Category: Family

Crested Butte, Colorado, my 60th birthday

I always think of you when I hear the Fleetwood Mac song Gypsy.  For years, that song has reminded me of you, and I always picture you in your Alaska days.  Tonight, during their show, for the first time I felt myself reflecting back on my pre-Arlo days, thinking like a gypsy in spirit.  I kept thinking about how cool it would have been if you and I were able to meet when we were both in our young twenties.  I think we would have been best friends.  Thank you for gifting me with a part of your spiritual gypsy soul.  Love you always!  Emery December 3, 2018

Emery sent this email to me after a Fleetwood Mac concert, when she was living in Fort Collins and I was still in KC, but would be moving to Boulder the following summer. I liked to think about Emery and me as friends— going to concerts together and wearing vintage clothing with braids in our hair.  I held her idea, knowing that someday we would go to a Fleetwood Mac concert and pretend to be in our early 20s, instead of a young mother and grandmother. Those words hold far more value for me today, as do the conversations, the photos, the experiences, and the plans that never came to fruition, because now they carry the weight of being finite entities.

This is not the typical beginning to a Mother’s Day post for me, with musings of pop tarts on make-shift trays and kids fighting over who gets to sit next to mom. Instead, I’ve been dreading this Mother’s Day.  Emery, who is why I landed in Boulder,  and was the one who ensured I was given a proper Mother’s Day celebration, is gone.  I don’t know what to do with the day or myself, knowing that her plans for us to celebrate our roles as mamas will be painfully absent.

Last year on Mother’s Day, Emery and I celebrated our motherhood doing what we loved — we played in the dirt and planted three carloads of perennials in her front yard. Emery did what I never could on Mother’s Day. She told Miles she wanted to spend the day planting with me after our family brunch. It was her version of me wanting to go to the movies by myself for Mother’s Day, but unlike me, she asked for what she wanted and got it.   Miles took the children fishing, and Emery and I rolled up our sleeves and dug in the dirt.  We planted, we laughed, we told stories, and we cried, all with the beautiful music of Stephen Sanchez in the background.  Emery preferred the wild, untamed, and overgrown look of an English garden, whereas I preferred the orderly and tidy look of a French garden. I told her we would know exactly who planted what in three years, as her area would be a tangled mess.  She smiled at me and said, “I know, Mom…exactly like I like it.”  I told her it would be fun to see the results of our plantings on the following Mother’s Day, when much of what we planted would be beginning to show blooms.  She suggested we do the same thing the following Mother’s Day.  I agreed.  I loved the tradition we had set into motion.

We talked about travel plans — a trip to NYC, and when the children were at an age when she could leave them for a longer stretch, maybe Paris.  She said she would visit me when I returned to the house I had rented on the Oregon Coast the following year, cloudy days and all and asked me where I wanted to celebrate my 70th birthday.  Emery had planned my 50th and 60th birthday celebrations, so I knew my 70th would be no exception.  The anticipation felt good.  We had so much to look forward to.  That ended on January 4th, at 11:38 am — a time on the clock and forever in my heart that marked my before and after.  It became my line of demarcation between when my life was whole and when a big part was gone.  It marks the time from when I looked forward to the trips and plans made, to not wanting to do anything. It is my before, when joy was present and my heart felt full, and now the after,  when I can barely get out of bed in the morning, can’t sleep at night, and cry without reserve or explanation at inopportune times.  It marks the time when I knew who I was, to the time when I have no idea who I am, or who I will become in my grief of missing my darling girl.  It marks the time before, when I bought two Mother’s Day cards last year to be given on two consecutive Mother’s Days, because they were that good, to the time after,  where there will always be an unsigned Mother’s Day card in the top drawer of my desk, because I bought it for Emery, and no one else. 

Thomas and Grant, who I became a mother to before Emery was born, have mothered me since January 4th and the 48 hours that preceded that difficult day.  They held me up, gave me their shoulders to cry into, came to me from another room when they heard me sobbing, and never once told me it would be ok, because we all knew it never would be. As we were leaving Emery’s hospital room the morning she died, Thomas said, “You can’t hold your sister’s hand while the machines that were keeping her alive are turned off and walk out of the room the same person.”  He was so right. We are all changed, and our love of Emery and each other is holding us together. Through their love, I have found my respite and refuge and because they are a part of me, they are the ones who can help me carry the tremendous load of grief I have for the part of their life and mine that is missing.   They have been by my side as we navigate this unfamiliar journey that often feels like an icy precipice with limited visibility on a knife-edge cliff. They have become my strength, my comfort, and the outstretched hands in person and words over the phone that have become my stability. They are my comfort.  They are my world. They are my opening into the wisdom of how we will carry this grief and how to set it down, if only for a moment. They carry stories that only we know, that are now safeguarded for Emery and Miles’ children, Arlo and Muna. To Thomas and Grant,  I’m honored that you call me Mom on this most difficult of Mothers’ Days and every day after.  You hold my heart. 

Emery’s Dad, Charlie,  and I were with our girl for her first breath and also her last.  We linked the circle of Emery’s being in the hospital room, overcrowded with machinery, anticipation, and hope, while time slipped and stalled and ended with a painful loss, whose depth we are still grappling with. And just as Thomas would later confirm, we filed out of her room, different from the people who had entered.

I’ve been going through the files on my computer titled Emery.  In it are countless letters and essays I’ve written to or about Emery, along with emails from her. I found the words I wrote for her Celebration of Life, and next to that, a copy of her death certificate.  That last entry makes it feel like the file had been closed, but it hasn’t.  It can’t be closed just like I can’t tell people I have two children.  I have three, two of them living. In rereading the essays and letters, there is a common thread of my difficulties in letting go that started with her going to kindergarten and ended with  her getting married, and eventually, moving to Colorado.  I didn’t want to let go.  I didn’t know how.  I learned the night after getting her settled in her dorm room at college, when she called and asked if I could return to college and be her roommate, she didn’t know how to let go either.  I knew she was joking, but I also understood the sentiment behind her words.  We missed each other when we weren’t physically close.  One of the letters I found in the collection was one she wrote me for my 60th birthday.  I stopped and started it several times as it was painful to read and decided to include part of it given that it’s Mother’s Day.

August 30, 2015 (from Emery)

“You taught me to always listen to my intuition and follow my heart. I’m so glad I listened to you because I wouldn’t be who I am today if it were not for you.

This is what I’ve learned about the heart and the mother and child’s bond:

When two people are near one another, their hearts’ electromagnetic fields synchronize.  This synchronization is like a support system, one heart learning to beat with the other.  The first begins in utero, when the mother’s and baby’s hearts synchronize. When you’re away from that person, your heart goes through a period where it has to focus on beating without the other heart, and it takes some time for your heart to get back to beating on its own in a normal fashion.  This is the feeling of heartache or missing the person.  It is real.

As two people who have spent so much time together, our hearts sigh with relief when we are together, Mom,  because we are so familiar with each other.  So, when I say I love you from the bottom of my heart, I really, really mean it.  I love you so much, Mom. Emery”  

You were right, my darling girl, the feeling of heartache is real. I wonder how much time it will be before my broken heart goes back to beating in the way it beat before January 4th at 11:38, if that will ever happen.

I’ve often spoken of the umbilical cord when writing about mothering, or the metaphorical cord after the physical one has been cut.  I’ve referenced my umbilical cord stretching itself to three different parts of the country, where my three children lived.  I don’t know how far Emery’s cord stretches now, but I know it’s still there. I can feel its tug when I see Muna’s big brown eyes and soft curls, so much like her Mama, or when Arlo leaned in at our birthday dinner, wanting me to tell him stories about his Mama.  I will tell him all the stories I can remember, and story by story, word by word, he and Muna will have the tools to paint a picture of their Mama when she was a child.   I feel the cord wrapping itself around my own heart, which is no longer intact, yet, the connections continue —a red-tailed hawk circling overhead, a quarter found on the floor next to my bed with 1990 on it, and a framed photo also near my bed that randomly fell over yesterday. Connections are different, but present. 

