A Reprise

Today news came that a good friend's son has been diagnosed with cancer. Our hearts and strongest prayers go out to him.


He and his family are in a state of rapid change - a vibrant young man launched on a journey that no one should have to endure, and his loved ones already learning to pull from inner resources of focus, courage and hope whose magnitude of spirit have yet to fully reveal.


I'm offering up this "re-post" of a piece I wrote several months ago as an educational reminder to those in our community of healthy ways to support and talk to cancer patients and their families. What Not To Say To Someone With Cancer


Please let Love, Compassion and Hope be your guides.
All will be well ~ mlp


"to love life, to love it even
when you have no stomach for it
and everything you've held dear
crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,
your throat filled with the silt of it.
When grief sits with you, its tropical heat
thickening the air, heavy as water
more fit for gills than lungs;
when grief weights you like your own flesh
only more of it, an obesity of grief,
you think, How can a body withstand this?
Then you hold life like a face
between your palms, a plain face,
no charming smile, no violet eyes,
and you say, yes, I will take you
I will love you, again."
— Ellen Bass

Feeling First

The only time I have ever heard someone say “I don’t make you feel that, you choose to feel that way” has been when the speaker was defending themselves, or trying to let him or herself off the hook for words or behaviors that created an outcome that was uncomfortable for them. In other words, they used it as an excuse and a foil rather than accepting responsibility for their part in a situation that evoked emotion.

Human beings, especially those who are in touch with their feelings in a mature and healthy way, tend to respond to outside forces and situations with their emotions first, and their minds and intellectual reasoning step in soon thereafter. Those who, for a myriad of reasons, are very private or guarded in their reactions, can often adeptly go from step A (feelings) to step B (thoughts) in seconds. Note the distinction: “mature and healthy.” I don’t consider someone who flies into a rage or into hysterics at the drop of a pin to fit this description.

When my son was initially diagnosed with cancer, I supposed I could’ve “chosen to feel” something other than shock and grief, but in my human condition, I went directly to the place that any mother who loves her child would go. It was through time, necessity and giving myself opportunity to process some fairly raw emotions in safe and supported ways - that I stepped into the second phase of both the emotional and cognitive journey.  His process has been different, of course - influenced by age, life experience and his uncanny ability to stay in the now. I think that life threatening illness or loss are extreme examples here, because when we grieve it takes longer to go from initial reactions to consciously “choosing how to feel.”

On a day to day level; however, there are many instances. When your playful cat does something silly and you laugh at his antics, you don’t stop - make a carefully thought out choice - and then “feel joy.” You simply feel joy. Now. It’s a beautiful and spontaneous synergy. When you are listening to exquisite music and the sound and vibration of inspiration, tone, rhythm and harmonies evoke deep sadness and tears, you don’t pause - considered your emotional options - and then select “weep.” You just surrender. Now.

I could offer example upon example of situations and experiences where perfectly intelligent and sensible people DO NOT stop to hold a consult in their mind, rather they allow themselves to fully FEEL FIRST. And thank god that we can do such a thing. Thank god that we can trust the deep knowing of our hearts on occasion as it is with our hearts that we can often see and understand most clearly.

So here’s the deal: What we have DO HAVE A CHOICE IN -- is determining how - after we’ve felt the laughter, cried the tears, burned through the fury or known the heart ache  - how and who we will BE NEXT.

If you’ve been one of those folks who likes to say “Oh, you’re choosing to feel that way.” I would strongly urge you to stop saying this. Stop sidestepping the reality of the human spirit, for to feel is to know that you are alive! Stop placating your own fears by shutting out emotions, and stop disrespecting the heartfelt (not “mind” felt) spontaneous joys and sorrows experienced by others.

No matter how messy or weird or too real it may appear to the nay sayers, those who know the emotional landscape of their inner selves also know that if they allow their feelings to surface, they can then begin choosing what comes next in a nourishing way. For me these are the choices that matter so very much and may actually make me a better person. This writer’s now-open heart, despite my mind’s desperate attempts to make it choose occasionally less messy responses, has the first and last say.

Standing Fast

“I do not wish to treat friendships daintily, but with the roughest courage. When they are real, they are not glass threads or frost-work, but the solidest thing we know.”

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson 

It’s been one hell of a year.

Every single day when I awaken, I try to concentrate on the unexpected joys that surround radical change and practice counting the blessings that are so abundant in my life; however let’s face it, I’m a flawed human being. There are days I get mired in some of the sadness that change has imposed.

