Scribbling: Happy Ending

I love happy endings. Who doesn't? When the happy ending arrives, you feel as if the circle is complete, the story was fulfilling. You aren't left with disappointments and regrets.

A little over a month after I married Chris, we got "the phone call" on the morning I turned 25. It was my mother calling as she explained that my father was being transferred from the walk-in clinic to the ICU. The next couple weeks were a roller coaster of emotions ranging from anger and frustration at my father's stubborn bullheaded-ness to grief and loss at his pending death.

I remember sitting in a little consultation room with my mother and Chris as we heard from a doctor that they found a large tumor in his colon. We saw the pictures, heard the diagnosis. We knew the next steps, and we suspended our hope in the air above our heads, that once we knew the problem, they could fix it, and my father could live.

We had a happy ending. After surgery and months of chemo, my father went into remission, where he's stayed since. He exercises every day, and I think he enjoys his grandbabies more. I am more easy to forgive him his cantankerous personality, because I know how much I'll miss him when he's gone – I had to face that possibility in a real way before, and I know how deep my grief will be, how strong my attachment is.

Some people don't get happy endings. Before I met Chris, before I became a proofreader, I was a nanny to a lovely little girl and her family. I had the privilege to get to know the whole family, and I regularly babysat Claire's cousins, Isabel and Felix, two very delightful children who amazed me every time and drew me to them with their sweet, funny personalities.

I especially remember Felix, who, before his fourth birthday, told me that he'd love some throw pillows for his bedroom as a present... and maybe an accent lamp. He was a charming little boy who loved dress-up and Batman, Barbie and Spider-man. He was free with his affections, and everyone in his life loved him desperately, including me.

Last summer, I received a mass email from Claire's father, letting people know that Felix was diagnosed with brain cancer. I hadn't seen him in three years, but his precocious smile and sparkling purity were immediately forefront in my mind. It wasn't fair. Not Felix. Please, not Felix. He's one of the special ones.

His mother has blogged their journey over the last year, and I've faithfully read along, my heart caught in my throat each time, loving to read of his bravery and strength, his courage and peace through everything. Like many pediatric cancer patients, he delights and cajoles the nurses and doctors, showing far more maturity than most adults would show in his situation. I've grieved silently with his family as the diagnoses became more dire, as the tumors that seemed to have been controlled in his brain spread to his abdomen, as he weakened.

Hopefully, he has one last summer. Last weekend, he and his mother were driven in a limo to the Milwaukee Brewers game, where he threw the first pitch and basked in the applause and joyous shouts of thousands of people. He continues to make beautiful paintings and other art projects, he loves his friends and his family, and he's doing what he's done since the day he was born – loving life with no apologies and no expectations.

Maybe we all have happy endings. Felix's happy ending is a legacy of peace and joy to everyone who knows him. My father's happy ending is a new understanding of how much we love him, how much he loves us. Happy endings may not always be full of life and sunshine, hugs and kisses; maybe all we can ask for from a happy ending is closure and peace.

Scribbling: Composure

The Sunday Scribble this week is Compose. Check out their website for links to see what other people did with this writing prompt.

Frustration. At first I just felt frustrated. I was mad at my body and horrified at the prospect of a lifetime of issues. Varicose veins in my "area" that aren't caused by pregnancy? Weak connective tissue in my pelvic floor?

Yesterday as I sat bottomless on the exam table with a pink paper drape on my lap, my legs swinging like a little girl, I realized why this whole ordeal has been jarring: I'm having to consider things on a long-term basis rather than just ride the roller coaster of short-term dramas. I gained a new perspective.

Even with the issues with my pregnancies, I knew they wouldn't last forever. Eventually, I wouldn't be pregnant anymore. One way or another, "this too shall pass." And it did. I have my babies now.

When I worked, I'd so easily get bogged down in the day-to-day soap operas of the cubicle farm. We'd have a disagreement or a situation with a project, and I'd be so upset and so insistent on getting my own way. But you know what? I don't work there anymore.

And it doesn't take much to remember all the ups and downs and sidesteps and earthquakes that came with the relationships I had before I met my husband. You all were saved from hearing about those dramas, but believe me, they were intense. They seemed so darned important and vital to me, but in retrospect, they didn't really matter. A rough few months after a break-up, and I could move on. It wasn't a permanent state of being.

So forgive me if I feel a little bit shaken by the prospect of a permanent drama, something that will not be fading into the ether in a few months or in a year. For the rest of my life, I will be managing my pelvic floor prolapse issues. There are things I can do to help, but it'll always have to be a consideration.

And yet, in examining and contemplating this state of existence, I feel myself nudged into a new state of grace. I imagine myself shaken and bumped and rolled around a nest of day-to-day stings and lifelong thorns, but I'm seeking a new composure, a new maturity. I'm walking into a new horizon of *gasp* adulthood where I won't keep thinking that things will be different in a few years, where I won't keep hoping that "this too shall pass."

