Georgia on my Mind

While it is true that there is no place like home in my heart, I also admit to a bit of the wanderlust invading my soul from time to time. Presented with the opportunity to visit one of my favorite southern cities for next to free...bags were packed and camera batteries were charged and ready to go in record time.

Savannah, Georgia exudes the charm and slow pace for which southern cities have become famous. It is a city whose history was nearly deflowered in the mid-fifties until a band of dedicated southern grande dames united in the effort to save it. (literally chained themselves to the fence to prevent the wreckers from demolishing the first of many historic houses preserved by this group)

In February 1733, James Oglethorpe and 120 souls snatched from the bowels of debtor’s prison landed on the banks of the Savannah River and began building one of the south’s most intriguing cities. Its history is a marvelous mélange of colonial, antebellum, Victorian and modern architecture and culture. (For an accurate and highly entertaining social snapshot of the juxtaposition of the antebellum and modern underculture of Savannah, read John Berendt's best seller Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.)

For my Tennessee friend who loves fountains…just 2 of the many within Savannah’s confines and some of my favorite Savannah sights (And a little something for my Texas friend who loves funny sayings:)

There Is No Place Like Home

“There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.” (Dorothy ~ Wizard of Oz)

I do not have to click my ruby slippers to remember or find my way back...I never left.

Of all things considered when Jim died, leaving this place…this house…our home…was never in my heart. When queried by friends, relations and even mere acquaintances within days and throughout the following years my answer has always been that here was where I would remain.

These aging uprights are steeped in the love, generosity and spirit of a special man who gave grace and meaning to my existence. Memories echo from every crevice within its welcoming confines. Flashbacks of life lived each day in the simple pleasure of being together, music, children’s laughter, soothing their tears and easing their fears.

Other than feeling lost and insecure in the world in general since Jim’s death, I have never felt unsafe in this house. It has been a healing cocoon…a soothing balm…to my aching heart steadying my steps and missteps along this widows’ path. I have missed his physical presence to the darkest recesses of my shredded soul and spilt tears to fill an ocean in my grief. I have paced its sagging floors, fingered its warped, oft painted walls and floundered in my sorrow. Even as I struggled to flee this unwelcome life I never thought to live elsewhere.

Overflowing with 30 years of life - growing up as a young bride, raising our 2 children, healing us from the loss of an unborn child, harboring a bereft grand daughter when her daddy heartlessly removed himself from her life at age 3 and cloistering her equally staggered mother – this space has sheltered me through both the happiest and bleakest days of my life. For a time over 3 years I have wrapped myself deep within the solace of this tiny 1970’s cookie cutter, brick veneer, cracker box plunked in the middle of an old cow pasture in the boonies of this backward piece of southernicity I call home.

Every joist, every beam, every living cell of this home has felt his loving spirit. No matter the dark nights that haunted my soul, his lingering presence has been at the heart of my healing giving me hope to step back into the sunlight, truly live and even love once again.

While my Handyman and I are reinventing and making our own stamp on this place as we rejuvenate its spirit with the essence of our own growing relationship, it will ever have Jim’s legacy as its foundation.

Our love for each other and our departed spouses add flavor to what is already here. Someday, he and I may move to another place passing on the gift of its tender heart. But, for this time…this chapter of our life…here is where we will remain secure that we enhance what was begun another lifetime ago.

This is home.

New Life

Not mine…a real one.

My Handyman is a first time Grandpop.

Born at 3 a.m., Thursday, October 7 and weighing in at 9 pounds, he’s bigger than most newborns. The upside to that is that they don’t seem quite as fragile as their small-fry counterparts.

With them living in New Jersey, he’s not yet had the opportunity to hold this teeny version of his DNA in his strong arms…but, I can tell you he’s in for one BEEEEEG surprise when he looks into those trusting little eyes the first time. (And…I suspect have an unexpected tug at his tough old heart that his Terry is not here to experience this as well.)

I can’t wait to see his face and watch as he bends his gray head towards this small piece of life affirmation and takes in that first inhale of sweet baby smell. (Believe me…the camera WILL be ready.)

Introducing DKV, Jr.

Humor as a Life Vest

After Jim’s death bleak despondency draped the walls with intensity almost tactile in its substance…a thick woolen tapestry that threatened to smother the life within.

