...because every time I read my archives, when I'm searching for something someone wants to see, I think, geeze, why aren't I doing this more often? I love blogging!

Have been dealing with a lot of highs and lows and more to come, I'm sure, so for now, just to get back into the groove, here's Where I've Been, Part Two.  This is based on everything I wrote in 2007, and will give Ontario something else to cluck about, I'm sure, but no matter.  I am finding it interesting to see how I felt as I wrote each entry, and comparing it to how the words make me feel today.

This,  in January, after having seen We Are Marshall.  Sadly, it's still true--still that same moment when you first waken and you have that dark heavy feeling compounded by 'what was ...oh....' as you remember what it was that split your world into before/after.

It is amazing, speaking of what we already know and yet reacting the same way each time, how we are always so blindsided by death.  Not one of us know exactly when we'll die, unless we choose to do so by our own hand (please don't, dear ones, please, please don't...) And yet, yet...when someone dies, our immediate answer is 'but he was just here!'  And we walk through rooms they won't see again, picking up a sweater that still carries his scent, the book she was reading to me just last night, the letter you were writing that he will never see, now.  And we just can't believe it.  How could this happen? 

History repeats this, over and over, in big ways (Pearl Harbor, 9/11) and small (a baby who didn't waken from her morning nap, a cousin on his way home from Fort Hood) and we replay that reel of thoughts and memories and conversations over and over, as if we could rewind it and somehow get a different ending.  I know I did that, endlessly, when Grizzy and I broke up.  Magical thinking.   Joan Didion got that exactly right, in her wrenching memoir of grief and loss.  I've done a lot of that in my time.  I just wanted whatever hurt so much not to be true, wanted to wake as if from a nightmare.  But some nightmares are true, and even in sleep you feel the pain.   

This was also from January, and reading it again I am taken back into the nightmare of 'how did I get here, and how do I get out?'  I remember being more confused then about what and who love was than I have ever been before or since.  What did I take away from the wily fox? The sure and certain knowledge of who I am, what I am, what I have to offer, and that I need no one to complete or rescue me.  I am a complete and complex woman, and I finally like that woman. THOSE are words to live by, baby, and while I may regret the whole incident--and I do--I am glad to have learned so much from it:

I'm a passionate believer in finding something good in whatever happens to me (not in a Pollyanna sort of way, just....life is full of lessons, and I don't want to miss them) and understanding as much as I can so that, with any luck, I won't repeat my worst mistakes.

As my marriage, my heart, my life blew apart, I took my comfort where I could. And I trusted my friends--those who quickly made themselves known as real friends, as opposed to good-time acquaintances--and put myself on autopilot until the worst of what was happening was over.  I seemed to find significance in so many simple phrases......there were days when I'd be just silently screaming "I can't go on, I can't go on, I CANNOT go on...." and then I'd go on.  (After all, what else can you do?)  Other days my mantra was "I will not think, I will not feel, I will not cry."  And my journal at the time had a lovely cover, an Oriental watercolor calligraphed with "I fall down, I get up.  Meanwhile, I keep dancing." 

All of those thoughts were true, and truly felt.

But I got sucked into what seemed to be the best friendship that was leading into something more.  Someone older, 'wiser', certainly a fox in the hen house who had used the same words, same poems, same lines on every single woman who ever crossed his path. I didn't see it that way at all, as I think he must have known I would.  Stupidly, I believed him when he said it had never been like this before, because I so desperately needed to be everything to someone.  It never occurred to me that anyone would play someone like that, that they could cast out the same bait to every single person in the pool and see who bit.  I never thought someone who sounded the way he sounded could really have so little respect for women, could have such an empty soul. 

And  I bit. 

Here's a couple paragraphs from one of those 'things you didn't know you didn't know about me.'  I wrote it in February.  I think it's funny that even NOW, after so much time, I am still learning who really looks at me and who just gives me the once over....those who assume a blonde must have blue eyes.  My eyes are not blue....never have been.  They're very feline, green, definitely my best feature, and no way could they be mistaken for blue.  I digress.

~~Because of my birth, adoption, and marriage, I have had five different names.  I had a couple of engagements through the years that I DIDN'T marry--my name is Beth, after all, not Elizabeth Taylor--or it might have been eight.  Or not.  Who's to say? If I'd married my very first love I might be married to him yet.  The world will never know.