I used to tell my kids that I would stand before a moving train if I had to to protect them.  I spoke metaphorically, but the deeper I got into motherhood, the less metaphorical that statement became.  I’m sorry I couldn’t stop that train on Jan 4th, Emery. I couldn’t even find the tracks, and as a mother, not being able to come to your rescue has been so painful that I sometimes struggle to find my breath. 

My Mother’s Day post in 2017 was dedicated to Emery as she had just given birth to her son, Arlo, four days earlier, ironically, on my firstborn, Thomas’s, birthday.

It feel timely to include an excerpt from that post.

Mother’s Day, May 4th, 2017

I will always be your mother, and you will always be my daughter, but now we’re entering into a new place, given that we both are mothers now, and that in and of itself is just about the most beautiful and perfect thing I can think of on this very first Mother’s Day for you. 

You will have days that you feel like you are swimming upstream in mud, and it will be hard to maneuver yourself out of the mire, but you’ll figure it out, and before you begin to slump into a human question mark, rest assured, dry land is never out of sight.  You’ll stumble, you’ll fumble, you’ll eat a bag of chips with a salsa chaser for breakfast, and you’ll call pajamas clothes for more days than you care to admit, and to that I say “do it.”  And do it repeatedly because you deserve every morsel of not-so-healthy and every hour of long past time to get out of your jammies.  You’re a mama now.  Claim that right with pride.

You grew up with a mom who often felt like that frazzled, wild-haired bus driver in the Magic School Bus series, which I greeted at the time with a sigh and a promise to myself to get it right the next time. Still, decades later and without apologies, I realize that the messy, the dirty, the not wearing the right shoes, or shoes at all, and letting go of a whole lot of shoulds and coulds, just might have been one of the best gifts I could give you.  I can’t end this letter without a big shout-out to your partner in life and love, Miles.  His hands-on fathering melts my heart. What a lucky baby Arlo is to have you both as parents.

From one mother to another, I wish you the best of everything and several consecutive hours of sleep this Mother’s Day, dear Emery.  Only now that you are a Mom, can you begin to understand how much I love you. And I do.  So much.

Still.

To all reading this, celebrate your role as a Mom, or celebrate your Mom today.  It matters deeply.

Mother’s Day, 2012

It’s the small things in life that seem to hold the most real estate in my heart – not from birthdays or weddings or special holidays, but rather, the moments from every day life that surprise me and have me wanting to push the pause button and absorb it before it moves past.   I had one of those moments on my last morning in Colorado, while staying with my daughter, son-in-law and 10 month-old grandson.

I was sitting on an ottoman that I had pushed up in front of the windowed door to the deck with my grandson,  Arlo, on my lap.  It was early morning and the sun was still making it’s last climb over the horizon, leaving a soft yellow glow in the house; that very peaceful time of day when everything seems to move a bit slower, including 10 month-old babies.  A herd of 20 or so mule deer were slowly making their way across their land, close enough to the house that they were easily spotted by both of us, even though their coats were camouflaged against the color of the winter grass.  When Arlo spotted them, he quickly looked up to me to insure that I also saw them, then pointed his small finger at them,  looked up at me again and smiled.  Arlo is a very busy, very mobile baby, so the  moments seemed borrowed in a way and I held onto them as long as I could as I knew while it was happening that it was a moment and a feeling  I’d later savor.

We sat there  for several minutes, quietly watching as the deer slowly made their way across the land behind the house, Arlo’s eyes wide with fascination. When he had seen enough, he turned his attention towards me and  grabbed my necklace, as he often does because he’s a baby and that’s what babies do, but this time he held it in his small hand as if he was really examining it, rather than simply trying to pull it off of my neck.  It’s a small silver disc with  the words “protect this woman” surrounding a small turquoise piece in the center.  I’ve worn it continually  around my neck for the past 5 years.  He seemed very curious about it.  Someday, Arlo, I will tell you about the day that I found the necklace in a small shop in Leadville, CO.  I will tell you that in the previous months, I had climbed to the top of five 14,000 foot peaks, by myself, and although I have a weakness for silver and turquoise, it was the words on that small disc that had me buying it without hesitation.  I’ll explain how even though it is only a piece of jewelry that I wear around my neck, somehow, it makes me feel just a tiny bit safer.  I’ll show you, someday, what it felt like to climb those five tall peaks and will give you the handful of tips I discovered  as we climb them together.

I will also tell you about the first morning after my young family had moved into our new home,  when your Mom was not even three,  and I saw a huge buck circling the large cedar tree in the front of our house and how mesmerized I was by the site of him and the fact that there he was, right in our own front yard. There’s just something about watching deer so close to where you live in the early morning hours.   I’ll tell you that those 5 acres that surrounded our new home made me feel like I was living on a ranch as I had never lived in a place with so much land around me.  You’ll laugh about that one, no doubt, as living with a lot of land around you is all you have known, but that’s ok.    At some point, I’ll  tell you the rest of my deer story… the part where the deer could wipe out days of work in my garden during their early morning feedings and how I spent countless hours and endless experimentation trying to deter them.  Even so, that morning when I saw the buck circling the cedar tree, just feet from our front porch, still wins on the deer memories for me.  Did I mention that it was snowing lightly that morning?

As I sat there in the quiet house, with Arlo  on my lap, I felt the awe of the role of Grandma that I was blessed with a short 10 months ago.  It’s a role that I covet dearly, first, because I am a mom and to see my baby take on the very role that shaped the biggest part of my life is beyond miraculous to me.  Second, because of my own grandparents and the important role they all played in me becoming who I am today.  My love of knitting, sewing, gardening, photography, writing and love of travel were all introduced to me by my grandparents, whether directly with a hand reaching over mine as I held a red plastic knitting needle as it formed stitches or indirectly, simply by exposure.

The silver bangle that I’ve worn on my right wrist since I was 16, is one of many continual reminders of their influence  in my life.  I can remember my maternal grandmother, always with an armful of silver bangles, and the noise she would make when she entered a room.  Her granddaughters were each given one of her bangles when she died and I’ve carried that little bit of her on my wrist ever since.  There are other reminders that come in flashes – the first bloom of the iris in the spring, a well-written, witty letter, a bolt of fabric with its limitless possibilities when a sewing machine and a lot of patience are added, skeins of yarn and needles and the hope of sweaters that will fit and the ever present  camera that resulted in boxes and boxes of  beautifully captured photographs.  These are the pieces of my life that have given me my sense of passion and have pushed my creativity in ways that continue to challenge me. If I can contribute in  a similar way to my own grandson’s life, I will feel like I’m not only sharing some of who I am with him, but I’m giving thanks to my own grandparents in the process.

Last week, I was in a baby store shopping with someone who I’ve called my best friend since I was 15 years old.  She was shopping for her  6 week-old grand son, and I was shopping for Arlo.  We hadn’t been there long when it hit me and in between the oohs and ahhhs and is this cute?  too cute?  and how big will he be in 6 months?,  I stopped,  pondered the reality of the moment, and commented.

“Look at us….friends for 3/4 of our lives, you living on the east coast for most of it,  and me in the midwest,  and here we are, in a baby shop in Breckenridge, Colorado, shopping for our grandsons.  Could you even have begun to imagine that out of all the searches we made together… the clothes,  the parties, the guys, the fun the beer and the cheap clothes and babysitting jobs to pay for those cheap clothes and maybe someone with a fake ID to buy the cheap beer, that someday our search together would be for baby clothes… for our grandsons???”

A beautiful passage of time seemed to have had us both in its collective hug and the 46 years had brought us to a moment that I think caught us both off guard.  We became grandmas for the first time 9 months apart and after sharing so many firsts, we’re sharing one again.

