teach.”

Then, just before she left, she turned back. “I wrote a poem about you,” she said.

About me?

“Well…it’s like about what I would be like if I was you,” she said.

Like me?

“Is that okay?” she asked.

Oh, yes.

This is why I teach. This is why I’ve done what I’ve done for the past almost 30 years. This is why AllWriters is what it is, and has been for 20 years in January.

This is who I am.

And this Moment showed me today that, despite how I feel right now, despite the grief, the depression, the feeling of letting the person down who I loved the most, despite the lack of energy, the fatigue, and this sadness that I feel has taken over for my skin, I am still here. Somewhere. I am in this temporary skin, but skin sloughs off and new skin appears, and in this case, the skin that will appear is the person that is me.

Whew.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

 

 

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Sometimes I crack myself up.

I have a long, long history of sleep issues, meaning that usually, I don’t sleep. Insomnia has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. But all of that suddenly changed after Michael’s accident. I began to fall asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. I always set up a guided meditation on my phone before crawling into bed, but often now, I don’t even remember the first sentence.

I’ve begun to crave sleep. Before, I could take it or leave it. Now, it’s the highlight of my day. Or my night, I suppose.

Some developments have been a bit disturbing. I’ve begun sleepwalking again, which I haven’t done for years. Several times now, I’ve found myself at the head of the stairs, leading from the third floor to the second. I don’t remember what brought me there, what I was planning to do. So I simply turn around and go back to bed.

I’ve woken several times now in the night, opened my eyes, and believe that I see that my bed has been turned sideways. I literally see it that way, and I freak out, because I can’t imagine who or what would turn my bed sideways in the middle of the night while I was sleeping. The image remains until I get out of bed and stand up. Then I realize that all is normal…and I climb back in bed and go back to sleep.

Often, when I wake up, I turn toward my alarm clock to see what time it is, so I can figure out how much time I have left before I have to get up. But lately, when I look toward my alarm clock, I don’t see numbers. I see pictures. Often, they are of people I don’t recognize. I blink, rub my eyes, sometimes turn away and then turn back, and then the numbers are there. I do my calculation and then go back to sleep.

My dreams, which disappeared from January to June, from Michael’s accident until his death, are now back and are very, very vivid and realistic. Last night, I had one of those dreams which continue, even after I’ve awakened, taken a bathroom break and crawled back into bed. It’s like I’m clicking pause on the streaming screen, and then hitting play.

So in the dream, I was in Lake Geneva, with my son, Christopher, his wife Amber and my granddaughter, Grandgirl Maya Mae, my son Andy, and my daughter Olivia. We were running around the town, collecting Mario Brothers memorabilia (for those who don’t know, Mario Brothers are a many-game series on Nintendo and other Nintendo game systems). I just found a 12-foot tall stuffed Mario, which I slung over my shoulder, when Christopher, Amber, Maya, and Olivia decided it was time to go home. They ran out to their cars and left, leaving me and Andy behind, and neither of us remembered where I parked Barry, my Chrysler 300S. This led to our running fruitlessly through long, long hallways in a variety of buildings to try to find our way out to the car, me with the 12-foot Mario wrapped around my neck and shoulders. Andy, annoyingly, kept running ahead out of my sight, and of course, I would come to a hallway that split into several choices and I didn’t know which way he went. Eventually, I would find him again, usually sitting and chatting with someone while he waited for me to catch up. Then we’d start tearing through the hallways again.

This went on for HOURS. One long dream, all the way through.

We’d just found our way to a doorway, and I could see my car parked outside, when I began to wake up. I don’t know what woke me – it’s my day off today, so I didn’t have an alarm set. But while my eyes were still closed, I could see my car. We started to walk toward it and I said to Andy, “Well, at least I’ve gotten my exercise in for today.”

Then I opened my eyes, saw that I was still in bed, all that vigorous exercise only performed in my head and my sleep, and I burst into laughter.

It’s a wonderful, wonderful thing to wake up laughing.

(As I said, sometimes, I crack myself up.)

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

In May of 2023, I started piano lessons. It was something I always wanted to do. Most of the music I listen to, the various bands and such, are heavy on the piano. My brother plays the organ, and we had the mighty Hammond in our house, preceded by the not-so-mighty Wurlitzer, but I just wasn’t interested in the sounds that came out of the organ. I loved the piano.

