Happy Hookers

Those of us who remember 1975, however vaguely, are familiar with the book and movie title "The Happy Hooker."  That's how my mother-in-law, Barb Woolman, jokingly refers to her Thursday afternoon rug-hooking group.  This is a picture of the happiest hooker I know with her granddaughter.


Today is May 27th and our family usually finds a happy way to celebrate my son's birthday.  Ben is no longer planet-side to be able to celebrate with us -- but we celebrate his birth anyway.  This year, because of job changes and just life in general, the day was almost left to a Hallmark greeting card version of "Yay, you were born." 

The message light on my phone was beeping yesterday and it was Barb inviting us to go with her to North Bay on Sunday to go to the OHCG (Ontario Hooking Craft Guild) 46th Annual Conference at Nippissing University.  I have the great fortune of having a mother-in-law who is also my friend.  I didn't say a word about how relieved I was not to be alone with the Hallmark greeting card version of this day.

The first scene we were greeted by was a four-panel mural of what life is like in Northern Ontario. 

The story I heard was that a community of hookers got together and asked everyone to contribute something to the panel about the seasons of what it is like in our part of the world.  One little girl reminded them that the scenes were missing a vital part -- and the mermaid was added to the second panel per her request.  To understand how much detail and work was done to create the mural, below is Carol showing us how to hook.



There are several supplies needed in order to create this kind of art.  Although I was assured that anyone can do it, I felt like Alice in Wonderland waiting for the next clue.  Even the handles of the hooks were unique.

These are palm hooks and Carol is holding a pencil hook.  I tried the palm hooks (left-handed) but it looks like I'm a pencil-pusher in the hooking world, too.  Maybe.

The colors... oh! the colors... wool seems to be the fabric of choice because it dyes well and in so many different shades.

This woman explained to us that the wool here is not tie-dyed, but it is put into a pot to boil on the stove with one dye and then other colors are ladled with a spoon onto the same cloth.  One of these strips cost $4.00 and it was also explained that part of the expense of the material is the effort it takes to get the colors. 

Our model, Sarah is showing the other kind of fabric that is dunked three and four times into dye so that the color bleeds down from one shade to another.

There are other kinds of fabrics used to hook.  These are skeins of saris. 

I found the brightest color of purple I've seen yet today...and the happiness I felt when I picked it up was palpably purple.  I promise you when the budget constraints ease up, I'm going to find that material again and use it.

I'm going to end this blog with a series of pictures of May 27th, 2012.  The words to describe what I found today were on a person's description of why they hook.  "How do you live a creative life?  Release the child within and lose the fear of being wrong."



Happy Birthday, Ben.  We love you.

Do You Hear What I Hear?

“Father God, may the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight.”

Look at these two pictures and I’ll tell you a story.

The first picture was one of the thirty-one trees in the home of Terry and Sandy Deforge-MacKean in Lively, Ontario.  If you click on their names, you’ll see childhood and love in motion.

And yes -- that IS a pride tree.

The second picture was from the house next to the one that had the second party I attended tonight -- and that was Mike and Kim's in Copper Cliff, Ontario.

At Mike and Kim’s house – we ate good food, sang hymns and carols, discussed repentance, deliverance and speaking in tongues at the grocery store.  We laughed, we cried… we were fed physically and spiritually and all of it – all of it – in, under, over and around the name of Jesus Christ.

Why is it, do you suppose that both of these pictures, both of these “signs” cannot co-exist in the same house of worship?  Let me correct that, because there are congregations now where they do exist in the same house of worship.  Why can’t they co-exist in all houses of worship? 

I’m having great difficulty returning to the church; I really am.  It’s either that my foot has grown too big for the shoe, or the shoe has grown too small for my foot.  I miss hymns.  I miss the fellowship of song and praise.  And yes – I admit it in my steely little heart – I miss Jesus.  That being said, every single time I darken the door of a church lately, I feel like I don’t belong there anymore. Why?  For several reasons, actually… the first one being that I do not believe and can’t believe that Jesus is the only way to God.  I cannot believe that God would have a selected list of people who have prayed the sinner’s prayer in a pique point of emotionalism (and then lived the rest of their lives tripping over their brethren in the street) trump an atheist ladling out mashed potatoes in a soup kitchen.  That makes no logical sense whatsoever.  I cannot believe in a God that does not celebrate the love of two married men or women who have the world of children and wonder lit up throughout their home – as much as He would the celebrate the live Nativity Scene at Science North.  Now there’s a dichotomy.

