Light

As we left my in-laws house Thanksgiving Day, it was early evening. The sun was going down supplying us with a beautiful sunset, the street lights were on and the house lights were being turned on.
The drive through the maze of neighborhoods with streetlights is as easy to navigate in the gloaming as it is in the day. We followed the lights, peeping into the houses as we passed, seeing other people celebrating the day. The streetlights slowly petered out as we drove onto I-91.
As we drove and the night got darker we could see out into what is know as the pioneer valley. Lights marking streets, parks and homes glittered into the distance. Lights flashed on the few high chimneys left from when the valley was full of huge brick factories fueling the economy of the valley so many years ago. Now the tall "plane" lights flash on cell phone towers that fuel our economy through commerce and trade.
As we drove further north the lights of Springfield, Holyoke, Northampton were left behind. We headed into darkness where the lights were to be found away from the highway. After a brief glimpse of the lights of Greenfield, the darkness surrounded us. We could see shimmer of lights on the hills and mountains as we passed by. Homes tucked safely away from the highway. Closer to the highway there were Christmas lights. A field of "deer", bright white and shining in the dark night  and the occasional outdoor Christmas tree festooned with lights.
We arrived at our exit in Brattleboro. Here there are streetlights, guiding us down to the next turn which will being us down to Rte. 30. The lights grow further and further apart. By the time we hit Rte. 30 we are running out of lights. The houses have thinned out and we are at the end of the streetlights. Shining across from us, reflected in the West River are the lights from the Marina Restaurant and the lights from Putney Road businesses., but we are not heading there, we will follow the road north towards home.
There are times you can drive for miles on Rte. 30 and not see a soul. It is as if you are the last car in some apocalyptic film noir. The last survivors, on a lone road in Vermont. Then in the distance there is a small pool of light. A gas station/convenience store. We zip by it, by this point the lights are becoming annoying. As we pass it, the stars start to appear in the sky. Stars that you can't see when you have too much man made light around. There is a twinkling of light from a mountain top as somebody switches on a light in their house. Tucked off of the roads there are houses whose windows are lit in the golden light of a home.
Onward we go north. Now we are where there are no lights, well no street lights and in a lot of places no guard rails either. These are the places where only the reflection of our headlights reflect off the yellow stripes in the middle of the road and the white stripes on the sides guiding us along the winding road. Occasional road signs are there and even the occasional guardrail with it's bright, triangular reflective pieces.
We pass River Bend Market, the last big pool of light. Then up to Townshend, taking a right onto Rte. 35. There are streetlights here and there is a small country hospital. Plenty of lights and signs to let us know where we are. But just a few short miles out of the center of town, the streetlights are gone and the signs are few and far between.
It is once again gloriously dark and the road is ours. We hit a point where the white stripes indicating the edge of the road have all but faded out. We are totally dependent on the yellow stripes like the yellow brick road to guide us home. Even the houses with their warm lights have started to disappear.
By the time we reach our dirt road we have run out of houses, and it is dark. There is sliver of a moon hanging in the sky surrounded by a galaxy of stars. There are no houses here at the corner of our road. No bright lights, just a dirt road. We turn down the road. It becomes like a tunnel. The trees spread their branches over the road. During the summer it shades the road, during the winter they give the road a feeling of solitude.
Finally some lights appear, quiet lights, house lights, Christmas lights, and finally, the light that is like a beacon pulling us up our driveway to our home. A quiet outside light, calls us to the mudroom door and finally we are home. We turn on the inside lights and enjoy the beauty of being the pool of light in the darkness.

