Dear readers,
Hi!
One of my favorite analogies is that we are traveling up a spiral staircase on this journey we call life, always coming back around in a circle, and yet, we are never in the same place in which we started, always moving forward and upward until we reach the stained-glass dome at the top at the end of our life journeys.
I also love the metaphors of the egg – ugly duckling – swan and cocoon-butterfly. I used to think in terms of a time in life we are in a cocoon or an egg. Then there is a crack-open time. And our feathers begin to turn from gray to white or our wings begin to unfold. A metamorphosis.
More recently, I have begun to integrate my perspective of a spiral staircase with the seasonality of nature, in which year over year there is a hatching, and then a molting or a spreading of wings in flight. As I observed many of these beautiful, winged monarchs together one evening, I began to think of the words of Margaret Wheatley in how she talks about our paths of contribution in this world. How one of my paths of contribution I aspire to step is in the words of Elsie De Wolfe. I’m going to make everything around me beautiful – that will be my life.
Though I know life tests our abilities to always see beauty, somehow, with much gratefulness in my heart, I am glad my eyes always see the beauty that is.
May everything around you be beautiful.
Wishing you a wonder-filled and wonderful two weeks. Talk with you again soon.
-Christine
The Creases Now Speak
Edward
Edward was sitting in his chair when the night nurse made her rounds at 11:00 p.m. on the night Joshua translated the letter.
Usually, Edward was sleeping when she did. On the occasions he wasn’t, he pretended to be, his body lying still as he sensed a shadow standing at the doorway, matching his motionlessness with her stance at the door. Edward wondered if she was watching for movements or listening for breathing.
Once he thought about holding his breath to see which it might be. But soon enough he would continually feel the sensation of held breath as the cancer began to fill more of his lungs. Holding his breath now wasn’t going to put oxygen in reserve and there certainly wasn’t a need to practice what it was going to feel like when Edward would be certain someone was squeezing the life out of his chest.
He already knew this feeling well. Long before lung cancer.
Edward didn’t hear the nurse’s nearing footsteps nor sense her silhouette at the doorway this night the creases spoke.
After Joshua left, Edward’s mind took him back to the table at the coffee shop looking into those eyes that made him feel like he was at the creek of his childhood. When his mind wandered further and he started to feel the sensation of bear hug arms circling around his chest and squeezing, he got out of bed. He pulled a photo album from the stack that rested on an end table and began turning pages. Rather mindlessly until he reached the page he couldn’t stop thinking about.
It was that page about one third of the way into the album that the night nurse saw when she walked in to see if Edward wasn’t feeling well.
“Edward, are you ok? Can I help you with anything?”
Edward looked up to read her name tag. “Sheila”. He had never known her name. When the same morning routine came every day, it was always either Audrey or Ben who greeted him with “Good Morning! How are you today?” Even the greeting itself was consistent like clockwork, like all the other routines that now comprised Edward’s days in this facility. Edward wondered how either of them would respond if he stopped being consistent in his “I’m fine, thank you.”
Edward never asked the nurses anything personal. That had been Patricia’s gift. She was good at connecting with people. No matter the age, interests, personality, job. Or Race.
Edward remembers the evening several years ago when he was being honored for excellence in international reporting. As Patricia floated among the room full of strangers smiling so warmly and listening so intently at each small group she stopped at, Edward’s boss clapped him on the shoulder, a big grin on his face as he chuckled, remarking “you should take your wife on your trips, Edward. She could get you more stories than you would have time to report. You’re a lucky man!”
Edward laughed, thanked his boss for the kind words, and spent the rest of the evening seeing Patricia in a way he hadn’t seen her before. He regrets he never told her how much he admired her ability to connect with people. Genuinely. Not at arm’s length, not superficially. Not as facts to report on, but as human-interest stories.
His daughter Laura inherited her mom’s gift for seeing people in a way he couldn’t. Or had stopped doing. Though Edward hadn’t talked to Laura in several years now, he knew through his grandson his youngest daughter was still a change agent for human justice and acceptance through her journalism. His boss was right. Patricia would have done his job much better. Just like she did his job of parenting not only better. She did it for him. Laura never had a reason to severe ties with Patricia.
Edward looks into the nurse’s eyes and shakes his head “no” as he looks back at the face staring at him. A face without a smile. There are four faces in the picture. Three are smiling. Edward’s mom, his little brother Donnie Jr. and Edward. His dad, Donald senior, is serious. Stern. Edward used to tell himself it was a necessary look his dad wore as sergeant in the army during WWII. A look leaders needed to exhibit when responsible for keeping men alive. Conveying courage and strength for the sake of men who were afraid.
Edward now ponders the fine line between strength and fragility, between stoic and sensitive, between unconquerable and penetrable. Edward looks at the picture on his lap, remembering the day his father stood with his arms firmly at his side in front of Donnie Jr. at the bus station. Donnie was about to get on the bus bound for basic training in Fort Lewis. Donnie had enlisted when news of a war in Vietnam was first being heard.
Edward recalls Donnie and his mom hugging. Edward hugged Donnie next. Donnie reached out his arms to hug their dad. Edward’s dad responded by raising his right hand to his forehead, giving Donnie a stoic look, and then placing his arm back at his side as he told Donnie “Make me proud, son”.
It would be the last time Edward’s dad had a choice to say, “I am proud of you” and hold his son in his arms.
Edward was certain someone was crushing the air out of his lungs the day an unmarked black sedan pulled up to their house, and two men in uniform got out and started walking toward their front door. Edward isn’t certain what he remembers the sound of more. “On behalf of the United States Army, we regret to inform you that your son…killed in action.” His mother’s wails. Or his father’s words as he witnessed the jaw line grow tighter, the stern look grow deeper, when his father said, “May all Gooks go to hell”.