Relics

It was a simple job, unpacking storage boxes posted with labels that said “BEDDING.”  Rote. Perfunctory.

I couldn't remember exactly what these boxes contained – they’d been stored for four years - but  ripped the wide packing tape and lifted out a couple of disinteresting sets of bed sheets.  Beneath the slick sheets lay several rough, ugly-green but beautiful army blankets made of wool - scratchy and patched and absolutely priceless.  

When I was a child, these blankets belonged at our lake cottage, and were my salvation when summer nights occasionally turned damp-cold.  I’d pick one and head down the hill into the deep night - edges held high so as not to drag on the dewy grass - toward the pier to stargaze.  There I wrapped myself burrito-style in the blanket, and when I’d had my fill of shooting stars and the Big Dipper, I carried it (which seemed very heavy to my small arms) back up the hill to spread over my cot on the sleeping porch.

But that was a long time ago.  In 1980 when I had a family of my own, I began using these old woolen blankets during our farmer friend’s annual hayrides.  Each year his tractor pulled a couple of wagons filled with dusty straw and jovial riders beneath star-studded autumn skies.  Our kids looked forward to Dick’s hayride every year, and still attend it all these years later with their children whenever possible.  It is an event that continues to tie us to a simpler era when we flourished without technological aids or conveniences.  You know, the good old days.

Cumulative memories replayed this afternoon as I shook the top blanket and a few bits of leftover straw slowly wafted to the floor. I could easily envision the tractor chugging its husky mechanical song while coughing out diesel fumes - its white spotlights blaring, red ones blinking.  I recalled the delight and wonder in my kids’ eyes, and how we excitedly passed around the traditional sack of Tootsie Roll Pops.  Bumpy, rough terrain jarred our spines.  Sometimes songs erupted. Jostled babies fell asleep in their parents’ arms as wheat straws flew through the air like soft missiles of playful war.  

These aged army blankets saw it all.

Today I shook the blankets outside, snapping them hard until no trace of straw remained.  Now refolded, they’re stacked on the top shelf of our spare bedroom closet.  They’ll probably sit there patiently, unused and holding precious memories, until some day in the future.  Then, when another person is in charge of them, he or she may wonder if there's any reason for such tired old relics to be kept.

The Eye of the Soul

The human soul (mind, will, emotions) has a God-given window.  Ancient Greeks called it the nous or eye of the soul, capable of "seeing" both tangible and intangible realities within and without us.  They believed the nous could even perceive divine things, and receive God’s thoughts through faith.

This evening I had soup and salad for dinner with three girlfriends at a local restaurant.  While laughter was common, we also shared deeper stories from our lives, the kinds of things that don’t always pop to the surface in casual conversation.  It was an evening of disclosure and acceptance, of seeing with the eyes of our souls into each other's hearts and expecting God to be present with us.  I count this a privilege and an honor, and am grateful to call these women my friends.

Sounds of Silence

Something has gone very wrong with my hearing.

This is 40-year-old news, but also the current headline since I met with the audiologist today. I have profound hearing loss of all high tones (that’s the worst level of loss, meaning no ability to hear whatsoever), and moderate-to-severe loss of everything else.  Auditory black holes have sucked up those high tones; they are now gone. Padded earmuffs distort the other sounds until they resemble Charlie Brown’s mother: “Wa-wa, wa-waaaa-wa-wa, wa-wa.”   My ability to hear spoken conversation is very poor.

Today the audiologist understood how intensely I strain in conversation; how I hide behind smiles, nods, and expletives; how I often fake it.  Most people don’t understand the potential for isolation, loneliness, and a sort of desperation to be human, to communicate.  But he did.  He got it.

He understood how it’s easy for me to slip into either of two images: 1.) inanimate, present but in a rock-like sense, 2.) bigger-than-life, relying on laughter and over-accentuated gestures and body language to bring life to the emptiness.  He brought up Helen Keller’s quote, one I embraced years ago: “Blindness separates us from things, deafness separates us from people.”  

