Right now isn’t the first time I’ve battled depression as a mom. Good grief, I’ve been a mother for over 25 years and have five kids. I’d have to be in a coma to never struggle. But I usually do pretty well these days. Usually.
Right now? Not so much.
My good buddy Cindy, whom I met years ago at a UU church when she was bringing her granddaughter and I was bringing my kiddos, has moved to New Mexico. I don’t blame her — it’s a fantastic new start for her — but I miss her.
She is just great fun, and a great person who is devoted to so many things that I care about too, like social justice and equality. And she’s just a hoot. And she’s been the biggest cheerleader for me — showing up at every poetry reading, foraging talk and other event I do in the public — even if she’s seen them three times before. ❤️
I guess this is an excuse for me and the kids to spend time in New Mexico, but I am a little lonely sitting in the church pews alone and not having my thrift store buddy or going to her house for supper.
I am also feeling lonely in general, and feeling a little lost. I miss having little ones. I miss breastfeeding and being pregnant and walking with a toddler whose whole little hand wraps around your finger while you walk at .02 miles an hour.
And it’s fall, which always makes my brain go back to being 8 years old and having to go back to school and bullying and throwing up in the morning from the stress of it all. And the end of garden season, and foraging season, and just being outside when your nostrils don’t freeze shut season.
So for now I’m modeling self care to my kids, which means I take a lot of baths with books and I do little things to pamper myself and I let myself be sad. I’m also taking supplements that I know help (for me, that’s SAM-e, making sure I get enough vitamin D, and adaptogens like ashwagandha and rhodiola) and making sure I get enough sleep, time outside, and exercise. And I’m working on making new friends and forcing myself out into the world.
All kinds of good stuff is happening here. I’ll write about all of that soon. But for now, I thought I’d write this in case anyone else was struggling, just to let you know you’re not alone.
I’ve always been a terrible procrastinator, especially with the practical stuff like housework and math lessons. I’ve been reading a lot of self-help books to review lately on the topic of overcoming avoidance and procrastination, and one tip that came up in one of them was to do the smallest change possible first.
Something about that appealed to me. I can do tiny things! And I know from experience that I usually keep going once I start something (but even if I don’t I’ve started progress in new habits). So I am going to try to do some micro-homeschooling and micro-housework this week for things that I keep feeling behind in. 😉
Examples…
Ask Alex to spell 3 words
Pick up the clothes on the bathroom floor that missed the hamper
Do a pushup
Wipe the counter
Go to the church (arts center) and do five minutes of organizing
Play one round of Jackbox with the kids
Read one page of history with Fiona
Take one vitamin/supplement
Anybody else feeling behind and want to join in? (Here I am pretending anybody reads this!)
I’ll keep you posted… Maybe! Since blogging is one thing I’ve fallen behind in. 😉
I promised to update you on our good news of this year, and I’m finally taking a minute to do so. It’s pretty wild! 🙂
Yes, we bought a church. It’s a 120 year old church just a block and a half from our house. They closed down a few years ago and sold it very cheap last year. Someone from out of town snatched it up right away back then and we were a little sad, but at the time we knew we had no extra money and no need for a church anyway and it was just a fun dream.
That’s the church on the left in the background in this historic photo of our town’s original high school. It was built in 1900. The steeple was removed years ago and it is now a tall rectangle on top.
Then last spring, it came back on the market. The seller had planned on making a duplex out of it and apparently realized the error of his ways. He wanted more money than he paid for it, which is one reason I suspect nobody moved on it for months. I recently inherited a little bit of money from my grandmother’s estate, and when we found out it still hadn’t sold we decided to just go look at it on a lark. We immediately fell in love with the space and started dreaming about turning it into a community arts center. It was a mess at the time (filled with things the seller had decided to store inside it) but we instantly loved it.
The seller hired movers to come take all of the stuff he had stored in the church, but we wrote into the purchase agreement that we would keep all the items original to the church like the pews, pianos, organ, dishes, fridge, oven, tables and chairs.The basement piano, which needs a lot of TLC but is perfect for kids to play on. Upstairs in the sanctuary there is a recently tuned piano and the organ.Fiona got to go with us and see it before any of the other kids because we met with the inspector on her birthday.