So, Arlo, that moment we watched the deer with the sun rising at our backs, tucked away in the quiet of the house  with you seated on my lap,  was one moment of countless moments to come.  I have so much to tell you and share with you and if just one of those many moments impacts you enough that someday you’re sharing it with your own child or grandchild, or really anyone, then I will have succeeded and that yarn of all of our collective experiences will continue to knit the stories that will connect the generations.   We  are all a part of the creation of something quite beautiful – stitch by stitch, row by row, that continues to grow.

Today,  I am seated on the same blue couch I sat on a year ago, looking out of the same picture windows at the same spot on the Oregon Coast.   I remember the story I wrote that day after being moved by what I had seen earlier at the beach.  The story has stayed with me and has become far more relevant and meaningful over the past few months than the day I wrote it. 

I had witnessed a small gathering of people standing shoulder to shoulder at the water’s edge with their faces and attention all towards the sea.  I was drawn to their stillness and connection to something I couldn’t see but could feel.  As I got closer, close enough to see the individuals in the group, while respectfully maintaining my distance, I saw someone seated in front of the group who appeared to be younger than those standing.  She wore a yellow raincoat.  The person at the end of the group moved next to the girl, squatted down, put his hand on her back, and handed her a box.  The girl held the box to her chest, then returned it to the man, picked up a stick, and began carving something into the sand.  When she was finished, the man returned the box to her and the group slowly walked away from the water in a single file, with the girl in the yellow raincoat trailing behind. I had walked away from the group, not wanting to intrude, and when I returned, I saw the letters MA carved into the sand.  The tide may have erased the first part of the word,  or maybe that was all she wrote.  Was it MA?  Or were they the last two letters of MAMA?  I wasn’t sure, but the image drawn beside it was unmistakable—a heart.

I may not have gotten the details right, and that didn’t matter, but what I did get right was the witnessing of love that the line-up of people had for someone who was no longer with them. It made me think of my three children and what they would look like had it been me who they were honoring and mourning. A year later, that is not the story I’m telling.  Instead, it is my two sons and I who are metaphorically standing at the water’s edge, mourning the passing of my sons’ only sister and my only daughter. It’s not the order of life we expected, and we still grapple with the reality that it happened. My daughter, Emery, who was not even as old as I was when I gave birth to her, is no longer with us. Of course, Emery’s metaphorical lineup at the water’s edge would be much larger than just me and her two brothers and would include her father, her husband, her two children, and her two sisters-in-law, for starters.

Emery was always my first text after I’d post a new blog.  She’d praise my words, noting specific parts that moved her or made her laugh, indicating that she had read the piece and wasn’t just giving me a quick “ I loved it!” acknowledgment. I remember her text after I posted my story of the lineup of people on the beach, and I could quote her exact words if I felt brave enough emotionally to scroll through her texts, but I don’t.  She later told me she could see herself and her brothers doing exactly what I said in the piece…“Talking over each other and interrupting with stories about Mom because there had been so many, but she should be here telling them because she was the storyteller.” I won’t get her response to this post.

Witnessing what I did that morning had me thinking about my death and how my family would react.  It’s not something that I think of often, but after seeing the group of people mourning someone they loved and leaning into each other in sorrow, thoughts of my death were softened by the love that has woven us together as a family.   I never thought it would be the youngest family member we would be saying goodbye to first.

This morning, a year later, I thought about the girl in the yellow raincoat, who I guessed to be a young teen.  She was the one I related to, especially after seeing the letters MA  and the heart carved into the sand.  As a Mama who said goodbye to her daughter, who was also a Mama, I became the girl in the yellow raincoat.  The oldest and the Mom in our family of five made an unlikely connection with the youngest in the lineup of people on the beach because of a heart drawn in the sand and two letters that I have turned into the word Mama for the story’s sake.  She missed her Mama, and I am a Mama who misses her child.  We have a connection.

Back in the mid-70s, when I was getting my pilot’s license, I became close friends with Leigh, who was also in her late teens, working on her pilot’s license.  Leigh and I connected with our experiences, enjoying each other’s stories far more than anyone else would.  Several times a week, we’d return to the fixed base operation at the small regional airport where I worked after closing. She’d park her car at the edge of the tarmac, and we’d lay on the car’s roof, looking at the stars and watching the lights of the planes as they descended onto the runway while passing a bottle of Cold Duck back and forth. It was a rich environment for sharing dreams, most of them in the skies.  Our conversations were punctuated by “this will be something we will tell our grandkids” because we thought it would be our role as grandmas to share stories that would have our grandchildren on the edge of their seats. It became our tagline and our push to do things that scared us — more stories for our grandchildren.  I had no idea at the time that the stories I would be telling two of my grandchildren would not be about my flying escapades but rather would be stories about their Mama, some that only I could tell them.  I will tell them the stories their Mama won’t be able to tell them. I will be the one to tell them she loved red shoes as a little girl, twirly skirts, and could French braid her hair when she was in kindergarten.  I will tell them she had a deathly fear of silverfish, and it had nothing to do with the holes they made in coveted sweaters.  I will tell them that for many years, she would only eat yogurt if it had goldfish crackers in it, and so that’s how I prepared it for her.  I will tell them I sang to her at night until she was old enough to sing along, and it became a nightly show rather than a peaceful transition to slumber.

In the same way, I would sit with my Dad in his last few years and ask for more stories, so afraid he would die before I had them all, I need to make sure Arlo and Muna have all the stories I can remember about their Mama.  It will be healing for me and information for them. I will feel Emery’s presence as I ramble on to Arlo and Muna with stories about their Mama. I will feel her beside me, nodding and smirking, then saying, “Well, that’s not exactly how it happened…”. And I’ll look back at her with raised brows, and she will correct herself and say, “You’re right and some exaggeration is OK because you’re the storyteller and you have a captive audience.”  At least, that’s what I imagine.  In telling my daughter’s stories, the edges of the missing part of my heart will soften. Salve to my heart will become information for Arlo and Muna.  I thought about the “stories we will tell our grandchildren”  while walking on a beach a short drive from where I’m staying. A few minutes later,  I noticed I had missed a call from Leigh.  We hadn’t talked in over 15 years.  I sat on a rock to listen to her message and saw a heart-shaped rock in the sand, directly in front of my boot. I looked up, half expecting to also see a red-tailed hawk, but only saw a seagull.   Emery is with me, and she’s making sure I know it.

As I returned to my car,  a couple reading the trailhead map at the edge of the parking lot stopped me and asked me if it was a hard hike down to the beach.  “Hard?  No, not at all.  It’s very easy and quite lovely.”  They thanked me and were on their way.  I paused, wondering why I had done what I did, responding to their question with the information they wanted but with a definite British accent.  I don’t normally respond to people I don’t know with a British accent.  Actually,  I’ve never done that before in my life, but there are many things I’m doing now that I’ve never done before as I’m navigating an unpredictable path. The only explanation I could come up with is that during these heavy days of sadness and grief, I don’t always want to be who I am.  I don’t want to be a Mom who has endured something that no Mom should ever have to endure.  Instead, I became a British woman, perhaps on holiday, enjoying a short hike and an afternoon at the beach.  Maybe someday, that will be added to the long line-up of stories I’ll tell Arlo and Muna.  The story of grief being so difficult to maneuver that their Laudie pretended to be someone else and spoke with a British accent. 

Many of the stories I will share with Arlo and Muna were recorded when they happened in journals and essays I’ve written and collected since the day I found out I was pregnant with their Mama.  As I sit here today, on the same blue couch, looking out of the same picture window to a part of the country I’ve come to love, I think about the girl in the yellow raincoat.  I wonder if, a year later, the raw edges of her grief have been softened and if she asks the others who were with her that day to tell her more stories because when there is a finite number, they hold more weight and importance than ever imagined before.  The words I write today,  tomorrow, and for the rest of my life, will be the stories l tell my grandchildren when the time is right. They are words inspired by my beautiful girl, Emery, written by the one she called Mom while in the throes of grief that I never could have anticipated.  

