sierrasong's Open Salon Blog

Falling...

Sat, 3 Oct 2009 23:10:06 -0400

Inside the house, it’s too quiet now. It’s empty except for me and Betty Boop.

It isn’t quiet outside. It’s one of those autumn days that seem to predict that winter is only a few days away. The wind is howling in the pine trees and the roof resounds with the thud of pine cones as they are swept from their moorings, making them easy fodder for the squirrels to harvest. The day is a crazy quilt of bright fall light and sudden dark overcast as the clouds go scudding by the sun, propelled by an oncoming cold front which is forecast to bring us an early dusting of snow tonight. I spend a futile few minutes trying to sweep out the garage. The wind has filled it with leaves, pine needles and great dusty puffballs of fur left over from the dog’s last brushing. Each gust of wind swirls the detritus back into the garage and before long, I give up, defeated by the howling autumn air.

I watch you trudge back and forth from the house to the car, laden with all the necessities of a college life: your clothes, cleaning supplies and of course, the TV and stereo. You moved out last year to go to college, but I’ve been spoiled by having you back again this summer and fall while waiting for your new apartment to be ready. So, it’s kind of like starting the empty nest thing all over again. It’s harder than I thought it would be. Much harder.

Next, it’s time to tear out all the faded and frost-shriveled flowers. Their drooping faces match mine as I pile their still green and tender carcasses into the trash can; a sad harvest, indeed. Wasn’t it just last week when I felt brave enough to plant them, being fairly sure the killing freezes of winter were over? A few courageous tomatoes cling to skeletal vines and I gather them to finish ripening indoors. I pause and watch as a giant crow struts across the road, oblivious to the wind and flying debris. He seems to be an omen of a hard winter ahead. Fall, in her gorgeous robe of gold, is usually my favorite season, but this year, I feel unease instead of exhilaration.

It’s right and important for you to get out on your own. I want you to be independent and learn the ways of the world. I don’t want you to know how bereft your leaving makes me feel for that old adage is true: You have to love someone enough to let them go. So, as is right and proper and completely healthy, you gather your things and go. I fuss about whether the electricity and heat are turned on in your new place and how you’re going to blow up the temporary mattress without a pump. Wouldn't you like to take some folding chairs since there's no furniture in your new abode yet? And you are so patient with me. “Mom,” you say, “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

Later, I walk through the leaf-carpeted woods with the dog and zip my fleece up to my chin against the unseasonal chill. The indisputable truth is that my depression and anxiety issues have been creeping closer and closer throughout the past few months. Now that the grand labor of the 40^th reunion is finished, there seems to be nothing to take its place. My job is overwhelming, I’ve been sick lately and in pain from my mouth for months. There seems to be no respite. Then my cell phone buzzes with a text, “Thanks for everything mom. I love you.”

No, thank YOU for everything. I love you more...

Of thee I sing; a paean to small town American life

Thu, 2 Jul 2009 01:07:16 -0400

Oh beautiful for spacious skies…

I admit it. I’m spoiled. I live in one of the most beautiful places on the face of the earth. A place visited by many thousands of people every year who come to enjoy the towering pine trees, breathe the pure air and create traffic jams. They see the grand vistas of the Sierra Nevadas and the deep blue sweep of Lake Tahoe but what they don’t see is what I cherish: a type of small town life that is fast disappearing across this great United States of America. They miss the subtle rhythm of the heart of small town life: the people.

And what kind of people are they? They are just like your neighbors, probably. But, do you know your neighbors? I mean REALLY know them? For better (and) for worse, I do. I know them and I can count on them. After living here for over 30 years, it seems I know nearly everyone, but of course I don’t. But the important thing is I feel like I do and that is a wonderful feeling.

They are the kind of people who look out for one another...

Cancer in the family or perhaps a terrible accident? You can bet there will be a benefit dinner, or auction or dance and you can also bet many people will be there and if they can’t, they will donate anyway. We actually care what happens to each other and take steps to help rather than just talk about it. We’ll cook you a meal if you need it and drive you to a chemo appointment or take your kids to school. Oh – and we’ll keep track of those kids as we see them walking around town (for it’s still safe for kids to do that here) and call you if we think you need to know what they’ve been up to when they thought no one was watching! Something to be proud of for sure.

The kind of people who band together for a common goal...