Art is so important to our family and such a big part of our lives — Daryl took part in “jam sessions” at quite a few different sites every month with other musicians before covid and is hugely into acting, Rhia plays several instruments and is very active in the folk punk community plus also does visual and needlework arts for sale and works as a photographer, Toria is a talented visual artist and photographer, every one of our kids has acted in plays and community theater, Daryl writes and stars in films and plays, I’m a writer and a poet, all of us have had at least a cameo in movies at this point, crafts have been a big part of our homeschooling all of these years…. Yeah, art is big for us. 🙂
Not only that, but art was hugely important to my grandmother as well. She collected art and was instrumental in helping to launch the career of a famous Ohio artist. And my biological grandfather on that side was a musician who also wrote and starred in radio plays (about social justice issues way back in the 1940’s, no less). My father was an artist too, both as a hobby (mostly nature paintings) and for a living (he did technical illustration for folks like NASA and the Agriculture Department). Using my inheritance from my grandmother on something that would benefit others in a way related to the arts seemed like such a great way to honor her and the rest of my family.
So we made an offer much less than what was asked for but just over what we knew he paid for it, and he accepted it! We officially purchased the church at the end of October and we’ve been furnishing it with supplies and spending lots of time over there. It needs a ton of work and there is still no running water, but it has been an amazing thing to focus on amidst all of our grief at losing both of Daryl’s parents, how sick I was, the kids’ recoveries, our isolation, and so much more bad this year.
The downstairs will be for visual arts, crafts, sewing, pot lucks and get togethers, and more. There is a small room that we’ve stocked with costumes of all kinds for all sizes and from all time periods (remember, we do a lot of reenacting, so we have a ton from 20 years of it!). I brought over my late mother-in-law’s beloved vintage sewing machine and I’ll be bringing over my modern one as well. Someone from our church donated 4 giant tubs of yarn that she inherited from her late mother. There are all kinds of papers, paints, pens, coloring books, odds and ends, glues, etc. for kids (and adults) to do art with. We also have brought over games that are in the costume room, especially ones related to improv and the arts.
The upstairs is stocked with musical instruments in the sanctuary that anyone can use. The hymnal holders are filled with music-related books. We have a karoake machine and microphone up on the stage area. The office has DVDs and a special section of DVDs that local folks have starred in (even a cameo), which is a lot just from our family. LOL There are also bookcases that will be stocked with writing books, poetry, etc. The front “cry room” works perfectly as a recording studio.
No, it didn’t come with a fireplace! That was in Daryl’s parents’ basement all of his life. He and his siblings are cleaning out the house to put it on the market so we moved it over to the church. That’s his mother’s rocking chair next to it and the little child’s rocking chair is from their home too. Both of Daryl’s parents loved the dulcimer and so the dulcimers are in honor of them too (the ones on the wall are made of inexpensive kits using cardboard boxes that used to be sold to schools so all children could afford musical instruments). We miss his parents so much but we love having their presence throughout the church.
It even came fully stocked with tons of large tables and folding chairs, an antique record player, a desk in the office, a sound system, pews on one half (the other half was sold but that’s perfect because there’s lots of room for dancing and playing music on that half now), two pianos and an organ. We looked up the organ and it alone is worth the price we paid for the church (which to be fair, was not a lot).
I’ve had so much fun exploring and finding all the historic treasures that were left inside. I found vintage silverware hidden behind the coffee carafes (yes, even all the coffee carafes were left behind), sweet Sunday school essays about the history of the church in the desk, plates and saucers and cups to serve a massive crowd in the cupboards, the antique stove and fridge, handmade furniture… Even the chalk and candles were still buried away in places, along with things like tablecloths, construction paper, hymnals, a slide projector, a Christmas tree and more that we have cleaned off and put to use again. And the kids have had a blast exploring all the little hidden corridors and spaces. Jack and Fiona have claimed one tiny room under the stairs as theirs.
We are very mindful of what a special place this was to people for well over a hundred years, and honoring that history. It was home to two churches, one that built it and one that bought it when the original congregation outgrew it 50+ years later (they now occupy a huge church in town). We can tell how much it meant to all of those people over the years and we are grateful and humbled to be able to continue to give it love and purpose to bless new people in new ways.
