My BFF from childhood is going to sleep tonight at Children's Hospital in Boston the night before her middle son's brain surgery. We normally talk everyday at some point, or at least every other day. I can't believe the topic tomorrow will be Charlie's brain surgery and not the "normal" things we talk about. When these things happen, the life we lived before the news seems so distant even though it was maybe just yesterday or two weeks ago when you did not know the diagnosis. It seems you step into a whole other life without warning or welcome. I have been praying all over town since the news of Charlie came over the phone ... praying on the road Amy and I used to walk to school on together carrying out matching Snoopy book bags ... in front of her childhood house on Seney Drive ... at the church we went to together for most of our lives, our middle school, high school and her favorite pizza place in the center of town.
It has been a difficult waiting period. They have had to wait for the surgery to happen at Children's Hospital in Boston and so it has been a long two weeks for them. We have been calling it "Holy Saturday," the "waiting time." Amy told me over the long weekend that it feels like everyone else's Memorial Day weekend is "normal" and she was having a hard time doing whatever it was she was supposed to be doing. I understand this feeling, even though it isn't true. I reminded her that everyone she was seeing out around her town had either suffered deeply during a past holiday weekend, is struggling now but may not look like it because they are running errands just like she is, or have a tough holiday coming. There is no escaping sickness and crisis in life, it comes to all of us at one time or another and if it hasn't found you yet, it will. And so will the grace of God if you are open to receiving it. This is a humbling thought ... tragedy will happen to all of us, it's an inevitable part of life. Grace is not so inevitable, it can come only if we open ourselves up to receive it. Grace itself is as real as the tragedy (even more real, but that's another story) but it has to be allowed in, whereas the tragic event comes uninvited.
Talking to Amy over Memorial Day weekend reminded me of when I called Lisa (another childhood BFF) in the wee hours of the morning when the calender changed to Sept. 12, 2001. I did not know if the sun was going to rise that next morning and I could not sleep. I called her at her house in Vermont from my own in Colorado. She answered on the first ring and I said, "I'm sorry, Lis, but I can't sleep." Her response was "No one is sleeping tonight, Megan." I was feeling totally and completely alone that night in the quiet of my kitchen, not realizing the thousands of other people, maybe hundreds of thousands, who were up that night for the same reasons I was. Just hearing Lisa's voice and knowing I was not alone brought great comfort to an unbearable moment. Fear creates such a feeling of isolation which is not necessarily real but it certainly feels like it is at the time. No one that knows Amy, Garrett or their three boys have slept soundly in the past two weeks. They probably feel so alone in that hospital room tonight, even though the amount of love being offered to them is staggering. I pray that they feel it through the thick fog of shock and fear. I have a feeling they do, because they are open to the grace part ... and the grace part makes the intolerable tolerable.
I picture Charlie falling asleep tonight (hopefully) and thinking about Harry Potter and some great lacrosse game he has played instead of his brain surgery tomorrow morning. They are in their worst nightmare and what I can do most for them today is pray and be grateful and present in my own life, and so I will pray, pray, pray, be grateful, be grateful, be grateful. Pray for grace for them and every other family waking up in a hospital room tomorrow as well as those out running errands around town, maybe not realizing the blessings of a day of errand running.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Monday, May 30, 2011
Have a Contemplative Memorial Day
This has been a joke with my friends all weekend ... how annoyed my sister and I get when people say "Happy Memorial Day!" which just sounds so weird to me considering what Memorial Day is about. So this is what we have been saying to one another. The parade today was so heartwarming. Regardless of any mistakes I have made in my life, the fact that I knew each of our veterans by name, that they know me and Eddie and waved to our girls while they were marching, made me feel like I have done something right in my life.
I thought a lot today about the turmoil I have been in about the support (or perceived lack of) that I have been feeling this week. The words of Ronald Reagan come to mind. In a speech he made on Veterans Day 1985 at Arlington National Cemetery. He said the following words:
"Sometime back I received in the name of our country the bodies of four Marines who had died while on active duty. I said then that there is a special sadness that accompanies the death of a serviceman, for we're never quite good enough to them -- not really; we can't be, because what they gave us is beyond our powers to repay. And so, when a serviceman dies, it's a tear in the fabric, a break in the whole, and all we can do is remember."