I want to be a minister in a church where everyone is welcome.  I want to be a chaplain of a faith that excludes no one.  Please God, show me that church and I will fall at the altar weeping tears of joy and I will serve You until I cease to draw breath (and for however many lifetimes after that).  Well, actually, I’ll serve You regardless – payback, you know… but it sure would be nice to have someplace where my belief system actually fit in with, oh… I don’t know… 10 other people.  I want just a dash of reincarnation, a sprinkling of the love of trees and nature.  Perhaps a dollop of do no harm – that would be nice.  I want people to be married in the church because of how they commit their lives and love to the people they love.  I want a place where we can lift our voices in song and praise to a God that loves us back.  And if the Old Testament really was You at some point in history, I really like the theology that You knocked up a virgin, had a kid and got a grip on your anger issues.  Everyone – every – one… is redeemable.  I mean, You saved me.

My prayer this Christmas, Sir… is that these two pictures – with 10,000 more to follow in varying light and color displays of the EXACT SAME STORY – could become one. 

Amen.

(Sing it Bing... click to here to hear the musical conclusion to your Sunday morning SueAnnie sermon.)

Character Recipe - Frank or David?

Okay, here it is.  I do not know anything about how to develop a character because I've never written fiction.  I do know how to explain the character of a living human being I've encountered.  It starts with the fact that my reader doesn't know them at all.  With that in mind, how will I create a character that doesn't exist except in my imagination?  How will I keep him consistent and believable?

This has been playing on my mind for the last three days and I happened upon a blog hop on a new page I liked recently called "Fellow Writers" on Facebook.  (Thank you Jessica L. Degarmo for leading me there.)  I am excited because I have made a few friends on Authonomy, feebly attempted to edit my own book, and have had venereal writer's block, also known as the Clunk, since September of 2010.

Frank or David is the question.  The main character in my first attempt at fiction needs a name.  I figure if I name him first then I can create a visual in my mind.  People-watching is great recreation.  Frank has the name because he would be a play on honesty. 

I know a Frank from my childhood memories.  He was my father's assistant in the pharmacy and he was a hippie that drove a VW bug.  This character is a carny.  He's the mechanic in charge of taking care of a metaphysical carousel.  So, I live on the main street of my city and we affectionately call it "the drunk walk."  There are plenty of Franks out there wandering home.

David?  David is a poet (yes, the same Psalmist or a variation on theme).  Problem is that David, to me, is a blond-haired, blue-eyed sweet boy.  I don't know why but that's what I see in my mind.  I have an inkling of where I want my main character to go because I thought about the story before I went for any characters.

Hell, I never was any good at recipes (much less following directions)...let me try this another way.

1 cup of Steampunk (nuts and bolts included)
1/2 tsp. of curiosity bordering on fascination
2 heaping tbsps. of cynicism and hard living
Dash of hope
Blend well with biker charm school and served without Chianti (he's sober)

I have a feeling the newbie is in for a whole lot of learning and I'm excited to give this blog hop a try.  Hope I did okay.

Change

I think the junior high assignment used to be, “What Did I Do This Summer” or “Where Did I Go This Summer.” Some such, that opened up the gates for the new school of learning to begin.

At the end of May, my husband departed for a two month military training course in Gagetown, New Brunswick. All of my married life – for both marriages – I fought against any type of lengthy separation largely because I was raised by a single parent and spent a lot of my time wishing I wasn’t alone. I hated being alone. When I was alone bad things happened either with my mother or simply by myself. In my layers of memory that fear still lived and breathed. Added to that was what kind of parent would I be to Sarah without the balancing force of Christopher when my anger reared its ugly head.

So I prayed. I walked and I prayed... had long conversations with God about why I was afraid. Most of them were completely unspoken in my head or out of it, but I think that He knew what I was saying in the deepest parts of me that have no language. Please, don’t let me be like my mother. Please don’t let me be like myself, let me be better.

