Christmas Sampler, 2

Yesterday Lola gave me my Christmas present, one only she could give me. Well, her friend Erin was here, too. Still unique.

They sang two Christmas songs to me. I did not know the songs, but that doesn't matter. Cory and Anna were here, too, but it was still just for me. How lovely, and Lola knew that was what I would want most.

They sound good together.

You should have heard them.

* * *

Thursday I made licorice caramels. And that is how I remembered why I have not made them for many years, maybe 15.

They are a lot of work. Long time cooking and stirring constantly. Hot stove. Really hot. Tricky adding the anise and black color. Very hard to cut when cooled. Preparing many small pieces of waxed paper is a tedious chore. Wrapping each piece is a pain.

Very hard to cut. I know I already said that, but I don't think you get it. Very hard.

I used to pour the stuff directly on the small area of counter top to the left of the stove and let it cool there. This time I poured it into a 13 x 9 buttered pyrex pan. Very hard to cut and remove from that pan.

Now maybe you get it.

But.

They are really good.

* * *

I am tired, having worked all day to prepare for tonight. But it will be a good night. We're going caroling to two places.

Then home for chili and hot chocolate, with mini marshmallows and peppermint candy canes.

* * *

Tomorrow I will be released from my calling as gospel doctrine teacher. Some Christmas gift. Hmph.

Truth is I could feel they were about ready to do it. Just don't put me in the nursery.

Yep, just thinking

My neighbors are the Clicks. No, really. They live behind me, moved here from Oregon about eight years ago, I think. They have two boys, both in high school now.

I saw one of the boys run through the back yard tonight to let himself in the back door.

When the boys were younger, they had a trampoline in the back yard, and there was a lot of jumping, a lot of play. Friends over to jump and laugh and make noise. Now, no trampoline, no boys playing back there. I did see the older boy sitting on their deck with a girl one day last summer.

Of course, it made me think of our boys and our girls. Lots of play in the yards, back and front, at 722. A trampoline briefly, the homemade water slide, wiffle ball, being buried in the piles of autumn leaves, crack the whip--Andrew's broken collar bone to remember it by--and whatever else. Even a little back yard fun here, but mostly for grandchildren.

No point to make here. Just thinking.

Yes, It Happens

Today at Costco a woman stepped around a corner to where I was standing and did a quick inhale.

"Oh," she said, "I thought I just saw my mother as I walked around this corner."

"Sorry," I said.

"But, of course," she continued, "my mother has been gone for a couple of years. It's just you're about her height and your hair is like hers, maybe not so white. But it's the kind of thing that happens sometimes."

"I understand." And I do, for sure.

Yeah, Sure

How to Make a Vegan Christmas Cake

Being vegan or dairy-free doesn't mean missing out on a rich, fruity Christmas cake. Even if you don't follow a dairy-free diet, this moist and delicious cake is worth trying. You'll need 24 hours to soak the fruit, and the cake is best if made ahead at least a week or more prior to eating it.

As if

That's his boy

Richard just called.

He said their friend Jackie is taking care of Penelope and Axel from 11 to 5 Monday through Friday for the rest of this month so he can finish the renovations on their house.

When they got to Jackie's house today, he said, "Penelope took off her shoes, dropped her coat, and ran." No problems.

"Axel didn't' want to go," Richard told me, "and it hurt my heart."

That's my son, who loves his son. He's a stay-at-home dad, you know.

Another Little Memory

Just out in the garage to get some Christmas things, I looked over and saw that yellow box-like thing. Stud Sensor.

Of course I thought of Wayne. He called it a stud finder and complained about it. I can hear him.

"That darn stud finder. It beeps every time I go into the garage."

Remember? Yep. He was funny.


P.S. My garage is clean, orderly. I wonder if he would recognize it.

What to say

I have been writing about the Bobs in my life. Last night I tried to write in the same vein about the Wayne in my life. It's harder. Can anyone tell me why that is?

I suppose it's because the Bobs came and went, and Wayne--well, you know. He did not come and go. Well, he did go but not until we had been married 40 years.

I suppose it's because there is too much to tell.

I'm looking at a picture I keep on my desk. It's of Wayne, standing on a nicely graded dirt path in McCall, Idaho. All around him are trees small and large. His hands are on his hips, his blue jacket tied around him. He holds my red jacket in his right hand and lets it hang down to his knees. He's looking at me--because I'm taking the picture.

