I Hope You Dance

I was feeling a little low...well, a lot low. Tired, achy, downright lazy. I think there was a bowling ball stuck in my abdomen, or something about that size and consistency. It was Saturday, and we needed to take back all the extra tile from our kitchen project. While we were at it, we also needed to pick up the flooring for our next delightful scheme: replacing the flooring in our nursery area. Which was rotten and full of old termite trails. Thankfully there were no insects still chewing on our wood, but time and water had done their worst. I was horrified when the guys ripped out some floorboards to reveal what was going on in the bowels of our home. There were roots from trees that were far from their trunks, trailing all across the floor, and evidence of decades of folks cobbling together rocks and random flotsam to keep the place upright. At least it's still standing and somewhere along the way, the termites expired. They pulled up every piece of tongue-and-groove in the room until there was only soil and history exposed. It's a good thing I love the delicious aroma of dirt -- it's now perfuming the whole place. It was at this point that we decided to head to Newnan, where there's seven things I love. Floor and Decor (one) and our youngest son and his family (the other six). Well, I like Floor and Decor, a lot, but I adore those Newnan people. Jesse helped me pick the perfect flooring, which looks for all the world like an old camp meeting cabin floor but it's made out of "luxury" vinyl. I know that C. M. Griffin (the builder of this house 121 years ago and the former mayor of Villa Rica) is going to haunt me for putting plastic in his gorgeous Queen Anne Victorian house, but there are times for economy and this might just be one. Besides, this part of the house was a sleeping porch long ago, not a parlor or conservatory. Not to mention, I'm keeping the place from falling down and that's got to count for something. 

This was not what I planned on spending this year's IRS bill on, so I might have been a little salty and blue. Sounds ocean-like, but it was definitely not. We hauled it on over to Newnan and I tried to enjoy the impossibly-pretty drive there while Ken played Eagles music. I remembered having brown skin and long hair bleached by the sun, but couldn't convince myself I was still seventeen. We had a couple of grandkids with us, and you can't stay old-fogey for long when they start singing along. Eventually we wound up at Red Robin for burgers, with our son and six of the grands, loud and excited to see each other. 

I enjoyed some serious conversation with our Jesse, who is a youth pastor at a large church in Newnan. He's always been a giant kid -- fun and happy, but somewhere along the way he became a man, serious and sincere about the things that matter, while still keeping his optimistic heart afloat. It came time to break up the party. The two ten-year-old girls were taking forever in the bathroom, so I checked on them. They were together in the handicapped stall, chatting like two magpies on steroids. I couldn't help but laugh at the range of subjects they traversed while I was there. Numerous other people came and went as I waited and tried to hurry them up. These things can take time. 

We were dutifully washing our hands in this (public) bathroom when a particularly fun and loud song came on over the loudspeaker. Maddie immediately starting dancing. I joined her, and then Eden jumped in there. The three of us whooped and giggled and cut a rug until the song ended. It was a brief, hilarious few minutes. We laughed and headed outside, where we all hugged our goodbyes and headed home. It's been a couple of days now, but I'm still bubbling with the sweet disruption to my pity party.

Sometimes, you just have to dance...    

Hope Springs Eternal

Over the course of days, I attended two events at opposite poles. One, an engagement party for a young couple. The other, a visitation for the death of one of Ken's cousins. The contrast of the two is still resonating within me. 

The impossibly-young couple sparkled like gin fizz (well, it seems more and more like that...and I am very much in favor of people marrying -- the younger, the better). I married my sweetheart when I was 21 and we grew up together, through the storms and tides of life. We weathered them with all the naivete and (probably) stupidity we could muster. Two flawed folks with their own perspectives from very different family cultures, thrown together in a boat and hoping to sail. As I looked on these two youngsters at the soiree, fresh-faced and beautiful, with family and friends gleeful and celebratory, it brought a smile to my heart. No one knows what the future will bring -- joys, trials, heartache, bliss, sin, triumph, glory -- all mixed together in a tumult of trying to stay ahead of the swells. The operative word that night was: hope.  