I was better. It wasn’t that I didn’t get angry, I did. Sarah is at the tender age of “me, myself and I.” We all visited that age and some days I still live there. It makes for great memoir writing. Hunter, our dog, managed to catch several glimpses of the anger that lives inside of SueAnn – especially when he chewed up the second pair of flip flops. He sat, ears lowered under the kitchen table avoiding the sweep of my broom. “In the box!” I yelled. The box being his safe spot, his kennel.

To my credit, Hunter spent a lot of time being a beagle. He gets a scent and drags me around the block, down the hill, up the hill – at one point turning my 200 pound frame halfway around with my feet struggling to catch up with my body as he lunged at yet another bicycle rider, growling with his hackles raised. He really does not like many people and finds that he has to be territorial right up until the time that Apollo, the pit bull and something much larger mix chases Hunter up the hill, down the hill and around the track again. Nearly every morning we were greeted by Buddy, the white schnauzer/poodle mix. Buddy’s mom and Hunter’s mom would have them sit to get rid of the leash and they would advance, stop... stare... advance, stop, stare...until one of them (usually Buddy) took off galloping at breakneck speed toward the other one meeting one another in a jump, a circle... a run. You know, I don’t know Buddy’s mom’s name. I just know her as the nice woman who waited for me from 5:30-ish until I got there at 6 and we would walk a couple of laps with the dogs and I would need to go back to get Sarah out of the shower. I had all these grandiose plans about contemplative walking meditation and prayer. Those were supplanted by two dogs and two moms meeting one another in joy. The last day before we went on our vacation, there was a woman sleeping in the park. She was huddled under her sleeping bag and three dogs, off leash, greeted her with curious growls and yips. It seems there are more and more homeless people in our neighbourhood and it worries me for Sarah – and it worries me for them. She looked up at me and declared, “I am not homeless, I am having a hard time.” I said, “Well, I was homeless and it wasn’t safe for me. Get off these streets as soon as you can. For men, it’s one thing – for women, quite another.”

The days ticked on by and Christopher and I texted each other on our cell phones sometimes six or eight times in a day. I don’t think one day went by that we didn’t talk at some point on the phone and life just continued. There were bills to be paid, dishes to be done, laundry on Wednesdays. I entertained myself with lunches out with my cousin-in-law, Bill and my mum-in-law, Barb. My friend Gaetan would meet me with her dog, Gizmo (a Yorkie) and we would walk together and talk. Gaetan belongs, very much, to the grouping of Margo, Dani, Kay, Yancie, Krista, to the human beings I have chosen to call my family. I think I might have found a friend up here, maybe. I am reluctant – at best – to form face to face human friendships because I am solitary and lazy when it comes to relationships. But I found that this does not make for a healthy SueAnn when my best friend is in New Brunswick; it is something that needs work. I depend upon my husband far too much to be everything for me and need to grow past that.
And so I did.

Our vacation is another blog, it was magical and this is our last full day of fun in the sun... Wendy is coming after lunch and we’re going to talk about the history of Stone Cottage and her family. She’s an artist, a painter and a potter. We both have kids in their 20’s and are constantly amazed by the twists and turns of that age. It’s time to stop writing and go outside. Sarah’s already gotten smacked in the mouth by the ball, been in to the plastic baggie full of ice and her father’s lap. Then there is the beach to explore...

Alone

Chris is away for seven weeks in New Brunswick. For the last eleven years, twelve in June, he is has been my constant companion. Constant through even fistfuls of fear pushing at him, constant through sludging through the past looking for seashells, constant through job loss, money woes, all of those things that make marriage a truly grand place to be. Before he left he asked me why I push him away when I am afraid. I'm working on that answer.

You know, I think frequently about the absolute silence I receive when I write and I wonder if my words are too self-pitying, or angry... or how is it that they make others so very silent. I've always wanted to be popular, hence the whole sit on Oprah's couch goal; but I remain awkward. I am alone in a room full of people. I am alone with people reaching out to shake my hand. I am alone in my writing, I can only hear my own thoughts. I'm quite certain the only fiction I'll ever write is self-delusion.

Why is that ok? For my entire existence I've sought the approval of other human beings. I can't even say that I think we all do, because I don't know that. I only know me. I think I've been afraid -- stark terror afraid -- of being alone because I am alone with me.

