community

i received two messages today.

the first one--a very exciting message that a friend's brother is returning to his wife and children here in the states after being deported wrongfully years ago.

the second one--a very sad message that a friend's friend and mentor is in the last days of her life after a courageous battle with cancer.

what is the same about these two messages? not a lot, though i would like to be able to reach out to both of them and squeeze them and sit with them in the waiting. so much of life is in the waiting. waiting for? something.

the big things? the big things come and go. it's the moments in between where so much of life happens--and when we need each other the most.

i'd bet someone you know needs a squeeze or a little hand-holding. we don't do life alone, but in community. and we can find our community anywhere, sometimes when we least expect it.

when my parents were hit head-on in a car crash in 2006, i found myself in a very strange community. a community of strangers in a ICU waiting room. ron was a man i first noticed one early morning--day two of my dad's ordeal. he was yelling at another man at about 3:00 in the morning. i was dozing on two chairs that i had smushed together. he pretended to call someone on his cell. he was a terrible actor. but he was scared and alone. later that morning he sort of tried to apologize to me--for the ruckus. no apology necessary. we were all in situations that we wished we weren't in. we all had lost control, control we all believe we have when life is flowing smoothly. ron's wife was in ICU with my dad for complications after a hysterectomy. he had four daughters. but, most days and every night he was alone. i asked him to sit with us. another group had lots of drama--fighting, yelling, screaming--pretty much daily and sometimes, nightly. it was a big family. they had decisions to make. they all thought they should be the decision maker. then one day, there was lots of commotion. a decision was made. by their person. the dad, husband, step-dad, grandpa, brother, uncle they had all been waiting for was dying. judy ran around the waiting room trying to get any cell reception. i gave her my phone and then physically caught her when she collapsed after telling her son that her father-in-law was dying....right now. the father-in-law she had told me days before, was more of a dad to her than her own father. later that night she found me in my dad's room--poking her head in she asked to talk to me. she hugged me for a really long time. you never know when you might be someone else's community. you never know that the little things you do may be what helps carry someone while they wait. you don't have to have the perfect words--or any words at all. sometimes, you just have to show-up for someone. however you can.


best
deborah

bittersweet

today, the 12th of january is such a weighted day for me. today is the 101st anniversary of my sweet grandma's birth. she would have been 101 today. you have no idea how much i would have loved to celebrate with her.
but it is another anniversary too. it is the 15th anniversary of my dear grandpa's death. yeah. he died on my grandma's birthday.

bittersweet, for sure.

i kind of believe that he knew she'd be with us that evening--not alone at home, when he died at the hospital that cold night.

i have no big plans today.
i'm going through boxes in the basement. deciding what to keep, toss and giveaway. i'll probably get lost in the first box for hours and then red will come down and rescue me(read *ask what's for dinner?*). deciding what to keep and toss and givaway is sometimes hard.

this i know.

i am thankful for all the things that my grandparents gave me with a warm hand. not anything of huge value to anyone else, but to me? priceless.
funny things.
worn things.
everyday things.

i'm keeping that in mind as i head to the basement.


best
deborah

apples

i kept the name of this blog for a long time to myself....kept it close to my heart. though in the early days, i wasn't sure what it meant and what i should do with it. i repeated it over and over for months....maybe over a year. i'm not exactly sure when it first came to me. i think i may have dreamt it. or was it whispered in my ear? then i began to turn it over again and again. and i realized it was something.

well, i'm going to break this post into more bite-size pieces.

the apples part is multi-layered.

for me, apples are a symbol. what do you think of?

me?

i think of lots of things, but mostly i think of my grandma. my grandma had the most generous spirit i've ever known. and when i think of the life she had, i have to wonder where that generosity of spirit came from.

i think of the first time i cut myself cooking was with her. making apple pies.
i think of the canned applesauce with cinnamon that she and my gramps would make each fall.

i think of her baked and fried apples.

years ago, the fall after my dear gramps died, my gram was living alone in an assisted living apartment not far from our little place. she had a teeny-tiny kitchen with a one-burner cooktop. most of her meals were in the community dining room--she was an amazing cook (i know *amazing* gets overused....but i'm not sure any other word works here)
the food in the dining room was tolerable. not awful, but not great. she never complained and would always find something to compliment. ::bless her::
i was having a family dinner at our home. big red picked up gram, who had a big tupperware bowl of fried apples in tow. she had helped herself to a few apples at a time from the fruit bowl in the apartment lobby for days. she had plenty of sugar packets (at one time, i think all grandmas had lots of sugar packets). she saved the butter pads at each meal. so, with a little cinnamon from her own tiny cupboard had made sticky caramel-y fried apples to share with us--potluck style.
after dinner, there was a little bit of fried apple left. she carefully slid them into a smaller container and placed them in my fridge.

a couple days later i chatted with her on the phone, i had just returned from getting a christmas photo of our oldest(then only 2 1/2 years). we talked about regular stuff, but she told me her vision had returned.

hold the horses.

my grandma had lost vision in one eye years ago, following the delivery of a stillborn baby boy in 1949. she had surgery in 1980, but that had not been successful.

my parents were at her place when i had called so i kept the conversation short.

early the next morning my mom called from the hospital--i should come right away. but, it was too late. grandma had died--a heart attack.

(this is where i always cry....still. 14 years later)
after coming home from the hospital where they pronounced her dead and where i last stroked her soft soft soft pale grey hair, i opened the fridge. there in the back was the little bowl of apples.
i ate them slowly. crying.



best
deborah

good time

i swear big red really does know how to show a girl a good time. i swear.

big red drove me around our neck of the woods so i could snap some shots of our autumn.

i know, so sweet.

he is smart, that big red.

he stayed near the road, ready to call for help when i realized underneath all this growth may be a basement or cellar--one i could have easily fell into. was it luck or faith that i stayed above ground?
if you look closely, you will see that this is a picture of a long-ago working silo and another building. these farm ruins--beautiful in their own way.

we drove dirt roads and i was sure to collect as many burrs onto my jeans as i could. success.

we ended our date at the cemetery.


shortly before sunset....so that the light cast long shadows.


you know, cemeteries used to be used more. i mean, we've buried our dead there, but then people would picnic there--hang out, spend the day. does anyone do that anymore? i wonder? why? would you? could you? i think it's kind of lovely. really. this connection to life and death is just but a moment. these old gravestones have me wondering about the people that are buried just feet below. i wondered about the stones that were badly damaged-broke and the words etched so long ago--now illegible.

have their loved ones all moved away? or has everyone that ever knew that person in life passed on, too? still, what a beautiful place to contemplate the big and small of life--the long shadows we all cast in the autumn of our lives. and to show a girl a good time.


best
deborah