Yesterday's trek was very different...my sister-in-love and her husband and I had one incentive, really: love on Aunt Frances. There would be other loved ones there too, but she was top on the list. She has endured the loss of a husband, a sister, a young son years ago and now this son, with a devastating, quick illness and death.  We left late afternoon, for a 2 - 1/2 hour drive ahead of Atlanta traffic, where we knew we'd have to make the same journey back as soon as visitation was over. My stomach was roiling before we even left. With the Atlanta insanity and herky-jerky driving, I wondered if I had been wise in coming. But as we moseyed through the roads, our word boxes began to empty and before long, the traffic began to fall away. Going to Washington, Georgia is like a trip back in time for me. I get misty-eyed as I remember Ken's grandparents and family, those early years where we visited them regularly. We arrived at the funeral home, promptly broke in line to head straight to Frances (my deep apologies to everyone else who had been waiting). It was for the best, as she melted into Melissa's arms and then mine, her grief palpable. I could see the strength behind her eyes, but also the aching sorrow. These things, you never recover from. You can only hope to learn, eventually, to live with them, cracked and all. There was an awkwardness as we had to make way for others to give her their condolences. It felt as if we should just head right back home, but we didn't. We settled in to conversations and hugs with other family members, becoming more and more comfortable with each others' stories and updates. A hum of voices and laughter settled over the room, as people came and went and the core of the family stayed to comfort each other. Like it or not, we are grateful. Grateful for each other and grateful to still be alive. We said our goodbyes and hugged our lasts, then pulled away into the inky night. Even through this dark side of life, my heart had the same response: hope.    

Go Ahead, Open It...

With an old house, there's always something that needs attention. We've owned several homes and that's actually true of all of them, no matter their age. It is a big, rotating list of demands, a mean ole' gaping maw of uncertainty looming in front of you. There are termites just waiting for a snack and the chance to weasel their way into all the quiet, dark crevices that you can't see. Then there's rain dripping slowly down, snaking its way until it finds a tiny, unpainted corner to drift into and start turning all your wood into mush. The sun and wind beat the roof into submission, widening any and all gaps until the gateways open up and let in the squirrels and any semblance of moisture. It's called something like "The Second Law of Thermodynamics." I didn't pay much attention in Science class, except to memorize the test and then promptly forget it. I taught my own kids for a couple of decades and realized that Science was amazing and that there are actually laws in place. Gravity. Heat Conduction. Fluid Dynamics. Things like that. It explained a few things, though I still am bumfuzzled as to how brainy some of these people are (who figured this stuff out). When I drive through Atlanta and see skyscrapers, for example. How did that many people, systems and engineering feats all conspire together to make something that magnificent, that functions and hums like a well-oiled machine even a centennial later? But the thermodynamics thing -- nothing's going to just buzz along without requiring some energy, and usually lots of it. Otherwise, it rusts, rots, dissolves and then goes back to the earth. We have to keep maintaining this place or it turns to so much debris. 

So it was no great surprise when what was once upon a time a sleeping porch began yawning towards the earth. Several years ago, I noticed there was a hump in the middle of that room. A little quirky, but part of the charm. We use that space as our "nursery" -- it's where the grandkids bunk when they visit and play. I painted everything in cheerful colors, put baskets of toys in the chiffarobe, arranged it just so and even put new packages of toothbrushes in the bathroom in case somebody forgot theirs. Over time, the chiffarobe started looking like the one in the Beauty and the Beast cartoon...listing heavily to one side. Then the little table by the bunkbeds on the other end of the room began threatening to fall over. We willed ourselves into denial, passing through on the way to the carport. Humming helps. But then, the front wall began separating slightly from the floor. One pesky son had the nerve to say, "Mom, you're gonna lose this whole room if you don't do something about that foundation." Doesn't he know that I've got to pay the tile man for what's already happening in the kitchen? 

Apparently we've got to rip out the floor in that room, dig out the dirt there, pour concrete and actually make a foundation, and then do something about all those wonky floor joists. We will end up with new subflooring and something on top of that (which remains to be seen). I love the smell of dirt. It's a weird thing about me and I'm embarrassed to admit I've been caught with mud on my face before, when I was a kid but then particularly when I was pregnant with Viking children. We're about to open up Pandora's Box and see what's been conspiring under there for the last hundred and twenty-one years. Wish me luck. 

