I was asked to write a poem for our latest Spring Fling community gathering.The theme this year was Pollinators. We had a scientific explanation from our well informed head of grounds here at Kendal as well as songs and dances and skits all celebrating spring and its pollinators. I added my piece which was used at the very end. It got chuckles and appreciation so now I pass it on to you, my family, friends and readers.
The Hummingbird, the Honeybee, and the Butterfly
One June morning, sitting on my front deck, eyelids closed against the strong sunshine, a buzzing sound annoyed my ear. As I opened my eyes to swat away an insect, a hummingbird had helicoptered over to check out my brightly colored blouse. I was all show and no sugar, so he zipped away to chase off the other guys vying for their drinks at the red and yellow feeder.
My cat came stalking back from adventures in the forest to show off the best way to sunbathe. As she languidly climbed the steps to join me, I noticed a honeybee in the grass. Not a big carpenter bee who drilled holes above my window frame, dusting my bureau with delicate sawdust, but a small earnest honeybee diligently visiting white clover after clover, imprinting his wiggle dance to map exact directions for the hive.
Over by the garage, a monarch butterfly landed on some few remaining milkweed plants. Their poisonous sap could harm our newborn lambs who delighted in escaping beneath the fence, though the mauve flowers the plants produced would seduce the nose of an angel. I watched the female fluttering upside down quickly depositing a single egg beneath one chosen leaf, and then another. Her larvae would ingest the toxins repulsing very hungry caterpillar eaters.
I called out,” Hola, Señora Mariposa!“ because she had just returned from Mexico to leave the next generation behind her.
These three pollinateers fly in and out of our landscapes every year. Seeking sweet nectar, they and their kin nurture beauty and carry the survival of our crops on their wings. In return, let’s pollinate the idea that we carry their survival in our grateful hands.
In 1968 Richard and I saw a partial eclipse of the sun when we were freshman at Emerson College in Boston. I no longer remember how we ‘saw’ the event but I do remember the awesome feeling of standing on the street with hundreds of strangers in a hushed moment. The city paused and held its breath as relative darkness washed over us in a primal revelation of how much we depend on the sun for light and warmth and life on Earth. How small we are in the cosmic alignment of star, moon, and planet.
Living where I do in Northeast Ohio, we are in the direct transit line of this current event. And, living in northeast Ohio as I do, it will likely be at least partly cloudy as the local forecast says. Nonetheless, our whole community has been issued viewing glasses and many families have reserved a local place to stay and to visit their loved ones at the same time. There is a real buzz of excitement that is catching and joyful in anticipation for the entire afternoon’s careful preparations for one and all.
Darkness and light, moon and sun, earth and all of its inhabitants, we breathe and live together invisibly connected through the stream of life. Spring erupts around us in myriad delightful ways. May we all be fortunate enough to be touched by the inevitability of growth and give thanks at least several times every day for the diverse gifts that abound.
I am coining a new phrase- SDD or Seasonal Disorientation Disorder. Since February 1st it has felt like spring here in Northeast Ohio. If it had been March or April, you would expect the yo-yo extremes of warm sunny days coaxing out the early flowers and returning songbirds followed by freezing nights and a few inches of snow. But it seems we have added another whole month to springtime. Now that it is March, there are already robins, nest builders, returning geese couples, early booming plants and benches that beckon you to sit a while in the warm sun. It seems wrong to cut winter short (unlike in Alaska where they had record snowfalls) and yet delight in wearing only a light sweater or jacket to walk and jog along clear paths.
We are fortunate that lovely weather is the result of climatic disruptions. Others around the country and the world watch droughts and floods and violent storms destroy their way of life, with the looming certainty that the usual order has forever been changed. I know I do my best to limit my climate unsustainable consumerism as an individual living in my community in America. But as an individual I don’t have much of an impact on the sweeping reforms necessary to ensure that my grandsons will have a safe planet to live on. But I can vote!
