How to deal with grief? A friend of mine told me that she found the most effective remedy for the overwhelming depression she felt after her father died is to walk. She told me this as we were clipping along the greenway that ran behind her house and along a couple of small lakes through trees and wetlands. Her father had died a year earlier and she said the desolation she felt was smothering. She didn't care what temperature it was outside. She simply took off for the path. She would begin the walk with tears streaming down her face, but as she continued the walk, her heart would begin to feel lighter and eventually the tears would stop falling. Now when she walks there are no tears, just the contentment that comes from being outside and from moving her arms and legs
I had the same experience when my daughter grew up and moved out of the house. I could not stand to be in the house. The emptiness was unbearable. I missed the sounds of girls running in one door and out the other. I felt haunted. I did what my friend did. I got out and walked. Even in the thick heat of the day, I walked. I tried to keep a fairly good pace, but I wasn't race walking. It usually took about 30 to 40 minutes but then the heaviness would lift and I would begin to feel good about life again. At one point, I began to pay attention to the birds around me. I later bought some binoculars and found a new hobby.
I read an article recently that stated that even twenty minutes in nature is energizing. I think the combination of being outside and paying attention to your environment along with the exercise you get from walking and the natural endorphins that come with it creates about the best anti-depressant you can find. And it's free.
Saturday, August 06, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011
The Kids Are Not All Right, Glenn
Glenn Beck compared the Norwegian teenagers who were recently murdered in a horrific attack on Utoya Island to “Hitler Youth.” Really. His rationale was that the young people were at a political camp. He somehow finds providing a camp for teenagers that focuses on politics to be “disturbing.”
What I find to be disturbing is how few young people in our culture care or know about how the political system, which affects almost every aspect of their lives, operates.
I have observed an appalling lack of political knowledge among my college students. The majority of them are ignorant when it comes to the different platforms of the two major parties. They do not know about any important rulings of the Supreme Court. They have no idea how to register to vote. And they’ve no inkling how government policies impact everything from how much tuition they pay to the safety of their workplace. They also believe that they are powerless to change anything.
The only thing they seem to be aware of is the price of gas. Now, that gets them fired up -- briefly. It doesn’t occur to them that more and better public transportation would solve many of their woes (including their worries about DUI’s).
My students are not stupid. Nor are they uncaring. But if anyone ever bothered to talk to them about politics it was too complain about paying taxes and having to support “lazy” people on welfare. Nothing of the nuances of public policy has drifted down through the cable news blather.
A high school course in US Government is not enough. Most students sleep right through it. Our young people could use a camp to inform them about our political system -- not for brainwashing or propaganda but for the sole purpose of helping them understand our government, our economy, and the mechanics of change. But it’s pretty apparent why that wouldn’t be popular here. We might somehow get a system that was fairer and more inclusive if people knew how it worked. And people might not gullible enough to be swayed by the likes of Glenn Beck.
What I find to be disturbing is how few young people in our culture care or know about how the political system, which affects almost every aspect of their lives, operates.
I have observed an appalling lack of political knowledge among my college students. The majority of them are ignorant when it comes to the different platforms of the two major parties. They do not know about any important rulings of the Supreme Court. They have no idea how to register to vote. And they’ve no inkling how government policies impact everything from how much tuition they pay to the safety of their workplace. They also believe that they are powerless to change anything.
The only thing they seem to be aware of is the price of gas. Now, that gets them fired up -- briefly. It doesn’t occur to them that more and better public transportation would solve many of their woes (including their worries about DUI’s).
My students are not stupid. Nor are they uncaring. But if anyone ever bothered to talk to them about politics it was too complain about paying taxes and having to support “lazy” people on welfare. Nothing of the nuances of public policy has drifted down through the cable news blather.
A high school course in US Government is not enough. Most students sleep right through it. Our young people could use a camp to inform them about our political system -- not for brainwashing or propaganda but for the sole purpose of helping them understand our government, our economy, and the mechanics of change. But it’s pretty apparent why that wouldn’t be popular here. We might somehow get a system that was fairer and more inclusive if people knew how it worked. And people might not gullible enough to be swayed by the likes of Glenn Beck.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Social Security is a Women's Issue
My mother worked from age 14 to age 86 as a professional musician. By the age of 86, she was simply unable to continue. She started taking social security as late as possible and still it was not enough for her to live on when she retired.