Falling Forward

I was holding his giant, gnarled, ancient hand as he writhed in pain, begging me to pull him up out of the hospital bed. It was my Father-in-law, who had broken his hip earlier in the day. The two kegs of morphine that they had pushed into his vein were doing nothing to help him. This, a man whom I've never heard complain about hurting except to say his shoulder was grumpy. Even with that, he won't generally take anything to make it feel better. He's a tough old Navy SeaBee, still strong as an ox at 90 years old. I felt like I was wrestling a bear for a bit there, as the fog of dementia further added to his confusion. Before the doctor found the sweet spot of pain relief for him, I tried my best to comfort and explain to him what was happening. Minute-by-minute, the words rolled back out of his brain and the pain overwhelmed all reason left in there. Alzheimer's has to be one of the cruelest diseases, stripping one of dignity or purpose.  Lucky were my MawMaw and my Daddy, both dying with their boots on in their recliners. We don't like to talk about death, but it's a thing. And it's a-coming. 

Climbing back into the car with my son, Jon, and his family, who had also visited my daughter-in-love's sister who happened to be at the same hospital...I was struck by the blessing of children. There were four shining faces -- happy, laughing, fresh, waiting on us. I wanted to squeeze the stuffing out of them. I was reminded of my Grandma Betty's death, where our 3-month-old firstborn (yes, Jon) and I rode all the way to Illinois with my folks for the funeral. He was fussy and full of sauce on that trip, but the old ladies said hearing those sounds made them feel hopeful. Life goes on. I get that now. Harvest moon looming big overhead. 

This week looks to be another insane one at the Norton house. Besides Ken's Daddy's surgery and a few procedures ourselves, our tile guy decided to jump ahead of schedule and will start tiling our kitchen, laundry and pantry tomorrow. We've been waiting for him for a couple of months, so no one's complaining. Our son Daniel rescued us this morning and arrived to move appliances out of the house and bring his personal comedy show while he was at it. He could make money making people laugh, if he so chose. Daughter Liz sent cute videos of two of the grands, bringing more sunshine to the horizon. We're planning on visiting son Jesse and his family later on the week, if possible. There will be four more jolly little faces there, as well as a whole passel of puppies. Puppies are always good. Things are looking up.   

Ohhhhh Shiny!

You beautiful, shining orb...who are you? I've seen you lately, every night when I walk the dog, hanging like a beautiful, eye-watering jewel on a tree. I want to shout to the neighbors in the waning evening light: "Can you see it?! Is it a planet or a star or a UFO?" Then they'd really know I was crazy. It's not moving, so it must not be aliens, and it's not the North Star, because it's in the east. It must be Venus, that blazing, flashy diva. All of my childhood, I was unaware that you could see planets with the naked eye. I just assumed all the shiny objects in the sky were stars. My Daddy loved to watch the heavens with us kids on summer nights. We'd lie on the warm driveway and look for "shooting stars." I don't know what took me so long, but now I know that many of the big, gleaming things suspended in space are actually planets. This makes my inner child very excited. 

My favorite wedding decor that I have been involved in had to do with night skies. We decorated my nephew and his new bride's reception with a theme from the book "The Little Prince" (her favorite childhood tome). I had never read it, so it was a delight to be introduced to the story. It involved stars, planets, the moon, a little boy and a fox. With a bevy of helpers, we spangled the walls of the church fellowship hall with big golden stars and twinkle lights. The tables had magical jars filled with more stars and firelight, then we stacked old books and trinkets alongside. I bought various sizes of Japanese lanterns and painted them, transforming them into the planets and a (really big) moon. One of our nephews, Benjamin, built a whimsical trellis out of branches; I festooned it with tulle and lace and lights. There was a a fox sitting all sassy on the grand piano and a massive telescope beside it. Said nephew also dragged tall saplings out of the woods and pegged them onto stands, feathering even more lights up into the branches. We hung the planets all around the room in the trees. It was like a fairy garden, but better. The piece-de-resistance was the cake my niece, Hannah, made: a multi-tiered confection, with blue and white icing that she had poured and swirled down the sides. It looked for all the world like the Milky Way. The massive moon was smack-dab in the middle of the trellis, with the cake the crowning gem of the whole affair. It was winsome, fun and beautiful. After all was said and done, the party over and all the decorations taken down, someone happened to notice that no one bothered to take pictures. Eventually one photo surfaced, a blurry one with the bride and groom leaning over the cake. You have to wonder: if there were no pictures, did it really happen? The most banal of happenings get documented these days...people looking insanely excited at the outside of a restaurant in their selfies, when the truth is they seem pretty bored once the picture-taking is over. Maybe this was a good sign, everyone too busy having a great time - talking, laughing, eating, and enjoying each other -- to stop and take pictures. We can all remember it as a wonderfully special night, and our memories can get more embellished and sparkly over time, than what any pictures would have shown.

