Dancers and Poets

Recently Troy and I have been attending a poetry group.  It got started unexpectedly - we were enjoying some dinner with a couple of close friends and after the meal, as we sat on their living room floor chatting about our favorite music, I kept glancing at their bookshelf.  I always love to look at a person's bookshelf - the books we keep near us say a lot about us, I believe.  It's fascinating to see what people have on their shelves.  Our friends had several books of poetry on the shelf and finally I pulled one out.  Or maybe it was Troy, I don't remember.  Anyway, poetry came up in conversation and as we talked about a certain poet we all love I suddenly got the idea that we should have a poetry night - just get together and read our favorite poetry or things we've written.  Luckily my idea was well received and not totally laughed at. We invited a couple of other families that we thought might enjoy an evening of reading poetry aloud.  Does it sound pretentious?  If it does, I don't care - it was so much fun.  The different poetry styles that everyone brought to the table were fascinating and it was just a lovely evening.  So lovely, in fact, that we have done it twice more since and have another on the calendar.  I hope it never gets old.

One outcome of this poetry night is that everyone has had the inkling to start writing a little of their own poetry. Even my husband, who after the first poetry night declared that he had never had the urge to write a poem in his entire life, suddenly found himself jotting down a few lines.  It is so awesome.  In fact, I thought one of his poems would fit very well as an accompaniment to some pictures of Bundle's latest dance performance.  I really want to post some pictures but have run out of anything interesting to say about Bundle dancing because she's had like 5 performances in the last 18 months.  And since Troy wrote a poem about his youngest child and her tendency to spin, I thought they'd go nicely together.

She skips just because

She twirls without thought of the furniture around her

She smiles from morning to night

She gives kisses warning or reason

And hugs with reckless abandon

Her giggles are like a virus

Every moment is a grand adventure

When Emma is your girl

I Once Caught a Fish THIS BIG

I was not expecting this evening to turn into an adventure.  After all, we only started out by asking our friends if they wanted to buy Girl Scout Cookies.  They kindly ordered a couple of boxes.  We didn't think that getting the cookies to them would turn from delivery to life-long memory! I guess we forgot to consider that these friends live in Layton so no matter how we got the cookies to them it would take some traveling.  And after all, these are our Christmas-Tree Hunting friends, and any time together with them at all is both rare and desirable, so if we were going to see each other at all why not at least spend the evening together?  At first we planned on enjoying some supper together. Easy - soup, bread, no problem.  But then Mary, the matriarch of the Layton-dwellers, had a great idea.  Why don't the Preslars head north, meet at Mary's mother's farm and fish for our dinner out of the trout pond?  Our kids LOVE fishing, this cute little pond is teeming with huge trout - how fun!  She made salads and a pie, I made scalloped potatoes, we were in the car by 4:45 and had lines in the pond by 5:30.

Of course Stomper had a fish out by 5:32 or something.  The fish must have been starving.  Stomper made like two casts and before we knew it he had a big ole' trout flipping around on the grass.  Triumph!  Then within 10 more minutes Troy had snagged another one and persuaded Bundle to kind of help him reel it in so she sort of felt some claim to that fish.  But then poor Bitty wanted to catch one with just a net.  She tried for a while but obviously wasn't very successful.  We took a break for dinner - the trout (talk about fresh!) were quickly gutted and wrapped in tin foil and thrown onto the nearby camp fire.  Everyone ate potatoes and salad and then when the fish was done started on that.  Bundle ate more than anyone else - she probably ate half of a 4 lb trout!

By the time people were eating trout, Bitty was getting desperate to catch a fish.  She started using a fishing pole (when it's not fly fishing, can I call it that or will I get in trouble?  Is it always a rod?  I don't know but I'm sure to screw it up!).  She stood by that pond for way more than an hour, casting and reeling, casting and reeling - I was really proud of her for not giving up and not totally having a meltdown because she was so disappointed.  Just as we were packing up dishes in the dusky evening, she started hollering - she had a bite!  The huge fish splashed violently while Troy and Stomper dashed to her side - just in time for the fish to unhook itself.  I saw one moment of I-Am-Going-To-Cry on Bitty's face until we all cheered for her for getting a strike and she went back to it.  Now I am trying to get everyone into the car and all the stuff loaded up so our bedtime wouldn't be completely shot, but Bitty just kept casting.  Just as I got the last few things in the car I headed down the grassy hill to fetch Bitty, only to see the group of kids gathered around Troy and an ecstatic Bitty who was beside herself with joy.

