If my grief was the smoke of a thousand fires,
then what's inside me is equal to the fuck of a thousand gods.
I would still want
you.
I would still not miss you...
I would miss you and not want you.
.
I
am my own limitation.
Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
Saturday, March 24, 2012
St Louis Misery
I want last week back, every minute, even the pain.
I want to be with you, want to be in your arms,
looking into your eyes,
laughing at our jokes,
kissing your lips,
content.
Not needing more.
I want to be with you, want to be in your arms,
looking into your eyes,
laughing at our jokes,
kissing your lips,
content.
Not needing more.
Monday, March 5, 2012
Fraternizing with the Enemy
"If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior strength, evade him. If your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces are united, separate them. If sovereign and subject are in accord, put division between them. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected."
- Sun Tzu, the Art of War
You want to be let in, you want to breach a wall, as if you are entitled to some "set of openness" that masquerades as honesty. Honestly, it is not, and you are not entitled.
Do you really want openness?
That.
That works both ways. You always deserve honesty.
That, that I can give unequivocally.
It merely comes to an economic proposition, a cost-benefit analysis: how much for you, what will you give me; how much for me, how much should I give you?
Do I want to give at all? Self-doubt, worry, esteem, fear, exhaustion, lackawanna all raise their vestigial, bestial heads.
Do I feel vulnerable because of your interest? Fuck Yes. But that's on me.
[ahgggh throw down, let us throw down, right here, right now, raw]
I see no benefit for me to reveal. A reveal gives you a package, an overall view, an envelope that shows you what I have accomplished, mistakes I've made. But it doesn't show you what that soil, that compost, that nurturing environment has created, the 'me' that is me today.
I want you to know the me that is the me blossoming now out of that soil, that fire, that roiling sea, that tornado.
You have engaged me intellectually, in an emotional way. Now I feel quizzical; perhaps I should rephrase: you have engaged me emotionally, in an intellectual way.
I am very aware that you will not be seeing this from me, not now anyway, so I'm filing this under "openness."
But I had teased you with a cost-benefit analysis.
I have no reason to reveal myself to you. You are far and a not a fantasy, not a flavor, not a future or a tease. Or are you?
I have held myself in great restraint with you, and I have
- Sun Tzu, the Art of War
You want to be let in, you want to breach a wall, as if you are entitled to some "set of openness" that masquerades as honesty. Honestly, it is not, and you are not entitled.
Do you really want openness?
That.
That works both ways. You always deserve honesty.
That, that I can give unequivocally.
It merely comes to an economic proposition, a cost-benefit analysis: how much for you, what will you give me; how much for me, how much should I give you?
Do I want to give at all? Self-doubt, worry, esteem, fear, exhaustion, lackawanna all raise their vestigial, bestial heads.
Do I feel vulnerable because of your interest? Fuck Yes. But that's on me.
[ahgggh throw down, let us throw down, right here, right now, raw]
I see no benefit for me to reveal. A reveal gives you a package, an overall view, an envelope that shows you what I have accomplished, mistakes I've made. But it doesn't show you what that soil, that compost, that nurturing environment has created, the 'me' that is me today.
I want you to know the me that is the me blossoming now out of that soil, that fire, that roiling sea, that tornado.
You have engaged me intellectually, in an emotional way. Now I feel quizzical; perhaps I should rephrase: you have engaged me emotionally, in an intellectual way.
I am very aware that you will not be seeing this from me, not now anyway, so I'm filing this under "openness."
But I had teased you with a cost-benefit analysis.
I have no reason to reveal myself to you. You are far and a not a fantasy, not a flavor, not a future or a tease. Or are you?
I have held myself in great restraint with you, and I have
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Planning
"Do they have a pool?" he asks, "I'll bring my trunks. Do you swim? Bring your suit."
"Yes, I swim, but we didn't use suits before."
I'm laughing, because our first, no, second night, together, we got into the jacuzzi,
Nekkid, before we ever kissed.
"We had our own tub."
I can see him smiling.