Busy days ahead, with us (the Carrollton Wind Ensemble) playing the Phantom, Thursday and Friday in Carrollton, then a creepy concert a few days later (I've got my pirate costume ready, aarrrrrrr!). We have a grandson coming over the weekend and then four more grands staying the next week while their parents head to the northeast for some much-deserved time alone and Fall color. I might better gird up my loins...  

Not-So-Silent Movie

In the spring and fall, when we're not sweating bullets, I open up my 121-year-old Victorian house so it can breathe a little bit. Most of our windows have been painted shut, dang-nab-it...but the newer ones still open and I have a big screen door at the front. It can get musty in here and start smelling like an old lady house, so I take every chance I can get to air it out. I light candles and put on music or play it myself. It kind of freaks me out when neighbors from a street over tell me they're hearing me practice my flute. Music is a wonderful thing, but the tedium of scales and arpeggios might bring out the Phantom or something. Speaking of which...our wind ensemble (Carrollton Wind Ensemble, look it up, buy tickets...) is practicing a new Phantom of the Opera arrangement by Elijah Green. It's not the Andrew Lloyd Webber one, please, please put that one in your thinking cap before buying tickets. This one is an accompaniment to the old silent film with Lon Chaney. I had never seen it in all my born days until last week. Why would I ever watch a silent movie when there's plenty of talkies? Besides, I'm still only 39. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. This version is fascinating, you must come out and see it. 

I get to feeling sorry for myself on Friday nights. I have a long history of that. When we were kids, my sister and I would watch The Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family on Friday evening. All I could imagine was that the neighborhood girls were at the skating rink and I was stuck at home, watching other (fake) people have fun in TV land. My Mama said that everybody was smoking and kissing boys at the skating rink, so I wasn't allowed to go. She was probably right and I'd have ruined my life right then and there. I didn't know at the time that there was such a thing as FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), but I was born with this condition. That's why I'm on the fluffy side. If anyone is eating bon-bons, I have to have some too. It's also why I can't get anything done, if there's a social event going on. Or if someone pops in for a visit, I ain't doing any laundry or dishes while they're here. I want to be all-there and hate to miss any of the conversations. It's probably why my bladder is already ruined, being stretched one too many times while conversing with fascinating people.

This particular Friday night, Ken was working until midnight and I was alone with the animals. That can be soothing, but not this time. I opened up the house to the cool night air. There's a chill in the air, so the critters are starting to try to get into the house. I ran out to the mailbox (well, I shouldn't lie...I walked spastically) and did a crazy dance when I found myself face to face with a garden spider hanging right in my path. I shook the water bugs (read: big, ole gigantic roaches with an agenda) off the cat food and brought it inside.  There was a gentle rain and fun sounds from the concert down the street. I desperately needed to practice the Phantom, so I hunkered down, opening up the actual movie while I played along. Things were going swimmingly as I worked on scales and exercises, then moved on over to the main event. The crisp night air was starting to nip at my fingers and toes, but I kept on working. The FOMO was significant and all I could think of was all my grandkids and the fact that I wanted to curl up with a few of them and a warm blanket. Or my hunky husband. But none of those people were there. 