The veil of depression is that I never know when the veil is on and when it is off. I can sense frustration, anger, all of the symptoms of the disease of doubt. Is it really depression or is it that my husband is away for six more weeks and I don't know how to be alone?

I have a new friend. She has been extending her hand and I'm afraid to take it. I pass her by in the car and wave. I motion that I'm in a hurry. I can't go to meet tonight, Sarah needs me. I can't meet tonight I have to grocery shop. Gotta run -- I'm late, I'm late for a very important -- you finish the rest. I've justified in my mind that I am on retreat. The dog walks in front of me and runs circles around my legs; all I can hear is the sound of the sand crunching on the track and the prayers I am saying out loud.

"...release me from the bondage of self so that I might better know thy will..."

Made a Decision

I'm up at 1:59 a.m. and I have the kid upstairs to thank for it. I never realized that not getting my sleep was so disturbing to me -- until I wasn't getting it. Funny how perceptions change, isn't it? At 19 years old or 20... being up at 2:00 in the morning meant a really good party was going on. At 23 years old, it meant that Ben wanted his bottle and at 25 years old it meant that Katie wanted hers. I slept pretty well through until age 35 when Sarah came along and then I promptly turned her and her bottle over to her father. At 44 I walked into my employer's office rubbing my eyes going, "what the hell is this?" Turns out a lot of women in their mid-40's aren't sleeping, don't sleep...and they don't die from it either. Who knew?

So, at 45 -- I've made a decision. I'm going to use these sleepless hours to write. Warning: I might write things that make absolutely no sense to anyone but me. Well, hell, isn't that what blogs are for?

I've been reading this book by Iyanla Vanzant called "Peace from Broken Pieces" and when I wrote The Truth About Whales I really thought that my experience would help someone, anyone. When I didn't get the responses that I thought I should, I wondered what the purpose was in the writing, at all. Self-promotion was exhausting and unfulfilling, at best. Finally, I resigned myself to the fact that I wrote the book for the one person who needed it the most -- me. This is what I am understanding from Ms. Vanzant's experience. All of the "victimhood" in my life to date has been voluntary and oh my God, if you only knew how shocked I am to have written those words.

In my spiritual journey for this lifetime I have chosen the victim role many times in my living. Sometimes I didn't have much in the way of choice -- until I was 10 or 20 years down the path still reliving what happened. That was my choice.

The greatest, kindest, most difficult and heartbreaking thing my son taught me was that I have no control whatsoever about what happens to another human being. I can be a part of their path, their living, their time here -- but it isn't my business to fix them. That belongs to them -- and in my belief, to God.

No one could have helped me if I hadn't sought it. Even in a stupor I was seeking. Twelve step recovery programs talk a lot about sobriety being a gift. I think that the grace I was given to be breathing up until the minute I found AA was the gift. What happened from 1986 until March 22, 2011 has been about choice. Today, this is what I have learned.

My husband just arrived and told me to go to bed. :)

The Walk

I have the stomach flu and I am irritable and grumpier than usual. I stayed home from work yesterday and slept all day long – it was wonderful and I needed it. This morning I got up, got my clothes out for work, opened the refrigerator door and just about heaved. Picked up the phone and called in sick again.

For those of you who don’t live in Canada, we have walk-in clinics that you can go to if you aren’t feeling well. They’re very convenient, but sometimes you might sit for two hours or more to be able to see the doctor. I just wanted to know if what I had wasn’t an ulcer. So I brought my book and picked up #89, waiting to be called like I was there for take-out.

People watching is my hobby because I believe that there are countless stories in conversations, in the way people sit, in how their bodies move. I watch them all the time and stories swirl in my brain. It’s great entertainment if you don’t have the stomach flu.

I should physically describe myself. I’m 5’1” and I weigh about 220 pounds. On top of that, my hair is spiked, I’ve got black circles under my eyes and when my face has no expression at all, I look surly. People often think I’m angry when I’m not even mildly peeved. It’s kind of embarrassing really because, inside, I’m a ball of emotion and I cry at the drop of a hat...or at least a good GE commercial, anyway.

