The Fire

When I feel lack in my life, my chest constricts, I don’t breathe deep and I create a little cloud of gray worry that lives above my head.

I begin to doubt myself and my place in the world. It’s amazing how quickly an event or series of obstacles can pull me into a place of fear.

But I had a lovely lesson about lack at the ocean last Sunday. 

I was with my daughter, Kristen, her partner Kenny, and ten year old Isabella. We’d had a full day of playing in the surf, walking on the beach and climbing over shell-encrusted boulders. 

It was time to drive back to Portland but Kenny wasn’t ready. He needed one more walk on the coast, so we filed down the stairs next to the sea wall at Cannon Beach and let the sunset wash over us in radiant shafts of orange, amber and red. 

I wish we had a fire, Kenny said. It’s a perfect night for one. 

People had wrapped themselves in sweatshirts and jackets to roast marshmallows and hot dogs, while warming their hands and feet near the flames. They had come prepared with large stacks of wood, papers and lighter fluid. Bonfires made little islands of blaze, up and down the shoreline. 

We can’t have a fire, I said, we have nothing to make one with. 

We watched the sun slip beneath that long going-on-forever line that defines the sea. It was breathtaking and full of calm. As the day faded into black, the bodies that huddled in close circles of humanity felt ancient and primitive. 

We were moving toward the stairs to leave when I noticed a tiny spark of light, a small flicker in the distance, as if someone had ignited a book of matches and dropped them on the sand. The silhouette of a man on hands and knees came into view as I walked closer, his silver hair reflecting moonlight. He was bent over a small stack of twigs blowing into their base with great hope and intention. A young woman kneeled beside him with an open wallet, searching the compartments for useable paper. She pulled out receipts and studied them, deciding which ones she could give to the fire and which ones must be saved.

There it was. The world’s smallest campfire made of a few broken twigs and copies of the days expenses. 

I stood above them. That is the most pathetic excuse for a fire I’ve ever seen, I said.

Yes, I know, the man laughed. I watched as he continued to blow on the base and the woman searched for more cash register tallies. 

I have a tissue, I said, dropping it into the fire. It’s clean and dry. 

Kenny caught up and became entranced as well. He bent down to help by blowing on the fire, while I searched the beach for more wood. Unfortunately, everyone had scavenged it clean, except for a few scattered twigs. Soon, their tiny fire became a group effort, with everyone searching their pockets for paper and probing the shadows for wood.

Kristen and Isabella were visiting with the rest of the family. There were new mothers with babies who were feeling sand on their fingers for the first time. Theirs was a family vacation that was coming to a close in a few hours. 

I’d like to report that the fire became a raging inferno, but it never did, and in the end, it didn’t matter because we all got to help and had fun doing it.

Driving home I began thinking about how important it is to begin what we have in our hearts to do, no matter how insignificant our efforts may seem or how depleted our resources.

This will be fun!

It started when my kids were very young. There was the wagon and the hill and the blackberry bushes at the bottom. All three of us piled in the Radio Flyer ready for an exhilarating ride down the hill. My son, Clayton, in front, my daughter Kristen next, and I squished in the rear.

This is going to be fun, I said.

Kristen was worried, how are we going to miss the blackberries, Mom?

Don’t worry dear; I’ll just turn before we hit them.

We flew down the hill screaming and laughing. At the critical moment I pulled on the wagon tongue, but it wouldn’t budge.

Oh, we’re in trouble, I yelled and tipped the wagon on its side, only seconds before  lurching into gnarled thorns. Clay walked away laughing, wanting to do it again, but Kristen gave me a look of distrust that said, no way lady. No more rides with you − a look I’ve since become familiar with. 

In the spring of 1980 Kristen had her appendix removed. I thought a camping trip to Mount St. Helen’s would speed her recovery, so I made up cots in the back of my panel truck, threw our bikes inside and took off.  We stopped at the visitor’s center before settling in, where I carefully explained that the mountain was one of many sleeping volcanoes on the west coast, all of which were inactive, so she had nothing to worry about.

I have an idea, I said brightly. It’s all downhill to the campground. Why don’t you hop on your bike and enjoy the slope? I’ll follow close behind and pick you up at the bottom. That should be fun!

