I’m sitting cross-legged on my bed this morning. There’s a nuthatch on the branch outside the window–the window with the broad, cracked smile. The smile that D has sealed with transparent packing tape and dolloped with some whipped putty. The power line from pole to house corner sags and glistens in the sun, and […]
Crossing the Bridge
Mom’s illness caused her fall and ultimately her death. Her younger sister passed on before. I don’t know when. I don’t know why. Theirs was a shattered relationship. Sometime after Aunt Lucy died, my cousin sought to reconnect with my parents. That’s how it is sometimes, I think. When we lose, we ache to […]
Still Grappling with Grief
One year ago yesterday, my mother died. I’m angry. And sad. And grateful. I’m remembering, second-guessing every decision. Immediately after her fall and diagnosis of a brain tumor, she spent several weeks in a local nursing home. She was not safe for surgery at that point. After the biopsy, she transferred to rehab where […]
When Loss is Real–or Not
I’m better this morning. Last night I hid in the bathroom for a few moments where I flushed the toilet (so the husband and the grandgirl wouldn’t ask what was going on with me.) I blew my nose, popped my contacts, rubbed my eyes hard, and ran cold water over my face. I didn’t want […]
When You’re Rooted in Grief
“I don’t know why I’m so exhausted,” I text. “The weather,” she responds. I toss and turn and dream and wake up and doze and wake up. Energy wanes. We’ve eaten out more than in. I wonder–could the root be grief? Is that what’s gripped me in the gray of these cold days? Did […]
Into His Presence
Blue Hole at Laity Lodge It’s a two-hour drive from the airport in San Antonio to Laity Lodge. I watch the city clutter fall away as we head into the hill country, pass through open land dotted with live oaks and scrubby vegetation. I’ve tucked my Horseshoe Lake poem in my pocket because I’ve registered […]
When We See the Deer
The deer, they tell us, come right up to the windows. My parents did, after all, build and operate the Deerland Motel. Deer have always been a part of our lives in some form. So we move Mom into the room with the view. I see a doe the next day, hidden way back […]
Going Home
We should be eating free pancakes (pfannekuchen) under the pavilion. That was the plan. That’s Friday morning Alpenfest tradition. But Sissy and I instead pack hospital bags–contact lens solutions, glasses, toothbrush, deodorant, a change of clothes. We slip computers into cases and cell phone charges into purses. We don’t know what the next few days hold. […]
Roots, Relationships, and a Seagull
The parsley and the basil roots pant for water as they bake in their biodegradable pots. I meant to sink them deep long before this. And the geranium 6-pack baskets, bought over a month ago when spring exploded early? Once luscious red, now with browned heads. I need perennials. Plants that thrive and spread […]
When You Need a Little Fixing
I’d forgotten about this post from almost two years ago until the other day when Duane called my attention to it. It was a post I’d linked to one of his “Pleasantly Disturbed Thursdays.” A bunch of random thoughts. I decided to dust it off and repost it today. I’d call it kind of a […]
