Writing the Path: Musings of a Fangirl

The Master is Within

I feel like I’m in a  whirlwind composed of all of the things that make up me.  I’m grasping at these pieces. When I manage to capture something in the whirlwind I declare “this is what I want to do” but then I let it go and am off picking something else. What I’ve declared remains in my mind, but it might not be up front. I’m still riding by the seat of my pants. I am rather fond of this phrase–and perhaps it works for writing a novel during NaNoWriMo, but it doesn’t work for running a life. In some ways, I feel a bit ill-prepared in my life. I had no problems with getting degrees because the expectations were laid out for me. Life comes with no such expectations.

I actually like the course my life has taken so far. I have had some interesting experiences, gone to different places, have met a lot of cool people, have learned about different ideas and perspectives. I just feel like something really intricate is lacking. I am not hitting on my calling. And I know that one’s career isn’t supposed to define a person, but I don’t think that lacking thing is creating this sense of unease within me. I feel like I can be doing and giving a lot more than I am right now. I feel like calling and career go hand-in-hand. One might not be getting paid for one’s calling, but one might have all of his or her needs met from his or her calling.

I am still scared and do not completely trust myself or my words. Then it spirals. Because I go from “I don’t know what I am doing” to “I couldn’t do what I want to.” It’s all about doubt and giving power to the ego.

I want to be a spiritual teacher. I want to teach how creativity is the driving force of a person’s life. Creativity, love, trust, and truth all go together. Creativity/expression sets a person free. It brings people together. When one is expressing oneself creatively, from a place of trust, his or her expression is pure and their Spirit sings.

Success!

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For the last seven or so months, I’ve been working on a joint creative project with my friend BJ. The proposal was easy enough, but when I wrote it, I hadn’t realized the emotional roller coaster I’d be taking.

Most of the work I’ve been doing is internal and journaling. I’ll write down my feelings and memories on paper, but the writing was too rough and raw for the project. I wanted something more polished, more creative, just not me telling my story.

With BJ’s help, I got out of the trap my emotions held me in. I began focusing on my mom and her journey, without remembering the purpose of the project. I had completely forgotten about the project’s write-up and had centered on my mom, as the project is dedicated to her and BJ’s friend Dodie, our mentors who passed away last year. But when BJ read the project proposal to me, I saw that I could be free in my writing–even if my mom was going to be referenced. The point of the project was BJ’s journey and my journey.

When I began working on my writing yesterday, my writing began to flow. I wrote two pages! I still have much to write, but I wasn’t getting chocked up when I was writing. I sat myself on the sidewalk in the sun and wrote.  I’m going to do that again later today. Now I have a rough idea of what I am doing. Going to get this sucker done so it won’t be hanging over my head anymore.

A Year Later

It would be so much easier to avoid writing this like I have been letting myself–but I do need to write it. It is important to me to write it.

My life was irreversibly changed a year ago on the 18th (I’d like to think it was the 19th because the 18th is my friend’s birthday and I would rather remember the 18th for that and not for what happened that day.) My mom was taken away from my house by ambulance, never to make a full recovery and never to return home. She passed away on September 9th, 2010, but I was losing bits of her before that time. I remember telling her (when she was still alive and in the hospital) that sometimes it felt like she was already dead because of how she had been removed from my life. Living at home for 28 years with parents who had been disabled since I was seventeen (and in my mom’s case, it was since I was about five or six), meant that I saw my parents a lot. Being an only child, I had a deeper relationship with my parents than most kids have, but I was particularly connected with my mom. Personality, temperament (though she had amazing patience and was not as quick to anger as I am), spirituality, interests, we were very much alike. There is nobody I know who is as wise as she is, or can connect with people like her, or who was so open about conversation. She told me that I could talk to her about anything, and I really could. There were some hard times, some hard conversations, uncomfortable conversations. It was important to her that I didn’t dwell on my problems. After talking to her, I always found I had a better understanding of something. I have so much I want to share with her now, the things that I’ve learned since September. Things spiritually, especially. Now I am wondering if I have some signs of Asperger’s and if I could be an Old Catholic. LOL Random, right? I don’t feel like I have anybody to bounce my ideas or feelings off of. I have some wonderful mentors who are mothers themselves, and like my mom have been married for a long time (20+ years), and while they are wonderful and I think they would be fine about me talking with them about these things, the bottom line is that they aren’t MY Mom! I want to be able to talk with my mom again…and I think I will be able to, but not like how I want to talk with her. I don’t want to be talking to her spirit or the part of her that is still with me. I want to talk with her! The physical her! Like before! How it’s always been. I keep having dreams about my mom. Sometimes she’s still alive and sick, sometimes she’s dead. I don’t remember ever sitting down and chatting with her in my dreams, but I do hope I have those dreams at some point.

