Sunday, November 27, 2011
Laur n' Glor
I started a post-Thanksgiving tradition 23 years ago with the help of one of Grandma Rita's homemade yeast rolls, a generous helping of Aunt Virginia's stuffing, cranberry sauce and a schmear of mayo. Me and gal pal, Laurie Geiser, sat at the table in the little apartment she shared with her big sister, our Turkey Day leftover constructions in hand, and chowed down. In the throes of gluttonous pleasure, we experienced an epiphany of sorts as to the nature of that which we ate. "Hey!" I exclaimed through a mouth of holiday goodness, "This is really a bread-on-bread sandwich!" Grinning her agreement at the revelation, she gushed, "It i-i-s-s-s . . . and it's SO-O good!" Her eyes rolled up into the back of her head as she finished chewing. It was bonding at its finest. And through the passage of years, boyfriends, jobs, marriage, kids, trials and triumphs, we've kept up our little shared foodie joke, reminding one another each late November of that belly-laugh moment in our young adulthood when everything seemed possible, when we seemed untouchable, when drama reigned and maturity feigned, and the promise of moving to New York together to pursue adventure was yet a beacon on the horizon.
But long before my posted picture on Facebook of this year's open-faced bread-on-bread sandwich appeared on Laurie's wall, and years before our interpretation of this food fact, we began an extraordinary friendship which would lead us both on an adventure of sorts, saving my sanity as a teen and setting my course for married life in the process.
Oddly enough, it began with a courtship and kiss with her big brother, of all people. A courtship which consisted primarily of conversations -- not to put too fine a point on the word, as debate might be more apt here -- on the topic of religion and faith with my mother in the tiny front room of the converted mobile home trailer in which me, mom, and my three younger siblings lived in LaVeta, Colorado back in the summer of 1985. That courtship, and my crush, came to a screeching halt with our first and final kiss. I'm pretty sure that for both of us it was something akin to kissing a close relative. Please pass the Scope! We parted as friends. Both of us with a knowledge of one another's families and lives stemming from the bits and pieces of chit-chat we had outside of his fascination with my mom's life and beliefs.
Being the curious girl that I was (and still am), it was no surprise to me that while hanging out at the local arcade -- one of those small game rooms situated in the back of Loaf n' Jug and 7-11 stores -- my radar sprung into action when a raven-haired beauty with a confident swagger accentuated by her well-fitting 501's walked past me. I'd seen her somewhere. No. I'd seen a photo of her somewhere. "Hey," I turned to ask one of the local teens next to me, "Is THAT Laurie Geiser?" Before a response could begin to form in the kid's mouth, a husky modulated voice sounded behind me, an edge of menace lacing each carefully spoken word, "Yeah. And WHAT OF IT?!" Turning back to face her, I smiled and popped out with, "Oh! I'm Gloria Sweigard. I know your brother? Jerry? He's told me all about you," I smiled even bigger, meaning every curve and tooth of it, "I've wanted to meet you for some time now." I was no threat to her world; her guard came down immediately. She, too, knew who I was. And that was all it took to spark the connection between us that would carry two girls, Laur n' Glor, through Alaska, Israel, California, and back to Colorado after my high school graduation -- which she attended. Thank you, very much!
In the beginning, Laur represented everything I wanted to be as an entering high school freshman. And everything I wasn't allowed to be. Or everything I didn't have with any degree of security. The freedom to move about in a town where everybody knew her name, with the certainty that her familiar bed and family home and relatives up on the hill would all be there when she sank into her pillow and clicked on that bedside radio, the tunes of the day lulling her into comfortable sleep. The freedom to experiment with varying shades of lipstick and eyeshadows -- all of which looked perfectly at home on her pretty face with its generous lips and almond-shaped eyes. The freedom to listen to Prince & The Revolution on that aforementioned radio, reliving the concert scenes from his popular though corny movie, "Purple Rain" in one's head. The freedom to be at home in her own skin . . . or at least as at home as a hormonal teenage girl can be given the variables which can afflict her soul. When I stayed the night at her house, I drank in every moment, noticing every corner of every room and each piece of furniture and lamp and knick-knack, appreciative of the food to which I could help myself in the pantry and fridge, grateful for the friendliness of her parents (who I know call Uncle Jerry and Marie, or Mer). In fact, I couldn't sleep. I would lie awake next to her, awaiting the next song in the DJ's lineup, hearing her breath, imagining a life where I grew up with the familiar from year-in to year-out.
And she made me laugh. Her own laugh was, and still is, highly infectious. You'd have to be cut from the hardest stone not to be affected by her bubbly giggles and guffaws. She could take my most tearful moments -- and I did have teary outbursts with alarming regularity in those first months of our friendship -- and turn them on their head, transforming my dark mood into a lighthearted breeze. It was one of her many gifts and talents as a stellar human being. Even then, on the periphery of adult awareness, I knew that about her. And so did my mom. Even when I railed against my mother internally, sharing these feelings with Laurie as teenage girls will do, my new friend was sincerely kind and respectful toward my mom. And my protective mother, wary of the world and its influences, trusted Laurie with her daughter because of the character she felt she could see in this young woman so important to my existence.
When I moved away from LaVeta, and consequently Laur, first to the town of Walsenburg -- maybe a mere handful of miles for someone with regular access to a car and gas money, but it might as well have been the North Pole for me -- and later to the great state of Alaska -- more miles than I could stack in my arms and definitely not doable in the gas department, and clearly closer to the North Pole -- I took to letter writing. Long letters. Multiple pages. Sometimes individual sheets of paper cut in wavy shapes, lined in magic marker, numbered and carefully folded before placement in an envelope and the acceptance of a stamp on it's top right corner. But always full of emotion and fears and questions and connection. (She would much later hand these letters over to me, thinking I might find them of use in some way, either to satisfy questions I may have had about myself as a teen at that time, or perhaps for writing, or both.)
Of all the many places I'd been and the many faces I'd met, Laur was the one thing, the one peer, that I couldn't let go. Even when instructed to so so for the good of forgetting the past and moving on into the future. No. Keeping Laur in my life, even on the down low, meant that I continued to exist, that I was more than a shadow person flitting from one place to the next without leaving an imprint on nary a soul: in short, Laurie's friendship, the fact that she loved me as much as I loved her and wrote and called me, never forgetting me, either, was just the validation that a lonely and troubled teenager desperately needed. There were several times where the desire for death darkened my heart and mind, and the solidity of Laur n' Glor kept me from fulfilling those desperate yearnings.
