Coming Back or Going Forward?

Past Endolesence now.  Stepping into the last "stage" if you will.  Old.  Old enough to die.  Old enough to hopefully have come up with some wisdom to carry and, with earned perspective, adjust to the experiences over so much time.

And it's been a long time since I've been here.  So it looks like the last time I wrote anything here was in 2018.  My how the world has changed.  I should look back in my photos to see all I was up to since then.  Let me see...oh my... it looks like Warren was born, Ocean Grove was done (including visits from Sasha, et al and that guy from Vermont I think? and my fishing attempts in the ocean), I had that fabulous experience going into the city when "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" was being filmed, did random art work, Kathe visited for her birthday where we shared crazy slipper wearing (was that her first visit?), Maggie's engagement pictures were beautiful, we had a Retarus party at our house, Maggie and Satin had their engagement party in San Diego, Dylan was sick, I made those awesome paper flowers (succulents), and then the fantastic mobiles for the girls, Maggie was pregnant, and I got to go to her wonderful baby party in Dallas, and then in January 2020 - the girls were born, and then a million pictures of Mia and Layla, and then the apartment in Bankers' Hill, and those really novel, pretty Christmas cards I hand drew for everyone, and a lot more baby pictures and Maggie and all the girls here in Allendale, and me trying on 'Mother of the Bride' dresses everywhere (it had to be perfect), and then fireworks and our new deck furniture it seems, Lucy, our European adventure (have to review and relook at that someday - it was some trip), and ooooh "the takedown" happened sometime during the time, getting ready for the wedding at the apartment, the wedding rehearsal, the wedding, the experience at the last Airbnb, pumpkin picking with the girls and little Scott, Halloween and Sharks with the girls, Christmas at home here with the girls, the coming of the Elf, I joined the Woman's Club, more of the Elf into 2022, and omg LEGO!, more pics of visits of the girls and so much fun with them, Elmo at the airport (on my luggage I suppose for the girls as a pic to send), and then the theatre, more pics of the girls, me trying or actually selling on Poshmark (then too much buying), oooh my first and only hike with Lynn and friends, more of the girls, oh and such fun making props (the flowers for the funeral bouquets as an example), the return of the Elf, more Woman's Club stuff, my beautiful Lady A, oh and that's right I was sick for that first Fashion Show, and by then sometime I had really (with help) actually cleaned out the basement, The Play that Goes Wrong (!) and the caricatures  I did for the wall, the 2023 Fashion Show and the modeling (no pleathure shorts), the beginnings of Cooper, the bird's nest on the deck, the visit to the mid-point with Allie and Maggie, Cooper arriving and we are here.  Wow and in all of that I don't see the pandemic, signs of Frank's diagnosis and where I am now.  But so much has happened!  Wow!

I suppose not bad for a span of about five years.  Certainly wasn't boring.  And, it shows a lot (of course it would they are MY pictures) of what I have done, I instigated, I made happen, I can do!  That deserves a wow for me.  And now what?

I was thinking just this morning, that now especially, I have to commit myself to finding something of joy from each day, something to give me meaning for a life well lived and a life going forward.  I have no illusions, actually I have no visions of what is immediately in front of me.  How sick am I going to be from this treatment?  How committed will I be to keep on going -- to keeping my attitude positive and my motion forward?  Where will Frank be?  Where will Frank and I be?  I'm asking this as I have no idea of how Chris or Allie have reacted (they certainly haven't yet responded) to my letter.  Does Frank know yet? 

My 70th birthday was just amazing.  Maggie was here!  Lady A was here!  Cristina is a gift.  Even Chris and Ally and Tyler came up here, Little Scott was here.  And my beautiful necklace that means so much to me.  I am surrounded by the people I love and that I care for and who love me.  That was all so very good and enriching.  