Yes, just as I was ready to pull out of the driveway, Bitty (with Troy's help but she reeled it in) caught the biggest fish of the night.  The thing was huge - Mary guessed it was 8 pounds or so.  Totally worth it for Bitty and us too - the smile on her face illuminated the car the whole way home, she was so thrilled.  We are looking forward to grilling it for dinner tomorrow night.  She asked if we could make it "extra fancy."

So bedtime was pretty much shot after all.  Not all homework got done, the kitchen is a mess but you know what?  I couldn't be happier.  Partly because we now do not have to go back tomorrow night to help Bitty catch a fish.  Another time soon, I hope, but for this trip, all dreams and wishes were fulfilled.

Thanks Burnetts!

Side Note: should I be disturbed at how completely enthused Stomper was to plunge his pocketknife into the brain of the fish?  It was his favorite part!  Was that too graphic?  Sorry....

The Ring

People ask me a lot how my mother is doing.  It's a really tough question to answer because everyone wants to hear something positive and encouraging.  Mom is going downhill, there is no way around that.  True, she is still overall a very cheerful person and tries very hard to connect to all her family members and friends though she is definitely getting foggy about how everyone fits into her puzzle.  She still knows us and that is great.  For now.  The way Alzheimer's goes, that will leave eventually too.  I've been wanting to write for a long time about it, and I just haven't known how to put the words together.  And then suddenly it all came tumbling out in a poem.  Here it is.


Star Sapphire


A ring is on my finger
Slender sliver circle
Oval of blue clutched by
Tiny empty claws 
Where chips of diamonds once winked
Long ago lost to the daily jostles of mother’s hands

My favorite part: a star
Hidden in the depths of the sapphire 
Flashing only when tipped just so in the light

It was a gift to me
A gift given awkwardly
Passed suddenly over a cafe table
No birthday, no parting words
Or “remember me by”
Just,
“Here.  
You should have this. 
It was a gift from my father.”

Surely my mother, with her sudden bestowing
Could not have known that 
Even then
She was striding so surely towards her descent 
Into the clouding oblivion of disease

What little voice whispered to her 
That this was the time?
The time to slip it off,
Look at it once more,
And with a quick polish of the thumb
Press it into my palm?

This ring,
It is a token
An anchor
A key to the secret entrance of time’s erasing:

There I am, leaning on the kitchen counter

The dirt of a summer day still smudging my face
Watching my mother’s hands hustle and whip over bread dough
The click of her ring as she rolled and shaped
Was the only solid sound in that mass of softness

And there I am, sagging at her side
Perching crookedly on her bench,
Leaning into the warmth of her as she played the piano,
Her ring adding a percussion of clack-on-key with every ring-finger note.

These visits to myself are brief but so solid
In memory all is yellow light
So warm it seems to gather everything closer
I see her hands; certain. efficient. warm.

Now they are flighty, unsettled, thin.  Cool.
I look for my mother in those cloudy eyes
Which hardly meet my searching gaze
I find little reminder of dough or music or warmth

So I bake bread
I sit at the piano 
I run my hands over the counter
And against a mixing bowl
Through all the daily jostles of a mother’s hands
My children lean into me
My sapphire winks
I hear a familiar little clack
And there is my anchor 
Holding in my mind
The remembrance that though she is not so now

My mother once was my mother.

Why I Love YouTube

Before I expound on the virtues of YouTube, I just have to share one little thing. Today is Thursday. My dear hubby Troy has been on a business trip since Sunday night. I made a big list that evening of everything I wanted to accomplish while he was gone. Checking things off my to-do list is one of the ways I get really really happy, so I thought it would help me get through the week. One of these things was to complete a blog entry each day. I, like always, have a long list of blog entries to get to eventually and I thought my quiet evenings would be a great time to start my best blogging month ever. And I have one thing to say about how that went:


BWA HA HA HA HA HA What was I on when I thought I would write MORE rather than LESS when Troy was gone?

Yeah, not a lot of blogging going on here. Oh well, one is better than nothing, right?