Sitting in the chair as far away from the door as possible, away from any infants, with my back to the wall – I settled in with my book and was all snugly inside my blanket-coat. Before Christmas, my husband took me coat shopping at the French River Trading Post and I finally got the rainbow-colored sweater coat that I had eyeballed for two years. It’s particularly warm and cozy; and it is so thick that the coat requires its own seat at the movies. Reading, I heard this little boy. He was babbling and singing; fidgeting in his chair and generally being all of 3 or maybe 4 years old. I looked up from my book and smiled in his direction, letting everyone around me know that the surly woman in the gay pride coat was thinking that the little monster was cute. Smile!

Creeping silently back into my book, I tried to concentrate on a paragraph and I heard his mother say, “Stop being so bad! Stop talking to me like that!” He was standing in front of her and she had her hand around his wrist. The younger woman she had with her was trying to circumvent whatever was happening and pulled the boy away to put him on her lap. Then she placed him back on the chair and they played rock, paper, scissors until both of them lost interest. I went back to my book.

“STOP playing with those blinds! I told you to behave...” the mother leaned over him and was face to face, scowling. She didn’t even have the temerity to whisper. Personally, I always used to say to my kids – in a whisper – “If you haven’t realized it yet – you keep behaving that way and sooner or later we’re going to be alone.” Generally, that got their attention right away. The next question in your mind, did I make good on my threat? Stupidly, the answer is yes. More than I would ever care to admit, I promise you.

Ok, so now I’m talking to myself in my head and I’m saying, “SueAnn, this is none of your business. Yes, she grabbed his wrist, yes she twisted it. Yes, she got right in his face...” and I could feel my heart thumping in my chest. It was the old fight or flight feeling of “I have to say something. I have to protect him. I have to stand up and deck her properly.” So I continued talking in very stern tones to myself, “You are a grown up. If you deck her it’s called assault. This is socially unacceptable behaviour. And besides, you are that brash American Yank living in Canada where the people are polite and don’t go up and deck bad mommies.” Back to the book... my stomach was doing belly flops in stress acid.

I could feel it. I could feel the little girl in me going, “Be good. Be good and she’ll be nice to you.” Well, yeah, that’s me, and it happened a long, long time ago. And I wrote a book and outted my bad mommy. That isn’t this woman, it’s not today. It’s a memory.

“If you don’t stop what you are doing, I’m going to take you for a walk.” She’s got him by the wrist again and he’s kicking his snow boots at her, not a full out tantrum but he’s scared and not willing to back down. Other people are coughing politely into their hands and looking away. I get up half out of my chair and then sit back down. I’m too angry to do what I want to do. So I sit and watch. I’ve put my book down and I’m looking right at her. I won’t break my stare. I smile. She has no idea what is smiling at her.

Finally, after what seems to be hours, they are called into the office and he walks past me. I want to grab him and say, “Listen – you talk about those walks, ok? You tell everybody within earshot about what happens on those walks. Ok?” And I don’t. I duck my head into my book and lament that I had my chance to say something and it has passed. Admittedly, I feel relief.

The woman, her friend, and that little boy walk out the door. I go into see the doctor and they’re gone from the lobby when I get out. So I’m walking toward the doors between the clinic and the pharmacy and here comes that mother – and she’s alone. I’ve got her now.

“Excuse me? Ma’am? “ My Texas is coming out. “Excuse me?” She turns to look at me and stops, even though she’s in a hurry. She’s young. Her eyes are light green... almost sea green. She has braces. “Erm... well, I couldn’t help but hear what was going on in there and I want you to know that you have a smart little boy. He knows how to push your buttons.” She smiled, “Yes, he’s a handful, he really does.” “Well, ma’am... boys like that will push every button you have if you let them know what they are...and he’s a smart little boy.” She nodded, still smiling, and my heart was calming. I smiled at her again. “But ma’am, one more thing, I have a suggestion. The next time he acts up like that – YOU take the walk by yourself, ok? He doesn’t need any more walks.” She stopped smiling and got the message.

You just never know who is listening in the clinic. You might just end up on YouTube... or at the end of the arm of a 220 pound woman who is walking down memory lane.

Parachute

I keep trying to write this book about being happy. It’s only fair, right? You write a book about the darkest times of your living – and subject people to those night terrors; so, now, you need to show them the light in your living. The fact is that I’m not there right now. I’m in a place that I’ve revisited so many times in my living that I’ve lost count. I’ve removed my finger from the page in my heart and stuck it in my ear to futilely block the raging, internal dialogue.

