“for tomorrow we’ll die”

by dailies

“Joy goes with happiness (sukha), but there are differences. When you are thirsty and a glass of water is being served to you, that is joy. When you are actually able to drink the water, that is happiness. It is possible to develop joy in your mind, even when your body is not well. This will, in turn, help your body. Joy comes from touching things that are refreshing and beautiful, within and outside ourselves. Usually we touch only what’s wrong. If we can expand our vision and also see what is right, this wider picture always brings joy.”

 

– The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy, and Liberation, by Thich Nhat Hanh

Tonight I’m sweating it out on the mat in an hour-and-a-half vinyasa flow class. Our instructor tells us the class is about Celebration. Which can feel kind of funny while challenging the body, and not necessarily looking graceful doing it. I’m ready to try to lift into Crow arm balance, and as I do I fall – almost on my face. Instead of irritation, the word, “celebration!” shines in front of me, and I laugh. I know if I almost fall on my face, I’m practicing correctly.

The sun has slapped itself out of the trees and grey skies. The air is warming; flowers are blooming. Each winter seems darker than the one before but, incredibly this winter is passing, too. I find a talisman for my daughter’s room – “to watch over you,” I tell her. “I’m honored you thought of me,” she returns, with feeling. She is my heart. One of the things I seek, and she doesn’t know it, is her smile. When she really really smiles – her grin is crooked slightly – it is revealed: the only childlike bit of her left, a babylike softness under her chin. She is a willow, a clear torrent laughing over savage stones. She is a tigress with scuffed tennis shoes and clean nails and a slender waist and wild hair she shakes out of her eyes.

Dark clouds threaten at my temples; worries. Anger about the past. These small storms come and go; I water the seeds of mindfulness instead. I abandon my work and hold my son, and his sweet-smelling head and hair of spun gold, and his warm little body. He too is growing and soon will be a young man. I’ll be left with thorn-pricks in my arms and without a single bit of understanding as to how I survived their childhoods.

blank sky

by dailies

My son is awake and he’s making soft chirping sounds. Singing to himself in the bed. He says, “Cuddle me,” and I lay down next to him. He says, “I need love. Your job is to give me love.” He’s safe and every day each day that is all that matters.

Ralph is making up coffee, hot coffee. We have good coffee no matter what, well most days. Grandfather: gone. Family: best not to talk too much about that. Thanksgiving: cancelled. But I have a home of my own and children and a partner and wee pets who count on us. Our rabbit greedily eats the beet-peelings from the night before. He knocks a parsnip top out my hand when I offer it to him!

My daughter is home from school. She’s dead-tired. She writes on her whiteboard outside her room:

KEEP OUT
unless you’re Kelly Hogaboom
Plan: take a nap / be miserable

Ralph is worried but I tell him this is a Good Thing, she has boundaries. And she knows what she needs.

I am off to do the Wednesday thing I do. People who don’t get to be with their families for Thanksgiving; who get to be lonely and in a dark place. Some of them have no hope. I can offer that if they can listen.

I am two years six months sober today and every day is a gift.

small stone #24
Nothing goes
like it’s expected to.

small stone #25
cold cold cold
the car is cold
Your hands are warm.

no joke, but I

by dailies

found out my grandfather, my last remaining grandparent, has cancer. Inoperable. He’s going to pass sooner rather than later and I won’t be able to be there. Traveling is not an option, expense-wise.

I am so tired from what-all else it’s hard to absorb. I do know I can be there for my mom. She’s going to need it.

I’ve had good support today and a lot of help.

Logging off for tonight.

small stone #19
Ice on the grass
Tiny crystals.
“It snowed!” You say upon awakening.
I explain the difference between snow and frost.
You dismiss me, saying:
“It’s the same. Because I can make a snowball with either.”

tying cherry knots, smiling, doing party favors

by dailies

Today at the orthodontist my son got perfect marks for his brushing and flossing. I am definitely in that “sky is falling” headspace because when the staff called me back to talk to me about his braces (they’re being removed here in a couple months) I had all these thoughts of some new horror to face, but instead it was all good news.