This morning in particular, I’m thinking about the unwritten guidebooks for surviving things like, being laid off from one’s job and long term unemployment, or having a marriage come to an end, or having a family member diagnosed with cancer. Specifically,  I’m wondering why there aren’t operating instructions for dealing with the loss of friends one once had, yet who drop away when life’s terrain gets bumpy and the view from the windows is less than scenic. Fair-weather friends, my mother used to call them: those who are most likely to appear when they are in need or, at best, when you are not in need. Because, let’s face it, friendship is sweeter when life is fun, right? A lot more work is required to remain present to someone who’s world has been turned on its axis.

Mind you, I’m not questioning WHY it happens. It happens for a myriad of reasons, such as:

1. People don’t know what to say or do. Keeping a safe distance allows them to watch without touching and very little extra effort is required.
2. Hard situations sometimes remind folks of their own problems - past or present - and they often don’t have the stamina for more.
3. Sometimes it’s about inability to pay attention to a story that isn’t a Hollywood action flick but a slowly unfolding real life documentary. People bore easily.
4. Folks get scared. They don’t want to admit it, but they’re afraid that if they get too close they might “catch” the problem. Like witnessing a friend’s divorce might cause one in their household, or knowing the reality and pain of cancer might cause a cell mutation in their family. Their fear takes on more meaning than their friendship.
5. They just can’t be bothered. They don’t want to take the time. They’re over it - even if their friend isn’t.

Initially, I was hurt and angry knowing that friendships were evaporating for reasons that, in my judgment (with the exception of #2) were pretty messed up and selfish. But in classic Kübler-Ross movement through the stages of grief, I’ve come to realize that what I mainly feel now is a deep sense of sadness and believe it or not, a bit of gratitude.

Relationships may be sweeter when they’re only fun, but they’re not nourishing.

As this big year of changes continues to catalyze and the guidebooks write themselves along the way, I grieve the loss of those I thought I knew, and celebrate the unwavering true.

In the long haul, I’m grateful to know and love a few well-rooted old friends as well as some amazing new ones. I am honored by these full-hearted individuals who have courageously reached out across the rough scenery and despite my grief to stand fast. Ambose Redmoon said, “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.” 

Choosing love is that “something else.”

“When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives means the most us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving much advice, solutions, or cures,  have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing  and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.”  ~ Henri Nouwen

A Lifetime Love Affair (Part III)

 
(In the form of a letter to my middle child, this is the final portion of a three part blog started on April 28, 2010 about expression of self and that which feeds our souls. The links will take you to some of my favorite pieces of poetry written by the highlighted poet. May you be "found" by something extraordinary in this offering. ~ mlp)

So, for years I’ve been telling you that one of the truly unique aspects of you playing the violin well -- will be that your violin will always be a friend to you. You can play it in joy; you can play it in sorrow. Through your fingers and abilities, your instrument may be an extension of your heart; it could be your only solace at times when lonely - and it might express love at times when words fail you. That’s been poetry for me, Sarah, both in the reading and the writing of it.
 
There’s been Rumi, Kabir and Whyte for honest prayer; Piercy, Hirschfield and Stafford for grounded awakening; Collins, Rilke, Merwin and Whitman for learning and reflection; Neruda and Kinnell for toe-curling passion, and my beloved Oliver for purpose, joy and deep humility.
 
There have been moments in my life when words failed me - whether in celebration, despair or even complete and utter boredom with living itself -  and I felt momentarily lost...until the arrival of a poem: my life’s version of a well-played violin.
 
Last fall when your brother was diagnosed with cancer, poetry from unexpected places and unknown poets arrived for me like small life rings from the universe. It was as if, in the absence of an answer to my pleading “why?” - God tossed out vessels of comfort -- in a form that would reach my heart -- to say, “There is no answer that will suffice, but let these words of reflection remind you that all will be well.”
 
"September Meditation" by Burton D. Carley
I do not know if the seasons remember their history or if the days and
nights by which we count time remember their own passing.
I do not know if the oak tree remembers its planting or if the pine
remembers its slow climb toward sun and stars.
I do not know if the squirrel remembers last fall's gathering or if the
bluejay remembers the meaning of snow.
I do not know if the air remembers September
 or if the night remembers the moon.
I do not know if the earth remembers the flowers from last spring or if
the evergreen remembers that it shall stay so.
Perhaps that is the reason for our births -- to be the memory for creation.
Perhaps salvation is something very different than anyone ever expected.
Perhaps this will be the only question we will have to answer:
"What can you tell me about September?"