She rolled up her right pant leg as I untangling colored streamers on her handlebars, so they’d fly free in the wind. Ready?

She started gently with a push and glide, then balanced herself with a careful turn of the pedal. The smell of pine sat on the breeze and played in my hair, as I congratulated myself for finding the perfect vacation spot for Kristen’s recovery. But my serene mood was quickly broken by a piercing scream, and the sight of her bike careening out of control. She moved in abrupt zigzag patterns, back and forth across grass and gravel barely staying erect, going faster and faster. As she approached a curve, she risked a sharp glance over her shoulder, calling for help, panic written on every inch of her face. I sped as close as I dared.

Mom, my chain has come off. I have no brakes! What should I do?

Jump off, I yelled. Jump before you go faster.

And she did. I stopped the truck in the center of the road, bolted from the cab and pulled the still spinning wheels of the bike away from her body. I gathered her in my arms and held her as she wept.  

Oh, I’m so sorry, I said as I picked pieces of stone from her right arm and bruised knee. I’m so so sorry.  That was a bad idea. 

Three weeks later it rained ash in Portland. It was a clear Sunday in May when I walked out of the Benson Hotel after a workshop and smelled sulfur. Looking skyward I saw plumes of gray snow-like substances falling on cars and sidewalks. Mount St Helens was showering us with debris from her explosion. This continued into the next day, one small eruption following the next. Kristen gave me the look, the − I don’t think I trust my mom anymore − look. 

These stories move through her childhood finding a crescendo in Mexico. Kristen was in her twenties; freshly back from living in Greece, when I decided a mother-daughter trip was in order. We were sitting by a swimming pool in a fancy hotel in Cabo san lucas, when a man approached asking if we’d like to parasail.

Of course, I said, jumping from my beach chair. Let’s do it. This will be fun!

I moved immediately toward the boat. Kristen came along. We sat in a double harness beneath a brightly colored kite that whisked up with lightning speed 600 feet into the air.  A speedboat pulled us without effort into a vast sky, where we dangled our barefeet above a cobalt sea. The boat, only a tiny speck tethered by a strong black rope, moved beneath us in azure currents next to an endless pale shoreline. I was in heaven. The bird in me was home. At last I knew what it was like for my human body to take flight. I looked over to share my joy with Kristen and found her frozen with fear. She was white, paralyzed, her eyes open in solid circles of panic. Her voice echoed in tiny sounds of terrified half sentences.

Down. Now. Can’t do this. Let me down. Her breathing was shallow, short and full of urgency. Mom get me down NOW!

The men in the boat didn’t look up. I tried. I yelled, but they were too far away to hear. Finally one of them turned. I waved and gestured.

We need to come down, I screamed, but my voice was lost in the wind.

The driver smiled and waved, happy to see that his animated guests were having a good time. Kristen was crying now in that cry we get when we think the world will end and us with it. I kept waving. Eventually the men in the boat reeled us in like fish.

Kristen walked shaken and wind-battered to our room, and fell into a deep infant-like sleep. When she woke, we sat together on the couch.

Mom, I can’t do this with you anymore, she said, exasperated. I can’t go running off with you on all the crazy adventures you dream up. This is it. This is the last one. I’m a woman now and get to say, no!

I’m sorry, I whispered, I just thought it would be fun.

Anatomy

My kids both went to The Metropolitan Learning Center which is an alternative school in Northwest Portland. They grew up in a bohemian single-parent lifestyle with an artistic mom who was away, in rehearsal or touring with theater companies.

When teacher conferences rolled around, nobody wanted to be stuck inside, so we all agreed to meet at the naked beach on Sauvie’s Island, where we could talk, tan and enjoy the sun. 

The teachers discussed their latest field trips to Mexico, whatever art project they were working on, and how the kids were doing in school, while full scale volleyball games were  played on the shore and tugboats motored up the Columbia River.

The naked beach was relaxed and easy. Those who were fearful soon learned that their bodies were just bodies, like everyone else’s, nobody had a perfect one and nobody needed to feel ashamed. Being there was liberating.