I like that with Maggie/s admonition about getting back into bed (after the surgery) just days before that where Maggie had said "you're just not normal mom."  I relish that in a way even with my trying all of my life to be "normal" or to belong to something "normal" whatever that may mean.  I am not, so I should instead celebrate that.

And now here I am.  The first treatment this Friday and I have, not willingly, joined a new club.  And I am scared.  I am terrified.  I am alone in this.  This is the way it is isn't it?  But there some things that one does do alone aren't there?  Is this where I have to be brave?  I hope I can be brave, whatever that means.  Lady A doesn't think I should do it.  She thinks (after talking with her many friends) I should be getting a second opinion.  Should I be?  Am I being foolish for trusting in the doctors I have.  The experience so far (under the dark circumstances) has been good.  I have felt supported and as if I have a proactive team of sorts caring for me.  That is true isn't it.  

Man this is the place where you want to call out "Mommy" even having not had a real time and comfort to reach out to one that was there.  This is the real "scared" in the state of being frightened.  You can't be more frightened that that which is whether you or going to live or how much longer you are going to live or under what circumstances you are going to live.  This is hard.  There are really no words for how hard this is.  I've just come to think about Kevin and what he must be going through. 

Is this a Blog or a Personal Journal?  Well, this is personal.  TMI?

Anyway, I have to think of a new name, a new label, a new heading for this next chapter

 

Chin Hair

Chin Hair

The idea came to me at my husband's aunt's wake.  She was 101 and lying in repose in a beautiful coffin with her hands folded across her chest caressing her rosary beads.  My girlfriend and I approached the casket to pay our last respects.  The room was rather empty.  At 101 there aren't too many people remembering you.  And it was quiet for that same reason.  We stood over her.  We were standing together and I carefully leaned a bit closer to my girlfriend as we were somberly looking at Aunt Mil and I whispered:

"Here's the promise:  if I go first, you'll take care of it.  If you go first, it will be my responsibility.  Deal?  Deal!"

We were holding hands and accepted that as our handshake cementing our pact and tiptoed away.

The deal?  Chin hair!  Make it gone.  No matter what.  If you have to bring a razor with you to my coffin - so be it - but promise me I will not leave this world with a last wily and wiry chin hair screaming for attention.

Why is it that when we get older we get hairier in the worst places?  This of course as we are losing hair in the best places.  My husband has a soft circular almost nebula shaped thinning at the back of his head.  But he suddenly has nose hairs sprouting like spring grass.  I have chin hairs and God how did that happen where singular long hairs spring one at a time from my chin and sometimes my neck - daily?  And they just appear - fully grown and dark, thick and ready for battle.  Why didn't I see it before?  Was it ever a little baby hair that started to appear?  That doesn't seem to happen.  They are just there - fully matured so to speak.

I tweeze my eyebrows daily.  I shave my legs when I have to (yes, much more often when I was younger - now it depends upon what I'm wearing).  I even shave my arms (started that in my teens and once you start you can never go back).  My mustache?  Yup I shave that but that's easy.   All just part of my daily routine.  But these other random chin and neck hairs are persistent and ornery and insistent and a new surprise about aging I just was not prepared for.

I can live with gray hair on my head.  Rather like it truthfully.  It is much more acceptable these days if not actually a style to aspire to.  Its been years since I've had my hair tinted or dyed or anything and I love it.  Saves me money, saves me time and for some reason it gives the impression of my (real or hoped for) inherent comfort with my maturity.  Ah, but the wily chin and neck hairs are not gray.  They are not soft.  They are usually black or at least the darkest brown and just THERE and not just there but standing at attention.  They are screaming for attention.

Is there some understandable physiological, scientifically explainable reason for them?  I have to think there is especially as they are only appearing in this number now.  Humans are hairy beings and the hair we have is generally  for protection.  Hair keeps you warm, helps keeps germs and bacteria and bay, assists with protecting all sorts of areas from insects and the like, protects you from the sun..  Will someday it be found that they might portend some illness or age related ailment?  I could accept the logic of these annoying me with their surprise appearances if they had a reason.  Like, hmmmm, black hair on the chin every three to four days is an indicator of osteopenia.  Or, perhaps, dark brown hair at the front of the neck might warrant blood tests for cholesterol.  Of course if this were true, attending to these newly realized issues would then eliminate the hairs upon remedying the physical or medical situation.  That at least would some sense.