I’ve had a piano in my house since the summer of 2018. For a while, I played with the idea of getting a player piano, so that I could have piano music in my house at the tap of a button. But I wanted to feel the music beneath my fingers. I wanted to create it. When I got the piano, Olivia, my daughter, was a few months shy of 18 years old. But her first grade teacher was looking for a home for her beloved piano, so she could change her music room into a nursery for her grandkids. The connection with this teacher went back even further than Olivia – the teacher’s son was my son Andy’s best friend for many years, from elementary school on. Andy is fourteen years older than Olivia. When I saw that this lovely teacher would give her piano away to anyone who would haul it, I felt like it was just calling my name. So I arranged for movers, and up into the living room, the piano came. Karla not only sent the piano, but she asked me about the colors in my house, and the piano arrived with a handmade bench cover and runner for the top.

And so there it sat, from 2018 to 2023. I touched the keys now and then, playing what I remembered of Heart & Soul. But otherwise, it was silent.

And then…I finally became brave and began lessons. I played from May to January, and then there was Michael’s accident.

And so I stopped. There was too much going on. And now…I’m back. My piano teacher, Eileen, and the staff at White House of Music, have been huge supports during this time. When I could come, I was welcomed and hugged. When I couldn’t, I was excused with compassion and offered hope and prayers.

Michael’s urn sits on top of the piano, and I apologize to him every time I sit down to practice. I smile whenever I picture him laughing and pretending to put his hands over his ears.

I practice mostly every day, after lunch. I have my morning clients, I eat lunch with a good book, and then I sit at the piano before I return to my office to write. I’d gotten to a point in my regular music book where the music was getting quite difficult (for me). Well, really, I don’t know how difficult it was, but my brain simply wasn’t having it.  It was like I was so full of hard stuff to deal with, that I just couldn’t handle dealing with hard music too. I needed something that wasn’t work, that wasn’t hard, that I could enjoy. When I found myself crying at the keyboard, I knew it was time to say something to my teacher.

And so, at least for the month of December, we have stepped backwards. I’m playing in a Christmas book that is a lower level than my regular book.  And while the songs are easy, and not a challenge at all, I am enjoying myself again. I’m making music that I can recognize. And that isn’t turning my head inside out and my fingers into knots. This week, I’m playing Oh Come All Ye Faithful, Go Tell It On The Mountain, The First Noel, and Up On The Housetop.

I am having some trouble with Up On The Housetop. The bass clef is killing me. I just don’t understand the thought behind creating two musical staffs, one called Treble and one called Bass, with identical-looking notes, but different names. Ridiculous.

When I started playing, back in 2023, all the animals would leave the room. At that point, it was Ursula, our dog, and Muse and Edgar, our cats. I’d sit down to an audience, and when I finished and turned around, the room was empty.

During this last year, both Edgar and Muse have passed on. So now there are Ursula, Oliver, and Cleocatra. But still…an empty room when I’ve finished playing.

Then…Cleo stayed. She curled on the floor and looked at me with open adoration, despite the noise I was making. And a few times, she’s joined me on the bench.

Then Ursula began to stay.

And now today. After playing the first three Christmas carols more or less flawlessly, I stumbled and swore my way through Up On The Housetop. Damn reindeer. Ho ho ho. Did you know that “Up on the housetop, reindeer pause,” is p-a-u-s-e? As in, they wait? I always thought it was reindeer paws. Which doesn’t make sense, I guess. Reindeer have hooves. So I may not have learned to play the song, but I’ve learned that.

I finished, sighed, apologized again to Michael, swore that after my lesson this week, I will never play this song again, and then spun around on the bench. And there they were.

All three animals. Ursula on the floor, Oliver on the loveseat, Cleo on the couch. All eyes open, all staring at me.

“Wow,” I said. “I did okay?”

Ursula came and rested her concrete head on my lap.

This could be applause. Or it could be a silent, rolled-eye appeal to please stop.

But I’ll take it as applause. I laughed and hugged the dog.

Lessons are on Thursday. Let’s hope I can play it without swearing by then.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.