Praying

It doesn't have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don't try
to make them elaborate, this isn't
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.

~ Mary Oliver ~

So, Sarah Grace, this whole rambling post started as the result of an argument we had about...a poem. It was or rather, is, a poem written by the other of my all time favorites, e e cummings. I thought I knew which cummings piece was my most beloved. I was certain for over twenty years, that “i carry your heart” was THE one. But then a few months ago quite by accident, I found the very poem that I offered you to take to your English class on Wednesday morning. 

You didn't want to.

Thank you for reminding me how much I love this art form and why; thanks too for giving me a chance to recall my dearest friends and their wisdom, and for inspiring me to tell you a story that might come in handy some day. Lastly, my love, thank you for reminding me that it is the poem that finds us, and only when the time is right...

~ I love you, Mom

"let it go"


let it go - the
smashed word broken
open vow or
the oath cracked length
wise - let it go it
was sworn to
go

let them go - the
truthful liars and
the false fair friends
and the boths and
neithers - you must let them go they
were born
to go

let all go - the
big small middling
tall bigger really
the biggest and all
things - let all go
dear

so comes love

~ e. e. cummings ~

The Thrilling Anxiety Of It All

Okay, I admit it. I’m thrilled and anxious at at once.

First, I’m thrilled by the realization and discovery that - given just an hour or two of solitude a day (along with the willing suspension of perfectionism) - I have a well of creativity to pull small buckets from on a regular basis and make this blog a reality. On the other hand, I’m anxious over the fact that this discovery is now asking me to rearrange the already precious-few hours in the day. (As in: I write, no matter what. I write, even if it means tacking more time onto the day’s end.) Yikes! My muse is a demanding character. Thank goodness!

Second, I’m thrilled that my blogsite welcomed 487 unique visits in the shortest month of the year, and that the studio has fans that I’ve known for years as well as some whom I know not at all. What an amazing combination of compliments! Meanwhile, I’m anxious because everything I read about successful blogging suggests that I’m really going about this in as bassackwards kind of a way possible. (And I’m humored by the fact that this is not at all uncommon for me.)

Third, I’m thrilled that, without a nudge from me but perhaps a giant one from the universe - the studio is picking up business. (Insert photo of me smiling here.) Out of the blue, I’ve been given the opportunity to take some portrait photos and design some promotional materials for folks who I have not only been happy to say “yes” to, but I am honored to support. Nevertheless, I’m anxious that I still have a secret longing for a big sugar daddy or some generous and devoted “sponsor” to swoop in and fund my wild untamed artistic life, as well as send me to Greece for an all-expenses paid writer’s retreat where (I promise), I will continue to post daily poems, beautiful photos and essays that are deeply thought-provoking and inspiring.

Fourth, I’m thrilled that February’s most popular posts yielded: The Boot Collage, Boot Size: Men’s 12, The Soul of My Boots (I guess y’all really liked Boot Week), The Sanctuary of God, and Visual Inspiration. And, the truth is, I’m actually not too anxious that posts: To Do or Not To Do, Tales That Defy Words and Putting It To the Page were the least popular. It’s true, they  touched on more “serious” topics and have fewer illustrations, but I felt great about them so, it’s not that big of a deal.

Fifth and last, I’m thrilled that spring has sprung here in Southern Oregon. I like the light, I like the daphne that is threatening to explode in a aromatic plume at the end of the front porch, I like seeing my youngest’s bare feet with dirt on them, and I like that my high schooler knows exactly how many days until spring vacation. But it's also a fact, I’m feeling anxious as our household heads into a month of new information about my son’s health and the next series of steps in his journey.

So dear friends - whom I know in real time, and who know me in cyber time - here's wishing you all a thrilled, low anxiety, fantastic, madly wildly blossoming, sweet smelling, hopeful, creative, abundant, time-on-pause, kiss the ones you love March. Thanks for visiting this Untamed Life On Purpose. Please make comments. Please share a link or two with your friends. Please breathe deeply. ~ m.l.p.

The Hippocratic Oath of Parenting

Okay. So the truth is, I am a horribly flawed parent. I get exasperated by my youngest’s unwillingness to wear anything other than brown or....darker brown, and down right angry at her nightly resistance to going to bed. I frequently guilt-trip my middle kid about the cost of violin lessons vs the amount of practice time I judge to be lacking, and I’ve been known to tell my eldest that he’s acting like an ass when his choices don’t meet my approval.