“Once upon a time, your Mama…” I’ll say,  and Arlo and Muna will lean in, holding onto every word then will carry them as their own.

(that I never thought I would write)

01/19/2025

As a writer, I have always found comfort and solace in words, much like other family members find in music and art.  Words have helped me make sense of the world and have given me a portal to express myself, whether I’m sharing my work with others or for my eyes only.  I’ve opened my computer countless times these past two weeks, but words fail me. Instead, when I open my computer, I find myself going through photos of Emery. I linger on the ones of her as a little girl because the more recent memories of my girl as a woman, a wife, and a mother hurt my heart too much now.  Funny stories came to mind, but I wondered if they would be appropriate for Emery’s celebration of life…a time of reverence, respect, and awe.  Then I felt Emery’s nudge…and her telling me, “Celebration, Mom, focus on the celebration part and tell the stories.”    And so I will.

My Flower Girl:

Like many children, Emery never wanted to go to bed, whether at night or during afternoon naps.  When most children her age would be put down for naps in their cribs, Emery would try to persuade me to let her nap on the couch, “mostly to keep me company.” I caved more often than I should have because I loved having her curled up next to me on the couch, pretending to sleep while I pretended to read.  One of my nighttime techniques to help her fall asleep was to sing to her.  I am not a singer, by the way.  I don’t remember how, when, or why, but the song “I Love the Flower Girl” by the Cowsills became my nightly lullaby.  When she was old enough to sing along, it became our duet, with hairbrush microphones in hand.  This hardly ensured Emery’s entrance into slumber, but it was fun, and we loved fun, so it became our routine and “our song.”  

Emery grew up loving flowers, and at an age when most of her friends didn’t know the difference between a daffodil and a daisy, she could name every one of the perennials and shrubs in my very large garden… in Latin because that’s how I taught her.  When she was in kindergarten, she started calling my garden “the garden of love.”  She decided she wanted her kindergarten teacher, Miss Lindner,  to get married there and began to make plans.  She  knew where Miss Lindner would enter the garden, under the rose trellis, of course, and where her husband-to-be would be waiting for her.  She told me we would need to call the newspaper.  I told her Miss Lindner needed a boyfriend.  She dismissed my concerns and said we needed a photographer.  “Could you be the photographer?” She asked.  I told her I’d be honored.  Miss Linder did not get married in our  “garden of love,” but we did attend her wedding two years later.  As we watched Miss Lindner walk down the aisle, we looked at each other, smiled, and nodded.  Our thoughts were on the same thing… our garden of love.  Truly, my flower girl. 

Marley:

Emery’s love of animals ran as deep as her love of plants.  When she was in kindergarten, we adopted our beloved yellow lab, Marley.  On our first visit to the vet, a female doctor came into the exam room, introduced herself, and told us she would be right back.  Emery asked me why the veterinarian was a woman.  She had opened the door to a conversation I loved having with her about how women can do the same jobs as men, but before I could finish my point, she interrupted me and said, “Oh, I know that, Mom. I was just wondering why Marley’s doctor wasn’t a dog because wouldn’t a dog understand our Marley better than a person?  I started to explain to her that a dog wouldn’t be able to tell us what Marley needed but stopped because I wanted to savor how her brain processed life through the lens of love.  Emery and I would be in that room together, curled up on a blanket next to Marley, 12 years later, when we had Marley euthanized.  She asked me why it hurt so much.  I told her because the deeper the love is,  the more painful the goodbyes are.  I told her this when her Gramps, my dad, passed in September.  I’m telling myself this now.

Not long after that, she asked me when the world turned from black and white to color because there were pictures of me and her grandparents in my photo albums that were black and white, and the photos of her and her brothers were in color.  “Was I there when it changed?  Was it amazing to see everything turn to color after it had been black and white? she asked me.  Another question I needed to savor first and explain later.  Emery saturated the colors in life in the way she saw things, and in doing so, she changed the way I looked at life. As alike as we were, I had one trait that she told me she could never understand, and that was my love of a gray day, a sad movie, a melancholy song, or a long string of rainy days. Emery wanted the sun and the saturation of colors that came with it. Emery needed the sun.

There are no words that can carry the depth and weight of the emotions and love I will always carry for Emery.  Nor should there be because feelings this deep cannot be defined by words but rather can only be felt in the depths of our souls. A part of my heart left with her because, as her Mama, I couldn’t let her go alone.

I want to end with words I wrote to Emery in November 2012 as I grappled with my emotions of letting her go to begin a life with Miles the following year.

“Sometimes I look at you, and you are four years old — with chubby arms and legs, wild hair that you refuse to let anyone but you comb, and you don’t, and a twirly skirt that you enjoy keeping airborne while revealing your mom’s lackadaisical dressing style because you have no underwear on.

You are not four years old, and I am not the mama of a four-year-old, yet somehow, in my teaching you how to fly, I forgot to teach myself how to let you go.  I’m watching you fly while I desperately try to remember exactly when your feet left the ground because one day, I was carrying you, and in what seemed to be no longer than a restful pause, you were carrying yourself.  When you were handed to me in the hospital, I felt like I was holding onto a big part of my heart.  I still do.  And just as you told me when you were little and what we still say to each other every day,  I love you with my whole heart.  Really, really, for my whole life.“

Soar through the skies, my beautiful Emery.

Life is short.  Make it sweet.  These words were printed on a wooden block that fell off a shelf and landed inches from my feet as I filled my coffee cup at McClain’s Bakery in Kansas City.   I picked up the wooden block just as one of the employees came over with profuse apologies and returned the block to the shelf next to the coffee urns.

I took my coffee to a nearby table and opened my computer to work on some writing, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the falling block and its message.  It felt like a tap on the shoulder that I couldn’t ignore.  Life is short.  Make it sweet. It also felt like something Dad would have noticed, possibly adding that he could have made a better block with letters carved instead of painted. It’s also possible that Dad was trying to bring those words to my attention with a block that was not precariously perched but fell anyway and landed at my feet.  There have been so many incidents since Dad passed, starting with the red-tailed hawk, where his presence was undeniably felt.  I’m counting the falling block as another one.

In the past several months, I’ve experienced the highest of highs and lows that had me crumpling and wondering if I’d ever be upright again. In July, my granddaughter, Frankie, entered the world, exploding my already full heart. The next month, my sister, Robin, was diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer, and a month later, my dad died—a timeline of the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. My cousin, sensing the profound grief and sadness I was experiencing, told me to look for the sparkles every day, especially now, as they will become more important than ever. I decided to follow her advice. During Dad’s short stay in hospice,  I sat by his bedside for several hours and let my mind weave its way through countless memories, some bringing tears to my eyes and others a good laugh.  Because the hospice nurse told me even though he might not react, he could hear me, so some of those memories I shared aloud with him. The door to Dad’s room was open, and during a quiet moment, a woman, who I didn’t know, came in, walked over to me, leaned down, and hugged me.  I was surprised, confused, and comforted.  She told me she hoped it was Ok, and I nodded, not knowing what to say; then she added, “I sat with my dad a month ago, and I know the feeling.  I recognized the look on your face when I walked by, and it looked like you needed a hug.”  I thanked her, told her she was right, and then she was gone.  It was all so fast that it took me a minute to absorb what had happened and the gift I had been given from a complete stranger.  Life is short. Make it sweet. I was grateful for my cousin’s reminder, and since then, not a day has gone by that I’ve not seen a sparkle.  The block falling at my feet was an unexpected but very welcomed sparkle.

