The Birthday Party

Relaxing in the evening in our wet bathing suits after an evening swim to cool down from another day of relentless heat, my husband and I revisited the 2012 James Bond movie, starring Daniel Craig, "Skyfall". Somehow, this time around, the figure of Raul Silva, played by Xavier Bardem, left a deep impression on me.The Spanish actor portrays a former MI 6 operative, out for revenge against his mother who betrayed him, a role played by Dame Judi Dench . My dreams often take me where during waking hours I would hesitate to go, so last night I had a dream where I visited my estranged brother in Texas. Interestingly, my brother's hair in the dream was dyed the same yellow colour of the character Xavier Bardem was playing in "Skyfall". That definitely was intriguing, considering my brother took take of my mother the last 2 years of her life, and Xavier Bardem plays a man desperate to torment and kill his mother who betrayed him. My mother betrayed me, and as a result I became estranged from her and my brother, who was by then my only surviving sibling. So, to see my brother in a dream, as a younger version of himself, looking like the Raul Silva character, and sporting the character's yellow hair, set the stage for an emotionally tense and conflicting dream script. The setting of the dream was a large, modern and luxuriously furnished condo with large bay windows where my brother and an apparent male room mate lived. My brother was holding a large birthday party for his daughter who looked about eight in the dream. He had at least a dozen children invited, along with their parents, and had set up a very fancy dessert table loaded with fancy cupcakes and a huge cake that looked custom made. His daughter looked so happy, and all the children were having a great time. I remember tasting one of the large cupcakes loaded with sprinkles and cream, and it tasted delicious. I remember smiling as I bit into it. My brother seemed both proud and relaxed. We sat next to each other for a while, and I told him he should come visit me some time soon. He did not answer, but seemed to look away into the distance. He smiled, but it was a distant smile, born more out of politeness than concern or emotion. I remember crying at one point. He was not mean or cold, just indifferent, which seems to be pretty accurate as far as our actual non- relationship goes. I told him he should read my memoir on Amazon, " Lioness in exile", and especially the story I did on him called " The Mallard", which recalls his love of birds and ducks as a child, based on the visit of a mallard in our pool a few winters back, and the longing it unleashed for my brother, and the pain of having lost him. My brother did not seem to hear me, which only added a deeper layer of both meaning and poetic melancholy to the dream. I woke up feeling I wanted to relive the dream, and relishing remembering the details and mood. The dream ended with me leaving the condo, catching a glimpse of its beautiful large stained glass bay windows as the setting sun cast a glow of warm light on the happy birthday celebration. 

Tropical Heat

The grass smells like wet rain this morning, and the scent reminds me of wet hay in summer after a surprise shower, a scent that brings back the fields around my village when I was growing up. The relentless heat the past weeks seems to change things , emotionally and socially. I am living in my bathing suit, as the temperatures continue to rise, and peaked at 92 Fahrenheit yesterday. I almost burned my bare feet yesterday afternoon as I was crossing the patio tiles to go swimming. The soft feel of the dry, hot grass felt like a massage compared to the searingly hot tiles. The water in the pool just soaks my body and soul with relief, and I love walking around in my wet suit in my bare, wet feet in the house, pleasantly chilled to the bone as the window fans blow cooling air through the house. The house is dusty from the air the fans bring in, the floor is wet and the dog adds her wet paw prints from rolling around in her own little pool, to get some relief from the beating down sun. The house feels like a small beach house, wet towels everywhere, wet bathing suits. I soak my hair to keep my head cool, and do not towel dry after I get out of the pool. The added chill keeps me comfortable until I am all dry again, and go swim again and again, drinking cold water all day to stay hydrated. The houses here, built on Scandinavian models inspired by the largely Nordic 19th century immigrants in the area, are made of wood frames and absorb the heat like sponges. If the summers increasingly keep getting hotter, I wonder if builders will have to switch to brick and mortar to ward off the challenges of overheated wooden houses. I think back of being a child in Belgium. We had a large custom built pool, full of ice cold water, as my father funnily did not want to spend the money on a heater for his fancy pool. We lived in that thing anyway, and would swim until our lips were purple and our teeth rattled with the cold. Our nanny would make hot chocolate and as soon as we were warmed up, we  would go back in the pool. For all the subliminal stress the hot weather here creates, mostly some irritation trying to keep the house below 80 Fahrenheit, which usually fails, even with all the window fans on maximum capacity, and the stress of the always on the verge of being resolved issue of when to install central air conditioning, I love the heat,because of the casual attitudes it invokes. BBQ dinners, ice cream every night for dessert, fresh berries from our garden, and fresh squash and beans, snap peas and green beans, living in bathing suits, wet hair and towels. It is a perpetual beach vacation in our own backyard. All the neighbours are out in their front yards in flip flops and shorts, no one cares what they look like in their bathing suits, everyone is united in the cause to stay as comfortable as possible in this scorching heat. People walk outside in their swim trunks to go check the mail, the men pause to chat in their shirtless jeans while mowing the lawn, women walking to the neighbourhood pool down the street in their over sized middle age bellies wrapped in towels and sporting large summer hats, their spouses trekking behind them in dark sunglasses and Hawaiian print baggy swim trunks, grand kids clattering along with pool toys and brightly colored swim gear. Humanity on display in all their comical flaws, off to enjoy a cooling swim on a hot day, united in the pursuit of happiness as they see it on a summer weekend day, as the hot sun overhead seems to melt not only assumptions about the summer weather, but also about clocks, schedules,and our obsession with filling every moment of time tied to them.

