Easter!

Posted on April 8, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

And now it is Easter.  Resuurection! Renewal!  The new beginning we talked about on Holy Thursday!  (I must interject I went to Good Friday Mass at a different parish and it felt more at home, more reverent.  However, I will continue to “interview” the various “applicants” in the area to make sure I land where I’m supposed to. )

I was cleaning out my computer – another blog on another day for that mind-numbing and astonishing task – but I found a photograph of Half Dome from Glacier Point in Yosemite.  You can also see Nevada and Vernal Falls from that point, and they were putting on a show.   Beyond Half Dome is the “top” of Yosemite, where the smooth white granite looks like a  snowy plain dotted with green trees even in the summer.  It is a wonderful photo that I took on one of my many visits.

Yosemite was one of Terri’s favorite places on earth.  She wanted her ashes spread there, but because she  donated her body to science, they will ultimately be spread in the Pacific Ocean by UCSF in a respectful ceremony that they perform for everyone who gives themselves selflessly to UCSF science.  I put the photograph as my desktop background.  Unlike most desktop photos that I have taken, if I use the stretch-t0-fit mode it looks like something you would see in a house of mirrors.  This panoramic photo needed, if anything, a BIGGER desktop!  It filled the whole screen in proportion.

When I open my computer now, I don’t think of Terri gone.  I think of Terri there.  Yosemite is so huge and so timeless, you can’t help but think of eternity – of the many people over thousands of years who walked there, were here and then gone.  Many times I have talked to God while looking at Half Dome – the answers come fast and furious and seem sure and true.  So when I look at that photo now, I only feel great joy thinking of Terri standing there with me on Glacier Point.

There is this world, and there is the next.  They are all one in the end.  Jesus taught us that, too.  Happy Easter, Terri, I’ll have a piece of my lamb cake for you!

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“What’s THAT about?” – Reflection on Holy Thursday

Posted on April 5, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

“What’s THAT about?”  Terri would say whenever she somewhat disapproved of something but was willing to entertain explanation of why it was the way it was.

One of the challenges facing me is finding a Catholic Church to attend.  After so many years at one parish, I dreaded that as much as finding new doctors and dentists.  True, the Mass is the same all over the world, which is a very comforting and wonderful thing about being Catholic.  Depressed in Wyoming?  Mass at St. Mary of the Open Range will take you back to the safe place in your heart.  Bummed out in Anchorage? Mass at St. Mary of the Snow will warm your spirit up.  Freaked out in France? Mass at St. Joan of Arc will calm you down.  Every parish has its own style though, it’s not all that easy to pick one in which you feel at home.

Tonight it is Holy Thursday.  I decided upon the closest parish to my home.  The website makes it sound up -t0 – date and open minded.  Just the ticket.  As I drove to the evening service, I asked Terri to be with me.  Terri and I were in agreement that Holy Thursday was our favorite night of the liturgical year.  During Holy Thursday services, the ritual of washing the feet is practiced, all over the world.  Different parishes do it different ways.  At one parish I attended the pastor washed the feet of 12 volunteers.  At St. Perpetua in Lafayette, we washed each other’s feet – you would wash mine, then I would wash the next person’s.  It is a beautiful ritual, and it was given to us by Jesus himself.  At the Last Supper before he died, he washed the feet of his Apostles.  Peter protested that he was not worthy, but Jesus insisted.  Terri and I loved that this was our lesson from Jesus.  We must kneel down and care for others.  This, for us, is the key point of being a Christian.  Also, too, we must have the humility to accept being cared for by others.  Neither is easy.

Tonight when I walked into the church here in town, I took the handout  with the evening’s prayers and songs and sat down.  The pastor’s message on the front page did not bode well for me.  The theme was “goodbye.”  That Holy Thursday is all about Jesus saying goodbye.  That new beginnings start with goodbye.  The message went on to encourage us to consider our own goodbyes – a dying friend? Leaving a home that no longer is?  Dealing with transitions?  I moved to a seat far from the crowd so I could make a quick exit if it got to be too much.