On the flip side, he also understood how I struggle to manage my current levels of tinnitus - loud referee whistles going off in my head that press me like inner vise grips.  He understood how so much is going on inside my skull, a raucous cacophony of noise that insists on taking the upper hand. How my brain recognizes this as a trigger for constant fight-or-flight responses.  How I can feel torn apart and chewed up by it.  How saying, “Learn to live with it,” isn’t enough.  How stress is everyday.

I appreciated his coming-alongside, his awareness. We talked about technological advances.  He checked my current hearing aids and introduced me to others with newer techno-features selling for the low-low price of $6,000, without insurance coverage.   They could definitely help me.  This was encouraging news, if also expensive. 

But there’s more: another story behind this one.  

Fortunately it is not imperative to hear well to be a whole, vibrant person. Although I experience the world in sensory bits and pieces as we all do, and want to stitch them together to catch a glimpse of more weighty spiritual realities, there’s something profound about confronting an acutely life-changing void such as deafness. 

Over time I’ve come to believe divine mysteries reside in earthly shadows. While the rigors of hearing loss are challenging, and I am extremely grateful for hearing aids, ultimately the bigger victory resides elsewhere.  It comes down to embracing rather than resisting the disappearance of a bodily function, and expecting it to be redeemed (curiously but surely) by the One who makes no mistakes. Then the lost is found; completeness manifests in qualities like humility, diligence, patience, hope, mercy, and compassion that yield satisfaction and new purpose.  

Home Again

With several matters of business waiting for our attention in The Old Home Town, we trekked four hours in Dorothy (the new car) on Friday to attend to them.  Our time there was precious and invigorating, triggering a long roll call of memories.  As the hours clicked by, we stood face-to-face with our own roots grown deep. The plow of time had not yet destroyed them. 

We still belonged there. 

Old friendships crackled with the same fire. The university campus sparked wistful memories of spring banquets when my professor-husband was awarded teaching award after teaching award after teaching award.  As we drove by our beloved country homestead of thirty years, I could almost hear the mama cows bawling for their new calves, and see our kids running crazy-wild in the pasture down by the creek, finally free from winter’s grip. All of these things, and more, made our visit a nostalgic roll call.  A sentimental journey.

There was an even more wistful trump card waiting, however. On the way home we visited the genesis of it all, the magnificent 1,800-acre lake where we spent every summer as children, met and courted, and eventually handed off a lake-loving-legacy to our own kids.  We drove by the El Rancho Theater (site of our first date) and my Dad’s lakeside property (site of our first kiss).  We felt the twinge of desire to return, the bitter-sweetness.

We still belonged there, too.

On Saturday evening we agreed: it was good to return to our current home.  As the sayings go, there’s no place like home, and home is where the heart is.  I also agree with Emily Dickenson who said, “Where thou art, that is home.”  Even though our connections with the old places are intense, we have come to realize that home is more internal than external.  It is where memories, dreams, and reality collide, where faith, hope, and love equip and furnish us in any given circumstance, even beyond this life.

Good-bye Moby Dick

A snowdrift resembling Moby Dick spanned the length of our deck for months this winter, as if beached right outside our sliding glass door.  Here are pictures I posted in January, in case you missed them:

Our almost-legendary Moby Dick is finally decomposing (think: melting).  Today only a shrunken corpse remains, as you see below.  Soon our winter mascot, this massive icon of nautical prowess sculpted by Old Man Winter, will seep through the ground and into the lake: a liquid memory flowing home, returning to sea.

Honing

When I answered the phone this afternoon, the feminine voice on the other end was one I hadn’t heard in a decade.  She sounded the same. 

She wasn’t the same.  I found her different, perhaps deeper. She was attending school to receive training for a new career that would prepare her to work with dementia patients and their caregivers.

The years had filed and sanded her, smoothed the treads on her tires.  She told me of chronic migraines and an uncertain future with a separated husband.  I heard the sorrow, the loneliness in her voice.  I also heard the resolve, the strength of will to prevail and make a difference. 

After the conversation, I reread yesterday's email from another friend of about the same age (both women being 20 years younger than me) whose anecdote for debilitating blindness is aggressive, pro-active involvement. “I know that the things that feed my soul are things I become invested in,” she told me.  “I force myself to keep up the things I know can yield joy, just in case. That creates a momentum of sorts.”

