BJ's Blog

My sweet aunt treated me to a massage today 🙂 Now the problem is staying awake to eat dinner and interact with everyone.

I never know how to spell that word 😉

So it’s taken me a month to write a post. A friend recently sent me his blog and asked for my input on a recent post. The interchange made me realize I need to get back on track here. Spring break seems like the perfect time. I’ll be traveling with my parents to Borrego Springs tomorrow–I’m in Kayenta with them now. Lots of reading, writing, knitting, blogging time. Meanwhile, I need to do some yoga and take a hot tub. Then begin reading the new Nevada Barr.

All the writing I intended to do over break and during this semester. C’est domage. I seem to be keeping busy nonetheless.

A fun winter break: baking, family time (Xmas village with my bros and their families and Xmas Eve with the parents and Aunt Carla–what a hoot she is!), puzzle (my annual Xmas puzzle,

which no one wanted to help with this year), and three relaxing days in Kayenta (hiking, biking, hot-tubbing, knitting, reading a Jo Nesbo mystery). Still, the first day of school came too soon. And the first week didn’t feel like the usual easing into the semester. Boom, pow, meetings on the 3rd day. Then interviews with job candidates, curriculum stuff, community partners to coordinate for two classes (8 CPs altogether), writing reports and letters, and meetings, meetings, meetings. It’s the 5th week and I’m so ready for spring break.

At some point–seems some people want me to begin this week–I’ll be the assistant chair. Guess I’ll find out more when I meet with Kathy this week, but she seems to want me to start the job now; however, I don’t think I’ll be compensated (with release time) until fall. Hm.

I finished the semester last week (waited until the last day to submit grades–a first for me) and am almost done with prepping for next semester. So I decided I’d best get blogging again. My excuse for not writing has been the “Life Writing” class I took from Judy Elsley, though to be frank, I didn’t do all that much writing for the class. As I revise the pieces I wrote, I’ll post them here.

Meanwhile, I had a nice afternoon chatting with a neighbor, who I met through al-anon. Turns out we have all kinds of things in common, besides the obvious. Her son coached my son’s little league football team, the brother of her best friend growing up lives across the street from us, she plays golf, she vacations in the St. George area, her daughter goes to school with my daughter, she used to drink but gave it up. Anyway, I feel nourished and rejuvenated after spending time with her. Reminds me why I need to keep having coffee with my al-anon peeps!

Just finished Moby Dick for the second time. The first time I read it was 23 years ago, in the summer/fall of 1988 while I was fighting fire in Yellowstone. What a long time ago. I was such a different person then, though I remember loving the book at the time. I love it more now. And to be able to teach it, ah! I’m convinced that this guy, Nathaniel Philbrick is right:

For me, Moby-Dick is more than the greatest American novel ever written; it is a metaphysical survival manual—the best guidebook there is for a literate man or woman facing an impenetrable unknown: the future of civilization in this storm-tossed 21st century.

It takes me back to the reasons I got fired up about this work in the first place.

Essay #1 – Missed Opportunity

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
– F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

I see the ash beginning to bend, threatening to break apart and scatter on the Persian rug. My body tenses, waiting for it, wanting to stop it yet resisting the urge to say something, knowing it’s none of my business. At the last possible moment, Grandma moves her cigarette toward the ashtray and taps it. Disaster averted. For now.

My memories of my mom’s mom, Grandma Mac, are hazy, like the cigarette smoke that continuously wafted up from her long, delicate, piano-playing fingers. She died when I was 18 years old, having suffered a stroke two years previously, which left her paralyzed and speechless. At the nursing home, her eyes would dart about occasionally filling with tears, obviously wanting to express something the rest of her body could not. I regret not speaking to her before she lost her voice, while she still played the piano, when Grandpa Mac was still alive. But I was teenager and not at all interested in the life of an old woman who never showed me much love and drooled on her hospital gown. Today, as a middle-aged woman, I regret not knowing her better, not asking her about her life.

We still lived in New York when Grandma had her stroke, and I remember Mom saying, “I ought to have Mother come live with us,” and Dad countering, “You know you can’t take care of her and the kids, it would be too much,” and Mom conceding, “I know, you’re right” but always feeling guilty about it. Two years later, we moved to Utah—even farther from Wisconsin and all of my parents’ family.

Grandma Mac lived for four years after her stroke, for six years after her husband died, and for twenty-eight years after her last child was born. But it took my parents another 10 years after she died to tell me the truth about her. Perhaps they felt I wasn’t ready to absorb the information at 18 or maybe they didn’t want to spoil my college experience. But at last the truth came out and all the pieces fell into place. Grandma had been a drug addict. She had needed daily injections of Demerol, a painkiller, because she’d become dependent on the medication after Uncle Ken was born. Grandpa was her supplier. He prescribed the drug and administered her daily (or twice daily?) injections.