There came a day some weeks down the path when our son looked at me and said that if there were not some laughter in the house soon we were going to suffocate in our grief.

Truthfully, my first thought was “Yeah? So what?”

Still…that little spark that remained buried deep within my broken soul knew he was right.

As he offered to run up to the video store for movies to make us laugh, I reminded him we needed chocolate and wine to go with. If we were going to have a night…it was going to be the whole nine yards and the thread to mend it.

To this day, I do not recall the movies he brought home…yet, I do recall laughing until tears streamed down our cheeks that had nothing to do with death. It was the first glimmer of realization that humor would save me.

I still stumbled, fell and wallowed in missing Jim with a ferocity that often frightened me. As the sorrow threatened to drown us again it was our son off to the video store for absurd movies, chocolate, wine and raucous laughter would, for a space, rock the walls of this little cracker box called home.

Even so, there came a point where I needed assistance in coping beyond the “movie nights” and two things happened that propelled me into the world of healing.

The first came in the persona of a gifted counselor who had not experienced the death of a spouse yet had the empathy, grace and expertise to give me knowledge to understand my grief at my own pace.

The second was (and remains) an online support group peopled by widowed folk all over this little blue rock that became my lifeline back into the real world.

At some point to inhabiting this cyber-world a small group of us became bonded in a real sense and created another niche within dedicated to laughter and just plain whackiness (spellun’ mine). We shared ridiculous jokes, the joys, sorrows and absurdities that had happened in our lives and became like an often dysfunctional yet loving sit-com family.

It was my salvation.

Among our little psychotic fambly dwelt a dour, misanthropic, pet hating (not), curmudgeon of a lad from Sterling whom we dubbed “The Mad Scot”. His sense of humor skewed in the extreme, he either had us rolling in tears of laughter or eating the carpet to keep from strangling him as he tossed social hand grenades willy-nilly across the floor just to see who would pick them up and pull the pin. I doubt we ever failed him. (that this delightfully wicked man has become a true friend and married a very special one of our own is a precious gift in this life.)

And what all of this has to do with humor being a life vest is showcased in the hilarious Scottish poem he shared below:

(note: Please hear “Shrek” as you read this)

The Effen Bee

He kept bees in the great town of Effen

A wise Effen bee keeper was he

When one day this Effen bee keeper

Got stung by a big Effen bee!!!!!

Now the Effen bee keepers “wee” Effen wife

For the big Effen “ polis “ she ran

For there’s naebody can sort out a big

Effen beeLike a big Effen polis man can

Now the big Effen polis was fit as a fiddle

And he ran doon the main Effen street

In his hand was a big Effen baton

He had big Effen boots on his feet

Now the big Effen polis caught the big Effen bee

And he twisted the Effen bee’s wings

But the big Effen bee goat it’s ain back

‘Cos this big Effen bee hud twae stings

Now they’re both in the Effen museum

Where the Effen folk oft come tae see

The remains of the big Effen polis

Stung tae death by a big Effen bee.

Humor and friendship has saved us all, given us breath and strength to survive the unsurvivable and guided our steps on this unwelcome path.

Both are still what I cling to when the melancholies threaten to drown me.

Skin Hunger

Failure to thrive. In 1969, my high school Psychology professor taught of studies in Russia during the early 1900’s in which social workers at city orphanages discovered that babies who received no physical contact -- cuddling, rocking, kisses, tickling -- beyond the bare minimum of daily maintenance became withdrawn, sickly, and finally died. The conclusion seemed to be that human beings require a certain level of daily skin-to-skin contact in order to survive.

Essentially the adult version of failure-to-thrive syndrome, skin hunger is all too familiar to anyone widowed longer than one day who is honest in their feelings. The loss of our loved one takes us down a road we never thought to travel and leaves us in a crumpled heap upon the floor seeking comfort where none is to be found.

We are bereft and need their touch at time when they are not here to provide that which is missing…the gentle pass-by touch going down the hall, that soft kiss upon the lips at good-bye, the welcoming hug and deeper kiss of hello, the cherishing warm, easy holding of each other on a dark and silent night, the wild, earthy, sweaty passion of lovemaking on mangled sheets...and we emotionally wither just as those babies in the studies.