The Eulogy

I had just finished watering the garden, trying to beat the heat. I had gone swimming in our pool, relishing that it was still completely in the shade , as it was late morning, and the sun would not hit the water until about noon. At 68 degrees Fahrenheit, the water felt delicious after having the sun beat down on me for close to an hour, getting water to all the flowers, veggies and fruit bushes. I knew President Obama was about to give the eulogy for the Reverend Clementa Pinckney in Charleston, South Carolina. I was impressed by what I heard. The president touched on the sore issue of unresolved racism in this country, and on the brave history of the black church in the US, a history that is intrinsically connected to the fight against prejudice and discrimination and the long battle for civil rights from the days of slavery to today. It is a history rich in heart and strength, politically and spiritually. The President praised Rev. Pinckney for his commitment to his community, for his heart and wisdom, his dedication and his unwavering faith, and how the murderer had failed to instill fear and division, as the black community came together in a spirit of forgiveness, believing love and forgiveness trump evil any day. The President dealt next with the issue of the Confederate flag, and said it was a symbol of a war that was fought for the wrong reasons, since it was in the name of perpetuating slavery, which he called " the original sin of our nation." He talked about the need for better education and training for our police officers, to avoid the temptation of prejudice towards black men in the judicial system. He brought up the need for honest dialogue about the undercurrent of prejudice that affects opportunities for blacks in the work force, and the threat to voting rights. He called on the need for sensible gun laws, before calling on grace as a gift from God that should propel us a nation towards action on all these issues. It was a stirring, bold,heartfelt intelligent message, as the president finished by expressing the wish that God may continue to bless the "UNITED" with great emphasis on the word, the UNITED States of America, in other words, a united, not divided against itself, country. I hope this wonderful eulogy will translate into some noticeable action on Capitol Hill. Together with the announcement that the Supreme Court had just decided that gay marriage is legal now in all 50 states, today is an amazing day in the history of the nation I call my own.   