Pain levels the ground as life’s common denominator.  And yet it has the potential to hone and sharpen us, to become the whetstone shaping unique growth and transformation out of common humanity.

“The person who truly wishes to be healed is he who does not refuse treatment. This treatment consists of the pain and distress brought on by various misfortunes. He who refuses them does not realize what they accomplish in this world or what he will gain from them when he departs this life.”

~ St. Maximus the Confessor (580-662)

Uplifted

My husband’s electrophysiologist, one of the doctors on his team of heart specialists, is a man of small stature and large influence.  We had an appointment with Dr. L today, and were grateful for his thorough medical expertise as well as his encouraging, patient, optimistic manner.  

Medical professionals have the opportunity to not only influence the human body, but also the whole person: body, soul, spirit.  They can chart a personalized, compassionate course that supports and boosts, or they can dash expectancy, just by the way they interact with a patient.  Who wants to be a number on a clipboard, a mere statistic in some big cog of medical gears? Even when news is difficult and prickly, a sensitive, big-hearted physician can soften it, can work with you and honor you in spite of it. 

This rather delicate-looking oriental gentleman, like all the other physician-advocates on my husband’s medical team, is wind beneath our wings.  We continually stand in awe of all of them: their gracious underpinning of us as unique individuals, and their careful, professional care.  We are grateful for their support that lightens our load and inspires us to hope.

Dynamite!

Translating words cross-culturally can leave a lot to be desired.  Sometimes a given language lacks a single word to exactly represent a single word in another language.  Gaps result, and with them, holes in understanding.

I'm reading a book by a Christian historian who says the Greek words dynamis and energia were used dozens of times in the early New Testament manuscripts when referring to God’s power or work in His people.  Dynamis is the root of our word dynamite; energia refers to explosive energy, like what comes from dynamite when detonated.   When these words were translated into more crisp-and-clean, formal English words (power or work), there was significant loss in meaning. Somehow the image of a charged-and-waiting stick of dynamite, and the explosion coming from it, are a lot more eye-opening, hair-raising, and (let’s face it) compelling than the image of ability and competence (synonyms for power), or service and exertion (synonyms for work).

To demonstrate the above example, the Apostle Paul’s passion to proclaim Jesus as God’s Son literally erupts in Col. 1:29: “For this (the gospel message) I labor struggling, according to His energy energizing me (with divine dynamis exploding in energia).”  This creates an image of an awe-inspiring volcano spewing far-reaching lava.

Or how about Philippians 2:12-13?  “Therefore (since your attitude/life/vision should be the same as that of Jesus, verse 5)…work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for God is energizing (with energia) in you, both to will and to energize (with energia) for His good pleasure.”

I realize some of my thoughts here are interpretative.  Please bear with me as I ruminate! It just seems when talking about God’s work/power in my life, I’d rather envision it as the Greeks did: dynamis and energia.

Green Nostalgia

A wave of nostalgia unexpectedly rocked my boat this evening while I robotically chugged along, preparing dinner.  Suddenly I found myself poised at the kitchen counter with knife in hand, feeling sentimental over (would you believe) a beautiful bunch of floppy, organically grown, hunter-green swiss chard.

Stopped in mid-chop with knife airborne, hands dripping wet, I admitted to myself how much I miss not having a garden.  Years ago, March was the month to pore over the seed catalogs and dream of what to plant, and how much, and where.  Now our small, shady yard doesn’t have room for a garden.

As I visually embraced the beautiful greens before me, their red and yellow stems accenting dark leaves, their intricate veins mimicking my own blood vessels, there was another side to the nostalgia - a sort of wistful appreciation for youthful vigor.  I remembered spending long hours bent over at the waist, or on my knees, weeding and thinning tender little plants while the hot sun prickled my shoulders.  I remembered the comfort of warm dirt crumbling through my fingers; the harvesting, washing, blanching, and freezing of huge quantities vegetables for the winter – so much wonderful food at such little cost!  One year we grew volumes of butternut squash that kept well all winter sprawled out on the concrete basement floor.  I remembered this bounty, the fruit of our soil and the fruit of sweaty labor, with a sense of gratitude and more than a hint of longing.  

