Stacked Up

When I was a little girl, one of my favorite games was playing office.  Our first home had a half-second story, one big room tucked under the attic, with a sloping ceiling and one small window that overlooked the sidewalk.  There was a wooden desk tucked into that alcove, with an old-fashioned manual typewriter and a vintage adding machine, the kind you operated with a pull down handle.  At the age of 3 and 4, you'd find me up there happily pounding away on that old Remington, writing all kinds of "important" letters, and adding long columns of numbers. When I was a bit older, we moved to another home, but my home office went with me.  My dad had a big desk in the basement, with lots of drawers - he didn't use it much, but I surely did.  My typewriter (by now I'd graduated to a Smith Corona electric) was seated smack in the middle, and I used one of my dad's cast off electric adding machines (I can still hear that funny little whirr it made when you pressed the "=" sign.) 

Yes indeed, I  loved playing office in those days.  Sometimes I pretended to be a lawyer, other times a magazine editor.  But whatever make believe career I embarked upon, they all required lots of paperwork, because I loved paper.  My fervent wish in those days was to spend my life playing with words on paper.

Well, as they say, be careful what you wish for.

Fast forward several decades to 2009, and I find myself sitting a desk every day, my computer with a large flat screen monitor front and center, calculator at hand, and absolutely surrounded by paper.  Stacks upon stacks of paper.

Not only does my daily job require tons of repetitious and seemingly redundant paperwork, the events of the past three months have found me drowning in a good deal of personal paperwork as well - namely, all the paperflow involved in settling my aunt and uncle's estate.

How does one cope when one's dream comes true and then turns into a nightmare?

I'm looking for ways to crawl out from under this mountain of papers...any ideas?

One More Goodbye

At least no one has died this time. This goodbye is a somewhat happier occasion, as tomorrow marks the retirement of our senior pastor, a man who led our flock of Presbyterians for the last 20 years, taking the church at a time when it was near death's door and breathing new life into it, growing it to over three times its size in people and program.

We're happy for him, because, as he said at his gala retirement banquet on Thursday, he is definitely "going out on top."  He's healthy, relatively young, he's left a good, strong mark in the work he's done.  His congregation fervently hates to see him go.   It's really the perfect time to ride off into the sunset, in the style of the Western sagas he loves so much.

But still.

Another goodbye?  Really?

On my way into banquet hall Thursday night, we happened to meet up in the parking lot.  "Hey, sweetie!" he said, giving me a hug.  "It's good to see you! How're you holding up?"

"I'm hanging in there," I told him, hugging back.  "You know, I feel badly that I haven't been in church very much, that I've missed your last few sermons."

"Hey," he said, with his trademark crooked grin.  "I know you've had your fill of goodbyes lately."

And that's just one of the reasons we all love this man.  He gets people.  Understands the human condition, in all it's glory and gloom.  Knows that, though he'd prefer to retire quietly with no fuss and fanfare, the congregation needs to fete and honor him six ways from Sunday.  So he graciously sits through long pot luck dinners and fancy banquets, he smiles at the jokes and tears up appropriately (and genuinely) at the tributes.  He's a good sport when the choir plops a cowboy hat on his head and sings "Happy Trails to You."   Because he understands that it's part of the process we need to go through in order to let him go.

One of the speakers at the banquet referred to him as a man "perfectly suited to the ministry."  It's a wonder, isn't it, when people can do what they are "perfectly suited" to doing?  And it doesn't happen often in this life.  I thought about that a lot on Friday, as I sat at my computer at work, typing faxes and organizing files, trying to read the chicken scratch of a doctor's handwriting on this latest medical record review.   It's not work to which I'm perfectly suited by any means...although I do it well enough, when I look at it in light of the accomplishments of a man like our minister, it pales to nothingness in comparison.

Of course, nowadays one has to be grateful for having gainful employment at all, no matter how "suited" you are to the occupation.  And I'm lucky ~ I pretty much know what I'm perfectly suited to doing, and I still get to do on occasion.

But it would be a fine thing indeed to have spent one's entire career in pursuit of something that fed the soul as well as the stomach, that put fire in the spirit as well as in the furnace.  I can say with certainty that Reverend Rick Peters has done that during his 45 years in the ministry.  And I wish him Godspeed in the years ahead.

Although I really hate saying Goodbye.

Fallish

I'm disappointed in Michigan this fall.  We've had nothing but dismal, bone chilling days for the entire month of October,going directly from Capri pants and t-shirts to winter jackets and gloves, with nary a stop in-between for fuzzy sweaters.  There's a leaden, gunmetal grey pall over the entire state, and not even the vibrant colors on our maples, elms, and oaks can dissipate it. In some ways, it's fitting...I was almost dreading the splendor that adorns this state in the waning days of its season.  Autumn has a glorious bittersweetness to it, one I usually revel in, but one that can sometimes be almost too emotional to bear.  This fall, with all the losses still so fresh in my heart, I was almost afraid of all that fierce beauty, flaunting itself at death.