Schools need money? Well, just put on your dancing shoes and join the Incline Star Follies. Every year for the past ten years, we have joined together as a town to put on the fabulous Follies which combines the talents of students, teachers and community members in one hell of a show. The show, which is as heavy on talent as it is on the amount of glitter worn by the participants, is a hit every year. Even in these recessionary times, we played to nearly full houses this spring and raised considerable money (think five figures) for our cash-strapped schools. Service groups abound. They hold pancake breakfasts, sell Christmas trees and hold golf tournaments all to benefit the local youth. Something to be proud of, too.

The kind of people with friendly faces...

We see each other all over town. We have very limited home mail delivery due to the amount of snow we get so most of us have post office boxes making the post office a de facto town hall. Depending upon the time of year, you’ll see the Girl Scouts out selling cookies, the veterans with their poppies and any number of political groups and their petitions. The same goes for our local supermarket, the bank, the rec center, the beach and on the soccer or baseball fields. You’ll always see a friendly face and get a chance to catch up on everyone’s news. I know that isn’t everyone’s cup of tea – many prefer the anonymity of a large, impersonal city -- but for me, a child of the 1950s who grew up spending as much time roaming the neighborhood as at my own house, I wouldn’t change it for the world. I feel safe here and that makes me proud.

The kind of people who take pride in their schools...

After teaching in our local middle school for 29 years, I am now teaching children of previous students. There is a certain joy in watching kids grow, leave town and return to get married and raise their children here. A continuity you don’t find many places, I don’t think. (Although I have been known to dart to another aisle in the grocery store to avoid a parent/teacher conference in the dairy section!) We have a perfect feeder system: an elementary, a middle and a high school and we do our damnest to not let anyone fall through the cracks. I’m proud to teach them all.

They are patriotic people...

And now that the fourth of July is right around the corner, it’s time for Red White and Tahoe Blue a true celebration of the spirit of small town America. There are American flags from huge to tiny, stuck in every possible location all over town including the riprap which holds the mountainside up! We will have daily flag raisings, celebratons honoring our veterans and ice cream socials. We'll enjoy the somewhat rinky dink parade (do YOU have the REAL Santa Claus on a fire engine in YOUR 4^th of July parade?) and the rubber duckies will race down Incline Creek into the lake to raise money for the Rotary Club. Don't miss the free pancake breakfast at the fire station, the games and food on the beach and, thanks to ardent fund raising all year long, the glorious fireworks over the jewel of the Sierras, our beautiful Lake Tahoe. Pride of ownership for sure.

Is life here perfect? Of course not! Do we argue about issues large and small, have serious political differences as well as our share of dirty laundry flapping in the breeze? Without a doubt! But, tonight the heavenly fragrance that the pines release at sundown is redolent in the air and my windows are open. I can hear my neighbor, whom I love dearly, singing in preparation for tomorrow’s concert of American music.

Who wouldn’t be proud?

From the mountains,
To the prairies,
To the oceans white with foam.
God bless America,
My home, sweet, home,

God bless America,
My home, sweet, home.

Hair it goes...

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:06:14 -0400

I can't believe the first post I've produced in two months is a picture of me with "Farrah-esque" hair. I obviously didn't have quite the volume she had, but was going for that look, lo those many years ago!

The "roots" of fear

Thu, 9 Apr 2009 18:04:31 -0400

I see the lights blinking all around and above me. They seem to form a circle, like the underside of a spaceship; shining down and pinning me to the bed. I struggle to sit or pull myself up the cold, metal bars of the cage in which I’m ensnared but I can’t; I’m tethered to the mattress by wires, and tubes and rough cloth restraints. I’m wild with fear and tear fruitlessly at the restraints that hold me captive. I scream for my mother, my father, for anyone. But, no one comes. I’m trapped, helpless and alone. I felt like the butterflies my brothers catch and then kill in the jar with carbon tetra chloride and mount on a board with stick pins. I have very few words at my command to express my terror and there is no one to save me. No one.

It all happened over 50 years ago, yet the emotions, sights, smells and trauma remain seared in my memory – nearly as fresh as when it happened.

A horror movie? Well, in some ways, it’s my own private one. The year is 1956, I’m 5 years old and in the hospital for open heart surgery. In those days, children were routinely admitted to the hospital with little or no family support. Parents were not permitted to stay with their children beyond set visiting hours and then, only a couple of days a week. For a child who was hospitalized, as I was, for several weeks, it was torture. My mother told me many years later that it simply ripped her heart out to hear me screaming, crying and begging as she headed to the elevators at the end of visiting time. In addition, it was generally accepted that children did not experience pain the same way adults did. Indeed, pediatric sized instruments were a rarity in the 1950s and adult-sized needles and other equipment were routinely used on children. I have a “cut down” scar (a process whereby an incision is made and the tube sutured into the body for nutritional purposes) on my ankle where I was fed intravenously for several weeks. My father, a physician, remembered it being an adult-sized, large bore catheter. Children were tied down so the staff didn’t have to worry about them disturbing the tubes or climbing out of the cage-like cribs. These practices resulted in a profound loss of control, panic and, ultimately in a condition recognized today as Pediatric Medical Traumatic Stress. In other words, child-sized PTSD.