I realized at the parade today, and I think I felt it all week long that President Reagan was right ... we're never quite good enough and I think I have not wanted to come to terms with the times that I take our freedom for granted ... the times I have seen someone in uniform and looked away instead of walking up to them and saying "thank you" and all the times I take the easy way out instead of truly utilizing all the gifts that our freedom has to offer.
Today when I saw World War II veterans struggle to their feet while the rest of us sat in the shade, I could not bring them enough water. I could not say "Thank You" enough and I could not stop wishing that my entire town had come to hear them speak instead of a small portion of the whole. I realize that everything I have I owe to them. And I guess sometimes all I can do is keep doing what I'm doing and have a contemplative Memorial Day and hope that it is enough ... even though I know that it isn't.
Two more nights until Charlie's surgery. Prayers for him have been in abundance. Still to difficult to write about ... maybe tomorrow.
I thought a lot today about the turmoil I have been in about the support (or perceived lack of) that I have been feeling this week. The words of Ronald Reagan come to mind. In a speech he made on Veterans Day 1985 at Arlington National Cemetery. He said the following words:
"Sometime back I received in the name of our country the bodies of four Marines who had died while on active duty. I said then that there is a special sadness that accompanies the death of a serviceman, for we're never quite good enough to them -- not really; we can't be, because what they gave us is beyond our powers to repay. And so, when a serviceman dies, it's a tear in the fabric, a break in the whole, and all we can do is remember."
I realized at the parade today, and I think I felt it all week long that President Reagan was right ... we're never quite good enough and I think I have not wanted to come to terms with the times that I take our freedom for granted ... the times I have seen someone in uniform and looked away instead of walking up to them and saying "thank you" and all the times I take the easy way out instead of truly utilizing all the gifts that our freedom has to offer.
Today when I saw World War II veterans struggle to their feet while the rest of us sat in the shade, I could not bring them enough water. I could not say "Thank You" enough and I could not stop wishing that my entire town had come to hear them speak instead of a small portion of the whole. I realize that everything I have I owe to them. And I guess sometimes all I can do is keep doing what I'm doing and have a contemplative Memorial Day and hope that it is enough ... even though I know that it isn't.
Two more nights until Charlie's surgery. Prayers for him have been in abundance. Still to difficult to write about ... maybe tomorrow.
Friday, May 27, 2011
More on Oprah...
My friend, Brigid, did an awesome job of writing down the main points of Oprah's last show -- here they are and they are amazing. I can't stop talking about it so I am having a viewing party next week.
When you get that you are responsible for your own life, you are FREE.
We are all energy ... please take responsibility for the energy you are sending out.
All the energy you put out is coming back to you 10-fold.
The common thread running through all our pain is a sense of unworthiness.
We block our blessings because we don't feel good enough, worthy enough.
We are worthy because we were born.
Everybody wants validation ... do you see me, hear me, does what I have to say mean something to you?
Validate the people in your life. I hear you, I see you, what you say means something to me.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Our house has a heart and a soul and eyes to see us with....
My dining room walls are painted a shade of rasberry that I love -- one wall is covered with a quote that Mark Twain wrote about his childhood home. It reads:
"Our house has a heart and a soul and eyes to see us with, and approvals and solitudes and deep sympathies, it is of us, and we are in its confidence and we live in its grace and in the peace of its benediction ... we can not enter it unmoved."
I have it up there because we live in the house I grew up in and it sums up my love for this house. My daughters are making brownies for the veterans and right in the middle of the baking extravaganza my 11-year-old Madison realizes we are coming back from the beach at the crack of dawn on Monday for the Memorial Day parade in our town.
She asks if her cousins are coming back that early.
"No," I answer.
"Is Nana coming back that early?"
"No, Maddie, just us."
Well, when are they all coming back??" (I can see the tears welling up.)
"I don't know, Sweetheart, it's not about what they are doing, it's about what we are doing."
(cry,cry,cry) "They get a whole other day at the beach?!"
It is then when I hear my Eddie's voice yell down from upstairs, "Madison, we are a country at war and the men we are honoring on Memorial Day fought in battles so we can have the life we have. We are leaving the beach early to come back for the parade. End of story."
I love him in this moment for being the funniest person I've ever met, but dead serious when it comes to United States veterans.
