In grammar school, I convinced my mom to let me take in a dirty, hungry, very tired stray dog. In 1988, at the age of 45, I was taking care of a neglected stray in an Israeli-Arab village. In between, there had been other canine companions in my life. Although they were quite different in looks, temperament, and personality, they were invaluable life teachers. From them, I learned the true depth of a best friend, loyalty, responsibility, loving and taking care of an "other" in the world. They were my first encounters in life with death and loss and grieving.
In 1999, when my father and I moved together into a retirement community after my mother's death, the first home I instantly loved and wanted was one that had a large patio that I thought would be perfect for a dog. My dad had lived in apartments for many years that didn't allow dogs, and he always missed having one. Finally!
However, my dad died only four months after we moved in. I thought about getting a dog, but several aspects of being a dog owner stopped me. First, it means being more tied down and complicates traveling jaunts. Then, there's the potential danger factor. My dad had suffered a broken pelvis by a too-playful big dog that jumped on him. I saw a lady who was badly bruised because her dog took off after something and dragged her behind on his leash. I've met elderly people who were badly injured by falling over their dogs who were underfoot. Since I've fallen twice in the last two years (not because of dogs) and broke a knee each time, I know falling isn't a simple matter as a senior.
Then, there is the high expense of veterinary care to consider. Keeping myself healthy is challenging enough without having to think of what it takes to keep a dog healthy in terms of proper exercise, diet, and care. There are programs for being a foster caretaker to a dog, which means I wouldn't have to pay vet expenses, but that also means having to say goodbye after a brief acquaintance. Of course, there's the nuisance problem for my neighbors if I end up with a barking dog.
But the biggest problem I can't figure out how to deal with is the coyote factor. I live in an area where coyotes live because development has given them no choice. I live on the ground floor, with a patio that has a wall, but is not enclosed. One of my friends had the terrible experience of coming home one day to find her chewed up dog on the bloody patio. I don't have the money or the interest in enclosing my favorite indoor-outdoor patio with an overhang and just enough wall for privacy, but not protection from hungry coyotes smelling dinner.
Still, I think of my adventures with Whitey, Ski, Taffy, Woosha, and Pancho at different stages of my life. Whitey was the beautiful dog I saved. Ski was the golden dog who loved to run free. Taffy was very neurotic and very lovable. Woosha gave me warmth and comfort in a cold trailer on the grounds of an Israeli boarding school. Pancho wanted to be by my side at all times even though such a friendship was not acceptable in the Israeli-Arab village where we lived. They were all strays. They were all mutts. Somehow we found each other. And connected.
Maybe, some day ......
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Then and Now
Admittedly, the "good old days" had their problems, but, when I compare my childhood to my young grandchildren's lives, I feel I got the better deal. My average day in grade school was to walk to school and back, change clothes, have a snack, and go out and play until dark. There were either lots of kids to play with who were also outdoors, or wiggling under a fence to the wilderness beyond, often alone. The wilderness I explored was a buffer zone between our housing development and an airforce base. We never got close to where the army housing or planes were. There was just swamp and flowers and small wildlife, and what then seemed like a huge hill to run up and roll down. I'm sure that was where I began to develop my lifelong love of nature.
My grandchildren are driven to school and back. Playmates come over by pre-arrangement with parental supervision. Their homes and backyards are their playgrounds, unless mom drives them somewhere else for an activity. There is little, if any, exploration on their own in untamed nature.
My generation was lucky in another way. I've always loved the sea. In my lifetime, I've swum in oceans and lakes all over the world. But today I only go to the ocean to admire its beauty and vastness from the shore. Even if the water looks okay, I know that human pollution has now made it uninhabitable even for fish. I volunteer in a hospital for wild seals and sea lions and have no illusions about what humans have done to their home -- the ocean. Tonight we docents at the marine mammal center attended a continuing education training. The word of the evening was ACIDIFICATION -- how the carbon dioxide of the world's emissions is ending up in the oceans. And the results are being recognized in the scientific world as disastrous.
So, perhaps my grandchildren and their children will never be able to see salmon coming back to spawn, miraculously-colored corals in the seas, find truly amazing living worlds within a small tidepool, or be able to experience one of my most memorable experiences ever -- spending the afternoon in a lagoon in Baja California surrounded by mammoth gray whales who actually wanted to interact with us. They may never be able to see the majesty of blue, blue glaciers as I've been able to get close to.
