Writing It Out

I haven't posted to this blog in a very long time.  When I started it, I had every intention of really writing - not just talking about it...finally doing it.  I thought if I could write about the pain of the divorce and loss I had been going through at the time, I could get through it and on with my life.  But it didn't work out as I'd planned - somehow that felt a little too naked and writing about those feelings hurt even worse than living them.  I couldn't get off the subject of loss and I thought I had to have something terribly profound to say or not write at all...so I just quit.

Well, a few years have passed and here we are on the first day of another year.  That pain is a distant memory, but tonight, I'm finding myself dying a little once again.  OK, not a little - a lot.  I've been hurt badly...again...and I walked right into it - again.  One of the most important relationships of my life took a header right into the crapper of New Year's Day 2014.  If last year hadn't been such a horrible year after losing Fred, I'd be tempted to laugh at the absurdity of starting out the new year like this.  But instead, I'm fighting like hell to keep my heart from shutting down altogether.  That awful, creeping numbness is just about up to my throat.  And I know from past experience, if the place where words form gets numb enough, the heart, the voice, the soul just closes down altogether.  I look fine on the outside, but it's deader than shit inside.  And that is one scary place to be...the place where all the hard-fought years of sobriety don't really seem all that great and I start to self-destruct.

But not this time.  It might not have been my first spectacularly bad decision, but with a butt-load of honesty, maybe it will be the last...or at least the last time I allow someone else to take away my voice.

This time, I'm going to write it out.

I'm not going to go into the agony and the ecstasy here, but I will give you this:  it was the best ride of my life and as hurt as I am, I don't regret one single minute.  That's all you get.  But for those who have been waiting, there's a bit of good news:  I'm finally writing the book.

I've gotta write this one under a pseudonym and change a few (?!) names, but it's already underway and the pages are smokin' -

Here's to 2014:  The year of getting this shit out on paper.  And you'll see me here, too - bet on it.

Service, Stickers & Gratitude

In the fall of 2000, I went to work for a fiber optics company in Seattle.  Little did I know the job wasn’t about starting a new travel program for the company at all…it was the opportunity to meet a wonderful man, fall in love and experience a tiny slice of what it is like to be associated with those who proudly serve our country.

I met Curtis in the fall of 2000 when I joined 360networks where he was already employed as the systems administrator.  I learned he had just retired from the Navy a few months earlier after a 21-year career, the kind of dedication which helped to explain why he was always the first one in the office and usually one of the last to leave at night!  It wasn’t long before we were talking and laughing late into the evening after most of the office was empty and starting to discover things about each other as the relationship progressed.  

But 360networks filed for bankruptcy less than a year after we met and we both lost our jobs.  Times were rough for a systems administrator looking for work in “dot-bomb” Seattle.   I was devastated far more for Curtis than myself, as he had never known the ups and downs of corporate life.  He had only taken a few days off after his retirement from the Navy before coming to 360...and then lost his job just over a year later.  He decided to return to school, focusing on database administration.  I wasn’t much support for him while he negotiated the new waters of school and unemployment, as I was recovering from a serious car accident that happened about the same time we lost our jobs.  But we stayed together and no one was more surprised than I when he proposed in December of 2002. 

Curtis was offered a position as the systems administrator at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, where he had been stationed for most of his 21-year career in the Navy, as a civilian contractor.  He commuted back and forth from the Seattle area to Oak Harbor for three months and we moved to Anacortes right after we married in May of 2003. 

After settling into our new home, we drove over to NAS Whidbey to get my military ID (to which I was entitled as the spouse of a retired military officer) and the decal stickers for my car to allow me onto the base.  I had never been closely associated with anyone serving in the military and I didn’t know what to expect as we drove onto the base.  I was immediately overwhelmed as Curtis began to show me around the beautiful installation where he had spent so much time during his military career.  Not only was the base situated on a gorgeous piece of land fronting on Puget Sound, but as I watched the men and women in uniform going about their work, I was suddenly struck by the magnitude of what these people did….for me and everyone I love.  Though Curtis never knew, he had given me one of the best gifts of my life…the chance to see even a small part of what it means to serve.  And to understand what he had lived for those 21 years.

But I really didn’t understand until I drove up to the guard station a few days later by myself.  The guard checked my ID and as I started to drive past, to my total shock, he saluted.  Me!  Why?  I was totally floored.  Curtis wasn’t in the car…it was just me.  And of course the first question I asked Curtis when I had been cleared into his office was “why in the world did he salute me?”