Food, it ain't always what it seems to be

Lately I have been reading a lot about food. Frankly I am obsessed by food. I love it and I hate it. Food makes me happy, makes me sad, fills me up, causes bloat, and makes me feel guilty.
I think I should be a vegetarian because it's good for you. Well an ovo-lacto vegetarian but then I remember I love meat. Really, I love it and I don't believe that as a vegetarian you should be eating "fake" meat. Soy hamburger or hot dogs or variations thereof. Besides I can't do a lot of soy. It's a "let's not get cancer again" thing. Which is why there was also a hysterectomy thing, but I digress.
Food is what makes the world go 'round. It is in every culture, in every form possible. From trotters to head cheese, from mesclun to giant pumpkins. We grow it, we eat it and sometimes we play with it.
When I was a young thing and I mean way back when before computers, when phones were big, heavy and usual black and when TV's got 3 channels on a good day. My pediatrician told my mother that I should drink "lowfat milk". I don't know the what-fors of this decision cause I also know that he thought I should stay away from potatoes and bread, like that was ever going to happen.I do know I have always had "gut" issues, tummy troubles, constipation to the trots and back again, I think you got it. I was a pudgy little kid. I wouldn't say fat as I always had height to even out things. Anyway, way back when, there weren't exactly big grocery stores around. So there weren't big dairy aisles offering everything from yogurt to almond milk. You went shopping at local stores, funny how life is trying to reverse itself now with the whole 'shop local' thing. There was no such thing as skim milk to be found bottled in a dairy case. There were 2 types of "dry" skim milk, both equally as horrid tasting. So basically I gave up on milk, but not on dairy. Full fat ice cream or cheese never caused issues, so they continued to grace my life.
A few weeks ago in my reading of all things food, I read about raw milk, you know, the kind people use to drink before pasteurization and homogenization came into the game. Raw milk. It's really not raw, it's just milk in it's natural form. When you get a bottle of "raw" milk, the cream has separated and floats on the top. I love to dip my finger into this. It's good and it's where butter comes from. Anyway I decided to try "raw" milk in my diet. I have taken probiotics for years and frankly they didn't seem to be doing much good.
I just want to be able to go to the bathroom (bowel movements) without constipation, diarrhea or searing pain in my gut, also know as IBS, irritable bowel syndrome, of which I was diagnosed with many years ago.
We have a local farm, about 15 minutes away from our house that sells "raw" milk. So I became a regular. At first it was a little weird. It's a unmanned farm stand, still run on the honor system although I understand not all people are honorable. On one side is the family home and on the other the barns where the cows live. I am not saying it is organic, GMO free, or anything else, I don't know and I don't care at the moment, cause I am there for the milk.
I love their milk. If I drink one glass a day (about 12 ozs) my gut is happy. No, all the problems don't go away but the difference is significant. If I miss a couple of days, the misery returns. No worse than before, but it's there.
I am not saying this is for everyone. You have to make your own decisions on food and it ain't easy. Organic is great but it is more expensive. You may argue that the benefits are long term, but for some it is what is in your wallet now. You can't always afford to feed a family of four on an organic chicken that costs $24 for something that weighs 2 lbs. So you have to do a balancing act.
The latest book I read made me understand that the big food companies treat us consumers as lab rats. They make food easier to chew, flavor is done with chemicals so we will come back for more and they add sugar, fat and salt to just about everything and trust me, this is why since the 1980's we have been getting fatter and I am one of the crowd. Just as guilty as everyone with mac and cheese in a box, cookies, chips, and all that stuff we just love to eat.
Unless we want to be buying into the big pharmas to keep us alive through modern medicine i.e. popping pills for everything, changing our diets is the only way we can control our lives and live better ones. I don't want to line up pill containers and try to remember when to take what. I have to live with my thyroid medicine, I have no choice. But if I can get off of the other 2 I take, or even 1 I will feel I have succeeded in taking back control of how I chose to live.
Oh and if you think dieting is the magic pill, nope it ain't. There is a certain amount of getting off the couch and moving. Doesn't mean you have to join a gym or take up running. It just means that at least 3 x's a week for at least 30 minutes each time, you need to get your heart rate up, sweat a little, take a walk, do what ever floats your boat, but enjoy it.
I'm trying. I don't succeed every day, but there are more good days than bad and that makes me feel happy.

A sponge, a fire and some words.

There are times when the old saw of "How long have you been married? Too long." rings true.

The argument is not over politics, religion or the kids but over a sponge. Well let's say the sponge is the trigger to the smoking gun.

Years ago my husband stated he hated the sponge being left in the flat area next to the faucet on our kitchen sink. So in my travels I found this "thing/holder" which straddles the double sink in our kitchen. One side is for the metal scrubby we use on pots and pans and the other side is for the sponge. It's not the greatest thing but it works for me, not for my husband. To him it is an impediment. Whether getting a glass of water or washing up, it is always in his way. So he removes it and leaves in on the counter next to the sink and  usually neither the sponge or the scrubby are in it. The sponge can usually be found on the counter and the scrubby in the sink (although many time both are on the counter). The biggest problem is usually the sponge is soaking wet or at least damp when placed on the counter. He does not think of putting the holder back in place and putting the items back in it. Guess that is my job. 

