Tag Archives: Memories

Time Keeps On Slipping…

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March has been an odd month for me these past few years —

Except for the staunchest of my winter loving friends, most of us in the Northern Hemisphere have all reached our saturation point of cold and snow by now and want it all gone already. The hope of the longed for First Day of Spring finally arriving lightens my mood.  Even though there is still several inches of snow on the ground, with more expected tonight, the thought of soon being able to put my down coat away for the season warms me immensely.

Of course, there is celebrating the birth of my first-born. Like all mamas of adult children I can still see the wide-eyed sparkle of those newborn eyes brought home oh so many years ago in the very eyes that roll, yet again, in some annoyance that I’ve -probably  happily – inflicted upon them.  Pretty much as I am sure I will do so again tonight when we meet up for birthday dinner. I’m Mom – it’s in the unwritten job description.

What has caught me off guard this year is what usually has been at the forefront of my mind on March 1st, these past few years.  I got to today, March 3rd, before the now 9th anniversary of my late-husband’s passing registered. I mean, it is not as if I did not know it was coming, after all his birthday – only a couple of weeks ago – is an automatic reminder.  Not to mention, I’ve had nearly a decade of it now. Yet the day itself came and went without so much as a blip to my conscience. I only noticed this morning, because someone else brought him up in conversation, that I had not noticed it even in passing thought. It truly was just another day.

I am not sure how I feel about that.

One hand, it is as clear-cut of a sign as can be that I no longer grieve for him. But, in reality, I stopped grieving years ago, because I am not the kind to wallow in such an emotion for so long before I make my own self sick of it. Which is a good thing, I know it is.  Still, there is this tiny little part of me that for the first ever wonders does it mean that I am slowly forgetting him? And while that bothers me just a little, very much like the month of March, my emotions on this are a fluid thing.

It has been nine years – isn’t it the way it should be? I think so, I think…

After all, how long do I continue to mark time in this way? Yet only a few days ago I was conversing with a friend about a certain point in recent time and what was my immediate point of reference? Whether or not Bill was around at that point and to calculate from there.  Clearly, I have not forgotten him and won’t be anytime soon.  Yet March 1st came and went without thought of him. Didn’t think that would happen either.

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Black Label Autumn Memories

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As I am  walking to the train station this morning a tiny flash of something bright falls just outside of my vision. It is a small golden leaf that lands on my shoulder. Being in my favorite season, I smile at the thought of autumn in New York City coming to its glory. I start to simply flick it off and go on about my day, but it somehow lands in my palm instead.

Then the heart does the one thing nothing else can do – make time stop for a moment as I am transported back some twenty years into the past.

It is a Sunday evening, the last night of an impromptu weekend trip with my late-husband to the Poconos. He is inside refreshing a drink. I am outside in my underwear leaning on the porch rail enjoying the view of the mountains that are basked in the warm bright colors of early sunset that washed the autumn foliage before me in rich shades before the sun reaches the ochre and indigo phases of its descent. With the annoying ability to walk on cat feet when he chooses to I do not hear him approach, but the heat from the eternal furnace that is his body reaches me just before he does and I turn to face him. He has on even less than I, and by the easy smile playing along his lips I am well aware of how much he likes what he sees before him. Wordlessly, he takes a slow sip of his drink as he reaches up to pull something from my hair and let it go. I extend my hand and a small golden leaf falls onto my open palm. It rests only for a moment before he gently blows it away and steps into my arms to kiss me. I remember wishing that we had more time there to enjoy ourselves before heading back to reality.

And reality reasserts itself back into my current life as a warm gust of air gently blows the fallen leaf from my palm.

It felt so eerily like his breath on my palm from that long ago evening; I shivered in remembrance. I have been trying to shake it off all morning, but here I am decades after the fact, hours after the memory, wishing I could once again enjoy the taste of Black Label on his lips.

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Almost A Moment – Always A Memory

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One afternoon in the late eighties, my late-husband and I were in some random deli in midtown. A gentleman with a full bushy beard, an overcoat, a ushanka pulled low on his bowed head, though it was hardly the weather for it, sat at an adjacent table and begin eating a sandwich. l paid little attention to him other than to casually note he was hirsute. Tufts of dark hair peeking out from the cuffs and the top of the t-shirt spied under the open collar of his shirt.  Something about the guy nagged the back of my mind, but I didn’t want to outright stare while I attempted to figure it out.  Still, I would steal surreptitious glances, trying to confirm or deny my hunch. In the midst of eating, what it was about the guy finally hit me so I pulled out my inner three-year old and in a childish voice said “Fuck it!”