Oh yeah, one more little thing. Remember how I decided I wanted to make my blog private? I never got around to doing it and now I've changed my mind. Thanks everyone who let me know they cared about the blog enough to be on my list. I just had a bad little experience with a naughty website that I thought was connecting to my blog and was then accessible by any visitors to my blog. This, I don't think, is true, but if you see anything fishy please let me know. Sometimes the internet is the best and sometimes it really sucks. But since writing this blog has actually helped me connect with some old friends and reach new people too I didn't want to make it inaccessible after all.

It's late at night and I think I might be rambling. What was the title of this entry again? Oh yeah, YouTube!

And now I'm realizing that this is probably just more stuff that no one will care about but me. Oh well!

So back in high school, back in the day when the national pastime of teenagers was to make mix-tapes, I got just such a tape from my sister's boyfriend. (Now THERE'S a story for another day.....) (And in case you are freaking out about that, it remains true that my sister and I have never kissed the same person so no worries there.) ANYWAY. I got this great mix tape. And it had these two songs on it by Colin Hay, the lead singer of Men At Work. One was called "Hold Me" and the other was called "Can I Hold You?" (Apparently the man really needed a hug.) I loved these two songs dearly. But sadly, my little mix-tape went the way of all mix tapes. It probably got all its ribbon pulled out by a dirty tape player or a curious little brother, or maybe my tape player broke and I never got a new one because I had so many CDs already. (SO 90's.)

I missed those songs though! And I never forgot about them. Every few years I have looked around a little in CD stores or online and have never found them. Even when the miracle of iTunes came along - finally, I could just buy one song instead of a whole album I wasn't sure I'd like! - I couldn't find these two songs. Anywhere. Probably someone could tell me in 2 seconds where to find them but with my limited abilities I have gotten nowhere.

Then the other night I had a little idea. Look on YouTube! And although I can't exactly take songs off of YouTube and put them on my playlist, I can listen to them. And as I listen, watch their slightly odd (even for the 80's) videos.

Thanks, YouTube. Here are the links - having trouble posting the actual videos. Maybe I can fix that later but if I don't post this now I will totally fail in my effort to cross "Blog ANYTHING!" off my to-do list.

http://youtu.be/OEc7868QlYA

http://youtu.be/BDj_rRcPhJg

Sun Worshipers After All

For all that Troy and I declare that we could never live in St. George, we sure do spend a lot of effort trying to get down there.

I am sure this has a lot to do with the fact we are currently striving to get through Salt Lake's crummiest season - Sheri reminded me that in 2013 we made something like 6 trips to St. George and all of them happened in the first four months of the year.  Maybe one in the late fall, I can't remember.  But once April hits the land of Dixie, we don't go there much any more!  (I'm sure I don't have those numbers quite right, but it's true, the earlier in the year it is the harder we try to visit Peter and Co.)

So far in 2014 we have made two trips south.  The first was in January over Martin Luther King Jr. Weekend.  We probably would have gone anyway but since Peter and Sheri would be blessing their new baby Iva Matilda, of course we had to go.  It was still pretty chilly but the air was so clear and fresh.  We were able to go just as the peak of inversion season was hitting Salt Lake.  (Getting back was a little depressing - the inversion stuck around for a long time this year although we all remember last year being much worse.)

Time to pass on the name of Bundle to one more deserving?

 The city of St. George has put together a delightful new children's museum.  It's free, so you have to get there early before the crowds roll in.  I found it to be clever and charming.

Oma and Apa came down and really enjoyed getting their hands on wee Iva:

So did I, for that matter:

In the first week of February I had some free tickets to a UofU women's gymnastics meet.  The Romneys love going and I admit that I need to take my family more often.  Of course this warranted a trip to our house for Peter and the gang.  For some reason, we just don't get sick of hanging out!  We had another lovely weekend although the grownups are all learning that it's harder than it used to be to stay up late watching stand-up comedy on Netflix and chatting till the wee hours - we're too dang old and tired!

The best (sorry,,, WORST) part about our fun, rainy, umbrella-toting trip to the zoo was that Bitty had been dying for her own umbrella and even saved up money to get one for herself.  We stopped at the store on our way up there so she could pick one out.  These are such happy pictures of her with her new umbrella - she had used the umbrella for a total of 10 minutes at this point.  I didn't take pictures of the incident that occurred not ten minutes later where, in here umbrella-joy she started spinning Gene Kelly style and the umbrella was blasted completely inside out bending most of the little metal arms.  That was a very sad Bitty.  Very sad.  Weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.