I was seated near the choir, and got a bit wary.  We have wonderful music at St. Perpetua, our pastor insists upon it, but it is what I would consider appropriate.  As I looked over and saw the drum kit behind the choir I was reminded of a Newman Center at University of Missouri in Columbia where the music during Mass sounded like we were at a football game.  Even my mother agreed to leave and consider our Sunday duty complete.

Al is working long hours, but I looked up to see his wonderful shaved head from across the church.  I took him back to my little corner and sobbed quietly.   Surely I would be safe with him there now.  Soon the Mass began.  The drums were not involved but each chorister had their own music stand and their own mike.  It was decidedly loud.  The lights on in the church are somewhat garish.  To be fair, this is a new community and the great hall is the worship space — church to come in the future.   But I missed St. Perpetua, where the lights are subtle at night and the atmosphere on Holy Thursday is, well, holy.  I just called on Terri and figured she’d be rolling her eyes with me.  Seriously, though, I was ready to move on to another service at another church that began at 8 p.m.

Before I knew it, the Gospel had been read and it was time for washing of the feet.  I always think I am not going to participate, and I always do.  This time I really  didn’t want to. Terri and I frequently washed each other’s feet and one year we even knelt down to wash her daughter’s feet together.  It was one of those moments you know you will never forget for its spiritual power.  The last time I held Terri’s feet in my hands was at the moment she died.  I felt her pulse fade away under my hands.  Her feet are the last thing I will know about her forever.

I went.  As I stood in line to get my feet washed (in this parish, the priest and parish staff and lay ministers washed the people’s feet), the trouble began.  I started to cry.  I couldn’t stop.  I hid it as best I could, wiping my eyes frequently, but by the time I sat down in the chair and slipped off my sandals, I could do nothing but put my head in my hands and weep.

Everyone sits in that chair in a unique state of mind.  Kids feel rather silly.  Some adults do, too.  This is not a day and age when we generally wash each other’s feet.  Some come with joy.  The people before me belong to the parish, they smiled at their friends who were doing the washing.  The washers looked at me for a smile of recognition when I sat down but all they saw was a person in deep grief.  The woman gently rubbed my feet with lemon, poured cool water over my feet.  The man gently towel dried my feet.  I said thank you but could not look at them.  The man held my foot until I looked him and he said “Thank you.”  See, that’s what it’s all about folks.  They were healing me, and in doing so they were healed.  It doesn’t get any closer to what my definition of Christianity is than that.

The Mass continued.  The music situation didn’t get any better – I mean the singers were all perfect – and loudly so.  The pianist never started with anything but a LOUD downbeat chord that made you jump out of your skin.  Now my pastor at St. P’s would probably joke that we cantors could use a strong downbeat, as we frequently miss our entrance. No chance of that tonight.  By the time the Holy Holy Holy rolled around and that jarring two hand chord downbeat hit the air I was holding back a giggle.  Terri probably had plenty of people asking her to be with them tonight.  Maybe she just managed to arrive at my side.  But I swear she was laughing with me and saying “what’s THAT about?” We would have joked about it all the way home.

Finally, the Mass concludes with the Blessed Sacrament, the Body of Christ processing out of the church to an area of repose.  There it will remain until midnight tonight.  Terri and I would sit in that area for a long time after Holy Thursday Mass.  It is reminiscent of Gethsemane, where Jesus prayed the night before he died.  It is a powerful moment of ritual for me and was for Terri.  I missed her body there tonight, but I didn’t miss her spirit, she was right there with me.

I have a little card that I keep – it says: “The Cross is where you leave your burdens and walk in faith.”   This was a difficult and very special Holy Thursday.  Next year will be easier I’m sure.  Until then I walk by faith.

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Where am I?

Posted on April 5, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

If you hear of a missing person matching my description on the news it just means I’m wandering around being lost.  We are in Laguna Hills and that is the worst – the roads change names, they twist and turn, one minute I’m going east and then suddenly on the same road I’m going west (I can only tell this because I understand the movement of the sun across the sky).

