Mountains Crossed

The shock of visiting my parents was more a glacial freeze, I think, than a tumultuous emotional blow. Upon my return, my movements are thick and slow, ponderous with a sludge of uncertainty, and my thoughts heavy with fog.

My son and I made another quick road trip to Pennsylvania for Christmas, a grounding with family to enliven us with a little of the holiday spirit, a touch upon our heritage amidst all the transformations of this past year.

On the surface and deep into the heart, there was such pleasure and satisfaction to spend time with my father in his little apartment. He gave us open views into his daily habits, the struggles that an 85 year old nearly deaf and blind encounters in every direction. I could appreciate the strength it takes to maintain independence against the growing urge to simply pass on and be done with it all.

Although he speaks clearly and regularly of his readiness to die, in fact, there were several paintings, fresh in frames, I had not seen, and yet another on the easel. Nearly as often as I in my home, he would lumber into the other room to check his email, a large screen TV magnifying words 10” tall to keep him connected to friends and family in the world. Unable to follow the movement in most sports, he has switched to baseball and celebrates it being the year his home team wins the World Series.

Breakfast out to a small place nearby is an adventure enough to him who has eaten in exotic cafes on all continents. We accomplished several simple errands for clothing and items that had caused him worry. I could provide some relief to my sisters who tend to him lovingly, but constantly, in the midst of their own busy lives.

The fact that he has been somewhat of a stranger to us most of our years—interpreted through my mother—evaporates when hearing him manage his catheter two or three times in the night. It is so humbling to help the man who has been so strong in my life from car to curb to cart ever so slowly, carefully, and patiently. He complains with a shrug and apologizes as he accepts my shoulder to lean upon.

Deep into a world unknown, my mother spends her day in a wheelchair, teeth gnashing with a painful sound that causes her no visible discomfort, surrounded by others—mostly women—mouths open and eyes closed in their own strange worlds. The staff banters amongst themselves, good-spirited but worn weary by the daunting task of keeping their charges safe and fed.

Warned to have no expectations, I am pleased and amazed to see her pulse quicken each time she turns her head towards me. She utters some guttural piece of thought I cannot recognize, still we nod, eyes locked, as if understanding. Her hand explores mine as if surprised and wondering, something she knew once, but just cannot explain.

I cherished this time with my Dad and was unabashedly teary-eyed sitting with my Mom. My energy poured toward them unreservedly as if I could somehow replenish all that they have given me.

Alas, they are at this place in their journeys and our best efforts are to keep them company and ease the details where we can. Two sisters living nearby are much more practiced than I—both more burdened and blessed. To an outsider, it is a lonely and dwindling road they wander, but the dignity and peace with which they carry themselves is a heart-wrenching inspiration.

My son stayed behind with his mother, allowing me the long drive home alone to contemplate past and futures, interrupted by miles of scenery I have traveled many times with numerous companions enroute or awaiting. This time, I had the sense of leaving my parents behind, their hugs still available, but our relationship forever changed, what once was now petrified in that glacier of shock under which flows a stream that is my own life moving onwards.

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How Kipper Gets His Turns Back

Eighteen inches of snow have fallen on Burlington this weekend, twice that at Sugarbush. I was there for first run Saturday morning, taking three down double diamond Stein’s Run before I went to work with my four year olds.

More runs in the afternoon and more on Sunday begins to show me that perhaps something special is happening here afterall. I purposefully took the runs by myself, consciously looking for the smooth line that could bring me down the mountain.

For weeks, now, I have been describing the struggle to learn a new style, writing that the change from exuberant dance and battle through moguls to a smooth instructor's turn, although uncomfortable and alien, serves as a good metaphor for the changes needed in my life in general. So weary of the tumult and scarcity, the strained and screaming muscles forcing their way, I have vowed to hold the concepts of prosperity and abundance close to me as I point my skis downhill and push off.

In similar periods of distress (and, lo, there have been too many!), I have taken deposits for the next construction job and applied them to bills from the last, straining to keep from crashing face first into another bump. Begging and pleading with creditors for just a little more time, breathing room has always been just out of reach.

When the truck broke down last week, I was clearly out of options and, without any internal discussion, I knew to the center of my soul, I had to react a different way, make that new style of turn.

Two days earlier, I had met with someone about a book-keeping job for a bio-energy consulting firm. Although the product was unknown to me and the money by the hour was far less than could be made as a carpenter, it was not frought with risk and challenge, but consistently earned hour by hour.

Having crossed that line to embrace the concept that less money with more reliability gains so much more peace of mind, I studied my expenses in the last months of this new life and saw how this, combined with some other incomes, could work. Developing a plan, organizing a budget, cleaning house settles the anxiety of the unknown into manageable bites to swallow.

Although few are hiring, I dropped off applications and resumes at numerous larger construction companies, stressing that I wanted office work, no nail belt in sight. One smaller company, very similar to mine at its best, needs a part-time office manager. Against fierce competition, I emphasize my unique qualifications of expertise in the business and contentment to just count numbers 20-30 hours a week, and they seem to agree. I pray that our needs align, for it seems the perfect balance of solutions to me.

It all began with a determination to write in a journal, no matter the prying eyes that might judge me unfairly. When I started this blog, it felt like a diseased patient, diagnosed as terminal, moving from bed to sofa, wrapped in a comforting blanket, turning eyes from internal struggle outwards to view the rest of the world, and making a choice to live.