Every day - in many ways - I fall down on the ice rink of parenting. I slip into officious bossiness when the conditions of the ice aren’t up to snuff. I flounder ungracefully on the blade’s edge between attempting to control and offering to guide, and am sometimes more absorbed in my own needs than those of the skaters I brought here to coach.

Someone asked me after my son’s cancer diagnosis whether I now found myself wishing I had made any different parenting choices or - to put it plainly - whether or not I was wrestling with any regrets in my relationship with my boy?

While considering one’s regrets can be a daily activity (or obsession), this has not been a pastime of mine in the parenting realm despite my plethora of flaws. Oh sure, there have been moments I’d like to have done things differently (done a bit more deep breathing, counted to a hundred - fourteen more times, put myself in “time out”), but for the most part, I’ve stayed out of contrition’s ruts on my metaphorical rink. And as I’m sure even those of you who have never known cancer personally can guess, I am now a hundred times more committed to living life fully and with as few regrets as possible -- especially where my kids are concerned.

In our humanness and varying degrees of personal evolution, and for those of us who are parents - where so much is trial and error -  a certain amount of “small stuff” remorse is inevitable. But here’s the crucial piece: Regrets are not the result of a “shit happens” experience like leukemia. Regrets are the progeny of choices poorly made that cannot be undone.

Wait. What? True this: Many regrets are in fact, the result of choices.

Examples of serious, real life and harmful parenting choices include: deliberately and knowingly using one’s child as a pawn in a failing marriage; teaching your children to be fearful or intolerant of those who are different than or don’t agree with you; fostering judgment and meanness by example; teaching children to act like and become victims rather than embrace and practice honesty; modeling running away rather than accepting responsibility; teaching your child to throw away relationships like broken cars rather than invest in the healing process. The list goes on.

So how as parents, can we make decisions that will reduce potential long range damage to our kids caused by regret? We can try to keep one particular phrase of Hippocrates’s famous oath in our hearts and minds at all times - even and perhaps most especially when - we, the parents, may be the very perpetrators of the injury. The phrase is:“I will keep them from harm and injustice.”

As a parent who has learned the hard way what it feels like when the power to keep your child safe from harm has been taken out of your hands, trust me on this one. If you have the opportunity, intelligence, compassion, good sense, love and CHOICE to keep your child as safe, whole and happy as you possibly can, do it. Don’t be selfish; don't wait. Do it. Now. There's no excuse not to, and you won’t regret it.

Tales That Defy Words

For years I have entertained the notion that our bodies tell stories. Whether through muscle memory, external markings, physiological changes, or real or imagined impulses on the surface of our skin, I believe that the whole of our physical selves are living art-forms.

William Emerson, Ph.D., one of the founders, teachers and practitioners of Pre and Perinatal Psychology might actually claim that our bodies begin to hold stories right from the moment of conception. Given that birth is considered one of the single most traumatic experiences we as humans endure, it’s at least a reasonable thing to consider that our bodies begin composing their stories from our entrance nine months later.

Then as time and life progress, more dimensions unfold in our human sculptures known as “me.” The battle scars of childhood - earned for good or naught - tree climbing wounds, broken bones, harms inflicted, as well as the feel of a familiar and safe embrace, the sensation of laughter in the belly, a hand held -  all chisel our surface.

While teaching children’s art, I’ve discovered that kids are particularly good at expressing and creating whole self portraits. In one project, each body part is represented by either an experience that has actually occurred - or that the young artist imagines will transpire some day. 

Legs become paintings of places they have been or hope to visit; arms turn into images of skills already practiced or desiring to learn; the heart depicts what is loved; the belly shows symbols of strength and power, and the head becomes a mural of what the future may hold. It’s a favorite lesson to teach because the artistic elements of real self and portrayed self merge together so naturally and become tangible art.

But what of the deeper, multi-chaptered stories in our bodies? What of the years of arthritis in my mother that has gradually changed the very structure of her gentle capable hands - robbing her of knitting and gardening and holding things securely - and leaving her to contend with true pain and lessons of patience and surrender? What of the knowing in an Olympian athlete’s muscles, after years of training and sculpting, that overrides the mind and challenges him forward to push the edge of physical potential? What of the impression that cancer has made in my son - the mutated cells that spiraled through his strong vibrant bone marrow and then the medicine, the poison, that was administered to slaughter those cells? What of the feel of the strings against a violinist’s fingertips, the first taste each summer of sweet melon, the feel of rising tears, or your beloved’s touch?