And...funnily enough...I use a different name from any of these for my publishing.

~~My eyes changed color somewhere throughout my life.  For many years they were considered hazel, and now they are pure green.  Gold-flecked green, to be sure, but green nonetheless. 

Here's my thoughts before I went in to interview for a page position at the library:

In the meantime, I'd love to be part of the library staff.  Anyone who loves books the way I do would be a tremendous asset for them.  So wish me luck.  (This is way better than being the Lunch Lady!)  I'm going in there dressed in something red (I always do, when I want/need to feel powerful) and I'm going to make them wonder how they ever got along without me.

And this is a couple days later:

...completely ignoring Gallagher's oh-so-sage advice: once you get past 40, don't put your butt over your head.

Okay, so I'm not really doing cartwheels.  Never could.

But I CAN put my butt over my head, if I care to, a yoga move, you know....lie on your back, stretch your legs up, up, up, and then bring them on over until your toes touch the floor behind your head.  Feels good.  Really!

But I digress.

 

The library called me for an interview.  Tomorrow, 1 p.m.  They are interested in me!

 

Well, of course they are, she says modestly....

Am I surprised? Not really.  I knew going in that if they looked at my application, they would at least want to talk to me.  And they do.  Grizzy says I am way overqualified, and I am, but this would still be a kick to do.  I mean, I have to be around books on a daily basis...if I am to breathe, that is.

And I am gonna knock 'em dead.  Watch me!

And finally:

I NAILED that interview.  There is just no question about it.  I could see it in their eyes, and feel it in the energy in the room.  I could hear my own inner voice telling me, 'This is yours, now go get it!'  I felt so good I didn't even need to wear red for confidence--today it was black velvet pants, olive green shirt and black/olive/peach jacket. 

Had three tests.  One was to read aloud, to see how well I could do that.  I do that very well, and I didn't stumble once over a single line.  And I have a good voice, too; I know they wanted to see how I'd sound if someone asked a question.  Grizzy always said I give good phone, so...go me.

Then I had to alphabetize a stack of cards, the kind that used to be tucked in the little pockets in the books when you checked them out...but they're pretty much history now that it's the computer/scanner age at the checkout desk.  I did that, and then, because I knew how detail-oriented librarians are, I tamped them back into a neat stack and double-checked my work to be sure it was correct, before handing them over.  And it was.

And while I was doing the last phase, which was to put the cards in order according to the Dewey Decimal System, I saw (peripherally) how both of my interviewers looked over my first stack of cards and nodded to each other.  I double-checked my work a second time and handed them over, knowing that was correct, too.  It's just a matter of waiting for the phone call, now.  They will make the decision this week. (AND it's gonna be me!)

Do you KNOW how good this is for me?  To once again stride into a place and know it can be mine, if I want it?  I've always been able to do that--make you notice me if I want you to, or be totally invisible if I don't want you to see me. 

They hired me that same afternoon. By the end of that year I'd moved up two levels from page to assistant, or 'hey! liberry lady!' Still, oh, still and always, I have to be around books if I am to breathe.

This is from April and oh! I can still hear every word of it and all the fun we had.

She's always had quite an imagination, this daughter of ours, and we've done everything we could to encourage it to blossom.

When she was 3, her favorite game to play was school bus, and she'd line up all the chairs in the house and then get into the 'driver's seat,' cautioning everyone to sit down and fasten their seat belts.  (And having seen the way she drives in her favorite arcade game, that's just as well.  Does the term "hell on wheels" mean anything to you??) 

It means we've often had imaginary playmates--I'm often called upon to make pancakes not just for Betsy, but for Tori and Whitney and Hope and Stephen and Jaylen--none of whom are actually standing anywhere but in the mind of our child.  But I play along every time, especially when she uses a half-dozen different voices to thank me, and I am careful to repeat every name in my "you're welcomes."

I like it.  I do.  It's nice to see where all she goes and the details in the scenarios she spins.

Today, she decided, is her wedding day.  She's going to marry Stephen, she says. (Fickle girl.  Last year before we moved here, it was Colin, a little Aussie boy who was utterly charming, whom she fell for on the spot the minute she met him, saying "Oh my GOSH, I HAVE to marry you!")

Then she decided that there were some details yet to be arranged, and would I take care of them.  In no particular order:

~~I'm supposed to buy some flowers.  Pink.  And I'm supposed to get some more flowers, pink ones, and take off the petals and put them in a basket so the kids can throw them at her.