The move to my space at Riverside I made to hear my own voice, long contaminated by the clatter and clamor of demands and duties, no longer clear, but strained and ineffectual. In moments of stillness, music arose to celebrate steps small and large. My fingers itching were able to stretch and caress, my voice returned, strengthening old phrases with new timber and pitch, and finding new songs.

So, alone on that trail in the soft quiet of the raging storm, warm and clear-sighted, I pushed off and soared through a field of moguls, skis carving turns as pretty as an instructor and dancing out and into the air with punctuations of personality completely my own. My heart sings with fresh life, so much glistening powder untracked and seductive spread out before me.

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Freefall

Fear knocks at my chest, beating my heart. At three in the morning, I lie awake, eyes wide to the terror of the looming unknown.

In my 35 years as an adult, the ultimate irony is that when I finally “grow up” and commit emotionally to getting a Real Job, it is at a time of massive layoffs and profound uncertainty. Worldwide, there seems to be a shift of energies, tidal changes. But as we reach the Solstice, the metaphor is never clearer that we must go through some serious darkness before we begin to see more light.

People agree there is a compulsion, like driving past an accident, to stare at the bloody mess (perhaps why, Dear Reader, you return to this blog?!). My chosen perspective is NPR where the economic crisis is reported in gory, heart-wrenching, and sometimes inspirational, detail. I should turn away, listen to my own songs of joy or the glory of others, but the stories of doom and glimmers of transformations similar to mine keep me company on the road or installing doors.

As my truck rolled to a stop on the shoulder last week, it felt as if all remaining options of salvation raced out of view like so many cars, shuddering mine as they passed and heading to some distant future I would never see. Always reliant on myself and my unbounded resources to find a solution, I knew this time I had to place myself completely in the merciful hands of others, and ask for help.

So broke no plastic could help me, I had to plead for a break to get the truck towed, and rely on a friend to change direction to take me home. This week, I have appealed to the kindness of others as diverse as my estranged wife, my landlord, and the cell phone operator to stretch their needs for another week as I regain control and formulate better, more reliable resources.

In the past, I have been at this point regularly and promised myself, and others, that my next endeavor would pay us all back with interest and bonuses. Tonight, I know I can scheme and create miracles no more. Refusing to consider any shadow of a project or handyman work dangling in front of me, acting as if one more deposit will save the day, this time I filter the Trickster's voice and hand out resumes instead of business cards.

To reach any stabilization of this freefall to disaster, I need to work regular hours for a regular check, a concept that has been anathema to my Trickster friend. In this last year, I have radically trimmed my budget, expenditures and, most importantly, my expectations so that I can live with less in hopes of gaining so very much more.

Fear beats at my chest, awakening me in the middle of the night because not only am I unable to promise my landlord his check, I cannot tonight describe what my day will be like after the holidays. The unknown is terrifying, but 35 years in the comfort of the known has ruined marriages, alienated children, challenged my father’s love, and left me exhausted.

Who wouldn’t want change?

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Kipster the Trickster

The loss of my truck has cracked a solid blow to my optimism and good cheer. So deeply weary of the struggle to thrive, I ache to awake, and wander through my day wondering how and in which direction do I take another step.

Firstly, I blame myself for this newest failure, expensive and inconvenient. Changes of oil are the minimum requirement of maintenance which I—in my constant state of hurry and paucity—have neglected. Foolish enough to put off and put off, the engine seizure is the reward.

This is the perfect example of the natural consequence of living in the belief of scarcity. If I live as if there is not enough money or time to take care of such basics, I create a world of problems that need to be fixed. As if this is not big enough, I take this opportunity to confront the very core of my being, the constant, prolonged struggle to reach a place of financial comfort in my life. The broken rods in the engine are like the bonds holding me to the habits that have driven my life. Something has snapped, and I am broken down on the side of the road.

Last night, in my group of men, we set up two chairs to ponder two voices that resonate within me. In the one, sat the healthy Kip who recognizes that Life is not working and wants to make changes. The other chair represented Kipster the Trickster who plots and schemes and wallops his skis through mogul fields of trouble so forcefully, he invites whoops and hollers of appreciation, but is still well back from the medal stand at the end of the day.

This little devil slouches comfortably, arms crossed, the cool cat, joking and jibing, a gleam in his eye, and the best intentions in all the world to juggle the many needs of himself and others to a glorious conclusion. He means no harm, but is really like a little boy, excited by what lies before us.

“Oooh, look at this glitter, look at that shine! You know you could really do this, or even better, really do that. If you just squeeze a little here, tuck a little there…”

All day long, throughout my entire life, this little trickster has whispered tempting distractions in my ear: easy shortcuts, big plans for glorious results, and convincing arguments to think if one such task is easily accomplished, why not three? Shirking on the details to actually complete any motion, he steers the eyes ahead to the infinite possibilities that lie just beyond our sight.

My trusty brothers forced me to run an exercise where first I spoke as the trickster, ogling and inveigling. Then I sat and spoke as the healthy Kip, the man who was tired of working so hard through so many obstacles, mistakes and misfortunes, always jumping right back to the task with a smile and encouraging cheers of bravado.

It is time to stand up to him, to put the trickster in his place, to say “no, let’s do it sensibly.” Not to diminish the spirit, or belittle the efforts, the time has come to tame the rebellious, rambunctious trickster, to invite him to rest and observe how moving with the flow of others, harnessing the mind which currently leaps six steps ahead, could better simplify and create a world of calm cooperation and successful endeavors.

Sometimes the wheel does not have to be reinvented, but can spin productively just the way it is.

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