“Because you’re an officer’s wife,” Curtis replied. The little blue and white decal on the front left corner of my car’s windshield signified that this vehicle belonged to an officer of the United States Navy.  And because I was his wife, I was afforded a sign of respect that meant more to me than anything I have encountered before or since.

Every time I drove onto NAS Whidbey, I was saluted.  And every time, my throat swelled and tears sprang to my eyes.  And even after the marriage failed, the salutes continued…even when I visited Mountain Home Air Force back home in Idaho.  I still had base privileges for several months after our divorce was final and when I left NAS Whidbey for the last time, I could barely drive away, leaving the beautiful place where so many had served, not the least of which the man I had so loved, in large part, for that very service.

Those little blue and white stickers.  My windshield became pitted, rock chips whittling away at my line of vision until finally, last winter, the windshield cracked all the way across.  But still, I couldn’t bring myself to replace the windshield – those stickers were the very last vestige of the life I had shared with Curtis.  Finally, just last month, it was time.  I called the glass repair company and went outside to take a picture of those little pieces of my life.  The man doing the work was so kind…he removed the stickers for me as I cried, but we could not remove them from the tape.  So I transferred them to a piece of card stock and slipped them into a safe place.  No more salutes, but forever a piece of a man I admired for his dedication, selflessness and commitment to his country.  And the tears because he never knew how much it meant to me.

Happy Birthday, Grandpa!

Today my Grandpa Harv would have turned 100 ... and he would have been just as ornery today as he was at 76 when he passed away.  That man could tell a joke and loved to laugh at one just as much.  They weren't always (and most likely not) the type you could tell in mixed company or around children, but oh, he loved a good laugh!  My Uncle Dean picked up that trait from his dad and he looks and sounds just like him these days...right down to that little sparkle in his eye that lets you know he's got a good one just waiting to be told.

One of the clearest memories I have of countless hours spent in Grandpa's company was the first day he took me fishing.  We went up to a sagebrush-surrounded reservoir somewhere close to New Plymouth (I'm thinking Spangler or Sage Hen) and he had only one rule for me:  if you're gonna catch a fish, you have to clean it.  Pretty simple.  So, he showed me how to clean the first one he caught.  I was SO excited!  I couldn't have been more than 7 or 8 and that's all I remember of the day....cleaning EVERYBODY'S fish!  I don't think I caught a thing, but oh, I was a happy little girl :) 

Many Saturday nights growing up, Grandpa and Grandma would take my brother Bart and me over to the Eastside Cafe in Ontario.  Grandpa and I would have the fried chicken, Grandma the #2 Chinese meal and Bart would order a cheeseburger and a big Coke.  Drama always ensued, because invariably Bart would be full by the time his meal came, having drained the Coke.  But he'd sit there under the watchful ...ok, glaring... eye of Grandpa until he finished every bite of dinner.  June, the manager, would bring over Grandpa's special "Fat Fong" fortune cookies that would always make him laugh, even though ours usually didn't.  I really didn't understand why I couldn't have one of my own...

Grandpa had a rare talent:  the ability to spot a tiny, succulent head of asparagus growing on the opposite side of the road while driving down a country lane at 70 miles an hour!  We'd go out aspara"grass" hunting, as Grandma Sarah called it, during the spring, ready with our paper grocery sacks, and jump out when he'd slam on the brakes and holler "over there - looks like a good one!"  He'd find a good stand beside a ditch bank or in an orchard or field and we'd fill our sacks to the brim.  I never liked the taste of asparagus as a kid, but would give anything for one of those big sacks right now!

Grandpa lost his leg later in his life as the result of poor circulation from smoking.  He wore a prosthesis, which was known as his "wooden leg," even though it was made of synthetic materials.  One day, my brother wanted to show his friend Gary his Grandpa's wooden leg.  Before anyone realized what he was doing, he hauled off and whacked Grandpa a good one right on the shin bone with a hammer....but he hit the wrong leg!  We didn't see Bart again until after dark, when he finally climbed down out of the tree in the backyard because he was more hungry than afraid.  But Grandpa really did just get the best laugh out of it...he said later he surely couldn't have chased him down!