Before we had ever kissed
You poured water down my breasts
You let me wrap my legs around you
My foot touched, my toes nearly touched
You intimately, it was easy, an ease between us.
We soaked in the warmth
We giggled, not talking, not like the first night
Relaxing,
Bubbling,
Letting the jets massage our legs
We're chest deep in roiling water and
Shyness and, dare I say it,
Some joy.
Your hair is so curly and so red and so thick and
Your skin is so porcelain white, so white the white of the
Clouds reminds me of the muscles and shapes of your body
I exult with laughter and happiness each time a cloud
Reminds me of you.
.
We're planning to meet again at a hotel in the middle of
America, the middle of next month, a month and a
Year after last I heard from you - I thought you were
Dead! Hearing from you again has set me atumble, I
Worry about seeing you holding you talking to you
Making love to you again it was so good before I
Hope you want me like you used to you've been
Through so much in a year.
.
"Yes, I swim, but we didn't use suits before."
I'm laughing, because our first, no, second night, together, we got into the jacuzzi,
Nekkid, before we ever kissed.
"We had our own tub."
I can see him smiling.
Before we had ever kissed
You poured water down my breasts
You let me wrap my legs around you
My foot touched, my toes nearly touched
You intimately, it was easy, an ease between us.
We soaked in the warmth
We giggled, not talking, not like the first night
Relaxing,
Bubbling,
Letting the jets massage our legs
We're chest deep in roiling water and
Shyness and, dare I say it,
Some joy.
Your hair is so curly and so red and so thick and
Your skin is so porcelain white, so white the white of the
Clouds reminds me of the muscles and shapes of your body
I exult with laughter and happiness each time a cloud
Reminds me of you.
.
We're planning to meet again at a hotel in the middle of
America, the middle of next month, a month and a
Year after last I heard from you - I thought you were
Dead! Hearing from you again has set me atumble, I
Worry about seeing you holding you talking to you
Making love to you again it was so good before I
Hope you want me like you used to you've been
Through so much in a year.
.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
The Choices of a Man
,If I'm a Man, my contraceptive choices (in no particular order) are:
1. Abstain (keep it in my pants)
2. Condom (wear a raincoat, not go bareback, use a French Letter, or a Rubber, or an Oven Mitt; you get the idea)
3. Vasectomy (tie off the vas deferens to prevent sperm from being ejaculated)
4. Rhythm or Coitus Interuptus *ROTFLMAO* (Not really contraception, but recommended as such by The Pope, supposedly a Virgin inexperienced in sexual relations)
5. Masturbation (choking the chicken, autonomy, self-love, spanking the monkey, rub one out)
6. Ben Franklin Method (only have sex with older women or known-to-be infertile women)
7. No Responsibility (only have paid sex with prostitutes or homosexual encounters).
If contraception fails, the consequences lie entirely with the woman.
If I'm a Woman, my contraceptive choices are:
1. Abstain (keep my pants on, excluding HONEST RAPE (Ron Paul, you are despicable)
2. Condom or Chemical or Mechanical (partner consents to use a Rubber, you take The Pill or an Injection, you wear an Intrauterine Device - or just keep your pants on, groaaaaan)
3. Get your Fallopian tubes cut and burned (if allowed; only if you've had several children and are over a certain age)
4. Rhythm or Coitus Interuptus (even The Pope knows this doesn't work - he's still ROTFLHAO)
5. Masturbation (autonomous self-love, spanking the monkey, rub one out; you gotta be strong - see #1; don't give in)
6. Be a Lesbian (no fraternizing with the enemy; risk social sanctions)
Scheist, women only get six choices; see how unfair this is already?
Oh, wait. I guess there's one more:
I knew an abortion runner who worked it during the 1940s and 1950s. She'd arrange the details with the woman in need: the payment of money, the secretive transport, the place, "the doctor" who performed the injection with mercury, Mercury!; the woman's return to her safe place. She also insured no particular was ever revealed.
She was proud of the work she did, made a good living at it, never got caught, and says she never lost a client to sickness or death of the woman, both common risks of illegal abortion; mostly eradicated by making abortion legal.