I was an environmentalist before I even knew there was a word for it. I spent endless hours worrying over the environment, until one day intuition told me that it was humans who would eventually disappear because of their own ineptitude and/or unwillingness to coexist with nature, but nature would regenerate and survive.
And so I have calmed down about the human destruction of nature, but have become more concerned about all that my grandchildren, and their children will miss.
My grandchildren are driven to school and back. Playmates come over by pre-arrangement with parental supervision. Their homes and backyards are their playgrounds, unless mom drives them somewhere else for an activity. There is little, if any, exploration on their own in untamed nature.
My generation was lucky in another way. I've always loved the sea. In my lifetime, I've swum in oceans and lakes all over the world. But today I only go to the ocean to admire its beauty and vastness from the shore. Even if the water looks okay, I know that human pollution has now made it uninhabitable even for fish. I volunteer in a hospital for wild seals and sea lions and have no illusions about what humans have done to their home -- the ocean. Tonight we docents at the marine mammal center attended a continuing education training. The word of the evening was ACIDIFICATION -- how the carbon dioxide of the world's emissions is ending up in the oceans. And the results are being recognized in the scientific world as disastrous.
So, perhaps my grandchildren and their children will never be able to see salmon coming back to spawn, miraculously-colored corals in the seas, find truly amazing living worlds within a small tidepool, or be able to experience one of my most memorable experiences ever -- spending the afternoon in a lagoon in Baja California surrounded by mammoth gray whales who actually wanted to interact with us. They may never be able to see the majesty of blue, blue glaciers as I've been able to get close to.
I was an environmentalist before I even knew there was a word for it. I spent endless hours worrying over the environment, until one day intuition told me that it was humans who would eventually disappear because of their own ineptitude and/or unwillingness to coexist with nature, but nature would regenerate and survive.
And so I have calmed down about the human destruction of nature, but have become more concerned about all that my grandchildren, and their children will miss.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Out of Step with My Lost Son
There was no birthday party for my son today. He died two weeks before his 35th birthday in 2003. It is not natural for a child to die before the parents, and so mourning for a child has a particular pain to it that other deaths in the family do not have.
I once thought of writing something about my son and me. Although I didn't get very far with the writing, the title came to me quickly -- Out of Step -- because that best described us and our relationship. Each one of us was out of step with society's norms and expectations, and with each other.
In the 1970s, there were heated debates in multicultural circles about whether it was better for all cultures in America to merge into a tasty soup, or maintain certain characteristics as in a stew where a carrot remains identifiably a carrot, a potato stays a potato, etc. Which was better for America? For the individual? For the ethnic group?
At the time my husband said he was ready for a child, I was 25. Influenced by the plight of foster children because I had been a foster care social worker, and touched by the dire predictions of Zero Population Growth, I said I wanted to adopt a child that needed a home rather than create a biological child. He agreed, and within three months or our application, we had our beautiful honey-colored toddler. We had asked for a "hard to place" child, and mixed black/white children past infancy was the largest group needing families at that time.
Soon after, black social workers in California felt that transracial adoptions were bad. Even no permanent home was a better fate to them than white parents who, by virtue of being white, wouldn't be able to adequately prepare their black children for being black in America. While not taking back black children that were already adopted, they stopped white adoption of black children dead in its tracks. And there it lay for years during the intense era of black power and fighting for Civil Rights. All of this seems so odd now given the many changes in adoption, transracial adoption, intermarriage, and the significant number of mixed black/white children in the U.S. today.
Time passed, our son grew handsome and tall. None of us was prepared for the divorce. At that time, I did not understand why it was happening, but I knew I was responsible for it. I almost drowned in the guilt of destroying what I had worked so hard to build. And my son never really forgave me. Weakened by the strength it took for me to leave, I accepted my 13-year-old son's decision to remain with his father. It is more common now for fathers to take care of their children after divorce, but it was quite unusual in the late 1970s.
Over the next several years, from Israel, China, and all the other countries I lived in or visited, I kept writing even after he said he wanted no more contact with me. There were occasional uncomfortable visits when I returned to the U.S. or he traveled to where I was. He grew even taller, more handsome, and strong. When I no longer knew where he lived, his dad sent my letters on to him. I was often exuberantly happy in my now worldwide life of challenge, travel, and adventure. But guilt was always my tucked-away traveling companion.
Out of the blue, five years after he had shunned all contact with me, and 14 years after he was found to be HIV positive, he called me. He was cool and detached, and I wasn't really sure why he had called. He said he may or may not call again. A few weeks later, his dad called to say that he was in the hospital diagnosed with the progression of HIV into AIDS. He quit work and became housebound. When my phone sometimes rang at 1:30 a.m., I had mixed feelings. I knew who it would be, but also knew that he would speak to me like a petulant teenager, taking up the relationship from the age I had left him.