~~I need to bake the wedding cake, tomorrow, so it'll be fresh.  Half chocolate and half  'nilla.  And though she handed me 'the little dolls' to put on top, she also asked me to cut out some cardboard dinosaurs--green ones--because that's Stephen's favorite--to put beside the little dolls.

~~I need to get a CD with "Here Comes the Bride" on it.

~~She would like me to bake cupcakes for the kids.  (We had a cupcake tree at our second wedding, instead of the traditional wedding cake, because we thought she'd like that best of all.  And she did.)

~~I need to set up the playpen for all the little kids.  (I'm not just sure who all these little kids are, but no matter.  We can imagine as many as are wanted.)

~~I'm supposed to get one hundred pink sparkly scarves and sew them together, and then get on a ladder and hang them up on the ceiling in a big U.

~~I'm supposed to get a big slide for out back for the bigger kids.  But nothing for the teenagers to do because they'll just want to watch the wedding.

~~I'm supposed to buy two wigs, for her little daughter, who is having a bad hair day.  (You think I'm making this up, don't you?)

~~I'm supposed to buy pizza and some drinks for the party for after the wedding.  And some water.

~~I'm supposed to get some poles to keep everyone in straight lines.

~~I'm supposed to take her husband to the ring store and that way he can pick what rings he wants to give her and then I can just buy what I think will look good on him and then he can choose.

~~Oh, and I can choose her dress, too.

 

My daughter, the bride.  In her wrinkled pink dress (worn over ever-so-attractive grey leggings) and bare feet.  With a temporary tattoo of a butterfly on her cheek.  Reminding me, as she walks down the aisle, "Mom! Remember! You're supposed to cry happy tears!"

Please join us for the festivities.  Mr. and Mrs. Stephen "I don't know his last name" are registered at Toys R Us and FAO Schwartz. 

(I really doubt we will have any MORE fun planning her actual wedding.)

That summer I had a spectacular struggle with the Beast, as I call it, and it lasted longer than any depression I have ever had.  In fact....I have to say that when weeks turn into months with no new posts from me here, it's a pretty sure bet that I am fighting off the demons yet again....it is the only time I cannot write and that simple fact only adds to the agonies.

For two months I've pretty much felt I was behind a thick and solid wall of glass.  I could see you, but not hear you.  I could not talk to you, because I had nothing, absolutely nothing, to say.  I was on autopilot, functioning just enough and no more.  It reminded me of the summer of 2002, when I was passing through the worst pain of my life, but you would never have known if I did not wish you to.  Even Grizzy and Betsy, and my parents, have been largely unaware of so much inner turmoil, because when you feel the same way day after day....you learn to keep it to yourself.  (No, really, you do.  Think about it.  How often when someone asks 'how ya doing?' do they really want to know?) 

And so I've dealt with everything I could, as best as I could, and let go what I could not manage.  I keep reminding myself that I'm not really as worthless as I have felt, though there are those who would surely disagree. 

Time heals.  There are always scars, but time heals.

"Pharmaceutical wonders are at work
But I believe only in this moment
of well being. Unholy Ghost,
you are certain to come again."

 

This is undoubtedly true.  But when that Ghost comes again....I will not go quietly.

Grizzy and I were in a whirl of preparations for our soon-to-arrive baby.  Just one month before, we hadn't even known we were having a baby, and after twenty years of being childless, if anyone had told me that a prayer of decades would be answered with just six little words--"YOU'RE Going to Have a Baby!"--I would never have believed it.  And now here we were, trying to get letters of recommendation, and go through all the classes and counseling and physicals and more classes and shopping, shopping, shopping.  We'd fall into bed each night, crazed, dazed and amazed.

But we were going to be parents.  WE were.  All those years of watching everyone else with their babies,  watching them walk their little ones to school, going to school programs for our nieces, helping with homework, buying them books and cool school supplies 'just because,' and now we would have all those things to do for our own child.  And so I was sitting at the table going over a list for our next trip to Traverse City, a trip we made each week to attend to more details.  I had blackberry tea steaming beside me, and a kitty purring in my lap, and I was happy clean through. 

And then....newsflash.

