by Susan Lobb Porter | Family, Life, Parents |
“Nature often holds up a mirror so we can see more clearly the ongoing processes
of growth, renewal, and transformation in our lives.”
Author Unknown
First apples blossoms of the season
Two years ago today we buried Mama’s ashes within a circle of moss covered rocks in the oak grove where the deer bed down.
It’s where she wanted to be.
We took Daddy down from the hutch and placed his ashes beside her. Then we covered them with earth from the forest floor and marked the spot with another great rock.
Family and friends planted Vinca around the grave. Some tears. Some laughter. A whole lot of numbness.
Then we walked up to her house, just a few yards away, and sat on the patio eating and drinking and telling stories. There was beer involved. And chocolate.
Mama would’ve liked that. Daddy would’ve too, especially the beer.
Two years later the Vinca has grown and spread. I walk by the oak grove every day on my way to and from the barn. Sometimes I stop and say hi. Sometimes the chimes that we hung ring out with the wind. Or without it.
Someone else lives in the cottage now.
And it’s all good. Because life goes on.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Life, Parents, Ponies |
I have not been here for a week. Have not written a blog post, have not thought of writing one.
But wait! Wasn’t that something I said I’d do when I redesigned the blog? Said I’d post something every day. Because, after all, I am a super-human, super-creative, super-duper-super-woman extraordinaire. Without the cape.
Capes get in the way.
Oh, whack me upside the head for being such a silly girl. For not realizing that sometimes life gets in the way of good intentions. That sometimes we need to be and do other stuff. And so I was doing. Doing doing doing DOING until my head spun a complete 360 like that kid in The Exorcist.
I was cleaning and clearing Mama’s cottage for the renter. Shlepping stuff up the hill to my place. To the dining room table for further sorting. To the kid’s rooms, the kids who no longer live here so I can use their rooms as storage for saddles and other stuff until I figure out where they need to be…those rooms.
To the thrift stores. And the dump. Buh-bye.
And all the while my head was SPINNING.
Because this week marks the second anniversary of Mama’s one-way ticket to Jesusland. The week she turned to me with such a perplexed expression on her face and asked, “Why is my body doing this to me?” And all I could say to her was “Because you’re so damn old.”
There was nothing more I could do for her except love her and tend to her with my sisters. That last morning, when she could no longer speak, I slipped some shaved chocolate between her lips. Her favorite, Green & Black 85% Dark. Her smile was pure bliss.
A few hours later she died, just a two weeks shy of her 96th birthday. She died at home. In the cottage, the cottage I’m now okay with renting.
Still, it’s been a rough week. Hard work and bittersweet memories. The cottage is clean now, the renter moved in. I still have sorting, distributing and disposing of stuff but the pressure of a deadline is past. I can breathe now. Relax a little.
This evening I went down to stand with the ponies while they had their buckets, their nightly treat of senior chow and supplements. And as they ate I stood there opening my senses to the moment. Taking it all in. The sight of the mud, of hoof print size puddles, of hay trod into the muck. The pile of hair beneath Lana, hair I pulled out by the handfuls last night in lieu of a proper brushing.
But it was the sounds of the evening that rounded things out. The sound of horses slurping. Birds high up in the trees. So many of them, different birdsong, sweet and clear. From down the lane the sound of voices. A small child. Adults speaking. Laughing. And then the music, notes from some sort of flute.
The sounds dipped and wove around each other like music. Subtly so. We’re not talking boom box here. But standing there with my all my senses…with my heart open to the moment…it was lovely.
Here’s a tiny slice of it I’d like to share. A moment in time captured with the iphone. And just so you know, that muck is mud, not pony poop. Well, mostly.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Parents |
I’m clearing out the cottage. The place where Mama spent her final seven years, the place that once was my studio. I’m getting ready to rent it out.
At this point it’s not the big stuff, it’s the things in the drawers and closets. The things on the shelves.
The things I’ve been avoiding dealing with.
Mama’s things. And mine.
Yesterday I filled my car with books. Art books I haven’t looked at in years.
Books I once thought I could never part with but now I realize I’ve grown beyond. Way beyond.
I don’t need them anymore but others will find them useful, will be as excited as I once was to open them up and learn new techniques. So I took them to the thrift store, the one that provides medical care for the animals in the local shelter.
It was a good place for my books to go.
A few days earlier I took another carload of stuff…mugs, kitchen things, linens… this and that’s that were once the everyday of Mama’s life… I took all of that to the Hospice thrift store.