I was thinking about my mom a great deal when I was away on my two and a half week trip of the Pacific Northwest. At some points I wanted to call her, while also knowing full well that she was dead.  I never had that moment where I forget that she’s passed away; I always know. I think it was easier not to think about it while at home because we had spent many months (nearly five) of my mom being in one hospital or another. So I had gotten used to her not being home, but I hadn’t gotten used to her being dead while I was on a trip. On my last trip, I was in Atlanta and my mom was living her last days. That is when her health took a drastic turn for the worst. I remember my last phone call with her. I had heard my friend Mary singing a song she had written and the song and her voice made me think of Joan Baez’s Forever Young, my mom’s favorite song. I had it on my computer because I had purchased it for my mom’s iPod. I played it for Mary and her friends and I burst into tears. I called my mom and she sounded agitated. She couldn’t talk because the nurses were doing something with her. I can’t even remember what was said, or if I said I would call her back. Talking to her was enough. This is strange to me, though. My iPod says that that is the last play of that song and it was on 9/3, six days before my mom passed away. I remember trying to call her on my way home (and being told how horrible she had gotten), but I don’t remember talking to her.

I think at some point either before going or in Atlanta, my mom and I knew that she wasn’t going to make it. When I was on my trip, I found from my uncle that she had told him that she was dying. I thought it wasn’t true. She had said this before at other times. Even so, I think a part of me knew she was serious this time. My mom’s hospitalization was preparing me and my dad for her passing, too. I wish she hadn’t spent all of that time in the hospital, or had come home.

When my mom was transferred from Kindred to Country Oak (a longer term care facility), I remember the nurse admin telling me to enjoy the time I had left with my mom. This was at the end of June and I remember thinking they were insane and being mean, but maybe they knew the signs. It had been a battle for the doctors, nurses, and my mom to keep her health up. She would respond to treatment and then something else wouldn’t be working as effectively, or her oxygen level would drop. Or she would get an infection. I wonder if she had had the infection that killed her for months, maybe even since before she was hospitalized.

The thing I regret the most about my mom passing away at an early age (56) is that she is not going to get to do the things that she wanted to do, or the things that I wanted her to do. She wanted to go see where  her parents grew up in Minnesota and Ohio. She also wanted to return to Wall Drug, in South Dakota. She had visited it when she was a kid and wanted to share that memory with me and my dad. My biggest regret is that she won’t ever see me get married or have any kids. I still don’t know if I want to get married or have kids even, but if I do, she won’t be there. This is one of the biggest problems for motherless daughters. The younger you are when you lose your mom, the fewer the milestones you’ll have experienced in your life that she will be there for. This leaves emotional damage on the daughter. I want to find a local group of women who have also lost their mothers. I am angry that I am in this group now. I don’t like being singled out. I also find myself jealous of my friends who get to spend time with their mothers, and even my mentors who have happy marriages. It’s like, why can’t my mom and my dad still have that? Even with health problems, I think my mom was happy. She was happy about what she had: my dad, me, her friends, and her family.

This might sound surprising, but I am not angry at God for taking my mom. For a time, I was wondering if her death could have been prevented, if there were things any of us could have done for it not to have happened. This is what I mean about bits and pieces of my mom being taken away from me: I think she was slowly dying for nine years. After her heart attack, she returned to good health for a little while, but then after that her health continued to ebb away. She had chronic lung problems, she was in the hospital at least once a year. She was always looking forward to the future. Looking for things to get better in life. I think she enjoyed herself the best she could while she was here.

I am grateful that when my mom passed away, my dad and I were there with her. I am also grateful that I had enough sense of the situation to tell our family friend to go see my mom. I think my mom was in a coma-like state at that time, but it was her chance to say goodbye. The family friend had always been a sister to my mom and that closure was important to all of us.

This year has been filled with ups and downs. Sometimes I think I am doing great and other times…not so great. It doesn’t help that I’ve been sick for more than a month in 2011. I think my body was so emotionally run down from last year that my poor body doesn’t get a break.

The trip to the Pacific Northwest helped me too. I had time to think straight and relax. I have looked back in some of my photographs from my trip and I can’t believe how happy I look. I spent time with friends and family while I away. In Astoria, I got to see lots of my cousins, including my cousin Jaci who I think I was supposed to be seeing. When I was looking for my birth certificate so I could get my passport, I found a letter Jaci had written to my mom after my grandmother had passed away in 1995. I don’t remember the letter, but I think my mom thought ahead and put it in the important papers for me to find after her own passing. My mom would do something like that. Her level of caring for people went very far. She always put others before herself, too.

I have a lot more about my mom and my life now to write about. I have things I have yet begun to work out. I make no promises about the quality of the writing or the writing itself. I am writing from my emotions. This might not be very pretty, but it is what I need to do. Anybody who had actually read through this stream-of-consciousness emotional blather?  Thank you.

The Road of Your Choosing

“Choose your ground, choose your weapon, and face what is to come.” — Rebecca Horne to Amanda, Highlander

I have to tell you a secret: I never know how to start anything I do or anything I write. I know the important thing is to start somewhere. And that when it comes to writing, it does not matter where you start, just that you do. You can start in the middle if you want–in medias res, which has to be my favorite writing device word, though I am not so sure about the application. It can be very hit or miss. It either works or doesn’t; there is nothing in between.

This blog right here, this is my experiment. I have no idea how it will go. But I am on that building’s ledge, with my eyes closed, and trusting Spirit that when I jump I am going to soar.