All these things - and so much more - make each of us beautiful, extraordinary, tragic, unique and priceless living art-forms. We are novels of tales that defy words and sculpting made of the truest stuff of life. I’ll leave you with these opening lyrics from Brandi Carlile’s haunting song, The Story, and ask - What story lies within your body?

All of these lines across my face

Tell you the story of who I am

So many stories of where I’ve been

And how I got to where I am

But these stories don’t mean anything

When you’ve got no one to tell them to

It’s true, I was made for you.

A Second Taste

Happy February! Three weeks ago, I made the decision to start writing and posting a blog every week day for at least a year (and yes, I reserve the right to renegotiate this "contract" with myself." Let me just say, so far - this is both a very large commitment (that I may have been being far too romantic about) and an artistic surprise - in regard to what has shown up.

Understanding the magnitude of this blogging commitment is obvious: Writing daily is tough, but making it worth sharing with others is damned hard. Poet, William Stafford, when explaining how he managed to be so prolific, said: “Every day I get up and look out the window, and something occurs to me. Something always occurs to me. And if it doesn’t, I just lower my standards.” Clearly, I have a long way to go to even meet the lowest of Stafford’s standards, but with nothing to lose except my sense of humor and a creative heart that is aching to cut loose, I’m game to give it a go.

The surprise part is that -- what started out as a container for exploring some unusual changes and challenges in my life (a child with a cancer diagnosis, single parenting three kids, revamping a career into something that has yet to fully materialize) has become resistant to definition. For the time being, the art of sharing daily aka blogging is a practice in surrendering to the creative process. This is about accepting as well as trusting that, whether I’m posting a poem or a reflective essay on family or an image captured through my lens, I’m on the right track and all will be well.

In the past month, this blog page has published on several topics. Insights on the “new normal”  life we’re living at our house since my son was diagnosed with leukemia are shared in Too Revealing, At The Sound Of The Tone, “Please Drain Tub”, New Math, What NOT To Say To Someone With Cancer, and The Salt Shaker.

There are some more artistic posts including poetry, fiction and visuals, such as Everything Essential, Old Wounds, Peppers in the Wine Aisle, Exploring The World, Photo Share, and Words & Art.

And finally, I also write a bit about the actual blogging process and my local life in The Making of A Groove, Care To Comment? and "Oh My God...How Risky." 

I can’t make any promises about what this month’s posts will contain, but I can tell you that the more that I write - the more that shows up in my head looking for a way out.  

You can participate in this Untamed Life On Purpose, by leaving comments at the bottom of any post. Your insights and ideas are important - not just to me, but to others who may be following along. You can also subscribe to this blog via the widgets along the left side panel of the page, share on Facebook,Tweeter or email posts to friends. And please be sure to link back to your own site if you have one, because I want to support you, too!

"We write to taste life twice." ~ Anais Nin

The Salt Shaker

Over the last twenty years I’ve managed to create a public persona that quite frankly, has earned me a salty reputation. My children, family and close friends have lived through varying degrees of amusement, embarrassment, and even distress over my fluctuating amounts of outspokenness, opinion, radical honesty, and just plain - talking too much. (And I thank them for their tolerance; I truly do.)

I use the adjective “salty, “ because - it’s not necessarily distasteful, this particular way that I am in the world. At times, people like the intensity and passion of my style. Some profess even to enjoy, admire and aspire to it because it can add flavor and spice to occasions that might otherwise be bland and thoroughly forgettable. On the other hand, too much (of anything) can create imbalance or make things rather unappetizing. And socially, let’s face it, everyone doesn’t always want salt. Sometimes we are only in the mood for sweet, calm, quiet, safe, non-confrontational, ever-positive milk and honey. 

With (slow) maturation, I’ve learned and practiced - just a tiny bit - reeling in my outspoken exuberance. There’s a time and a place, right? And, as idiom goes “You can attract more bees with honey than vinegar.” 

So, when Reid got sick, it became necessary to make some serious choices about how, what and why to communicate with the people in our lives. Cancer is, for better or worse, an opportunity to practice being one’s best person, and I quickly realized that singularly being salt may not be the best approach. 

Thus for the last four months, I’ve been trying to be as publicly strong and positive as possible. “Patience” is the watchword for day to day interactions and exchanges; “Honest” and “Educational” are close runner’s up. The brave face is the one worn out the front door, and if I can’t find it - I stay home and look into the face of my gentle and truly brave son. 