My son was an adolescent at the time and uncomfortable on a naked beach, but felt inspired to hide on the hill with his friends to enhance his knowledge of human anatomy and upgrade his education from lifeless playboy centerfolds to the real thing. 

I walked the shore with my friend, B’Lou on my right, who was busy smoking long brown cigarettes and listening to the walkman she’d strapped around her waist. Carolyn was on my left, with a large straw hat and lots of proof that her bright red hair matched the hair on other parts of her body.

Clay and his friends were lying on their bellies in the hills, like soldiers on a spying mission, as our threesome approached.

Hey, check out those women, one of them said.

Clay smiled until he realized the woman in the middle was his mom, then jumped back like he’d been kicked by a horse.

Hey Guys, this isn’t cool anymore. Let’s get out of here. I don’t want to do this anymore. The whole thing is grossing me out.

The boys were reluctant to leave, but Clay insisted. It took him a few days to tell me what happened, and he never quite looked at me the same again.

Mother’s Day

I don’t know about you, but I find Mother’s Day a little on the loaded side. My mom lives in New York and will be 94 in June.  She can no longer hear on the phone so I send presents and write, but don’t call. My family of origin feels like a foreign country; one I have a passport to visit but would rather not.

My daughter and I have this communication thing that drives me crazy. If I say Good Morning in the wrong way, she feels criticized and launches an attack that would level a small country. We decided to do separate things that day.

My son called from California. That was nice. I know he hates talking on the phone, but he calls, bless his heart. To ease the pain of duty, he’ll multi-task, usually working on the computer as we speak, so there will be long moments when I wonder if he’s still there. But not this year, this year he was shooting crows with a new BB Gun to keep them from pooping all over his yard.

Hang on a minute, Mom. I gotta take this shot. Oh crap! Missed him!

I opened a magazine on Mother’s Day and read an article about this mother and daughter that looked so enchanted in each other’s company, you’d think they’d just gotten married. One of the things they do together is cook.  There was a recipe at the end of the article that shared a batch of carrot coconut muffins glowing in shades of golden brown. 

I made them this morning, thinking that if they turned out, I might be transported into their picture perfect kitchen - and their picture perfect relationship - and their picture perfect world. But mine did not turn out, of course! I forgot to soak the dried coconut first, so there were little hard things where yummy soft things ought to be. 

I don’t know. There is something about holidays, families, expectations and lack of perfection that turns my smile to a scowl and propels me to the garden, where I pull weeds with a little too much passion.

Perspective

Money never went far enough when I was a single mom. Food stamps were quickly spent, a welfare check covered a few basics and the child support check, on the rare occasion it arrived, covered even less. I stood in lines for heating assistance, showed up for bags of government rice and cheese, and cultivated friendships with folks who liked having my kids to dinner.

It was 1980. I was going to school, worked part-time and had two kids. In third grade my daughter, Kristen, came home from school and announced that she no longer wanted the free lunches given to children on welfare, because the other kids were making fun of her for being poor. I sat her down in the rocking chair for a talk.

‘It’s very important that you understand the difference between having no money and being poor,’ I said.

‘Being poor is a state of mind that reflects a deep internal sense of lack. Being poor is when people believe they will always be deprived of the good things in life. They expect scarcity and get it, because they don’t know any different. Being poor is when you don’t understand how to use your creative skills to make ugly things beautiful. I don’t think you have the makings of a poor person. Not having money for awhile is different. That means that our financial supply is low, but it will get better, because we are not poor on the inside. We deserve good things and eventually we’ll understand how to have them, even if we don’t know how right now.  Money has nothing to do with self-worth or who we are as people. It’s just pieces of paper.  We are presently without money, so the government, the school and other people are helping us. There is no shame in that. It’s a smart thing to say yes to what we need. Let’s try an experiment; do you want to?’

She nodded her eight-year-old head in agreement and adjusted her weight in the chair. ‘Great, close your eyes and look deep inside yourself.’

She wrapped her little hands around the wooden armrests like she was bracing for a space launch. ‘You’re doing great, now relax a little. Her hands remained firm but she tucked her chin.’

‘Okay,’ I coached; ‘now tell me what you see.’

‘I don’t see anything. Everything is dark. ‘

‘That’s normal.’ I moved closer and lowered my voice.