He made a last trip to see me. He was still tall and handsome, but far from strong. He was as breathless as an old, old man. Instead of trying to talk, he gave me a page from his diary written three years earlier. It said, "So, now I'm wondering why I've been thinking about mom so much the last ten to eleven months or so. There's no anger there. Actually, I've thought how fortunate I've been. She really was a terrific mother! She taught me to 'see' more and how to be open to the unknown. I have mostly very good memories of childhood (mostly = 85%), so many opportunities sent/brought to me. A multitude of seemingly unimaginable, once-in-a-lifetime experiences. Is it possible there were too many? Find myself acutely aware of constant introspection: Why so much? (So much more?)"
The closest moment on that visit was when I read to him while he was in the emergency room awaiting transport to a hospital better able to deal with his rapidly deteriorating condition. Still, he lived another year and continued to call occasionally. He never gave me his phone number or invited me to his apartment. But, after he died, I went with his dad to take care of his belongings. There, in his apartment, I got a glimpse of the man he had grown into that he had not allowed me to know. Each section of each room was artistically arranged like a series of vignettes of what had been important in his life. I read letters from his friends which allowed me to know how others had perceived him. And, carefully placed on his desk, tied with a decorative string, was a package of all the opened letters I had sent him.
Since then, I have felt closer to him in death than I did for the majority of his almost 35 years. In an old film canister, his ashes travel with me so I can spread them in beautiful places I visit. The little mementos I took from his apartment now bring him permanently into my home. Guilt still mingles with tears for my son as my life winds down.
I once thought of writing something about my son and me. Although I didn't get very far with the writing, the title came to me quickly -- Out of Step -- because that best described us and our relationship. Each one of us was out of step with society's norms and expectations, and with each other.
In the 1970s, there were heated debates in multicultural circles about whether it was better for all cultures in America to merge into a tasty soup, or maintain certain characteristics as in a stew where a carrot remains identifiably a carrot, a potato stays a potato, etc. Which was better for America? For the individual? For the ethnic group?
At the time my husband said he was ready for a child, I was 25. Influenced by the plight of foster children because I had been a foster care social worker, and touched by the dire predictions of Zero Population Growth, I said I wanted to adopt a child that needed a home rather than create a biological child. He agreed, and within three months or our application, we had our beautiful honey-colored toddler. We had asked for a "hard to place" child, and mixed black/white children past infancy was the largest group needing families at that time.
Soon after, black social workers in California felt that transracial adoptions were bad. Even no permanent home was a better fate to them than white parents who, by virtue of being white, wouldn't be able to adequately prepare their black children for being black in America. While not taking back black children that were already adopted, they stopped white adoption of black children dead in its tracks. And there it lay for years during the intense era of black power and fighting for Civil Rights. All of this seems so odd now given the many changes in adoption, transracial adoption, intermarriage, and the significant number of mixed black/white children in the U.S. today.
Time passed, our son grew handsome and tall. None of us was prepared for the divorce. At that time, I did not understand why it was happening, but I knew I was responsible for it. I almost drowned in the guilt of destroying what I had worked so hard to build. And my son never really forgave me. Weakened by the strength it took for me to leave, I accepted my 13-year-old son's decision to remain with his father. It is more common now for fathers to take care of their children after divorce, but it was quite unusual in the late 1970s.
Over the next several years, from Israel, China, and all the other countries I lived in or visited, I kept writing even after he said he wanted no more contact with me. There were occasional uncomfortable visits when I returned to the U.S. or he traveled to where I was. He grew even taller, more handsome, and strong. When I no longer knew where he lived, his dad sent my letters on to him. I was often exuberantly happy in my now worldwide life of challenge, travel, and adventure. But guilt was always my tucked-away traveling companion.
Out of the blue, five years after he had shunned all contact with me, and 14 years after he was found to be HIV positive, he called me. He was cool and detached, and I wasn't really sure why he had called. He said he may or may not call again. A few weeks later, his dad called to say that he was in the hospital diagnosed with the progression of HIV into AIDS. He quit work and became housebound. When my phone sometimes rang at 1:30 a.m., I had mixed feelings. I knew who it would be, but also knew that he would speak to me like a petulant teenager, taking up the relationship from the age I had left him.