(11-year-old tears, tears and more tears)
In my mind's eye, I see myself sitting in the same place looking up at my dad with the same freckled face, it's 1980 and I don't want to go to the parade. It's going to be hot, boring and I don't know if any of my friends are going.
"Sweet girl," I say in the calmest voice I can muster, "I know it's hard but it's what we do as a family and we will always do it -- we owe our lives to them and we are going to the parade. And guess who the grand marshal is. Mr.Walsh!" (she had just told me yesterday that Bob Walsh was her favorite veteran).
Her tears started to dry up and a look much older than her young self came over her face. She was resolved, and even though it wasn't what she wanted, even though she didn't fully understand why, she knew that by coming back for the parade she was somehow following the road less traveled (her Grampy's favorite poem) and she had the wisdom to take it. She wiped her face with her filthy shirt she wore to soccer practice and got up to put candied American flags on each of the 12 brownies.
I felt like an old, strict parent. I questioned myself for a half a second. Then realized that years from now, when I am no longer here, maybe Madison would honor the veterans in whatever town she ends up in and say to her kids, "We're going home to make brownies for the men; it's what I used to do with my mom and on Monday we gotta get up early to get a good seat at the parade."
"Our house has a heart and a soul and eyes to see us with, and approvals and solitudes and deep sympathies, it is of us, and we are in its confidence and we live in its grace and in the peace of its benediction ... we can not enter it unmoved."
I have it up there because we live in the house I grew up in and it sums up my love for this house. My daughters are making brownies for the veterans and right in the middle of the baking extravaganza my 11-year-old Madison realizes we are coming back from the beach at the crack of dawn on Monday for the Memorial Day parade in our town.
She asks if her cousins are coming back that early.
"No," I answer.
"Is Nana coming back that early?"
"No, Maddie, just us."
Well, when are they all coming back??" (I can see the tears welling up.)
"I don't know, Sweetheart, it's not about what they are doing, it's about what we are doing."
(cry,cry,cry) "They get a whole other day at the beach?!"
It is then when I hear my Eddie's voice yell down from upstairs, "Madison, we are a country at war and the men we are honoring on Memorial Day fought in battles so we can have the life we have. We are leaving the beach early to come back for the parade. End of story."
I love him in this moment for being the funniest person I've ever met, but dead serious when it comes to United States veterans.
(11-year-old tears, tears and more tears)
In my mind's eye, I see myself sitting in the same place looking up at my dad with the same freckled face, it's 1980 and I don't want to go to the parade. It's going to be hot, boring and I don't know if any of my friends are going.
"Sweet girl," I say in the calmest voice I can muster, "I know it's hard but it's what we do as a family and we will always do it -- we owe our lives to them and we are going to the parade. And guess who the grand marshal is. Mr.Walsh!" (she had just told me yesterday that Bob Walsh was her favorite veteran).
Her tears started to dry up and a look much older than her young self came over her face. She was resolved, and even though it wasn't what she wanted, even though she didn't fully understand why, she knew that by coming back for the parade she was somehow following the road less traveled (her Grampy's favorite poem) and she had the wisdom to take it. She wiped her face with her filthy shirt she wore to soccer practice and got up to put candied American flags on each of the 12 brownies.
I felt like an old, strict parent. I questioned myself for a half a second. Then realized that years from now, when I am no longer here, maybe Madison would honor the veterans in whatever town she ends up in and say to her kids, "We're going home to make brownies for the men; it's what I used to do with my mom and on Monday we gotta get up early to get a good seat at the parade."
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
My T-shirt today reads: I LOVE OPRAH
Not really but I may get one. She was unbelievable today on her last episode! My girls asked me what I was going to do now everyday at 4 p.m. and my oldest daughter, Madison, suggested that maybe I could clean their rooms now that I had a free hour ... NOT.
Oprah spoke the truth today to millions and millions of people. Her message, without actually saying it was: "Stop looking at me and look instead at your own life." I watched it with my girlfriend and Madison over Diet Cokes and half way through my friend said "I was uncomfortable in the beginning but this is awesome!" She was uncomfortable because growth is uncomfortable and Oprah is asking us to grow. She was so authentic and real and spoke the truth about who we are without any fluff. Brilliant. The thing I realized the most from watching the show is that her journey to this love fest has not been an easy one. She feels so loved because she has done what is necessary to really receive the love available to us -- she has let her guard down, faced her demons and allows herself to be loved. Awesome Oprah. While we were sitting there Madison said to me, "I think if Oprah met you she would really like you, Mom." Maybe I will clean her room tomorrow at 4 ...
