Closer to Fine, Only Once (Denise Levertov), If to Say it Once (Gregory Orr), a Spiritual Journey (Wendell Berry)

Hmmmm,  think I overdid it this weekend.  I finally can swallow without pain, and my only real issue is fatigue and some neck and arm issues from the radiation, and I went a little crazy.  

Ok, the weekend started with my absolute favorite band, the Indigo Girls, playing at the Palace Theatre in our Playhouse Square district.  I just love them, and I have loved them for years and years.  They both look a little bigger than I remember, but who doesn’t? And I just love the vibe.  The Indigo Girls have really become the banner-wavers for the LGBT community as well as making great music.  The theatergoers this weekend were about 2/3rds lesbian and 1/3 hetero.  The people-watching was wonderful and the whole experience was such fun to be a part of.   I am definitely “closer to fine” just having been there!

Indigo Girls Closer to Fine

The next day, several friends and I drove and then took a short ferry ride to Kelleys Island; one of the small islands in Lake Erie.  We have dear friends who have a family home there.  They told us about an opportunity to help band the only kind of migratory owl, the Sow-whet owl.  So we went!  We got to Kelleys Island in the early afternoon, and everyone had brought some part of a great feast.  We walked around, checked out some chickens, and prepared our feast.  After dinner, we took our chairs and our wine glasses up the road to the nature preserve, and joined a quiet group from the Cleveland Museum of Natural History and a local expert bird-bander, Tom.  I am not so sure that the group was happy to see us as we had had a glass of wine or two and were not as quiet as we might have been.  But, with a recording of the mating call of the Sow-Whet owl playing, we were led by Tom to the nets to find five or six owls tangled there.  Tom would untangle them, bag them and give them to us.  Then he would take each out of the bag, measure their wing span, check their body fat, measure their weight, and then put them on someone’s head.  The owls are very small (around 86 grams) and quite docile.   We even had the incredible experience of watching Tom call a screech owl, the Sow-Whet’s greatest enemy, and then we tagged it too.  Very, very cool….but cold.  Once we had tagged about 7 owls, we went back home and had desert and a lovely island night of rest.  In the morning, we had fresh eggs and local sausage with jam made by a friend and bright sunshine on our walk through the nature preserve. 

That night, Chip and I went to Apollo’s Fire with some friends; they are our nationally renowned chamber music group, and they are wonderful.  Finally Sunday, I went with a friend to the Cleveland Heights High School production of The Phantom of the Opera.  You know, it was pretty darn good.  The sopranos were amazing!  By this point, my neck was a mess, I was exhausted, and I kind of crashed and didn’t wake up for many, many hours.  Perhaps I pushed it just a little….

Now, several days later, I’m feeling much better.  I guess I wanted to pack it all in before I start chemotherapy again.  I am really not looking forward to receiving yet another drug that will make me feel bad and give me a whole host of nifty side effects.  Maybe it won’t be so bad, but I don’t feel quite as resilient this time after a radiation course that turned out to be much harder than I naively suspected.

In fact, I’ve been thinking about mortality.  More specifically, I’ve been thinking about the dog’s mortality! Yesterday she emptied two cardboard quarts of chicken broth onto our bedroom rug, which required steam cleaning…..grrrrr.  Today, I just returned home from voting and a long walk and psychologist visit to find the last piece of pizza ground into the dining room rug and a box of spelt cereal emptied lovingly down the front stairs.  I am going to kill the dog, that is all there is to it, even though I love her.  Please let the trainer get here soon!  Unfortunately, the trainer is out with a terrible case of chicken pox, so I am a bit worried that I will act rashly before she appears.

Seriously though, for the very first time, I have lost some things.... permanently.  While I’ve been living with disease for a long time, most of my “losses” have been hidden things—breasts, ovaries, and lots and lots of emotional things.  I haven’t really been unable to do most things until now, and I realize that my weepiness of late is the result of grieving for these things.  My right arm seems to be permanently affected as my C6 nerve root ran right through the tumor and was heavily radiated.  I am having trouble writing and dealing with weakness and constant tingling and numbness.  Now this truly isn’t the end of the world, but it makes everything a little harder to do.  I am used to a body that moves fluidly without question in any way I want it to.  Now, I have trouble holding my right arm over my head or supporting my weight in plank or grasping something or writing.  Thank goodness for computers; at least I can type.  But I am jealous of my friends going off to play squash or tennis or yoga or whatever.  I am most likely not going to be able to do these things again, and that is a big loss for this old athlete. 

But this morning the sun is out, the President is still with us, the dog is asleep as I write, and I have already been hugged by several wonderful Carmelite nuns.  It is a good morning.

And here’s the thing: I will continue to lean into what is happening to me and to all that is happening around me.  This is the only way to live, sick or well, isn’t it?  I am awake, and the opportunities for wonder and joy and hope are here every day.  I just need to take some deep breaths, learn from my art and writing sisters, lean heavily on all you wonderful people who love me and walk, talk, feed, and help me, and find a way to laugh every day.  Oh, and let’s all give back and help all those suffering and displaced by the hurricane!

How about some poetry:

Only Once (Denise Levertov)

 All which, because it was

flame and song and granted us

joy, we thought we'd do, be, revisit,

turns out to have been what it was

that once, only; every invitation

did not begin

a series, a build-up: the marvelous

did happen in our lives, our stories

are not drab with its absence: but don't

expect to return for more. Whatever more

there will be will be

unique as those were unique. Try

to acknowledge the next

song in its body -- halo of flames as utterly

present, as now or never.

If to say it once (Gregory Orr)

And once only, then still

To say: Yes.

And say it complete,

Say it as if the word

Filled the whole moment

With its absolute saying.

Later for "but,"

Later for "if."

Now

Only the single syllable

That is the beloved,

That is the world.

A Spiritual Journey (Wendell Berry)

And the world cannot be discovered by a

Journey of miles,

No matter how long,

But only by a spiritual journey,

A journey of one inch,

Very arduous and humbling and joyful,

by which we arrive at the ground at our feet,

And learn to be at home.