Transitions

My  precious daughter is days, perhaps hours, from becoming a mother. Although labor is a painful transition, nothing compares to the exhilaration of holding a newborn in your arms for the first time.  As a mother, I can’t wait for her to experience that joy.

Daughter. Wife. Mother.

Nine months of growth.

Watching her pregnancy progress, I’ve been transitioning, too.

Mother. Widow. Grandmother.  It’s been a painful nine months for me after losing my husband. But I am joyously awaiting the birth of my grandson and the birth of my new life.

 

Eighteen Months Ago = A Lifetime Ago

My last blog entry was 18 months ago.  I wrote about the turbulent summer of 2018.  Turns out, 2018 was a whisper compared to the trauma tornado that was 2019.

March brought a second terminal and painful diagnosis for my husband–as if dialysis wasn’t enough.  On April Fools Day a cast iron sewer pipe burst in our house, flooding us out.  The next 10 days were spent bouncing from Airbnb to Airbnb while our foundation was jackhammered open to remove and replace the corroded pipes.  Trying to work full time and take care of my husband was a nightmare.  Someone backed into his car; my car battery died.  Couldn’t get much worse, but it got better.

We were so grateful to be back home.  For a few days in May life was good and sweet and peaceful.

Then he nearly bled to death.  From May to July he was in the hospital five times, including a week at the state medical university hospital.  He hemorrhaged three more times. Too weak to walk, he chose to go to a rehab/nursing home to build up his strength to return home.  He didn’t want to discontinue dialysis and go into hospice.  Also, the second condition was miraculously improving.  Every night it took me an hour to bandage his extensive wounds, but he was getting better.

He wanted to live.  By August he made it home. I replaced our king bed with a hospital bed for him with a twin beside it for me.  We snuggled under our matching green fuzzy covers.

September brought a brief hurricane evacuation, a friend’s wedding and a Games Afternoon hosted at our house.  We went to church, went out to eat.  Little things, normal people things, but oh how we treasured them.

The last calm before the final storm…

Then, out of nowhere, came hemorrhage #5.  Another ambulance ride, another bloodbath in the living room.  When I got to the ER, he was chatting on his cell phone with one of our friends.  They’d stopped the bleeding and said he could go home.  That was Monday, October 7.

Tuesday and Wednesday passed normally.  We spent Wednesday evening reminiscing about our cabin in the North Carolina mountains.  In the wee hours of Thursday, October 10, he said he was having trouble catching his breath and sat up in bed.  Five minutes later he put his head down on the pillow and drew his last breath.

Gone, just like that.

I am here, three months later, trying to climb out of the rubble of my grief and survive.  One thing I do know.  I am forever changed.  Without him I’m not “STL16” anymore.

 

 

 

 

 

Summer of Storms

Finding time to write is next to impossible these days.  It’s late July already in a summer of storms, both atmospheric and personal.

I’m trying to hold on to summer, 95 degree and 100 percent humidity summer.  I’ve been cheated out of pool time thanks to this year’s torrential downpours that begin in the morning and last till sundown.  Sundown equals bedtime for me, summer or not, because I’m up at 4:30 a.m.

The season started spectacularly with my daughter’s beachside wedding, the very day Tropical Storm Alberto brushed the state. Now the dog days of summer have arrived and I haven’t met my quota of cookouts or ice cream or beach sand in my toes.

This summer it’s as if the east coast and west coast seabreezes are colliding right over our heads and it won’t stop pouring.

That pretty much describes where we’re at right now–the aftermath of another hospitalization and now mobility issues.  Instead of road trip accommodations, I’m searching online for heavy-duty rollators and bedside commodes.  We should be searching for the best barbecue joint on the interstate.

Maybe this summer can be salvaged after all.  Maybe the skies will clear.  Maybe we can get my hubby out of the house and into the car for an ice cream run.

I’m not giving up on summer yet.

 

The Merry, Marry Month of May

Time flies, especially if your daughter’s wedding is in 20 days and she lives out of state.  She’s planned a simple ceremony, dinner, drinks and dancing kind of affair for 50 or so.  There’s some DIY involved, however, and I am not exactly Pinterest material.

But I do know about weddings.  I’ve had, um, several of them, and thank God I’m not making little meat rollups or hanging honeycomb bells.  She wouldn’t want either of them or tacky little favors.  To make sure I stay on task–and not venture into OMG No Mom Land–she has given me spreadsheets to follow.

I’m grateful for the guidance on the wedding plans, but experience has taught me this:  To buy the flowers wholesale and to marry the right guy.  My daughter’s taking care of both.

 

A Happier New Year

I slept through the ball drop and several hours into 2018.  For me, the best way to start a crazy new year was with a little extra shut eye, the ultimate “me time.”

No need for champagne last night since I drank plenty enough during Christmas week while the family was here.  Celebratory food and drink and laughter and love just kept coming.  My minimalist holiday decor proved to be perfectly merry enough.

To my great wonderment, the holidays actually turned out relaxing and restful and included a pair of beach outings and a movie.  I’m actually sleeping at night again.

My Stress-o-Meter has been reset for this next trip around the sun.  I’ve decided to let love–not worry–drive.  Even though detours lie ahead, love makes for a smoother journey.

P.S.-This should say “Every day” but the Grammar Police apparently have the day off in Meme World.