It seems there is no such thing as a “grid” in this area.  Despite the fact that is area is largely “planned development,” apparently the town borders were here long before this and were determined as far as I can tell, by ranchers putting their fences up wherever they damn well pleased depending on the water and the grass available.   Then they eventually got together on a Saturday night at the local saloon and said “ok, our two ranches will be one town, and your two ranches will be the other.”  They had another shot and that was that.  Of course I’m making all this up but it seems plausible. Why else would one town be split down the middle by another town, which then moves to split apart yet another town, which has been split apart already by the first town?

Yes, that is what I am dealing with and I AM SO CONFUSED!

Last week I went to Dana Point to join a chorus (yay!)  When I left my house, I followed my GPS.  I have already learned that I should just shut up and not argue with the GPS right now.  I knew Dana Point was southwest of where I live.  But the GPS told me to turn east on the main drag.  I was sure I was never going to get to chorus because as I drove I could take off my sunglasses – it was 6 p.m and the sun was clearly behind me and I was headed due east.

I knew that the main drag would change names somewhere along the line, so that did not phase me.  I kept driving, figuring that it really didn’t matter in the big scheme of things if I never arrived at chorus.  I glanced around, noticing the Trader Joe’s and telling myself I’d have to remember where it was, and oh, there’s an Ace Hardware and gee, imagine that – a Starbucks!  Suddenly, despite being on the same road and not having been aware of any turns, sharp or otherwise, I was being blinded by the sun and there was the ocean ahead of me.  Yes, I was facing due west.

It’s been going on like this for three weeks.  I have always prided myself on being good with directions, having a sixth sense  of where I am in space, based on 57 years of watching the sun come up and go down.   It’s true that because I grew up living in Illinois where the Large Body of Water –  Lake Michigan – was east, even after 30 years in the Bay Area I would have to consciously think when I took an exit ramp that demanded I choose between east and west. I would have to go through the mental process each and every time: “In Illinois the water was east.  Here the water is west (over those coastal hills).  You want to go towards the water.  Go west, young man, go west.”

But here in Orange County (which is gorgeous, friendly and I’m very happy thank you very much, don’t even think I’ll be looking for that plastic surgeon after all,  there are normal people here) the hills go every which way, there is no coastal range per se to orient me, and I wander around aimlessly.  Fortunately I have enough time now but next week I start work – as a home health visiting physical therapist have mercy on my soul.

Call me once in awhile.  I will have my phone plugged into the cigarette lighter on the car and I figure I can just gas up and keep wandering, but it would be nice to hear from you once in awhile, and maybe you could guide me home.

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The Logic of Hot Rod

Posted on April 4, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

I  put a photo of Hot Rod and Ed the Dog so you get some perspective on how big Hot Rod is.  Ed is a 50 pound boxer.  Hot Rod has a head the size of a playground ball.  He is an Argentinian Mastiff and looks very scary.  He is a gentle giant.  Jeff adopted him for the shelter in Santa Barbara where he worked after getting to know him for some months.  He is rarely aggressive.  I can’t say never (and Jeff is aware of that, Mom, and keeps him muzzled when he takes him for a walk…) because:

His first encounter with Twister the Cat last year was not a peaceful one.  She, as usual, gave a hiss and a nasty cat swipe at his face when he came up to say hello and forever after when he got a whiff or her or a glimpse of her all hell would break loose.  He didn’t just look scary and there’s no question he would have killed her or maimed her had he gotten his paws on her.  When Jeff came back last summer we decided to find a temporary home for Twister.  Of course, Terri agreed and by the end of the summer she was referring to her place as Terri’s Summer Camp for Twister.  Jeff went off to KU at the end of the summer and took Hot Rod with him.  Hot Rod has a little female beagle roommate who doesn’t scratch him in the face but lets him know who’s boss.

Last Monday night (and we’ll just touch on this lightly) Kansas lost to Kentucky in the NCAA National Championship game. As you can imagine the whole campus, after drowning their ecstasy two nights earlier when they beat Ohio State to be in the showdown, now drowned their sorrows at the loss.  Most of the campus was passed out somewhere, except the guys who walked in the unlocked back door of Jeff’s house and stole their TV.  I know you are all dying to know right now – are they still alive?  Did they escape with just barely their lives as well as the TV?