The counter has suffered over the years from this constant action. Water has pooled in the grout and despite my efforts to clean it, the grout has turned unpleasant colors and in some areas the grout has almost disappeared entirely. Yes, this upsets me but I have lived with it along with the many other things my spouse does that piss me off and knowing I am not perfect, I am smart enough to know there are probably a few things that he has to put up  from my side of the marriage. But it sometimes are the small things, those everyday things that spark off the conflagration. They pile up like dried tinder, just waiting for a spark, that little something that will ignite them. A misplaced word (or sponge) will cause everything to go up in smoke. 

Sometimes there just doesn't seem to be a rhyme or reason to why the argument starts. Surely a sponge is not that important. But in reality it's not the sponge, it's the days before. In my case the stress build up to an important meeting, learning about 2 incidents aboard Navy ships, one which has cause the loss of life of 7 sailors, which as a mother of a sailor currently deployed just brings tears to my eyes for the mothers of those lost, my own chronic illness which at times causes me to swirl out of control and become morose, blue, sad, exhausted, lost and bewildered and finally that getting older isn't for sissies, I am just am not sure I can do it some days. 

It all piles up and then....the sponge incident. As I sit in my darkened room typing this out it does seem a bit silly but it's not. There are so many things in marriage that are left unsaid. No matter how honest your relationship may seem it's not as honest as you think. 

We do not tell our partners of all our fears. We don't tell them of all the things they do that drive us crazy. Why not? Because we have learned that honesty can hurt. That we are not perfect and we may not want to hear what they say. 

I have deep fears, hiding down in a place I don't go. Really there is no reason to go there because they are the  things I faced many years ago and unlike the fool in the horror movie that opens the door despite all of us in the audience yelling for them to step away, it's not a door I need to open. I know what is there and it can stay there. I don't need to revisit the past.

It is now the future that frightens me. The truth that there is less time ahead of me than behind. The fact that my body is slowly wearing out and my mind may go with it. There are a thousand and one fears if not more that some days I can't keep behind the door. They all come out and terrorize me like the nightmares I had as a child. I don't want to feel this way but I can't help it. Just like the fool in the horror movie I open the door although I can hear all those voices telling me to step away.

So is the sponge a metaphor for something? No, it's just a sponge. It was just the tipping point. That place where this time instead of cleaning up and not saying anything, I got mad, I yelled, I cried, I wrote this and then I read it to my husband. You see, one of my secrets that I find easier to write and post then try to verbalize my feelings. Product of my environment? Yes. Will I be able to change at this point? No, but I have found a door I can open, this one. I can write what I feel better than say it, which means I can also share it with the one person that counts more than anyone in my world. It may not be a perfect way to communicate but it is the best I have and a hellva lot better than starting a fire.

An epiphany on a bad day.

I know this will seem odd to some, but it has taken me 60 years to figure out that I have abandonment issues. 

My husband pulled one of those bonehead moves yesterday that tips me over the edge and I really never knew why. He went to church, okay, that part is fine and usually he is home by 1:00 p.m. but he didn't get home till 2:00 p.m. I waited on lunch until my tummy rumbled louder than the ATVs flying down our road and gave in to eating lunch alone. When he finally showed up I was, upset to say the least. Well he stopped to see someone and then casually mentioned at least he didn't stop to see another friend doing some physical rehab in our local hospital. "Oh lucky me", I thought, "he came home even though he could have been out visiting." But wait! He knew he was going to visit at least one of these people and he couldn't have given me a heads up? Like a note on the fridge or a call from church before he headed out? Nope. This has been an issue in all of the time we have been married. " Please", I have asked of my husband and my children, "call me if you are going to be late." It happened sometimes but not all the time.

As I hung about the house being snarky and sulky the rest of the day, it dawned on me that time wasn't the issue here. It was him (or them) not coming back. I ran through my storehouse of memories and realized that I had spent a great deal of my life doing what I asked them not to do. 

I left behind friends and boyfriends before they could leave me. I have spent almost my entire life in a self-imposed solitude. Now don't get me wrong. I actually like my company and when younger would not have enjoyed spending time with women who thought of hair, makeup and clothing as main topics of conversation. Now that I am older, I have reached slightly out of my comfort zone trying to interact with people on a social level, but still have no idea at times how to hold a conversation.