We went up there and rented bicycles to ride around the lake, but the bicycles are not in the picture. In our early fifties, maybe. I don't know. It's a picture I like a lot. Nothing grand to remember about it. Just a nice little trip.

Yes, I could write about every day we spent together. But that would get into the everydayness of things.

I don't know how a person could actually do that. Or why.

Mind Tricks

Who can understand these things? Not I.

I pulled out of my driveway Saturday, looked down the street, and saw man walking in my direction. I could only see the top part of him. He was about the same height and size as Wayne.

So here is what my mind did.

Just for an instant, it thought: Maybe that's Wayne. He has come back.

Heavens!

I know how silly that is, how stupid. But that is what went through my mind, and then I had to process it, think it over, actually tell myself it is not possible.

Just because I would like it to happen, after these nearly nine years, doesn't mean it will.

Just a Note

Dear Wayne,
Thanksgiving dinner at Andrew and Michelle's with their boys and others. A very pleasant time. We missed you, but Andrew made the pumpkin pies, carrying on your tradition.

You know, it was nice not to cook the big dinner, but I miss having everyone come here for Thanksgiving.

Changes. They bring their mixed blessings with them.

As usual, I didn't go shopping the next day. Millions did, you know.

I wonder about you, of course.

Love,
Carol

To Lift the Heart

A couple of days ago Richard and I spoke by telephone. Here's one of the things he told me. It's about Axel, his two-year-old boy.

Richard was watching Axel play and said to him, "I love you."

Axel said, "I love you, too." Then he stopped, looked at his dad, and said, "I love you, Babe."

Which is what Axel hears his dad say to his mom.

I love this story. And them, of course.

Of Spiders and Such

I have just now killed a wolf spider. I think it was a wolf spider. It was big, ugly, dark, and it had designs on the blinds in my front window. I mean, like, to live there.

I had other ideas, so now, if it has any life left in it, any consciousness, it will find itself wrapped, crushed, enveloped inside two Kleenex tissues deep in the dark of the garbage can in the garage.

Was it male or female? Richard would know. I would not.

I dislike killing spiders, and this one I could feel inside the Kleenex because it was big.

Gross. And a little bit scary. But I am here and Wayne is not, and I cannot call a neighbor in to do it. Poor me.

So. It is done. Good for me.

If you could have heard it

I wish I could describe last night's Boise Philharmonic concert. Lola and I attended.

I cannot do it justice. The most exciting part was the Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No. 3, Barry Douglas the soloist. Glorious, thrilling, brilliant. About the best I can do.

What a blessing to be there. That concerto is one I have two recordings of. I've heard it many, many times. And Lola has heard it, too. But the truth is there is nothing like hearing it in person. Nothing like watching the music pour out of the pianist and the orchestra, to witness their love of the music, their work to bring it to life. Nothing like it.

And better still, to sit by Lola all through it.

Oh well

My friend Sue came home one day last January and found her husband, Wayne, lying dead on the garage floor. She has had a hard year.

No. Wait. She had a hard several months. Last couple of months she's been online, looking for a man. Found one. Went to California to see him. Came back and said he was absolutely boring. All he wants to do is sit around the house.

Now, apparently, she has found one who lives in Oregon. Closer is better. Right? They meet in Baker City, OR. Half way for both, I guess.

She likes him. I guess he likes her. Don't know how many times they have met. I should see her tomorrow and will get all updated.

My response?

Flabbergasted. Kind of grossed out. It's just not me. Obviously it is Sue.

* * *

By the way, on a different subject and one not at all related to Sue's, my friend Audrey told me today she has never eaten Campbell's tomato soup. Not ever in her life of, I'd say, 40+ years.

No recrimination here. It's just that I find that remarkable. That's why I have remarked about it.

It's the widow speaking here

I met a woman last night named Ernie. She dislikes her name, that one and the one it is derived from: Ernestine. Can't say I blame her.

But for me, my name is perfect, and I love it. Carol, my mother's little song. That's what she told me.

But this is not so much about names. You'll see.

Ernie is a widow, she told me she fills with envy when she sees a woman walk into a room with a husband. I told her I feel the same. Ernie's husband died seven years ago. She dislikes living alone.

I told her I understand.

Because, you know, it gets long, this living without my husband. Things happen in the mind, mine anyway, and I can get to thinking he didn't really love me.

I can hear my children yelling at me about that statement. But it's true. Things like that happen in the mind.

But in conversation with Alyce tonight I told her something that, as I think on it now, lets me know he surely did love me.