So you should know I’m going to straight-up bitch and complain for a few paragraphs. You may not want to watch. I’m serious. Just a lot of complaining. Yarp.

So. Life is feeling cold and inhospitable. I’m tired of having an old, broken, dog hair-infused coat. And either wearing that or being cold. I’m sad AF that I’ve only managed to put $300 aside for Christmas. I had this whole excellent plan about a specific special thing to buy Ralph and instead we had to eat a bunch of the money I put by. I’m tired of not having a car, because the fella I paid a lot to fix my car fucked it up. And I’m tired of riding in my husband’s car that has no heater. My days mostly consist of moving small bits of cash here and there and borrowing different vehicles to do the things I need to do for my family. And some of those things are things that give me a great deal of anxiety.

I spoke to someone close to me recently and requested they not speak to my children a certain way. This person responded by un-friending me online and, now, giving me the silent treatment. I’m not angry, and I don’t regret making the request I did. But I am right on that verge of being angry. So then I’m worried I won’t forgive this person for not being there, while we’re going through the shit. My hurt is reasonable; my anger, is not. Did you know – I am more terrified of forming resentments than almost anything! Luckily I know it is in my power to not stand idly by. I have a choice in how I accept my life’s circumstances.

Some people are giving my family “privacy” while we go through the ish with sexual assault. This is kind of annoying. I wouldn’t write about it publicly if I didn’t want to share it. I am excruciatingly careful what and how much I share, for a variety of reasons. But it’s like – I’m putting myself out there precisely because I’m not going to pretend this shit doesn’t happen.

There are these “little” things that matter to me that I can’t shake. It bothers me my son orders the cheapest hamburger at the fast food place because he knows where we’re at. It hurts that I’ve been too distracted to be a good schooling mum for my daughter. I haven’t been able to pick up my shrine flowers and that is like… something I haven’t skipped since I started. I am willing to have hunger pangs and pick up those flowers. But it’s just: no, because I wouldn’t be the only one having hunger pangs if I picked them up. The fact I skipped the flowers, it weighs on me.

Life is really good and I know it is. I don’t want a rescue, either. I am not asking for someone to make me feel better. I am not longing for anything specific.

I just want that tiny bit of space to say, “Ouch.” I’ll bitch a little more, then I’ll stop.

As I read last night, “[I] no longer live in a completely hostile world.” I really don’t, and I know I don’t. The money stuff is beyond depressing, today anyway – but yet we keep getting fed, and I keep paying the bills. (Most of them.) Other people pay some bills, too. Last night a friend bought the Underbellie domain for the next year so I could keep writing there. Today we received a blog donation of $8 and – I am not kidding, $8 goes a long way so I am grateful! Donations can be hard, because it can fell like I’m supposed to “prove” I deserve it. I have to put that thought aside a time or two a day.

So: I’m struggling. The worst thing of all is, I look at my kids and I don’t feel the joy I used to. What we are going through as a family, it has taken a lot of my joy away – temporarily, yes, I know this. It’s a damn good thing I don’t live just for feeling good. Holy shit.

It’s hard on me to be the joyless Mama. Sometimes I think it’s my duty to be happy and to be loving. This isn’t a smart thought, it’s just something I can’t easily shake. When my joy is just robbed out of me I feel sad, and I think I’m letting people down. What I know is I have to sit down at my computer and admit a few things that don’t make me look all that great, but at least they’re honest. I can’t move through any of this if I don’t acknowledge it’s happening.

I lived many years not being honest, publicly or privately.

I’m not gonna roll that way again.

And, okay. I’m done complaining. Thank you for listening.

small stone #18
wet cat along the side of the highway;
second day we’ve seen her.
Driving past, my son & I both stiffen, the same thought:
we should bring her home.

in company

by dailies

small stone #16
My friends saw me in my mom’s old pickup truck –
In the dark, in the cold, in the wet night.
“Who’s that with Kelly?” they asked.
Brake lights flared up:
My dog’s companionable profile revealed.
My friends laugh.

small stone #17
I get a headache listening to you,
but I think that’s just a coincidence.