All of his grandkids had our special relationships with Grandpa, but I think he understood me more than anyone in my life.  Even though I was not related by blood, having been adopted into this wonderful clan by my Mom and Dad, I was the one who loved to smoke and drink, tell inappropriate jokes now and then and drive my car for hours on end just like he did, just to think and figure out what was in my mind.  To this day, when I take a road trip of any length, he usually shows up at some point, hovering around my shoulders, like the angel & devil he could be, just to check in. 

Whenever we were hurting, he'd always say "damma luck" and I hear his voice when I've got a big heartache.  He'd have cried right along with me when I lost my two beautiful English Setters, Rooster and Jenna.  I fell in love with the breed as a little girl, trying to ride his Maggie around the backyard with my cousins.

Grandpa consoled me through my first divorce, but confided one day that he never could see us together, even though he loved Mark dearly.  He also told me during that time I was being mean to my dog...hurt like hell to hear that from him, but I was in a crazy mode and leaving the little sweetie all by herself far too much.  So I gave her back to Mark.  Wise man.

He wouldn't have known what the hell to do when I brought home my next husband.  Love him as I did, I had no illusions about my Grandpa, who would surely have had something to say about me marrying a black man.  But I do know this beyond a shadow of a doubt:  he would have seen immediately how much I loved Curtis and accepted him without question.  They would have had many a belly laugh together, I know.  And at the end, a really big "damma luck."  Oh, Grandpa, sometimes I'm glad you weren't here for that pain.


He told me not to have any regrets at the end of my life...this from a man who at the time was in a hospital bed dying of emphysema.  He told me the only day he wished he could have back in his life was the day BEFORE he started smoking as a young man.  Even after watching him die of that dreadful addiction, it took me 20 more years to quit. And I've tried to live my life according to his advice.


He knew me so well.  As I'd go out the door, so often he'd say:

"Be good....and if you can't be good....be careful!"

I try, Grandpa - I try :)  Happy Birthday - I love you.

May 10 to May 10 to May 10

Ten years ago, I was living in Seattle, working at a job I loved as the first travel manager for an international fiber-optics company, starting a new relationship, making terrific money, living a life surrounded by great friends in a city that filled my soul and loving every second of being alive.

On May 10, 2001, I was rear-ended by a large truck heading southbound on I-5 in a five-car pileup.  It was the third serious accident I had been in from 1988 to 2001, creating more damage to my neck and back than I realized at the time.  I had previously had spinal fusion surgery in 1992, followed by nine  glorious pain-free years.  But those pain-free days ended with that huge white truck bearing down on me in the rear-view mirrow.

A month later, the great job ended when the company went bankrupt in the dot-bomb fiasco in the Northwest.  And then...9/11.  It was the trifecta of life-altering events that was to begin a ten-year period of loss and grief that I am just now beginning to understand in those terms.

I'm going to be writing about experiences during those ten years in the coming weeks and months.  It's the only way I can really process what happened to me, the good, the painful and those things I thought were unbearable at the time, but that I survived nonetheless.  And have received gifts of joy I would have never dreamed possible in the darkest stretches of those years.

Along the way, I passed another milestone on May 10:  on that date in 2003, I married the man I thought for sure was the love of my life...my soulmate.  But we were two battered, broken souls, drawn to each other for a variety of reasons and neither of us healthy enough to make it work.


I still look normal...never in any of the three accidents did I so much as break skin.  No broken bones, no bruises other than from seat belts...just soft-tissue damage like whiplash and some herniated disks, creating havoc with nerves and setting up years of degenerative disease and arthritis.  But on the outside?  No sign on my forehead saying "beaten to shit by large, moving objects."

Or..."lives with bipolar disorder" - no caution sign around my neck for the unwitting.

So, on this May 10, 2011, I marvel at the place I am now, after traveling those bumpy, winding roads over the last ten years.  So many of you are new additions to my life during that journey and I could not be more blessed.  And for those who have remained with me from the years before, I give thanks every day.  And to the many who have left footprints on my heart, you will never be forgotten.

The First Step

I keep thinking I'm a writer...but as Stephen King says so eloquently..."writers WRITE!"  And so, instead of jotting all my notes on the insides of my eyelids and etching countless drafts in the gray matter, this time, it's really going down in black and white...or umber and soft green.   Whatever...I'm venturing out for the world to read...and who knows what wonderful things might happen?!