Both Hot Rod AND Sylvia, who howls like a beagle at anything that moves, DID NOTHING.  Fortunately they only wanted the TV (I still wonder if it wasn’t someone they knew, it’s awfully suspicious that it’s so random) and left the bikes, the computers, the phones etc.  Not they couldn’t have made numerous trips out to a waiting van with everything else, as far as Hot Rod was concerned.

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Neurotic Pets

Posted on April 1, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

OK, both Twister and Ed the Dog have had a rough time of it since moving.  For the first couple of weeks the only time we saw Twisty was when the food bin opened.  Then she was gone again. When we first arrived I put all her accoutrements (oh for heaven’s sake, WordPress, you not only underline accoutrements as some kind of misspelling, but you underline WordPress as well – what gives here?)  ahem….I put all her accoutrements in the downstairs bathroom that is just a toilet and sink, figuring we wouldn’t use it that much.  That was a mistake for two reasons – we use it that much and also poor kitty had to run the gauntlet of Ed the Dog every time she wanted to do her business.

Unfortunately, as you know, I had to return to Lafayette to grieve Terri almost immediately after moving here.  That short week my friend Deanne came over to service Ed the Dog in the afternoon.  Al works long hours and we didn’t want him alone that long.  It didn’t matter.  Apparently he had a doggie nervous breakdown (not that far from normal behavior for  Neuroto-dog) and peed on the rug every day.  I arrived  to rugs in a rental home that needed attention.

Off to the internet I go, searching for the answer.  I settled on vinegar at first, let it dry, then baking soda plus hydrogen peroxide and a little dishwashing liquid.  I also read that using a black light you can see where it all is.

I want to make it very clear right here and now that Ed the Dog was not the first animal to pee on the rug.  It also looked like someone did some ironing (school project involving appliques or something?) on the rug as there were spots that looked like an iron had been placed on the rug.  I don’t know.  So I’m not going to worry about it.  If you want to be totally grossed out about your home, just turn off all the lights and turn on a black light.  Ew.

The problem now is that I did such a great job of cleaning up that now the spots where the pee was looks cleaner than the rest of the time-worn rug.  What to do about that I have no idea except to get a pro in here to clean the whole rug.

Then it appeared Twisty was peeing.  I could tell because it was small, female kitty sized circles and under the black light there were none of the wild patterns that looked like Ed the Dog was trying to write his name in the snow like a typical guy.  This worried me, I mean if I catch the dog doing it I can scream his name and yell loudly that he shouldn’t be doing that .  I can’t do that with the cat, because she is a stealthy little gal and because I can’t throw her out the door.  We have coyotes.  I’m not that bitter.

I consulted with her REAL owner, my son Andy, who suggested (as did my online searches) that maybe she has a bladder infection.  This seemed like as good a time as any to try out a new vet – which was highly successful.  Nice young man who has been practicing for awhile with another group and decided to open his own clinic.  Perfect.  Didn’t want a corporate owned vet.  Regardless, you have to get some pee to do the test.  They don’t give the cat a cup and tell her to put her name on it and go to the bathroom.  This guy is a winner – he and his wife took her back and he said once they got her on her back she just laid there complacently.   She really must be sick.

Of course we haven’t gotten the test results.  I put her stuff in the upstairs bathroom and I have not seen any more spots on the rug.  Figures.  $146 later and all she needed was a room of her own that she could get to without having the pee scared out of her by the dopey dog.

In the meantime, Ed the Dog seems to have calmed down as well.  We have spent a couple of nights cuddling (yes, he’s a Boxer, yes he thinks he’s  a lap dog) watching TV and it appears he is getting the idea that this is home now.  Both of them ADORE the fact that the sun streams through the many windows in this house.  Everywhere you look in this house there are animals lounging around in the sun like  the Real Housewives of Orange County.

The icing on the cake for Ed the Dog was when Robbie, Andy’s college roommate who lives down here and a frequent visitor in Lafayette, came to warm our home.   That was when he knew everything was going to be all right.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that  Eddie will now revert back to his adult self and get a grip.

So now I’m left with the rugs.  There is decidedly no odor, of that I’m sure, but the cleaner than clean thing – well, I just hope that a year of living here will even it all out over time.