Because we owe so much to Hospice.
Today I walked into the cottage, looked around and thought Holy crap, there’s still a lot of STUFF here!
The stuff I never wanted to deal with. Like shoebox (size 8) stuffed to the rim with notes and cards from when Daddy died.
I looked through them, reading each and every one and wondered if Mama did that from time to time, before her vision failed her. I read them, notes from people I haven’t seen in years and years. Notes from people I never knew.
I set one letter aside, the rest–box and all–went into the recycle bin.
Because it’s time to move on.
I loaded up my car with more things. And then I went up to the new! improved! Studio Grande. Cranked up the music. And painted.
Because I can’t think of a better way to remind myself that life goes on.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Parents |
Spent a lot of time in Studio Grande today. Painting. And cleaning the non-studio part of the cottage. The part where Mama lived. Amazing how art stuff can migrate from one room to another. Must do that at night when no one is looking.
And who the hell made all that mess anyway???
I’m not usually into cleaning. Not enough to interrupt a painting frenzy. But this week marks the first anniversary of Mama’s passing. ‘Passing’ being a euphemism for cashing in her one way ticket for Jesusland. I’m sure she’s quite happy there. What’s not to like? Lambies. Angels. Floating around with Daddy on a cloud, feeling no pain with all the heavenly libations.
But best of all, the millions and BILLIONS of souls who haven’t heard her stories yet. OMG, she’s in HEAVEN!
And this, the first anniversary of her passing over to the other side, falls on Passover. What a co-incidence! I mean, how fitting is that?
So I cleaned. Well, not really cleaned. I straightened things up, scooped the kitty poop out of the litter box. Fresh sheets on the bed. That sort of thing. Got some family coming in for the anniversary. We’ll talk about Mama. Have a nice dinner. Eat some chocolate.
I’ll tell you all about it on Monday. Or not.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life, Parents |
It’s been almost a year since I brewed a cup of tea in Mama’s house, the cottage that’s been serving as my temporary studio ever since she died. I’d bring my own tea when I came down to paint. And when I finished it I’d walk up the hill to my house and make another cup.
Even though Mama has a complete kitchen. Even though this was a place of countless cups of tea.
It didn’t cross my mind to put the kettle on down here. Until today. Today I decided to be brave.
Well, actually it was the assignment in Bloom True, Flora Bowley’s on-line painting class. Today we were to face our creative fears and paint them anyway. Embrace whatever emotions the process brings up, head on. So I decided to take the horse picture from last week, the one that was in the early stages, and see if I could finish it. Because it’s easy for me to start paintings, much harder to finish them. Especially a painting that challenges me to find it in the marks, to let it be a dance between paint and canvas.
It’s still not finished. But it’s richer. Much richer.
Here’s how it looked last week.
Here’s what I did today. Think the color is off in the photo. It’s not quite this yellow. This gives you the idea.
But this post isn’t about the painting. It’s about being brave. About letting things come up, And facing them when they do.
One of the first things I do when I come down to the studio is put on some music. Music and painting go together. Dancing too. I’m a multi-tasker. Today I chose Glen Miller. Big band stuff. Mama’s music. Just appealed to me for some reason. Then I put the kettle on. Her kettle. Her stove.
I brewed a cup and sipped on it as I painted. Got carried away with the painting and the music. Eventually the tea grew cold. I put the kettle back on to hot up the tea and as I was filling the cup with the boiling water it hit me…the last cup of tea I had with my mom. Or the last one we talked about having.
It was a day, maybe two, before she died. The days were all running into each other by that point and it’s hard to distinguish one from another. One sister was up at my house taking a much needed break, the other was enroute from Norway. All I know is I was alone with my mother and she was dying.
She struggled to get comfortable in the hospital bed we’d set up in her living room. As I helped her adjust her position she asked me why was her body doing this? She looked so perplexed it nearly broke my heart.
Why was her body doing this? Why was it finally giving out after nearly 96 years…
Because you’re so damn old, Mama. I said it lovingly. Jokingly.
But she needed more than that. I needed more than that. Because we had danced around the inevitable for years but never openly discussed it. She’d moved into the cottage seven years earlier so I could take care of her during her final days. It was the elephant in the room. And he was getting bigger every day.
She didn’t need me to give her the church position. She’d had plenty of visits from her priest, the deacon from her church, the spiritual advisor from Hospice. She knew all about the heaven and Jesus thing. But she wanted to know what I thought.