Now dinner is over and the dishes have been washed, and yet I remain awash in warm garden-related memories. Our own plentifully-producing swiss chard plants sustained many repeated cuttings: I can still envision the row of prolific leaves with occasional holes (evidence of a caterpillar’s lunch). That was another lifetime ago, a time when my fingernails held dirt, when the flies, bees, mosquitoes, ladybugs, grasshoppers, and Japanese beetles shared the garden with me: a living community of plenty.  I am glad for those days of fulfilling work, and for the ability to nostalgically remember them.

Footprints, Torches, and Miles to Go

Two days have passed

Since sleds skimmed

Over freshly fallen snow,

Jumped the seawall,

And delivered riders

To the frozen lake.

The thrill-seekers ventured

Out and out

On solid water:

Explorers!

Retreating inside the house

With cups of hot chocolate,

They charted paths on the map

Of forthcoming travels

To two destinations:

One far, another farther.

Today, footprints linger on the ice,

Evidence of that day.

While I reminisce,

A car and truck

Speed away and away,

Carrying precious cargo:

Two children,

One dog,

Three grandchildren

(And another in utero).

The mini-van treks toward Texas;

The F-150 pick-up hauls a loaded trailer

To our Hoosier home town,

And then…Mexico.

I pray for peaceful, safe journeys

While replaying last night’s 

Farewell and birthday parties.

I hold dear in spirit

Those who are gone,

The torches gleaming in their

Wildfire-eyes,

Fierce-warming me,

Reflecting love

And life. 

Snow Day

We joined eight of our ten grandchildren today (three visitors and five locals) for sledding under sunny skies in almost-balmy forty degree temperatures.  The wet snow packed well, making runways smooth and slick, and snowmen easy to shape.  Pictures speak the loudest, so here are a few.

Five well-packed girls rode Grampa/Baba's big ice fishing sled together:

Cousins loved every minute:

Sisters, too:

Mothers helped encourage sledders on their way back up the hill:

I rolled three balls to make a three-tiered snowman, then added stone eyes and a bent twig for a mouth. The kids added stick arms, stone buttons, and grass hair.  He became a celebrity...

...until his eager fans converged to eat him alive!

No Words

In July of 2013, three very young granddaughters moved with their parents to the other side of the moon, actually 1,300 from here (it feels like outer space).  The girls and their mother visited in September, but not since then. If you flip calendar pages, that equals six long months - a lot of time for very young, in-the-moment youngsters to potentially forget about Nana and Baba.  Before that, we were involved with these blonde beauties on an almost-daily basis for three long years.  The youngest was even born at our house.  

Last night the girls and their mother arrived for another precious week-long vacation visit. I am delighted, of course,  but there’s also something beyond emotion going on, something profound. It’s not often words completely fail me, but this is such a time.

Let me just say that today I held a napping princess in my arms, pushed my face deep into her silky, fragrant scalp, and felt her charisma seep through skin to completely fill a spot deep within me that had been empty and waiting.  That’s a huge testimony to the impact and complexity of human relationship, of bonding that can’t be measured or explained with words, only experienced.

Presence

A Fed Ex driver delivered a large brown box to our porch last evening.  “What is it?” my husband asked, carrying it into the kitchen as I washed dinner dishes.

“It’s addressed to you,” I replied, looking over my shoulder at the label.

“To me?”

“It’s probably your heart monitor.”

“Oh yeah.  I forgot.”

We decided not to open it right away.  This wasn’t a particularly exciting package to receive, like a new book from Amazon.com, or a Christmas gift sent from a loved one, would have been.  It was a reminder.  Of a problem.  Of an ongoing medical condition.

This morning we took our time getting to the box.  He fixed himself a big breakfast, and I managed to find a million things to occupy myself.  I wanted to be helpful and supportive, but didn’t know what that might mean when dealing with new technology.  Finally it was time.  We opened Pandora’s box: an official-looking carton within the brown box.