But to prepare oneself each day with one's "toilette" and with time accept the aging one sees:  jowls, sagging, age spots, creepy eyelids, graying eyebrows for God's sake.  That is all, well, it has to be manageable and we've all been forewarned by our elders in person and in the media what the future holds for us as we get older.  I've survived the hot flashes.  Im living with the creaky knees.  I can take care of my ever so less tolerant stomach.  But... a hair here or there jutting out from my neck as I am starting my day or a hair waving hello from my chin?  Nope!

My Big Reveal!

My Big Reveal!

So... when I was and still adjusting to MY "Endolescence" - where your body, your mind, your hormones and your expectations are jumbled in a ball if not ricocheting throughout you. And Im trying to navigate to land at some comfortable place in my young older age — I decide I need a new style to help carry me through.

I am vain enough to try and find a style for this next decade:

1. I'm lazy so my hair is longer and grayer but I'm no Scandinavian beauty like those women populating Pinterest... So I'll just keep my hair pulled back in a hopefully sophisticated ponytail. Save some money that way too.

2. I've always hated all makeup except of course for eye makeup and I have a lot more time... So... I'll work on a tan (spray and sun intermittently) and voila = I no longer look like a stalk of celery.

3. And sunglasses - always loved accessorizing - now I need all kinds of glasses to see far and wide and close and tiny. So... The bigger and darker the better. Plus it keeps me away from strangers.

4. Lastly crisp cotton white tailored shirts are a classic for any age. Stand up collars and folded cuffs are just too completely cool. So... Still love them and still wear them whenever I can. I'm way past Chico's (no frills or bling) but I'm not dead (will never do polyester). So... My colors are black, white and gray (to match my hair)... And sometimes a surprise beige in there somewhere.

And who do I look like?

Caught myself in a reflection the other day...

And oh my God I look like...

Wait for it...

KARL LAGERFELD !!!

Well, the man has style!

An Unexpected Lift

An Unexpected Lift

We’ve all experienced tough times.  Really tough painful almost unbearable times.  And the older you get the less surprised you may be about the possibility of them.  Age and experience however does not diminish the agony and sheer sadness of some of them.  And, of course you are never prepared.

This past Christmas season, December 23rd as a matter of fact I had a collection of events develop where the two people closest to me (my 33 year old daughter and my husband of 25 years) were truly abandoning me emotionally. I had had a difficult few years.  Enough so that I separated from my husband for a year,  My daughter had no tolerance for that (he’s her stepfather by the way) since she was sure whatever the situation was it was my fault and had to be because I was “difficult.”  And my husband was bewildered, angry and resentful.  I was alone.  I’ve been alone before.  I was raised by a family that Tennessee Williams couldn’t match insofar as being alone.  Feeling alone was a misery quite comfortable to me.

But this time was different.  I was sure I was losing my sanity, my mind and my will to live.  I was being abandoned by my daughter and husband at the end of my life (I’m 64) and I came into this life emotionally abandoned by my own mother and physically abandoned by my father at 2 1/2 years old.  So I was feeling “poor me” with tears I couldn’t hide,

My husband at our home in New Jersey was being “snarly” as I called it after I thought I made so many concessions to try and make our marriage work (more on that with other entries) so I was not feeling “in the spirit” or “at home”.  My daughter, with the best of intentions, invited me to her house in San Diego for the holidays since I was miserable.  But remember she has her own feelings and necessity for distance from this situation.  She’s disappointed I may leave this marriage like I left her father years ago.  And, she’s a therapist so of course she has this whole thing all sorted out in her own mind regardless of what may be her own emotional vulnerabilities and not so objective skewing of what is happening.