Her descriptions made my head spin. I graduated the same year Roe vs Wade passed. I knew several high-school classmates who'd had "babies out of wedlock," had been forced into “marriages of convenience,” and, who'd had illegal abortions.
It's amazing to me how many of my classmates in the under-18 illegal-abortion group had parents who were staunch Christians - my sister's parents included, when she had her abortion.
Oh, wait! that was AFTER Roe vs Wade. But our parents had their rationale of experience of friends and family who'd had carried babies only to give them up for adoption - including knowing all the emotional consequences thereof.
How many people (women, or couples, or families) had availed themselves of abortion services in the 1940s and 1950s?
Plenty Plenty Plenty. The numbers of abortions have actually decreased since the passage of Roe vs Wade.
There were actually more abortions annually before the change to legal abortions than after R v W (this fact is tracked at the Center for Disease Control, the CDC).
But I digress. This is about The Choices of a Man.
To limit women’s choices smacks of discrimination, which, as we know from the smackdown on California's Prop 8 yesterday, discriminating against a singular group of people is completely unacceptable.
Still, in high school, in my senior civics class we were assigned a community project. I wanted to call in Planned Parenthood to speak to our class. Planned Parenthood only wanted to come out to our tiny rural school for an assembly.
I had to go to the principal, who vetoed it 100 percent. I spilled my intel: what about this one and that one and the other who are pregnant/post-abortion/gave up a baby?
I named, to my shame now, four young women, my classmates, NOT girls, young WOMEN who were sexually active and who should have had the option of convenient and inexpensive birth control.
In our rural school, it was a 30 mile drive, a long trip nearly 40 years ago, to avail oneself of Planned Parenthood services.
It wasn’t like all of us could go to the local doctor - that sensible MD, who accepted my Huge Lie of Horrible Periods to put me on The Pill; that same doc who recommended the doctor who performed my sister’s abortion. Dr Hermann, your courage amazes to me, even to this day.
I somehow convinced the Principal to okay the school assembly, inviting Planned Parenthood, with his the caveat that every student had to have a parental signature.
Permission slips were duly printed and handed out, the invitation made. I believe, to this day, that only ONE of those signatures was real. I believe it because that mother was the only adult to show up at the assembly; 550 students in the school, 550 showed up, plus one parent.
Do I think anything has changed for teenagers today?
No.
Were we hungry then for information about contraception?
I think we were ravenous.
.
1. Abstain (keep it in my pants)
2. Condom (wear a raincoat, not go bareback, use a French Letter, or a Rubber, or an Oven Mitt; you get the idea)
3. Vasectomy (tie off the vas deferens to prevent sperm from being ejaculated)
4. Rhythm or Coitus Interuptus *ROTFLMAO* (Not really contraception, but recommended as such by The Pope, supposedly a Virgin inexperienced in sexual relations)
5. Masturbation (choking the chicken, autonomy, self-love, spanking the monkey, rub one out)
6. Ben Franklin Method (only have sex with older women or known-to-be infertile women)
7. No Responsibility (only have paid sex with prostitutes or homosexual encounters).
If contraception fails, the consequences lie entirely with the woman.
If I'm a Woman, my contraceptive choices are:
1. Abstain (keep my pants on, excluding HONEST RAPE (Ron Paul, you are despicable)
2. Condom or Chemical or Mechanical (partner consents to use a Rubber, you take The Pill or an Injection, you wear an Intrauterine Device - or just keep your pants on, groaaaaan)
3. Get your Fallopian tubes cut and burned (if allowed; only if you've had several children and are over a certain age)
4. Rhythm or Coitus Interuptus (even The Pope knows this doesn't work - he's still ROTFLHAO)
5. Masturbation (autonomous self-love, spanking the monkey, rub one out; you gotta be strong - see #1; don't give in)
6. Be a Lesbian (no fraternizing with the enemy; risk social sanctions)
Scheist, women only get six choices; see how unfair this is already?