There were many pieces and parts inside, each separated in its own styrofoam cubicle:  small hard square rectangles encased in black plastic, coiled wires, batteries, electrodes.  A second layer underneath held more batteries, more wires, more electrodes. And a big user manual.

The manual clearly instructed us: open this certain door and insert a battery; press this, now that, and finally the start button.  With electrodes attached to his chest and electronic stuff hanging all over him, my always-looking-for-a-laugh husband cocked his arms and head like R2D2: great comic relief.  Were we ready?  Wait – the start-up would take 20 minutes, it said.  We counted minutes…while he played the piano…

Now, finally, press yes.  Okay. We’re ready to go.  All set.

But no!  The instructions neglected to tell us one important step.  The critical step!  We should have charged the monitor first, before doing anything else.

It had taken us nearly an hour to get to this point.  We’d been in it together, although I felt like I’d done nothing tangibly useful. I was just there, offering encouraging words and the most I had to give: my presence.

He stood bare to the waist with electrodes stuck on his newly-shaved chest, and a black box hanging around his neck like some funky piece of retro jewelry.  Nothing was happening.  Nothing could happen. There was no charge to the monitor.  “So what do I do now?” he said with a hint of discouragement.  The electrodes couldn’t come off or they’d be wasted; we only had a certain number. 

I didn’t know.  I suddenly felt defeated, as if I should have had the right answer, or at least some answer.  In the last six months there had been so many unanswerable questions.  Couldn’t I at least find something to say?

He didn’t seem to mind my silence, but rallied and uncoiled a promising-looking wire that plugged the monitor into the phone jack. Then, we waited.  For what seemed a very long time. Sitting on the edge of the bed.  Together.

When the monitor was half-charged, he clipped it on his waist in the appropriate case. “Okay, now I’m ready!  Thanks for your help!”

What had I done?  Very little.  Actually, zilch. I’d been with him, that’s all.

“What’s on your schedule?” I asked with an intentional lilt to my voice.  “Are you going ice fishing?”

He paused, unsure of his response.  “I feel tethered,” he finally confessed while pulling a t-shirt over his head.  It wasn’t a complaint, just a simple statement of fact.  The shirt hung bumpy and distended because of the various wires looped like big snakes all over his chest.  He grinned with a sheepish look as if to say, this really isn’t as fun as I’d like it to be, but it’s okay, I’m doing fine.

“That’s because you are,” I replied, smiling with a knowing look.  “Tethered.” There was nothing else to say.  I felt useless.

I understood his comment, and could imagine how he felt. I couldn’t change anything – couldn’t fix his heart issues, or take away the constant medical intervention that now defined our lifestyle.  But I could do something.  Right now.

And so for a long, extended minute I embraced him. The electronic man held me tight, and I felt his wires press into me.  Deeply.  This was the most we could offer each other.  Presence. It was enough.

Jump-Starter

My husband’s post-retirement job in no way resembles his career as a college professor. Now he’s working toward his own improved health, and our days are filled with goals to that end.  But yesterday we also recognized another ongoing occupation: making things happen.

When we were younger, he was always doing something. We took for granted his pro-active, involved, hot-wired approach to life that meant the whole family was active as well.  He made things happen, and we were automatically included.

Yesterday he invited our son and nine-year-old grandson (who loved watching the winter Olympics) to the local snow ski area for the grandson’s first snowboarding experience.  The day was a huge success!  Although he regretted not being able to participate on the slopes, he watched and cheered for several hours from the sidelines and enjoyed the vicarious high.

“I guess my new role is making things happen,” he said last evening.  “Maybe not fully participating, but getting the ball rolling.”  He explained that our son had thanked him for initiating the experience, which wouldn’t have occurred otherwise.  “So I can be the pioneer, the one to launch activities.”

“The spark,” I added.  I could see him kicking off activities like a trigger at the starting gate of a race, a key in the ignition, a switch on the lamp.  A spark plug.

One of his ongoing gifts to the family over the years has been an encouraging presence.  Whenever an interest surfaced in any of us, he believed in giving it a try, “Or else you will always wonder.” 

He still can do that.  Be the wind in the sail.