The Carry - On

It was a glorious morning, one of those perfect early summer mornings with plenty of sun and just the right touch of a sweetly scented breeze. My husband was outside watering our abundance of brightly coloured flowers. He was looking all relaxed barefoot in his shorts and without a shirt. I was happy to see him checking on our garden before he was to take off on a 5 day short trip to Nevada to visit his mother and two younger brothers for their mother's 90th Birthday. At this point in the juncture, the trip was sure to be fraught with emotional challenges and tensions, dealing with a mother in denial about her age and how that stubbornness weighed down and frustrated her three sons. To see my husband Michael walk around his garden was touching, it was clear he'd just as soon stay home, as from previous experiences his mother rarely listened to his and his brothers' solid advice on matters of diet, socialization and money. Issues with her were resolved at a snail's pace. The whole thing over the years reminded me of a noir western. But, for now, Michael was happily eying his sunflowers growing steadily taller in the heat. He was pleased with the progress of growth of the squash and cucumber and tomatoes, beans and snap peas. The Fuchsia and Morning Glory were multiplying in blossoms it seemed each day, looking like brightly coloured jewels mixed in with the fruit bushes and veggies. Michael was walking around all the flowers watering each flower and plant lovingly, like he was taking leave of them until he was to return on Friday. It made me smile. Thinking of this garden would get him through the possible rough spots of his visit. Michael is not a man of many words, but the way he was taking leave of his garden this morning was like watching a silent lovely dance, imbued with spiritual light and feeling. I will remember it always. My husband came in and changed into his casual traveling pants, shirt and leather coat. He put on his socks and shoes, grabbed his carry- on bag, put on his Husky hat and kissed me and hugged our son as he went out the door, where the air porter transport bus would whisk him away to the airport. A part of Michael would stay, and it would be with my son and I, but it would most certainly be walking in his garden until his return, and that is where I would find him each day during watering hours in the morning and at night.

College Graduation

My son Nicholas graduated from Evergreen State College on June 12th, 2015, with a Bachelor's degree in Liberal Arts with an emphasis on creative writing. It is his intention to pursue a Master's degree in writing at Pacific Lutheran University. It is so much fun to see his creative side blossom as I at 58 finally am pursuing my long delayed dream to write. We encourage each other, it is an enriching experience,artistically and intellectually.
For young people today, the world is proving to be a challenging place, some would say, an increasingly more dangerous place in view of certain international conflicts that seem to take on a rather nerve wracking turn, whether it be in the Middle East or the Ukraine. Tag on the enormous challenge on all levels of global climate change, and you want to wish young people today both courage and intelligence to overcome these daunting assignments. I wish my son the best of luck and heart in what his creative mind will contribute in his own unique way and with his own crystal clear perspective that is hopeful without being naive.    

Tiger Embroidery with Metallic Threads

 
My post "Embroidered Eyes," is about this project.

Have I Got A Witness?

It was January 1994. My neighbour and new friend Shelia and I were walking up to a small wooden church building. Shelia had invited me to go to church with her. She and her husband had built and moved into the house next door in the summer of 1992. They were the only black family in our street, and I was really eager to meet Shelia and her husband and two teenage children. It took a while, because I was busy with a brand new baby, my son Nicholas, who was born in July of 1992. My husband watched Nicholas while I went to church that first time 21 years ago. I had no idea what church my neighbour was a member of, and it became apparent I was walking up to a mostly black members church. I remember being a bit nervous. I knew enough about black history in the US to know that to this day most black people and most white people live separate lives in separate neighbourhoods. Our neighbourhood was no exception. Other than Shelia and her family, there was one neighbour in the next street over who was a nurse and her husband was black, a guy my son Nicholas really liked to hang out with at neighbourhood BBQ.s when he was a toddler. Charlie was an electrical engineer, and Nicholas would go talk to Charlie in his backyard. As I was walking up to the church with Shelia, I wondered how my presence would be welcomed. I needn't had to worry. As soon as I walked through the door, I was warmly greeted and hugged. I still remember thinking how much better this world would be if all white people welcomed black visitors to their white churches with equal warmth and kindness and open hearts. I was baptized by our Pastor, the Reverend  Bishop Obey, on March 20th 1994, a defining moment for me spiritually and personally. I keep the picture of my baptism in the Bible Shelia and her family gave to me. Over the next 21 years New Life Baptist Church, that is now located at a beautiful big new building across town, nourished my soul and helped me make sense of my youngest sister's suicide, my other sister's untimely death from cancer, the demise of my parents' 45 year marriage, my father's Alzheimer's and death, and my mother's alcoholism and subsequent death from kidney complications. The church strengthened my marriage, my energy for my son and his talents, my determination to shake off the sadness and trauma after all the loss. To hear then on the news that last night a deranged hate absorbed white young man went into the Bible study at Emanuel AME Church in Charlestown, South Carolina and killed 9 parishioners including their Pastor,the Reverend Clementa Pinckney, after spending an hour with them was spine chilling. I know about Bible study on Wednesday nights, I attended a few some years back. To think that this stranger was welcomed into the class, in view of the openness of the way I was greeted, only makes the massacre that took place more heart breaking. At my church I always feel like I am accepted, loved, unconditionally. It seems like politics these days is forcing once more the issue of race and colour. It is like we are turning the clock back to a past where prejudice and hatred towards black people in this country were common fare. Polarization in politics is bringing the division and thin veneer of racial relations back to the foreground, and I hope the resulting dialogue will be a positive and fruitful one. During sermons, the preaching pastor will often ask, when making a point about faith : " Have I got a witness?" It is a question designed to encourage affirmation and testimony from the audience. I think the affirmation the world needs today is that we can all agree as civilized people of this great country that hatred and the deadly violence it wreaks have no place in a decent society. " Have I got a witness?", please, can we agree that we need to start opening our hearts and minds to a brotherhood of civilized souls that can see across the spectrum of race and colour to a future that will set everyone free from the fear and suffocating limitations of prejudice towards our fellow men and women?