We also love honoring Daryl’s parents with so many of the things we’ve brought from their house that he and his siblings are clearing out. We love having his mother’s rocking chairs for people to sit in while they knit or listen to music, bookshelves, a futon in the office for relaxing and for friends from far away to overnight there, and even the faux fireplace from their basement. We miss his folks so much but it has been so comforting for so many of their things to find a new home there.
We have tentatively named the church “The Cottonwood County Center for the Arts.” It is very important to us that it be accessible to all, so it will probably be a sort of “donations welcome” thing for activities and events, perhaps with a membership for those who can afford to help pay to keep the heat on. 🙂 Our family missed out on so many cool events because with lots of kids and a low income, even small fees added up to more than we could often afford. We are determined that this is a space where everybody can benefit.
We have been spending so much time there — cleaning and restoring it but also having music jams, family suppers, game nights and more.
The kitchen after a little TLC.
Last night, Daryl informed us that there would be a short play at 6:30 and we showed up to see Toria, Jack and Daryl in a short Christmas play. The front stage area is so perfect for performances and the pews are perfect for watching.
There was even a hanging cloth for presentations and we discovered that our projector turns it into a great place to watch movies or for the kids to do pretty epic video gaming. 🙂
Lest I oversell it, it’s important to note that it needs a ton of work and some rather costly updates and improvements. The furnace is over 60 years old and quite temperamental, and we’ll need to replace it very soon. It needs a new roof, paint, repairs and there’s the aforementioned problem of no running water yet so we take lots of trips home to use the bathroom. 🙂 We’ve done lots of cleaning and we have to nicely evict the squirrels from the roof. But this came at the perfect time for us as we have time to put into it and can financially cover the basic repairs. There are also grants in our area for arts organizations, which may be able to help out with some of the future costs. We have been busy with updates, repairs and such but it has been a really wonderful busy to distract us from all the sadness of the year.
If you want to follow us on Facebook, there’s a brand new page that hopefully we’ll start updating soon. I imagine we’ll set up an Instagram for it too at some point, but for now you can check in on my instagram to see occasional updates.
Some of the things we plan to host in the church/arts center are:
Regular jam nights for beginners and experienced musicians
Improv and comedy fun
Craft clubs and classes for kids
Arts and crafts materials for everyone so people can create even if they can’t afford materials
Musical performances
Square dancing and other dance activities
Costumes for all kinds of acting and role playing for all ages and sizes
Free use of knitting, crochet and sewing materials and comfy places to use them
Free use of musical instruments and helpful advice for folks interesting in finding the right instrument to learn
Movie nights
Plays
Poetry readings
Displays of work by local artists
Potlucks and get-togethers
Free lending library of arts related books
A gaming area for role playing games and fun family games
Art supplies and musical instruments for little ones to use while parents play/create
A quiet space to work on personal art
A gathering space to connect with other artists
A performance space for local musicians and artists
Since our family has been so active in acting and reenacting over the years, this is just a fraction of the costumes we’ll have on hand.
We are beyond excited at what the future holds and the ways this can help spread some good stuff for so many who have been through so much this year. I’ll keep you updated on the progress!
My wonderful mother-in-law, Helen, died last month. We knew it was coming as she had both Alzheimer’s and cancer, but it happened much more quickly than we expected and it was devastating nonetheless. She was an awesome grandmother, mother and mother-in-law, and we have not been able to accept the fact that she is no longer here.
Daryl’s dad took her loss very hard. He was wracked with grief. Family members took turns visiting him and helping take care of an infection on his leg, and on Monday he fell and needed to go to the ER. We spent the day in the waiting room anxiously awaiting news (they wouldn’t let us back because of Covid) and Daryl got to briefly see him before he was transported to one of the only open ICU beds in the state. He was doing well, despite having a pint and a half of fluid drained from one lung, and we were making plans to move him to a rehabilitation center when things went wrong very suddenly and he died Thursday night.