My mother did not receive a cost of living increase in her social security payments last year; and yet her rent went up $200 a month. Somehow we scraped up the additional money. She was fortunate enough to have three children who were able to help her make ends meet for the last seven years of her life. Not all women are so lucky.
According to the Social Security Administration, about 90 percent of all elderly women live solely on social security. In addition, women live longer than men and their social security payments are less; and few elderly women have private pensions. Another scary statistic: by 2030, one in four American women will be over the age of 65.
Terry O’Neill, president of the National Organization for Women, was recently interviewed on the NPR show “Here and Now.” O’Neill said that “the best marker of whether a woman will live in poverty in her old age” is motherhood. I was shocked. “Being a mother is the one factor that correlates strongly with living in poverty in old age,” she said, adding that we don’t have policies in this country that support caregivers. O’Neill noted that caregiving is largely unpaid and largely done by women.
Cutting social security benefits directly impacts large numbers of women -- not just the women who receive social security but their caregivers as well, which creates a vicious cycle. Women who take care of elderly parents will now have to do more with less.
According to a study by the Commonwealth Fund, 25 percent of women who care for a sick or disabled family member rate their own health as fair or poor, and more than half of women caregivers have one or more chronic health conditions. I can attest that while taking care of my mother, I often neglected my health for lack of time, energy and money. The study also states, “Nearly one-third of all caregivers (31%) report a decrease in their family's savings because of caregiving responsibilities. Overall, two of five women caregivers devote more than 20 hours per week to caring for a sick or disabled family member.”
The bottom line is that you don’t earn social security for your work as a caregiver. Cutting social security may sound like a good way to cut the deficit, but ultimately it will create more problems for the elderly and for their families.
My mother did not receive a cost of living increase in her social security payments last year; and yet her rent went up $200 a month. Somehow we scraped up the additional money. She was fortunate enough to have three children who were able to help her make ends meet for the last seven years of her life. Not all women are so lucky.
According to the Social Security Administration, about 90 percent of all elderly women live solely on social security. In addition, women live longer than men and their social security payments are less; and few elderly women have private pensions. Another scary statistic: by 2030, one in four American women will be over the age of 65.
Terry O’Neill, president of the National Organization for Women, was recently interviewed on the NPR show “Here and Now.” O’Neill said that “the best marker of whether a woman will live in poverty in her old age” is motherhood. I was shocked. “Being a mother is the one factor that correlates strongly with living in poverty in old age,” she said, adding that we don’t have policies in this country that support caregivers. O’Neill noted that caregiving is largely unpaid and largely done by women.
Cutting social security benefits directly impacts large numbers of women -- not just the women who receive social security but their caregivers as well, which creates a vicious cycle. Women who take care of elderly parents will now have to do more with less.
According to a study by the Commonwealth Fund, 25 percent of women who care for a sick or disabled family member rate their own health as fair or poor, and more than half of women caregivers have one or more chronic health conditions. I can attest that while taking care of my mother, I often neglected my health for lack of time, energy and money. The study also states, “Nearly one-third of all caregivers (31%) report a decrease in their family's savings because of caregiving responsibilities. Overall, two of five women caregivers devote more than 20 hours per week to caring for a sick or disabled family member.”
The bottom line is that you don’t earn social security for your work as a caregiver. Cutting social security may sound like a good way to cut the deficit, but ultimately it will create more problems for the elderly and for their families.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
The Old Couple at My Mom's ALF
My mother’s 93rd birthday is next week. I went to see her today at the assisted living facility. Because of my teaching schedule I’m not able to see her Monday thru Thursday, so I try to visit every day on the weekend. Today we sat out on the front patio in the sun. She looked down at her hands and said, “I’m not sure why I get these things for no reason. It’s not like I bump into anything.” She was pointing at a huge purple bruise on the back of her hand. Her arms are also covered with bruises. She looks like an abuse victim.