The Tiny Sunflower

Our garden looks beautiful. Every spring and summer my husband fills our entire backyard with an abundance of flowers, veggies and fruit. Sunflowers, Sweet Peas, Petunias, Nicotinia, Sweet Alyssum, Fuchsia are are among the favorite flowers we grow each year. Tomatoes, green beans, snap peas, squash, cucumber and strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, cherries, Asian pears are among our delicious harvest. It is wonderful.
Our dog Yara, a feisty Labrador - Bouvier mix, is cautious around all the plants and flowers. There was a tiny sunflower that had not been staked properly and that she had knocked down, breaking its small stem. The tiny flower looked limp, barely alive. I picked it up and put it in a vase of fresh cold water. Within hours the flower was lifting its head, and its petals started looking fresh and bright. Now it looks like a happy small sunflower, very cute with its 3 inch diameter head, and its lemon yellow petals and dark honey scented heart. I was glad I noticed the small flower in time to save it and give it another chance, the same way I am glad when I can save bees in time when they fall in the pool. It made me think of how a little help can make all the difference. We all need a little encouragement sometimes, and when we see a friend or family member wilt under some strain and pressure, it often does not take more than a little kindness to give their hearts and minds back their full vigour and potential. It is good to remember that. Francoise Hardy, I just recall, has a beautiful song talking about just that. It is called " Un peu d'eau ", "A little bit of water". I think this idea can encourage us to be both kind to others and their needs, and also kind to ourselves. It is a win-win situation. All the little sunflower needed to get a chance to survive and thrive was some water, and for someone to notice that is what it would take. Maybe all the next person you come across will need is a smile, or a simple, "Hi, how are you?" to give them the bit of energy they will need to get to where they are going next. The small rescued sunflower is a beautiful reminder that we can all make a difference, and perhaps the small differences over time can make a big impact, both in outlook and result.

Embroidered Eyes

It took a full year. My left shoulder was throbbing with a sharp, persistent sting all the way up my neck. But finish I did, and not one minute too soon. I drank a glass of cold milk and took the rare Aleve hoping to feel some relief for my aching body. The tiger tapestry was the ninth one in a series I started 8 years ago. They take me out of my head and allow my mind to relax while my fingers and eyes and creative imagination and self taught skill are tested for the patience and persistence required to work on and finish each project that takes anywhere from 8 months to a year or more. The exercise seems a perfect anti -dote to our daily complex digital lives. If the apocalypse hits, I already have a great way to occupy my leisure time in a very satisfying and creative way. The tapestries are also a nice way to both revisit and write poems and stories while my fingers are busy working the fabric and needle and threads. It is a most satisfying combination of the tactile and cerebral, although today and the days before that, my middle aged shoulder and neck seem to protest that harmonious arrangement. Thankfully, since our days in martial arts of rigorous black belt training a few years back, I know about the soothing properties of tiger balm for aching, overworked muscles. The tiger tapestry turned out well, considering I was not sure I would be able to draw the tiger successfully. I am very pleased with the expression of the eyes, which I considered to be essential to the rendering of the animal's mystique. Considering this was the first time I drew a tiger, and had to render it in thread and needle, the project turned out very well, without any technical mistakes, much to my relief. As with each project, there is a bond that develops between it and myself, a certain attachment that develops with the creation of something that requires such patience and the will to see it through. A part of me is with that tiger now, it is an intriguing feeling. But a part of me is also set free in the creation of the tiger, and that feels very good. My next project is a large sunflower, my model a photograph I took of one of our own large sunflowers we grow each year. To draw, whether it is with pencil or thread, requires you become in a way your project, in order to make it come alive. I love the connection that slowly develops with each challenge, from drawing the project onto the fabric, to choosing the colours, to handling the technical challenges. In the case of the tiger, the challenge came from bringing focus to the eyes, and accurately rendering the stripes around them. The face was the biggest challenge, including the eyes, as I was intent on rendering the tiger both realistically and accurately, while still allowing for artistic uniqueness. My aching shoulder and neck are testimony that this required effort both mentally and physically. But as exhausting as this creative marathon was, I already am anticipating the sunflower project, wondering what challenges it will bring that will both delight and puzzle me.