None of us has any doubt that he died of a broken heart. He and Helen were married 65 years and he didn’t want to live in a world that didn’t have her. That said, we’re all having a very hard time coming to terms with living in a world not just without her but without him too.
Chester was a war hero (he was badly injured in the Korean War and insisting on going back once he recovered, then survived another attack that killed every other member of his platoon and left him with lifelong PTSD — he spent the rest of his life giving talks to schools and community centers about the realities of war and working with younger soldiers who were dealing with its effects), a mayor, a fire chief, a die-hard volunteer for every cause in the community and one of the nicest people you’d ever meet. He loved to tease and he was the toughest guy I ever knew. He and Helen hand built most of their house when they needed to expand it for their growing family, side by side.
My parents died many years ago and Chester and Helen were our kids’ only grandparents. They were two of the most important people in all of our lives. It’s been a hard 3 1/2 weeks.
Our family has other news that is actually very good in these tough times, but I’ll leave that for another post.
Rest in peace, Grandma and Grandpa. Thank you for being so awesome.
Well, that was an interesting spring. We took a family trip to the Mall of America for homeschool days at perhaps the worst possible time, just as Covid-19 was quietly invading the country. We stayed in a hotel, went to IKEA and Trader Joe’s, took in all the sights at the MOA (Sea Life, mini golf, laser games!)…. and brought home more than the souvenirs we’d planned.
Jack got sick first, with a terrible cough, fever, fatigue, etc. Coronavirus was barely on our radar at that point even though I had joked about “going to the biggest international tourist destination in the midwest at the start of a plague.” Yeah, perhaps I shouldn’t have thumbed my nose quite so much at fate? 😉
Corona gives you very rosy cheeks
In any case, Alex got sick for about a minute and was better. Fiona developed a high fever, stomach ache, sore throat, cough, etc. and was sick for about a week but never dangerously so. Jack got better but had lingering fatigue and muscle weakness (especially in one leg) for literally months. Rhia and Daryl didn’t really get sick at all, even though I was very worried about Daryl since he’s older and disabled.
And I… good grief did I get sick. Wowza. It pretty much leveled every system in my body. I had so many weird side effects that it felt like it was gaslighting me, since the news certainly wasn’t reporting things like numb toes, bursting blood vessels in your legs, phantom heart attacks, tingling limbs, hypothermia (my body temp dropped to 93.7 twice) or your body inexplicably forgetting to breathe when you fall asleep, just to name a few of the weirder manifestations.
I spent over two months doing breathing exercises (I cannot recommend those enough to protect your lungs, prevent pneumonia, calm anxiety, decrease blood pressure, increase lung capacity and raise your oxygen levels), drinking massive amounts of water (ditto, cannot stress this one enough), taking hot steamy baths and medicating round-the-clock with kitchen/nature remedies that I used to manage and conquer the whack-a-mole of symptoms that is coronavirus. Daryl foraged me nettles every morning for weeks to make me strong nettle tea and I also relied on fresh garlic (you must finely mince it and let it sit for 5-10 minutes before taking it to activate the alicin, and then remember to take it 2-3 times a day just as you would meds), elderberry, ginger (a very potent antiviral that is also excellent for many of the parts of the body this attacks), apple cider vinegar, fermented foods and drinks like kombucha, etc.
Two months into my illness I finally was able to see my doctor and she told me to keep doing “exactly what you’re doing” because all of my levels were so high for things like iron and white blood cell counts. Now three months from our initial sickness, Jack and I are still recovering (he is still weak and tires easily, I still have some numb toes and muscle/joint pain) but we’re firmly in the post-viral phase of recovery and long past the terrifying actual illness.
I have found a lot of ways to find the blessings this gave me. I learned a lot about the honestly impressive power of affirmations, meditation and deep breathing, and the importance of finally prioritizing sleep, stress relief and real self care. I spent time every day on our roof balcony doing light yoga and stretching and getting sunshine for vitamin D. I went for walks and bike rides with the kids to make sure I got light exercise every day that I could (there’s about a month that’s pretty much a blur though). I’ve lost weight and toned my body. I gave up coffee and lost my hot flashes in the process. I gave up wine for a month or two but Daryl and Tiffany convinced me that it would be okay if I wanted to imbibe again and boy, did I want to after all that. 🙂 I spent my time doing things I enjoyed like reading and reviewing books, working in the garden, watching Netflix and Hulu with the kids, and spending quality time with Daryl. And we all made it.