Roughly four years after our initial meeting, I made the decision to turn down a full-ride scholarship to college in California, opting instead to head for the familiarity of Colorado and Laur. Little did I know that returning to her world would also set the course for my life as a wife and mother. Seated in a chair in the living room of her big sister's apartment, where Laur took me straight from the airport, was her cousin, the boy I began seeing after my brief dalliance with her brother, the boy whose kisses reminded me not in the least of family but, instead, steamed up more than a few windshields on dates and double dates. The boy who caused my heart to leap into my throat when he approached. The boy who now stood before me, one of his legs encased in a cumbersome brace (he'd recently had knee surgery), his naturally curly hair bringing out the deep brown of his eyes, bolo tie snug against his neck, and wearing the heck out of that pair of pale blue jeans. He shook my hand, holding onto it longer than was absolutely necessary or required, and I found that I needed a moment to push my heart back down into the proper cavity in my chest. We would be married and expecting our first child in less than a year from that casual meeting. Next March will mark 23 years of legal and loving union together for us.
As for Laurie, I would go on to live with her family in LaVeta, walking to the family-owned truck stop with her mother, where I waited tables for a time. At the house, I made myself at home with Scrabble games, baking homemade cookies for her little brother, Jeremy, and visiting her grandma and other family members up on 'the hill.' Later, I was given clearance to move into that small apartment with her and her sister, Annette. I worked odd jobs. Began to see Jimmy again. Met the cousins. Partied. Had myself some of my own life experiences -- not all of them pleasant, a good many of them just plain stupid, but all of them exhilarating and attributable to me. When I came up pregnant, Laur and her sister said I could stay with them, get an education and job, and they would help me raise the baby . . . if I decided that getting married wasn't a good idea. Obviously, I decided against that. There was tension between us for a time because one of the things which bonded us was our passion for the paths of our lives and the stubbornness with which we sought out those paths. She worried that I was surrendering both my passion and my path. She wasn't in my wedding though she was AT my wedding. But as good friends do, we patched it all up, and sojourned on, marching forward into our adult lives with its countless unknowns, never once believing we wouldn't continue to be best buds for life.
And we have. She has listened and loved. Counseled and corrected. Watched and wondered. Her family accepted me into their fold even before my marriage to her cousin, and this closeness only strengthened between myself and her siblings and parents. Later, this closeness flowed down into the other aunts and uncles and cousins, the grandma and great aunt and great uncle. They all became as much a part of me as my own family, that in which I grew up and that expanse of extended relatives who have roots in central California. I was accepted as the quirky person that I was. That I am. I learned about what comes with settling down and growing roots. Where my practical knowledge of common issues in everyday life were lacking due to my unique nomadic childhood, Laur offered her insight and suggestions with assiduous concern.
I observed Laur with her sister and drew upon their relationship for the basis of the bond between my own children . . . and as an example through which to heal the wounds between me and my own sisters and brothers. When my baby brother went to prison, more than once, and most painfully when I was forced to turn him in, Laurie comforted me and refused to judge my brother, still sending him cards of encouragement, as much for my sake as for his. When my sister suffered a post-partum event which stripped her of her children, and her sanity for a time, effectively bringing about our own family holocaust, Laurie did not waver in her support, and her tremendous ability to empathize was put to the ultimate test. There was a time when I put my trust in the wrong hands and caused her immediate family legal and emotional grief which I desperately attempted to rectify, and she stood by me though it put her in the immediate path of her beloved sister's temporary rage toward me. We survived that. All of us.
There have been births and weddings -- I was a bridesmaid in Laur's wedding AND I sang a lovely song a capella, enduring sweaty armpits and stained rings of satin (as opposed to rings of Saturn) -- along with deaths and funerals. Great big parties abounding in food and family, friends and fun, to celebrate birthdays for kids and adults, high school graduations and holidays galore. Before she had her own children, she doted on mine with genuine affection. After she had her own children, she decided she wanted to add my son to her two-count! Though our lives follow different courses, our common threads of compassion and the importance of family and friends, along with a shared love of chocolate, Mojitos and bread-on-bread sandwiches, link us at our cores. We are women of substance and inner beauty, though our outward stuff ain't too hard on the eyes!
Distance now separates us, as it has at many points during our years as friends. Laur resides in Wyoming. I'm here in Tennessee. But no longer is there an ocean, literal or figuratively, between us. The history is too rich, and the shared experiences too precious, for anything other than love and admiration, one for the other. My friendship with her opened me up to the possibilities of close friendships with other women. So, I've added on, but never do I subtract.
But in a world of BFF's (best friends forever) and BBF's (best buds forever), Laur ranks high atop these as she is my oldest (um, not by age) and steadiest friend. She intuitively gets me, all of me, because she was with me during a period of my life when most other folks entered through the front door and left out the back. Or was that me? She came on in. And stayed. Hiding under the bed if she had to, just to remain in my life. Other people may know me, having had me as a classmate for a short stint in grammar school, but I was there, and then almost as quickly, gone, with no phone numbers or addresses in hand as I departed.
So instead of the traditional sparkling wine toast, I hoist my stuffing-and-roll sandwich aloft as I salute Laur n' Glor -- two girls who made it big in this life in ways which fell outside of their young plans and dreams, in part due to their chance meeting once upon a time in a makeshift arcade, introductions made with the strained hum of Ms. Pacman in the background, far far from I-25 and the big city lights. If you have any questions as to the validity of our closeness, might I direct you to these well-spoken words, "WHAT OF IT?!"
Sunday, November 13, 2011
3:30 In the Morning Comes Quickly
3:30AM. A good time for a coughing fit. A practical time for one's bladder to call to duty. And evidently an opportune time for waking a guy up out of a dead sleep to inform him that he's being transferred to another state hospital all the way on the opposite end of the state . . . and he's got ten minutes to prepare for the move.
It's funny in a very NON-ha-ha kind of way how a few minutes can alter the plans and schemes of man, and big sister in this case, leaving very little room for proper reacting and adjusting. I mean, what can a guy -- pretty sure we all know I'm referring to my little brother, Gary -- do but grab his pants, sputter out a few grunts, pee, and maybe squeeze in a decent question? When the powers that be say 'you are outta here,' then you are outta there. Concepts like two-week notice or good-bye parties just don't figure in. All that matters is where a patient falls on the spectrum of 'naughty' and 'nice.' And though baby brother isn't brokering any major drug deals out of Columbia, he hasn't exactly been squeaky clean these past few months.