My memories are not of a door closing or someone saying goodbye. They are visceral, a part of me that is buried deep within my psyche. My father left, my mother left, my brother was gone, my aunts, uncles, everyone that I knew in the first 3 years of my life. Yes, I had my adoptive parents, my adoptive family of aunts, uncles and cousins but it was all different. There was something I lost but had no conscious thought of the loss. It was what made me do some of the things that I did so I wouldn't be hurt again because how does a 3 year old express that kind of pain? In my case extreme shyness, holding back on attachments to people but becoming overly attached to "home", our house, the only place I knew that was safe. My parents suggested we move at some point in my pre-teen years and the nuclear meltdown on my part caused them to rethink that idea.

My parents once remarked that they had been told I didn't like to be hugged so therefore (in the logic of the 1950's) they were told not to try to hug me. It's still an issue. Hugging, I can't even describe how that infringes upon my space although I have become accustom to hugging my family (you have to if you marry into a big Italian family) but it took years.

I was also told by my adoptive mother that they had wanted 'the boy' (my brother) but he was taken so they took me instead.  Excuse me, are we talking about getting a pet here?  

My adoptive parents and I had issues, beyond the usual stuff, but not the kind of stuff that lead me to killing off anyone or pulling wings off of flies. Just things that now I realize were not just the everyday growing up stuff.

I suppose I will always have to deal with the whole idea of being abandoned for the rest of my life, but in a way this epiphany has opened a door and let me see why I have done and still do some of the things in my life. 

I relate this story not for sympathy but because I need to see it in print. I need to feel the keys under my fingers as I release this little demon. It will always control me in some way, but now that I know the root cause maybe I won't be so anxious when the husband is late, or the kids don't call or people leave, but don't expect me move anytime soon, I am no going down that road ever again.

I thought that whatever happened to make my 'real' parents give me up, had to have been because I did something wrong, but it wasn't my fault, for years I thought it was my fault. I became passive, because scars like that never heal. I have realized in the past few years with the reconnection with 2 siblings and learning about and connecting with  2 others (mom was a busy girl), that there was a story there of people who made bad decisions and whose life choices ended up changing more than just their life. That is the way of the world. We make decisions and sometimes we forget how one decision can ripple outwards and change so many things.

Now don't get me wrong. I have seen my share of shrinks and therapists, after awhile you learn to say what they want to hear. I loved my adoptive parents and they loved me, we just didn't always get along and they didn't know the whole story about those short years in which I was someone else's daughter. Maybe if they did, we would have hugged or moved to another house, but those things can't be changed. I don't have regrets cause they were good people and to regret my life with them wouldn't honor the love they gave me. That is the special thing about adoption, okay so they want the boy but they still took me. They didn't have to. They could have said no and walked out the door but they didn't and that made them great parents.

I could go on and on about all the issues, conflicts and assorted baggage that I have, well frankly we all have baggage. I guess it comes down to how we decided to carry it. Do we load ourselves down with it and carry it through life blaming it for whatever evil befalls us or do we zip it up in a small carry-on realizing that occasionally we will have to look at it? Whatever is in that baggage will always be a part of us but it doesn't have to control us. We just need to know it's there and get on with our lives.

Winter's full moon.

The moon's light creeps around the edges of my curtains in my dark room causing me to get out of bed and pad silently down the stairs so I can stare out on the snow covered gardens, lawn and woods to admire the beauty of the midnight hour.
The moonlight pouring through the downstairs windows of our house is  like muted sunlight. Shadows lay across the snow cast by the barren trees. Wicked shadows, shadows which hide the coyote as it hunts. Shadows only disturbed by the silent wings of an owl searching for prey.
It is not a fat, warm summer moon which calls out fireflies and moths to flit among the night flowers and grasses at the edge of our woods. It is a cold, hard moon, high in a winter sky. It brings out a beauty of a night world in sharp relief. No warm air to caress my face as I step out of the door to look at it. It entices with it's hard beauty and cold light. It draws you out into the bitter night air to look up at the sky and see the stars laid out in a black sky.
There is no sweet scent of a summer night, instead there is a dryness to the air, a sharpness. The only smell on a cold night as this is the smoke rising from the chimney. The mingling of maple, cherry and birch wood as it burns to heat our home.
Inside again, in the warmth of our home I hear the creaks and groans that are the house settling down on it's foundation. It makes me think that the moonlight itself is gently trying to work it's way inside and if it does, we will float up into the sky, and become the moonlight.We will be forgotten by those who knew us. Nothing will be left of the house or it's foundation. There will just be the gardens which will go wild, and the woods which will close in on the lawn.
It will all be  a dream that happened one cold winter's night when there was a full moon.