I’ve been through the lowest of lows these past few months, but it was in those lows that I’ve been reminded of what really matters, even though it was something I knew all along. Thanksgiving is about toasting and giving thanks at a beautiful table filled with platters of food and the cranberries I insist on bringing, even though my daughter tells me nobody likes cranberries.  And just like last year, I will bring home an almost full dish of cranberries that I will eat for a few days and then throw away. Thankfulness is the incredible group of people from around the world who I met while at a writing retreat in Greece last July and who I now call my friends.  Thankfulness is the connection I made during my writing retreat for one on the Oregon Coast, inspired by the scenery and the group of writers and artists I was selected to work with.  Thankfulness was the birth of baby Frankie, who arrived days before I left for Greece and who became my priority when I got home, booking my flight to LA two days later to hold her in my arms. Thankfulness is the moment when I set down the burden of heavy anxiety I had been carrying with an exhale and a sigh of relief because the doctors said Robin’s bloodwork looked good and her cancer was asleep. Thankful is knowing Dad had an easy and peaceful passing, confirmed by the hospice nurse who, in her compassionate delivery, told me he had a perfect death — quick, painless, and peaceful.   

I’m thankful for the love my kids have given me with their emotional and physical support and for showing me through grief and sadness that family and friends are what hold us together in life more than anything else.  Family. Friends. Cousins. My Mom. We’ve all been holding each other up and, in doing so, have found our strength, our resiliency, and, thank goodness, our humor.  A comparison between poorly folded sheets in the linen closet to the flag the two soldiers ceremoniously folded at Dad’s military ceremony was some of that necessary humor.  

I’m thankful for unexpected reminders that life really is short and to make it sweet.  In a time when life has felt so difficult and I wondered what I could find to be thankful for this year, I’ve come up with a list that holds more meaning and depth than most years, which I’m calling my Thanksgiving sparkle.  

Happy Thanksgiving to anyone who reads these pages.  I hope your day is filled with unexpected sparkles with people you love and cranberries that no one likes but someone made because they love you.

Dad started what would become a tradition when he and Mom moved to their retirement home 15 years ago.  I don’t remember if it was Veterans Day, Memorial Day, or the 4th of July, but on the first patriotic holiday after moving in, Dad went to their patio and played taps.   He told me he didn’t know if anyone else could hear it (adding that most had compromised hearing, so probably not), but even so, he felt it needed to be played to honor and respect the many Veterans who had died.  His playing was noticed, and so it continued and soon became his tradition.

When our family was at Dad’s interment ceremony at the Veteran’s Cemetery in Higginsville, Missouri a few weeks ago, the ceremony began in a small chapel. I transported Dad’s ashes again, although this time in the back seat of my car as Mom was riding shotgun. When we arrived, the urn of ashes were placed on a small table in the front of the chapel with the tricorn folded flag in front of it.  Two uniformed service members unfolded the flag and with ceremonial respect and measured precision, refolded it before handing it to our mom.  A lone bugler, who was positioned outside the chapel,  played taps as the flag was being folded. I was Ok, or as Ok as one is when their father dies, until I heard the sound of taps being played.  I thought about the many patriotic holidays when Dad played taps, whether anyone could hear it or not. Today, with the urn of his ashes on the table while two uniformed servicemen refolded the flag, I realized the significance of an unknown bugler playing for a man they had never met – the same man who never let a patriotic holiday go by without playing taps on his patio for the soldiers he knew and most that he never would.  Someone was playing taps for Dad. With that realization, my tears flowed. Dad would have loved the precision of the military ceremony and the respect paid to him, but most of all, he would have loved the sound of the bugle being played in his honor and having his family present to witness.

Taps is a 24-note melancholy piece of music played by a single instrument, usually a bugle or a trumpet.  It began as a last call before lights out that was played on military bases. It eventually evolved into the familiar solemn farewell that few can hear without being emotionally touched. It is played slowly, respectively, and never with embellishments. 

I miss you, Dad, especially on days that held such deep meaning to you.  It took me hearing taps at your funeral to understand why playing the 24-note piece became not only your honor to those who lost their lives in service, but your personal obligation. Today, on Veteran’s Day, I have no doubt that someone will play it for you, in your honor.

I’ve written things I didn’t want to write, pieces I regret ever seeing the light of day, and countless stories, essays, blog posts, and a few memoirs that may never be finished.  Some pages come easily; others are slogs, but I stay with it if I feel like something’s there.  A few days ago, I was given the difficult task and deep honor of writing my Dad’s obituary.  I  was honored my family gave me the responsibility of writing it, but I also struggled.  Not because I couldn’t find the words or the stories but because I didn’t want to write in past tense.  It was also hard to edit my words to an appropriate-sized piece as I wanted to include far more than would fit into the parameters of an obituary. I called the Kansas City Star to ask them what the average length of an obituary was and was told there was no limit.  She told me they had seen a few at 900 words, which was rare, and if I had a lot to say, 800 words was a good number.  As we spoke, I looked down at my word count.  982.  OK, I told her I’m good.  Inhale, exhale, and start deleting. 

I settled into a table at the back of a cafe with a big cup of coffee and my computer and started typing. I was only a few sentences in when I realized that typing in a public place had not been a good idea, as I was only a few sentences in when I began to sob.  If anyone around me knew what I was typing, I’m sure they would have stopped staring and sent over some tissues. After an hour or so, or about a large cup of coffee later, I finished editing, cutting a few hundred words in the process. The cutting felt painful because who am I to decide what is put in and what is left out when it comes to such a public reckoning of who my Dad was and what he did in his life?  Dad was a storyteller.  He would have also struggled with the assignment.  I felt proud and sad at the same time and made a promise to myself that it wouldn’t be the last time I wrote a piece about my Dad.  I was also sad, because Dad was one of my favorite readers, always with a comment, and this would be one piece he would never read.

Dad was blessed with 96 years, and up until two months ago when he fell, most of those 96 years had been good, with Dad holding onto his attitude of “today is going to be my best day yet,” regardless of what he had on the calendar. 

 I left the cafe with the kind of headache you get after crying, a pain that is felt more emotionally than physically. I got into my car, called my sons who happened to be in town and told them I was on my way to meet them for lunch, then I backed into a truck who was entering the parking lot.  I’m a good driver and can count on one hand how many wrecks I’ve been in with a couple of fingers left over, none of them serious. All I could think of was, seriously?  This is how I’m ending my morning? The couple exited the truck, and the man said, “Oh great, I see you don’t even live here… Colorado?”  “Yes, I do, but I’m here for a while because”… I considered my next sentence as it felt manipulative, but I said it anyway… “My Dad passed last week, and I’ll be in town for a while.”  The woman sighed and told me how sorry she was.  The man went back to his truck in search of paper. Both of our vehicles were damaged, his worse than mine, but both were drivable. We exchanged information, and I got back into my car and cried because I wasn’t sure what else to do, then started laughing because seriously, had I shared with the couple that I had been in the cafe writing his obituary…well, you can’t make this stuff up and it sounded like I just did. 

The events of the morning would have been a great story to share with Dad.  After hearing it,  he would have ensured that I was OK and the person I hit was OK, then would have found the humor in the situation along with the irony.  He was good at that.  Had he been in a similar situation, he would have chatted with the other driver and likely shared a story, ending with a handshake and a laugh. You were the storyteller, Pops, and I was honored to be given the gift to tell yours. 

Bob was often called a Renaissance man, “a fully-rounded person, knowledgeable in many areas, including the sciences, arts, and humanities.”  To that, his family would add that he was the one who got the call when the car wouldn’t start, the disposal was jammed, or help was needed to get an oversized mattress down a narrow flight of stairs. Dad was the first call when a trusted Volkswagen was no longer trusted and needed a tow. He improvised with his equipment more than once by taking his belt out of the loops and using it as the tow rope.  Dad was always available and ready to roll up his sleeves and go to work whenever his family needed him.  This philosophy was also how he spent 28 years working Monday through Friday at Olathe High School, where he was a guidance counselor with an open-door policy to anyone who needed advice, encouragement, counsel, or simply someone to talk to.