The ceremonies today for the veterans were great. I prayed all morning to "get the mud out of my own eyes" and stop the judgment I was having toward all the people who haven't shown up to support the men. I realized that what I have to do is listen to my own teachings. I had to make the choice to live my own life in a meaningful way today instead of wanting others to behave in a particular way. "Meaningful" is a term that is different to each person and who I am to say the way it should be. I get very defensive of the veterans in a way I do not in the rest of the Heartworks opportunities. Heartworks is a chance to live a more meaningful life through receiving and giving. For the most part, Heartworks is only about doing what works for you -- we don't want you cooking a meal for someone if you hate cooking. Don't volunteer to plant flowers in someone's yard if you don't like gardening. It is about using the things you already love to do and just stretch it a bit and do it for someone else. It is all about do what you want when you want to do it -- it is not about an extra thing on your all ready full to-do list. But it feels different when it comes to the veterans. Everything we have is because of them. Everything -- the comfortable bed we don't want to get out of too early, the errands we "need" to run, the schools our kids will be late for if they come to the 8 a.m. ceremony. But this is only how I see it. It is also because of these men that other people can see it differently than I do and it's safe to have these differences!
So I knew I just had to live my life in a way that felt good to me today instead of focusing on what everyone else around me was (doing or not doing). Which is why, when I had a chance to drive Mazda home from her rehabilitation session, I said YES even though I was going to leave from a highlight with soaking wet hair. Mazda is a mom in town who had a stroke last year and has a tough time doing all the things I usually take for granted. Like talking, opening a car door and making dinner. She is beautiful and I love her. So Mary (my youngest) and I went to pick her up and drive her home before the afternoon flag ceremony. While in the car we started to talk about Oprah's last show. Mazda said in a slow and shaky voice (but not as slow as a few months ago because she is recovering more and more each day), "Oprah gives me hope." When I asked her in what way, she said, "Because I saw on her show a woman with no limbs take care of her children." Because of Oprah's fearless decision to talk about God and the difficult things in life, this woman next to me, who had her whole life change in one day, is beginning to see that she can be a great mother to her children even though her body is not working the way she wants it to. This is why I want my Oprah T-shirt.
The 4 p.m. ceremony had more people than usual because a local school came to sing, but it didn't matter. My mind felt so clear standing there with the men. I had stopped focusing out and focused in on my own life.
I was just grateful within myself to know these men and to have 10 opportunities this week to expose my children to something meaningful and important.
I was grateful that the rain has stopped and the sun is out.
Grateful that we live in a country that offers Charlie the best surgeons in the world next Wednesday when he lies on the operating table.
And that a black woman from Mississippi can go on TV and talk about God and not be arrested or killed.
Thank you, God; thank you, veterans; thank you, judgment, for teaching me again and again. My 4 o'clock will feel a bit empty on Monday without seeing the veterans or my friend, Oprah, but my girls' bedrooms can always use a good cleaning and I know now not to take this for granted either. Thank you, Mazda.
Oprah spoke the truth today to millions and millions of people. Her message, without actually saying it was: "Stop looking at me and look instead at your own life." I watched it with my girlfriend and Madison over Diet Cokes and half way through my friend said "I was uncomfortable in the beginning but this is awesome!" She was uncomfortable because growth is uncomfortable and Oprah is asking us to grow. She was so authentic and real and spoke the truth about who we are without any fluff. Brilliant. The thing I realized the most from watching the show is that her journey to this love fest has not been an easy one. She feels so loved because she has done what is necessary to really receive the love available to us -- she has let her guard down, faced her demons and allows herself to be loved. Awesome Oprah. While we were sitting there Madison said to me, "I think if Oprah met you she would really like you, Mom." Maybe I will clean her room tomorrow at 4 ...