As an adult, I’ve analyzed this situation to death and all I do is end up with questions—questions I’ve asked my mom, though she doesn’t know the answers to most of them either: Why did Grandma need a painkiller? Who first prescribed it for her? How did she get hooked? Why did Grandpa continue to supply her? What happened to Uncle Ken when Mom and Aunt Mary moved out (which they did as soon as they could)? When Grandpa died, what happened to Grandma? Did she suffer withdrawals? Is that why she had a stroke? Horrific images fill my mind of life at that house. But I knew that house. I stayed there. And I survived my visits. My uncle, my aunt, and my mom survived too.

My mother, Harriett, was born in 1938, the eldest of three children, each separated from the next by seven years. Her dad, Kenneth, was a pediatrician; her mother, Astrid, a nurse. In photographs, I’ve seen Mom smiling while her dad pushes her on a swing. Pigtails flying, glasses not disguising her crossed eyes. This condition—she explained it to me once—appeared at birth and she later had surgery to correct it. But even today, when she gets tired, her eyes sometimes cross a bit. Her mother or “Mother,” as she called her, rarely appears in the “happy” photos I’ve seen. That should have been a clue.

When she was seven, Mary Margaret was born and Mom seemed genuinely happy to have a sister, though she didn’t like sharing her dad with anyone else. I suspect this because Mom talks often about how much she loved her dad. She almost worshipped him. Later, when I found out about all the bad stuff, I wondered how Mom could idolize him when he so clearly contributed to the problem. Mary became Mom’s best friend and my favorite aunt. I’ve heard that Mary is a lot like her mother—similar bone structure, similar temperament, and similar addictive personality. She smokes, like Grandma Mac did, in spite of the horrible photos of blackened lungs that I would drag home from junior high health class or my surreptitious efforts to banish cigarettes from her house, which I admit to doing as recently as 4 years ago.

Mom was fourteen when Kenneth John (KJ Junior) was born and, according to her, she began taking on many of the household duties: cleaning, cooking, washing (they didn’t have a dryer back then, so she hung the clothes on lines strung across the basement ceiling), and tending the baby. According to Mom, Grandma Mac was ill—too sick to take care of her family—so Mom stepped in. Until I heard about Grandma’s drug addiction, I always thought my Mom’s upbringing was normal. The way I saw it, my grandmother worked and became ill after her last child was born, so it made sense that my mom and her dad took care of things at home. As a kid of approximately the same age my mom was when took on these extra responsibilities, I just thought my mom was an amazing kid who did everything around the house—unlike me—and that Grandma Mac’s place was simply different from Grandma G’s. That’s all.

When we visited the family in Madison, Wisconsin, I’d alternate sleepovers at each grandparent’s house, though my parents usually stayed with my dad’s parents. I never knew to ask why they didn’t stay at Grandma and Grandpa Mac’s house. Grandma Mac would sleep late. Grandpa would get up and help fix breakfast for me. Usually toast with raspberry jam. The smell of toast always takes me back to that old kitchen, with the Norwegian plates hanging on the walls, the counter-top linoleum beginning to crack. Upstairs, I’d sleep in the small bedroom with eaves and a door that led to the attic. I loved to explore this dark and musty place, filled with books and trunks smelling of mothballs. Unlike my Grandma G’s modern apartment, which boasted soda machines down the hall and an outdoor pool, my Grandma Mac’s house was filled with reminders of the past. Great-grandmother’s braided rag rugs covered the floors, lace doilies covered the armrests and headrests of already antique furniture, and somber paintings of the old country hung from the walls. I loved to stay there, in that quiet place.

But when Grandma awoke, which sometimes wasn’t until the afternoon, she always seemed so foul, so grumpy. If Uncle Ken happened to be around, she’d lash out at him, her temper vicious and totally unpredictable. Ken’s only 10 years older than me—closer in age to me than his older sister, my mom—so he was more like a big brother to me than an uncle. I felt sorry for him when Grandma yelled. Yet I also sensed that she was mad at him for not growing up and not moving out earlier like his sisters. It took Ken a long time to “find his way,” as they say. He struggled in school, barely making it through college, and had his heart broken by several women. Eventually he made it out of the house, but it wasn’t until Grandma died.

They all made it out: Mom, Mary, and Ken. Yet they’re not unscathed. None of us are. I know what’s happened to all of us. The one I don’t know about is Grandma Mac. Apart from a few photos, in which she doesn’t look very happy, I have only my dim memories and little bits of stories my mom tells me. For instance, Mom has suggested that her mother might have been happier as a lesbian, without children. I wonder why my mom thinks this—are these merely the words of an angry, disappointed daughter? But I’m not offered any other information. Apparently, Grandma was an intelligent nurse, a brilliant pianist, and a keen analyst of politics. Dad talks about how much he enjoyed discussing issues with his mother-in-law: she was well read, with an acerbic wit, and could argue about almost anything. I’ve inherited many of her books, everything from Milton to Tennyson to Emerson. Perhaps she even read Fitzgerald too. I want to meet this woman now: when I can appreciate her, when I can really talk to her, and when, just maybe, I can finally begin to understand her.

to leave for Southern California tomorrow. the kids and I will drive to Vegas then make our way into Laguna/Newport on Tuesday. we’re staying at a Best Western near the Vegas airport = non-smoking, outdoor pool, continental breakfast. if we get an early start, we’ll stop in Kayenta to visit my folks in the afternoon. I’m looking forward to the trip. I love road trips. and the place we’re staying in Newport looks great = 3 pools, close to the ocean, hiking nearby, whale watching, etc.