A state institution exists as its own kind of community, no matter how altered a state that community is, and gossip flourishes every bit as much as hard truth. So, if a guy is caught up in perpetuating his drug habit and has a reputation for smooth-talking and hustling a good deal, it isn't a stretch to start wondering what else he might be up to. Or for someone else wishing to cast the light of unwanted attention off himself and onto another to toss out a few believable untruths concerning a certain fellow client. Before long, things begin to snowball and take on a life of its own. That's when the house cops start covertly removing patients in the still hours before dawn. Quietly. With little attention and fuss. And a reduced opportunity for floor wide pandemonium to take hold.
Somewhere there is a list of names known only to a few. Someone higher up feels that these wards of the state represent a possible risk to the low-security facility that is known as Napa State Hospital. And since the death of an employee at the hands of a patient last fall, fear of any danger has heightened and played upon the sensibilities of the entire town of Napa. Though several staff members didn't believe that my brother had made that list, he has been worried about that very thing for months. Personally, I struggled to believe that anyone who'd read his file would consider doing this to him because the place IS considered a hospital and NOT a prison. A large part of his personal pain, his issues with his past, revolves around being abruptly ripped from his surroundings without warning or practical plans for a relocation, unable to have the closure of goodbye or the security of a safe place in which to land, thrust into situations a child could not comprehend. As a young adult with a history of running away, juvenile hall and foster home placements, jail and prison, that painful pattern was repeated, and thus reinforced, again and again and again.
Evidently, it didn't matter what I believed. It didn't matter that next Wednesday I was scheduled to fly out of Nashville and land in San Francisco. It didn't matter that I'd sent in my money and reservation for the family Thanksgiving meal for Thursday. That Gary and I had planned to visit and celebrate our birthdays together with cake and food and Scrabble on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. That I would be his FIRST outside visitor since November of last year when our brother, John, shared the aforementioned meal with him. Or that the professor-doctor who meets with him every Tuesday for individual therapy sessions wanted to officially meet me and talk about things. Or that other people had made plans on several fronts to accommodate my visit. All it took was ten minutes, six hundred seconds, to render null and void all of it.
So, after the initial shock of his call from Patton State Hospital on Thursday last, tears and sobs spent on the back porch so as not to upset my convalescing daughter and her boyfriend, and a well-timed visit from a dear friend bearing pho soup and spot-on food for thought concerning the bad news from California, I pulled my chin up and began examining this development from other angles. But until a second call from Gary two days later where I heard for myself his take on the event and the place and staff, I reserved my judgement.
He had a lot of time to think on his eight hour drive. Time to be amazed by the private transport driver who was driving at 100 miles an hour while texting. "It was a WILD ride," said the man who gave a few wild rides and chases in his day. Trust me, the irony of the woman's illegal actions while transferring a mentally-ill criminal on a state-funded trip was not lost on me. I didn't know my eyes were capable of rolling that far back in my head.
Instead of losing his temper and causing a scene -- which was his standard at one point in time -- Gary accepted that there was no turning back. No tantrum, no series of expletives, no amount of standing his ground would change the fact that he was leaving and not going back. His recent change in thinking per his situation was still wending its way through his awareness. Thank goodness! Upon his arrival, he noted instantly that the atmosphere at the new place was different. The staff was professional in the sense that one knew right away there would be no manipulating the situation. If he chose to act up, he knew they would simply render him harmless with an injection that would mess him up for a couple of days. The employees seemed to treat their positions as actual jobs they wanted to keep.
Patients HAVE to wake up in the morning and are NOT allowed to hang out, unsupervised and left to their own devices, in their rooms all day. Almost every staff member runs a group of some sort and runs it with bonafide authority about the subject at hand. He's heard from other clients, including a friend of his who was transferred there ahead of him and does NOT want to leave the hospital, that patients are more likely to rehab from this location than the one in Napa. In a nutshell, based on my experience at Napa as a visitor and as a caring relative who often heard about what was going on in the background there, and what Gary had to say, this recent move may actually benefit him in the long run. Due to the long-term severe nature of his immersion in prison life, my brother is so institutionalized that the lack of firm structure at Napa probably HURT his chances of kicking his habit and dealing with his mental illness. The high-security ranking of this other establishment calls for a few more rules and this may bode well.
Gary must sense this himself because he brought up the subject of him needing to expect more out of himself and my need to expect LESS from myself where his rehabilitation and reintegration back into society is concerned. Easier said than done, but done is must be. We both realize the truth therein. I feel as if I've already done quite a bit of stepping back but he's telling me that I can put myself in reverse a bit more. Enjoy my life more and allow him to sweat his more. We talked about how though he says he loves people, he's never really had to SHOW that love. He has more than witnessed my ability to enact love; he has more than often made excuses for why he can't love that way. But whatever epiphany has turned the switch in his brain and heart, it also left him feeling a whole lotta responsibility for the 'coulda, woulda, shouldas' in his adult life. Who am I to argue? It's a step toward recovery. Let him make it.
Another positive that he mentioned: his Tuesday doc from Napa called down to Patton and touched base with a colleague to ask after Gary; set up a phone conference so that they could have a proper good-bye (this moves me the most); and request that they look into continuing his one-on-one weekly counseling sessions with a psychologist on staff. For new clients, the waiting list for such sessions is appallingly long and it's almost a perfunctory gesture to add names, much less hope for an opening!
But hope is what I'll do. It's what I'm best at doing. A gift. A talent. My cross to bear. Especially where Gary is concerned. And if I want him to roll with the punches and adjust accordingly, the same should be expected of me.. Isn't that what big sisters are supposed to do?
It's funny in a very NON-ha-ha kind of way how a few minutes can alter the plans and schemes of man, and big sister in this case, leaving very little room for proper reacting and adjusting. I mean, what can a guy -- pretty sure we all know I'm referring to my little brother, Gary -- do but grab his pants, sputter out a few grunts, pee, and maybe squeeze in a decent question? When the powers that be say 'you are outta here,' then you are outta there. Concepts like two-week notice or good-bye parties just don't figure in. All that matters is where a patient falls on the spectrum of 'naughty' and 'nice.' And though baby brother isn't brokering any major drug deals out of Columbia, he hasn't exactly been squeaky clean these past few months.
A state institution exists as its own kind of community, no matter how altered a state that community is, and gossip flourishes every bit as much as hard truth. So, if a guy is caught up in perpetuating his drug habit and has a reputation for smooth-talking and hustling a good deal, it isn't a stretch to start wondering what else he might be up to. Or for someone else wishing to cast the light of unwanted attention off himself and onto another to toss out a few believable untruths concerning a certain fellow client. Before long, things begin to snowball and take on a life of its own. That's when the house cops start covertly removing patients in the still hours before dawn. Quietly. With little attention and fuss. And a reduced opportunity for floor wide pandemonium to take hold.