My spiritual practice stabilizes me in a big picture of humanity’s sojourn on Earth. There is nothing in the universe that does not expand and contract, passing through stasis points on either end. What remains constant is the source of creation itself, called by many names, accessed, and sought after by science and diverse paths, all leading to acknowledge our impermanence. I can live with that. I do live with that intimately as my body ages and declines in its own unique way.
Today I am grateful for mobility scooters and sunshine, friends and neighbors, nurses and physical therapists, and the joy of being alive to witness being one of eight billion people on earth. Consider that we are a very small percentage of the billions of beings that we share the planet with. Even the few tiny ants that have begun to traverse the desert of my bathroom floor are part of my world each spring. Taking every moment that I have, just to be alive, is the joyful thing that I, as an individual, can do my best to inhabit every day.
Around mid-January I found myself turning teary while listening to the sad news or the occasional good news story on the radio, hearing just about any music, or seeing my dear elderly companions as they each navigate their days. I was teary when a retired nurse from my assisted living area recently returned for a day to fill an open space on the schedule. She is a very formal efficient sort of woman, and when I greeted her as I rolled past the nurse’s station in my wheelchair, she stepped out from behind her desk and came around to give me a hug. My friends and I were astonished at this display of affection. It touched me deeply and I saved shedding the tears sparkling in my eyes for when I returned to my room. I teared again up today when the sun shone bright after weeks of dreary cold weather. It was fifty degrees F on the first of February, and I went outside on my mobility scooter to enjoy the fresh air for the first time in a month. The above photo of melting ice on the pond is from that excursion. Joy undid me. It doesn’t take much. I, too, am melting.
I am not feeling sad, just very vulnerable. I know this emotional upwelling is because we are approaching Valentine’s Day, marking the sixth anniversary of my husband death. I try to remain available to whatever arises in me to mark this occasion. My daughters and I usually score some chocolate chip ice cream to honor his memory, just as we did when we served ice cream to the hundreds who attended his memorial. Grief is an unpredictable ongoing phenomenon. So far, this year is offering me a delightful mixture of nostalgia, memories, gratitude, and joy. I have written before about how grief is tied to gratitude. My heart was cracked wide open when Richard was dying. It appears that it has never again closed as tightly as before. This is what the touchstone of this anniversary is revealing to me. Losing him was his gift to me of a still opening heart.
Of course I miss him, and the intimacy of a partner who knew every fault I have and loved me anyway- the jokes we invented together when we were teenagers falling deeply in love- or co-parenting two cherished daughters- and the knowledge of how he would have adored his two grandsons had he lived to meet them. I embrace missing that Richard, the man who was my husband for almost fifty years. I also know how happy he would be that I live in a wonderful new home where I am supported at all levels of my being to thrive and live the last chapter of my life without his physical presence. His devoted life work provided me with the opportunity to live at Kendal at Oberlin and I am grateful for that alone every day.
May Valentine’s Day be not just a commercial reminder to buy cards, flowers, and chocolates, (there’s nothing wrong with any of those!) to show our love for others but also to serve as a deeper touchstone for sharing our love and light every day with all beings in our lives.
I have likely posted this song some years ago? but I post it here again with my voice of loving remembrance.
A new year. For thousands of years, we humans have been aware of our passage around the sun. It is a worldwide ritual acknowledgement of time. The cyclical nature of endings and beginnings has always been embodied in the natural world we inhabit. Mortality and renewal are sad and joyful in their turn. Denying the reality that we are embedded in this cycle seems ignorant and yet, our culture takes death so personally, that we employ all manner of denial to avoid the inevitable.
I include a piece I wrote last fall about attending to my body after death. I am so glad I did. It still makes me smile to think of that day. On this finally frigid morning, a bit of snow shower whitewashing clings to the grass outside my window. It has been overly warm until this week, and it feels like a relief to know we can have a real wintry day. Because I don’t have to drive anymore on icy roads, I simply appreciate the white stuff with a bit of nostalgia from when snow was a playground of delight. My cement garden frog looks a bit concerned because snow lingers between his eyes. I assure him the afternoon sun will rise above the rooftop soon enough and his serious stone visage will be restored- at least until the next snowfall. May this year bring joy, peace, and freedom to all.