It was intense and there were some really terrifying times (I’m intentionally skipping over the scariest stuff). Don’t underestimate this thing. But boy do you appreciate the little things (like being alive) when life reminds you how lucky you are.
If you or someone you love is sick with Covid-19 and you want more detailed information on the best resources I’ve found, let me know. I found that the media and most websites were really worthless for the most part, but there are a few helpful sites out there and I can round them all up if it’s helpful.
I’m just going to jump in like I’ve been yapping regularly all this time and not bother to try to catch up at the moment. 🙂
We’re back from a week at Tiffany’s in Nebraska, and it was just what we needed. I took Alex and Fiona in my new(ish) Nebraska car that I got last summer. (I jokingly call my cars Nebraska cars since I rarely drive other than going to visit Tiffany, and it’s been a few years now since I had a “Nebraska car” or vehicle of my own.)
We escaped the snow and bitter cold of Minnesota for far less snow and more bearable cold of Nebraska.
Fiona and Millie were inseparable, as always. When we’re all home in our separate states, the girls spend much of every day video chatting and playing “side by side” that way, so it didn’t seem to them as if they’d been away from each other at all (they are video chatting again right now as I type, as a matter of fact).
We didn’t do a whole lot, which is mostly the point when we go. We sit around under cozy blankets and read books and do crossword puzzles, drink copious amounts of British tea, help Tiffany walk and play with the numerous dogs she cares for, and play cards and Pictionary into the night. It’s wonderfully laid back and rejuvenating.
Tiffany’s Jack (now 17!) has been going to the local public school for the past couple of years since they have really fantastic programs for kids with Downs Syndrome, so he was gone during the weekdays. Once he was home, he and Alex had great times playing Wii and Minecraft,, practicing basketball and hanging out, too.
We did some crafts to use up some of Tiffany’s craft supplies and had fun painting (this was my sign to remind myself to say yes to more, in all kinds of ways).Jessie even did a couple of fantastic tarot readings for me to practice her craft (she’s started a tarot business that is going really well).
Escaping to Nebraska is always just what we need. I’m now ready to face reality for at least another month. 🙂
Daryl told me years ago that he read in a novel that September was “the month of winds and magic.” That has always stuck with me and while I kind of hate September for signalling the end of summer, I kind of love September for a hundred other reasons.
(Of course, this year September has really been the month of winds, with the hurricanes and tornadoes. Tornadoes even hit our area of Minnesota last night. My heart goes out to everybody affected by the storms.)
We’ve been super busy with homesteading this month, as always. September is a month where lots of garden goodies are ready to harvest and when we forage large amounts of some of our favorite wild foods like acorns and elderberries. It’s also when we forage less than wild foods like apples and pears that are free for the picking, literally. We have friends and neighbors who let us pick from their trees (we keep the ground underneath clean and often bring them goodies in thanks) and there are a lot of public places where we pick, too.
The nursing home in town has a huge pear tree that bears delicious fruit that they want no business with and also has a row of elderberry shrubs that are only there for a windbreak. Daryl has permission to go picking there and we get gallons of elderberries and bushels of pears every year. There’s also a pear tree at a rural park that bears delicious canning pears (too firm for fresh eating but perfect for canning). You can always tell where homesteads were years ago because even though there is no sign of a house anymore you will find apple trees, pear trees, peonies and other long-lived plants that once blessed the people who lived there.
We’ve also been busy with Daryl’s birthday and our wedding anniversary. As I’ve talked about before, we get married in a different way every year around our anniversary and this year we had our first back yard wedding. We made it a zany theme with lots of color and silliness. It was simple and fun.
And in other news, Jack (15) has his first job! He was hired by a local farm family to help with the harvest. He was originally hired to work 4-6 hours a day during the day just until the end of harvest season in October. Then we found out that homeschoolers under 16 are not allowed to work during public school hours even if they homeschool during other times and they’re not allowed to work more than 3 hours on a public school day, so we’ve had to change his schedule around. He now works 3 hours “after school” most weekdays and longer on Saturdays.