The ceremonies today for the veterans were great. I prayed all morning to "get the mud out of my own eyes" and stop the judgment I was having toward all the people who haven't shown up to support the men. I realized that what I have to do is listen to my own teachings. I had to make the choice to live my own life in a meaningful way today instead of wanting others to behave in a particular way. "Meaningful" is a term that is different to each person and who I am to say the way it should be. I get very defensive of the veterans in a way I do not in the rest of the Heartworks opportunities. Heartworks is a chance to live a more meaningful life through receiving and giving. For the most part, Heartworks is only about doing what works for you -- we don't want you cooking a meal for someone if you hate cooking. Don't volunteer to plant flowers in someone's yard if you don't like gardening. It is about using the things you already love to do and just stretch it a bit and do it for someone else. It is all about do what you want when you want to do it -- it is not about an extra thing on your all ready full to-do list. But it feels different when it comes to the veterans. Everything we have is because of them. Everything -- the comfortable bed we don't want to get out of too early, the errands we "need" to run, the schools our kids will be late for if they come to the 8 a.m. ceremony. But this is only how I see it. It is also because of these men that other people can see it differently than I do and it's safe to have these differences!
So I knew I just had to live my life in a way that felt good to me today instead of focusing on what everyone else around me was (doing or not doing). Which is why, when I had a chance to drive Mazda home from her rehabilitation session, I said YES even though I was going to leave from a highlight with soaking wet hair. Mazda is a mom in town who had a stroke last year and has a tough time doing all the things I usually take for granted. Like talking, opening a car door and making dinner. She is beautiful and I love her. So Mary (my youngest) and I went to pick her up and drive her home before the afternoon flag ceremony. While in the car we started to talk about Oprah's last show. Mazda said in a slow and shaky voice (but not as slow as a few months ago because she is recovering more and more each day), "Oprah gives me hope." When I asked her in what way, she said, "Because I saw on her show a woman with no limbs take care of her children." Because of Oprah's fearless decision to talk about God and the difficult things in life, this woman next to me, who had her whole life change in one day, is beginning to see that she can be a great mother to her children even though her body is not working the way she wants it to. This is why I want my Oprah T-shirt.
The 4 p.m. ceremony had more people than usual because a local school came to sing, but it didn't matter. My mind felt so clear standing there with the men. I had stopped focusing out and focused in on my own life.
I was just grateful within myself to know these men and to have 10 opportunities this week to expose my children to something meaningful and important.
I was grateful that the rain has stopped and the sun is out.
Grateful that we live in a country that offers Charlie the best surgeons in the world next Wednesday when he lies on the operating table.
And that a black woman from Mississippi can go on TV and talk about God and not be arrested or killed.
Thank you, God; thank you, veterans; thank you, judgment, for teaching me again and again. My 4 o'clock will feel a bit empty on Monday without seeing the veterans or my friend, Oprah, but my girls' bedrooms can always use a good cleaning and I know now not to take this for granted either. Thank you, Mazda.
Overwhelmed or 'whelmed' as Amy and I call it
I have been wondering (and so has The Bernardsville News, who asked me to start blogging three months ago) why blogging has apparently been so challenging for me ... if anyone has noticed, I've done only four blogs in three months and I've been told, though I've only read two blogs in my life, that this is something people do on a daily basis. By all accounts, if you were asking someone who knows me, even for 10 minutes, I am a non-stop talker, non-stop writer, non-stop processor, truth teller, no-filter kind of person. So why in God's name would blogging be challenging for me? It really doesn't make any sense, and those who know me say, "Megan! I would think you would LOVE blogging!"
So I have thought about it ... is it my fear of exposure? my question of "why would anyone care what I am doing?" or maybe it's my concern that if people really knew what went on in my head on a daily basis, someone would have me in the next ambulance racing up Route 287 to Morristown Memorial Hospital psych ward. I am a psycho-therapist and social worker, so this would not be the best way to attract new clients.
I am a thinker ... a feeler ... an explorer of the human experience, and sometimes this can be so damn annoying to me, and I am convinced it is the same for the people who love me (and especially to those who don't love me) But I am who I am. I am my father's daughter.
So if I am going to cover today's events, they are as follows: Starting my day off with 12 United States veterans raising the flag in the center of our town. Heartworks started this tradition a few years ago and I look forward to it all year. Out of 200 families on an e-mail list announcing this event no more than 15 families have shown up any morning or afternoon this week (they raise the flag at 8 a.m. and lower the flag at 4 p.m.). This makes me want to scream. This makes me want to knock on doors and ask what the (expletive) people are doing with their time. If it were not for these men we wouold more than likely not have soccer practices to be on time for or breakfast meetings. I don't understand, especially because we are presntly at war, how anyone in our country can continue to take anything for granted. I really, truley do not understand why people would not be jumping out of bed 30 minutes early to come say "thank you" to men that have paved the way for the life we have.