My burial site 30 feet to the left. with my daughter and H
“I am not courting death, but death is courting me”.
Yesterday, my older daughter and I went to choose my burial site and we were giddy with joy. My death is not imminent (I sincerely hope not, anyway) but I was thinking the other night, “I am not courting death, but death is courting me”. Death is courting all of us since the day we were born if you care to think about. Which most people do not. Our culture in general does its best not to embrace death as an essential aspect of life. I currently live in a wonderful CCRC (continuing care retirement community) in the Assisted Living area of Kendal at Oberlin and am surrounded by neighbors in their 80’s, 90’s, and two amazingly sharp people who are 103. So, yeah, living here I think about death as a regular occurrence treated with utmost care, respect, and support for all involved in the loss of their beloved.
I have had MS for over 50 years and since I was in my 30’s, I have been hanging out in the secondary progressive phase of MS, (for me, a slow but steady decline). I am now officially in the primary progressive stage (my decline is increasing monthly). I am 72 years old, and my new neurologist said to me the words I have heard many times before, “You don’t die of MS but because of complications with having MS.” I also am not going to get any stronger so if I wanted to locate my burial site, now was the time to do so.
I live in a body that is in chronic pain. The increasing inflammatory nerve messaging to my entire torso, legs and back, means that I am in a high-tech power wheelchair, for which I am very grateful. I definitely have down moments as I eliminate one activity after another from my life. Knowing that my young grandsons will never know the active grandmother I had thought to be, is maybe the hardest one to accept. I am part of their lives through FaceTime and carefully planned in person visits that I treasure. They and I make the most of our times together with the help of my persistent daughter making sure that her sons know her mother. My husband, her father, died in 2018, precipitating my move to this Ohio community from our 60-acre homestead in upstate NY. His ashes were scattered in a river we once loved.
Yesterday, my daughter loaded me and a small portable wheelchair into the car and drove me an hour and half away to the Foxfield Preserves. It is a designated section within a 650-acre wilderness center with 3,000 allocated sites for a green burial. When I heard this advertised on the radio a couple of years ago, I was delighted. Ohio being a conservative state, I never imagined I’d have this option. I was now ready to prepay and manage my burial so my family doesn’t have to deal with it later. It made me happy to think of being buried in a natural setting wrapped in a simple white shroud and placed directly into the soil. That is just what I wanted.
This was the day we were to choose my site. First off, it was a glorious day for fall foliage viewing. Cool nights suddenly turned muted brass into a full fanfare of color. Except for doctor visits and seeing my daughter’s family in a Cleveland neighborhood, I don’t get out much. We drove south and west into farm country. Large working farms spread out for miles. As we got closer to Wilmot, (known as The Amish Door) the town where the Wilderness Center was located, we saw the occasional Amish horse and buggy trotting along the highway. The last three horses my husband and I owned were Amish animals, two of them from Ohio. One was a gorgeous fellow we named Lucas. He loved pulling a fore cart along our upstate NY roads and that trot was his specialty. Seeing these horses was the first tug at my heart. My daughter and I both commented that had he lived, this was the sort of area where her Papa and I would have moved to.
When we arrived at the Wilderness Center, we informed the receptionist that we were here for the Preserves and to meet with H, our guide. We were told to take the elevator up to the observation deck as we were early, and the receptionist would come tell us when H was ready. This top floor was filled with nature scenes made of carved wood with painted displays for children (and me) to touch and climb in out of (not me, but my daughter and I immediately envisioned her boys in here). It was beautifully arranged information about the flora and fauna that the wilderness offered, with no plastics or breakable objects in sight. Going outside on the sunny deck provided an even stronger pull on my heart.