‘Just keep looking. Go so deep inside that you can tell whether your spirit is rich or poor. Either way is fine, but it’s important to know; keep searching until you know. ‘

Her brow furrowed in serious concentration as she navigated the uncharted territory of her inner world. Finally her face softened, a smile crept across her lips and her eyes sprang open. ‘I’m rich inside. I’m not poor at all. I saw a beautiful princess.’

‘Ah, just as I suspected. Remember when we bought our panel truck and how ugly it was, and how we fixed it up and made it beautiful?’

She nodded, sliding from the rocker to a pillow on the floor. ‘Well, that’s  what I mean, because we didn’t leave it ugly. We made it nice. We can be rich in what we do, in the way we think, and the experiences we bring into our lives.  Get it? ‘  She smiled and I knew she understood.

Oh, My Papa

Oh my papa, to me he was so wonderful

Oh my papa, to me he was so good

Gone are the days when he would hold me on his knee

And with a smile, he’d turn my tears to laughter

 

Oh My Papa, was a popular song when I was growing up. I used to sing it and wonder if people really had such a relationship with their father. 

One afternoon I brushed against a photo album while cleaning my office, and watched it tumble to the floor. I bent to pick it up. I was in a hurry, and having to retrieve it heightened my impatient haste. The album had fallen open to a picture of my father in his hospital bed. The sight of him froze my attention. He looked straight at me, as if trying to tell me something, as if there was something left unsaid. I looked closer. There he was peering back at me, this proud angry man dressed in one of those awful cotton hospital dresses, his eyes pleading, and reaching out.

His eyes always told the truth, unlike his words.

He looked like a drowning man who had realized for the first time that no one could save him, that no one could make a difference, not now or ever again. My heart went out to him. I picked up the photo album and held it in my arms, pressing it against my heart, the way I longed to reach out and cradle his soul, the way I longed to release the bottomless unspoken pain that called to me from his broken life. I wanted to bury my feelings for him with his body, but it was not that easy.

I sat there for, I don’t know how long, embracing his spirit. There was nothing in the world but the two of us, and then I closed the cover and put it away. God, how I hated him and how I loved him so.

Reunion

When I got off the plane everyone hugged. It’s a family ritual. We hug when we meet and when we part. After that, conversation is limited. ‘Did you have a good flight? You must be tired. Are you hungry? Is everything going well at home?’  Curiosity prompts limited inquiries into one another’s lives, after which we settle in like strangers waiting together in a bus station.

When we reached my mother’s house I unpacked and spent the evening in front of the television. My mother’s partner, Joe sat across the room in his recliner, my mom on the sofa and I near her feet. She stretched once, her foot touching my lap. I thought about pulling her slipper off and massaging her foot, but didn’t. Any sign of random affection was against the rules, and the rules were all the stronger for being unspoken. I would be seen as perverted or needy. I lived on the west coast after all. People did all sorts of strange things out there.

We sat together in a small over-warm room and gave our full attention to the television. An audience applauded and smiled. A game show host with too many teeth coaxed contestants to greater heights, and was interrupted at intervals by commercials of Jeep trucks careening down steep terrains, and people eating hamburgers. We watched. No one talked. I had come 3,000 miles and no one talked. We didn’t know how to reach each other. There was no vocabulary. We were inches away, but it could have been a continent. I excused myself and went to bed. 

The next evening, we had a family reunion in a near-by restaurant. We started in the lounge with numerous rounds of drinks and the standard apology to the bartender. This is my daughter, Karen, she doesn’t drink. I was an oddity. Well, how about a coke or something, he would answer. You can’t just sit there with nothing. The evening wore on as I got more and more hungry, and they got more and more social. Grabbing my mother’s arm, I said, do you think we could eat soon? I’m really starving.

Oh yes, dinner. The light of recognition returned. That’s why we’d come. Of course honey, we’ll be right there. There would be twenty minutes more for breaking off conversations with barroom regulars, rounding up drinks and finally the migration to our table.

When the waitress came to take my order the table fell silent, as I inquired about the ingredients of a dish. My oldest sister, having her tongue loosened by alcohol gave me a sharp poisonous look. Don’t be a problem, she yelled from the head of the table. Just order like everyone else. I don’t know why you had to come home anyway.