Vividly sexual dreams of Jim began within days of his death. His touch, scent and voice were as real as if his body were truly upon mine. I would awake breathless and then dissolve into mortified tears. Without any knowledge of skin hunger I thought something must be wrong with me…my husband had just died and here I was dreaming of making love.

Through an online support group for those who are widowed I found kindred, learned about skin hunger, that I was not a bad person for having these feelings and that I was not alone in my desires. While it neither stopped the longing for touch nor the vivid dreams over the next 2 years, I was armed with understanding and ceased to loathe myself for being human and missing that part of our relationship as well as his presence in my life.

One night alone, a few JD and lemonade’s too many in that dark place only the tormented widowed soul understands, the hunger was so intense it left me literally rocking in my chair arms wrapped around myself gasping for breath. The anvil on my heart, the desperate loneliness and deep ache for Jim’s touch on my skin drove me deeper into the bottle and further over the edge. Even in the fog of the drink I was aware of the fact that it was a good thing I was at home, not in some bar picking up some unknown with whom I would regretfully awake in my bed the next morning. A stranger who might satisfy the near overwhelming desire for skin to skin contact, yet, not touch the hole in my heart.

The thirst to be held can become an obsession to which we consider giving in and taking hold of the first available stranger to quench. A dark night of the soul or fall into the abyss of sorrow can lead us to make poor choices.

A friend penned a frank, soul touching verse that grasps both the hollowness and ultimate desire of skin hunger, which she has graciously allowed me to share.

Please note that the language is blunt, perhaps crude to some. Yet, while she gave permission to make changes, it stands in its honesty exactly as written.


now!!

anonymous sex sounds appealing right now

right fucking now

one night of hard passion, devoid of feeling

no meaning other than

animal instinct--

i'll quietly slip into the bar room

spot my target-

"you, cum with me"

hot and wet I'd mount him

fuck him till he cried

then without a word

get dressed and walk outside

the darkness of anger my

cleverly drawn cape

would make me vanish again.

my frustration eased

i could return to normal

whatever that isf

or a few more years

with no contact.

don't look at me

don't ask my name

don't remember my

hot lips wrapped around you

i plan to forget you in a matter

of hours

a drink

and several hot showers

i'm not asking for

sweet nothing talk

or gentle reflections on love

i'm demanding your iron hard dick

bursting inside my warm glove

fuck me hard

no harder

make the pain in my belly

scream louder than the

pain in my soul

just for now

take me

take me

take me away from myself

just for now

right fucking now.

don't remember me

don't give a damn

i won't be back!

i was gone the moment i entered the room.

(jh2 2/2005)

Widows and Orphans

Serendipity...Synchronicity...Karma. What ever. It happened and for the good of 3 widowed souls, methinks.

Tuesday ~ October, 4, 2005

Last minute plan change had me headed home sooner than expected. My newly widowed neighbor was at her mail box and I stopped to speak. Nearly 2 hours later I made it home.

I've lived in this neighborhood since 1974, her son and my daughter played together as kids and young teens, she was the ER nurse during Jim's first 2 heart attacks...yet, I learned more about this woman in that 2 hours than I've managed in the previous decades of "knowing" her.

Her isolation is unbelievable...no in-laws, no parents, one critically ill sibling and one grown son who struggles with sobriety and part-time custody of his 2 bewildered children. She retired 3 weeks after Bobby died because her grief was such that she was afraid she'd make a critical error and cost a patient their life. (She'd already used all the family leave time AND taken a leave of absence while he was so ill.)

Her main contact is another widow in this neighborhood nearly housebound caring for her ailing, elderly mother who gets hysterical if anyone other than the youngest grown (and working) grandson comes to stay while Carol tends to errands.

I'm glad I stopped...but, I feel like a clod for not knowing these 2 women were so isolated. Yet...I should have...I know how this works...I certainly shut myself away from the world as much as possible for nearly a year after Jim died.

Wake up, Josie...your life is much uncomplicated compared to theirs. Methinks it's time to reach outside myself here at home.

At any rate, I'm going to try.

Wednesday ~ October 5, 2005

After 3 cups of coffee, hemming and hawing for 2 hours, I finally took the phone and rang up the other widow in my small rural locale. A woman I’ve known as long as I’ve lived in this little blue collar subdivision plopped out here inna middle of an old cow pasture in the boonies.