Now we could see that this whole wilderness area was surrounded by big rolling hills. We had passed signs for hiking trails on our way up to the information center and noticed two large solar panels over angled roofs below us in a parking spot. Looking around from on high, it was inhaling the hills that cinched it for me. I grew up in the Catskill Mountains of New York. So far, I had seen only the astonishing flatness of Ohio. This 180-degree panorama of rippling hilltops was balm to my flattened heart. I could feel what I call my ‘animal body’ sigh a huge gust of relief. This place felt like home to me. This place was my old home right here in my new home of Ohio.
Then we were summoned to meet H, and our tour of the Preserve began. She drove slowly in front of our car pointing out the three potential areas for my site. My impressions as we bumped along the grassy dirt tracks, was that the number 1 area was mostly wooded winding up to the top of a knoll. The number 2 area was partially wooded and partially winding down to the prairie, and the number 3 area was mostly a wide-open prairie field. When we stopped there, silence ruled all around punctuated only by birds whose field calls I did not recognize, and the calming drone of humming insects. No cars, no mechanical sounds- just acres and acres of wild Ohio. The sun, the molten colors, and finding an enchanted resting place for my body together with my daughter: all of it made us giddy with joy.
We chose a spot 30 feet off the driving track in the second area, on a ridge so you can look out beyond to the hills. I think you could maybe see down to the prairie below. I could not traverse it on foot, of course, but my daughter and our family will be the ones at my interment and if she said this was the place, then we agreed, this was the place. On our way back to the wilderness center building we met two women who asked H for help to locate their son’s burial spot in the woods. We waved her on to help them and met her back at her office. Such personal care and kindness and intimate knowledge of each burial further rooted the joy in my heart that here was the right place for me and for my family’s future visits.
We asked our guide questions, including requesting permission to bury a tiny pinch of my husband’s remaining ashes with me. She said, of course, and then advised us on various funeral homes who will take my body to hold overnight until the actual hole is dug after which my body will be driven back to the Preserve for interment. A memorial gathering will take place later at my retirement community. My community has always been very good at holding unique and moving memorials for my friends and neighbors and I know my family will have a good experience setting this up at Kendal when the time comes.
We signed the contract and agreed to the additional required donation that accompanies the arrangement. The idea of helping to maintain a small piece of wild Ohio is a lovely legacy for me to leave behind. Besides, as members of my family, my daughter’s family can come for free to hike, explore the wilderness area, or use the small observatory that had just sponsored a children’s astronomy weekend. I foresee that my grandsons will enjoy coming to Gramma Judi’s last physical home. The body of this land will always welcome them.
My mother would chant this to me every winter. Pondering this brought up the following random memories of winters with my single mom.
When my two older brothers and I got into the decrepit ’48 Chevy (some years I was elected to clamber through the open window because the front passenger door didn’t open anymore) she’d say,” We’re off in a cloud of…” whatever was happening. If we were going to the dentist, it was, “We’re off in a cloud of Novocain,” or in the winter, “off in a cloud of Santas…” or “ice skates, or sleds, or huskies, or squirrels…”
We lived on a short but steep hill in the Catskill mountains and never had much money to spend on cars or proper tires. In the winter, it was a daring adventure to see if Mom could gun the engine to get our heavy boat up the hill and into our sloping driveway. If it had slithered sideways blocking off the few neighbors above us, she’d reluctantly have to call somebody to pull the car back down the hill to park it discretely alongside the lower road. Otherwise, the vehicle threatened to remain there until next spring.
When headed precariously downhill, she commanded me to curl up into the space underneath the glove compartment. I huddled there as she inched her way down the slippery slope.It was a breathtaking experience. When I think about it, the car was built like a tank and it probably was a very safe place to stash me in case of an accident. As our mechanic used to say, while supplying my mother every two years with yet another ancient vehicle, “Nothin’ like iron outta Detroit.”
