Ann Shields on Letting Go

Holiday After thoughts

Christmas is over, wrapping paper scrunched into balls, tossed around the room to amuse our cats. A low key holiday this year, fitting for a pair of great grandparents who once held center stage with red stockings hung in a row over the fireplace. Those were chaotic,joyful days surrounded by family and friends Forty years sped swiftly by with losses and gains and blessings galore. This Christmas morning at granddaughter Suzi and Ryan's home held a new wonderland of surprises with great grandsons, Lucas and Nathan who went from present to present while pet dog Ruffi stretched out in the middle of it all. The musical laughter of happy children. Their Daddy flying a motorized helicopter around the room. The rest of us, David, Barara and Andy uwrapping gifts. Des, not feeling well enough to join us. Life's cycle of change, as expected. Gratitude for what remains. These thoughts overrule. The glass still half full. I celebrate what is, ignore what should be, That's a judgment call, and the jury is still out. At the candle light Christmas Eve service at my church, I felt the presence of loved ones, gone. My mother and father, the givers of my life and the assurance that I was loved. Gone this year, Jeannette and Jan, two friends who taught me how to live in the midst of dying. Jeannette sending out handwritten notes of encouragements every day to others, her left side paralyzed, writing had to be a struggle, yet never failing to draw a smiley face at the end of her notes. Thanking peope for kindnesses to her, never complaining, slyly tossing out corny one liners. Jan struggling with her oxygen tank as we went to lunch to split potatoe skins and soup. Adapted to life in a senior living complex, she wrote pithy observations of her surroundings. Funny and poignant, these essays became a book, Active SeniorLiving and no reader would suspect cancer was taking it's final toll on her. On to the coming year, my best Christmas presents were a Smart Phone and a hearing aid. My greatest strength comes from the awesome people who love me. How cool is that? So Says Sassy

October Birthday - The Big One

On a Sunday night in Chicago, 80 years ago, I interrupted a poker game as I kicked started my impending birth.  My father happened to have  a winning hand. Not now, he probably said to my mother who was not amused.  Or so the story goes. They managed to get to the John B. Murphy Hospital where I was  born.  It was the depression....1931.  My father had lost his job.  They never got around to paying the bill, and before they managed to scrape up the money, the hospital burned down.  An auspicious beginning.

Thus began the roller coaster ride of my life up to this month where I am able to wrap my head around the awesome fact that I am 80.  Yikes!  How did I get this far?  One breath at a time, so to speak

So far, I am having a good time becoming 80, thanks to my family who have made it fun.  I got treated to dinner at the Ranch House in Ojai, a surprise from son David and Barbara, joined there by Suzanne, Ryan and Andy.  In the garden setting with twinkling lights around tall bamboo stalks, it was another world .  Serene, warm and comfortable with winding paths over a small wooden bridge over a pond of gold fish.  Herbal gardens, abound.  Truly a magical place.

Another celebration a few days later, when daughter Judith and Joe arrived from Portola Valley to spend overnight with us in order to coordinate with best pal, Donna,  a special event during the coffee hour of our church with cake, platters of fruit, cheese and crackers, lunch meat and other goodies.  The cake was a work of art.  Donna borrowed a photo of me taken in 1950 when I was a bridesmaid at a friend's wedding back in Chicago.  Albertsons baked the birthday cake with my picture in the center, edible later because it was made with rice paper - thepicture that is.  Good thing I got a picture of the picture since in the rush to clean up, we all forgot to take the leftover cake.   Trying to trace what happened to it was like detective Columbo trying to detect the perpetrator who got away with the goods .  Finally, several phone calls and emails  later, the plot unthickened and the unwitting perpetrator was abjectly remorseful.  I promised to keep his secret.  but I can't help wondering who ending up cannibalizing me.  It was such a good picture.  In fact, one nameless church member said to me, 'gosh, you were good looking then.'   Yes,I hit him. 

On Tuesday, October 11th, the actual day of infamy, David and Barbara scooped me up for breakfast at Cafe Neuvo where Suzanne joined us, fittingly, since it was her birthday as well.  How cool is that to have a granddaughter decide to be born on your birthday?  Another granddaughter missed it by a couple of weeks, Elle being born on Halloween.  Not to mention son David, born on October 6th.  Libras do shine in these parts.

Okay, no more celebrations, although Donna took me out to lunch and other friends are lining up.  Being eighty is turning out to be pretty neat.  An easy feat to pull off, too.  Just  one breath at a time,

Another time, I will wax philosophical on life, but not until I get past a small study group ruminating over Job, Proberbs and Ecclesiastes.  The study revolves about wisdom, but so far I decided that Job was a whiner, Proverbs preachy and as for Eccclesiastes, Solomon seems to talk a lot about chasing the wind.  Obviously, they  didn't have access to Prozac back then.

So says Sassy

Mixed Blessings

This is a day to celebrate with thankful hearts what we know to be true.  That we are blessed beyond measure.  No point in listing how and why.  Besides, some blessings are accidents of birth, not choice.  I love my country, but my immigrant grandparents chose it first all the way from Italy. 