Bob was born in Pleasant Hill, Missouri, on August 1, 1928.  He died on September 7, at Foxwood Springs in Raymore, Missouri, where he and his wife Nancy had lived for the past13years.  When Bob graduated from high school, he joined the Army and was stationed in Pisa, Italy.  His musical ability was recognized, and he was asked to form a band with the German prisoners of war.  He didn’t speak German (or Italian), but he shared the language of music with his band, communicating with notes, not words. 

He met his wife, Nancy, at Central Missouri State University in Warrensburg, Missouri. They were married after he graduated, and on August 29th, they celebrated their 71st anniversary.  He had a special evening planned 71 years ago that would end with a marriage proposal, but he couldn’t wait. Bob pulled off the highway under a Miller High Life billboard and popped the question.  Nancy said yes, and on every anniversary after, including this last one, he would tell anyone around that he still couldn’t believe she said yes. 

Bob and Nancy had four children: Robin Blackman of Kansas City, Missouri  (Jim Cumley), Laurie Sunderland of Boulder, Colorado, Susan Ketterman of South Egremont, Massachusetts (John Clarke), and Tom Blackman of Olathe (Renee Barta). They also have five grandchildren: Thomas Sunderland, Grant Sunderland, Emery Golson, Randi Jo Blackman, and Evan Blackman, as well as five great-grandchildren.

Bob was a curious man with many hobbies, most of them worked on in the garage, which never had a car parked inside. Instead, it became the headquarters for Bob’s many creations, which included everything from making furniture to carving intricate designs and figures to building a telescope that he spent countless hours working on in an unheated garage.  His biggest project was building a sailboat. The maiden voyage was at a nearby lake, and before pushing the newly crafted boat into the water, he announced that he had no idea if the boat would float or sink. Thankfully, the boat didn’t sink and became another weekend hobby.  

He taught his children, his students, and anyone who knew him the power of kindness and the beauty of living with a “glass half-full” attitude.  At age 90, he connected with a few musicians at his retirement facility and formed a jazz band where he played the coronet.  Playing music was one of his greatest passions, and even at age 96, he still played with strength and soul, never using sheet music, always by ear.  His last concert was ten days before he died.  His love of jazz began in high school when he would sneak out of his house and hitchhike to jazz clubs in Kansas City, where he was given opportunities to take the stage, eventually playing with the band The Scamps.  Expressing himself through notes played on his horn was one of his greatest joys, and although they wouldn’t let him play his coronet in rehab, his mouthpiece was on the table next to his bed.  One of the nurses said they weren’t crazy about him using the mouthpiece due to breathing issues, but they weren’t about to take it away from him as it gave him so much joy.  Two days before his passing, when he was beginning to fade, a video was shared of him playing a solo during a recent concert.  His eyes were closed, but he had a big smile on his face, and his foot began to mark time under the blankets. When asked if he knew who it was playing, he shook his head and said,  “No, but he sure is good.”  You got that right.  You sure were good.  

His kindness, his smile, and his “today is going to be my best day” attitude will be forever missed.  

This isn’t my typical post, but it is the perfect 10 year anniversary gift to myself.

@TheKeepthings published my piece about my Papa, who was a life long collector of National Geographics. He bound and hand lettered hundreds of issues, including Volume One, Number One, into books. @TheKeepthings is a memoir project where people share stories of lost loved ones and the things they left behind. It’s filled with beautiful stories that I’d encourage everyone to read. I feel honored to be a part of this project.

https://thekeepthings.substack.com/p/my-papas-national-geographics?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share

There’s a saying about not being able to go back or return home or something along those lines — my own interpretation being when you go back, you can’t expect it to be the same experience. I confirmed that a few days ago when I walked over to my son and daughter-in-law’s house. It’s
still their house, but they no longer live there. They live in Portland now, not Boulder. My son, Thomas, told me there was going to be an open house for their home that is now on the market and he thought I might want to go have a look. Might? Does he know me at all? Open houses are the non-creepy, socially acceptable way to snoop and given that I know the owners, I didn’t hesitate. In fact, I was the first on there upon opening, promptly at 11:00 am.

As I approached their driveway, noting the unfamiliar car in the drive, I stopped for a moment to take it all in. My main reason for going had been curiosity about the staging. It’s always fun to see what is brought into a home when selling, not living, is the objective. But standing there in the driveway, I realized that this peek into their newly staged house was going to be more about the memories shared inside of these four walls and less about decor. I took a deep breath, walked over to the front door, hesitated, then opened it and stepped into the entry way. Once in, I wondered, are you supposed to ring the doorbell for an open house? Two realtors, a man and a woman who I later learned were twins, greeted me, asked if I was looking to buy then began to talk about what a wonderful house it was. I quickly redirected their enthusiasm and told them who I was and why I had come, adding that what I had seen so far looked great and I’d report back to my son.

The man, was sitting in Lilah’s spot. He looked too big to be seated where she was supposed to be. We talked about real estate trends, house prices and what a find it was to have a lot as big as theirs in that neighborhood. I’m good at small talk but don’t enjoy it so diverted the conversation to the night they saw a bear walk across their deck which prompted Thomas to start writing down all the animals he had seen in their back yard. Had it been a bingo game, he would have almost had a black out. He was missing the moose. They thought it best not to share that with prospective buyers. I agreed. I had established enough of a relationship with the twins that I felt comfortable taking as much time as I needed to make my way room by room, through the house. First impressions were that the house looked amazing, but odd. It wasn’t the house I was familiar with, yet it was.

A rectangular table replaced the round table that Brooke and Thomas had. We shared a lot around that round table and I know the memories will continue at that same table in Portland. So many dinners and celebrations came to mind —the birthday parties for Lilah, the first one postponed because she got sick and coincidently, it was the day after we were told that quarantines would be starting and we should prepare by buying enough food to last at least two weeks. Little did we know. On her 2nd birthday, we got over a foot of snow and Thomas had to give me a ride to their house because even for this snow-loving girl, it was too much for me to maneuver. And her 3rd bday, the butterfly-themed birthday, was shortly after Thomas and Brooke told me they had decided to move back to Portland. With the news still feeling like an open wound, I gave Lilah a tee-shirt with a picture of the Flatirons on it and BOULDER COLORADO in bold letters.. I didn’t want her to forget. I thought about the two Thanksgiving dinners I had at that table — the first when Brooke was newly pregnant with her second and was so tired but she made a beautiful dinner in spite of that early pregnancy exhaustion and the 2nd this past year, which was the best Thanksgiving dinner I’ve ever eaten. I marveled at how she did it given she had a 3 year-old and a 4 month-old. Even the butter was freshly “churned.” I thought about our New Year Eve celebration in 2020, held late afternoon in their kitchen. My daughter Emery, son-in-law, Miles and two grandkids, Arlo and Muna, were also a part of the celebration. We tried hard to make it festive at a time when nothing felt very festive. We raised glasses of champagne and toasted to a covid-free year ahead. Our celebration was wrapped up by 7:00.

I walked around to the slider door in the kitchen, the one that Thomas was constantly repairing with reminders to his toddler not to slide the screen door and not PUSH it to open. looked out on the same deck where a short time ago looked warm and homey with an outdoor couch, a rug, a coffee table and a hanging rattan chair along with multiple baskets filled with toys and stuffed animals. It was empty and barren now — no furniture, no toys, no baby or one year old or talkative 2 or 3 year-old Lilah. It would be a blank slate for the next family to fashion as their own. If the weather was nice, and it usually was, we always ate outside on the long wooden table with benches that sat under a large tree that the deck had been built around. On the other side of the deck, the first spring they lived there, Brooke planted a sunflower house for Lilah. By mid-summer, the heads of the flowers bent towards the middle, their stems not strong enough to hold them upright. It formed the perfect little house for Lilah. This was the same yard where Thomas started finding 4 leaf clovers almost daily and even a few 5 and 6 leaf clovers. I found two. The only two I’ve ever found in my life.