Which in turn reminds me of how judgmental I am. How I have to remind myself that I grew up with a father, a Korean War veteran, who never let us "celebrate" Memorial Day weekend. We were told from an early age that it is a weekend of reflection and gratitude, not sales at the mall and BBQs. This response was always met with my very best eye roll and heavy sigh. He was a man who, on freezing cold winter days, would be in warm flannel pajamas sitting in front of a roaring fire and would get up, put on shorts and a T-shirt and run five miles until he came home with ice hanging from his earlobes. As he came back home hooting and hollering, my mom would look at him and yell, "Larry! You're crazy! What the hell are you doing?" and my Dad would run up the stairs, jump into a freezing cold shower and scream at the top of his lungs. Ten minutes later he would come downstairs in two pairs of flannel PJs and his striped robe, with a hot cup of coffee in his hands. "Meggy Meg, I started to take the warmth for granted, so I had to fix that!" and would settle back into his chair for the rest of the football game he had started.
I am 42 years old now (really??) and I have to realize that not everyone was raised by my dad. So I have no right to judge or blame anyone.
Oprah always says, "When you know better you do better." So the fact that so many women, all of which I love dearly, do not see this flag ceremony the way I do is difficult to swallow but I understand what Oprah is saying and I realize that everyone has different reasons for supporting different things...but in reality...how can you not supoort our Veterans??
Next is the agony of throwing out half of a tuna sandwich that my daughter Madison didn't eat for dinner tonight, because I just got through watching a video by an organization called "Feed the Poor" about three little girls spending their days, in a country I've never been to, walking up and down a mountain collecting clean drinking water for their family. They spend so much time doing this that they don't have time to go out and find food to eat. They choose clean water over food. They have to choose this and they are like 2, 5 and 8 years old and have nothing. When their mom brought home rice from a neighbor's house, she had to pick leaves off a tree to give it some nutritional content. My loves, Madison, Caroline and Mary, are 4, 9 and 11. so enough said, right? Torture to throw out this half a sandwich tonight! I live in a town where if someone's road has a pothole in it or their neighbors play their music too loud people seem to have time to raise hell to raise at a town council meeting, but 8 minutes each morning and afternoon for a week to honor Veterans? Nope. Is my judgmental personality showing through again? This is why I am hesitant to blog.
And then there is my godson, Charlie. The most painful part of my day to write about. Even more than our veterans not being honored enough (only in my own judgment, of course) and starving children walking up and down hills for clean water, it is more painful for me to write about sweet Charlie because a week ago tonight, four hours from now, my best friend from childhood's son woke up in his room in a small town in Rhode Island, had a seizure, fell down the steps, which woke his parents up to their worst nightmare. He was rushed to the hospital (though by Amy's account the word rushed is inaccurate because when your third grader is in the back of an ambulance, it takes FOREVER). I believe her because I have a third grader as well.
It was the same day that lovely Pat called me from The Bernardsville News and said, as politely as she could, "Megan, blogging means to actually blog, write down your thoughts, your experiences, your feelings". But sometimes this concept is just too much to ask. I have not been ready to write about Charlie or the tumor that was found in his brain when he arrived at the hospital. I have not been ready to write about the silences on the phone with my Amy because even though we are as close as BFFs can be, there are times like this when there is nothing to say. This silence has been our sacred ground. A comfortable discomfort between two lifelong friends ... My heart reaching out to her from New Jersey to Rhode Island, to say, "I love you, I love Charlie, this is all (expletive) up but both you and I know that God is as present as He has ever been".
Nope, not ready to write about Charlie. But I will ... because Pat from The Bernardsville News and people who love me seem to think I can be a blogger ... so I guess there will be more tomorrow. Good night and thanks for listening,
PS: The reasons behind the title "Overwhelmed or "whelmed" as Amy and I call it, is because Amy and I say "whelmed" instead of overwhelmed when we are overtaken by God's grace and powerful truths of the human experience. Simply put, the term "overwhelmed" is reserved for too many soccer games in a day, the air conditioning being too cold and too many hand-me-downs to fit in the closet. "Whelmed" is when the important truths of life seem to be too much, either because they are so awe inspiring or so terrifying and there are no words to express the experience. Though as a blogger I will do my best.