And it's good to fix the messed up thinking that goes on at times.

Here's what he did:
Less than two years before he died, he changed the amount of the buy/sell insurance policy on his half of the business. He more than doubled it. He did it so that, if he died, the insurance would provide for me. It has and it does.

You need not think I'm happy about it. I'd much rather have him here than have the money. But I'm making a point here.

You get it.

In the Blood

I dreamed all the seas were gone, blown dry by a malicious wind. The ground stretched and cracked and its breaking let out foul smells. Clouds thinned and died forever. Lush became a word forgotten. Green did not exist. No tears welled in people's eyes. I was a fly, clinging to carrion--your love for me long dead.

I think we do not dream in words. But to tell it is another thing. Then words, our tools, become phantom, and where one time they might distort and change what we would say, they may this time not distort enough. We may despair of ever getting it right, whether it's a dream to tell or a memory or a high-minded thought, and we wonder if the result is ever worth the struggle. But the wish to try gets in the blood, like music, like the love of that one person you have to have, and we write--to release the hold these things have on our minds, to sort the moments or our lives, perhaps never to say something final and definitive. It's all quite tentative, remember.

Just Thinking

Paul repaired the bookcase from the family room. I have long thought Wayne built it, but I can't be sure now. Its tongue and groove shelves look pretty sophisticated, and I don't know how he would have done it.

Sometimes I think about moving out of this house, although I know it would take about three years to pack up. If I lived somewhere else, in a place we didn't build, a place where he never was . . . what would that be like?

Would I think about him less often?

The Readers

Charlie, age six, reads very well. He told me he read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. He started it on his own, Ann said, and finished it in less than a week. An informal quiz by his dad showed that Charlie understood most of it. He finished another shorter book while I was there. He likes to read. I hope the school programs that force reading don't ruin that.

During scripture reading he read Bethphage without help, needed help with Zebedee's. And that was all.

Johnny, age four, reads with help, but he did read happy without help and then explained the Happy B'day Mom sign to me. "The B stands for birth in birthday, Grandma." I believe his memory is long and flawless. Watch out.

Scripture reading, his mom reads a phrase and Johnny repeats it. Last morning I was there went like this:

Ann: And the blind
Johnny: And the blind
A: and the lame
J: and the lame
A: came to him in the temple;
J: came to him in the temple;
A: and he healed them.
J: and he healed them.
Brief pause.
A: Now I'll read the next verse.
J: Now I'll read the next verse.
Laughter from all, even Edmund.

Sad, but . . .

not too sad.

It's about the two tomatoes. They have been sitting in my kitchen window, wrapped in newspaper. I came home from Pennsylvania at midnight last night--another delay in Denver, but that's a different story--and did not look at the tomatoes.

Too tired. Too afraid of what they might look like.

This morning I unwrapped the small one. Gross. Then the larger one (a relative term--they're both tiny). Grosser.

Good thing it's trash day tomorrow.

* * *

Johnny is still a redhead. Charlie is tall and very much a big boy. Edmund is priceless. Well, they all are priceless. But here's just one thing about Edmund. He sings. I mean he just sings to himself through the day. You would love it.

Charlie and Johnny went trick-or-treating with their mom. Edmund stayed home with his dad. Not by choice. He really wanted to go. Cried and cried. His dad kept promising "next year." Not a lot of help.

Eventually his dad took him upstairs, calmed him down, and convinced him he should sleep.

But I think Edmund will remember.

Halloween. It is kids, costumes, and candy. Hard not to eat a lot of candy when it's just sitting there in front of you. But those boys do pretty well.

Grandma's have to go home. And that is really hard.

Schiess people and their musical ideas

I've been asked to get a choir or small group together and prepare a musical selection for Thanksgiving. So I chose the very traditional Hymn of Thanksgiving, long a favorite of mine. As I have been singing it around the house today, I remembered that Wayne and I sometimes sang it together. We left the tune alone but made a small modification to the words. As follows: (Hope you like it.)

We gather together
to gather together.
We gather together
to gather together.
We gather together
to gather together.
We gather together
to gather together.

* * *

Wayne also liked to sing "I Wonder As I Wander" a little differently.

I wonder as I wander
in my underwear . . .

Not sure if he ever finished it. But he certainly got a kick out of himself whenever he sang just that much.

Today it brought up a memory for me. It's my mother's uncomfortable recurring dream. She is wandering in her underwear . . . down at the Ocean Park Pier. People don't seem to notice that she is wearing only underwear, but she knows, and she is sure someone is bound to notice sometime soon. Poor Mama.