Somewhere there is a list of names known only to a few. Someone higher up feels that these wards of the state represent a possible risk to the low-security facility that is known as Napa State Hospital. And since the death of an employee at the hands of a patient last fall, fear of any danger has heightened and played upon the sensibilities of the entire town of Napa. Though several staff members didn't believe that my brother had made that list, he has been worried about that very thing for months. Personally, I struggled to believe that anyone who'd read his file would consider doing this to him because the place IS considered a hospital and NOT a prison. A large part of his personal pain, his issues with his past, revolves around being abruptly ripped from his surroundings without warning or practical plans for a relocation, unable to have the closure of goodbye or the security of a safe place in which to land, thrust into situations a child could not comprehend. As a young adult with a history of running away, juvenile hall and foster home placements, jail and prison, that painful pattern was repeated, and thus reinforced, again and again and again.
Evidently, it didn't matter what I believed. It didn't matter that next Wednesday I was scheduled to fly out of Nashville and land in San Francisco. It didn't matter that I'd sent in my money and reservation for the family Thanksgiving meal for Thursday. That Gary and I had planned to visit and celebrate our birthdays together with cake and food and Scrabble on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. That I would be his FIRST outside visitor since November of last year when our brother, John, shared the aforementioned meal with him. Or that the professor-doctor who meets with him every Tuesday for individual therapy sessions wanted to officially meet me and talk about things. Or that other people had made plans on several fronts to accommodate my visit. All it took was ten minutes, six hundred seconds, to render null and void all of it.
So, after the initial shock of his call from Patton State Hospital on Thursday last, tears and sobs spent on the back porch so as not to upset my convalescing daughter and her boyfriend, and a well-timed visit from a dear friend bearing pho soup and spot-on food for thought concerning the bad news from California, I pulled my chin up and began examining this development from other angles. But until a second call from Gary two days later where I heard for myself his take on the event and the place and staff, I reserved my judgement.
He had a lot of time to think on his eight hour drive. Time to be amazed by the private transport driver who was driving at 100 miles an hour while texting. "It was a WILD ride," said the man who gave a few wild rides and chases in his day. Trust me, the irony of the woman's illegal actions while transferring a mentally-ill criminal on a state-funded trip was not lost on me. I didn't know my eyes were capable of rolling that far back in my head.
Instead of losing his temper and causing a scene -- which was his standard at one point in time -- Gary accepted that there was no turning back. No tantrum, no series of expletives, no amount of standing his ground would change the fact that he was leaving and not going back. His recent change in thinking per his situation was still wending its way through his awareness. Thank goodness! Upon his arrival, he noted instantly that the atmosphere at the new place was different. The staff was professional in the sense that one knew right away there would be no manipulating the situation. If he chose to act up, he knew they would simply render him harmless with an injection that would mess him up for a couple of days. The employees seemed to treat their positions as actual jobs they wanted to keep.
Patients HAVE to wake up in the morning and are NOT allowed to hang out, unsupervised and left to their own devices, in their rooms all day. Almost every staff member runs a group of some sort and runs it with bonafide authority about the subject at hand. He's heard from other clients, including a friend of his who was transferred there ahead of him and does NOT want to leave the hospital, that patients are more likely to rehab from this location than the one in Napa. In a nutshell, based on my experience at Napa as a visitor and as a caring relative who often heard about what was going on in the background there, and what Gary had to say, this recent move may actually benefit him in the long run. Due to the long-term severe nature of his immersion in prison life, my brother is so institutionalized that the lack of firm structure at Napa probably HURT his chances of kicking his habit and dealing with his mental illness. The high-security ranking of this other establishment calls for a few more rules and this may bode well.
Gary must sense this himself because he brought up the subject of him needing to expect more out of himself and my need to expect LESS from myself where his rehabilitation and reintegration back into society is concerned. Easier said than done, but done is must be. We both realize the truth therein. I feel as if I've already done quite a bit of stepping back but he's telling me that I can put myself in reverse a bit more. Enjoy my life more and allow him to sweat his more. We talked about how though he says he loves people, he's never really had to SHOW that love. He has more than witnessed my ability to enact love; he has more than often made excuses for why he can't love that way. But whatever epiphany has turned the switch in his brain and heart, it also left him feeling a whole lotta responsibility for the 'coulda, woulda, shouldas' in his adult life. Who am I to argue? It's a step toward recovery. Let him make it.
Another positive that he mentioned: his Tuesday doc from Napa called down to Patton and touched base with a colleague to ask after Gary; set up a phone conference so that they could have a proper good-bye (this moves me the most); and request that they look into continuing his one-on-one weekly counseling sessions with a psychologist on staff. For new clients, the waiting list for such sessions is appallingly long and it's almost a perfunctory gesture to add names, much less hope for an opening!
But hope is what I'll do. It's what I'm best at doing. A gift. A talent. My cross to bear. Especially where Gary is concerned. And if I want him to roll with the punches and adjust accordingly, the same should be expected of me.. Isn't that what big sisters are supposed to do?
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Wishing for the Banal
It's one of those Saturday mornings where I find myself sandwiched between two fully-charged heating pads, iPhone and throat lozenges in one robe pocket, TV remote in the other, uncomfortably situated in the worn leather recliner that I can never quite conform to my back, under the lulling influence of 800 milligrams of ibuprofen and hydrocodone-laced cough medicine. My oldest child has taken up temporary residence on our similarly worn couch with her own iPhone, alternately playing rounds of Words With Friends with friends (how else?) and dozing in between DVR'd episodes of "Sex In The City," almost a full three days into her post-exploratory-laparoscopic-procedure convalescence, herself also under the influence of a pain-numbing narcotic.
Just your typical weekend in Middle Tennessee suburbia, eh?
Though I don't care for the overt sexual nature of the aforementioned program, I am drawn to the witty intelligent writing, and the positive trajectory of the enduring friendship between the four women characters around which all plot and thematic lessons revolve. And quite possibly I appreciate the 100% departure from suburbia inherent in viewing the show. The quote-o'-the-day, and consequently my laugh of the day, comes from an episode where the ladies must leave the comfort of their Big Apple to attend the baby shower of an old friend who resides in the 'burbs of Connecticut, where our main heroine, the writer of a newspaper column, observes "I was struck by how a place so filled with nature could look so-o unnatural." But it's the disgusted utterance of one of the lawyer member of the quartet which cracked me up so completely, "There's a woman in there breastfeeding a child who can chew steak." As with most humor, the origin of its hilarity lies in the core of truth at its center.
