To a Damaged, Imperfect and Flawed Friend

Dear Damaged, Imperfect and Flawed Friend,

How very glad you are all of the above.  It means you're still here, still working on 'stuff' just like the rest of us poor slobs.  It means you recognise that your current unhappiness is not normal and that you are already in the process of change.  I am sorry you are blue and experiencing a (temporary) lack of self confidence and that inner fortitude that I, and everyone who knows you, sees so clearly. 

What happened to your Big Life?  For whatever reason it no longer suited you.  Perhaps it will suit you again and you will go and create another Big Life.  Because you can.  You know you can.  Then again, maybe a Big Life isn't the answer either.   Maybe just a different life; different from the **** and ***** life, different from everything you've known and done before.  God, if anyone can do it, you can.  Do you know how much I admire you, how I try not to envy you - your energy, your intelligence, your confidence, your wisdom, and that Bigness of Being.  I always feel like I'm not doing enough, being enough when I'm around you.  Not that you in any way try and make me feel that way, not at all.  My feelings are my responsibility, my problem - but you are a bit larger than life and the rest of us are kind of animated shadows in your presence.  Lazy animated shadows.  You've accomplished so much, done so much, been through so much and come out the other side, long striding with a cheeky smile.

It's obvious I see you differently than you see yourself right now.

To me it is also obvious that you are grieving, grieving for what was, as imperfect as it was, as impossible as it was, it was still your reality for over 10 years.  Now it's finished and letting go is a bit sad especially as you're not quite sure where you're going next.  But go you will.  It might mean HUGE changes, changes that you think impossible now.  New chapters usually mean change.

I am sorry you've been disappointed by a friend or friend(s).  That's rough.  First time it happened to me as an adult I was flabbergasted.  I didn't think adults did that to each other, thought adults left it behind in elementary school but I was wrong.  I got over it and did as you have done - just got them out of my life.  Time is the only thing I (don't) own - so wasting it on people who have other agendas besides friendship is verboten.  I owe them nothing. 

You might put out more love when you get assaulted.  I'm not evolved enough to do that.  Self preservation comes first.  No, being really pissed off comes first.  Then self preservation, then letting them go - wishing them well (like I said, not evolved enough for love) but getting them away from me.  I do know that I can love them later.  The one and only guy in my past who physically abused me - first I got myself and my cat out of there, then I did alot of How Dare He?  Then I healed and forgot, then finally forgave him.  Now with the distance of many years I see he had real problems, that he was weak and frightened and quite pitiful.  But took me years to get to a compassionate view of him.  Anyway, you didn't need a betrayal on top of everything else but it might be part of the moving on scenario you're embarked upon.  Who knows?  Or maybe you've outgrown the friendship and they found a way to set you free.  Friends, especially friends of long standing (like close family), reinforce certain images we have of ourselves - but maybe it's the wrong image.  

You're a traveller.  Remember when you rocked up on foreign shores where no one knew you and you were more yourself than you had ever been?  Maybe that didn't happen to you but it did for me.  All the Holly Daughter, Holly Wife, Holly Sister, Holly Friend facades cracked and a somewhat different, stronger, tougher, and more authentic Holly emerged.  Your friends could've done you a huge favour.

LIke you I get depressed about things out of my control.  It's an ongoing life lesson that I'm still very much engaged with.  I rant at the stupidity of people, governments, you know the drill.  And all I accomplish is getting myself upset.  So I try and do other things instead - live my life in a way that treads lightly, write lots and lots of letters to politicians, sign lots and lots and lots of petitions, give money to good causes and then let it go.  I am responsible for my own life, the example I set,  the thoughts I think.  I subscribe to things which tell me good news, or informs me about creative people, and sites which reinforce the beauty beauty beauty in the world.  And thank god I walk the dogs every day.  That hour in nature does so much to restore my equilibrium.  That and the hour of yoga (yoga has changed my life).  But the best antidote to depression  is gratitude.  I thank my ugly feet for carrying me so well, the bed which carries me safely while I sleep, the food, OH THE FOOD!, that I love too much and which others don't have, for Richard, always for Richard, the cats, the headache which feels so good when it's gone, for everything.  Can't meditate very well  so that deep well of stillness is elusive, but I can and do give thanks.

For you too.  For your troubles which will make you shine even brighter.  The wisdom you have, the compassion you share, the love you give so unselfishly - do you think you can be what and who you are and live old and alone, in that very small life?  No, your spirit is too large and radiant for that.  And if it doesn't feel that way now.  Just wait, it will.

Richard's mental sharpness is deteriorating almost, it seems, before my eyes.  He's slower, his speech is slower, his voice is no longer his but an old man's voice.  It's almost as though I speak to him through a thick brown pane of glass.  He can hear me and I can hear him but the sharpness and immediacy of speech is muffled and delayed. 