It was the very next weekend that the kids had a day off of school for Presidents Day so.....why not go back to St. George?  Oh my gosh, it was so lovely.  We were SO LAZY.  We talked about going for hikes and walks and doing fun stuff....but the kids were so happy playing out in their backyard that we just let them.  Stomper was even lucky enough to have a friend going down the same weekend - a really sweet kid who has three little sisters and a baby brother.  He needs boy time as much as Stomper does.  They kindly invited him over one day and Stomper had several hours of boy
time with his buddy which was wonderful.

Okay, okay, on the last morning we were there we actually DID leave the house and go for a stroll on the red rocks.

We're thinking we'd better sneak in one more trip before the heat really hits....

Outings

One of my favorite gift ideas for the kids this year was an outing for each of them with either Troy or me. The kids seemed happy but not head-over-heels thrilled when they opened their envelopes announcing their individual activities - I don’t know what it was I was hoping for - screaming? Jumping up and down? Smothering me with kisses and weeping? Something like that, I guess. They were definitely happy and said as much with a, “that’s great, thanks!” kind of thing. The shiny packages still under the tree waiting to be unwrapped were definitely more enticing than the thought of a future outing. But I’ll tell you what, when the outings actually happened, they paid off. They were really really fun.

After our return from our trip to Seattle, Stomper cashed his in almost immediately. We got back early early in the morning on January 2nd, and we slept in late. We had a lazy day of tidying up and hanging out at home. About two in the afternoon he let us know that he needed to use his coupon right away and that was fine with me. (Side note: I think he is more upset by the condition of his grandmother than his sisters are and I could tell he needed some one-on-one time with a parent for some emotional cuddling. Sweet kid.) His outing was to go out to eat at a restaurant and get crab legs, his absolute favorite food on earth. He picked his father to go, which made me happy although it’s funny that I’m the one who loves sea food, not Troy. No problem, though, daddy-son time is vital. They went out and just enjoyed all the crab they could eat and all the together time they wanted. I’m so glad they went.

Then on the Saturday before school started back up I took Bitty for her outing - not an expensive one but one that she had been begging for since the first snowflake fell…whenever that was. It was so long ago and today was so warm and sunny it was practically spring so I don’t remember. Anyway. I took her iceskating. I was nervous to do this - I am not a, uh…particularly strong skater myself, and the thought of being very wobbly while helping a kid up after falling over and over and over didn’t sound very fun. But guess what. Bitty was awesome. She didn’t fall a single time. She absolutely loved it and I loved taking her and I can’t wait to do it again. I guess I’d better hurry - it’s almost March!

And now, a terrible confession. Bundle’s gift was an outing to the children’s museum. And guess who hasn’t taken her yet.

Bad mommy. Bad girl.

I will take her, I swear! Just as soon as I’m caught up on this blog. And I’m getting closer. Hey…I’m already all the way through the first week of January and it’s not even March yet!!

Seattle and a Learning Experience. Alzheimer's is the Worst.

I think the very idea of tackling this post has been one of the reasons the blogging has not really been flowing lately.  It's just been a big block in my way that I haven't been able to get around, over or through.  And I haven't wanted to give up on it.  I just really want to get this down but I have to warn you, I don't think it's going to be very pretty.  But I am going to do this TONIGHT or PERISH.

So, I guess I'll just start at the beginning.

A few weeks before Christmas I was feeling really bad for my dad.  Taking care of my mom, who's Alzheimer's disease is markedly advancing, is a tough never-ending job.  It just wrings you out.  This topic of what exactly is so hard is too vast for me to express adequately even in a face-to-face conversation with someone, not to mention in just a few sentences in a blog.  I will not attempt it.  Let's just leave it at this:  when a loved one is suffering from a terminal illness it is heart breaking.  Add to that the fact that it is a sometimes decades-long process.  Add to that the fact that it is your loved one's mind being affected and thus much about them changes and deteriorates into someone you don't really recognize.  Add to that your own emotional tangles and hangups and hidden hurts that you run into through the process and....there you have it. Alzheimer's. Sheesh I'm depressing myself even talking about it.  It's just the pits.