My mother was not very physically inclined, but she did appreciate walking and the beauty of the mountains, even in winter. One night, as I was muttering over my social studies book memorizing dates and battles, she came up behind me and slammed my book shut. “Hey,” I protested. “I have a test tomorrow.”
“No, you don’t. It’s going to be a snow day or at least a two-hour delay for school. Get your things on, we’re going outside.” Our elderly dog wisely declined to join us for the inclement weather.
I tugged on snow pants, my damp wooly coat, and buckled up my squeaky black galoshes. Covered by hat and mittens, we trudged off downhill into the night. It was snowing huge wet flakes and we listened to the soft hush gathering all around us. We didn’t talk much, united in the rhythm of our steps and the occasional sound of cars cautiously shushing along on the highway at the far end of our road. The temperature dropped, and hard snow started zinging against the totally white ground. By the time we reached the highway, we stared, astonished at the millions of flakes swirling thick in the green glow of the single streetlight. Mesmerized, my mom and I held hands gazing up into the dazzling moment.
To our horror, once in a while my brothers and I missed the school bus and mom had to take us there herself. Living in the country, the central school we attended was 45 minutes away. She was never dressed when she fed us breakfast, packed my lunch, (my brothers always paid 25 cents for theirs) and sent us off to the highway where the bus would stop to pick us up. We would have to walk back all the way up the hill after realizing we were too late, or it hadn’t been a two-hour delay, only an hour delay. We had been left behind. My mother would throw her winter coat on over her pajamas and tatty bathrobe and shove us in the car.
The race was on. If she could manage to overtake the bus as it stopped for pickup after pickup, she wouldn’t have to drive us all the way. If she did catch up, there she was in her nightclothes for everyone on the bus to see! If she had to drive us all the way, the whole school would see! To us kids it was horrifying. Probably nobody noticed, but we sure did.
Christmas was the perfect holiday for Mom to get excited about. My siblings and I were once enthusiastically recruited to make bell ornaments to hang on the tree. We made paper mache and molded it over lightbulbs with flared bottoms, wrapped them in aluminum foil, and topped them with ‘snow’ made out of soap crystals. Twisted pipe cleaners poked through for hooks. My brothers were not impressed and ditched the project before even one bell was finished. Undeterred, my mother and I carried on. When I later inherited the box of our childhood ornaments, there were still two sorry bells among the few surviving glass balls. My own children were also not impressed, and those bells no longer ring out Christmas cheer.
My single mom was a delightfully complicated and challenging mother all year long. I just unearthed something that I wrote on the first Christmas after she died of AIDS following a massive March blizzard.
Christmas Tree, 1993
I miss my mother. I look at this tree growing crookedly out of my living room floor, waiting for my children’s hands to tug each branch down with the weight of their joy, and it is now that I miss her.
For the first time, Mom, I do not flinch to remember your inappropriate childlike zeal with the Christmas trees of my childhood. Each year, your oversized emotions were squeezed into another lopsided evergreen we managed to haul through our woods, and each year, the tree was redeemed by your words, “This tree has……character!” Somehow, your determination to wreak magic would prevail, and that tree would shine proudly with all the handmade theatrical glory you craved.
From underneath it’s branches, the presents you gave and received carried too many words with too many loud exclamations. They clumsily unwrapped your own girlchild seeking love she had not found.
When the room was lighted only by the tree, when subdued expectations met the darkening sky, you always sang. Freed with the full throttled exuberance of each carol, your heart swelled out loud and strong. Your heart was made visible by your beautifully cultured soprano voice. Today, I can finally join my voice with yours, bringing peace to both our childish hearts. I like to believe we are all made welcome by the celebration of loving children.
The moment before power twisted your words, leading millions of victims astray.
The moment before rage pulled the trigger, killing and killing the innocent.
The moment before a bloody war is declared, endlessly recycling severance from reverence.
Sifting through the rubble of a shattered home.
The cherubic silence of a traumatized child falling asleep.
The first green leaf appears in the charred forest.
Gathering the push before I birthed her.
The soft momentous gasp before he left his body.