The Competition

Last night was another one of those nights were my dreams take me to a world all my own. What I like about the dreams that involve my parents, or sisters, who are all deceased, is the large space of the buildings we happen to live in. The houses in the dreams are spacious, modern, cool temperature wise, with soft, white carpeting throughout. In the dream last night, my parents were hanging out with me, but were living in separate houses, accurate to what actually transpired the last 8 years of their lives. In the dream, my siblings were not around. The circumstances of the dream were vague, but it somehow involved a dance competition. I was in my early twenties, and it was summer, and hot, and the dance competition was held in a large outdoor tent. To my surprise, the dance partner assigned to me was my cousin Dirk. He is the eldest son of my father's sister, Denise. Tante Denise just turned 87 in March, and my cousin Dirk must be 63 by now. When I was growing up, I had a crush on Dirk, something of which my parents did not seem to approve. This disapproval was something I did not know about until just a few months ago. I was 16 at the time, and my cousin was doing an internship at the factory were my father was CEO. Dirk was invited by my father to eat lunch for those summer months at our house. It seems my father was encouraged by my mother to stop that arrangement when it became obvious to her that I liked my cousin. Perhaps it made my father uneasy too, because he certainly agreed not to let my cousin come back the next summer. My crush was harmless, as my cousin and I were never alone, and it really makes me sad to think his future was partially compromised because he and I liked each other. Interestingly enough, when it came to the sons of her brother and sister, my mother actually encouraged the crushes my sister and I had on them. That seems very biased in retrospect. Anyhow, that is all water under the sludgy bridge.The dance competition in the dream was really fun. Apparently Dirk was as nervous about being my partner as was I. He did a really good job and remembered all the moves to the tango we were doing really well, not just technically, but also emotionally. We won hands down to generous applause. By then my parents had faded in the dream. The dream faded too, and I woke up smiling and shaking my head at the surprising dream. In the reality of waking hours, the dream seems to imply that the longing to overcome the huge gap left by my parents' animosity in their marriage and the resulting dismissal of my father to a retirement home in Belgium, never is far from my mind. The longing to have been allowed to know my cousins on my father's side as well as my cousins on my mother's side, and to close that gaping void of having been left out of a lifetime of friendships and connections. The cousins on my father's side are all grandparents now. But in my mind, apparently the longing to have a chance at being children together, teenagers together, once more with a fair chance of interaction, is still very strong. As it turns out, I would probably have very little to say to my cousin Dirk today, but I do have a good connection to his kind younger brother Marc, and I have a good connection now with the children of Tante Blanche, the second recently deceased sister of my father. That friendship is proving very powerful and healing, especially with Blanche's eldest daughter, Myriam, a highly intelligent and interesting woman, who I looked up to as a child. To be allowed to get to know her and her daughter now is a wonderful experience, courtesy of modern technology. The dream about Dirk is just wishful thinking, a longing for all of us to be friends in mutual respect and understanding. Somewhere, sometime, if nothing else, in the realm of the dream world.