I told my mother about the work I was getting done on the roof of my house because squirrels had gone at the shingles like Arthur Anderson after internal Enron memoranda. Then I told her about other mundane events in my life.
“So the new thing is,” my mother began. “Well, I don’t know . . .what was I saying. Oh, nevermind, let’s not talk. Or let’s talk about something we know about.”
As my mother says, thoughts tend to slip off some neuron cliff in her brain. Well, she doesn’t say “neuron,” of course. That is one of those words no longer in that once-voluminous vocabulary.
A man and his little boy crossed the parking lot in front of us.
“Oh, look at that little boy,” my mother said, her voice full of delight.
I took her hand and she gently rubbed my fingers. She loves to touch, to be touched.
“My mother never hugged me,” she has often told me.
“My mother hugged me all the time,” I reply.
As we were sitting there, a slender man with silver hair pushed his wife toward us. He stopped not far from us and stood patiently, while his wife, gazing thru slitted eyes said, “Let’s leave here now. Let’s go. It’s broken. Let’s go. Let’s leave here now.”
He patted her arm and said, “No, it’s okay here.”
We made some room for them on the patio and he wheeled her up and sat down. I looked over at him. His eyes were expressionless. His wife was curled into herself. She began a monotone monologue, constantly repeating things. Water was a refrain. Down the hill. New York. New York. New York.
I tried to imagine her as a younger woman -- someone who ran a household, maybe had a job, tended to children and grandchildren, probably cooked. Maybe they danced. Maybe they loved each other madly.
Now here she was -- a mynah bird. His eyes met mine. He was a portrait of patience, of devotion. I wanted to cry. I wanted to hold him so tightly and say over and over again, “You are a good man. You are a good man.”
Sometimes, I get really tired of being the good daughter who comes to see her mother three times a week. I get tired of the constant expense. It’s difficult for me to make long-term plans because I don’t know what I’ll do with her. I travel for my work and for pleasure, too, but I don’t like to be gone too long. There’s this tether that’s wrapped around my heart.
But today as I looked at this man and his wife, I felt ashamed of those feelings. His wife didn’t look like she’s anywhere close to my mother’s age. I wondered if he ever wishes he were free. This woman is not the same woman he lived with for God knows how many years. But the love was there. In every tender gesture.
His wife got agitated. I don’t think she liked us being there.
“Take it easy, Mary,” he told her and patted her hand.
My mother looked down at her hands.
“I don’t know what causes these purple splotches,” she said.
“It’s just that your little veins have been on the planet a long time,” I told her. “They’re leaky.”
Then she laughed. Her laughter was as melodious as it ever was. Her eyes shone. She may not remember shit, but she was there with me in the moment fully present. I got up and wheeled her inside for dinner. Before we got to the dining room, I bent down and kissed her hard on the cheek, hugging her.
“Oh,” she crooned. “I’m so lucky.”
“So am I, Mom. So am I.”
I told my mother about the work I was getting done on the roof of my house because squirrels had gone at the shingles like Arthur Anderson after internal Enron memoranda. Then I told her about other mundane events in my life.
“So the new thing is,” my mother began. “Well, I don’t know . . .what was I saying. Oh, nevermind, let’s not talk. Or let’s talk about something we know about.”
As my mother says, thoughts tend to slip off some neuron cliff in her brain. Well, she doesn’t say “neuron,” of course. That is one of those words no longer in that once-voluminous vocabulary.
A man and his little boy crossed the parking lot in front of us.
“Oh, look at that little boy,” my mother said, her voice full of delight.
I took her hand and she gently rubbed my fingers. She loves to touch, to be touched.
“My mother never hugged me,” she has often told me.
“My mother hugged me all the time,” I reply.
As we were sitting there, a slender man with silver hair pushed his wife toward us. He stopped not far from us and stood patiently, while his wife, gazing thru slitted eyes said, “Let’s leave here now. Let’s go. It’s broken. Let’s go. Let’s leave here now.”
He patted her arm and said, “No, it’s okay here.”