So I told her about an experience I had once when I thought I was dying. When I realized I couldn’t control what was happening to my body but I still had a choice how I could react. When I realized I could embrace the unknown with fear. Or with love. And I chose love.
“Oh, I like that”, she said with a beautiful smile. “Choose love.” And then she told me to put the kettle on. “Make us some tea. And we’ll drink it with love.”
So I did. But by the time it was ready she’d drifted off to sleep. So I sat there on the sofa within arm’s reach of her bed and drank the tea for the two of us. With love.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Family, Life, Parents |
January 31. This marks my parents’ wedding anniversary. Seventy years ago today they tied the knot. Mama was a Girl Scout, Daddy a Marine…they knew their knots. This one may have gotten a little frayed around the edges but still it lasted 58 years. Fifty-eight years…until the day my father died. At home in his own bed with his wife by his side.
Edie and Dick. Yin and Yang. They were a pair. And they were tied tight. Right over left and through, left over right and through. A good old fashioned square knot.
I came along late in the game but I heard the story of their wedding over and over. Mama loved to tell stories, especially if she was involved in them. And I loved all things about weddings. A pretty dress, flowers and cake that’s ten times better than any birthday cake. All that and a handsome man who will love you for EVER.
And don’t forget the PRESENTS!!!
So here’s the story AS I KNEW IT. It was a small do. An intimate gathering of family and close friends. The early afternoon reception was a simple one. Cake and coffee. Maybe some champagne. Because I can’t imagine a wedding without champagne. It was at her sister’s house. The same sister whose dress she wore. The honeymoon was a night in Manhattan. Fancy dinner. Fancy hotel. Fancy that.
Oh, and it rained.
And that’s what I was going to write. They fell in love, got married and did the ’till death do us part’ thing 58 years later. Because that was the STORY. Until I went through the folder labeled Richard. Daddy’s papers. I was looking for the menu from the restaurant. I saw it years ago and thought I’d amuse you with photographic proof of what two bucks could buy you in 1942. If memory serves me right–and these days it doesn’t aways–a full course lobster dinner plus drink.
I didn’t find the menu. But I found some interesting things. And, as I went through them, all sorts of questions began popping up.
It began with the envelope addressed to my father. It was plain white. Unadorned with anything save the simple return address. The White House. The letter inside was on matching stationery. It contained a hastily scrawled note from my father’s brother. Dated January 29. Two days before the wedding. He didn’t know if he could make it. No one was getting any time off.
There was a war going on. The whole damn world was shooting this way and that. And my uncle had a first row seat for the duration. Secret Service. OSS. Army Counter Intelligence.
He never made the wedding. Daddy’s friend stood in as his best man instead. One of the honorary uncles of my childhood. But I never put two and two together, never realized that’s why he was the best man and not my uncle. Not until I read the letter.
And then I realized there were a lot of things I didn’t know. A lot of questions I wanted to ask.
But there’s no one left to answer them.
I’ve always looked at the wedding portrait and seen my parents. Mom-and-Daddy-yin-and-yang-in-their-fancy-best. Young but old, because they came before me.
My uncle’s note sent the story I knew spinning off in another direction.
It was raining that day. Hard. Cold and blustery. Pearl Harbor was a little more than a month in the past. We declared war on Japan. Hitler declared war on us. Shock. Fear. Anger. Rage. Bravado. But happy days? I don’t think so.
I look at that photo now and see a couple of kids, 26 and 28. Just a little older than mine are today. Kids who were striving for normal when the world was going bat shit crazy around them. Kids who pledged their forevers together when there was no guarantee of tomorrow.
I think about the simple reception. Hear the undercurrents of small talk that never made it to the story. People smiling and raising a toast to the happy couple while in the back of their minds wondering….All the men in that room old enough to serve, did. Four uncles. And my Dad. The Army. The Marines. Europe. North Africa. The Pacific.
From the concentration camps to the streets of Nagasaki after the bomb.
They all served. They all came home. And they never, EVER, talked about it.
Mama was the story keeper in our house. She touched on a little of everything and told them over and over again. But like the story of her wedding, they were the bare bones, not the meat. And when I took care of her in her later years I heard them so often I stopped listening.
And I’m sorry I did. I regret they became so familiar I tuned them out. I wish I’d dug deeper.
Because she wanted to tell her story. But she didn’t know how.
And I didn’t know enough to ask the right questions.