Oh, wait. I guess there's one more:
I knew an abortion runner who worked it during the 1940s and 1950s. She'd arrange the details with the woman in need: the payment of money, the secretive transport, the place, "the doctor" who performed the injection with mercury, Mercury!; the woman's return to her safe place. She also insured no particular was ever revealed.
She was proud of the work she did, made a good living at it, never got caught, and says she never lost a client to sickness or death of the woman, both common risks of illegal abortion; mostly eradicated by making abortion legal.
Her descriptions made my head spin. I graduated the same year Roe vs Wade passed. I knew several high-school classmates who'd had "babies out of wedlock," had been forced into “marriages of convenience,” and, who'd had illegal abortions.
It's amazing to me how many of my classmates in the under-18 illegal-abortion group had parents who were staunch Christians - my sister's parents included, when she had her abortion.
Oh, wait! that was AFTER Roe vs Wade. But our parents had their rationale of experience of friends and family who'd had carried babies only to give them up for adoption - including knowing all the emotional consequences thereof.
How many people (women, or couples, or families) had availed themselves of abortion services in the 1940s and 1950s?
Plenty Plenty Plenty. The numbers of abortions have actually decreased since the passage of Roe vs Wade.
There were actually more abortions annually before the change to legal abortions than after R v W (this fact is tracked at the Center for Disease Control, the CDC).
But I digress. This is about The Choices of a Man.
To limit women’s choices smacks of discrimination, which, as we know from the smackdown on California's Prop 8 yesterday, discriminating against a singular group of people is completely unacceptable.
Still, in high school, in my senior civics class we were assigned a community project. I wanted to call in Planned Parenthood to speak to our class. Planned Parenthood only wanted to come out to our tiny rural school for an assembly.
I had to go to the principal, who vetoed it 100 percent. I spilled my intel: what about this one and that one and the other who are pregnant/post-abortion/gave up a baby?
I named, to my shame now, four young women, my classmates, NOT girls, young WOMEN who were sexually active and who should have had the option of convenient and inexpensive birth control.
In our rural school, it was a 30 mile drive, a long trip nearly 40 years ago, to avail oneself of Planned Parenthood services.
It wasn’t like all of us could go to the local doctor - that sensible MD, who accepted my Huge Lie of Horrible Periods to put me on The Pill; that same doc who recommended the doctor who performed my sister’s abortion. Dr Hermann, your courage amazes to me, even to this day.
I somehow convinced the Principal to okay the school assembly, inviting Planned Parenthood, with his the caveat that every student had to have a parental signature.
Permission slips were duly printed and handed out, the invitation made. I believe, to this day, that only ONE of those signatures was real. I believe it because that mother was the only adult to show up at the assembly; 550 students in the school, 550 showed up, plus one parent.
Do I think anything has changed for teenagers today?
No.
Were we hungry then for information about contraception?
I think we were ravenous.
.
I am so cruel
You say you want me.
You don't have time for me.
Tell me you're thinking of me.
I never hear from you.
I made it real easy although
I don't think I made it clear.
I told you I already sent myself
Roses so I wouldn't miss you
on Valentine's Day if you got it
you would know I have no
expectations of you as well as
I know you won't meet any of
my needs.
.
I will be the foam on the wave.
Ride in - enjoy it - disappear
when the wave leaves, as it
inevitably does, without
being impacted, because foam
is just air, after all.
Not consumed or subsumed,
just there, then ready to go
again.
You don't have time for me.
Tell me you're thinking of me.
I never hear from you.
I made it real easy although
I don't think I made it clear.
I told you I already sent myself
Roses so I wouldn't miss you
on Valentine's Day if you got it
you would know I have no
expectations of you as well as
I know you won't meet any of
my needs.
.
I will be the foam on the wave.
Ride in - enjoy it - disappear
when the wave leaves, as it
inevitably does, without
being impacted, because foam
is just air, after all.