The highlight of our pre-noon day centered around my Ashley's victory in finally being able to attend to her own post-toilet hygienic ablutions. She still requires assistance for standing in the fully upright and locked position, but somehow this little bathroom victory feels a lot like the moment in her toddlerhood where she finally figured out how to wipe herself during potty-training! Funny how malaise, whether viral- or trauma- or surgery-induced, strips a person of the most basic physical, and often mental, abilities. Including but not limited to: recalling the grocery list, grocery shopping itself, organizing the family schedule, reading an entire book chapter without passing out, eating without wheezing, peeing without stops and starts, moving one's bowels AT ALL, even the passing of gas. Upon their return -- sometimes painful day by painful day, oft times a simple night's sleep away -- we experience a profound appreciation for the banal. And then the flow of life rushes in to fill the blank spaces left in the departing wake of forced rest, discomfort and medications. The banal is once again relegated to the periphery of awareness.
At least for most of us. I can't help but to think of examples from this past week where the axiom I outlined above does not play out. Examples to which I share a personal connection. Examples of the heartbreaking variety that have contributed to my underlying emotional fatigue, which surely have played a large part in keeping this persistent virus on board and adoring its stressed and worn-like-the-living-room-furniture hostess.
The most extreme of these examples revolves around a friend of my mother's who lived in the same little building as my mom and roughly fifty other ageing and/or disabled people. Collectively, this body of mostly women, a few men, visiting family members and a bevy of healthcare workers, make up the interactive community of the Holiday House. I've been a part of this place long enough to realize the name is rather a misnomer. Still, there is a weary charm to be felt up and down the halls of the two-story brick apartments. And there's something all at once comforting and reliable about walking into the lobby, balancing my armloads of this, that and the other thing, signing the visitor's book, and realizing the entire time that the eyes of the ladies huddled around the coffee table and television behind me are following my every move. To me, their habits of curiosity mean that while a gossipy few may incorrectly conjecture and spread misinformation, the balance of residents will responsibly know what goes on within the walls of their encampment and this awareness fosters a true sense of safety. Not too much will slip by and allow unwelcome surprises at some later date.
Except in the case of Carol and her husband, Ray. Carol and Ray met and began their romance as residents of the Holiday House. Carol was one of the original crew of ladies for whom I harbor a specific affection who initially befriended my mother when she moved in. The kids and I enjoyed weekend and summer visits in the game room upstairs, constructing puzzles and rolling the Yahtzee dice, and listening to the stories and banter of Carol, Sarah and Vera (little old ladies laden with character, and sisters to boot), Earl -- one of the only gents living there in the early days of mom's time there, who I always thought had a bit of an unrequited 'thing' for Carol, and whoever else was able to leave the confines of their rooms and make their way up via the elevator. In the spectrum of age displayed amongst the ranks, Carol was on the younger side, which is to say mid to late sixties.
When I first met Ray, I found myself charmed by his quick smile and friendly ways. Not to mention that he possessed a playful handsomeness that he wielded without guile. When I heard the news of his impending marriage to Carol, I couldn't help but to think how apt their late-in-life matching was. The way Carol positively lit up whenever she was in Ray's presence was impressive. It was a softer side of her that I'd not previously witnessed. A genuine testament to the power of that elusive thing we call 'true love.' As I'm not one to exercise trite phrases simply to fill in the blanks, rest assured that their romantic love was, indeed, the real deal.
Last fall, I was among those folks who attended Carol's and Ray's simple wedding ceremony out on the back patio of the Holiday House. I snapped an album's worth of photos of the event, and each time I look at those pictures I can still feel the joy evident between the couple and in the adult children, cousins, octogenarians (and at least one centenarian) and others who witnessed the joining. It was the sort of joy that transforms a basic ceremony into a moment more lavish than even the most extravagant of planned nuptials. And it was one of those shared moments that created an atmosphere of excitement in the lives of the residents there that transformed a few weeks of ordinary autumn into the extraordinary.
A Saturday ago, our region experienced a morning of heavy long-lasting fog. It blanketed every nook and cranny of every yard and field, every roadway and intersection. And it caused a traffic accident at a specific light on the edge of town which spawned a secondary collision that abruptly changed the partnership of Carol and Ray in ways no one saw coming. Ray ended up at our local hospital with various broken bones and contusions; Carol's injuries, including a torn aorta, resulted in a lifeflight to Vanderbilt in Nashville. And until last night, husband and wife were unable to be together as their respective medical teams and families set about getting them put back together enough to reunite. Though Carol's previously-existing COPD merged with the damage from her injuries and made breathing on her own impossible, it seemed that her step-down from one form of assisted breathing to another would eventually lead to a restoration of her basic ability to follow an inhale with an exhale. My mom decided to put off visiting Carol until she was significantly improved, opting for a the less obtrusive card for the here and now.
But improvement didn't come. Last night, doctors informed the family that she would never be able to breathe on her own and she was lapsing in and out of a coma-like state with more frequency. The decision was made to remove her trachea tube and allow nature to take its course. Per advanced directive, this was Carol's wish under such circumstances. (Who among us average Joes ever thinks it will come down to this?) Barring the advent of a miracle, death was a certainty.
Ray's daughter rushed him to Vanderbilt where he met up with the pastor from their church. Perhaps the one miracle here was that when Joe bent down to show his wife who was there and they explained that the entire church was in prayer for her situation, Carol opened her eyes and smiled, thus seeing her beloved for one final time. The stripped-down reality of that last look between these precious friends and lovers demands our attention. And our sympathy.
I woke to today's news from my mom that Carol passed away during the night. Her family decided that instead of a funeral, they would have a memorial service to celebrate her life. And it would be held at the same place where Carol had enjoyed a rich life of friendships and marital love: the Holiday House. That seems fitting to me. I believe Carol would approve wholeheartedly. Though I know Ray must surely be aching with a pain far more profound and lasting than anything resulting from the car crash, the comfort he will draw from being surrounded by those who knew Carol best, and knew him as her other half, will be source of sustenance for the days ahead without his best friend.
Ray and Carol were denied their co-return to the banal. It happened quickly, much the way this blog entry shifted in an instant from humorous to somber. For that, I'm most sorry.
(This is a link to a Facebook album containing the wedding photos of which I wrote:
Just your typical weekend in Middle Tennessee suburbia, eh?
Though I don't care for the overt sexual nature of the aforementioned program, I am drawn to the witty intelligent writing, and the positive trajectory of the enduring friendship between the four women characters around which all plot and thematic lessons revolve. And quite possibly I appreciate the 100% departure from suburbia inherent in viewing the show. The quote-o'-the-day, and consequently my laugh of the day, comes from an episode where the ladies must leave the comfort of their Big Apple to attend the baby shower of an old friend who resides in the 'burbs of Connecticut, where our main heroine, the writer of a newspaper column, observes "I was struck by how a place so filled with nature could look so-o unnatural." But it's the disgusted utterance of one of the lawyer member of the quartet which cracked me up so completely, "There's a woman in there breastfeeding a child who can chew steak." As with most humor, the origin of its hilarity lies in the core of truth at its center.