The Purple Cloud

Yesterday my son graduated from Evergreen State College here in Olympia. To celebrate, my husband took us to Anthony's, a very fine seafood restaurant here in town.The food was elegant and very tasty, and after a strawberry cheesecake desert, we walked outside and strolled around the restaurant's elegant waterfront terrace connected to the Port of Olympia and its scenic view of the Sound. The sun was already behind the clouds, magnifying the light and intensifying the surrounding colours of sky and water. My eye was struck by a huge purple cloud that seemed to hang like a hovering huge spaceship across the picturesque waterfront restaurant and the surrounding buildings. To the opposite side was downtown, and above the many boats by the dock was the darkening outline of the Olympia Capitol. The lights of the buildings and pleasure boats sparkled like so many small stars in the cool evening as we walked along the graciously landscaped walkways in front of the restaurant leading up to a walk towards downtown. I kept looking back at the dark purple cloud behind me. It seemed like it was watching us, moody, brooding like a scene out of the introduction to a movie or story about a world led to a post apocalyptic reality. I shook the feeling and focused on the aesthetics of the scene instead. The fresh air whispered away any lingering preoccupations with the cloud and we went about our walk before turning back to the parked car on the other side of the restaurant to return home.
That night I slept very well, happy with my son's college graduation. When I woke, I was surprised to recall a most disturbing dream that had occupied my mind that night. The dream was set in a world that was in the midst of destruction and chaos caused by apocalyptic events. My husband, son and I were surviving , but we had to be on the move constantly, trying to stay ahead of the next disaster. The most vivid memory of the dream was the sight and noise of jets literally falling out of the skies all around us, like huge metallic disabled flies, looking surreal as they crashed nearby in a cacophony of twisting metal. My husband, son and I were taking care of a group of orphaned, frightened children, trying to each night anew, find shelter that was effective and safe. There was rubble everywhere, and there, in the middle of the dream, was the huge purple cloud. That is when I woke up. I was intrigued by the presence of the purple cloud, but not in a troubled way. I viewed it as an artistic detail that had made its way from my waking hours into my night slumbers. Hopefully, that casual response to the looming cloud in both worlds will be the prevailing one.