The world does not pause with me when my heart is breaking open.
Perhaps it never will.
A spring erupts from the side of the mountain, a source of hope running down to the sea.
I pause between one breath and the next that I may inhale the river.
It has been a tough time for us all, no exceptions. I balance the news with this sketch I wrote- a fantasy based on the memory of a real child’s comment to her grandfather. I wish safety and love to all.
10/23/23 Thanksful Judi Bachrach
Vivian tugged at his sleeve. “Grampy. What are they talking ‘bout? I don’t like it when they talk ‘bout things I don’t understand.” She waved her little hand around the table., which was covered in half empty platters and bowls of wild turkey, gravy, fireplace roasted potatoes, pumpkin soup, dilly beans, chestnut cornbread stuffing, creamed onions, cranberry sauce, and winter garden salad. She had long since finished eating everything, but it looked like the grownups would never stop eating because they never stopped talking.
Grampy turned to look at his 2¾ year old granddaughter. Vivvy was very verbal and very bright for her age. She was the first grandchild and the only youngster present. Vivvy’s parents, who lived down the road, sat across from them and were pleased to have him be her minder for the duration of the meal. He was delighted to have the honor of his granddaughter’s close company. His younger son and lovely new wife, Laura, a progressive freelance journalist, sat next to Vivvy. Vivvy’s other, spunky widowed grandmother was here as were his ever-grumpy conservative brother and sister-in-law who were all sitting near his wife at the far end of the table.
“Vivvy, they are just talking about boring grownup things”, Grampy whispered.” Look at their faces. Do they look like they are talking about fun things you’d want to know? There’s lots to learn when you’re a child. ‘Course, I’m pretty old and I still don’t know why people say and do half the things they do.”
Vivvy carefully looked at everyone, fixing their names in her mind, one by one. Grammy had let her take clean turkey feathers from an old pitcher to set down at each person’s place at the table. Vivvy had saved the shortest (but prettiest) feather for herself. “No, they don’t look happy. Why not, Grampy? Daddy said it is supposed to be a fun day. It’s…a…a.. hol-i-day. For giving thanks. They said thanks for nice things way b‘fore. Now they don’t look thanksful to me.”
“No, they don’t look thankful right now” Grampy agreed. It’s easy to forget to be thankful sometimes. It’s why we have a special day to remember. You said you were thankful for the pies you helped your mama make. We get to eat those later. What else are you thankful for?”
Tickling her feather under her chin, Vivvy screwed up her face to think. “I am thanksful for…you. I am thanksful you listen to me and talk to me. Can we ‘scuse us selves and go outside b‘fore ‘sert? I am also thanksful for the sunny day. But we needs our jacket.” She vigorously scrubbed her face and hands with the big white napkin.
Grampy stood up and cleared his throat to interrupt the intense conversation which had moved on to politics. Laura stopped to look up at him just before whatever she had been going to say. He suddenly found that he was very grateful to have a reason to take a break. Besides, he really didn’t need more stuffing, or another mug of hard cider. From the rug by the fire, three dog tails began wagging.
“Scuse us, everybody. Vivvy and I are going to take a little walk outside before dessert time. If anybody cares to join us, we’ll be going along down the field past the barn. Vivian said she didn’t know what y’all were talking about just now, but she thought you didn’t look very thanksful. She was thinking it was supposed to be a fun holiday. See you later.” He winked at his wife as he and Vivvy walked past, all three dogs trotting close behind.
Grammy grinned at them. “Yes, well, you two go and have fun. Now, would anybody care for some more gravy? There’s plenty left on the stove.”