The highlight of our pre-noon day centered around my Ashley's victory in finally being able to attend to her own post-toilet hygienic ablutions. She still requires assistance for standing in the fully upright and locked position, but somehow this little bathroom victory feels a lot like the moment in her toddlerhood where she finally figured out how to wipe herself during potty-training! Funny how malaise, whether viral- or trauma- or surgery-induced, strips a person of the most basic physical, and often mental, abilities. Including but not limited to: recalling the grocery list, grocery shopping itself, organizing the family schedule, reading an entire book chapter without passing out, eating without wheezing, peeing without stops and starts, moving one's bowels AT ALL, even the passing of gas. Upon their return -- sometimes painful day by painful day, oft times a simple night's sleep away -- we experience a profound appreciation for the banal. And then the flow of life rushes in to fill the blank spaces left in the departing wake of forced rest, discomfort and medications. The banal is once again relegated to the periphery of awareness.
At least for most of us. I can't help but to think of examples from this past week where the axiom I outlined above does not play out. Examples to which I share a personal connection. Examples of the heartbreaking variety that have contributed to my underlying emotional fatigue, which surely have played a large part in keeping this persistent virus on board and adoring its stressed and worn-like-the-living-room-furniture hostess.
The most extreme of these examples revolves around a friend of my mother's who lived in the same little building as my mom and roughly fifty other ageing and/or disabled people. Collectively, this body of mostly women, a few men, visiting family members and a bevy of healthcare workers, make up the interactive community of the Holiday House. I've been a part of this place long enough to realize the name is rather a misnomer. Still, there is a weary charm to be felt up and down the halls of the two-story brick apartments. And there's something all at once comforting and reliable about walking into the lobby, balancing my armloads of this, that and the other thing, signing the visitor's book, and realizing the entire time that the eyes of the ladies huddled around the coffee table and television behind me are following my every move. To me, their habits of curiosity mean that while a gossipy few may incorrectly conjecture and spread misinformation, the balance of residents will responsibly know what goes on within the walls of their encampment and this awareness fosters a true sense of safety. Not too much will slip by and allow unwelcome surprises at some later date.
Except in the case of Carol and her husband, Ray. Carol and Ray met and began their romance as residents of the Holiday House. Carol was one of the original crew of ladies for whom I harbor a specific affection who initially befriended my mother when she moved in. The kids and I enjoyed weekend and summer visits in the game room upstairs, constructing puzzles and rolling the Yahtzee dice, and listening to the stories and banter of Carol, Sarah and Vera (little old ladies laden with character, and sisters to boot), Earl -- one of the only gents living there in the early days of mom's time there, who I always thought had a bit of an unrequited 'thing' for Carol, and whoever else was able to leave the confines of their rooms and make their way up via the elevator. In the spectrum of age displayed amongst the ranks, Carol was on the younger side, which is to say mid to late sixties.
When I first met Ray, I found myself charmed by his quick smile and friendly ways. Not to mention that he possessed a playful handsomeness that he wielded without guile. When I heard the news of his impending marriage to Carol, I couldn't help but to think how apt their late-in-life matching was. The way Carol positively lit up whenever she was in Ray's presence was impressive. It was a softer side of her that I'd not previously witnessed. A genuine testament to the power of that elusive thing we call 'true love.' As I'm not one to exercise trite phrases simply to fill in the blanks, rest assured that their romantic love was, indeed, the real deal.
Last fall, I was among those folks who attended Carol's and Ray's simple wedding ceremony out on the back patio of the Holiday House. I snapped an album's worth of photos of the event, and each time I look at those pictures I can still feel the joy evident between the couple and in the adult children, cousins, octogenarians (and at least one centenarian) and others who witnessed the joining. It was the sort of joy that transforms a basic ceremony into a moment more lavish than even the most extravagant of planned nuptials. And it was one of those shared moments that created an atmosphere of excitement in the lives of the residents there that transformed a few weeks of ordinary autumn into the extraordinary.
A Saturday ago, our region experienced a morning of heavy long-lasting fog. It blanketed every nook and cranny of every yard and field, every roadway and intersection. And it caused a traffic accident at a specific light on the edge of town which spawned a secondary collision that abruptly changed the partnership of Carol and Ray in ways no one saw coming. Ray ended up at our local hospital with various broken bones and contusions; Carol's injuries, including a torn aorta, resulted in a lifeflight to Vanderbilt in Nashville. And until last night, husband and wife were unable to be together as their respective medical teams and families set about getting them put back together enough to reunite. Though Carol's previously-existing COPD merged with the damage from her injuries and made breathing on her own impossible, it seemed that her step-down from one form of assisted breathing to another would eventually lead to a restoration of her basic ability to follow an inhale with an exhale. My mom decided to put off visiting Carol until she was significantly improved, opting for a the less obtrusive card for the here and now.
But improvement didn't come. Last night, doctors informed the family that she would never be able to breathe on her own and she was lapsing in and out of a coma-like state with more frequency. The decision was made to remove her trachea tube and allow nature to take its course. Per advanced directive, this was Carol's wish under such circumstances. (Who among us average Joes ever thinks it will come down to this?) Barring the advent of a miracle, death was a certainty.
Ray's daughter rushed him to Vanderbilt where he met up with the pastor from their church. Perhaps the one miracle here was that when Joe bent down to show his wife who was there and they explained that the entire church was in prayer for her situation, Carol opened her eyes and smiled, thus seeing her beloved for one final time. The stripped-down reality of that last look between these precious friends and lovers demands our attention. And our sympathy.
I woke to today's news from my mom that Carol passed away during the night. Her family decided that instead of a funeral, they would have a memorial service to celebrate her life. And it would be held at the same place where Carol had enjoyed a rich life of friendships and marital love: the Holiday House. That seems fitting to me. I believe Carol would approve wholeheartedly. Though I know Ray must surely be aching with a pain far more profound and lasting than anything resulting from the car crash, the comfort he will draw from being surrounded by those who knew Carol best, and knew him as her other half, will be source of sustenance for the days ahead without his best friend.
Ray and Carol were denied their co-return to the banal. It happened quickly, much the way this blog entry shifted in an instant from humorous to somber. For that, I'm most sorry.