We made some room for them on the patio and he wheeled her up and sat down. I looked over at him. His eyes were expressionless. His wife was curled into herself. She began a monotone monologue, constantly repeating things. Water was a refrain. Down the hill. New York. New York. New York.
I tried to imagine her as a younger woman -- someone who ran a household, maybe had a job, tended to children and grandchildren, probably cooked. Maybe they danced. Maybe they loved each other madly.
Now here she was -- a mynah bird. His eyes met mine. He was a portrait of patience, of devotion. I wanted to cry. I wanted to hold him so tightly and say over and over again, “You are a good man. You are a good man.”
Sometimes, I get really tired of being the good daughter who comes to see her mother three times a week. I get tired of the constant expense. It’s difficult for me to make long-term plans because I don’t know what I’ll do with her. I travel for my work and for pleasure, too, but I don’t like to be gone too long. There’s this tether that’s wrapped around my heart.
But today as I looked at this man and his wife, I felt ashamed of those feelings. His wife didn’t look like she’s anywhere close to my mother’s age. I wondered if he ever wishes he were free. This woman is not the same woman he lived with for God knows how many years. But the love was there. In every tender gesture.
His wife got agitated. I don’t think she liked us being there.
“Take it easy, Mary,” he told her and patted her hand.
My mother looked down at her hands.
“I don’t know what causes these purple splotches,” she said.
“It’s just that your little veins have been on the planet a long time,” I told her. “They’re leaky.”
Then she laughed. Her laughter was as melodious as it ever was. Her eyes shone. She may not remember shit, but she was there with me in the moment fully present. I got up and wheeled her inside for dinner. Before we got to the dining room, I bent down and kissed her hard on the cheek, hugging her.
“Oh,” she crooned. “I’m so lucky.”
“So am I, Mom. So am I.”
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Cup
It's just a ceramic cup. It fills the hands nicely when it's full of warm peppermint tea. It was smoothed and rounded by someone's hands on a potter's wheel. The bottom flares out like a belly. The handle is perhaps 3/4 inch wide and 1/8 inch thick. The cup is sturdy but not heavy. The color is many blues like the ocean. My friend gave it to me before she died so I could drink tea on my home from visiting her.
I slept in her house the night she died at hospice -- in the guest room where I aways slept when I visited. But that night I didn't really sleep. I lay in the bed for hours, reading anything. I wasn't particular about what it was. Sometimes I'd get up and wander around the quiet, empty house. Nothing felt real -- not the green walls adorned with quirky works of art, or the small kitchen, or her bedroom with the large regal looking headboard and all of her vintage clothes and shoes and the painted crutches leaning against the wall.
I found an old worn pair of slippers she must have worn and I slipped them on my feet. I had brought the cup back, but decided I would keep it.
A couple of months ago, my roommate used the cup. I said, "You might not want to use that cup. It's the one thing no one is allowed to break."
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Poem Inspired by a Photograph at the Mint Museum
and even this
in our shabby lives
concocted of chain link
and clapboard
when the fog has taken
everything else
are we willing to leave
this blue invisibility
and burst into the pale
orange light where
nothing is hidden
anymore?
Or do we pass by and wander
along the cracked sidewalk
like coyotes hungry
for yellow cats?
in our shabby lives
concocted of chain link
and clapboard
when the fog has taken
everything else
are we willing to leave
this blue invisibility
and burst into the pale
orange light where
nothing is hidden
anymore?
Or do we pass by and wander
along the cracked sidewalk
like coyotes hungry
for yellow cats?
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Requiem for a Friend
In 1995 I finished my doctorate in English from Florida State University, but I didn’t have much in the way of job prospects, so I cobbled together a meager living doing freelance work and adjunct teaching, and my family and I stayed in Tallahassee. It was through my varied pursuits that I met Freedan Wakoa. He came to me at the recommendation of a friend. He needed someone to help him turn his award-winning screenplay into a novel because an agent had told him that he might find a producer for his film that way. Seemed like a convoluted method to me, but I was willing to try and Freedan was willing to pay me a few bucks. (My fees were pretty much rock bottom.)