He made a last trip to see me. He was still tall and handsome, but far from strong. He was as breathless as an old, old man. Instead of trying to talk, he gave me a page from his diary written three years earlier. It said, "So, now I'm wondering why I've been thinking about mom so much the last ten to eleven months or so. There's no anger there. Actually, I've thought how fortunate I've been. She really was a terrific mother! She taught me to 'see' more and how to be open to the unknown. I have mostly very good memories of childhood (mostly = 85%), so many opportunities sent/brought to me. A multitude of seemingly unimaginable, once-in-a-lifetime experiences. Is it possible there were too many? Find myself acutely aware of constant introspection: Why so much? (So much more?)"
The closest moment on that visit was when I read to him while he was in the emergency room awaiting transport to a hospital better able to deal with his rapidly deteriorating condition. Still, he lived another year and continued to call occasionally. He never gave me his phone number or invited me to his apartment. But, after he died, I went with his dad to take care of his belongings. There, in his apartment, I got a glimpse of the man he had grown into that he had not allowed me to know. Each section of each room was artistically arranged like a series of vignettes of what had been important in his life. I read letters from his friends which allowed me to know how others had perceived him. And, carefully placed on his desk, tied with a decorative string, was a package of all the opened letters I had sent him.
Since then, I have felt closer to him in death than I did for the majority of his almost 35 years. In an old film canister, his ashes travel with me so I can spread them in beautiful places I visit. The little mementos I took from his apartment now bring him permanently into my home. Guilt still mingles with tears for my son as my life winds down.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Friday the 13th
It is that day in American culture that feels rather creepy to many people. Gory horror stories connected to Friday the 13th are plentiful. Numbers are meaningful in other cultures - good luck numbers and bad luck numbers - but Americans generally shun 13. You can't find a 13th floor in some buildings, or even an apartment 13.
I, on the other hand, feel a certain connection to Friday the 13th since I was born on one. It has always felt like a happy day to me even though I must admit I can't remember anything particularly lucky or unlucky happening to me on a Friday the 13th.
But I do remember a very unusual Friday the 13th. I was flying back from Asia. I left on Friday the 13th, and since we gain a day flying from Asia to the U.S., I arrived early on Friday the 13th. I wonder when I'll ever have two Friday the 13ths coming together again.
So, Happy Friday the 13th!
I, on the other hand, feel a certain connection to Friday the 13th since I was born on one. It has always felt like a happy day to me even though I must admit I can't remember anything particularly lucky or unlucky happening to me on a Friday the 13th.
But I do remember a very unusual Friday the 13th. I was flying back from Asia. I left on Friday the 13th, and since we gain a day flying from Asia to the U.S., I arrived early on Friday the 13th. I wonder when I'll ever have two Friday the 13ths coming together again.
So, Happy Friday the 13th!
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
To Drive or Not to Drive
I am reluctantly forced to face this question now. My 1993 car needs some expensive repairs. I ask myself, "Do I need to drive?" It is just about a given in California that everyone needs a car. Unreliable and inconvenient bus schedules back this up. I have elderly neighbors who can't see well, hear well, or turn their heads easily who still drive. In their 80s, 90s, and even 100s (yes, it's true), they can't understand why a reasonably fit 66 year old would voluntarily give up driving without a fight. The most told jokes in my retirement community have to do with seniors driving.
I survived very well without driving for many of my nomadic years in China, Taiwan, Macau, and Korea. But, of course, they had significant alternative forms of transportation. My local transportation options around where I live are hourly buses around the community and surrounding stores where I live, and a subsidized taxi voucher service where $40 buys me $100 worth of rides within my county. Then, there is the well-known Bus 11 (as it was called in Israel) which meant walking where one needed to go. I did do a lot more walking when I didn't have a car. And I like walking. Hmm! At this age of my life, would walking as transportation help or hurt my arthritic knees?
I'm not foolish or brave enough to ride a bike sharing the same roads as cars. But what about an environmentally-friendly motorized tricycle that would allow me to carry home groceries? Weather isn't particularly a problem where I live. I could cross the busiest streets and get to most of the places I go rather than riding along them. Or, a popular option where I live would be a golf cart. We have special paths just for golf carts, and our city is planning more. But it wouldn't get me everywhere I regularly go.