I didn't choose my parents, but they were good people who loved me beyond measure, their only child.   They had flaws, but not fatal ones.  I was treated with love, respect and sometimes indulgence.  Less than perfect, they were products of their own era and culture.  So it isn't fair to indulge in the blame game.

Most blessings are mixed anway.  Never more so as we age.  Eyesight may dim along with hearing.  Big deal.  My husband can't see my wrinkles and thinks I'm beautiful, or so he tells me.  His hearing is terrible and some our conversations could be a comedy act in vaudeville...kind of like the old George and Gracie patter.

Genetics are another mixed blessing.  I have inherited my mother's round face, white hair and snap judgements. I inherited my father's lousy arteries and and dark brown eyes. They were both smart, uneducated and charming.  He was moody and she was funny.  He was an addicted gambler and she was a fastidious housec cleaner.  I am neither, thank God.

Marriage is a mixed blessing.  My first one was not great, but produced two great kids.  They, in turn, produced 5 wonderful grandkids and one of them handed down two great, great grandsons.  I did nothing to deserved this other than to love then all in my own,  imperfect way.

My second marriage, to a man I deem to be the love of my life, has brought us, 38 years later, to the crossroads where health matters more than money.  We have been blessed, through hard work, with enough to meet our needs.  But health keeps interfering with simple pleasures.  We can afford to travel but harder to do.  Another irony of mixed blessings.

Tonight we returned from Thanksgiving Dinner at David and Barbara's, son and daughter-in-law.   We enjoyed Grandson Andy, 28, Granddaughter Suzanne and husband Ryan both 30, and their two sons...our great grandsons, Lucas 22 months and Nathan 8 weeks.   Lucas was the life of the party, giving Des high fives and Nathan swaddled in a blanket like a cute barrito.

   A traditional thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings and completely gluten free.  Another mixed blessing of genetics, it turns out David, Barbara, Suzanne, Andy and me are intolerant -- we have Celiac, an autoimmune condition.  Looks like Lucas may have it too.  Yet, as we held hands in a circle before we ate, and David asked the blessing, the love of family overwhelmed me. 

My last but not least thought on blessings.   The gift of God's love, up close and personal, is the greatest blessing of all.  Nothing mixed about that.

 

Gratitude

I am a week into my gratitude journal and find a pattern emerging.  Seems friendships and workouts are dominating.  The deal is that I write down 5 things I am grateful for at the end of the day.  It should be easy, but lately I am stuck in neutral with my writing.  I noticed, reading my granddaughter's blog, that she was musing on whether it was possible to have bloggers block.  Must be going around.

Recently, driving from a doctor's appointment in Sassafrass (my red Toyota Corrolla--where the cats sleep at night in the garage on it's roof,)  but that isn't the point here.   Anyway, I was  listening to my CD playing a melancholy Sax that tugged at my heartstrings for no apparent reasons.   Grateful that the doctor's visit was nothing to get too excited about,   I passed a rag tag procession of people with obvious challenges.  Life was not fair to them, I thought, finding tears welling up. 

Hey, lighten up, I told myself.  Still, I felt sad as I watched one guy in a wheelchair, head rolling backward, pushed by a scrawny woman followed by four others intent on their journey.  I guessed they were coming from some day care center, heading for McDonalds a block away.  I thought about my gratitude journal and all I had to be thankful for.    But, maybe they did too.  It is all relative.

I changed the CD to KCET talk radio to kick start my brain into reality.  That's better.  The sun shone brightly, and life was good.  A family of unidentified flying objects, better known as birds I couldn't name, swooped in front of me and soared up to sit along telephone wires, all in a row,  like school kids waiting for the teacher to show up.   Another thing to be grateful for.  Birds.  But not garden lizards, especially when brought into the house by our hunter cat.

Meanwhile, I drove along with my thoughts now that sadness fled and I was mentally writing a grocery list when there sat another sad sight.  At the stoplight where I was turning to go to Trader Joe's, a tattered old man sat in a wheelchair next to a shopping cart full of his possessions heaped within plastic bags.  A teddy bear pearched at the top of his wheel chair and his head was slumped down to his chest.  A cardboard sign sat on his lap but it was not legible from my position. 

Who said that the world is too much with us must have been overcome by the visual sorrows of every day life in a semi prosperous city, with island views and a cross on a hill side overlooking the fair city.  It is a dichotomy, perplexing, mind bogging.  Could be fodder for a blog?

But my blogger is stil blocked and I have too many questions and too few answers for the perplexing unfairness of life.

Wait.  I have one more thing to be grateful for.  My sweet husband, Des, has built wonderful sleep area in the garage next to the wall with soft cushions and blankets in and around it.  So Sassafrass is free to come and go in the garage without having to be undressed from the cats' bedding on it's roof whenever I need to take it for a spin.   Obviously, Des is at the top of my gratitude page.

So says Sassy