According to the Handbook of Attachment (Cassidy/Shaver) children underwent phases when separated from their parents during hospitalization: protest (primarily consisting of screaming and crying), despair and detachment. At the time, it was thought that the arrival and departure of the parents or caregivers actually exacerbated or reactivated the “protest” phase since children would be vastly more upset and intractable when they were left alone again after a visit. The answer at the time was to restrict parent visits. It was noted that “Parents were seen as ignorant and noisy intruders who only criticized the staff and disturbed the quiet and disciplined course of events on the ward.” (van der Horst, Frank C. P. and vand der Veer, Rene: Changing attitudes towards the care of children in hospital: a new assessment of the influence of the work of Bowlby and Robertson in the UK, 1940-1970)

Mothers were seen as “spoiling” their children in their quest to remain with them while they were hospitalized and, unbelievably, fathers were considered to be traumatized by the loss of their own creature comforts when their spouses were visiting children in the hospital. Who would make his dinner, wash his clothing or make his tea?

Reforms were slow in coming. In 1952, British psychiatric social worker, James Roberts, released the now famous (in medical circles) film A Two Year Old Goes to Hospital which showed the emotional damage (potentially permanent) done to children who were hospitalized and separated from their families. The film was met with such hostile reaction and resistance by the medical profession, that Robertson opted to pull it from general distribution for two years. Like any other institution, medicine is resistant to change and sadly, it wasn’t until the mid 70’s and early 80’s that it was finally acknowledged that children suffered great trauma when hospitalized alone and, as a result, parents were not only allowed, but encouraged to stay with their children. The dark ages of pediatric psychological care were only yesterday and I remember them clearly. The scars have been with me all my life and make me deeply ashamed, but I cannot seem to totally eradicate them.

Tomorrow, I’m going for a root canal. I will be restrained in a chair while a dentist does things that could potentially hurt. Bright lights and cold steel instruments will be used on me. I will have little to no control over what happens to me. Is it any surprise that that little 5 year old will be present and feeling helpless? I’ll do my best to comfort her.

The roots of fear, indeed.

For Karen and an epiphany

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 14:02:43 -0500

Sunrise over the Tahoe basin enshrouded in fog. Taken from the lookout on Mt. Rose Highway.

It’s not a profound observation, but one that often escapes me. When we are in the fog, we forget what lies above it.

I haven’t been able to be a full participant in OS for the past couple of months due to pressing commitments in my life. I have only been able to read and comment infrequently and have missed all my OS friends. And so, I sat down this morning to ask for your support. I wanted to ask for your encouragement as I deal with two of my main phobias this week: Extensive dental work and a long flight, both of which have me beside myself with anxiety. I am so full of shame that fears like this overcome me and invade my every waking moment. I fight them, I take medication, I force myself to go through the situations that spawn these fears; but they control me, nonetheless. How weak and pitiful I feel. How self centered I am.

For the past few days, I’ve been searching for an “angle” to write about my angst. No one really wants to read one more needy post about highly personal issues, I thought to myself. But, then I realized, after poking around a bit this morning, that it’s Karen’s birthday. And that Karen, likewise, hasn’t been around OS for a while. But her reasons are far more serious and dire than mine. Catching up, I piece together the awful fact that Karen has cancer and has been dealing with radiation and chemo. With chagrin, I recognize that the events in her life dwarf my puny problems.

I don’t know Karen well, but we had a few private conversations about adoption after I wrote my piece about my newest grandchild and the adoption issues surrounding that event: Never Enough Love . Karen was writing a new book and asked if I would mind sharing a bit about my adoption experiences. I told her that I would be delighted to, but never heard from her again. Now, I’m painfully aware why.

And so, unintended, Karen has given ME a couple of gifts on her birthday: The gift of the learning to appreciate the blessings in my life and the gift of rising above my own miserable miasma. For above that self-induced fog, there’s a glorious sunrise. I hope it’s heralding the coming joy for Karen when the cancer is beaten and life is hopeful again.

Happy birthday, Karen. May you have many, many more.