I was glued to that television for the rest of the day, shocked and horrified and grieving, watching terrified children running from their school, watching a terribly injured boy falling from a window into the arms of those waiting to help.  Different channels showed different opinions and....body counts.....and no one really knew what was happening, but everyone seemed compelled to keep talking, to try and make sense of something that made no sense at all. 

I was suddenly so terrified for our baby-to-be that I could hardly breathe.  I didn't even know yet if we were having a son or a daughter, and the only real fear I'd had so far was that I would fall hopelessly in love with this child, and the mother would change her mind.  I knew that to have this child--and then lose him/her--would be pain that transcended all the previous twenty years: watching a baby become a little person, watching talents and personality emerge, seeing so much potential and promise, and then gone? just like that, gone?

The parents of those students that terrible day were undoubtedly praying, hoping, waiting for the phone to ring and hoping it was the voice they most wanted to hear, freezing at the sound of a doorbell, not wanting to see who would be on the other side.  They had to be thinking just the same things: but she's all set for college, we haven't even taken the prom tux back yet, oh my God, did I even tell her goodbye this morning?  What was she wearing?  Where would he be in the building this time of the day? Is he safe, will she come home, I don't care what it takes to get her back on her feet, we'll do whatever it takes but oh please, please, please God don't take my baby.

In the days and weeks that followed, more and more information was revealed, some of it accurate, some not, and some would never be known.  All that was real was that 13 innocents died that day, and one valiant teacher.  You couldn't look at those pictures and not see the terrible cruelty of being taken too soon, of having those last moments not in the arms of loving parents, but all that fear and pain.  And you couldn't help but knowing that not a parent among them wouldn't have gladly laid down their own lives if it would have saved their child.  My baby wasn't even here yet, but I already knew there was nothing I wouldn't give if it would give her what she needed...even one more day.  Anything, anything I had or would ever own, it's yours, just please, oh please, please don't take my baby.

And I thought about the parents of the two who had perpetrated such hate and madness, and I hurt for them just as much.  They were not just dealing with the loss of their child, but with the knowledge that their child had taken so many others.

Can it really be ten years?

Doesn't time stand still when you mourn ?

No. 

Even if you wish it would, so you could freeze that moment just before...and make it not happen. It moves on, inexorably, and what was a living, breathing essence of joy--what a child truly is--becomes memory, becomes 'she would be 21 today.'  Most of these children would be married by now, and parents, even, experiencing for themselves the wonder and magic they had been for their own parents.  I read a quote about this from one of the  mothers, about how the hole in her heart where her daughter was...was just the same size as her daughter.  It would never grow smaller, and so you had to make your heart grow bigger. 

I can understand that.  All those years, there was a hole in my heart where my daughter was supposed to be.  For twenty years I lived with my arms around the emptiness of her, and the feeling of her in my arms for the very first time is indescribable, even now.  I looked down at her tiny, perfect face in those first few hours, and knew that no matter how many years I had with her, it would never be enough.  I knew that I wanted the world for her, everything she wanted to be I wanted to make available for her.  I knew that I was already so in love with her that no words could define it.

I also knew to be true something I'd read years before, that to be a parent is to walk around with your heart permanently outside your body.  My heart clutches whenever my daughter leaves my sight, and even now, ten years later, every time there is yet another story like this--for, sadly, Columbine was not the first school shooting, nor the last--I find myself praying oh please, please....hoping that our town is indeed as smalltown and safe as it seems.

I've never forgotten the names of those lost that terrible day, nor will I.  They live in on in memory, even in the memory of those, like me, who never knew them.  Their loss that day demands increased reverence for life, and insists that more care be taken at every turn.  And...I have never been able just to think 'thank God it wasn't me.'  Because when a child dies, something dies in each of us.  You spend all that time debating a name when your baby is on the way, wanting it to be just right, something wonderful and special, something you'll see on report cards and letters and diplomas--something you never expect to see carved in stone.  Much as you hope your child will achieve great things, this is not a way you'd ever want your child's name to be nationally familiar.

In the name of:
~~Rachel Joy Scott~~Daniel Rohrbaugh~~Dave Sanders~~Kyle Velasquez~~Steven Curnow~~Cassie Bernall~~Isaiah Shoels~~Matthew Kechter~~Lauren Townsend~~John Tomlin~~Kelly Fleming~~Daniel Mauser~~Corey DePooter~~

...hold your child extra close today, protect their innocence, and say a prayer for innocence lost.