This morning I rang Canton Ohio to see if Aunt Lee was still alive.  A letter I'd written her in October was returned.  I know now that she gave me the wrong address but I didn't know that until I'd googled it looking for the phone number.  Anyway, I spoke to her.  She had no idea who I was.  The name was familiar, Barbara and Jack's names were familiar but she couldn't place them.  She couldn't remember the name of her husband either.  I wrote in reply to a letter she'd written in October which although confused and rambling was anchored in the reality of names and places and events.  It's only December.  She's slid into la la land in a few months, the same as Grandma Anne.

Which brings me to - Richard, who was fully aware of who I spoke to and why (we spoke at length about the returned letter and Aunt Lee), kept referring to Aunt Lee as Grandma Anne.  Who, I asked.  Grandma Anne.  Normally a person would catch themselves and say, "No, I meant Aunt Lee!" but even when pressed he stuck to Grandma Anne.  Then when his attention was drawn to the mistake he accused me of being angry with him.  Because he's scared he goes on the offensive.

Often I see him standing or sitting staring off into space, no, not off into space, at the ground.  He doesn't look up anymore.  For minutes at a time.

I didn't used to worry but I'm worried now and I worry about my worrying for it doesn't help and it wears me down.  I understand why I slept for 2 days when he went to the States.  I didn't have to check up on him all the time, nor did I have to - not entertain him but break up the silent empty chunks of time for him.  He often comes looking for me.  I feel the neediness of him even if it isn't verbalized.  He needs to know I'm nearby.  I understand why I'm riding more than I used to.  That hour on Balthazar is time by myself where I cannot be reached.  I breathe more deeply then.

Worry too about moving house.  Is it a crazy idea?  Or will it help him to engage and focus more.  When he's interested in something he pulls himself together and seems quite normal (although he fixates on things more than he used to, grabbing on to a topic or job and worrying at it until it's finished).  On the other hand, if he is deteriorating as quickly as he seems to be, I will eventually face the reality of being on my own.  Do I want to be on my own and still live in Gatton?  Can't imagine I'd be moving myself and all the animals and furnishings by myself.  So if we're going to move it has to be soon.  Suspect that whereever we're living in the next couple of years is where I'll be seeing out my days.

 I feel guilty for thinking about a future that only contains him on the periphery but if my suspicions are correct there will come a time, and perhaps sooner than I think, when I won't be able to manage him.  If that is the case, I want to live in a place where there is no annual massive burning of the bush or an operating quarry.  I want to live in a place of physical beauty and be near people who perhaps aren't so hidebound and conservative as they are in this farming town.   So I plan and scheme and try and convince Richard that it's a good idea to move to the Tweed Valley and not north to the Sunshine Coast hinterland.  If we move there we will only be able to afford a small acreage and will be stuck in some hobby farm development on poor soil with the possibility of crap neighbours and noise.  If we go south we can afford acreage, acreage which will act as a buffer.

I would give a lot to have Richard back as he was.  I miss him.  I blame that damn surgery and that damn incident which put him in intensive care (and of which we don't know the real truth, I'd wager).  Until then he'd been fine.  Now I do the heavy lifting.  Maybe that's only fair.  He was my strong hero and looked after me.  Now it's my turn.  I chose to remain childless to avoid responsibility.  But there's no escape from the lessons we're sent to learn.  I have to learn unselfishness.  MIndfulness.  Trust in the Universe.  The healing power of love, for him and for myself.  Endurance.  Resilience.  Humour.  Patience.  It's all come together, is coming together in one massively intense One on One lesson. 

Richard away in Ipswch.  The farrier was here until 11.  Have done very little of a constructive nature all day.  Just finished yoga and meditation.  Trying to build up to 15 minutes of meditation - eventually to work up to 20.

The days seem to come and go with frightening rapidity.  Copied the previous post to the blog - wrote it 8 days ago - and have intended to write every day.  By the time I've ridden Balthazar and done morning chores it's 10am and I'm pooped.  Guess I'm not 20 anymore.  Have to stop and sit for awhile, then again I've been up and going since 5:30 so maybe I'm being a little hard on myself.

Truth be told.  I fritter away a lot too.  I'm an expert timewaster - reading Weird News on Huffington Post - or playing games - still  playing games although credit where credit is due - not nearly as much as I used to - also practive French - and writing weekly to my elderly aunt who's in a  home in Canton Ohio hundreds of miles away from family.

I hope I'm wrong and one of her two kids is nearby yet going on past history, I doubt it.  Can't help but pick up clues from previous letters.  She was so painfully grateful when L took her to the Cabin.  Maybe they are loving attentive children and make the effort to stay in touch but somehow I doubt it.  Therefore I've decided to write her once a week.  News, not from Lake Woebegone but from Dry Gully Road.  Perhaps she's non compos mentis now.  I knew she was having cognitive problems after a fall, maybe she's passed away - she's in her 90's - and no one's told me so that I wrote to an empty bed or a wastebasket, but it's still worth the effort.  After a shaky start she flouted husband and husband's brother and remained good friends with Mom.  That means a lot.

