Scarred By Love

At first glance, my demographic can be sized up pretty quickly - middle class, suburban, modest, white woman. Labels have always defined me. But as Kierkegaard said, "once you label me, you negate me." I think that's why I love my tattoo.

My crowd would assume I must have had a roaring drunk moment in my youth, or that I am a loose woman prone to impulsiveness, not giving much thought to permanence.

But my tattoo is not a novelty. It is holy ground. It was etched by one worth dying for; it symbolizes one worth living for. It hails a four year old child, my grandson Parker, who died two years ago from a tragic fall from a two story window.

My son and I were stunned in grief. I needed a way to touch that place; to touch it together with him. We had danced around his profession, a tattoo artist. I had come to accept his artistry and vocational community, but I hadn't yet found a way to embrace it that said, "bless you my son."

A few days after Parker's death, steeped in sorrow, aching the loss of my grandchild and the brokenness of my son, I found the touching place. Stroking the inside of my wrist, I knew I had found the place to meet my son, the place to connect in a combination of ink, tears, and hearts.

He designed it for me; he etched it as we clung together in love and loss, remembering a precious little boy who giggled his way into our lives and left his mark in our souls.

Yes; I am scarred with an eternal stain - the stain of Holy love.

Bless you my son(s).

Last Choice

NOTE: This entry is fiction. It's the result of a writing assignment from the Tolovana Arts Colony writing group I've linked into - an exercise titled "If this were your last day, how would you spend it?"

It is NOT autobiographical. However, as a novice fiction writer I am drilled to "write what I know." So, though I draw from life as I know it, and while this is not a real incident nor are these characters real people, I have to admit if you know my life, some things are, I apologize...so very familiar. I like how a classmate and new friend puts it (citing Joyce Carol Oates) - "I'll tell you my truth, but it will come out as fiction."

At some point, I hope to become skilled enough in fiction that nothing I write is recognizable; except what is universally human. And there we are. All in the same camp.


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She knew this was her day.

Yes, there'd be more days ahead, but they would become clouded, vaporous. This was her day that she chose for herself, while she still could. Choice had become her most sacred companion. This friendship with self-design had become...how could she explain it? Delicious. Yes; that was it - sumptuous; delectable; sensuous even. This time there was no default; no fall-back plan-B arranged around appeasement, the safe-guarding of others' needs at all costs. This was about pure, unadulterated self-comfort. And it was luscious.

Like the melty, chocolaty, marshmallow-gooey graham cracker mess sticking to her grandchildren's fingers as they leaned into the campfire, setting their smore-ish concoctions ablaze. They were cherubic, those fingers. She wanted to lick them, to keep forever in her mouth the taste of babies, toddler-hood story time, rocking and singing together in the big gold chair, racing through the play-ground monkey-bars playing tag-you're-it, squeezes and giggles and wrap-their-scrawny-little-arms-around-her-neck hugs that stole her breath and heart.

"Mom. How you doin'? Are you warm enough?" Mark reached over and tucked the blanket tighter around her.

He looked at her, his eyes soft, but straight on. He always made sure they connected. Even at times when it would've been easier not to, he did. She looked up at him and once again they smiled at each other deeply, as if to reassure each others' soul; to reassure their own.

"I'm doing great, honey."

She leaned back in her chair digging her toes deeper into the sand and gazed up at the Dipper. Earlier Venus had been the show, had hung brilliant and solitary, dancing for the longest time between light and dark; between indigo and tangerine, sky and horizon, chasing the sun, changing partners, but now, rollicking among the crystalline chorus-line - a part of an incandescent anthem. She understood this Venus-dance; she was coming to know this song. She took a deep breath and inhaled the notes.

And there they were: the campfire; the sea; the sand; her children and grandchildren, their voices as aroma penetrating her senses clean through to her cells. Their laughter now, around the campfire - a love potion.