The first week of October here in northeast Ohio was in the 80’s. Summer weather! Though we had had a number of chilly September nights that rendered nighttime insects silent, the creatures surged back with enthusiastic trilling. Since yesterday, the thermometer and insect sounds slid back down again. There is a stiff breeze accompanying the cold front. Sweaters, corduroys, and snuggly jackets sprouted like mushrooms overnight. I had help to accomplish the annual Changing of the Clothes and my bureau is full because of bulkier materials. My closet is half empty with the hung blouses, skirts, and dresses tucked away in a storge bin under my plant shelf. Who knows what this year’s transition to winter will be like? Warmer than usual? Colder? More or less snow? What exactly is usual anyway? Not like what I remember when I was a child? Answer: wait and see.
The world goes on as it does. Horrible events explode, others weary in duration, unexpected discoveries and under-reported miracles of beauty, love and survival shine through the cracks of our human endeavors. I never could have imagined these ongoing challenges presented to me every day- the ones where I am asked to keep my heart open to witness constant violence and the unraveling of democracies all over the planet.
I thought only to hold my beloveds as they go through the trials of their ordinary lives. To be a planetary citizen who cultivates compassion and peace is to have long ago signed a contract to live in this age at this exact juncture of history. Not the one our parents lived in. Not as we remember how life used to be when we were children. Weather, politics, education, technology, science, or history are not the same for our grandchildren as it was for us. The challenges of my generation continue to expand even as our hearts want to contract in the darker face of it all.
Focusing close to home is where we can have an immediate impact and where we can see how to heal and be healed. Here in the northern hemisphere, the old tapestry colors of fall illuminate the beautiful necessity of letting go. Chlorophyl factories are not on strike but naturally shutting down their former production. Leaves detach without any makeup or clinging and fall to the ground in an ever faster choreographed ballet. Animals fatten up and prepare for slower metabolisms, dormancy, or migration without wondering for how long or how cold it will be. They trust they will adapt. As will we. As we must and as fast or slowly as we do.
I am adapting to my new power wheelchair. Her name is Reina the Beast (a queen because she has a bit of purple metal on her fenders. She rises up so that seated, I can look a tall person in the eye. She reclines and unfolds like a hospital bed, and is designed for indoor or outdoor navigation with large middle wheels sporting thick cleats. (I haven’t yet found the control for her to pay my taxes, but I’ll keep looking.) I only use her inside for now as I do not wish to deal with the dirt her clever wheels would track into my one room home. As long as I can still transfer into my scooter which lives in the hall by my door, I will ride that into dawn and sunsets wearing my hat and fall jacket. I am losing mobility and strength, and Reina will help me maintain my independence for that much longer. Not with a “little bit of (but with a lot of) help from my friends.” Cue the Beatles…you do remember them?
This is my birthday month, and both my younger daughter flying in from NY state and her older sister’s family will help me celebrate when the time comes. It is a challenge for someone with my declining mobility to navigate to my daughter’s home 45 minutes away with a portable wheelchair even with a room arranged to accommodate my need for rest and privacy. I want to keep accomplishing this expedition as long as I possibly can. But as MS continues to erode my nervous system, I am grateful to be able to make the trek at all.
I was hoping that being in my early 70’s would finally bring my chronological age closer to my body’s apparent age. Alas, my body zooms ahead in its losses to bring me in line with my fellow residents in this Assisted Living Area who range from their late 80’s into their 100’s. We all work with what we have and I am right at home with our trusty wheelchairs and rollators and scooters to get us where we need to be.
Weather everywhere no longer fits our tidy memories. Here in Ohio, August was quite chilly requiring sweatshirts every morning, and now this first week of September is hovering around 90. People complain of an abnormal amount of heat or cold or wet or drought-like conditions, as if we were able to control it. We have managed to create global warming, but not to create clear pathways to redirect our efforts towards solving the results of the disastrous impact on our shared planet.
Adapting to change inside and out requires an ongoing maturation of honoring desires within the reality of what is or is not possible. Acceptance is always the first and most difficult step towards undergoing real change. All twelve-step programs know this, as do all therapists of any stripe, as do all spiritual and religious teachings. It is hard to accept loss of any kind. Loss hurts. But using it as the doorway to lasting change brings a deep relief as we line up with what is in our power to choose going forward. I finally had to accept I needed an electric wheelchair and now only use my rollater in my room when I am able. Releasing any idea of this being ‘a defeat of my will against my struggling body’ only makes sense. Embracing the change is now a joy and results in a little more freedom even as I still cannot sit up in it for very long.