When / if (and it’s a big IF) people consider disease, like cancer, it is considered scary,  confusing and analogous with dying; dis-ease instills ill-ease. Few want to think about these things, most want to avoid them, no one wants to be ill at ease, and I find no fault in that.

So, while reaching for the salt is no less enticing (because I’m no less passionate that I ever was!), I now stop and consider my choices.  These days being a little less colorfully candid and a lot more gentle feels essential and even healing at times. When you look fear in the face and smile, maybe it can inspire courage and hope. Now that’s a reputation to strive for.

"Please Drain Tub"

"Please drain tub." That’s what a tasteful little sign above the jacuzzi requested as I steeped in appreciation of a gift certificate recently given to me. The words brought memories into mind --

First, I recalled 17 years ago when, at day’s end of a very intense personal growth workshop, the facilitator said to the group, “Take a long bath tonight but be sure to shower for a moment afterward. You don’t want to stew in the juices you’ve been releasing; be sure to rinse it all away.”

And next, I remembered our fourth day of cancer. I was on the phone with a friend. The stormy debris of the first shock-wave was surfacing: intense fear, the gravity of Reid’s illness, a leukemia diagnosis, being alone, being homesick for my daughters. Searching to offer me some sort of comfort, she said, “See if you can find a bathtub, Martha. You need to be held. Find a bath and let the water hold you for a little while.”

We’d been there for three days, and I wandered from Reid’s room only far enough to get a cell phone signal or use the bathroom. It was hard to conceive of leaving long enough for a quick meal, let alone an entire bath, but I went searching.

I discovered the “family facilities” in the Knight Oncology Treatment Unit: a laundry and sleeping room on the 13th floor; another sleeping room and a shower on the 14th floor. A shower. For family. Hot water - and a moment in time.

I’ll never forget that first shower. It was neither an embrace nor a receptacle for the grief that washed from me. I closed my eyes and let the water take control. It was elemental, and with deep shuddering breaths of solitude and vulnerability, I stood naked  - in all ways - and cried.


Maybe it’s a good thing there is no tub in the oncology unit. Maybe someone very wise said, “Let's not put bathtubs in the family facilities. There’s already so much sadness here, we’d best not have folks soaking in it also. Showers only here, so we can send grief down the drain.” 

Let it go; let it go. Let it all go down the drain.

The Making of a Groove

Before one can actually "get into the groove" there needs to be one in existence.

I was kindly informed by a follower yesterday that my pieces are too long. I agree, and beg allowances and forgiveness due to the infamous learning curve of one trying something new.  

While I've read that the "best" blogs are about 250 words, I suspect that the length of my entries will fluctuate according to topic, degree of motivation and/or opinion and time. Every blog is unique and their purposes vary. I sense that one of the natures of this particular blog is that it bend toward organic and liberated spontaneity.  Because my platform is the untamed life I'm currently experiencing, and particularly the situation of having a family member with a cancer diagnosis, there's a huge degree of "let's see what shows up today" in this exercise (and I mean that literally, metaphorically, and on multiple levels of this blog's purpose).

Be the entries long or short, it's tough to fathom what insights I can possibly share, or who may be interested, or if I'm skilled and articulate enough to produce something worthwhile for another. I'm committing to this process, and although I have no idea where it will lead,  I hope it will be positive. Seth Godin he says that he believes writing a blog is "a lot like curating a sound on the saxophone. Training helps, listening to records helps, but mostly you blow a lot until you resonate and then repeat, prune, experiment, prune, repeat, prune until a groove occurs."

I've started curating.

"Oh My God...How Risky."

The wind and rain did some serious window rattling last night. My youngest - despite her own awareness of the mountains rising protectively around our hometown - asked as she was surrendering to sleep, "Are you sure we can't have a hurricane here?" It was a concern I remember having myself as a child in this very same town, and I cherished the sensation that we lived in such a remarkably safe place.

Ashland, Oregon is a sweet-natured, semi-conservative, attractive to big city refugees, feels-slightly-metropolitan but is actually a fairly-small-town -- that is tucked into the foothills of the Siskiyou and Cascade mountains. It's not geographically conducive to tornadoes or tsunami's and it's been a long time since the last volcanic eruption. I happily settled here, in part, to give my own kids the same nurturing and sheltered childhood that I experienced.