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Settling In

Posted on March 25, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

I arrived home last Thursday from Terri’s funeral.  It was an emotional and exhausting four days.  It still seems like a bad dream to me, but of course there is nothing now but to move on.

I was supposed to go to Colorado to be with Joe and Jeff for the NCAAs and to perhaps ski, but Friday morning found me unable to do much but walk around in a fog.  I did laundry but couldn’t focus enough to decide what to pack, and the thought of another plane trip just sent me over the emotional edge.  Reluctantly, I let Joe and Jeff know I wouldn’t be coming and that I would definitely be a party pooper if I did come.  We will be going there again in May for Joe’s graduation from CU so…

Now.  What I would like to know is how come it never occurred to me that packing up all our stuff was only half the story?????  We are not unpacking everything figuring this will be a temporary home for about a year, but I am finding that a lot of stuff will get unpacked just to carry on our life in these United States of America.  Each box of “essentials” I unpack reminds me that in another year it will have to get packed up again.  Presumably we won’t be moving that far so I envision it as similar to the college student/young adult moves of yesteryear – throwing much of it into the back of the car and going back and forth.

We are comfortable though.  Our rental house is pleasant enough – lots of natural light, quiet.  I was mentioning to Al yesterday that for some reason this house just feels like a home, which is not something I would have expected.  It guess the “stuff” of life is really what makes a house a home.  I can’t wait for the guys to come and bless this place with their presence.  But there on the wall is the clock Jeff made in middle school woodshop, there’s Ed curled up in his bed, the glide rocker I bought at that Black Friday garage sale a few Thanksgivings ago in the corner, the little caned rocker that I re-caned in my college apartment and of course my piano.  It all means I’m home.

Al and I cannot believe we are really together again for more than a weekend.  It has been three years, which in itself if almost impossible to fathom.  Before you know it I’ll be packing up.  Or not, who knows?  I could stay here for quite some time and be perfectly happy I think.

 

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A Storm in SoCal!

Posted on March 19, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

I am so excited.  I laughed when the SoCal weather reports called for a storm on Saturday, and showed the satellite of it moving down from the arctic to the west coast, and then making its way here.  Oooh, I’m scared.  A southern California storm.  Must be a whole .5 inch on the way.

My uppity northern California girl best-storms-on-the-planet attitude was taken down a notch by the end of the day on Saturday.  Hail.  Wind. The lone palm tree in the backyard allowed its crown be blown back like a fashion model’s hair in a photo shoot.   A tile flew off the roof of the rental house scaring the bejeezus out of Ed the Dog and making him bark at the imaginary bad guy for a good five minutes.  Because I really like my new home – it’s airy and the newest house we’ve ever had in California, so doors close tight and faucets turn off without having to know the secret code – I had started already thinking that maybe I didn’t need a view home anymore.

That was until this storm.  It was clearly coming in from the ocean.  We are less than 10 miles from the ocean and the way the rain was coming in horizontally,  it didn’t  look like a good day to be enjoying a sail out of Dana Point Harbor.  I started running around, looking out of windows for a better view.  Perhaps the upstairs windows? No – could only see the house across the street and a tiny bit of valley to the right.

The rain continued to pound on the window throughout the day.  It was heavenly.  It lingered through Sunday morning but that was it.  I guess there probably won’t be the endless Bay Area storms that roll in and last for days or weeks, but that one rip snortin’ storm my first week down south gave me hope that maybe I won’t die of sunshine and blue sky boredom.

 

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Travelling Zoo

Posted on March 14, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

Al took off early Sunday morning with the 26′ UHaul.  I was to follow up with a pickup truckload o’ stuff and Ed the Dog and Twister the Cat.  The truck could literally not take one more item.  I had to leave the litter box and have Al pick up a new one before I arrived in SoCal.   Anna came over to pick up a few items I needed to give her – including extra boxes and packing materials she could use to clean out Sweetbriar.  Andy was able to come for awhile to pick up some last minute items.  By the end of the process Anna and I were unpacking boxes and stuffing things into corners of the truck wherever they would fit.