It is about midway through the movie when the Phantom gets unmasked. It's the silliest thing you've ever seen, if you have normal proclivities and have already seen other modern scary movies, but I don't watch horror movies or attend witch covens. When that dumb girl pulls off his mask, you want to laugh but then you might want to scream. I mean, he doesn't have a nose, for heavens' sake. And I'm supposed to keep playing my flute, which requires air and relaxed lips. It was then that I decided to quickly close up the windows and the front door. I tried to get back to some serious playing, but it just wasn't happening. I curled up with my blanket and a flighty movie about some over-empowered Australian woman, a pilot, who falls in love with a wimpy but fantastically cute guy who is scared of everything, including his own Daddy. Why would she do that? The abs will definitely fall later and then what will she do? And why is he such a chicken? He's got everything going for him but he can't step up and be the hero. Well, he kind-of does some of that at the very last minute but if I were her I'd be worried that might not hold up under duress. I am a woman, so I tend to blame women for the state of these things, but I digress...

I got ready for bed, gathered the dog and took her to the side door for her last hurrah. The door was unlocked. It had been unlocked all night! As I rushed poor Sadie to do her business, all I could think of was nose-less crazy people in the corners of the yard. Or probably already inside the house. Now who's the chicken?   

Priorities and the Pull of the Barcalounger

The space between summer and fall is one of those renewal periods in my year. Spring is another one, of course, but Fall is special because, you guessed it -- there's no pollen! Everything is cooling off, but there's still warm days interspersed here and there in the South even up to Christmas, for heavens' sake. Then from Christmas to March we've got little sun siestas all along the way, mixed with the occasional ice and sleet storm. We might get snow one day and the whole place shuts down, even if it's just from the threat of it. I've been mulling priorities in my brain these last few days. We desperately need to clean out our barn, but Ken says that half of that mess belongs to our son who is still working on building their house. I don't believe him. That man is the most organized neatnick known to humanity, but he doesn't have the ability to throw anything away. His clothes are color-coded in the closet, shirts are spaced equidistant from each other, and all his belts and ties are perfectly stored in their racks. But he can't throw away a candy wrapper. Oh yes, he folds it neatly and lays it on the counter (perfectly parallel to the edge). Then I have to be the one to throw it away. When it comes time to clean up or organize his shop, I'm the unlucky one who gets the job. He can't bear to think of disposing of anything, so I have to make those decisions. I'm the mean mug who is filling up the junkyard, ya'll. Don't hate me. I'm the messy one and I've also got all my collections of paraphernalia cluttering up the house. But I love my junk. It's too pretty to throw away. You see the hypocrisy here? Stopping to prioritize our lives takes sincere intention and effort. You have to actually stop, turn off HGTV, make a plan, get off your duff. Read: quit watching other people live and get to it. Please remember that I am preaching to myself. If I write it down, maybe I'll do something about it. Ken hates my sticky notes, but I need them because if I don't put a reminder right in front of my face, I'll go chasing the next butterfly and forget all about it. 

What do I love? What do you love? Put it on a sticky note. If you decide later that you don't love it, throw it away. Sort them in order of priority and then actually do something every day to make that thing show up in your life. We don't need 500 of these, not even 20. Stick to the top 5 or 10 if you can, then daily remind yourself to give them energy. 

I was thinking this morning about paint. Paint is a lovely thing to me. I love the movement of it over a page or wall or piece of furniture. The way it changes the world is magic. It's not terribly expensive. When you add your effort to it, it becomes something new and different. It can be ugly, but I ain't having that. It smells wonderful, covers a multitude of sins and feels like the world just got a do-over. I get down, when I haven't had enough paint in my life. This is just a fact of my existence and I keep forgetting that. I should put a new sticky note on my desk: Paint Something Today. Heading out shortly to get paint samples... 

We can live for years without doing the things we say we love or want to do. I had a friend who kept saying, for years, that they wanted to ride the whitewater down the Colorado River (that seems pretty much like hell to me -- think about it, cold, wet, all that jostling...). With the event never occurring, I recently asked my friend when they were going to do it. There was some pondering and then he said, "You know, truthfully, I really don't care about doing that." So I said, "Quit saying it then!" Time's a wastin' and if we're gonna do something, let's get to it. If not, let's make another plan, a realistic one. To quote an overused but wonderful phrase: Carpe diem!