I walked back into the kitchen and around to the front room where I had entered and am sure in real estate terms, it is referred to as a “formal living room” and not a front room, but I prefer “front room.” Two white upholstered chairs that I would be proud to own, sat where their couch had been. That missing couch was where I stayed for 3 days after having a minor procedure on my knee of stem cell injections. It wasn’t as minor as I had anticipated and the pain, that I was told wouldn’t really be much of an issue, was. I planned on being driven home and spending the first night on my own couch, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to navigate the 18 steps up to my room, but given the amount of pain I was in, and my inability to walk, Thomas and Brooke insisted I stay with them, which I did, without argument. I remember Thomas and Emery helping me out of the car and into that front room, one under each arm, and depositing me onto the couch that Brooke had made up as a bed for me. It was where I lived for the next 3 days. The next day, I got out the crutches out that Thomas had bought for me and with great determination and focus, hobbled over to the bathroom, which wasn’t far, but when you’ve never used crutches and were told to not put any weight on the leg they had injected, it might as well have been down the street and around the corner. Lilah, not quite three, saw me carefully making my way across the front room, while awkwardly maneuvering the crutches. Realizing I had an audience, I tried hard not to wince in pain and keep my swearing to in my mind only. She watched me with the pride of a mom watching her toddler take their first step.
“Well look at you!!” She said to me proudly, with hands on hips and a big smile on her face.
It’s still one of my favorite lines I’ve ever heard from her and there have been many! Thomas would later tell me that when she came home from preschool on the day I went home, she told him that the couch was a bed with Laudie in it in the morning but now it was just an old couch again. That couch that once served as my bed, now resides in Portland. I hope taking it out of context won’t take those few days out of her memory.

As I slowly made my way through the house, room by room, mentally pushing aside the new furnishings and letting my memories guide me, I was surprised by the memories that stopped me in my tracks. Of course there were the birthdays and holidays and getting to see Thomas and Brooke’s second child come into their house for the first time, but it was the small things, the very small things that grabbed me. I remember sitting in a tiny chair at the child-sized table in Lilah’s play area, brushing the hair of one of her dolls, her name escapes me, but it was probably Sophia, because most of her her dolls were named Sophia at that time. Her hair looked like yarn that had been brushed – dull and fuzzy. Lilah gave her to me along with a brush and asked it I could “make her hair pretty.” I gave it my best shot, but even after brushing poor Sophia’s hair, it still looked like a matted dog. She took the doll, shook her head with the understanding that the hair wasn’t going to get better no matter how much it was brushed, then added,
“I think it will work best for Sophia to always wear a hat.”
Out of the mouths of babes. And Sophia is never without her hat.

We watched football games, basketball games, world cup soccer, old home videos and Biden’s acceptance speech in the same room I was standing in but there was no big, comfy couch or scatterings of stuffed animals and books or two cats — both the shy one that only came out to play at night and the playful one, or even a TV for that matter. It was just a family room with a lovely fireplace and beautiful natural light. We had big plans to have a regular movie night and watched “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” for the kick off to our great idea. We still haven’t had our second movie watch. Maybe we just haven’t decided what to watch. Maybe in Portland.

After passing the twin realtors, still perched on the island stools with untouched plates of bakery cookies and bottled waters patiently behind them on the island, I went upstairs, and paused at the empty wall in front of me in the landing. A short three weeks ago, this wall had been a gallery of family photos. I remember the thrill I felt the first time I saw a photo of me in that gallery. It was a photo Thomas had taken years several years earlier at a restaurant in Kansas City while waiting for our order. When he gave me a copy of the photo a few weeks later, I told him I thought it was the best photo any one had taken of me in recent years. I liked it because I thought it looked like the the way I think I look, not to others, but to myself.

The guest room and Lilah’s room’s were empty — easier for me when I didn’t have to push back the unfamiliar furnishings to get to the memories. I thought about the two consecutive nights that I was called in the middle of the night when Brooke had gone into labor. The first night was a false alarm and I left before Lilah work up in the morning. I later told her I had spent the night at her house and had driven over in my pj’s. She loved that — her Laudie getting in her car and driving in her pj’s.
“Did you wear your slippers too, Laudie?” She wanted to know.
“Of course I did! Shoes would have looked strange with my pj’s.”
The second night was not a false alarm and in the wee hours of the morning, I received Thomas’s text that Ozma Rose had arrived. The thrill! — seeing those words pop up on my phone through the blue halo of light in the dark room. I quickly texted back then went back to sleep, or at least tried. I couldn’t wait for Lilah to wake up so I could tell her she had a sister. Impatient with the wait, I tiptoed into her room around 7:00 and made enough noice to “accidentally” wake her up. She was so excited and went straight to her closet to find a dress to wear (not her normal choice in clothing) because she wanted to look “extra nice” when she met her baby sister. We ate breakfast then took a walk around the neighborhood and when we saw a white car turning into the cul-de-sac from a distance, we thought it was Thomas and Brooke and baby Ozma so we picked up our pace only to find out as we got closer that it was the wrong car. Lilah looked at me and shook her head and said,
“Oh Laudie, we were just a couple of kiddos chasing the wrong car, weren’t we?”
It would become our inside joke and something we’d randomly say to each other periodically to share a laugh. It had been a while since I’d been called a kiddo. A few hours later, I’d be laying next to her while she laid next to her mom and her baby sister, watching her marvel at how tiny her baby sister was and how excited she was. The staged bed was nice — a linen duvet with colorful, bohemian pillows lined up neatly across the head of the bed, not too many either, which seems to be a popular trend. I thought about warehouses of home furnishing and how fun it would be wandering up and down the aisles selecting items to tie in with an overall theme. Surely the decorator doesn’t have to go from shop to shop to obtain the goods. On second thought, it wouldn’t be fun. The impermanence of it all would make me sad. Still, nice duvet. Nice pillows.

Before I went downstairs, I returned to the empty room that used to be Lilah’s. I lingered in the doorway, long enough that I decided to get comfortable. I sat down on the floor, stretched my legs out and leaned against the wall. I looked at the empty space to the left of the window — where there used to be a bed with pastel bedding and a line up of very loved stuffed animals on the pillow. I felt the lump in my throat then the tears on my cheeks. Out of all the rooms, this one felt the most difficult for me to leave. I stayed until it felt like it was time to leave then quietly said, “Just a couple of kiddos, chasing the wrong car.” In the quiet of the empty room and from the bed that didn’t exist, I heard her respond with a soft laugh.

I thanked the realtors, took the blue cloth booties off my shoes and returned them to the basket by the door. I opened the door and hesitated. It was quiet. There was usually a tinkle of a bell that would sound when the door was moved, a good idea, I thought when there’s a toddler living in your house. I had become so used to it that I didn’t hear it any more, but in its absence, I heard the quiet.

As I walked away, I looked back at the large picture window in the front of the house with the sheer drapes that framed it on either side, and saw Lilah in my memories peeking out from the sheers, watching as my car would pull into the driveway. I would always wonder how long she had been waiting for me. There is no better entrance than one made with such a captive audience inside.

There was no white car in the drive and no tiny bike with training wheels parked next to the garage door. The house had been stripped of those who had lived there before, yet the memories were so strong that I had to wonder — how long will the energy of my family remain in this house even though their physical things have been removed?

I walked home, realizing I would never be in that house again, but it was OK and I was OK. I’ve done this before, with all of my children — helping with moves that have involved 6 different states, 8 different cities, with multiple locations in each. Several years ago, in a Mother’s Day blog, I talked about umbilical cords and although it was cut after birth, its essence lives on in the souls of the mothers. I mentally went through the list of the many cities and states where I’ve moved boxes into trucks, out of trucks and into houses and apartments. I stopped at 14, but not because I was done. The essence of the umbilical cords of my 3 children are strong and stretchy. They have been well exercised over the years.