Two Bits

• Neti Pot. If you haven't heard of it, you will. I bought one and have been using it. It is a small piece of equipment that facilitates a sinus wash. You're thinking: gross. Well, weird is a better descriptor. But I'm kind of converted to the sinus wash concept anyway, and this is so much easier than snorting warm salt water. (Gross works here.) Would Wayne ever have used such a thing? No, as they say, way. But, then, his concerns were centered in another body system.

• Yesterday I pulled the two unfortunate tomatoes off the plant and brought them inside. Quite green and not likely to ripen now that it's autumn. And it was supposed to be in the low 30s last night. They are now wrapped in newspaper and sit on my kitchen window sill. I should have thrown them away, but I just couldn't. I'll wait until they turn red, if that ever happens. Then I'll slice them, taste them, and then throw them away because I'm pretty sure they won't taste like home-grown tomatoes. No bacon needed.

Some Days

Today I miss Wayne. A lot. I've been asking him where he is.

I just need him here to talk over a few things. It would help me so much. He always had a way of making me know things would be all right. I would like to hear him tell me that today.

Too bad.

It's Sunday

Today is a great day. You should know there are such things.

I went to church. Sounds simple. Sounds small. But it was great, from start to end. So that a person comes away almost overwhelmed and filled with gratitude.

Awfully glad I was there. It was a blessing. I mean, a blessing.

And then I get a call from Alyce, sharing her experience in church. Another blessing. For me and for her.

It's a great day.

Small World, as they say

Monday I went to Curves in Centerville, Utah. A woman there heard me tell my last name and said her husband has Schiesses in his genealogical line. They pronounce it Schi-ess, like two syllables.

We exchanged contact information. I will send her what I have. You know, pedigree charts.

When I figure out how to email that kind of stuff.

Ann's email

I was at a friend's house this morning and she (Steffanie) was telling me and another friend about her parents. They've been called to serve a mission for our church in the Philadelphia PA mission, Spanish speaking. That's the mission where we live.

This prompted the other friend to ask, "Do they speak Spanish?"

Steffanie answered, "Oh yeah. We lived in South America for a while when I was growing up. And when he was young, my dad served his mission in Uruguay."

You can guess what I said, "My dad served his mission in Uruguay."

Steffanie, who is always amazed at everything you tell her, said, "No way. Do you know when?"

I told her dad was born in 1939. She said, "My dad was born in 1939." We talked for a moment about the fact that my dad died in 2003.

After asking me my maiden name, she got her phone and called her dad. She said, "My friend's dad served his mission in Uruguay, and we think it was at the same time you were there. Did you know an Elder Schiess?

He said, "Elder Schiess. Of course I knew him. I have great respect for Elder Schiess." This friend's father, a man named Rogers, told her that Dad had been a great missionary and had worked hard and had been a zone leader.

We already knew those things about dad, but it was still nice to hear them. Steffanie then told her dad about Dad's death. He was surprised.

As she talked for another minute with her parents about our dad, I sat there trying not to cry. I was happy and sad. Happy that all the people who knew Dad have great respect for him and sad because, well, I miss having my dad to call on the phone like Steffanie did. So easy. Just dial a number and there he is on the line.

I love you all and I am glad I have many family members who can know what it's like to miss Dad as I do.

Please overlook any typos here. I know I often send messages with typos.

Ann

It's as if

When our children were little, they hated the vacuum cleaner. Each child in turn.

When they were babies, they would cry when I vacuumed. I mean really cry hard. Or, if they could run out of the room, they would.

They were quite afraid of it.

Now, I think I'm afraid of it. Well, you know, it's as if.

Sing, Sing A Song

Most days I move about the house singing. Sometimes just a melody, but more often a song will get stuck in my head. And I'll sing it--we're talking out loud. I might even dance a little. Even in the night when I can't sleep, I'll sing. Out loud, I mean, why not? But maybe not dance.

Lately, I've been singing "It Had To Be You," an old song, like from the 1920s, I believe. Anyway, I know the words, I like the song, so I sing it.

This is something I have done all my life. Singing every day. Maybe it means a) I love music; b) I am a happy person.

Many songs rest in my mental repertoire--I used to say I know the words to all songs; never quite true, less true now, because who can keep up?--but, hey, I know a lot of songs. Anyway, some song will surface now and then and I will sing it.