Not consumed or subsumed,
just there, then ready to go
again.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Prop 8 is Unconstitutional
I'm still processing all I've heard on Rachel Maddow tonight, listening to attorney Ted Olsen, who looks, amazingly, like my grandpa's brother, my Great-Uncle Dale - he sounds like him, too. I am enjoying the deep rumble his voice reaches now and again, so much like my motorcycle. It's all good, but I digress.
More importantly, I'm listening to his words regarding California's Proposition 8, which had authorized the civil right to marry the one you love. The Court had said "selecting out a group by particular characteristics," to prevent people from marrying one they love, is without merit.
My friend had married her same-sex partner in California before Prop 8, so I asked her what the impact of today's ruling was for her; the impact may be minimal, since she has rights in Alaska as a state employee, for her civil union to be recognized for benefits, signed off by no less than former Governor Sarah Palin.
I'll wait for her answer back, but I feel joy that she gets the same civil right I have - and far be it from me to prevent anyone from enjoying the misery of marriage; she and her wife are so strong and beautiful - I am delighted they get to keep their legal relationship.
Won't it be great when a legal marriage that occurred in California is recognized across these United States, from Sea to Shining Sea.
.
More importantly, I'm listening to his words regarding California's Proposition 8, which had authorized the civil right to marry the one you love. The Court had said "selecting out a group by particular characteristics," to prevent people from marrying one they love, is without merit.
My friend had married her same-sex partner in California before Prop 8, so I asked her what the impact of today's ruling was for her; the impact may be minimal, since she has rights in Alaska as a state employee, for her civil union to be recognized for benefits, signed off by no less than former Governor Sarah Palin.
I'll wait for her answer back, but I feel joy that she gets the same civil right I have - and far be it from me to prevent anyone from enjoying the misery of marriage; she and her wife are so strong and beautiful - I am delighted they get to keep their legal relationship.
Won't it be great when a legal marriage that occurred in California is recognized across these United States, from Sea to Shining Sea.
.
Friday, February 3, 2012
The DJ Series, part one
You saw me on the hottest day ever
Me in a black sweater
Take it off, you asked, aren't you too hot?
I looked at you
Ohh, you're already in love, I thought.
Too close, we stood too close together,
I could see inside you
You looked at me, you looked
like you wanted to say
something
Walked away, you walked on
you mocked, something you said
made me know you were in deep
too soon, already.
Right there next to me in
the midst of all those others,
I knew.
.
How do we stretch things
over space and time?
When your kiss came to me
I knew it was you
Unseen, felt deep
Encompassing.
How can that be?
.
Hidden, keep it hidden,
You're my secret go to,
You're mine alone, I
Don't share a word about you
I hold you close to me,
See you when my deepest need
cannot be expressed
Or contained.
Me in a black sweater
Take it off, you asked, aren't you too hot?
I looked at you
Ohh, you're already in love, I thought.
Too close, we stood too close together,
I could see inside you
You looked at me, you looked
like you wanted to say
something
Walked away, you walked on
you mocked, something you said
made me know you were in deep
too soon, already.
Right there next to me in
the midst of all those others,
I knew.
.
How do we stretch things
over space and time?
When your kiss came to me
I knew it was you
Unseen, felt deep
Encompassing.
How can that be?
.
Hidden, keep it hidden,
You're my secret go to,
You're mine alone, I
Don't share a word about you
I hold you close to me,
See you when my deepest need
cannot be expressed
Or contained.
She Didn't Want It, Reprise (DJ)
You bring huge comfort to me
Your love making
How you keep it going,
building for days, sometimes weeks,
too long while I ache for you
Call you, tell you I don't want you
Laugh and laugh, rant, rave, you laugh with me,
Egg me on
Say what you want
I say I don't want you
Don't call back,
I don't want you
I'm calling to say
don't tie me back
Don't let me take you in my mouth
Don't kiss me so hard like you do
the kisses that flip me open
that warm my universe and make me
melt with delight
Tonight
You got it right
All day long you called me
Called me to you
Called my body to yield
My lips my breast my hips
You're in me
Rocking me, I propel, too free
Your smile says it all
You've loved me for years.