"Mom, remember the time...," Leigh was laughing so hard she couldn't finish. Her luxurious doe-eyes, those eyes that seemed to behold and reflect wisdom, that could shimmer mischief, that could ooze love right back onto itself, were now crinkled in tears and whimsy. Leigh was pulling her youngest son, Samuel, onto her lap, wrapping her arms around him and burying her laughter into the nape of Samuel's neck.

She could smell that neck with Leigh.

"You guys were so mean," said Scott. "Giving me head-swishies in the toilet. I was a little kid! Freakin' scared me to death."

He drooped his eyes, pouted his lips way out and despite his tattoos and dangling cigarette, managed to look every inch the innocent. But he couldn't stifle glee; couldn't hinge a mirth rescued from flames, re-born from angst, and throwing his head back he cackled from such a deep and lavish place that everyone around the campfire was captured with him; even the little ones joined in, their giggles like harmonized tinkling bells. His laugh was contagious, just like his spirit.

"Aww; come on little brother...we weren't really mean. That's just, you know, sibling protocol," said Mark, his laugh deep and long, like a sigh that had waited a long time, and now reveled in its release and goodness. He saluted Scott with his beer.

Scott raised his, which sent all the grown-ups into motion.

"Here's to us," said Leigh, raising her wine glass.

"To us," they chorused.

Yes, she thought, to us.

There were a lot choices they had all made through the years. Choices that made them who they were. Some choices came from places that drove them; drove them to survive; to just make it through. Some came from recoil; some were scripted; and some, yes by God, some were freely decided - rationally, deliberately, selected in grace.

Her daughter-in-law leaned over and whispered to her,

"This is so fun. I'm glad you planned it."

"Yes. Me too, sweetie."

She felt her scarf start to slip off her head, felt the chill actually, and reached up to adjust herself against the night. Her fingers brushed the scar in her naked scalp, but she refused their usual impulse to linger. She knew its line by heart. No need. Not now. No.

The fire popped. Its glow warming the remaining strands of night. They were all there, around the campfire - warming the night with her.

"Gramma?"

"Yes, darlin'."

"My fingers sticky."

She looked at them.

"Ohhhh, yes they are!" she said, as she cupped Samuel's hand, licking his fingers, savoring the gooey messiness of love, sending him into squeals of laughter as he wriggled away.

"Nah, nah. Can't catch me Gramma!"

"Oh yes I can! You better run, Samuel. Gramma's gonna catch you and eat those tasty little fingers right up!"

And she leapt out of her chair, chasing Samuel beside the dune.

Yes. While there was still a dusky campfire light.

Yes. While the sea hummed; while the sky glittered.

Yes.

To us.

Yes.

Finding the Sweet Spot

I have a favorite spot in my kitchen, an area where I end up. It's the place where I saute, where I watch the evening news, where I gaze out the window, where I often stand and eat my meals. I call it the sweet spot.

This summer two of my dearest friends (I call them "the girls") came out from New Jersey to visit. They gave me a writing journal - a purple-ish, floral, ribbon-tied book with an elegant pen. I dubbed it "Musings from the Sweet Spot," and propped it within easy reach on the counter between my radio and wine rack. But I haven't had any particular musings to jot down while occupying that space. I tend to hear my muse as I walk the beach -

.....until the other day.

Lately I have been re-figuring my days, trying to get a sense of how to shape my daily life since my job(s) have been gradually pared down from three to one, from three-quarter-time to half-time, to quarter-time, to no time. The summer economy at the coast has whittled away my employment; has shaken loose my self-created structure - my sense of order and purpose to each day. I have enough post-divorce support to manage for a while, I am not panic-struck, but I am uncomfortable with this "non-productive" freedom. I find myself needing to qualify; to quantify; to fill this space responsibly.

So, at the Sweet Spot I am contemplating - how should I re-do my resume....I need to start net-working....gotta make sure I keep up with the local bi-monthly classifieds....how's this gonna work, Carol.....

.....when I hear Love, in the tenderest tone say, "You have been spurning Me."