The Loom and the Shuttle

About once every 3 or 4 months I call my aunt Lieve in Oostende. She is the youngest sister of my deceased father and at 75 as nimble minded as a 20 year old youngster. She is a woman with a razor sharp intellect, a big warm heart and a wicked sense of humour. Fiercely independent and resourceful with a keen insight in human nature, she has helped put the pieces of the broken puzzle of my family and its tragedies and mysteries together if not in a clear picture, in a pattern that is starting to at least draw a consistent shadow of that picture. My family history, of my parents and sisters and brother is plagued with intrigue, lies, addiction, neglect and abuse. To try to put the pieces together is very difficult, emotionally and actually. My aunt Lieve helped take care of my father the last 7 years of his life in Belgium , and over the last 10 years has helped me through our hours long phone calls, try to bring into focus a picture that has been blurred most of my life. My father was slavishly devoted to my mother, who drank his devotion like an intoxicating drug until she had destroyed our entire family. My father was weak when it came to her, and no amount of cheating, lying or drinking on her part ever convinced him otherwise. Even when she kicked him out of his house at age 70, he still believed he could patch things up with her. As children we grew up believing our father was no good, no matter how hard he worked, no matter how much he spoiled our mother, no matter he paid for four years of education at private American universities for all four his children. A web of lies was woven so tightly around our family that it hung my sister Ludwina and killed my other sister also at a young age, destroyed my brother's marriage and almost mine, and left scars emotionally on my son and my sister's and brother's children, some more hidden than others. My aunt Lieve is a very methodical person, and listening to her over the phone share her experiences with my father and mother is very revealing on a most intriguing level. Over the years she and I have each told our questions, doubts, anger, shock, disgust, sadness at what happened. I have come to realize it is like watching the same play over and over, with revealing slight differences to each interpretation. Those slight changes in the recollections remind me of watching a loom put a fabric together with the agile speed and technique of threads fed through the loom's shuttle . At first, all you see is the shuttle zip through bare patterns, but over time, the fabric tightens and a steady pattern and colour emerge, eventually making a complete solid piece of fabric, that you can touch and appreciate in its thickness, style and size. As time passes, a pattern is showing itself that speaks of a mother who was very selfish and manipulative, and a father who was devoted to his children but ill equipped to handle his narcissistic wife and his own lack of will ultimately, to protect us and himself from her. The same way he had proven himself incapable to stand up for his mother and youngest sister as a young man who had promised to ensure his sister Lieve's chance to finish her education after high school, instead choosing to marry my mother earlier than planned, foregoing his promise to his own family in a World War II era where widows like his mother were left without any financial assistance. It continues to be a  most sobering experience for me to have had to come off this high of adoration I had for both my parents as a child and teenager. Once I became aware of my mother's manipulations and lies at age 26, it still took 17 years to begin to comprehend the extent of the damage to my sisters, my brother, my father, and myself and how it also impacted to varying degrees my brother's children, his ex -wife, and my sister's children and to a lesser degree, my son and my husband. I called my aunt today, and after 3 hours and 24 minutes of a very energetic and satisfying dialogue, the image of the thread and the shuttle as they race across the loom ran through my mind once more. My aunt and I both have pieces missing in the story, each at times holding a piece of the vast puzzle that the other needs to get one step nearer to a chance at closure. It is amazing we have been able to achieve this by long distance calls between Olympia and Oostende. I last saw my aunt in Georgia in 1996, when I was 39 and my son was 4 years old. My aunt was 56. I am now 58, my son is 23, and my aunt turned 75 in March. We have always gotten along really well. I have always admired her independence and determination, her smarts and style, and her devotion to dedicate her life to being fair and kind as a woman using her talents in the social welfare sector of  Oostende. To me she was strong no matter her petite frame and beautiful in her elegant dress and style. Talking to her on the phone is always mental gymnastics, staying in step with her stories and revelations, her insights and perspectives, and my chance to share my own experiences and understandings. She is giving me back a part of my childhood and life I had not understood or seen before. These pieces of information are priceless, because they are helping me become fully three dimensional, and that in turn is setting me free, slowly and deliberately, to have a chance at finally be truly me. It is allowing me to cross that bridge of hurt and come to terms with the anger and a lot of the bitterness at being betrayed and left behind by the person I should have been able to trust implicitly, my mother. I worshipped her, always feeling inferior to her, only to discover I just annoyed her. When she realized she could no longer manipulate me, she was furious and then became indifferent. The indifference turned to sudden panic after both my younger sisters died tragic deaths, but even then she could not stop deceiving herself and me. By then I had walked away to save the shred of dignity and hope I had left. The threads in the shuttle  will keep going for many more a phone call and the fabric and colours on the loom that continue to emerge will keep changing and growing. I am happy the loom is busy. There was a time it was sitting idly, mute and empty, locked away in a sad room I never got to see a glimpse of save in a restless dream. Now my aunt and I are working on it together, side by side, in a close bond of loom and threaded shuttle,  in a friendship that has stood both the test of time and blood.  

The Funeral

It was such a beautiful morning, cool still with a whisper soft breeze, under a blindingly bright blue sky. The heat that would wilt the morning's resolve was hours away. I delighted at the opening fuchsia flowers an their bright pink and purple petals, as hummingbirds swooped by like miniature jets in metallic sound. The neighbours 'chickens were singing their pride and as I closed my eyes and let the still gentle sun engulf me like a warm bath, half a dozen bird songs gave me surround sound pleasure. What a treat to be soaking up this solitude and peace. I went inside for a bowl of cereal and turned on the national news to see the funeral service remembering our Vice President's son, Beau Biden. The church of St. John of Padua, a beautiful Romanesque building, exuded dignity and hope amidst the somber realization of the tragedy of the event. As I watched the stately Catholic funeral ritual, one I grew up with, I drifted back in time to April 1998, and the day my youngest sister was buried a week after her suicide by hanging at age 35. The funeral I was watching on national news was inspiring, dignified, full of quiet hope and a sense of community and love. The funeral of my sister 17 years ago was a bizarre affair. My other sister did not sit with my mother and brother and I, but decided to sit with her boss and his family. My father wandered around the church during the service, dazed, confused. The burial was surreal. When the coffin was being lowered into the ground on that hot Georgia day, my mother and other sister started laughing out loud in some sort of twisted private joke. It was beyond undignified and insulting. There was no sense of community, of love or togetherness. The funeral I was watching on my television gave me a sense of personal hope, and also a sense of national pride. Politics in the US right now were so divisive, so toxic; to see our President and Vice President and their families so united in a deep bond of mutual love and respect made me be proud to be a citizen of this country, for the first time in years. This was an occasion of mourning, but the quiet strength it brought to the foreground, emphasizing virtues I love of this country I made my own as one of its citizens 21 years ago, deeply moved me. For a brief moment in time I was forgetting the caustic national politics that made me doubt the future of our democracy. I felt my cynicism melt and it was replaced with a spark of pride and love. Maybe we would be alright after all. I so wished that for all the effort my father put into bringing us to this country, for my own dreams I still hold here, and mostly for my son and his future. But I also wished it for this country, this USA that I made my country, my home, and that I love, and so much want to believe in still. 