I chaired the Saturday morning meeting then spoke at the combined speakers (AA + Al-Anon) meeting Saturday night. It was quite the day. I think I had a bit of letdown yesterday.

The topic I chose for the 1st meeting was relaxation:

One of the wonderful, but unexpected, benefits of working the Al-Anon program is learning how to relax. Until now, most of my life sped by in a frenzy of activity. School, work, projects, obligations, all helped me focus outward…. There is nothing wrong with working hard and producing results, but I was abusing these activities. They were socially acceptable ways to deny my feelings. Both family and society supported my hiding behind them until, beaten down and exhausted, I reached the doors of Al-Anon. By that time I couldn’t have relaxed if I had wanted to–I didn’t know how it was done. (CTC 198)

Obviously I haven’t mastered this concept–I still create massive lists of tasks that must be accomplished during my time off (see all of my posts since school ended)–but I’m at least aware of my compulsion and have begun to allow myself some time to relax every day. We had a good discussion and interesting contributions from a couple of newcomers, one of whom is a colleague. This disease knows no boundaries. It effects everybody.

For the 2nd meeting, I wrote the following speech:

At a recent meeting, someone chose the topic, “Why Al-Anon?” As I answered the question, I remarked that Al-Anon had saved my marriage.

Three years ago, everything imploded: I discovered the extent of my qualifier’s disease and realized that I was helpless; I tried everything: counseling, taking long trips by myself or with one of my children, volunteering, joining a church, working extra hours, practicing yoga, and finally, attending an Al-Anon meeting [the only tricks that worked, that have really helped me, are yoga and Al-Anon–if there’s a speaker’s meeting for yoga addicts perhaps I could speak there one day ;)].

At the time, I assumed that AA and sobriety would fix my problem; now I know that the problem is much bigger than my most recent qualifier. Although my parents aren’t alcoholics, my maternal grandmother was an addict and my paternal grandfather probably was an alcoholic (he died when I was 10); I have aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, and in-laws who battle the disease of alcoholism and addiction–most without knowing what they’re battling.

As a child, I learned to strive for perfection, to be responsible and help others, to work hard, to stay busy, to do do do; I also learned to feel guilty for all those undone tasks and unsaved people; life was exhausting. I had many relationships with addicts and alcoholics who never seemed to love me enough and certainly couldn’t live up to my expectations.

I married, began a career, and had two children. These roles started me on my path toward Al-Anon; that is, they taught me, painfully at times, that I couldn’t control everyone and everything (you’d think I’d have learned that fact after 40 + years on the planet!). Some of my lessons: yes, there is sexism in the workplace and there’s nothing you can do about it; a child won’t use the toilet until he’s ready; a spouse won’t quit using even if you ask –> beg –> threaten. This last lesson was the hardest because I took it personally–if I was a better wife he wouldn’t need to use. Clearly I was a failure at marriage, and if I was a failure at this, perhaps I also was–or soon would be–a failure at my career and parenthood as well.

So the self-determined spiral into dread began: I was diagnosed with depression, I suffered debilitating back pain, I developed migraine headaches, and I blamed my condition on everyone else. By the time I reached Al-Anon I was ready to scrap the marriage and everything else.

It didn’t happen overnight…I went through 3 months of craziness before I found enough patience to live one day at a time and not destroy my family’s lives…but it did happen.

Three years later, I’m finally moving through the steps. (It took me 2 years to find the courage to contact someone about sponsorship.) And now I’m reaping the rewards of the program.

• I know how to say “no.”
• I’ve stopped running away from my family.
• I try not to say “I’m sorry” for things I’m not sorry or responsible for.
• I’m learning to love myself for all of my imperfections–though I still wish I could be perfect.
• I try to relax and take time for myself.
• I celebrate 15 years of marriage.

I never could have reached these goals without Al-Anon. Thank you everyone for saving my life.

So I volunteered to chair the Saturday morning al-anon meeting awhile back, and I’ve been a bit nervous about it. Then someone asked me to speak at the Saturday evening combined speakers’ meeting. Oh my! After some fretting, I agreed to do it. Now I need to come up with a story. I have bits and pieces of stuff that I’ve written, but I haven’t yet compiled a full-blown story. Guess it’s time to do that. I’ll post my notes–once I’ve written them 😉

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