Bill immediately snorted as that had become something of a silly catchphrase for us at the time. The gentleman at the other table startled, but did not otherwise acknowledge my low-keyed outburst. Satisfied I had the right of it I continued dining and conversing with my husband. As Bill went to pay for the meal,  I started stacking the dishes on our table.  I glanced at the guy one more time and simply couldn’t resist.

“Fuck it! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!”

This time he looked up and slowly smiled. It was a rueful kind of “Ah, you got me!” smile.  Having fully satisfied my idle curiosity, I simply winked, nodded once in acknowledgement and continued cleaning off the table as though nothing happened. Bill arrived back to the table just as the guy was lowering his head back down to his meal. I knew Bill recognized him when his eyes started to go wide.

“Is that…?”

I grabbed Bill by the arm and pulled him away before he could think to disturb the man any more than I already had.

“And being a fool, he was simple-minded, he didn’t see a king. He only saw a man alone and in pain.” –The Fisher King

When later asked why I pulled him away,  I responded the man just wanted to be left alone, get a bite to eat and be on his way. If he wanted fawning star treatment he wouldn’t be at some random deli in midtown. Who were we to disturb him? I was afraid if we spoke to him we would draw attention to him. If my interpretation of that rueful little smile was correct, it was clearly not something he wanted at that moment.

That man?  Robin Williams.

This was within a couple of years or so of Williams’ tears of laughter inducing one man show Robin Williams Live At  The Met. At the height of his career, the top of his game.

I sit here now, the last person left of that random happenstance, that snapshot in time. Had you told me then, that he would be gone less than thirty years later, I would not have believed it. If you had asked me five minutes before I read of his passing yesterday, I would not have believed it. He has been gone roughly twenty-four hours now and I still cannot believe it.

Facebook - Robin Williams I, and I imagine most of the comedy loving world, spent a good chunk of time last night watching YouTube after YouTube of Williams in bittersweet heartache. Not that any age is ever the right age for someone to leave us, but in Robin’s case, it really was far too soon.

“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”
– Dead Poets Society

I mean no disrespect here for those that suffer the level of depression that had plagued him, but for me, at this moment, the hows and whys of his death does not change the simple fact that he is gone. Williams has been a part of the comedic world and our lives since the 1970s.  I figured if anyone, anyone would go for the George Burn’s Oldest Living Wise-Acre record it would have been Robin Williams. I could easily imagine him still part self-deprecating and part wily and part sage and still hilarious with a scoundrel’s twinkle in those youthful blue eyes that would belie his much advanced years.  Alas, that is not to be.

“Shazbot!”
– Mork and Mindy

Last night the skies were clear. Logically I know many across the globe woke up to clear bright skies this morning, but I woke up to a gray morning, darkening clouds threatening rain. The skies matching the mood of many here in NYC already missing him. The world is a just a little bit darker without him in it, it is fitting. And that he would pass during the brightest nights of the Perseid Meteor Showers, the night skies welcome another star making it just a little bit brighter for a little while. I find it equally fitting.

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Packed Away

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Through the myriad rays of
Late afternoon sunlight
Dust flecks shift, flicker flow over
The slowly opening trunk of
Packed away memories, not mine

In fluid pen, on lined sheets
Harsh words of war, of need, his
Contrast the soft verbiage of home, of desire, hers
The sharp scratches, on unlined vellum
Scant hints of Chantilly scent
The barely there waxy impression of lips pressed
Of my triple, double and solo great grand predecessors

From a time not so long ago
When letters with news were already
Weeks old upon receipt
Instead of the instant access
That we come to expect now
No now, no now, no now, no now…

Baptismals, confirmations, certificates of life and death
And though it is not the same , freshly printed emails in san serif,
Screen-captures in HD sharpness and clarity join them

I jot a quick note of reference in cursive,
Giving the only human touch
To more papers becoming
Packed away memories, not theirs
Of my future solo, double and triple great grand successors
Before I softly close the trunk on it all,
Setting more dust flecks to drift
flicker, flow in the myriad rays
Of the fading late afternoon sunlight.