Finally got on the road.  Ed the Dog was medicated and situated in his bed in the back seat. He’s just so nutsy, he would whine and pace the whole seven hours – add the presence of a cat in there and…well, he was medicated, that’s all.  Twisty was in her travel crate on the front seat next to me, and just above her was her fuzzy bi-level barrel where she can hide at home; it was lying on its side and all was just fine.

Twisty began bitching almost immediately.  Ed the Dog didn’t say much but wasn’t quite ready to lie down.  I had to stop twice before I even got out of town because the cat food bin kept falling onto Ed the Dog’s space every time I turned a corner.  Finally got that settled but then…

Suddenly the back window opened completely.  I sort of panicked – heaven knows what a drugged out Ed the Dog would do – jump out the window at some hallucination or just a big ol’ truck passing by?  I couldn’t figure out why I couldn’t close the window – the kiddie lock wasn’t on, I was pushing the correct button.  When I finally was able to get to an exit, all the while saying “Stay! Good boy! Stay!” – it turns out Druggie Doggie was sitting on the window button – so he had opened the window but like a good dog he was “staying” and so I couldn’t close the window.

Off we go again.  By this time Twisty has become psychotic.  Mind you, I’m only two  miles out of town.  She tries to claw apart the bars of her travel cage.  I start to think of where I might find a pet store before I hit I-5 down the Big Valley so I can get some of the kitty calming drops the vet told me about.  About this time my stomach takes the opportunity to remind me I haven’t eaten much all day.  In n Out Burger seemed like the way to go – satisfying and enough to get me all the way to LA.  As I pass the first one Twisty seems to have calmed down, Ed is already asleep, so I keep going, knowing the next one is half an hour away.  This is vaguely reminiscent of the years travelling with children, the Golden Rule of those years being “If the kids are asleep in the car, pee in a jar if you must, but DON’T STOP.”

I arrive at the Livermore In n Out, but by the time I drive around looking for the pet store, Twisty has again seemed to have acclimated, so I drive on.

Until the first rest stop, by which time she is chewing at the bars.  OK, I’ve never travelled with a cat, what do I know?  I take a chance.  After I take my rest stop, I let her out.  Ed the Dog is thankfully dopey enough that he doesn’t much care. before I start the car up,  I let her roam around the car a bit, hissing at her if she comes near me in the driver’s seat.  After a few minutes she climbs into her furry house thingy and that’s that.

From then on, peace reigned.  Once in a while she would poke her head out of the openings of the houselet to look around, mewing a bit on the summit of The Grapevine (do cats have the altitude thing in their ears like we do?) and coming out completely when we hit the LA freeways, as if to say “LA!  This could be my big opportunity!”  She watched the trucks go by and in typical cat style, acted as if she could take them on.

Ed the Dog slept.  It was nice to have my little buddies with me.  I think it would have been too sad to drive away and watch my old life disappear in the rear view mirror without their goofy animal antics.  That little black Twisty head popping out once in a while made me giggle more than once, and made me feel like I wasn’t alone.

 

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Back to the Future

Posted on March 14, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

It has been difficult for me to get back to Favorite Philosopher.  Al and I completed our move to Laguna Hills, CA on Sunday March 11.  There is plenty of debris rolling around in my brain to write about, but I have been avoiding writing because of the first thing that must be written down before I can move on.

My dear friend Terri is gone.  I am fine, going about the endless business of a major move, until I have to speak those words, write those words, accept those words.  It is incomprehensible to me.  She had cancer for so long, and for so long it was a non-issue, asymptomatic, held at bay, not real.  Then, in the blink of an eye, it was a big issue, very aggressive, unable to be contained, all too real.  And now she is gone, in a matter of a few months.

I left Lafayette and it is probably just as well.  Her mother, Marge, who has lived there for 12 or so years, will be moving out of the home she and Terri rented.  Marge was my buddy, too.  I took her to doctor’s appointments, Christmas shopping, errands now and again.  She will move to Sacramento and I fear I will never see her again.  We (Terri, her kids, my kids…) all called her “Speedy” because she walked so slowly with her walker, to her resigned delight.  She went to Mass every single morning and will be leaving her support community as well.  I worry about her.  She will be 90 years old on this Saturday, St. Patrick’s Day (an Irish girl from the get-go!)