Although practice may help with efficiency, it does not make the process easier emotionally. Add a very sweet 3 year-old to the mix who calls me “Laudie,” and it becomes even more difficult.

They don’t live here any more.

It’s still raw and my emotions feel wobbly and too close to the surface. It will take me a while before I remember that they really don’t live here any more. The day will come though and instead of grabbing my phone to call Thomas with pleas for his help with something that needs moved or fixed or constructed, or Brooke to set up a play date, I’ll get out my calendar and will look at airline schedules. In time.

 

I’ve measured time in many ways throughout my life – as a child it was measured in the “untils” as I didn’t have enough “pasts” to really matter……. how many days until my birthday, until summer, until Christmas, until I get new clothes/shoes/stuff and, well you get the picture.  As my life started accumulating more pasts, my time markers became milestones….graduating from high school, starting college, quitting college, finishing college, moving, moving back, getting married, having kids, getting divorced and so on.  Those are dates that are easy for me to remember because of their significance and dates that everything else seemed to be based around with befores and afters.   Lately, say in the last 12 years or so, monumental trips  have become markers for me…. Perú, Morocco, Patagonia, Bhutan, Nepal, the Camino, the Camino again and most recently, Ghana.  Those experiences help me keep track of life, when looking back, giving it a sense of order.  I may not remember all the travel dates exactly, but I do know the order, which makes it pretty easy to extrapolate an approximate date. Not that any of this really matters one bit to anyone but me, and only at the most inopportune times, such as in the middle of the night when I’m trying to piece together a life timeline for no reason other than insomnia,  but today it all seems very relevant.  One year ago, on this very day, I was given a new marker to the year 2017 – one that I’ll never have to extrapolate with events  to remember.

Arlo was born.  My daughter became a mama.  My son-in-law became a dad.  I became a grandma.  And all of this happened on MY first born’s birthday.  April 30, a date that was etched into my memory – a date that has become a double marker for my timeline of befores and afters.

My friends that came into “grandmahood” before me, had shared stories of a love like no other and told me with such certainty that everything would be forever changed when grandkids entered my life.  Of course I had no reason to doubt them, but it was like having someone tell you how incredible seeing the ocean was for the first time.   OK, I thought, my first time standing barefoot in the sand with sea spray in my face and water as far as I could see was memorable, but who’s to say what the introduction of a new generation into my family will really bring?  I’ve got a confession to all of those who went before me and fell head over heels in love the first time they laid eyes on their grandchild, I get it.  You were spot on and all of your predictions and words of love made perfect sense as I held my minutes old grandson for the first time.  That understanding has grown each and every day since, 365 to be exact.

A few years ago, my cousin’s daughter was pregnant with her first and had asked the question (possibly rhetorical) of, “Just how long is the umbilical cord anyway?”

I had no answer, simply because I didn’t know, but have thought a lot about that question ever since and have most likely included it on at least one previous Mother’s Day post.  So here’s my answer (once again):

It’s as long as it needs to be and will continue to grow as necessary.  Mine has extended to Chicago, LA and Ft. Collins, CO.  Of course physically it is no longer attached, but energetically, its connection remains strong, and much to my surprise, it has the capability of growing a new grand baby branch.  As a Mom and a Grandma, the tethering has continued.

Just one year ago… a very short year I must add, I was doing my own version of the in labor pacing – into and out of just about every retail store in downtown Fort Collins, buying much more than I should have but blaming it on nerves, excitement, and my daughter was in labor for Pete’s sake!  I found a miniature version of a stuffed dog that my own first born had been given when he was born (thank you, Aunt Robin) and had loved it clear down to an unrecognizable pile of pieced together patches that was missing both ears and a tail.  I bought it.  It seemed ominous.  It just happened to be the birthday of MY first born child as my baby was in labor with HER first born child.

Emery’s first words to me just moments after Arlo was born, were:

“Mom, we both gave birth to our first child on the same day… and they were both boys.”

I had held full composure until that moment….I hadn’t thought of Arlo being born on Thomas’s birthday as OUR shared experience, but rather, had looked at it as her son being born on her brother’s birthday.  Our thread of connection, which was already strong,  became even stronger than I could have ever imagined.  Right then, at that very moment, with her newborn in her arms,  she had everything she needed to begin to understand the depths of love that a mom has for her child.  As I looked at her,  a new mom holding her baby, my love for her expanded so much that I could physically feel it in my chest and I’ve got to think that because of what she was feeling for the first time as a mother to her child, her love for me did the same thing.  We were our own versions of the Grinch – hearts exploding with love.

For the past year, and as often as possible as we don’t live in the same state, I’ve watched my grandson grow from the tiny helpless newborn that I didn’t want to let go of, to a walking, communicating, personality-filled one year-old that I also don’t want to let go of.  I’m continually in awe and it’s not as if I’ve never  seen newborns turn into toddlers,  but watching my grandson has been different.  I get to roll around on the floor and play and be silly and make funny sounds that I forgot I even could,  while leaving the heavy lifting to his Mama and Daddy.  I earned this role and I’ve got to say, I’m loving it.

A year seems to go by faster and faster the older I get, and honestly, I never thought I’d type those words as I’ve heard them so often that frankly, I’m bored by them, but it’s true.  In the short span of 365 days, I’ve watched a helpless 7 pound, 7 ounce bundle of wonder turn into a walking, climbing, babbling, funny, curious toddler.  I’d say that’s a very productive use of time there, Arlo.  In comparison, I’ve logged a few more miles and have a few more wrinkles to show for my year.  I could have at least upped my Spanish game or learned how to crochet or something.  In comparison to your year, I’ve simply laid around.  There cannot be any other time in life where so much development and change happens outside of that first year.  What a joy to watch from the sidelines while not having to worry about schedules or feedings or planning ahead and bringing everything you MIGHT need in the diaper bag along with the everlasting wonder of will I ever get a good night’s sleep again?  I’m here for grandma duty and I’m here to play.  Can we wake him up now so we can play with him or can I just go look at him???

I’ve fallen head over heels in love with my one year-old role as grandma (or Laudie as I’m referred to) and am continually amazed by the impact that this little soul has had one my life.  Today, while trying to turn on the window unit air conditioner in my rented space in Boulder,  it took me a few moments to realize that I was using Arlo’s clunky baby phone (or is it a remote?), which wasn’t getting the air conditioner turned on.  Without hesitation or even surprise, I slipped the not an airconditioner remote into my purse, grabbed the correct remote, and turned on the air.  Later, while in a coffee shop, I pulled that same toy phone, or whatever it was,  out of my purse to answer my phone and wasn’t the least bit embarrassed when I realized that it was Arlo’s pretend phone and not my real phone.  Again, I have to emphasize the no embarrassment part.  I also had a pacifier and pretend car keys in my purse.  I suppose I put them there, but have no recollection.  At least I didn’t attempt to start my car with the big primary colored plastic keys.  There was a time, many years ago, when volunteering with the elderly in Perú, that I felt I was one Kleenex up the inside of my sleeve away from becoming one of them as I had begun to take on some of their behaviors (forgetting to zip up my pants, hugging and kissing far more than was appropriate and of course always having that tissue tucked up the sleeve, which I rarely used).  It’s possible that it is happening again.  This time, though, I feel like I’m one call on a Playskool phone call away from becoming a toddler.   I’m guessing I’ll be redirected by my daughter if it gets too out of hand.

A few nights ago, while trying to calm down an overly stimulated almost one year-old, I heard my daughter quietly singing the same song that I used to sing to her.  You are still my sunshine, Emery, and the sunshine that you and Miles have brought into my life with Arlo, shines brighter than I could have ever imagined.

What a year it’s been.  Happy first year of everything, Arlo, but mostly love.