Shifting Seasons

The last of the Thanksgiving dishes are done.  So is fall.  I am reluctantly packing up the pumpkins, fake autumn leaves and harvest decor tonight.  I’ve made a faux fall here in honor of the Nature’s decor in the Smokies.  Oh, how those people know how to celebrate fall!

Although it’s officially the Christmas season (signaled by Santa’s first wave in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade), I haven’t quite arrived at the corner of Holly and Jolly.

Too many friends have lost loved ones this year.  We certainly live differently than we did a year ago.  Call me greedy but this holiday season I long for simplicity, sincerity and sanity.  Give me Christmas carols in the car, cookies baking in the oven.   I’ll take joy, straight up, with a chaser of good cheer.

Hello holidays, I’m on my way!

Stormy Weather

I haven’t posted a word since late May.  Blame on this maelstrom year.  It’s been one hell of a year, a year with unspeakable tragedies occurring more frequently than paydays it seems.

And then the natural disasters kicked in.  In September Irma left her mark in our little town.  We lost dozens of shingles and power for a few days.  Other than that and a pool full of oak limbs and leaves, we did just fine.  Our new roof should be on soon.

We tried to evacuate from Central Florida, but made it only 100 miles up I-95.  There’s really nowhere to go when a hurricane takes aim at the entire state of Florida, and Irma would have been right behind us anyway.  Lesson One:  Don’t think about leaving and hunker down where we are safer.

Other than our Memorial Day farewell to our mountain home, our only other adventure was seeing the eclipse at 95 percent in South Georgia.  We didn’t claim much summer joy this year.

This has been a year of losing friends, friends losing family and the passing of music icons and childhood favorites.  It’s been a year when both of us had to deal with physical limitations and diminished health.  Not surprisingly, by mid October my angry frustration had bubbled over into everything I touched.

Forthwith came Lesson Two:  Let it go.  Breathe.  Live.  Be grateful for every day.  Summer’s gone, but autumn’s light is lovely too.  And winter’s pretty damn nice in Florida.

 

 

 

 

 

Transitions

May is melting away into June quickly.  Where have the last five months gone?  I’ve spent the majority of the days being biopsied, recovering from surgery, Magic Markered and irradiated 33 times. By the time my skin looked like a blistered red potato, I’d stopped wearing anything but cotton camisoles on top.  I dragged through each day, foggy brained and fatigued, able to do one. thing. at. a. time.

Thank God I am one of the lucky ones who’ll get to pop a pill every day and (hopefully) live a fairly normal life.

My post-rads recovery has produced a pair of epiphanies:  I didn’t realize how exhausted I was until I backed into a UPS truck coming out of my own driveway.  And, after a trip to the peaceful North Carolina mountains, I finally allowed myself to grieve after a series of setbacks this year.

The decision to sell our beloved little cabin meant it was time to close a chapter in our lives.  But giving up something is infinitely easier than giving up someone.  You remember, you sigh and you move on.

Last Friday I turned 61, a day of love, tears and laughter, and our last full day in the mountains.  Now I could rejoin my life, already in progress.

Happy to be home and healing.  This sign is now in our Florida backyard.

 

 

Joining the Pink Warriors

Nobody enthusiastically joins this group, but now it’s my time.

My official invite came Jan. 29 when I received the lousy news that I had breast cancer. This came after 20 years of careful watching and benign biopsies. In my family, it’s not “if” but “when” one of us joins the club. The Big 6-0 seems to be the magic number for the Big C for us.  It happened to my mama and her mother exactly then.

Losing a breast didn’t slow either of them down much.  Mama’s still going strong and 88 plus; my grandmother made it to 87.  I may not have to make such a generous immediate flesh donation to join the club–a lumpectomy is planned–but I will also be catching some post-surgical rays provided by a radiation oncologist.

However, this isn’t the first time the Big C has knocked on our door.  In 2012 my husband lost some essential parts to bladder cancer. A parade of nasty infections have all but knocked out his kidneys since. He was in the hospital having emergency dialysis on the day of my fateful biopsy.

As I join the Pink Warriors, it’s time to channel my favorite feminine fictional badass, Scarlett O’Hara.  Like Scarlett, I’ll do what I have to do and “think about it tomorrow.”

Pat Conroy Appreciation Month

Driving through South Carolina in early April, I smiled wistfully when as we passed the exit to Beaufort. The literary light of Beaufort and gifted southern writer Pat Conroy passed away March 4.  I’d seen the “Prince of Tides” ages ago, but couldn’t recall reading the book.  I shop in the non-fiction section, usually biography, anyway.

It took reading his obituaries to learn that his novels were autobiographical, powerful and beautifully written.  I became a fan girl right then, too late to meet my new personal literary hero, but smitten just the same.

I started my Conroy binge with the Santinis–“The Great Santini” and “The Death of Santini.” I followed it with “The Water is Wide.”  Next stop is the “Lords of Discipline.”

To write about real people in your life takes real courage.  I am trying to marshal a bit of that Conway courage as I write through a family saga.  In any story, sometimes the heroes are also the villains.  They are often people we love.  Pat Conroy told his stories honestly, like a neat shot of whiskey that burned first then warmed the reader.

Son of Santini, thanks for the inspiration!