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Theme  Thursdays | Paper

Pictures Taken

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Such silly smiles that split the planes of our faces
Vacations have a way of doing that
Pictures taken visiting places
So happy anywhere we’re at
Dressed in our Formal Night styles
Now looking over these
Staring at our smiles
I’m on my knees
Tell me why
I cry

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I recently came across some images of my late-husband and I on our very first cruise together. It was a bittersweet discovery to say the least.

I haven’t done a form in a while and what better way to kick off National Poetry Writing Month? This form is called Emotive Ten.

Emotive Ten (nonce form)

 An Emotive Ten describes some form of emotion and has ten lines, the only restrictions is that it is syllable based.  It starts with twelve syllables and throughout the poem working its way down to two; it should describe usually an emotion in paradox, i.e. life to death, loneliness to love, light to dark etc.

If rhyme is used it must go with the syllable count in numbers and rhyme in letters:

12A, 10B, 9A, 8B, 7C, 6D, 5C, 4D, 3E, 2E

An alternate rhyming suggestion is a/a/b/b/c/c etc. The form can also be done in reverse, still ten lines, but starting out with two syllables and ending with twelve.

Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler!

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Happy Mardi Gras!

When most of the world thinks of Mardi Gras they are rightfully only thinking of the very last day big party day and night for which it is named, the ever popular Fat Tuesday. Those last hours of enjoying ones vices before the 40 days of self-sacrifice that is Lent beginning with Ash Wednesday, the very next day.

When I think of Mardi Gras it is always New Orleans 2001. I have yet had the pleasure to attend any of the balls, but I have enjoyed many of the local community parades that flow through the streets. There were the family friendly local fetes held by smaller Krewes in various parishes and of course the big parades held by the major Krewes along Charles and Canal Streets. My very first parade was the Bacchus Parade always held the Sunday night before Mardi Gras. The streets were as packed as any in New York City on a major parade route. So many people all crowded together, I felt right at home. I pushed my way towards the front and had a blast watching the colorful floats, the amazing costumes and high school / college bands. There were even gaily decorated Clydesdales prancing in tune to the joyful music. Naturally, there were the drunk and rowdy young and old. One poor child – okay college kid –had far too much alcohol and was not-so-quietly being up held by his friends as he gave back the liquor consumed.  Yup, just like being home on St. Patricks’ Day, yet not.

This is Bacchus, so yes, there were brightly colored beads a plenty casually tossed out to parade watchers. I quickly noted those were beads that could be purchased by the dozen for a dollar at any given store in the Quarter.  However, they were very selective in which revelers were tossed the pretty beads, the “Bacchus Beads” with flashing lights and better decorations.  And you guessed it; the young women upholding the infamous tradition of flashing their breasts to “earn” beads were generally the major recipients of these.  I planted myself next to one such young lady sitting on the shoulders of what I presume is her boyfriend. As the beads were flying down, I would snatch them in mid-air if they looked interesting. If I liked the beads I kept it, if I already had that design or did not want it I tossed it back to her. Suffice it to say she and her boyfriend were not initially happy, but they got over it as I partially shared. Hey, it was not my fault she was too drunk to figure out how to flash with one hand and reach out with the other and he could not hold on to her with one hand as she squirmed about trying to grasp beads. I simply took advantage of the opportunity.

That year the Bacchus Parade, known for having popular celebrities as its King, had chosen Nicholas Cage. We could hear the approach of the float he was on before we could see it. The noise level surrounding it was that intense. It took a good twenty minutes from when I first noticed his float until the monster was directly in front of us. Each step of the way the noise level increased. Between the bands, the revelers and those on the float itself, by the time it was before us, it was just deafening wall of sound and it was wonderful!

And all of that was nothing compared to the day of Mardi Gras itself. Getting up hung-over and groggy from partying that Monday night, it was pretty much a literal, was, rinse and repeat as we showered, ate, shopped, watched other parades and yes drank. There was this current in the air, this excitement, this tangible thing that my late-husband and I felt as the day grew on.

And then the sun set and we hit Bourbon Street in the French Quarter and…

Oh.
My.
God.