Although I got my license at the age of 16, I've never enjoyed driving. My father's words to his newly-licensed daughter -- "Remember, you have a murder weapon in your hands" -- have had a chilling effect upon me to this day. And, although I hear well and can easily turn my head to look behind me, I know my vision and my reaction time are not what they were. Until recently, I was aghast to see night lights radiating like colorful sparkling diamonds. But then, I found out it was a coating on my glasses that had become scratched and was distorting everything. Better now, but still not the sharp night vision of yesteryear. Talking to a friend today about an elderly driver knocking her mother's walker right from under her in a parking lot reminded me once again that I live in the most dangerous driving (and walking) radius possible because of all the elderly drivers who won't give up their keys. I definitely don't wish to be one of the ones who lives to regret not giving up driving earlier.
What to do?
I survived very well without driving for many of my nomadic years in China, Taiwan, Macau, and Korea. But, of course, they had significant alternative forms of transportation. My local transportation options around where I live are hourly buses around the community and surrounding stores where I live, and a subsidized taxi voucher service where $40 buys me $100 worth of rides within my county. Then, there is the well-known Bus 11 (as it was called in Israel) which meant walking where one needed to go. I did do a lot more walking when I didn't have a car. And I like walking. Hmm! At this age of my life, would walking as transportation help or hurt my arthritic knees?
I'm not foolish or brave enough to ride a bike sharing the same roads as cars. But what about an environmentally-friendly motorized tricycle that would allow me to carry home groceries? Weather isn't particularly a problem where I live. I could cross the busiest streets and get to most of the places I go rather than riding along them. Or, a popular option where I live would be a golf cart. We have special paths just for golf carts, and our city is planning more. But it wouldn't get me everywhere I regularly go.
Although I got my license at the age of 16, I've never enjoyed driving. My father's words to his newly-licensed daughter -- "Remember, you have a murder weapon in your hands" -- have had a chilling effect upon me to this day. And, although I hear well and can easily turn my head to look behind me, I know my vision and my reaction time are not what they were. Until recently, I was aghast to see night lights radiating like colorful sparkling diamonds. But then, I found out it was a coating on my glasses that had become scratched and was distorting everything. Better now, but still not the sharp night vision of yesteryear. Talking to a friend today about an elderly driver knocking her mother's walker right from under her in a parking lot reminded me once again that I live in the most dangerous driving (and walking) radius possible because of all the elderly drivers who won't give up their keys. I definitely don't wish to be one of the ones who lives to regret not giving up driving earlier.
What to do?
Thursday, November 5, 2009
CURLING UP WITH A GOOD BOOK
Although I made sure the book I wrote (Memoirs of a Middle-aged Hummingbird) is available on devices like Kindle and Sony Reader, I still like to curl up on a couch or bed, or best of all on the chaise lounge on my plant-filled patio, with a good book. Entering the world the book presents to me, I travel vicariously, happily, and inexpensively to the realms of fiction and non-fiction. Sometimes the book presents totally new worlds to me, and sometimes it reminds me of people and places I have personally known.
"Shanghai Girls," the newest book by Lisa See, recently transported me back to China. Having spent so much time in China since 1988, I knowingly nodded my head yes when it described aspects of Chinese culture I have become accustomed to, and it added details of history I had heard of before, but didn't know well. Personally struggling to try my hand at writing fiction now, I was intrigued by the characters she developed to tell her story. Since I had only one brother and no sisters, I could only imagine the strength of the relationship of the two sisters in the book (the translation of the book in Chinese is actually called "Shanghai Sisters") who shared so much love and pain spanning their childhoods and adult years.
But that's what good books do -- they engage us totally for the hours we sit with them. They allow us to enter worlds we can never participate in. They give us ideas we may never have thought of. They broaden our perspective as well as our knowledge, make us laugh, cry, wonder. In contrast to movies, books give our imaginations the opportunity to visualize the people and places in them.
Public libraries are indeed the best buy in town.
"Shanghai Girls," the newest book by Lisa See, recently transported me back to China. Having spent so much time in China since 1988, I knowingly nodded my head yes when it described aspects of Chinese culture I have become accustomed to, and it added details of history I had heard of before, but didn't know well. Personally struggling to try my hand at writing fiction now, I was intrigued by the characters she developed to tell her story. Since I had only one brother and no sisters, I could only imagine the strength of the relationship of the two sisters in the book (the translation of the book in Chinese is actually called "Shanghai Sisters") who shared so much love and pain spanning their childhoods and adult years.
But that's what good books do -- they engage us totally for the hours we sit with them. They allow us to enter worlds we can never participate in. They give us ideas we may never have thought of. They broaden our perspective as well as our knowledge, make us laugh, cry, wonder. In contrast to movies, books give our imaginations the opportunity to visualize the people and places in them.
Public libraries are indeed the best buy in town.
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