I waited a few minutes more before excusing myself to sit in the Ladies room. I didn’t want her to have the pleasure of knowing her arrow had reached its target. I breathed deep, closed my eyes and tried once again to compose myself. Her attacks came without warning. I retreated into silence and counted the minutes until my plane left.

Susan picked me up from the airport and spent the night. Her love, words and assurances were like healing suave on freshly opened wounds. I talked most of the night, while she listened and offered compassion and insight. I cried with a child’s voice, while she comforted me like the mother and sister I never knew. I started my period after dropping off to sleep. Blood stains as I woke in the morning seemed a fitting symbol for the wounding of another visit home.

The Supposed ability

Sometimes I want to throw this culture right on its ear!

I picked up the dictionary this morning to check the spelling of clairaudience and read: The SUPPOSED ability to perceive and understand sounds from a distance without actually hearing them.

I continued.

Clairvoyance: The SUPPOSED ability to perceive things that are not in sight or that can not be seen. Keen perception and insight.

I looked up mathematician, which is defined as an expert or specialist in mathematics.  Why doesn’t it say a SUPPOSED expert or specialist in the field of mathematics? What a rip!

Thirteen years ago I wrote a memoir. My therapist asked me to do it. Go ahead, she said, write it all down. It will be good for you, give you insight.

And so I did. I took a year and wrote the whole thing out. And you know what she said when she read it? This is excellent. I’d like you to write my memoir when I am ready. Your book could really help people, and would sell if you’d just take the spiritual parts out.

It has taken most of my life to share who I am with people. I have just listed a few of the reasons why.

The fricken dictionary that informs the whole English speaking culture is giving me a bad rap. This is so exhausting. I read a book about a psychic that grew up in a family that supported and encouraged her skills. What a concept.

In March of 1993, my mother’s husband Joe was dying. I was leaving to teach a morning class when I was stopped by the feeling of a spirit voice trying to talk with me. His photo on the mantel was radiating light, so I sat down, closed my eyes and began to listen. I knew he was in the hospital with cancer and taking morphine to endure. I figured he was in too much pain to stay in his body, so he’d come for a visit. Sure enough, when I closed my eyes his face loomed before me. I’m going to die before my birthday he said. I need you to prepare your mother. We visited and I agreed but felt uneasy with the task. As far as my family was concerned, I had never been employed because my healing work did not show up for them; they had no frame of reference for it. This was going to be tricky. I was also a little angry because Joe himself had often said, I don’t believe any of that stuff. It’s not real, none of it! Now he was asking for a favor. The rejection of my core essence has always hurt, but in all fairness, if I was not living with one foot in the spirit world, I would probably not believe it either.

Joe had two weeks before his birthday. I called my mom to see how she was doing , not sure how to bring the subject up. We were talking about Joe’s condition and his unrelenting pain, when she surprised me. Do you get anything about that, she asked? I wondered what she meant. You know, psychically.  I couldn’t believe my ears. As a matter of fact, I have a lot to say about it, because his spirit came to visit and asked me to prepare you for his passing. He is going to go before his birthday but needs you to release him.  You need to tell him it’s okay to move into the light and that you are ready to let him go. He needs to hear that from you. He also wants you to give something he loved and valued away, to move it out of the house. You can decide what that is.

She listened and when we rang off, I felt a sense of personal healing at being allowed a conversation that would have been otherwise impossible. Joe’s birthday was on the 8^th and he died on the 3^rd. I returned home as requested and stayed close to my mother to comfort her. As usual she did things right, with no detail overlooked. Always stately in her approach to life, the gathering reminded me more of a coronation ceremony for a queen, than a funeral. People greeted her, handed her roses and bowed their respects and regrets, friends were in abundant supply.

That’s the story of Joe, but if old Mr. Webster comes calling, I’m going to make him look up the definition of Eating Crow, (to undergo the humiliation of having to retract a statement, admit an error). I’ll require a few revisions in his reference books.

Not my job

I am not a nurse. My father thought I should be. He saw my gentle ways and compassionate heart and declared me nurse material, but he was dead wrong.