Acceptance of, and adapting to, change in all aspects of our daily and planetary citizen’s lives requires wisdom that we are sorely lacking. Creating a doorway leading to necessary change is my hope for us all.
Turkey vulture…..Here is a poem I wrote two weeks ago.
Northeast Ohio where I live has been spared most of the high temperatures burning across America and the world. We are fortunate in that regard. We have Lake Erie not far away and the water table is very high locally. Our campus is carefully and sustainably built on former wetlands. As a result, we have seven different ponds which support various waterfowl and other critters of the water loving variety.
I saw my first Green Heron the other day. It was sitting on a downed grayish log lying across the far end of the pond. I only saw through its perfectly blended camouflage because the head moved to reveal the long dagger sharp beak in profile. I wondered why the frogs were silent and why two small birds kept fluttering wildly over that log- a feeble attempt to foil the still predator among them. It was too far away to get a closeup with my phone camera but when I looked green herons up online, it was obvious that is who I saw to add to the blue and white ones that I have seen as more frequent visitors here.
In the middle of July we did have a short hot spell. That sent some songbirds to begin their migrations and the insects to begin their romancing all ahead of schedule. It is hard to believe there are still avid climate change deniers around Ohio or anywhere in the States these days. Anybody who loves the outdoors for sport, large- and small-scale agriculture, or play, has to know that former patterns of weather systems have changed significantly. People are too frightened to admit the evidence before them and are not given the information or the structured guidance as to how we can all dig in to make necessary painful changes that must happen if we are to adapt to this new world we share. Hence, we are watching a presidential denier accumulate indictments as a means of funding his reelection campaign.
Burning the Cicada Calendar: July, 2023
From high in the trees
cicadas launch summer sonics,
wave after wave of trilling clatter
filling silent holes migrant
songbirds leave behind.
To the day, this used to denote
Listening to their fanfare every year
August had crawled up the branches in our woods.
we promptly flipped the calendar.
But today it’s only mid-July
annual male cicadas rattle their tymbals
the drowning whir for females
subsumes frog bellows and leaf chatter.
Hot soil summoned adults out of the earth
out of synch, out of time,
the cycle used to be
nature’s careful calendar.
End of Summer Insects
By day cicadas
By night crickets and katydids
Where did summer go?
I cannot sustain my life by living in despair for the future. I am not sticking my head in the sand to declare everything is “gonna be OK”. Rather I look for joy wherever I can find it and my friends and I do not leave our conversations in the downward spiral that starts innocently enough with: “Did you hear the news that.. read the article in.. see the documentary on..” and before long we are shaking our heads at all the awful things happening in the world. We always stop ourselves, breathe, and share a personal story of friends and family to end on a positive note. It helps us to keep things in perspective. Much is out of our control, but in small significant ways we can contribute to remain balanced and uplift one another as best we can.
I wrote this for my own self to hum when the world gets me down. It has a simple melody but here are just the lyrics:
JOY
Have you laughed out loud with a friend today?
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
Have felt contented and peaceful today?
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
How can you sing of joy when
The world is so full of sorrow?
How can you sing of joy
When the world is so full of fear?
How can you sing a song of joy
When we’re losing our hope in tomorrow?
How can you sing a song of joy
When the future is so unclear?
If joy dries the tears on just one face
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
If joy makes the world a more loving place
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
If joy holds up hope through one endless night
Then joy, joy let’s sing of joy
If joy brings the world a heart full of light
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
Have you had a moment of joy today?
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
Have you shared a moment of joy today?
Then joy, joy, let’s sing of joy
August unfolds before us and may the end of this summer season bring you joy to affirm and sustain you and yours for wherever your life leads you next.
Judi B's Blog 