One of the things that carried me in my life is my ability to keep track. When the controller of my company (note that word, controller) asks me where he put the piece of paper that justifies this purchase or that “clawback” – I walk into my office, know exactly where to lay my hand. It’s simple. If you always do things the exact same way, if you label the folder, if you staple the pieces together, it’s always easy to find. Then, I get my pat on the head or the back, my reward.

Why can’t I do that with my life? Why can’t I put away the pieces that hurt me? By this time, I should be able to take the story and neatly file it away, compartmentalizing it so that the tendrils of shame or self pity don’t wrap themselves around my arms and pull me headfirst into the filing cabinet, abruptly slamming in regret. I continue to offer my open arms to the past, to the things over which I had no control.

The song, “Parachute” has been non-stop repeat in my brain for the last month. I admit that it is “The Wind Beneath My Wings” kind of pop pabulum with a good, universal message.

“And when the world gets sharp and tries to cut you down to size
And makes you feel like giving in,
Oh, I will stay, I will reign, I will wash the words and pain away
And I will chase the way we push, the way we pull
You’re beautiful.”1

My mind gyrates at 3:34 in the morning and I move from side to side trying to find comfort. Why did this person at work choose to send that piece of paper out into the void without asking my permission? Do I have the right to give them permission? I have the knowledge, I have the responsibility, I have the title – but not the respect. So I get in there and demand my respect because if no one in the entire universe is going to stand up for SueAnn, damn it… I will.

Wow. Now there’s a control freak on the loose if I ever heard one. Save yourself from the hurricane of “Cover My Ass” paranoia, find shelter! The truth of the matter is that the employee never thought about what kind of terrorizing effect this would have on my ego. Never took a split second before putting that piece of paper out to whoever it was and hit the “send” button on the fax. Much the same way that I didn’t have an inkling of what I was doing when I originated the same sin a couple months back in the reverse direction; the machine was in movement, get out of my way, I’m busy.

Friday morning I was in the bathtub and I had the entire day off. I was reading the last bits of a book, a cherished book, telling me to take care of myself. Not – “Hey, SueAnn, go out and seek a massage, a spa, a retreat in the Caribbean.” It was saying, “Be your own advocate.” Well, what’s the difference between an advocate and a bully? Perception. Again, and for the billionth time in my learning, it’s all about perception.

The people who have been reading The Truth About Whales get quiet. They don’t know what to say. I’m standing in front of them, as a child, a teenager and an adult with a ten foot sign that says, “I was harmed.” How long do I have to carry that sign? It’s an old sign. It’s been used a lot. And now, it’s out in print in a whirlwind of no control. The reviews I find most frightening are the ones that nail me as a survivor, as someone championing a cause. Yet, that’s the same printing on my sign, isn’t it?

Is the insanity ego? Tell me it isn’t ego because, well, that’s just embarrassing, common, and disgustingly normal. In the school of the human condition, I want to be an “A” student. I want my academy award. I want to say, in my best and most girlish voice ever, “You like me. You really, really like me.”

Secretly, the truth is that I’m sick of my sign. I’m exhausted from the worry and the anger of carrying it. I want, desperately, to take care of SueAnn and have not a clue on the face of the earth exactly how to do that. Re-runs of Glee and Hershey’s Kisses do not keep the stories at bay.