It made the crowds at the parade look paltry for the sheer amount of bodies per capita. The closest thing that can come to it is Times Square in New York City on New Year’s Eve and really that doesn’t capture it. There just aren’t enough and yet far too many words to describe the throng of bodies on the streets, in the side alleys and hanging from the wrought iron balconies of the beautiful French Quarter. The various states of sobriety, questionably legal substances and dress, or rather undress, especially from those in the balconies. Yeah, I’m leaving those in the purview of my mind’s eye. Like Vegas, some things will indeed stay in New Orleans.

Today I wear the traditional purple, green and gold colors of Mardi Gras in honor of the day and the memory of the wonderful times I had there. A couple of people have commented on the beads adorning my neck knowing what they are and where they are from. I will not confirm nor deny whether or not I have engaged in such technically illegal activities as earning them the traditional way or not. I will say that I have collected a vast assortment of beautiful beads in my visits and leave it at that.

I haven’t been to New Orleans since 2007 or Mardi Gras since 2005 and I wistfully gaze at my New York City skyline knowing it is definitely a too late for this year’s Carnival. Oh, but something tells me my Tuesday, February 16, 2015 Slice of Life may contain a post direct from N’awlins. Oh yeah….

I’m putting out the siren call of Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler right now.
Who’s with me?

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Still Breathing

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It’s been two hours,
I’m trying not to let the sadness bombard
Wondering how to heal this heart so scarred
My body gasps for air, but it’s too hard

It’s been two hours, and I want to stop breathing

It’s been two days,
I’m worn out from the sleep denied me
From the fullness of the pain inside me
When I’m as empty as the bottle of Jack beside me

It’s been two days, wondering why I bother breathing

It’s been two weeks,
I said I wouldn’t write another word
About you and all that has occurred
Yet fresh tears making new lines blurred

It’s been two weeks, the hurt tells me I’m barely breathing

It’s been two months,
No longer needing Mister Daniels to cope
For the first time not wanting to wallow and mope
Resolving to end this broken heart trope

It’s been two months, and yet I’m still breathing

Hell yes, I’m still breathing…

What Is Proper? (For Kay Cee)

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I have a Facebook friend who recently loss her husband.  Like I did then, she feels all alone on her path of grieving. I wrote the below a few months after the loss of my husband. As others who walked the path before me reached out to me,  I share this now so she knows she’s not alone on her path either.

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What Is Proper? 
I look over these years of my life from childhood until now.

Intellectually, I know I’m just a brief dash of eternity. But in my heart, half of that “dash” was my entire life with him.

What is the proper form of grief? I’m being told how well I am doing, how strong I am. If I don’t look as though I’m going to huddle in a corner and sob my eyes out any second, is that sufficient token to gauge my passion? I sometimes feel as though, I was expected to immediately fall apart and because I have not, it’s as though all these years with him have been a farce. For every few sets of real flowers he gave me, he also gave at least one artificial one “because like me, they will still be here when everything else is gone.” But since no one is there at night when I’m falling asleep exhausted clutching those same flowers on the bed, is that form of sorrow any less worthy? So who was pulling the masquerade? Bill? I honestly thought the artificial flowers would be gone first.

What is the proper time of grief? My mother passed away years ago and I still deeply feel her loss, but there is no expectation of a potential replacement for her. I’m expected to carry on and someday find a replacement for the irreplaceable. But when is ‘someday’?

If a year from now some new form of happiness enters my life, am I in too much of a rush to dismiss what was by pursuing it? What if a year from now I find I still cannot take off my wedding ring, am I flat out holding on far too long?

Oh God, a year from now – another dash of eternity I can not comprehend when I’m trapped in pseudo time warps.

I hear a song on the radio and for a moment we’re dancing so close together. But then it’s over and I’m forced back into the reality that he’ll never dance with me again. Then I’m feeling even more the fool for once again letting myself get sucked into a happy memory when I know the end result of such reminiscence is pain. I know it won’t always be like that, but right now I feel like I am wading and wading along a shore of my own tears, trying to find an answer in the tide, but it’s on a crest just out of my reach. I’m so close, yet so far from the solace there.

“One day at a time” I’m told. Right now, I’m just trying to get through one minute at a time.

I’ll work on getting through a whole day later.

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I also offer this:

In Smiling Silence

And this:

Scared of Me…

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Think about this for a moment: Yes, we all know what we look like smiling and laughing, there are pictures galore of such, especially in this modern age of cell phones capturing our lives in vivid pixelation. We see ourselves disappointed, sad, depressed and even crying because we lock ourselves away for a private moment in our bedrooms / bathrooms and a mirror shows us our hurt.  We may even see ourselves in various states of tumescence.