Your love making
How you keep it going,
building for days, sometimes weeks,
too long while I ache for you
Call you, tell you I don't want you
Laugh and laugh, rant, rave, you laugh with me,
Egg me on
Say what you want
I say I don't want you
Don't call back,
I don't want you
I'm calling to say
don't tie me back
Don't let me take you in my mouth
Don't kiss me so hard like you do
the kisses that flip me open
that warm my universe and make me
melt with delight
Tonight
You got it right
All day long you called me
Called me to you
Called my body to yield
My lips my breast my hips
You're in me
Rocking me, I propel, too free
Your smile says it all
You've loved me for years.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Golden Bear, Golden Locks, First Bear Awakens
Early Spring
Rain & Wind
hard ride, exhilarated,
He saw me.
I saw him like Adonis, Apollo,
a vision filled my eyes like
glacier wind had filled my lungs,
a sweetness after barren winter,
it cleared my head
.
I rested, wanting to talk to him
Beg him come to me
Wrap his legs around me and ride,
let me take you to a meadow
and show you what I mean
.
On I get, push around to leave, he gets out to say to me, “Ride safe, darling,” and a million other things I couldn’t hear
and could not have wanted more.
In surprise I blundered 'thank you' in three languages, but not one thing of what
I really wanted to him to know.
Go ahead, ask
I feel it like a heartbeat
A little nauseating
A little thrilling
I’m edgy
Excited.
I know you want this
you asked
you begged
a simple dream
Are you ready for this?
I know the way,
take my hand.
I can feel you thinking, wondering, wanting to ask.
Afraid.
Waiting.
I feel your anticipation
I feel your arms
Around me.
Yes, you want to hold me
You want it like you’ve never wanted anything.
Go ahead, it’s yours; ask.Tuesday, January 24, 2012
My Mom is So Funny, page 10
I dreamed I washed my mother's feet.
She passed away about six weeks ago and in the dream she seemed so glad to have me do this for her - the feet were very dirty as if she'd been walking, walking a lot! Barefoot!
Enjoying herself, I could tell, she had the silliest grin on her face. She didn't dialogue with me, she just let me scrub the dirt off.
I realize, in a dream, I am everything in my dream. I am my mother, I am the dirt, I am the feet, and the grin and the water; I am also the person giving.
I have not found much information yet about the dream meaning of washing your mother's feet. I know the rite of foot washing has religious symbolism: a humble attitude by one participant to another; taking away grief, sadness, and sorrow; an act of giving comfort and love, as well as being able to accept the ministrations of another.
To complicate it, my mother was a quadriplegic who was not able to use her limbs or feel her extremities for several decades; washing her feet doesn't have the same effect on her that I would feel, for instance, if someone were to wash my feet - someone had to do everything for her every single day.
She always had to be in the position of accepting an act of comfort she could never return.
I have no idea what that must feel like; I cannot even begin to speculate.
I washed her everyday for two years, I know exactly what that felt like, but this was different - dirty feet felt like transition - of course, I assumed it was her transition because, of course, she is the one who has passed.
The transition affects me, as well, because I no longer have this major job of managing her body but all her other needs: the nurses, aides, social workers, volunteers, household, nutrition, and on and on and on, as well as maintaining my job. I had put most of the rest of my life on hold, choosing to help my parents through their end-of-life needs.
She wasn't a burden to me, surprisingly; for years and years I wouldn't do any of her care because I was afraid of getting sucked into a vortex of unending unmeetable needs. I took her on because I promised dad, and truthfully, a fully-needy quadriplegic is far too much trouble for a nursing home to manage. We tried, it didn't work.
So what about these dirty feet? Mud-encrusted happy feet on a woman who wasn't a walker the last time I saw her. What does that mean?
If I am my mother, then I've been out doing something I haven't done for ages, and I'm doing something quite fun, getting out there barefoot!! I do love dirt. It's the middle of winter - nearly five feet of snow in my yard - I couldn't see dirt today if I wanted to, much less run through the yard barefoot. Even better, trek through sand at the beach! Or get my feet washed and tickled, massaged and lotioned and kissed.