The story that Freedan had written involved a little girl who lived on a planet called Lumin. Everyone on the planet was born with wings, but they had forgotten how to fly. It was up to the young girl to help people learn how to fly again, but the mighty “wingless” class did all they could to prevent her.
I liked the story a lot, but there were also a few places where I found it read a bit too much like 19th Century Americana. When Freedan explained to me that the story had been inspired by a young girl who was part white and part African-American, I countered that people on other planets would not have the same racial backgrounds that we had, and another planet might operate by very different rules than ours. But, of course, in our minds, the heroine was a mixed race child with golden wings.
One of the the first things I did was change the spelling of each character’s name. The girl, Alexandra, became Alixandra. Thatcher (the insipid school teacher) became Thatchin, and so on. I decided that grass might grow down as well as up depending on the season, and I added a couple of moons. Otherwise, I kept the story intact, fleshing it out as prose.
As I transformed Freedan’s screenplay into a novel, I took a chapter every day to the small “hands-on” learning school my daughter attended and read it to the children -- about 50 kids from kindergarten thru fifth grade. It was such a hit that for the Halloween party that year, many of the children and faculty dressed as different characters from the book.
I finished the book, and in the meantime became close friends with Freedan. Although he was in his fifties, he had the boyish enthusiasm of a 20 year old. Quite fit with (Paul) Newmanesque blue eyes, he had a surplus of women in his life, and he had recently fallen in love with a gorgeous black woman in her 20s. She was calm, almost ethereal, while he bubbled over with joy.
Freedan told me once that he could “see.” Actually, he told me this several times. What he meant was that he could perceive the universal field. I believed him. There was something extraordinary about the man. He felt it was his mission in life to teach other people to see. That’s what he was doing with “Alixandra’s Wings.” It was an allegory, of course, but he had also created an exciting adventure story.
While we shopped that book around, Freedan lit onto another project. The light of his life was his beautiful teenage daughter. She’d been in some student films, and Freedan wanted to produce a movie that would feature her, as well as a student director from the film school at Florida State. I would write the script based on an idea that he and I came up with. I was thrilled with the idea. We rented some office space, we had long meetings, we traveled in search of locations, and I wrote and rewrote. We even managed to get a few investors.
In March of 1998, Freedan flew out to Los Angeles, where his girlfriend had recently moved, to try to find a “name” actress to help us make the film more enticing for investors. One day he called me from his girlfriend’s apartment. He said he couldn’t move half of his body, and his speech was slurred.
“You’ve probably had a stroke,” I said. “Get to the hospital. Now.”
But it wasn’t a stroke. It was a brain tumor, a particularly nasty kind called a glioblastoma. The next three months were dreadful. He came home, and we watched this vibrant, energetic man waste away. His daughter was devastated. Money was an issue because we had made certain commitments, most notably to our director who was afraid of being sent back to Belarus where she was from. Freedan’s ex-wife was understandably upset when Freedan gave me money to help keep her here. That was money his daughter would need. Looking back I realize I should have done things differently.
But the one thing I’m glad I did was to create an audio-book version of “Alixandra’s Wings” before Freedan died. I made two hundred and sold almost all of them. The money paid off some of the debts we had incurred in our movie-making venture. Freedan was pleased. He wanted Alixandra’s Wings to be like a virus. I learned years later that some kids listened to that book over and over for years. I know my daughter did. Adult friends told me they listened on long trips and didn’t want to get out of the car.
Freedan died in June, and the book became a file on my computer. I had my own books to write and sell. I had my child to raise. The book didn’t fit with what publishers wanted, and I didn’t have the technical expertise to publish the book myself. I also didn’t have illustrations for it. So I let it sit.
It took me 12 years to come back to it. A college friend of my daughter’s, who is a brilliant artist, jumped at the opportunity to make the illustrations. Someone else offered to help me with the technical aspects of publishing the book, and he did a beautiful job. His 11-year-old son, Jack, was the first to read it. “Awesome,” Jack reported.
Now Alixandra’s Wings is available as a print book, an e-book and an audio book on Itunes. I hope I’ve honored my friend’s vision at last.