And I am struck - with awe at the gentleness; dumbfounded by the statement; curious of the meaning. I know this voice; instantly. I know this Lover; this One who woos me in the sunsets; cradles me in the soft sand, enfolding me in dunes like a warm blanket. I know this One, and I cry out - "Spurning You? Oh, I am so sorry! How have I been spurning You?"

Now, it's hard to explain how a nanosecond can contain chapters of meaning; how instantaneously scenes flash into cognitive view, connect to deep desires, and make sense. Some call it revelation. For there it all was - in Love's reply:

....."I love meeting you in The Writing; I love to hear your voice."

And there it was - in the flash of unspoken desires, oh how I wish I could write; how I wish I could live at the beach; how I wish I could find my voice. There it was in a burst of recall - the support of family, the affirmation from friends, most recently from writer Mike Burgess, "Carol, if you keep hearing you're a horse, then it's time to get the saddle." There it was in an explosion of purport - the years of journaling, the closed employment doors, the available house, the financial means, the beach spread before me like an avenue to my heart. In a gasp I knew - knew why I ached for my core; knew that I had shoved it away; knew that my core was a chamber designed for communion, to be written in the language of Love.

Oh, yes; I have spurned You. I have treated this gift of space and time too casually. I have tried to minimize Your voice, though You have yearned powerfully within me. You have ached for me; ached for me to express; ached for me to write. And I have been aching for You.

And there it all was....

....my Core; uncovered at the Sweet Spot.

A Picasso-ian Family Portrait

My family is attempting to re-assemble. It feels like a Picasso.

There's a leg over here; a cracked face hanging over there; broken composition lines, un-tethered figures floating around with no clear spatial relation to one another. All the familiar pieces are there (though looking strangely unfamiliar) within the composition. But fitting them together in a familiar way has been obliterated like a mega-bomb.

Some Picasso canvases are soaked in color, bleeding passion like the slap of a furious lover. But this one, Guernica, is black and white, creating a different kind of slap. It's like a shock of cold water that startles you into sobriety. Guernica is a portrait of horror - the horror of violence, chaos, war. Some wars are political; some are within ourselves, flailed out on family ground. We see the wounded, the maimed laying strewn; grasping, arching for rescue and placement. We see bullish monsters and groaning steeds; but more than anything we see madness.

Next week my children, grandchildren, myself, and (here I go again, attempting an appropriate label I'm comfortable with) my former spouse (the father and grandfather of these mutual offspring) are getting together in our first post-divorce vacation-like thing. Now, to say that we're ALL getting together at the same time and place is a stretch. Various arrangements of us will be together at various times, but there will be a few over-lapping instances when most of us will be together. The planning of this vacation-like thing has already gone through several drafts, been sabotaged in a grenade-like implosion, reconstructed with smudgy lines that could dribble off the page any moment, yet is still attempting to wobble forward. We are desperately trying to reconnect, to reconstitute some kind of family beyond semblance. We want to be together; we just don't know what together is. And, there is still a lot of bleeding on the field. We are all, still, very raw.

We are struggling to gather onto this post-bombed canvas - to hang onto a portrait. All families have those studio-portrait moments of assemblage - the arrangement of tall to short, girl to boy, which baby is upon whose lap, whose hand is on which shoulder....now smile. There is a placement; a kind of artistic structure, no matter how arranged, which says - we are family. Walk in any office or cubicle and from across the room in a glance, you know exactly what that framed, matted, people-grouping is hanging on the wall - it's a family portrait. It says this is the collective from which I come; which places me; of which I am. This is us; this is me.