It’s hard work but he is doing a great job and he got his first paycheck yesterday. His boss also told him yesterday that he was his best worker and that he’d decided to give him a raise! I could not be more proud of my boy. 🙂
The weather is turning cold and I’m doing my best to embrace it and not yearn for lake days and sprinkler weather. Snow will be coming way too soon here in Minnesota but for the most part we’re too busy to focus on that anyway.
The rest of September and October will be very hectic. I’m giving an acorn foraging presentation at a library by the Twin Cities in early October, then we have Fiona’s birthday and the week of History Fest, which is a crazy but wonderful time. And then there’s processing hundreds of more pints and quarts of applesauce, pears, spaghetti sauce, salsa, and so on.
I am honestly so excited about 2018, as I’m thinking that after the epic awfulness of 2017 there’s nowhere to go but up! 🙂 I feel as if a light is being turned on again, or I’m making it turn on. Things will turn around. I just know it.
I’m not going to bother talking about the bad going on right now (see a previous entry if you want a taste of what has me up at 4:35 a.m. talking to you instead of sleeping!). Enough with the bad. It’ll go on whether I acknowledge it or not. So let’s look at the good.
Fiona is in such a hurry to get to more homeschooling. It makes me smile the way she nags me for more homeschool.
She has been playing like crazy with letter cubes, math manipulatives and pen and paper lately. She happily made up words with letter dice yesterday, bringing me four cubes at a time for me to help her form words from them. Her reading and spelling are coming along so fast now. I have promised her that we will get to lots of everyday homeschooling on Tuesday after the holiday. We had a forced (by me) school break with everything else going on. 🙂
Santa gave Alex a 3-month Gamefly subscription for Christmas and as a result I have seen him far less than usual! He and Jack have had so much fun playing together though, and it’s the dead of winter when it’s hard for him to get out and do as much as he’d like to. It’s currently -20 F (no, that doesn’t factor in the wind chill and yes, it is really that cold) so he can’t even play in his beloved snow until it gets a bit less life-threatening out there — though this weather is good for the occasional quick outdoor science experiment like freezing bubbles and vaporizing hot water to make instant clouds.
Jack, Alex and Fiona have all been having a ball with library books right now, too. Toria has a weekly appointment in a city an hour away that turns out to have a fabulous library, so we go and stock up every couple of weeks. The little ones love it and even Jack has discovered some beloved new book series. I love the way he’ll say he has no interest in a book and then read the entire thing before we get home that day!
I have made all sorts of resolutions for this new year on every front there is — housekeeping, homeschooling, work, personal, health… We’ll see how well they all work out but I am really excited about trying, which is a nice change.
I’ve been homeschooling for over 15 years now, with one child already completely done and one about to finish (Rhia will graduate in the spring!). I don’t want to shortchange the younger kids with waning enthusiasm for it all, but it is hard to juggle the needs of so many different ages and stages — especially with Victoria’s scary health issues and now the issues with her new (old) house and all that it’s bringing into our lives (burst pipes and dead furnaces in 20 below weather anybody?).
But I’ve renewed our memberships to the science museum and the zoo, I’ve made up daily plans and I just have this faith that has been missing since the train wreck that was 2017 begun. Hope, optimism, all that jazz.
I’m ready to blast through a hundred lesson plans, art projects, history games, math challenges and educational obstacles and make some magic again.
Happy 2018, all! May it be a fantastic one for all of us.
There are some times in life that are just magical. Things seem to have all clicked into place. The world seems full of possibilities and I wonder often how I got to be so lucky.
This doesn’t happen to be one of those times.
To be honest, things have been difficult. For quite some time. I have been doing my best to put one foot in front of the other and just get through it, but that doesn’t make for much inspiration for blog posting (or much of anything else).