In that same book, the author says that we have to champion our thoughts. If we have no control over the things that enter our minds, or that happened to us as children; then we do have to find a way to think responsibly. Meditation might help. Taking a breath before the rant, or at least twenty-four hours before hitting “send,” might help. For me, putting down the sign and stepping quietly away from the past is a good start.




~~~~~~~~
Please... by all means, go listen and buy that pop pabulum song, Parachute... it's just wonderful.

1 - Monahan, Pat and Gregg Wattenberg. “Parachute” Lyrics. Save Me, San Francisco. Columbia 2009.

The Heart of the Matter

Mr. Henley has it right and I'm fairly certain that it took him a couple of decades to learn all of the wisdom that is contained in these verses.

"There are people in your life who've come and gone,
They let you down, you know they've hurt your pride
You better put it all behind you baby, cause life goes on
If you keep carrying that anger, it'll eat you upside,
I've been trying to get down
To the heart of the matter
But my will gets weak
And my thoughts seem to scatter
But I think it's about forgiveness,
Forgiveness,
Even if, even if you don't love me anymore..."

Not everyone that I know and love is going to understand what I am trying to accomplish with The Truth About Whales. They will take from their own life experience and interpret or perceive their truth in my words. There is a ton of anger in that book because that was primarily the emotion I felt when I was writing -- that and regret. I was plowing my way through twenty plus years of wreckage of the past and explaining to myself why I did the things that I did. Not what they did, what I did. Not how they felt -- how I felt. So the book was selfishly, totally and unapologetically about SueAnn. It felt like taking the ragrug in my soul outside and whacking it so loudly I woke the neighbors. When I was finished, I knew there was something put to rest inside of me and I could live with the consequences of my book.

My father did not hear the amends within the book because, contrary to what I had been told, he hadn't read it. "I choose not to live in the past" was what he said on the phone and, you know, I applaud him that. He is not the same man I knew at five and six years old so much as I am not the same child he knew, I am an adult. What I was trying to tell him so ardently was that I made nearly every single mistake that I knew of -- that he had made -- and I understood. Blame has a very difficult time withstanding self discovery. For all of us, I think that is what age achieves. We finally know what it is to stand in someone else's shoes and go, "Oh, that's why."

Last night a friend emailed me and said, "I didn't like the book on many levels" and my ego immediately went, "But...but...but..." Today I'm waiting to find out exactly what it was she found objectionable (gee, there are SO many things that are downright narcissistic and rude about my book -- which one to pick). A couple of people who have known me for years and years said, "You were too hard on yourself about x, y and z." Well -- I was hard on the majority of the people who played any part of my life - still am. I always have questioned - and judged -- and will question some more, it is who I am as a human being.

What keeps going through my head and my heart is, "It's about forgiveness." Well, hell...that's the sequel, isn't it -- after all.

Collecting the Shells

Happy Mother's Day to all of the women who raised me. The short list includes: Dolly, Shirley, Margo, Leslie, Charlotte, Danielle, Jonna, Sarah, Kate, Mary, Barb, Bev, Elaine and Lorraine.

I woke up this morning at 4:00 and realized that I had to write. My muse is an early riser and she does her best between 3 and 4, so I knew exactly who it was. "Aw com'n..." I mumbled and attempted to nestle back into our newly foam covered mattress. No such luck. Then my mind started to whirl with the pictures and the glimpses of what I should be up writing about. I saw Dolly's picture in my mind, the one of her as a child. I think that is my comforting frame of reference because children are blameless. Right behind that I thought to myself that I had been beating her over the head and shoulders for most of my life -- and that's when the tears came. Rather than cry all over the pillow and cause my husband to wake from yet another night of sound sleep to entertain my muse... this is what I wrote.

~~~

It took me twenty years to catalogue my anger, to tell the story, to have it in my hands as proof positive that I wasn’t imagining it all and I really did have the right to be upset. At the end of the book, I was much as where I began, with a death that I could not solve and my own life to appraise, find the faults and the forgiveness… and move on.

I met an author on a website slush pile, a place for people to present their writings and back one another’s quest to become published, finally. She claimed to be a medium and I gave her the socially-acceptable amount of doubt and lit my candle quietly, sitting there hoping that she might choose me. She did. Her message back to me was that my mother, the same mother that I had skewered publically to all of my family, friends and complete strangers passing by, forgave me. She forgave me for my anger. Lorraine told me that when I got stuck writing, I could ask my mother for help and she would give me the words.

If I could go back and pick up the pieces of the eggs lying scattered on the slate floor of my memory, my hands would not go unguided. There would be hands that were slightly darker than mine with their nails manicured and painted in 1970’s green glitter. She would wipe the makeup that was smeared on my face with her tears and spit and I would flinch away giggling, “Mommy – ewwww.” When I asked her to explain the marks to me she would tell me the whole story, holding nothing back, and admit to me that she was in more pain than my child’s mind could fathom. I could hold her pain, for just a second, because she wanted me to find the catalyst for forgiveness. Then, she would reach for me and help me to stand up again from the floor where I laid waiting for the slap that never came.

For twenty years I waited and when the opportunity came to deny me the right to tell my story – she chose instead to guide my hands, picking up the pieces together.