Suppose too, I've so little family that keeping touch with those that remain becomes increasingly important. My other aunt doesn't write and the few missives received are so fragmented and full of joy and gratitude that I've written her that she imparts no news at all.  She's a bright and loving spirit but goes off on tangents to her tangents to the degree that not one sentence is completed.  I love her and love her joie de vivre but she exhausts me too.

(Written November 12).  Having trouble finding uninterrupted time to write - to follow a thought more deeply than just thinking it.

For days now I've wanted to investigate why I feel something may be lost by mindfulness.  If I'm always 'in the moment' I'm not thinking and if I'm not thinking I am not - or so it seems.  Isn't our whole reason for living to make use of this gigantic grey muscle, the brain?  So why then does it exhaust me with its constant chatter?

I've certainly become more aware of it and the mindlessness and fixations of its mindlessness.  The fires for instance.  Frequently I catch myself having reasoned arguments with the proponents of burning.  In doing this I'm not coming up with new insights, it's more an ego thing where I try and convince them of the uselessness and harm bush burning does.  So I stop and a few minutes later find myself doing the same thing again.

I've been quite surprised. 

This awareness, this mind observing the mind, is a new thing for me.  A bit mortifying but awareness is the first step to change.  When I become aware of being somewhere other than here and  now I try and focus on body and breath.  That focus lasts about a second, maybe two then I'm off again.  But it's a start.

Have also started doing yoga without the bird CDs.  Have several recordings of birds; in Turkey, India, Far North Queensland, Tibet, etc.  Always listened to them while doing my hour of yoga.  Now I do it in silence.

I've decided to try not to be distracted from the here and now.  Already understand that the rest of my life will be needed to even begin to get a handle on this.  Yoga is better although my mind still wanders - of course! - deeper, more correct, more calming, with less impatience to get this over with to move on to the next thing.

There's always neough time for everything in the here and now.

"Right Now" I am taking refuge in the Towoomba City Library from a) the heat and b) more bush burning at home.  When I heard John was ging to burn the corridor across from Horrocks' where  two pheasant coucals and a whipbird live I got upset.  Again.  Useless to cry for what was going to happen.  Then hearing Peter Horrocks was going to burn the creek (which doesn't belong to him) gave rise to a real rant.

So, here I am; in the air conditioning (it's 36 in Mt. Whitestone, probably 32 here) with a full tummy from a Jilly's salad and with my caffeine levels topped up with a very bitter soycino.

Started reading Turning the Mind Into an Ally by Sakyong (which translates as Earth Protector) Mipham - which only goes to illustrate how much of an antagonist my mind is because of the suffering experienced BEFORE the burning even took place. 

Still one has to start somewhere.  I don't meditate every day, even when doing yoga there's usually an excuse I can find to postpone it.  Two to 4 times a week probably.  And the little I do and the inconsistency of it doesn't make for a mind I'm in control of.

This book will make a big difference.  After a rough start I'm pretty consistent with yoga because the benefits are so obvious and addictive.  I feel better.

Suspect that regular meditation will reap the same reward.

Beyond that -found The House, the Purple House (so called because of it's purple painted front facade and deck) which appeals to R and I.  Two hours from Brisbane which is its main drawback.  But nevertheless it's a winner.  100 acres at Lillian Rock between Kyogle and Murwillumbah.  $650,000.  Affordable.  Private.  Beautiful.  Even wrote to the realtor.  Who knows?  I do know we will find the best place for us.  I do know, or think I do, that it is time to leave DGR.  On the way home from the ride this morning (through burnt out overgrazed paddocks) saw men in fancy casual clothes and expensive 4 wheel drives - 3 of those - returning from a look at the quarry site.  It mght have a price tag of $9.5 million but some rich investor will buy it as a tax break and future investment.  Anyway the signs are there, from the quarry being on the market to endless torching of the bush to a proliferation of motorcycle traffic even to hoons doing donuts at the end of our driveway - and squealing as they did it - not the motorcycle engine but a chubby young man, squealing like a pig and so engrossed in making donuts he didn't see me standing there staring at him.

Another of the many symptoms of my untamed mind.  I judge all the time, form opinions all the time.  Catty things - just then a young woman, long blond hair pulled into a ponytail, black t-shirt and jean shorts, great bone structure, honey coloured skin - and obsese.  I make alot of silent judgements about obsese people.  Not how horrible they are but how sad.  But no matter whether it's catty or commiserative it's still a judgement call.

I don't experience reality as it is.

Wonder if they've finished burning yet.