The past couple of years have been hard. I lost my job as a columnist when Examiner.com went down. I really enjoyed that job as I got to write about all the things I loved and was passionate about (homeschooling, sustainable living and attachment parenting). I got hired at a new site and made good money but only if I mass produced content that I found soul-draining. Yes, I occasionally wrote about topics I was passionate about, but those tended to tank and get me stern messages from management, so I found myself writing about celebrity baby names and seedy news stories. I decided to quit and try to make it as a Kindle/CreateSpace author even though I knew that would be a drastic cut in pay and we already live on next to nothing. I don’t regret that (life is too short to sell yourself out for a paycheck) but it has meant no more frugal Florida vacations and some really serious belt tightening on top of what was already an extremely thrifty life.
Then in the fall of last year, our beloved dog, Layla died. We all still miss her. Then on New Year’s, my grandmother died. We had seen it coming and had made the trip to Ohio three times that year to try to take care of her and get time with her, but it was still a very sad loss for all of us.
Then in the spring of this year, three of my friends died. One was my dear friend “Savage,” an ex-cop who was a close friend of mine from years ago (he even walked me down the aisle when Daryl and I married 21 years ago). One was a really wonderful homeschool mama friend who was one of the best people I’ve ever known. And one was an old friend here in town.
And then Victoria’s pseudo-tumors hit. Things are still pretty dire there, despite lots of visits to the Mayo. I am not just worried about the pseudo-tumors themselves and the pain and issues they bring, but also about finding the underlying illness that is probably causing them and about the massive doses of steroids the doctors have her on to manage them and the toll those are taking on my poor daughter’s body. Toria has been through so much already — the cancer, the sepsis, emergency surgeries and baffling illnesses. At 19, she has had three surgeries and all of them have been above the neck. She is handling this so well but nobody should have to go through this.
There have also been lots of other little catastrophes and sadnesses. Daryl is recovering from major shoulder surgery and has been in pretty severe pain and quite limited in what he could do for the past two months. Someone stole things from our van that was parked in our driveway this week. Victoria and Gabe are in their new house but have no heat (in Minnesota December). Fiona wants far more of me than there is right now and would prefer twenty times more homeschooling than she is currently getting, which leads to great guilt on my part. Alex, at 10, has hit his first existential crisis and cried for an hour at me the other day about things that were making him sad and about not wanting to leave his childhood. And the teenagers — well, parenting teenagers has never been a joyful and worry-free time in this house.
And those are just the things I can make public. There is a lot more that has been keeping my insides full of rocks and waking me up in the night. (Not to mention what’s been going on in the country and the world, which has been a pretty endless string of awful.)
So I have been sad. Just sort of bone-crushingly sad for a pretty long time. I keep trying to turn things around for all of us and start the day fresh and make some magic, but more often than not I have just been trying to put one foot in front of the other.
I keep thinking about a blog post I made 6 years ago when I said I was too tired to talk about cancer anymore and then unloaded here. I guess twice a decade I need to just call everything out for the train wreck it currently is and then put one foot in front of the other again.
So that’s things here.
As always, I am brainstorming ways to turn everything around and make us all happy today. And also just to keep going. It will get better.
As one of my favorite singer-songwriters, Jason Isbell, sang, “Last year was a son of a bitch for nearly everyone we know.”
“Hope The High Road” (Jason Isbell And The 400 Unit)
I used to think that this was my town What a stupid thing to think I hear you’re fighting off a breakdown I myself am on the brink
I used to want to be a real man I don’t know what that even means Now I just want you in my arms again And we can search each other’s dreams
I know you’re tired And you ain’t sleeping well Uninspired And likely mad as hell But wherever you are I hope the high road leads you home again
I heard enough of the white man’s blues I’ve sang enough about myself So if you’re looking for some bad news You can find it somewhere else
Last year was a son of a bitch For nearly everyone we know But I ain’t fighting with you down in a ditch I’ll meet you up here on the road
I know you’re tired And you ain’t sleeping well Uninspired And likely mad as hell But wherever you are I hope the high road leads you home again To a world you want to live in
We’ll ride the ship down Dumping buckets overboard There can’t be more of them than us There can’t be more
I know you’re tired And you ain’t sleeping well Uninspired And likely mad as hell But wherever you are I hope the high road leads you home again To a world you want to live in To a world you want to live in
Here’s to better days. And I promise to blog something fun next time. 🙂
Magic and Mayhem 