So I felt like my dad really needed a break. At the very same time, I was feeling like getting out of town right after Christmas might help with the post-holiday blues that seem to overtake me every year.  At the very same time, I was thinking of how much I miss my brother Adam and his family and how much I love the North West.  So many thoughts converging!  How wonderful  - let's take mom with us on a trip to see her son and grandkids!  She'll love it, dad will get a rest, and we'll get to get away.

From now on, I will always think of this collision of fabulous ideas more as the Perfect Storm (or possibly the Bermuda Triangle) rather than some type of serendipitous timing.

You see, we had travelled with my mother to St. George the previous February and though it was a little challenging, it did work.  We were able to give my dad a break and help mom enjoy seeing grandkids.  She did spend a lot of time trying to do Sheri's dishes and occasionally getting into the wrong person's bed in the middle of the night when she got lost, but these were not insurmountable obstacles.  We could totally do this.

Except we couldn't.

We didn't really realize how much had changed for my mom in a year and how unable she was to orient herself to reality without her anchor, my dad, there at her side to guide her. We made several discoveries about her abilities, or should I say INabilities, that basically  added up to me feeling like I broke my mom.  The poor woman.  She was mostly okay during the day, though of course needed constant supervision, redirection, support and direction.  I even entered the exciting world of helping my parent bathe and making sure she was eating and drinking.  It was when she got tired in the evenings that things got bad and total confusion overpowered her. She woke up 20 times a night looking for my dad. She forgot my name in the night time.  It got to the point of extreme paranoia, fear and misunderstanding of anything going on.  Nothing we said could comfort her or change her thinking.  Everything from believing that dad wasn't there because he was off having an affair, to being frightened of me, calling me creepy, and feeling certain that I was taking her by force to an insane asylum. THAT was a lovely feeling, I'll tell ya.  (Still having PTSD just so you know.)  (Not kidding.)

Not. Fun.

We learned a lot.  Mostly that my mom can not be comfortably separated from my dad and that she is farther along this road than we thought.  I will say that it was extremely tender to see how much she loves and depends on my dad.  When she got a chance to speak with him on the phone, his was the only voice she would listen to, and gaining reassurance from him filled her with joy and happiness.  It was quite a thing to see.  I have never felt such relief as I did at 2:00 in the morning upon our arrival home (we cut the trip short and booked it home as fast as our minivan could carry us) to see my father in our driveway, waiting to welcome his wife into his arms, take her away from her scary kids and reassure her of her safety and belovedness.

And now that I have gotten out of my system the yuck aspect of our trip to Seattle, I would like to talk about the wonderful parts.

I deeply love my siblings.  I am so grateful for them and for my darling sisters-in-law.  I wish I lived closer to both of my brothers.  I admire their fathering and what they are doing with their lives.  My cup is filled to brimming when I watch my kids with their cousins.  That was definitely the highlight of this trip; sitting back and letting the kids just play their hearts out.  Artwork, go carts, walks on the beach, a ton of hot chocolate at the local bakery, ice cream, dress ups, baths...oh yeah.  The BEST was when Bundle and her counterpart Rosey made a sheepish appearance in the kitchen, Bundle with her hair absolutely PLASTERED with hair gel.  Rosey proudly announced that she had given her cousin a makeover.  When they saw our faces, Bundle leaned over to Rosey and whispered, "I TOLD you we were going to get in trouble!"  That had us laughing our way right up to the bathtub where we made an attempt to de-gel Bundle.  Her hair stayed pretty crispy for the rest of the trip despite our efforts.

Anyway, despite the challenges of the trip, I truly was so happy to see my family and to enjoy a part of the country I love so much.

These pictures are pretty out-of-order but I'm not up to trying to switch them around.  Let's just get this entry posted and off my plate!

Troy found a car with its own little moss-garden on the windshield

Our drive up there was so foggy and frozen - this is about the only view we had for most of the drive!

The happy crew on our drive

The ride on the ferry is always a highlight.

Oh my gosh, this baby is such a sweet kid.  I miss him!!

THE GEL-DOO.

Whit was so sweet about letting the littles help her bake a cake

Troy and I got to sneak away one evening for our 16th anniversary.  We ate tasty Indian food and saw Philomena - a great movie that was kind of hard to watch.  

My girls' curls LOVE Bainbridge Island

On New Year's Eve we stayed up and let the kids watch The Sound of Music for the first time

Attempting to remove the gel

The girls were outside so much we almost never saw them - they LOVED these go-carts!