Within a month from today the house will be empty of all the life that existed there over the years – the casual barbecues, the Halloween gatherings, the quilting marathons, the teenagers roaming in and out over the years, Speedy clunking down the hall at every commercial break like her therapist instructed.  The next time I return, there will be no “there” on Sweetbriar Circle.  Someone else will live there.  It will all be like a dream.  It is surreal, the fleeting nature of life, how quickly we can be erased from a particular scene.  Like my next door neighbor, whose lifetime of belongings I watched be dumped into a dumpster over a period of weeks – we are forgotten it seems simply by tossing the stuff of our lives.

Of course, we are not forgotten.  We are eternal in God’s universe, only having occupied this human form for a short time until we are set free again.  When I was leaving the hospital after feeling the life leave Terri’s body under my hands, a woman was being guided into a wheelchair, ready to be wheeled to the maternity floor where a new life would enter this world, its very first inhale sharing in Terri’s final exhale.

It’s just too big to figure.  I will write more presently, but will take a few minutes, as I always do after writing the words “Terri is gone,” to cry my tears of disbelief and grief.  I will always remember this dear woman with whom I shared so much of myself and whose presence allowed me to achieve so much of the potential of Mary Horton Sondag.  I hope that I can honor our friendship and love by not ever forgetting who I was in her presence – good humored, creative, open and sacred.  I wish I could have always had that help to be the best I can be in this life, but hopefully my belief in angels will be confirmed in the days to come.

She wrote these words to her children in her last hours and whispered them to me: “Always talk to me, I will be there.”   Please excuse me while I do just that, in hopes that my deep sorrow will be transformed into joyful action.

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The Wind

Posted on March 6, 2012 by favoritephilosopher

Today is a dark day for me.  One of my dearest friends, Terri, is coming home from the hospital today and is not expected to live beyond a few hours or days.  Terri is my quilting friend, she is my camping in Yosemite friend, she is my faith friend, she is my talk philosophy friend, she is my watch funny shows and drama shows on TV friend.  She has had this cancer for 12 years.  The life expectancy was ten, and only within the last few months did it ravage her body, and only within the last week did her body deteriorate completely.  It is for this reason that those of us close to her are in shock.  As recently as last week we were packed to go to Yosemite over night, it was my great desire to get her there before she died, but that morning I could see that she would not do well in altitude.  So, again, we just hung out in her living room and…well, just hung out like we always do.  With Al’s job taking him out of town over the past 3 years and her husband having left a few years back, I have been at her house almost every evening, and as Terri would explain to people who came in “this is what we do – hang out, watch TV, surf the ‘net, laugh.”

Earlier in the summer during one of those summer nights when I was quilting, for a week straight we had a heat wave, but every evening the breeze would come through the living room window to cool us off.  One night she stopped and looked at me and said “We will have to remember these summer nights.”  I will never forget her saying that, and I will always remember.

Now today I will go to that home for the express purpose of holding her hand while she leaves me.  She and I have a strong faith, and I believe I will always catch glimpses of her throughout my life.  But I will miss the day to day, the field trips to quilt shops, and Yosemite, Yosemite, Yosemite.  She wants her ashes spread there, so it will always remain even more special that it already was.  She will be at my campfire like she always was, she will stand next to me and watch the waterfalls, she will be there as I look up at the sheer cliffs and marvel at God’s real church.  When we were there in August we talked back and forth between our tents, looking up at the sky through the tent roof windows on  a Yosemite morning.

Terri loves the wind.  She told me once how, growing up on the coast, when she was at the age where death was inconceivable, she and her friends would stand on the cliffs over the ocean, leaning out as far as they would with their arms spread wide, their jackets like sails,  while the stiff ocean wind kept them from falling tumbling off the side of the cliff.

I woke up today to gusty winds coming in from the ocean, making all sorts of racket in the trees.  In a few hours I will go to the hospital to meet with hospice and prepare to bring Terri home.  I only wish this wind could keep her from falling off this cliff, just one more time.

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