Life Song

Our piano tuner makes music with his very presence.  I’m not sure how he does this, but an inaudible melody accompanies him whenever he enters our house.

We’ve known him for over a decade.  He visited again today to re-harmonize ivories with subtle incongruities that would lead to discord if not corrected.  We chatted as usual, and I caught the swell of his optimism as usual.  Even as we spoke I wondered about his everyday lifestyle - if he constantly tunes his own thoughts as a matter of course, correcting sour ones that threaten to sabotage his standard, hopeful song,

“No what-ifs, no if-onlys, no regrets,” he said today in regard to his father’s passing.  His relationship with his dad had been fraught with limitations, but he’d accepted them and worked within existing parameters. He spoke tenderly and respectfully of a hardened man who’d divorced three wives and driven himself to his own death with alcohol.  This was not a song of sorrow, but rather a compassionate score - an inspiring love song of forgiveness and mercy that refused to be tainted by disappointment.

Metaphorically, this man reminds me of an inspiring musical sonata with many interpretative movements.  But in another sense entirely, he resembles an unassuming oyster.  When sharp grains of sand invade, he waits for pearls instead of despairing over the grit. 

Exploring Inner Space

Today we visited an optometrist who ran all the standard tests and ordered new lenses for our glasses.  She also photographed the interiors of our eyes, something we’d never had done before.

The inner space glowed, our fiery optic nerves burning like tiny suns. Spidery blood vessels ran wild: blood-red lightning with millions of branches.  It was magnificent to view these spectacular images, knowing they were the source of our vision.

Upstream

My husband’s various doctor offices have become our homes-away-from-home these days.  But today is my day to see a doctor.  Oh boy.

I’ve had “white coat syndrome” since I was little, when the husky-looking pediatrician on Superior Street made house calls and always brought super-sharp, long needles.  You could count on those needles, every time.  After my child body had been stuck clear through, he tried to make it okay with a floppy candy sucker – one of those with the paper loop handle – which I thought a poor attempt at reconciliation.

Anyway, over the years I’ve had many experiences that have taught me to respect medical professionals, but also question what they do and why.  In it all, I’ve learned to maintain ultimate responsibility for my health. 

In some respects, I still have “white coat syndrome.” Today my heart will sprint a little faster when they listen, and my blood pressure will elevate.  It’s part of being adrenalized, ready to participate in the games.

I’ll drive an hour-and-a-half for the privilege of sound medical advice that isn’t necessarily conventional, some potentially dicey decision-making, and a bill not covered by insurance.  This is the way it is when you swim upstream to a medical tributary offering options not typical to the mainstream.  Is it worth it?  YES.

Freedom: Mulling it Over

Snowflakes have the ability to fall freely through the air without the need to know where or when they’ll land.  Birds have the ability to fly wherever their God-given instincts dictate.  They’re free.

Children have the ability work at play, and play at work, without confusion over which is which.  Adults have the ability to discover their truest selves in relationship with the Almighty.  They’re free.

Being “unfree” means bondage or exile: snow held captive in a cloud, or driven by wind; birds imprisoned in a cage, or blown off-course in a storm; children crippled by unrealistic expectation or limitation, or ignored or abandoned; adults fettered by self-preservation, or fallen from intuitive wonder and awe into stale existence.

Fish

If you read yesterday’s blog about ice fishing by lantern-light in the dead of night, you might have wondered about The Manly Wigwam On Ice.  So I wandered out today with the camera.  Here it is in broad daylight.  Inviting, isn’t it?

Temperatures inside typically soar to about ten degrees warmer than whatever they are on the outside.  Here’s a picture of the interior. Note multiple holes in the ice (I think there were four total), just in case the fish down below are too lazy to swim ten inches to the next closest wormy thing.  If there are any.  Fish.  Down.  Below.

In the later afternoon hours today, the thwarted Fish Slayers decided to change locations.  Good-bye Wigwam!

 At new open-to-the-elements holes some distance from The Wigwam, they set up the electronic fish finder and….there they were!  FISH!  And they were hungry! Which just goes to show, you can’t judge a fishing hole by its tent.