(This is a link to a Facebook album containing the wedding photos of which I wrote:
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Hope, Highlighted
Yesterday, the highlight of my day flitted about in the form of a monarch butterfly masquerading as a falling leaf in a local intersection. I embrace, inhale, devour and take great delight in these seconds of beauty caught in the midst of my daily busy-ness. They harness the power of this great planet and concentrate it onto the point of a pinhead for a brief and shining moment. My mind and my body halt in their engagements, sometimes only for a heartbeat or a quick intake of breath, but they are stilled all the same. And I welcome this stillness because I recognize the extreme rarity of its very existence in my life. And I understand the intrinsic value of this stillness as it relates to me as a spiritual being, as it relates to my well-being, as it relates to epiphany. And I wonder who else out there relates to this brand of harmony doled out in quick, highly digestible, necessary-to-quality-of-life bites?
Yesterday, the hope of my day arrived via my iPhone, my Girlfriend who is now devoid of her one eye thanks to the questing sharp canines of my 8 1/2 month-old white lab-mix pup. Like most days, or at least several days out of each week, I talked with Brother Gary. Only, after months of talking with my brother (lowercase), I actually spoke with my Brother. There is a difference, and that difference comes by way of a needle and cooked pills. Over the past six months or so, maybe longer, my emotions have been dulled by blame and anger and apathy. Not my own but that of Gary.
I knew he was in a downward spiral not long after the murder by a patient there at the hospital of a kindly helpful employee with whom my brother was acquainted. It's been almost a full year since that horrific act was committed and changed the inner-workings of the institute . . . and the inner-workings of my youngest brother. For reasons springing from a double-headed source of necessity and fear, the higher-ups clamped down on the rights and freedoms of the patients at Napa State Hospital. Their ability to regularly breathe the fresh air outside the halls of their wards diminished considerably. The presence of the grounds police force increased on all fronts, creating more of a prison-like atmosphere than is desired in a medically-based establishment. Tensions between staff and residents multiplied, with leaking stories to the press and grumblings in the community feeding the gossip fodder, attenuating real life into a Stretch Armstrong version of actual events. In this fishbowl, Gary's emotional and physical health has deteriorated.
I'm not stupid. And the air between me and my brother is always cleared. Neither of us tiptoe around what's going on. That my bipolar heroin-and-meth-addicted sibling had returned to the destructive and painfully familiar source of his lifelong comfort was not lost on me. Though street drugs are unavailable there, there is no shortage of patient- and staff- supplied prescription meds for sale or trade. And Gary lives on a ward where the population consists of either severely mentally ill men -- you would not be off base to picture individuals talking to their inner voices, stumbling along in circles, urinating on themselves, screaming at those around them -- or men not really engaged in their treatment plan. That would include addicted individuals who are not truly ready to tackle their problem.
It's a different animal, this thing of actually dealing with him and realizing the depth of his addiction. Prison did not allow this level of intimacy and awareness between us. I knew he had warts and scars but didn't have to see them almost every day. Because I was more concerned with his survival in prison, I made a conscious decision to accept him, his habits, his methods of getting by, feeling we could deal with all of that upon his release. There was a short period of time in prison, the early months of his short marriage, where he kicked his habit to the curb and stayed clean. That is an accomplishment. But for an addict, the getting clean is merely the beginning. Living with the consequences of that addiction, whether it be hepatitis C or burned bridges, exists as the bigger ongoing challenge. For the loved one of an addict, all the days and weeks and months of the addiction are the ongoing challenge. Maintaining hope in the face of doubt -- whether it is self-doubt, the doubt of friends and family who love me and adore my loyalty but think it misplaced and wasted -- is chief among those challenges. "Keep hope alive!" is harder done than said.
Lately, hearing the ringtone that signifies an incoming call from Gary has stirred irritation within me. If I'm being honest, even a bit of resentment. Sending him pictures or cards, much less ordering a few things here and there, managing the dwindling supply of money gifted to me on his behalf upon his release from prison back in October of 2008, feels more like a burden than a joy. Because those feelings are there, they have to be dealt with. Not ignored but examined. Their basis dug up and aired out. Over the past month or so, my overriding sentiment to Gary concerning his state of mind has been, "If you don't deal with your drug addiction, you will never be able to learn how to handle your bipolarity or develop the skills to overcome your institutionalization." Though his situation is unique, and quite painful, it can not be an excuse to languish, to diminish the core of who he is meant to be, to gnaw away at the taut threads of unity which exist between us. That just plain pisses me off. As anyone who has opened themselves up to relationships well knows, it is possible to both love and hate a thing. I love my brother; I hate the persona he chooses to project to the hospital staff and the men around him. It is demoralizing to imagine him screaming in the face of a cafeteria employee, hurling expletives, his face darkened with rage, the prison ink reflecting back his turmoil, essentially having himself a temper-tantrum because a power-hungry individual who will most likely never change has gotten under his thin skin. The man I support is better than that. He simply refuses to acknowledge this fact because the drugs allow him to wallow in self-pity and bitterness, blaming everyone around him for his lack of progress, his eyes blind to a better future that I can see.
Before Gary called yesterday, I was watching Our America with Lisa Ling -- her show on OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network). This particular episode centered around a drug-addicted couple she had interviewed 18 months previous. Then, they were strung out, thin, looking only for their next score. Upon her revisit at the top of this show, she was stunned to see them both clear-eyed, with meat on their bones, and clean for the past 18 months. But they were still living on the streets. Sleeping in shelters at night. Working where they could get honest money. Carrying around their meager belongings in several bags. Adhering to the judge's orders regarding their decorum as they continue to work toward reuniting with their 7 year-old son who presently lives with a foster family. Listening to their story broke me down into individual units of pain and faith, each one crying for recognition and a need to be reconfigured. I began praying for Gary while my purple-gloved hands continued to wash the pots and pans. The Lord doesn't need a prayer closet to move on a willing heart. And I was on my knees within.
When I answered the phone, I began with a series of questions to each of Gary's short explanations as to why he hadn't called in awhile. Finally, he admitted to being ill in the face of quitting a certain substance he'd been mainlining for a significant period of time. (The cops have been raiding his room every day for weeks since discovering a needle and a makeshift tattoo gun.) I listened as he explained an incident with a fellow client that made him realize he really wanted to be a quitter. Of drugs, that is. "I haven't been one of those users saying to himself, 'I need to quit. I want to quit.' But I am now." There was much more to it all than that but it doesn't need saying here. He wants to leave his ward and start a new program on another ward specifically tailored for users with a true desire to stop using. He wants to live up to the guy living at his core who's only shown his face for brief periods of time to his sister and his mother and maybe every now and again to a prisoner or patient in need. He wants to accept the opinions of the professionals there at the hospital who have repeatedly told him he is worthy and can get out of there alive and intact if he buckles down and does the work.