Queen Anne's Lace

The clouds thin grey speeds across a pale sky
quiet as suppressed sighs.

Green and bright your absence comes to mind
a hundred tiny white flowers with a proud dark heart.

Shadows soft to the touch follow my eyes
as your fingers paint out of the corner of time
slowly in colours of red, yellow and blue.

The past leads me back to my uncle's artist studio
the scent of oils still in my smile, when sleep
came swift and deep and dawn was a song of peace.

Across an ocean of understanding and loss
you came along like a man with no horse
in a desert of melted clocks and cactus.

Alice and the rabbit she chased down the hole
tear up my dress and shoes, I cannot find
the key that would allow me an audience with you.

A hundred tiny white flowers floating around my soul
I laugh as I pull on the edges of your worn out coat
stained so beautifully with the canvases of your dreams.


Trudi Ralston.
June 3rd, 2015.
For a fellow traveler.

Rain

After a sunny, warm weekend the weather is back to clouds and rain showers. I could not be happier. As much as I love sunny days with clear blue skies, the days in between where we get rain and a cool breeze blows teasing the air and trees and flowers, with subdued light and loudly chirping birds in the backyard and the woods behind our property, make me feel super relaxed. The many shades of green all around us seem to be in sharper focus, and my artistically inclined eye views all colour around me as richer, stronger and more defined. The world makes sense on rainy spring days, all doubt as to the meaning of life and the universe as we know it seem removed. When I was growing up in Roeselare, I watched a lot of movies about medieval knights and their adventures. There was always a wizard involved, and brave princesses or queens, and there was order and logic amidst the magic and wonder and battles, and it seemed like the weather was always cloudy with some showers. It seemed the weather of choice for noble conquests and Merlin coming up with just the right potion to overcome the evil warring overlord or enchanted dragon. Apparently, cloudy, rainy weather was one of the ingredients for successful outcomes of complicated plots in those medieval stories. I feel like the same type of weather adds a lighter touch to my own story. This cloudy, grey, rainy weather where I get to wear soft, cozy sweaters the same colour as the sky makes me feel luxuriously relaxed like my yawning cat in his warm basket. On days like today I convince myself that all important inventions and discoveries were made on exactly such days. The intellect seems at the same time more relaxed and more focused, more inwardly directed. I also love the feeling of belonging, of feeling safe. I am not sure why spring days with rain also make me feel warm inside and secure, like no harm can touch me at the edge of this quiet forest. It is a wonderful feeling, one that allows me to breathe deeply and happily. One that makes me dream of far away travels, but makes me grateful for the security of my home here with my husband and son. I feel safely tucked in with the rich green foliage of the trees, I belong right along with the other families in our street, with the dog and cat, with the birds singing overhead, the grass under my feet. There is no traumatic family history, no loss, no sorrow, no lack of closure. Everything makes perfect sense, and the world feels rich with promise, hope and an unmistakable and palpable sense of peace and joy. I have no idea on a deeper level why I feel this way, and maybe that is the best part, that rainy spring days make me feel happy inside and it seems totally irrelevant as to why. No puzzle, no problems. Bring on the spring showers and its clouds. I am so ready.
Now, mind you, when the sun comes back on Friday, warm and bright, I will be ready too, Capri pants and sandals and light summer blouse and all. But for now, this rain is so right.