My “other mother” as a young wife, new to both the city and the south. First as my sitter and then my friend, we connected in a way that seemed important to both of us. Her youngest son became sitter to my youngest son years down the road. Her middle son named his first son after our first son. Her oldest son was my yard boy, charging me only $25 to mow (push mower) and rake 1 ½ acres of uneven ground.

In fact, it was he who heard me ask the pastor of the small neighborhood church if he knew anyone who kept children in their home as I was needing to work to help pay our newly acquired mortgage. As the preacher was saying “No”, this young, slim blond child said shyly “My mom keeps kids.” Conversation revealed that they lived only a block away; the beginning of a life long relationship with this woman, her children and her grands.

Somewhere along the way life took us on different paths rotating around until it united us on the one journey we never expected. She wouldn’t let me feel guilty for letting our lives drift…how like her to do so.

2 ½ hours…laughing, crying, talking…reconnecting. What a gift.

Next week on my way home from my Tuesday morning creative venture I will pick up pizza and 3 middle-plus aged women will sit around a comfortable kitchen table talking, eating and drinking that southern staple - sweet tea.

For a space the world will revolve around just us.

Mirror Image

Mirror Image

Reflections in a mirror
A woman used to be
Sad eyes
In a bathroom glass
White frame, silvered back
Peering...into me.

Step aside
Glance the window view
Reversed images
Rotated, angled
Ever so slightly askew.

Would that she be Alice
Step through
The looking glass
Back to that
Which once she knew.

A time
That things made sense
The day not long and black
Where colors rose and reigned
And flowers bloomed the fence.

Melancholy waves her flag
Twines the heart
Pulls the soul
As memories unwind.

Twill all pass
With winter's cold
Sleeping
Silent
Tamed.

Step once again
Through the glass
The vision blurrs
Rights itself
Dry the tears
March on.

Love comes again
To ease the heart
Yet...
Forgets not the pain.

Friday ~ September 30, 2005

ARRRRRRG!!!
Tough old, boot kickin’ Outlaw…3 years & some months down this road…feet planted in the present.

DANG IT!!!

I’m supposed to be past this…finished dragging the past round like a sea anchor…bragged as much…what a fool…arrogant wench.

Yet…here I sit as memories of a past life slam smack into those of the present.

Restless…I’d like nothing better than to grab a handful of mane, mount that pony called “Run Away” and take of hell bent for leather for anywhere but here. These darn September (now October) melancholies nip my heels like a poorly trained pup.

My Handyman must think he’s hooked himself up with a real nut-case chameleon. I love my Handyman so much…he brings light and life in extraordinary measure into my life. But, dammit, it still hurts and my heart is obviously still capable of twisting into knots over the loss of Jim.

Last year when this hit I was on my way to the wilds of New Mexico and the most amazing and unexpected spiritual journey of my life. Now, how come I can’t keep those lessons in mind now? Why can’t I be grateful for the wonders in my life instead of wallowing in the loss?

OK…I know this will pass. I know the world will right itself again. Yet, I’m thinking I’d better get to doing something to help it along. Now…if I could just figure out WHAT.

Saturday ~ October 1, 2005

A day at hard labor…riding my little John Deere around my 1 1/2 acre yard…taking in the sun…the dirt and dust…the dogs…the animal farm next door…the smell of crisp leaves being munched by the mower…balm to a weary soul.

Then reading words written by two VERY special women in my life. The things they accomplish with all that they have on their plate.

Well…Outlaw…get a clue…your life is WAYYYY less complicated.

What a blessing they are and don’t even know what good they’ve done me today.

Sunday ~ October 2, 2005

AHA!!! (you know…that moment when the light bulb blazes.)

I will build a monster. A monster worthy of that my Jim would have built. And I will put him…dubbed Creepy 2…after his predecessor…in that old rocker on the screen porch and light him up for Halloween.

My testament…maybe memorial in an obliquely skewed sort of way…to how much my Jim loved Halloween and all the prep work he did to create just the right combination or horror and humor to the delight of the neighborhood children (and their parents as children).

The kids have all changed. They will not know the Creepy who came before. But, my children and my grand will and that is all that is important to this little tableau I will create.

I’m a woman on a mission and finally smiling as I should be.

HOO-AH.