It's a turning point. If he can stop putting the car in reverse. But either way, it's time that I return to my written contemplations on matters of the heart and mind. Whether or not my brother makes it remains yet to be witnessed, but someone out there may need to read of my perspective and it is simply selfish not to share if even one can be helped through all of this.
Yesterday, the hope of my day arrived via my iPhone, my Girlfriend who is now devoid of her one eye thanks to the questing sharp canines of my 8 1/2 month-old white lab-mix pup. Like most days, or at least several days out of each week, I talked with Brother Gary. Only, after months of talking with my brother (lowercase), I actually spoke with my Brother. There is a difference, and that difference comes by way of a needle and cooked pills. Over the past six months or so, maybe longer, my emotions have been dulled by blame and anger and apathy. Not my own but that of Gary.
I knew he was in a downward spiral not long after the murder by a patient there at the hospital of a kindly helpful employee with whom my brother was acquainted. It's been almost a full year since that horrific act was committed and changed the inner-workings of the institute . . . and the inner-workings of my youngest brother. For reasons springing from a double-headed source of necessity and fear, the higher-ups clamped down on the rights and freedoms of the patients at Napa State Hospital. Their ability to regularly breathe the fresh air outside the halls of their wards diminished considerably. The presence of the grounds police force increased on all fronts, creating more of a prison-like atmosphere than is desired in a medically-based establishment. Tensions between staff and residents multiplied, with leaking stories to the press and grumblings in the community feeding the gossip fodder, attenuating real life into a Stretch Armstrong version of actual events. In this fishbowl, Gary's emotional and physical health has deteriorated.
I'm not stupid. And the air between me and my brother is always cleared. Neither of us tiptoe around what's going on. That my bipolar heroin-and-meth-addicted sibling had returned to the destructive and painfully familiar source of his lifelong comfort was not lost on me. Though street drugs are unavailable there, there is no shortage of patient- and staff- supplied prescription meds for sale or trade. And Gary lives on a ward where the population consists of either severely mentally ill men -- you would not be off base to picture individuals talking to their inner voices, stumbling along in circles, urinating on themselves, screaming at those around them -- or men not really engaged in their treatment plan. That would include addicted individuals who are not truly ready to tackle their problem.
It's a different animal, this thing of actually dealing with him and realizing the depth of his addiction. Prison did not allow this level of intimacy and awareness between us. I knew he had warts and scars but didn't have to see them almost every day. Because I was more concerned with his survival in prison, I made a conscious decision to accept him, his habits, his methods of getting by, feeling we could deal with all of that upon his release. There was a short period of time in prison, the early months of his short marriage, where he kicked his habit to the curb and stayed clean. That is an accomplishment. But for an addict, the getting clean is merely the beginning. Living with the consequences of that addiction, whether it be hepatitis C or burned bridges, exists as the bigger ongoing challenge. For the loved one of an addict, all the days and weeks and months of the addiction are the ongoing challenge. Maintaining hope in the face of doubt -- whether it is self-doubt, the doubt of friends and family who love me and adore my loyalty but think it misplaced and wasted -- is chief among those challenges. "Keep hope alive!" is harder done than said.
Lately, hearing the ringtone that signifies an incoming call from Gary has stirred irritation within me. If I'm being honest, even a bit of resentment. Sending him pictures or cards, much less ordering a few things here and there, managing the dwindling supply of money gifted to me on his behalf upon his release from prison back in October of 2008, feels more like a burden than a joy. Because those feelings are there, they have to be dealt with. Not ignored but examined. Their basis dug up and aired out. Over the past month or so, my overriding sentiment to Gary concerning his state of mind has been, "If you don't deal with your drug addiction, you will never be able to learn how to handle your bipolarity or develop the skills to overcome your institutionalization." Though his situation is unique, and quite painful, it can not be an excuse to languish, to diminish the core of who he is meant to be, to gnaw away at the taut threads of unity which exist between us. That just plain pisses me off. As anyone who has opened themselves up to relationships well knows, it is possible to both love and hate a thing. I love my brother; I hate the persona he chooses to project to the hospital staff and the men around him. It is demoralizing to imagine him screaming in the face of a cafeteria employee, hurling expletives, his face darkened with rage, the prison ink reflecting back his turmoil, essentially having himself a temper-tantrum because a power-hungry individual who will most likely never change has gotten under his thin skin. The man I support is better than that. He simply refuses to acknowledge this fact because the drugs allow him to wallow in self-pity and bitterness, blaming everyone around him for his lack of progress, his eyes blind to a better future that I can see.
Before Gary called yesterday, I was watching Our America with Lisa Ling -- her show on OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network). This particular episode centered around a drug-addicted couple she had interviewed 18 months previous. Then, they were strung out, thin, looking only for their next score. Upon her revisit at the top of this show, she was stunned to see them both clear-eyed, with meat on their bones, and clean for the past 18 months. But they were still living on the streets. Sleeping in shelters at night. Working where they could get honest money. Carrying around their meager belongings in several bags. Adhering to the judge's orders regarding their decorum as they continue to work toward reuniting with their 7 year-old son who presently lives with a foster family. Listening to their story broke me down into individual units of pain and faith, each one crying for recognition and a need to be reconfigured. I began praying for Gary while my purple-gloved hands continued to wash the pots and pans. The Lord doesn't need a prayer closet to move on a willing heart. And I was on my knees within.
When I answered the phone, I began with a series of questions to each of Gary's short explanations as to why he hadn't called in awhile. Finally, he admitted to being ill in the face of quitting a certain substance he'd been mainlining for a significant period of time. (The cops have been raiding his room every day for weeks since discovering a needle and a makeshift tattoo gun.) I listened as he explained an incident with a fellow client that made him realize he really wanted to be a quitter. Of drugs, that is. "I haven't been one of those users saying to himself, 'I need to quit. I want to quit.' But I am now." There was much more to it all than that but it doesn't need saying here. He wants to leave his ward and start a new program on another ward specifically tailored for users with a true desire to stop using. He wants to live up to the guy living at his core who's only shown his face for brief periods of time to his sister and his mother and maybe every now and again to a prisoner or patient in need. He wants to accept the opinions of the professionals there at the hospital who have repeatedly told him he is worthy and can get out of there alive and intact if he buckles down and does the work.
It's a turning point. If he can stop putting the car in reverse. But either way, it's time that I return to my written contemplations on matters of the heart and mind. Whether or not my brother makes it remains yet to be witnessed, but someone out there may need to read of my perspective and it is simply selfish not to share if even one can be helped through all of this.
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