These trees are in my neighbor's yard, and greet me when I open the drapes first thing in the morning.  The photo is from last fall, for we've not seen any patches of sky that blue so far this month.

Ah well, there's still November.

Bell-issima

Several months ago, I promised my friends in Classical Bells that I would join them in the recording they were scheduled to make on October 19, out in a small recording studio in Ann Arbor.  A couple of times each year, they do  demo recordings for one of the larger publishers of handbell music.  This fall's batch of new tunes included a couple of  piano/bell combo pieces, so they asked if I'd do the piano parts. As is par for the course with Classical Bells, things always turn out to be more involved than you would expect.  Actually, that's just the nature of music in general.  So a gig that started out being just one easy piano piece, turned into one easy and one not so easy piano piece, plus "garbage bells" on first one, then two, then three bell pieces.  Then, Jim got involved on a piece where the bass bell ringers needed some extra muscle. 

But I'm not complaining.  Far from it, in fact.  Yesterday's rehearsal reminded me once again of the restorative power of music making.  Because I went in dragging my residual yoke of sadness, the one that seems perpetually tied to my shoulders, and came out with a definite spring in my step and a considerably lighter heart.  For the first time in a long time, I felt as if I were where I needed to be, doing what I was meant to do. 

And once again, I realized how important it is for everyone to have something they're passionate about.  For me, it's music.  For my friend Kim at work, it's running...and though I couldn't run  26 miles if my life depended on it, I understand her excitement about the marathon this weekend, the one she's been training for the past six months.  It's the same excitement I feel about preparing for a special concert, like the ones we did with the Detroit Symphony several years ago.  And it's the same sense of satisfaction and pride whether  you're crossing a finish line or listening to the last tones resounding in the air. 

Whether you're a musician, an artist, a writer, or an athlete, it's this passion, this sense of satisfaction, this feeling of all's right-ness, that helps us survive everything from the occasional boredom of everyday jobs to the searing pain of grief and loss. 

So I'm thankful for my moments of music, and thankful for the friends who invite me to share with them.

Bellisima.

Early Riser

Thump. The sound of Molly's four feet hitting the floor, jumping directly from the bed, her failure to use the miniature staircase placed beside it indicative of her emergency need for the backyard.

My eyes jolt open, and glance at the clock on the dresser.  4:11 a.m.

She trots urgently toward the back door, and I stumble along behind, my heart sinking as I feel my eyes opening wider and my mind begin to crank itself into gear.

There will likely be no more sleeping for me this morning.

Oh, I give it my best shot - attempting to woo myself back into sleep with hot chocolate Ovaltine and cinnamon toast.  I even heat up the microwaveable neck wrap, curling it around my neck as I crawl back into bed and prop myself up with lots of pillows.   I take up my book and read for an hour or so, finish another chapter at 5:23 and think I might just be able to close my eyes again, get another hour of sleep before the real wake up time arrives.   I turn out the light, curl up on my right side so that Magic can insert himself into his customary place beside me, and try to fall back asleep.

No dice.

Admitting defeat, I get up and make coffee.

I'm also admitting to some difficulty getting my life in gear this week.   Topping off the trauma of the past couple of weeks is the fact that I'm still getting sorted in my new work routine.   This business of leaving for the office every day at 9 am and not getting home until nearly 6 pm is new for me.  So while I'm in the process of grieving for my aunt, I'm also faced with grieving the loss of more than half my personal freedom.   

And I'm not liking it so much.

I miss having mornings to walk the dogs and go for coffee afterward.  I miss spending an hour or two writing after breakfast.  I miss practicing piano until lunchtime and then eating my sandwich at the kitchen table with a book for company.  I miss the afternoon shopping trips with my mom, and stopping at Panera on the way home for coffee and a danish, and feel guilty about spending less time with her as I know she's grieving these days too.

And it's silly perhaps, but I think about all the days now that I won't get to spend with Magic and Molly, and I jealously watch them grow more attached to Jim because he's the one here with them all day while I'm the absent figure who comes home exhausted and desultorily throws the ball a couple of times before collapsing on the couch to watch television.

I find myself thinking more and more of the broad spectrum, the long term picture, because I've learned this summer how fleeting the happier moments of life can be, how very fragile life itself really is.  I'm angry at circumstances which force me into this position, angry that when my boss pulls one of her little power trips on me I don't have the luxury of saying fuck-you-and-your-little-job-too.  I'm angry about thrusting myself back into life with all it's busy-ness before I"ve had a chance to properly come to terms with yet another loss, angry that the modern world expects us to simply pick up and carry on as if nothing ever happened. 

Ultimately, I'm just tired of feeling that life is out of my control, because you all  know  how much I need to be in control. 

All this and it's only 6:00 in the morning.

I have a feeling it will be a very long day.