Then there's a whole 'nother chapter titled Richard and the almost daily manifestations of his rapid aging (he's only 67!).  Forgetting things, dullness, not following through with a thought or action.  I'm starting to check up on him, make sure things are done properly -without him knowing.  This morning the flyveil  lay unwashed by the tap.  He'd taken it there and then forgot about it.  One of the feed buckets was still in the yard, the hot water tap was not turned off properly so that it dripped, the dishes were done but no counters were wiped (if I cook he does the dishes which as I'm doing almost all the cooking means he does the evening dishes all the time.  I do lunch.  He does breakfast).

Pen dying, time to quit - buy a new pen!

RIght Now and my happy death wish

"Right Now" rolled the die for this - choices were:  Wash walls (going to start washing the outside walls by hand, not enough water in tanks to use the gurney), washing living room windows, chip lantana, draw (nearly finished cloud drawing), blog or start weekly letter to Aunt Lee.

Aunt Lee.  Her husband, my Uncle Ben, died in January.  I wrote as soon as I heard but never received a reply.  Then, at the beginning of this month, I get a letter from her.  She's in an old age home in Canton, Ohio, hundreds of miles away from Grand Rapids, Lansing, where Linda lives, or Jake, wherever the hell he is (he was in North or South Carolina, then Mexico, so who knows?).  I don't know the story so getting mad isn't helpful.  Maybe Linda is desperately trying to get her in a home closer to her.  Aunt Lee doesn't mention the kids at all.  All I know is although she was trying to be brave, the letter was sad and spoke of a woman very much alone - and you can never be lonelier than when you're lonely in a crowd.  So decided I would write her once a week.  Can only tell her Dry Gully Road news, certainly don't want to write of my woes (not that I have any) but writing about the animals and Australiana and upbeat newsy stuff, well, it might just make her smile sometimes.  I am so glad Mom and Dad never went into a home.  I'm not going either.  I'll die first - and that's the only way to avoid them; stay healthy, stay active, keep your marbles, then die in the night or better yet, have a little warning that I am soon to be cactus so the animals are taken care of.

That was my only fear while Richard was away.  If something happened to me while he was gone and no one noticed then the animals would suffer.

So there's my death wish.  Suppose Aunt Lee is tired and perhaps no longer looks at dying with a jaundiced eye.  It's a long beautiful, well-deserved sleep at the end of a long busy life.

Remember reading somewhere that those who have recently died go somewhere where they get to recuperate from life's rigours.  And Wayne had that wonderful dream of Mom in just such a place.

Death is no enemy.  Death is called an angel with good reason.  It is love that releases us from the constant, miraculous, exhilarating, beautiful but ultimately exhausting embrace of life.

So tired I can hardly write - and I'm purposely writing slowly to avoid mistakes (after crossing out two paragraphs and having to start over).  Very little sleep last night from the worst and longest lasting episode of 'restless legs' I've ever experienced.  All due to running home (about 2km?) from where I found a female, a pregnant female, flying fox hung up on a barbed wire fence - about 30' west of where Helen Keller, the deaf and blind and starving wallaby was discovered.

By the time Peter arrived (neither Richard or I are vaccinated against the deadly lyssavirus), it was dark so we worked by the headlights and a torch.  The female was so entangled on the barbs Peter had to pass her in a circle 3 or 4 times around the fence wire and even then had to cut it in order to free her. 

Brought her home for a drink of water, some Aspro Clear (one tablet in 30ml) and to finally disentangle her soft brown skin from the barb.  There was no blood save for what was on Peter's fingers after she bit him.  And who could blame her?  The pain must have been excruciating.  She was hyperventilating and whimpering continuously.  I haven't heard anything so tragic since working at the vets.

The bat hadn't broken her teeth, her bones or punctured her palate, something they often do when biting the barbs.  Peter thought her chances were pretty good.  The wing flesh wan't dry or papery - she'd been on the fence during a cloudy day - but even with all these things in her favour she died overnight, her and her unborn baby.

We tried.  Then there are all those bats and birds and animals that die unknown and unlamented somewhere in the bush - or in a bush fire, but I won't go there again, have already had my rant.

Took Balthazar up to the Secret or Hidden Valley which is neither secret or hidden anymore.  John's burned it, luckily he burned very little of the bush but of course every burn encroaches just a tiny bit further into the hitherto untouched bush.  Besides that he's had a dozer clear the track.  The dozer cut a huge swathe up the sides of the ravine.  It's a great clear riding track now but at what cost?  The earth and rock overflow now clogs the seasonal creek, and the waterfalls that appear after heavy rain will mean blocked water gouging out new channels and causing more erosion.

Said to Richard yesterday how much I love this house.  And I do.  It's going to have to be a very special property to get me to move.  Now that I've calmed down after the fires have finished I lose that keen edge to move.  But if it needs to happen it will happen.  I leave myself in the hands of the god.