Before that, he thought I should be an airline stewardess. In 1955 airline travel was all the rage. He was a world class flight instructor and had visions of me dressed in high heeled shoes, white gloves and a smart little tailored uniform serving gourmet meals to the elite few who could afford to fly. I tried to comply, but each time we became airborne, I turned white and threw up all over his career plans. We tried this repeatedly, thinking perhaps my queasy stomach and loss of breakfast was a fluke, but nope: airplane up, vomit, airplane down. I was predictable. No waitress in the sky job for me. 

I flew back and forth to a Vermont boarding school on holidays. I climbed the steep steps of a puddle jumper, the name given to a small plane with such a short distance to travel, (500 miles) that it didn’t bother with altitude. These flights were filled with business men in dark suits and polished shoes. They moved their fine leather brief cases out of range as I filled one barf bag after the next. When I finally stepped from the plane I was ill, weak and embarrassed.

These planes still exist, if you are ever in the mood to torture yourself. Anyone going into the Elmira airport can find themselves on a plane so small that there are no overhead compartments, one seat on each side of the aisle, and a flight crew that graduated at the bottom of their class. No matter what seat you were assigned, you’ll be asked to move to the rear, so the plane will have enough weight for take off.

The stewardesses and pilots assigned to Elmira flights are a different breed and take some getting used to, lest you think you are standing in front of a renegade nun brandishing a ruler that looks like a microphone.

On my last flight from Philadelphia the stewardess made the following announcements:

“If you have to go to the bathroom, I want you to hold it. If you get up and head to the toilet while we are in line for take off, the pilot is required to go to the back of the line. That would be bad for everyone involved. You don’t want to be responsible for that happening, so hold it.

Check for personal belongings before you get off the plane. On the last flight a man named Tom Harris forgot his divorce papers, left them right there in the second row seat. Don’t tell me he’s not going to miss those!

You’ll be happy to know the pilot did a real good job on take off last time and brought it down just fine too. He’s doing real well today, so don’t worry about a thing.

Soft drinks will be served after we reach maximum altitude, if you have exact change. Don’t ask before I offer. Also, hang on to them during turbulence, because the liquid jumps right out of the cup. Stay in your seats and you’ll have a nice flight.”

 I am tending my friend Susan today, who has been my non-biological sister and closest, dearest ally for 35 years. She just had a hip replacement and needs a live-in friend. Her attitude is always top-notch, even in recovery. She is a big Swedish optimist, whose laughter fills the house and whose love for me has never faltered.

I, on the other hand, am anxious and grumpy. I am a poor queasy excuse for a nurse, being traumatized by the sight of anything medical. The pill bottles, hospital bed in the living room and changing of bandages leave me nauseated.

This morning I took her chamber pot from her bedside (totally gross) and spilled half of it on my feet as I poured it in the upstairs toilet. That was lovely, both the moment and the cleaning up after.

A nurse will visit to draw blood this afternoon, take her temperature, blood pressure and peer into her raw incision. I’ll take a long walk around the block, breathe some fresh air and think that maybe being an airline stewardess on an Elmira flight might not be so bad after all.

Clayton

My son left today and I am not going to cry.

I am not going to envision the kind of connection we could have if he lived in Portland and not in Los Angeles.

I’m not going to replay all the ways I failed him as a child.

I am not going to dwell on the hurt I know he carries deep in the fabric of his childhood heart.

I am not going to miss his smile for days after he has gone.

I am not going to wish I saw him once a week instead of once a year.

I am not going to wish I could do his childhood over so I could be a better, normal, stable, not so weird mom.

I am not going to take it personally when he’d rather fill his visit here with friends and sports than hang out with his white haired mother.

I’m not going to think about how much I love him as I wash each dish in the sink.

I’m not going to dwell on what a strong man he turned out to be, what a fine husband and father.

I’m not going to yearn for the blonde curly haired toddler I cuddled and played with for so many years, the one who got older and went to live with his dad because I was melting down.

I’m not going to think about how open and loving he is with each child he meets.

I’m not going to think about how much his humor delights me, and how I could not imagine a more perfect son.

I’m not going to miss him with every cell in my mama body.

Well, maybe I will, maybe a little.