Alixandra's Wings
The story that Freedan had written involved a little girl who lived on a planet called Lumin. Everyone on the planet was born with wings, but they had forgotten how to fly. It was up to the young girl to help people learn how to fly again, but the mighty “wingless” class did all they could to prevent her.
I liked the story a lot, but there were also a few places where I found it read a bit too much like 19th Century Americana. When Freedan explained to me that the story had been inspired by a young girl who was part white and part African-American, I countered that people on other planets would not have the same racial backgrounds that we had, and another planet might operate by very different rules than ours. But, of course, in our minds, the heroine was a mixed race child with golden wings.
One of the the first things I did was change the spelling of each character’s name. The girl, Alexandra, became Alixandra. Thatcher (the insipid school teacher) became Thatchin, and so on. I decided that grass might grow down as well as up depending on the season, and I added a couple of moons. Otherwise, I kept the story intact, fleshing it out as prose.
As I transformed Freedan’s screenplay into a novel, I took a chapter every day to the small “hands-on” learning school my daughter attended and read it to the children -- about 50 kids from kindergarten thru fifth grade. It was such a hit that for the Halloween party that year, many of the children and faculty dressed as different characters from the book.
I finished the book, and in the meantime became close friends with Freedan. Although he was in his fifties, he had the boyish enthusiasm of a 20 year old. Quite fit with (Paul) Newmanesque blue eyes, he had a surplus of women in his life, and he had recently fallen in love with a gorgeous black woman in her 20s. She was calm, almost ethereal, while he bubbled over with joy.
Freedan told me once that he could “see.” Actually, he told me this several times. What he meant was that he could perceive the universal field. I believed him. There was something extraordinary about the man. He felt it was his mission in life to teach other people to see. That’s what he was doing with “Alixandra’s Wings.” It was an allegory, of course, but he had also created an exciting adventure story.
While we shopped that book around, Freedan lit onto another project. The light of his life was his beautiful teenage daughter. She’d been in some student films, and Freedan wanted to produce a movie that would feature her, as well as a student director from the film school at Florida State. I would write the script based on an idea that he and I came up with. I was thrilled with the idea. We rented some office space, we had long meetings, we traveled in search of locations, and I wrote and rewrote. We even managed to get a few investors.
In March of 1998, Freedan flew out to Los Angeles, where his girlfriend had recently moved, to try to find a “name” actress to help us make the film more enticing for investors. One day he called me from his girlfriend’s apartment. He said he couldn’t move half of his body, and his speech was slurred.
“You’ve probably had a stroke,” I said. “Get to the hospital. Now.”
But it wasn’t a stroke. It was a brain tumor, a particularly nasty kind called a glioblastoma. The next three months were dreadful. He came home, and we watched this vibrant, energetic man waste away. His daughter was devastated. Money was an issue because we had made certain commitments, most notably to our director who was afraid of being sent back to Belarus where she was from. Freedan’s ex-wife was understandably upset when Freedan gave me money to help keep her here. That was money his daughter would need. Looking back I realize I should have done things differently.
But the one thing I’m glad I did was to create an audio-book version of “Alixandra’s Wings” before Freedan died. I made two hundred and sold almost all of them. The money paid off some of the debts we had incurred in our movie-making venture. Freedan was pleased. He wanted Alixandra’s Wings to be like a virus. I learned years later that some kids listened to that book over and over for years. I know my daughter did. Adult friends told me they listened on long trips and didn’t want to get out of the car.
Freedan died in June, and the book became a file on my computer. I had my own books to write and sell. I had my child to raise. The book didn’t fit with what publishers wanted, and I didn’t have the technical expertise to publish the book myself. I also didn’t have illustrations for it. So I let it sit.
It took me 12 years to come back to it. A college friend of my daughter’s, who is a brilliant artist, jumped at the opportunity to make the illustrations. Someone else offered to help me with the technical aspects of publishing the book, and he did a beautiful job. His 11-year-old son, Jack, was the first to read it. “Awesome,” Jack reported.
Now Alixandra’s Wings is available as a print book, an e-book and an audio book on Itunes. I hope I’ve honored my friend’s vision at last.
Alixandra's Wings
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