Like "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue?" and "Come In From the Rain" and "Splish, Splash" or "All the Things You Are" or "Hound Dog" or "God Rest You Merry Gentlemen" or whatever. You name it. Go ahead, you name it, chances are I've sung it.

Today it's this: "Oo-ee, oo-ee baby, oo-ee, oo-ee baby, oo-ee, oo-ee baby, won't you let me take you on a sea cruise?" I think that's the correct spelling of oo-ee. I have to confess to not knowing all the words, and that is frustrating for me because it means I might sing this annoying oo-ee thing for a whole day.

"September Song" has been on my mind. Seems appropriate.

"Oh, it's a long, long time from May to December,
and the days grow short when you reach September.
When the autumn weather turns the leaves to flame,
one hasn't got time for the waiting game.
And the days dwindle down to precious few.
September, November.
And these few precious days I'll spend with you.
These precious days, I'll spend with you."

I wasn't going to put all the words here, but I couldn't help it.

So here's another one I've been singing, and it has nothing to do with my widowhood, I don't think:

In the wee small hours of the morning
When the whole wide world is fast asleep,
You lie awake and think about the boy
And never ever think of counting sheep.

When your lonely heart has learned its lesson,
You'd be his if only he would call.
In the wee small hours of the morning,
That's the time you miss him most of all.

If you tell me that's from Sleepless in Seattle, I'll tell you, yes, they used the song, but it's really from the 1950s.

And, oh yeah, classical music and hymns, too. I'm versatile.

Something happy

Caroline's blood is free of gluten for the first time since they've been monitoring it.

THAT IS WONDERFUL NEWS.

They have been so careful, and it has paid off.

I am thankful.

Not Much

On these warm nights I open the bedroom windows. Except Alyce's room. I only open those windows if the day has been very hot. Today was 90, not as hot as very hot.

So I have just opened up the windows, and when I went in to open the window in Ann's room, I half expected to see her there. Only half expected. It has been many years since she lived here.

This house used to have every room full and busy. Alyce in the front bedroom, Ann in the corner, Richard in what I now call the guest room, and Paul down in the basement bedroom. We have a big family; even when two were married and one gone on a mission the family was big enough to fill this house. Which is why we built a big house.

Now those bedrooms don't belong to anyone, I guess. Sometimes it makes me sad to see them empty. But that is only a person looking back and half wishing for the past to come again. Half wishing.

I have given away at least four beds, and still there is a bed in every room but Alyce's. So that when family comes home to visit, they usually have a place and a bed for sleeping. Wayne's boys slept on the floor in Alyce's room this summer. He and Kimberli had the guest room. Richard's family slept in the basement on the bed there and a big air mattress they brought with them, except for Lena in Ann's room. So the house was full again.

Now it's kind of empty. Well, I'm here, and I go into every room nearly every day, but I don't really "use" them all. Not sure what the significance of that fact is, because I am here; I own the place; I like it here; I plan to stay.

Books

For a while after Wayne died--don't know how long, but it seems a long time--I couldn't read anything. Friends, family, acquaintances recommended books and some sent books for me. But I could not read them, especially those about grieving or coping with death.

I do read now, but I have reached a place where I can quit a book if I don't like it and not feel guilty. Well, almost.

Here's what I've read this summer.

Second Wind, Tom Plummer
The Lifted Veil, George Eliot
The Saint, Oliver Broudy
Understood Betsy, Dorothy Canfield Fisher
Rules for Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life, Roger Rosenblatt
How Ronald Reagan Changed My Life, Peter Robinson
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
A Companion to Your Study of the New Testament, Daniel Ludlow
Making Sense of the New Testament, Richard Holzapfel and Thomas Wayment
The New Testament Made Easier, two volumes, David Ridges
The New Testament

Books I Started and gave up on.
Hamlet's Blackberry, William Powers (coulda been and shoulda been a pamplet)
A Walk Across America, Peter Jenkins (failed to live up to the promise in the title)
The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (again, but I'll keep trying)

Books I'm in the middle of.
A Light in the Wilderness, M. Catherine Thomas
Being Wrong, Kathryn Schulz
Letters of a Woman Homesteader, Elinore Pruitt Stewart (this one I'm sure to finish)

Technology World

Some time in the late 1990s or early 2000s I bought two cell phones and set Wayne and me up with a cell phone company. I don't remember which one. Actually, I believe it was a 15-day free trial. I went for it because I thought it would be a handy thing for us.