Because you know what? Some things just don't pass. Some stay. And life goes on despite. And I can't stay in a perpetual state of drama and anxiety. *deep breath*

The important parts of life matter more. I recognized one yesterday as I walked and played with my little family. I threw my shoulders back and reveled in the permanence of our life together. I felt centered and fulfilled. I felt blessed. I felt an inner stillness and silence and simplicity, and that one sensation is infinitely healing and calming.

Up, Up and Away

The writing prompt from Sunday Scribbles this week is "Out of This World." Basically, talk about your feelings and thought about things outside the Earth's atmosphere.
Okay. I can do that.

I remember in 3rd grade, we were introduced to the idea of living on the moon. As a class, we brainstormed what life would be like. We talked about Jetsons-esque bubble cars, fully enclosed cities, really awesome zero gravity basketball games.

Then a little while ago, Guy Kawasaki's Truemors site twittered a link to this story about signs of life being discovered 63 light years away. So I talked to Chris about it. Mostly, I was musing about the baiting, irresponsible journalists who wrote the headline that seems to indicate that life was discovered on another planet. The story itself clarifies and says that a single sign of life, or a single element required to sustain life, methane, was discovered. The planet is too close to its sun, so life is not sustainable, and the scientists used the search as practice for discovering signs of life on planets that are actually capable of hosting life.

Though it goes against my Christian upbringing, I've always left the possibility of life on other planets open for debate. When dealing with something infinite like the universe, I prefer not to make blanket statements either way. You know the old monkeys with typewriters thing... how eventually, due to the whole infinite random chances in an infinite universe, the monkeys would produce the complete works of Shakespeare. I certainly don't know about life on other planets.

I don't go in for conspiracy theories, and I just tend to smile and nod when confronted with narratives of abductions and such. My fancy gets tickled with stories like Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle In Time, which I had the pleasure of listening to again recently. I love the flight into the unknown, the discovery of the new and the intensely beautiful. I love the possibility of entire civilizations of beings who are closer to God than we ever dreamed. And I love boiling the struggle between Good and Evil down to something so intrinsic as to bridge the culture gap between human and non-human beings.

So, my brain foray into other worlds has led me inward instead of outward. That's what happens when I try to wrap my brain around a concept so huge as outer space: I wrap myself around the infinite that I can feel so tenderly. And I wonder if that happens to other people... or even those curious little guys on other planets. I wonder if they find themselves musing on the nature of God instead of trying to figure out ways of reaching out to other planets.

Scribbling: Anticipation

A nifty writing prompt site, Sunday Scribblings, had the theme of "Smorgasbord" this week. The word prompt wasn't this Swedish diner lingo, but an extensive list of previous scribbles. Ala carte! I've chosen "Anticipation" from the list, because I'm anticipating a lot of things right now.

In a few oh-so-short weeks, I'll be exposing my most private parts to a roomful of strangers. Strangers with knives and needles and probably razors. I'm anticipating a lot of "discomfort." That's a give-in. But how am I preparing for this time?

I'm anticipating a struggle with my weight loss goals during my recuperation. I won't be able to exercise. I can sit on my throbbing butt and do nothing. That's about it. I have some fun graphic design projects planned, but that won't shed the poundage.

Just 7 pounds from my "forty," I can almost taste the anticipation of getting to that magic number: 201. So close to 199, which will feel so amazing. The anticipation of my "forty" tastes like chocolate ice cream and pizza. (My "forty" refers to a 40-pound weight loss since Jan. 5.)

I'm anticipating a lot of anxiety about my house getting messy. I shudder to think of what will happen when I'm no longer able to crawl around the house with Ben, picking up trucks and trains. I *really* hate asking Chris to do stuff like that, because he almost never does it graciously. Though he's a superior specimen of a husband, this is one area where we experience a lot of friction. There's usually a guilt trip involved because I'm a SAHM and he's gainfully employed, and there's usually expectation of a medal of some sort. The anticipation of clutter tastes like dust bunnies and murphy's oil soap.

I'm anticipating a lot of downtime. Well. This is a "duh." Since I signed on to FlyLady, I haven't let myself have a lot of downtime. I even put my sewing machine on a counter so I couldn't sit down while I quilt. I allow myself about 45 total minutes of blogging time every day, and I play six short daily word games on Shockwave. Other than that? I'm decluttering, deep cleaning something, washing dishes, doing laundry, playing catch with a toddler, etc.

So what am I going to do with 2-6 weeks of relative inactivity? Graphic design, blogging, writing letters, sewing at a table, crossword puzzles, watching bad TV, boredom. The anticipation of downtime tastes like anchovies and cottage cheese.

Those are future anticipations. Right now, I'm anticipating bedtime, and that tastes just like Diet Dr Pepper, since I just finished enjoying a glass of it, and I'm going straight to bed.