While social and economic times and ways of the world have grown and shifted, Ashland, Oregon has been fortunate to keep crime and calamity to a minimum. But it's not a utopia, so occasionally bad things happen to this good community. Most recently, a couple incidence of sexual assult. The response throughout Ashland has been swift and vocal. Newspaper articles, police warnings, a composite sketch, internet messages with safety tips, announcements at the University and local high school, and even a "Take Back the Night" march to raise awareness. It's good stuff. When alone it's smart to tune in; be familiar with one's surroundings; take off your ipod and listen to the world around you; practice "wide angle vision" (a tracking term for seeing and intuitive awareness  much further than the distance between self and screen, steering wheel or Wii);  walk with a "don't mess with me" confidence. They don't always stop the worst, but employing these tools and others will definitely increase one's odds of well being.

So, here am I, finishing today's blog so that I can -- go for a walk, in broad daylight, in the rain, ALONE! Oh my god...how risky. 

Let's face it, we can spend our whole lives being afraid or cautious - or even equal and intelligent parts of both. We can employ every measure of safe living and behavior that we are taught. We can stay in, lock the doors, filter the water, "green" the house, eat organic, take our vitamins, put on our coat, walk with a buddy and carry pepper spray, but in the end, we have no control.  Huh? Nope. Nadda.

Sometimes, no matter what you've done "right," a monster shows up. Shit happens -- in spades -- right in your own living room. 

Having recently lost so much of the freedom I treasure so dearly and the sense of safety -- for myself and my loved ones -- that I have always prized, I will not relinquish a simple act that brings me joy. I will take walks.

Too Revealing

People keep saying I should be writing all "this" down. "This" being the vague euphemistic reference to the fact that my eldest child was diagnosed with leukemia last September.

While I've been diligent in semi regular communications about Reid's health status via a blog created on his behalf, it's the more personal and in depth that are being called for: the experience of being a family with cancer, how it feels to be a mother dealing with a child's cancer, and how I'm a woman who's world has been turned on tilt (by a number of things).

"Why don't you do it?" Asked one old friend, and I told her that I felt as though I was sparing others by not sharing all the dirty details. It's my version of "what you don't know - can't hurt you, " and after seeing the people I love hurt so deeply by cancer - why would I want to add to their pain?

Writing the reality feels raw, uncomfortable, too revealing. So why am I here today?

Because I've realized that to be revealing may be the most honest way to embrace life.

Behind The Door

I love this small hometown of mine. I truly do. I love my childhood memories, the comfort of belonging, the safety of well known places and sensations, the lifelong friends as well as the recent. I love the deep abiding sense of community. This place and its people have taken care of me and mine, and I feel honored to do the same for those around us. Perhaps, because of the depth of my familiarity, I am equally aware of the degree to which none of us can every really know one another completely.

None of us really knows or understands all of what unfolds behind the doors of other people’s homes. How can we? Even with friends and family we’ve known for years, sharing the heights of celebrations and the depths of challenges, there are always dimensions in other’s lives that we simply cannot be privy to unless we reside together. Frankly, even those with whom I have the deepest affection, I don’t spend much time wondering about the unseen aspects of my friends and neighbors’ lives. I trust that what they choose to share will be right for them, that it’s up to me to care, learn and pay attention, and that together we decide whether to be in relationship - and to what degree. As for what others know of my “behind the door” life, I am as honest as there is interest and sincerity. Since I’m a fairly average person, I don’t imagine that too many folks apart from my close friends could care less about the innards of my household, so it’s always a surprise to me to discover that my life has been the topic of a conversation among people who hardly know me. Wow, I think. Someone must be either really bored or really confused (as in, you think there’s a more interesting story here than there actually is). So - for those of you who fall into one of these categories, here’s a little bit of sharing about what happens behind my door on a typical day. Hope it scratches your itch, and let me just say up front, sorry to disappoint you.

We like pie in our family, so I’ll use a pie chart to explain a 24 hour cycle in my world. My three children have effectively divided their mother (that would be me) and my time into three portions. Here’s how is goes, more or less:

The littlest one (a nine year old), gets the night-into-morning portion. After her dad moved out last spring, my youngest daughter moved into the master bedroom. One night of needing a place to recover from a bad dream became a second night, and then a third....and now every night she lays on “my side” of the bed sighing deeply in her dreams and occasionally allowing me to curl into her small warm body. When I am lonely, I am tremendously grateful for the radiance of her small spirit next to me. When I am exhausted, I fall into the blankets hoping that neither of us will disturb the other.