When I look at Guernica I feel it more than see it. Frankly, I don't know what the heck I'm looking at. But I can feel it. I feel the bombastic lack of structure - like jagged glass it tears at my sense of order and sanity. I don't feel safe in it's shadow. I feel the vapid loss of color and life, a canvas screaming for a gigantic crayon swatch, while declaring at the same time how this sallow pallor is perfectly appropriate. It feels drained of warmth. There are no soft lines, and I feel that too; the angular, weirdly juxtaposed planes shoving me off footing. I feel my arms flailing, flapping at something, anything. I feel the pain, the angst, the horror, not only as my own, but as ours; us - sprawled disjointed across the canvas. I feel us groping, clawing at pieces, trying to create some kind of composition that says something about us other than we are a flayed out mess. Some kind of assemblage that says, we ARE still family; we are more than the horror.

And perhaps,
this is the redemptive point of a Picasso.

"Then Peeled the Bells..."

I just heard Harry Belafonte singing this - slowly, prayerfully.
It made me cry;
and then, it made me hope.

Kind of like a psalm....a soulful expression that does not minimize human tragedy, violence, pain, sorrow, injustice, but.....it doesn't leave you there. While it stirs hope, incites a redemptive stance, it doesn't white-wash reality. It lets both stand, side by side - broken reality and redemptive hope. We get to choose how to align ourselves....each and every day; with each and every action. Both are true. Like the incarnation - God and man, occupying the same space.


"I heard the bells on Christmas day
their old familiar carols play;
and wild and sweet the words repeat
of peace on earth goodwill to men.

"I thought, as now this day had come,
the belfries of all Christendom
had rung so long the unbroken song
of peace on earth goodwill to men.

"And in despair I bowed my head.
There is no peace on earth, I said.
For hate is strong and mocks the song
of peace on earth goodwill to men.

"Then peeled the bells more loud and deep.
God is not dead, nor doth he sleep.
The wrong shall fail; the right prevail
with peace on earth goodwill to men."


Hopeful Christmas to you all.
May we choose - purposefully; incarnationally.
Ring a redemptive bell.

Seaside Hope, Bedside Panic

Good grief. How quickly hope fades to anxiety.

I walk the beach, am inspired by brilliance - laughing gulls; the breeze-kissed top of a softly curling wave; velvet sand. I'm soothed, cradled. I can breathe deep. God, it's been so long since I've been able to take a deep breath. The kind that's just a part of living; not the kind that comes in sighs that just can't get down there and empty things out - that shallow kind of grasp. Deep breathing is.....peaceable. It's like a floating helium-filled balloon. And yesterday, I was a dirigible. Not a hot-air balloon, but a flat out Goodyear blimp.

I soared. I could believe in anything and everything. I did not feel speck-like next to oceanic vastness, but rather, largess infused me. Tidal rhythm became my own pulse. I felt tethered to Creation - to a Sea-Mother pumping umbilical cord Life, inflating my very cells. Of course! Now I could see it. Dreams were the point; hope was the avenue. The present absurdity of my life was irrelevant. In this incubator of Creation, nothing was impossible.

And then I went inside.

Moving into the routine of tending - clicking on the TV, chopping tomatoes, setting my plate - helium started hissing. The Dream of a few hours ago now seemed so, fantastical, ridiculous, impossible. What the heck am I doing? This is reality, Carol. You are living over a garage, for Pete's sake. You need a job. You are 57 - you are aging; you gotta figure how you're going to take care of yourself. You are crazy! This is not the stuff of dreams, this is plain ol' husbandry - roof over your head, food on the table, an occasional trip to the beauty salon.

By the time I crawled into bed, a heavy-duty, northwest coastal storm began whipping and screaming outside. Like a startled child, I pulled the covers over my head to muff out the squalls and I heard instead, my own muffled cry. A panicked tantrum, insisting on battle lines - that something's got to win out. It's either hopes and dreams, or practical reality. I want the soaring of hope to banish the fear of an uncertain life. I want the dream to rub out the storm. I don't want the storm. I don't want the storm.

But this morning, the storm is still here....raging in gusts over 70 miles an hour. I pull up the shades and face the howls, and realize - both are true. Storms and dreams. Practicality and hope. Fear and peace. Husbandry and provision.

Now the question - how to live the paradox? How to live out a redemptive dream in the midst of a storm-ravaged dwelling?