But Wayne wanted nothing to do with a cell phone. Not sure why, maybe he didn't want to deal with learning the technology involved. Whatever the reason, he refused to use it, even once.

He was not a telephone person anyway.

So I took them both back. Hmm. Today I'd have to pay a $350 fee for stopping service early. Cell phone use for me had to wait a while. His never came.

I thought of this as I saw a young man walking along carrying his two pieces of essential technology: a cell phone in one hand and probably an iPod in the other. He had pockets in his shorts, but he carried these items in his hands. I suppose he would put one in a pocket when he needed to text someone. I use the word "needed" on purpose here and the word "essential" earlier because that is the way it is.

Digital, electronic, and probably newer terms I don't even know, these words and the things they represent have become essential to us. We need them, and some of us need to text someone at least 100 times a day.

I'm not poking fun, you know, although I do not text--or at least I have not as yet. I'm just saying it is the truth, because I have to admit that being without my cell phone service for 24+ hours was beyond inconvenient. It was the eve of my birthday and my actual birthday--and I had no phone. Couldn't make calls, couldn't receive calls. Therefore, I missed calls. Bummer.

I used to say I'd like to go back to the time when you left your house and thought absolutely nothing of leaving your phone in it. If someone called, you missed it. No big deal.

Today is different.

Wayne, however, never knew about it. He died in 2003, before this enormous techno takeover.

Poem

If I posted this before, hold up two fingers, and then, I guess, you'd better tell me.

Not Forever

Carol Schiess

The sky was dark and clear

this morning as I walked,

stars bright and white,

like on a winter night

when the moon and stars

seem fixed

in a blue-black sea of air,

never to move or fade,

always to blink out their lights,

always to be up there as surety and comfort

for sailing ships and airplanes,

for walkers in the early morning dark,

but, of course, we know they won’t.

They’ll dim, fade,

disappear, like first love,

like my mother

when she died.

On My Mind

The last time my mother, and father, came to my home in Idaho (722 N Georgia, Caldwell) was just after Christmas 1978. Mama played for me and my friend Joyce to sing at a two-stake holiday dance at the Caldwell Stake Center. The evening was kind of a big deal. But we were pretty much a big deal, too, when we sang.

Whenever we practiced, my mother thought I took the tempo too fast--on just about everything--and she told me so, of course. She tried to slow us down, and, if you knew my mother, you would know she slowed us down. Some, anyway. My mother was the very best accompanist I've ever known, by the way, and I was so glad to have her play for us. She made that trip up to Idaho just for me.

It was very cold that year, and my dad didn't do well in the cold. Very cold. He was a worry to my mother, but she was the one who died nine months later.

I watched her as she sat in my house, folding my laundry. At least that's what I wrote in a poem about her dying. She was folding socks.

I saw how tired she looked. Or I like to think I did. But I was likely just like my dad, who did not see it, I suppose. Whatever he needed from her, she gave. As always. You can tell I'm feeling critical of him about it, but I know I shouldn't. Besides, she loved him.

I went down to Utah three times the next year, 1979, the year of my last pregnancy. My journal tells of a busy year for me, six children, singing here and there, teaching at church, going to school, and running every chance I got for as long as I could do it. Not always feeling good.

Oh yes, and a husband. Once I wrote of how kind he was to me. Thank goodness I wrote it.

The last of those three visits was on my birthday. From my journal:
2 September 1979, my birthday. Am spending it in Bountiful with my parents. My mother had a heart attack several weeks ago, and I have wanted to come down to see her & my dad. Wayne's parents bought a plane ticket for me. I left all my kids at home with their dad. So this visit is a quiet one. My mother is not very well, but it is hard to make her stay inactive--and Daddy makes it impossible. She is giving a party tomorrow for my birthday. I wish she weren't--but she is.

That was the last time I saw her alive. I remember we went to Dick's market together, probably the day before the party. I expected she would walk around with me, using the grocery cart to lean on. She didn't. She sat down on some bags of salt or dog food and waited. Not like her.

She took me to dinner one night. And she did not eat. Not like her.

Clearly, she was not doing well. I could see it. I remember thinking about it. And yet I did not expect her to die.

It's coming up on 32 years now.

There's This

The time when we invited my friend's kids, only three at that time, I think, to dinner. The three corresponded in age to three of mine, and they were friends, too.