As I post this blog, my iPod is playing "Here Comes the Sun" by the Beatles ... this fits perfectly into the realm of "whelmed."
So I have thought about it ... is it my fear of exposure? my question of "why would anyone care what I am doing?" or maybe it's my concern that if people really knew what went on in my head on a daily basis, someone would have me in the next ambulance racing up Route 287 to Morristown Memorial Hospital psych ward. I am a psycho-therapist and social worker, so this would not be the best way to attract new clients.
I am a thinker ... a feeler ... an explorer of the human experience, and sometimes this can be so damn annoying to me, and I am convinced it is the same for the people who love me (and especially to those who don't love me) But I am who I am. I am my father's daughter.
So if I am going to cover today's events, they are as follows: Starting my day off with 12 United States veterans raising the flag in the center of our town. Heartworks started this tradition a few years ago and I look forward to it all year. Out of 200 families on an e-mail list announcing this event no more than 15 families have shown up any morning or afternoon this week (they raise the flag at 8 a.m. and lower the flag at 4 p.m.). This makes me want to scream. This makes me want to knock on doors and ask what the (expletive) people are doing with their time. If it were not for these men we wouold more than likely not have soccer practices to be on time for or breakfast meetings. I don't understand, especially because we are presntly at war, how anyone in our country can continue to take anything for granted. I really, truley do not understand why people would not be jumping out of bed 30 minutes early to come say "thank you" to men that have paved the way for the life we have.
Which in turn reminds me of how judgmental I am. How I have to remind myself that I grew up with a father, a Korean War veteran, who never let us "celebrate" Memorial Day weekend. We were told from an early age that it is a weekend of reflection and gratitude, not sales at the mall and BBQs. This response was always met with my very best eye roll and heavy sigh. He was a man who, on freezing cold winter days, would be in warm flannel pajamas sitting in front of a roaring fire and would get up, put on shorts and a T-shirt and run five miles until he came home with ice hanging from his earlobes. As he came back home hooting and hollering, my mom would look at him and yell, "Larry! You're crazy! What the hell are you doing?" and my Dad would run up the stairs, jump into a freezing cold shower and scream at the top of his lungs. Ten minutes later he would come downstairs in two pairs of flannel PJs and his striped robe, with a hot cup of coffee in his hands. "Meggy Meg, I started to take the warmth for granted, so I had to fix that!" and would settle back into his chair for the rest of the football game he had started.
I am 42 years old now (really??) and I have to realize that not everyone was raised by my dad. So I have no right to judge or blame anyone.
Oprah always says, "When you know better you do better." So the fact that so many women, all of which I love dearly, do not see this flag ceremony the way I do is difficult to swallow but I understand what Oprah is saying and I realize that everyone has different reasons for supporting different things...but in reality...how can you not supoort our Veterans??
Next is the agony of throwing out half of a tuna sandwich that my daughter Madison didn't eat for dinner tonight, because I just got through watching a video by an organization called "Feed the Poor" about three little girls spending their days, in a country I've never been to, walking up and down a mountain collecting clean drinking water for their family. They spend so much time doing this that they don't have time to go out and find food to eat. They choose clean water over food. They have to choose this and they are like 2, 5 and 8 years old and have nothing. When their mom brought home rice from a neighbor's house, she had to pick leaves off a tree to give it some nutritional content. My loves, Madison, Caroline and Mary, are 4, 9 and 11. so enough said, right? Torture to throw out this half a sandwich tonight! I live in a town where if someone's road has a pothole in it or their neighbors play their music too loud people seem to have time to raise hell to raise at a town council meeting, but 8 minutes each morning and afternoon for a week to honor Veterans? Nope. Is my judgmental personality showing through again? This is why I am hesitant to blog.
And then there is my godson, Charlie. The most painful part of my day to write about. Even more than our veterans not being honored enough (only in my own judgment, of course) and starving children walking up and down hills for clean water, it is more painful for me to write about sweet Charlie because a week ago tonight, four hours from now, my best friend from childhood's son woke up in his room in a small town in Rhode Island, had a seizure, fell down the steps, which woke his parents up to their worst nightmare. He was rushed to the hospital (though by Amy's account the word rushed is inaccurate because when your third grader is in the back of an ambulance, it takes FOREVER). I believe her because I have a third grader as well.