She is a relentless morning person. I am not. She bolts upright and looks eagerly at the clock. I do not. She has a plan; right now. I simply wish to continue sleeping. Her plan always includes speaking to me; right now. She is learning to start off softly and gently (my grumpy threats about the necessity of being nicer to mom in the morning seem to be paying off); thank goodness. Each day, we take turns making the bed - comforter up, pillows in place, and the creatures (Chestnut the lion, Alice the elephant, Dexter the mouse, and Tommy and Dixie - the pigs) all assume their lounging atop the smoothed blankets. Yesterday morning, as I placed the menagerie against the pillows and surveyed the stack of children’s books on the headboard, I felt very cranky. Where is my adulthood? I gnashed. Where is the privacy of MY bedroom? I grumbled. It was a frivolous moment - some would say a “typical American mother moment” - of wanting “my space.” For now though, this is her major third of my pie - which I willingly give (while sometimes fearfully wondering if she’ll be there until she’s eighteen? Yikes!).

My eldest, my son - claims the banker’s hours (or these days, doctor’s office hours) of each day. This is the nineteen year old whom I thought had been successfully launched into his own life. Hugged, kissed and sent off to college a year ago, he was off like a rocket! Well, Houston, we have a problem. Launch delayed due to cancer. Most days we move in parallel. He has his routine (sleeping, healing, labs, doctors appointments, girlfriend, eating, more sleeping, distractions from leukemia - like video games, buddies, books and movies) and I have mine (waking him, making sure he’s eating, taking him to the appointments, watching-listening-questioning-advocating with the docs and nurses, arguing with him about the hours he keeps, worrying about him, feeding him - and his girlfriend, learning more about leukemia than I ever would have imagined in two million years. When his blood counts are dangerously low...and they are each month in between rounds of chemo, we really don’t know from one day to the next if he might be required to stay longer at the clinic for a hemoglobin, or red cell, or white cell infusion. He is vulnerable, and his body’s responses are unpredictable. These days we’ve found that making plans is a luxury we don’t get to enjoy since the best laid plans of cancer families are often dashed. We’re not in control. Period.

I was laid off from my job not too long ago, which is what makes it possible for me to devote myself to being my boy’s primary caregiver while he weathers the chemotherapy storm he’s been in since September and will be until February. This is my new job. I feel privileged to be here for him, to witness, love, hold tender and be fierce for him. I also feel scared, for him and his life, for his sisters and their lives, for our precarious financial situation, of all of the unknowns and this feeling that everything is out of control. On days that he feels well and strong, he ventures out to act “normal” in the light of day, and I do small freelance jobs from my office here at home. It’s quiet then and a little bit lonely, but peaceful.

My middle kid, gets the afternoons and evenings. This sassy high school freshman is my soccer player, swimmer, violin playing, youth symphony girl with nearly unflagging optimism and a nearly regular smile. Back before her older brother’s cancer, her intense schedule had us all panting to keep up. Now, she manages - mostly - to navigate it on her own, except for the times she needs a ride, or an audience, or her own special witness to the passions that fill her heart. She doesn’t ask for much, which makes me want to offer her that little something extra, and she’s more helpful than not, which makes me want to hold her closely - even when the day has been longer than usual. When she arrives home I want to take more than just a moment to hear about her friendships, inquire about the school day, listen to the radio songs she’s singing along with and watch the rhythmic way she moves around the house.

Dinner comes, and my son’s sweetheart is usually with us, and we all take our places around the table. This is it. Me - with four kids and a dog - at the end of the day. I sigh. It is a grateful sigh, a tired sigh, a “this isn’t what I thought my life was going to look like” sigh, a single mom sigh, and a blessing sigh. I actually wish I could give them each a larger slice, but I’m only one pie - no matter how hard I try to be more.

This is not a horrible life. This is a blessed and beautifully complex life. This is not an idle life. This is a full and multi-faceted life. This is not a life of mystery and mischief-making. This is pretty damned straight forward and honest to the point of discomfort life. This is a life infused with love between children and mother, as well as between family and friends. I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t missing being more then a mother some days. At times, I’m hungry for the unique woman I am apart from the “mother-me,” and then my kids tell me that they love me, and I figure “pie be damned.”

If you see me out without my kids in this wonderful small town of ours - alone or with a friend - then you’ve witnessed a unique and fleeting moment in my present life. And if after reading this lengthy snapshot of the ordinary life behind my front door, you still think there’s some more thrilling version that’s not being shared - go ahead and ask me whatever it is you’re curious about, or better yet - come on over and trade places with me for a couple of days. I’d appreciate the short vacation - and I can promise you - you won’t be bored.