My friend's son Joe, I'll call him, was adopted. I had told my children, but Joe's parents had not told him. Which means he did not know. By the time he left our house, he knew. Actually, by mid-dinner he knew. We may all have finished eating. All except me and maybe Joe. I don't remember that part.

Of course, the whole thing was my doing, my fault. I had neglected to warn my children against telling him. I had neglected to tell them he didn't know. I was immediately sorry for what I had told my children and for what I had neglected to tell them.

Joe's response to the information he received in my dining room--information his parents had the right to withhold or reveal as they desired--was bewilderment, disbelief, utter disbelief. I can see him now, looking around at all who were there, looking to me for confirmation or denial. It was a terrible moment.

I don't remember which of my children spoke the life-changing words, but I knew it was without guile, with no harm intended. Innocent it was. But its effect was profound.

I left the table and called his mother, confessed what had happened, and apologized abjectly. I was truly and deeply sorry. I think I was also worried about our friendship.

Of course, I knew that the apology was inadequate, but there was nothing else I could do. She did not yell at me or call me stupid or curse my children, any of which she might have done. She was kind, understanding, forgiving. At least, over the phone. I have wondered if that is how she really felt.

I don't know how Joe's parents had planned to spend their evening. Plans changed, no doubt. They had until I brought their kids home to figure out what they would say to Joe. I had until I was able to forgive myself to get over it.

I think of it now because I just heard something stunning on the radio as I drove home from Nampa. It came from a woman who was adopted as a child. She said that she has never known who she is. That is a stunning, sad admission. One I have never been forced to make, have never even needed to think about.

No need to talk about the loving people who adopted and raised her. That was not the issue she spoke of.

She simply does not know who she really is. She knows that her mother was 17 and that her father was "passing through." And that is all she knows.

Joe's parents, the ones who adopted him, knew much more than that about his "real" parents, and I suppose they told him all they knew. Showed him documents, names, places.

We have read and seen depicted that desire adopted people have to know, to find their real roots, their real parents. And so I wonder if Joe wanted to find his people. I do not know if Joe ever did that, if his parents encouraged it. I have never asked. I did not want to be trusted with any more information on the matter.

Various

Today I applied Scott's Turf Builder to my lawns.
Of course, I'm hoping it will build turf. I'm really hoping it can build turf where there isn't any.
What do you think?

Took some food out to Neide again today. She's doing fine. Healing well after back surgery.

I lost 2.2 pounds in the last week. Hope I don't find them again. Life shouldn't have to be a constant inner debate--eating vs . . . whatever. But it is.

About a week after Wayne's funeral I was at Costco. Someone I knew from years before in Middleton came up to me. I couldn't even think of her name. She put her arm around me and said, "He's better off." Oh yeah? Why would you say that? And how would you know? Maybe it was true. Maybe. Probably she just wanted to say the right thing. And I know people mean well. But the right thing is actually not to say anything. The arm around me would have been more comfort without any words. In fact, her words felt like a slap in the face.

Why do I remember this just now? Because.

Yes, Indeed

My grandson spent a good portion of last night here.

Two brief notes about the evening:

1. I fixed him a peanut butter and honey sandwich. He chose it. He also chose to drink the smoothie I had made in the morning. And he chose to have Cheetos on the side. Or I thought on the side. Turns out he dipped Cheetos in smoothie. "Yes, it's good." And he pulled the sandwich apart to lay Cheetos inside."Really good."
   
2. He asked a blessing on his food and included this extra part straight from his heart. "Heavenly Father, my dad is coming tomorrow, and that is awesome."
   

What Kind of World Is This? Part 1

A woman I know was in See's candy shop two days ago. Lots of people were there at the time, so there was a wait. Behind her, a mother and her son, about 7, and her daughter, about 5, were talking about what kind of lollipop to get. Both children decided on root beer. The mother held a 1/2-pound prepacked box of chocolates.

The woman said, "Go ahead of me; you already know what you want."
"Oh, no," said the mom, "thanks, but it's fine."

Just then the boy went over to the glassed-in cases of candy, came back, and said, "I changed my mind. I want a key lime truffle."

"Good choice," said the woman. Then followed a short explication to the boy by the woman and the mother about key limes: where they come from--hence their name--how small they are, how many are needed to make something from the juice, and so on.

The little boy went back and saw the bon bons and thought he might like one of those but then said, "No, I'm going the stick with what I said."

"The root beer lollipop?" asked the woman.
"No, the key lime truffle."