So I ran (flew in every sense of the word) to San Diego on December 22.  Well that didn’t bring much relief to me since from the beginning I got on her first nerve about everything from not using a coaster to not washing my coffee cup. Really?  I’m the mom and I’m walking on eggshelves.  In the state I was in I took responsibility for everything.  If she’s behaving spoiled, self absorbed, selfish and thoughtless that must be my fault too. She is who I raised yes?

My husband and I were fighting on the phone in the middle of the night I arrived.  My daughter was rolling her eyes like she was 16 all over again and I was weeping.  By the way I’ve never cried before.  No one ever saw me cry since I was a child but now quietly, without sobs I was weeping and weeping and weeping.  My daughter said “ what’s wrong with you mom.”  And I just said “ I’m having a hard time and sorry but it’s up there with a life crisis.”  And then, and then, now in the early morning of December 23rd she threw up her arms, rolled her eyes and said “oh God what’s with the drama Queen?”

That shut me up, closed me up and tore me up inside,  it was 10:00 in the morning and then SHE said “I think you should leave.”  Now I stopped weeping.  I stopped breathing.  I just couldn’t believe this,  There was nowhere for me to go.  I know no one else there.  It was Christmas... I had to go back.  From awful in San Diego to miserable in New Jersey.  I thought this was a badly written Lifetime movie.

I stayed calm.  I’m very proud and stubbornly independent.  I packed.  I call the airlines and found the ONLY FLIGHT leaving that day was the Red Eye at 9:0O PM that night.  It was now 10:30 in the morning.  I booked it, showered,  dressed, packed and sat in her living room at 11:00.  I can, thankfully, keep my mind occupied with my gadgets.  I read, play games, write.  So long idle hours DONT scare me.  But, but, but, now she sat across from the couch from me and quietly said:  “I’m sorry mom but I think you should leave now.”

Now?  Now?  Go to the airport now at 11:00 in the morning when my flight wasn’t leaving for ten hours.  Sit at the airport alone for 10 hours?

I stayed calm BUT the tears were streaming again, my throat was aching again, I wasn’t even sure I was breathing but I would maintain my dignity, waste no time fighting and just go.  I called a car service, stood up, dragged my little wheeling suitcase outside to the corner and cried and cried and cried.  Couldnt hide it.  Couldn’t stop it.  Couldn’t imagaine what this all meant and what hwould happen after this.  Could this ever be repaired?

I was standing at the corner and remember trying to maintain all the dignity I could muster.  But I was weeping and weeping and weeping.  I couldn’t stop.  At some short point after that my daughter shuffled with her fluffy slippers to give me the least sincere hug I’ve experienced outside of a business get together.  Then she shuffled back to her house.

Then my Lyft driver arrived.   A tiny little car with what looked like a tall, lanky, young guy inside.  He was all sunshine and California healthy looking.  Once I got into the car, he realized I was crying.  I think the whole block must have been waiting for me to fall to my knees.  He confirmed my airline and... then...looked at me in the rear view mirror... and delicately and sweetly asked me if I felt like talking.  I barely whispered “no, but thank you for asking.”  He told me he wasn’t being nosy but could listen if I needed it.  Then we drove silently to the airport.  Not a long drive.

When we got there he got out of his tiny little car.  He had to be at least 6’ 2”. He got my bag and brought to me.  And then he said... after a pause I suppose for him to consider it... “Do you need a hug?”

I was dumstruck, still weeping, totally surprised and looked at him... thought about it for about 3 seconds and said “Yes.”  And he walked to me and gave me a real caring meaningful loving connecting human hug!  He then said bye, walked to his car and drove away.

My Lyft driver gave me a lift having so many definitions.  He gave me a “gift” I will never forget, always cherish and be reminded what can be wonderfully surprising it n our lives.