However, we almost never see ourselves truly scared or really angry or outright furious because we are generally facing that which has made us truly scared or really angry or outright furious and rarely is a camera there to capture the moment.  If you’re about to go postal do you think anyone would want to flash a camera directly in front of you? Don’t think so.  Yes, we can imagine what we may look like from what we’re told after the fact. However, when such strong emotions occur we are rarely in front of a mirror and by the time we reach one, we are no longer at the height of that emotion to really know.

Except I now know what that type of fury looks like for myself…

Today started as your normal Tuesday morning. I was up, my bed made; I was showered and dressed for work.  I made a quick call to a friend to confirm a detail on plans for later this week.  As usual between her and me it was not quite the quick call expected.

Our conversation meandered and somehow touched on an erstwhile family member I had not laid eyes on since 1991. Let me just say, point-blank, it was under very bad circumstances when we parted ways. If I never lay eyes on that person again, it is because even the deities know it would not be good thing, especially after this morning.

So I had her on speaker phone as I stood in the mirror applying make-up. I was looking at my eyes, giving them a final check before I close the eye shadow case, when she dropped the following what if on me:

“Yes, but he doesn’t know where you work. What if your boss called you into his office one day and he was sitting there a new employee?”

Only because I was looking dead into my own eyes at that exact moment did I see it. I felt my whole being react to the thought of the scenario proposed and in a split second went from apathetic to apoplectic before my very eyes.

My pupils dilated fully and something in them… around them… behind them…

Flashed.

…And scared the shit out of me.

I scared myself so badly that the eye shadow case slipped from my fingers as I took a step back.

The sound of the crash as today’s colors hit the floor and flung out in all directions, along with my friend wanting to know was that noise, snapped me back to reality.

There was so much strength, so much power, so much rage in that one glance of myself, I shudder now as I type this thinking of it.

What there was not, was absolution. None. Whatsoever.

But what frightened me the most of the experience was the fact that my reaction was from a mere hypothetical “what if…?”

How much worse would the reality be should the deities change their minds and let it occur?

I have actually seen the evil within me start to emerge.

And now I wish I could go back to when the only thing I could do was imagine it…

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Two Writing Teachers | Tuesday Slice of Life December 2, 2013

What’s Yours?

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No I cannot forgive you yet
No I cannot forgive you yet
You leave us all in debt
I should have known…

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When the Foo Fighter’s song “I Should Have Known” came out, group lead Dave Grohl stated -and he does have a point- that anything he writes relating to loss or death, the public will generally read into it that it is in some fashion related to the suicide of his Nirvana band mate, Kurt Cobain. However, the song becomes especially more haunting and Cobain related for those of us that knew that Dave was joined by two other members of the now defunct Nirvana as guests musicians on this song.  And while Grohl certainly understands why the public instantly makes the connection to Cobain here, he has stated repeatedly that yes Kurt is in there, the song was not specifically about him.

And that I can understand…

For  just as much as I feel the impact of the loss Cobain in this song, as I also feel the loss of my late-husband…

I was home  -thank goodness- when I first heard the song. On that very first listen, by the end of the first stanza, I remember I stopped everything I was doing at the moment, sat down and just listened to the song on repeat. “I Should Have Known” immediately reminded me of some of the stages of grieving, I went through…

The guilt: I’m still standing here, You leave my heart in debt, caught me unawares…

But especially the crescendo as Grohl refrains No I cannot forgive you yet.

It’s raw, it’s pounding, you can all but see the fury and anguish pouring out. For those of us who have walked the grieving path, especially for the loss of someone who left us unexpectedly, we know this. We know it too well.

When my husband passed away, I recall being in that anger stage for a very long time.

A. Very. Long. Time…

And this song took me right back there to that very first year of grieving.  It hit me so hard, that when I was finally able to turn the song off an hour later, I was hurt and wanted to scream all over again.  This song is  such a brilliant mood changer for me, even now.  Here I am -some seven years after my husband’s passing and two years after the song’s debut- that the moment I heard those first opening chords of the strings through my iPod, it still gave me a moment’s pause, that I stopped reading my book and just listened.

Enough of a pause that, hours later, I still had to acknowledge it and write this blog.

Everyone has a song that gives them pause… what’s yours?