Then it was the woman's turn. She selected a few pieces, paid, and pulled out a $10 bill, slid it surreptitiously to the cashier and said, "See that?"
"Yes," she said.
"Put in on . . . " and she tipped her head in the direction of the young family. Then she left.

Today, two days after the candy incident, the woman I know took herself to sushi lunch.

Side bar: Don't get the idea this woman goes out to lunch and for candy every day of the week. She doesn't. Not even one time every week. But this day she had suffered through a mammogram and decided sushi was in order.

She ate her sushi lunch--a bento box, actually--and was still eating when the waitress brought the bill. When she had finished her sushi, she took out her credit card and went up to pay.

The waitress handed back the card and waved the woman off. "No," she said. "Your lunch is paid for."
"What?"
"Yes. The couple who just left bought your lunch."
"They did?"
"Yes, they're regulars of mine."
"Well," said the woman, quite stunned, "how wonderful. Thank you."

So now what do you make of that?

Something to think about

My friend's mother died early last Wednesday morning. Down in Ogden, Utah. My friend was there several days, had a good visit with her mother, told her she loved her, and came home Tuesday night to receive the next day's early morning call.

The visit was a good one, a time--for just the two of them--before her mother left this earth, a time she will always be glad for.

And while I call her my friend, which she is, I learned of this through another friend, one a bit closer. So this report came to me only today. I'm feeling sad for my friend, of course. But just now I'm thinking of something my friend said about this last visit with her mother.

"I was never her favorite, but I was the one who was there to tell her how much I loved her."

And I'm sure she felt that she spoke for others in the family, about the love.

But it's the other part I've been thinking about. "Not my mother's favorite." I tried to say that about myself--I was never my mother's favorite--but I couldn't say it. I wondered if I could say I was my mother's favorite. Or was it Janeen or Lucile or Sterling or Bill?

But here's the thing. I absolutely do not know. Which means, at least to me, that my mother didn't pick one of us as a favorite.

So here is what I believe. We were all her favorites, her real favorites, every last one of us five children. We were her favorite people on earth.

I'm sure of it.

To Each Her Own

Just back from visiting my friend Neide in the hospital--back surgery.

She told me about her student this semester, a woman in her 30s, wanting, says Neide, to be in her 20s like most of the class.

Cute, long curly hair, as in kinky curly, petite, but apparently lacking somewhere--like the good sense area. On the day of an important presentation to the class--and Neide said twice it was an important presentation--she came wearing what Neide called funky jeans, not particularly good looking, just funky and kind of dirty, and an ultra tight t-shirt with these words across the front: I'm a Hot Chick.

Made me laugh.

Also made me think of my t-shirt. Not ultra tight but I wouldn't wear it to an important presentation, if I ever were to make such a one.

My shirt is a tasteful black with these words in bright blue/green: Geezer Bait.

Yes, I have worn it in public. Three times. Well, maybe only twice. But I like it.

About My Dad - It's Father's Day, After All

Born October 30, 1891 in Manti, Sanpete County, Utah, to William Jedediah and Margaret Kirk Brimley. That's my dad.

Wilford Charles Brimley. It's a good name, I think. I remember no shortening of his name. My mother always called him Wilford. I can hear her now calling to him.

At his tallest, he was 5'6" and that's not tall. I never knew him slender, never knew him with a full head of hair, although I'm sure he had one at some time.

My dad was a no nonsense kind of man, a get down to it and get it done man, a hard worker--or so I believe. Not that I would have noticed such qualities when I was a child. Except, I think I noticed the no nonsense part. Maybe I was too much about nonsense.

We were not close. My Aunt Allie says he was hard to get to know, hard to get close to. And yet my two sisters--one the oldest in the family, the other the baby--say they were close to him.

Both were Daddy's girls. I was not.

Here's my poem on the subject.

Daddy's Girl

In that window-walled

square room of yours

you play a fast clack clack song

on the L. C. Smith black keys.

Seated you are my height--

I can see the window's shine

on your head, my voice can speak

straight into your ear.

You do not look up

or stop your fingers

while I tell my wishes.

I think you must hear me.

In the flowered chair,

you hold my sister on your lap

as rain slaps the street outside

and runs down our long hill.

The lamp throws a yellow light

around you, yellows your head,

your teeth, your tongue as you laugh,

saying funny names, made up words

whose meaning I guess at.

You touch her hair, her face,

call her china doll.

It's an old poem. But I have written more charitably about him since and confessed an affection for him, an appreciation for him.

Does that mean I love him? I think so.

I know my mother did.