Actually, the dream may have been prescient.
A few nights ago, I did something I had never done, and I actually did get my feet rubbed and kissed and tickled. It was fun. I was open to it. I took what someone wanted to give me without thinking for a minute that I had to give something back.
I think I must have had the silliest grin on my face.
She passed away about six weeks ago and in the dream she seemed so glad to have me do this for her - the feet were very dirty as if she'd been walking, walking a lot! Barefoot!
Enjoying herself, I could tell, she had the silliest grin on her face. She didn't dialogue with me, she just let me scrub the dirt off.
I realize, in a dream, I am everything in my dream. I am my mother, I am the dirt, I am the feet, and the grin and the water; I am also the person giving.
I have not found much information yet about the dream meaning of washing your mother's feet. I know the rite of foot washing has religious symbolism: a humble attitude by one participant to another; taking away grief, sadness, and sorrow; an act of giving comfort and love, as well as being able to accept the ministrations of another.
To complicate it, my mother was a quadriplegic who was not able to use her limbs or feel her extremities for several decades; washing her feet doesn't have the same effect on her that I would feel, for instance, if someone were to wash my feet - someone had to do everything for her every single day.
She always had to be in the position of accepting an act of comfort she could never return.
I have no idea what that must feel like; I cannot even begin to speculate.
I washed her everyday for two years, I know exactly what that felt like, but this was different - dirty feet felt like transition - of course, I assumed it was her transition because, of course, she is the one who has passed.
The transition affects me, as well, because I no longer have this major job of managing her body but all her other needs: the nurses, aides, social workers, volunteers, household, nutrition, and on and on and on, as well as maintaining my job. I had put most of the rest of my life on hold, choosing to help my parents through their end-of-life needs.
She wasn't a burden to me, surprisingly; for years and years I wouldn't do any of her care because I was afraid of getting sucked into a vortex of unending unmeetable needs. I took her on because I promised dad, and truthfully, a fully-needy quadriplegic is far too much trouble for a nursing home to manage. We tried, it didn't work.
So what about these dirty feet? Mud-encrusted happy feet on a woman who wasn't a walker the last time I saw her. What does that mean?
If I am my mother, then I've been out doing something I haven't done for ages, and I'm doing something quite fun, getting out there barefoot!! I do love dirt. It's the middle of winter - nearly five feet of snow in my yard - I couldn't see dirt today if I wanted to, much less run through the yard barefoot. Even better, trek through sand at the beach! Or get my feet washed and tickled, massaged and lotioned and kissed.
Actually, the dream may have been prescient.
A few nights ago, I did something I had never done, and I actually did get my feet rubbed and kissed and tickled. It was fun. I was open to it. I took what someone wanted to give me without thinking for a minute that I had to give something back.
I think I must have had the silliest grin on my face.
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Hope you are all enjoying! JULY 4th - INDEPENDENCE DAY
Here are a few tidbits I thought about today:
The Declaration of Independence was created June–July 1776 Ratified July 4, 1776
(about a month, just try that now)
The Constitutional Convention started May 25, 1787 (did you know not everyone that was supposed to be there bothered to show up?)
The Constitution was signed September 17, 1787
(less than three months from Convention to signing, wow!)
The Affordable Care Act was a concept that FDR tried during his administration, it was called the Wagner National Health Act of 1939.
In 1943, it became the very famous Wagner-Murray- Dingell Bill. The bill called for compulsory national health insurance and a payroll tax.
When Truman took office he changed the bill somewhat because he wanted universal healthcare for all (1945).
We all remember Hillary Clinton's efforts to introduce and pass Health Care in 1993.
Now, here it is 2012.
The Affordable Care Act was introduced by President Obama Feb 2009, worked it's way through the House and Senate and was signed by President Obama March 2010 (over a year) and was deemed Constitutional July 2012
So....for those of you saying it was rushed or pushed, it took apprx 28,000 days before a Health Care Act was enacted, whereas the Constitution took about 116 and the Declaration Of Independence less than 30.