It was the same day that lovely Pat called me from The Bernardsville News and said, as politely as she could, "Megan, blogging means to actually blog, write down your thoughts, your experiences, your feelings". But sometimes this concept is just too much to ask. I have not been ready to write about Charlie or the tumor that was found in his brain when he arrived at the hospital. I have not been ready to write about the silences on the phone with my Amy because even though we are as close as BFFs can be, there are times like this when there is nothing to say. This silence has been our sacred ground. A comfortable discomfort between two lifelong friends ... My heart reaching out to her from New Jersey to Rhode Island, to say, "I love you, I love Charlie, this is all (expletive) up but both you and I know that God is as present as He has ever been".
Nope, not ready to write about Charlie. But I will ... because Pat from The Bernardsville News and people who love me seem to think I can be a blogger ... so I guess there will be more tomorrow. Good night and thanks for listening,
PS: The reasons behind the title "Overwhelmed or "whelmed" as Amy and I call it, is because Amy and I say "whelmed" instead of overwhelmed when we are overtaken by God's grace and powerful truths of the human experience. Simply put, the term "overwhelmed" is reserved for too many soccer games in a day, the air conditioning being too cold and too many hand-me-downs to fit in the closet. "Whelmed" is when the important truths of life seem to be too much, either because they are so awe inspiring or so terrifying and there are no words to express the experience. Though as a blogger I will do my best.
As I post this blog, my iPod is playing "Here Comes the Sun" by the Beatles ... this fits perfectly into the realm of "whelmed."
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Monday, May 23, 2011
I Can't Complain about the Rain
I can't complain about the rain today because of the morning I have had today. It started at 8 a.m. in front of our town post office. I gathered with other Heartworks members to take part in our annual flag-raising ceremony for the week before Memorial Day. I stood there with 12 men who at one point in their lives slept in ditches in the rain for my freedom. They wore wet, dirty clothes for days without a warm shower so that I can live in a place like Bernardsville and speak my mind and talk about God without being arrested or killed. The rain meant nothing to me as I stood beside a World War II veteran who once told me a story of losing all his friends the day his mess hall was bombed. He cried as he told me about it standing in a parking lot 70 years later. I figured if it had been my play group that was killed, I would be crying about 70 years later as well.
When I got home, I turned on the news to see Joplin, Mo., after a tornado hit the area yesterday. I was in downtown Bernardsville at a street fair with my three girls while that tornado ripped through Joplin. The devastation was so bad it caused the news reporter to break down during the coverage. It reminded me of volunteering at the Convention Center in Houston the week after Hurricane Katrina. Utter despair. Utter hopelessness. Utter devastation. I know what I felt like after John was killed, I know what I felt like after my dad died. Utter despair. Utter hopelessness. Utter devastation.
And yet my friends and neighbors were safe. My town was intact and we I have a roof over my head and a bed to sleep in. I cannot begin to imagine what it would feel like to lose all these things at once. So today instead of complaining about the rain, I will pray for Joplin and other related areas and be grateful for things like spending too much money on crap at a street fair, mud being carried into my house on the bottom of my daughters' boots and the freedom to assemble at 4 this afternoon at an intact post office to stand with men who saved my life even before I was born.
When I got home, I turned on the news to see Joplin, Mo., after a tornado hit the area yesterday. I was in downtown Bernardsville at a street fair with my three girls while that tornado ripped through Joplin. The devastation was so bad it caused the news reporter to break down during the coverage. It reminded me of volunteering at the Convention Center in Houston the week after Hurricane Katrina. Utter despair. Utter hopelessness. Utter devastation. I know what I felt like after John was killed, I know what I felt like after my dad died. Utter despair. Utter hopelessness. Utter devastation.
And yet my friends and neighbors were safe. My town was intact and we I have a roof over my head and a bed to sleep in. I cannot begin to imagine what it would feel like to lose all these things at once. So today instead of complaining about the rain, I will pray for Joplin and other related areas and be grateful for things like spending too much money on crap at a street fair, mud being carried into my house on the bottom of my daughters' boots and the freedom to assemble at 4 this afternoon at an intact post office to stand with men who saved my life even before I was born.
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