37 Years Ago

It seems hard to believe that 37 years have rushed by. Today, 37 years ago, I gave birth to my son and surprisingly, given some of the risky experiences he's had, he's still alive and presumably surviving. At least, I think he is.

Last year, just before Christmas, I turned up at my home in Florida to begin discussions with him about selling it and getting it ready for the market. I intended to share some of the benefits with him because I thought he was taking care of the property.

What I found was a dump. I had been conned, tricked, manipulated and convinced by my son that he was truly managing it by mowing, trimming, taking care of issues - all the things one has to do to keep a home livable. But he was not doing anything.

And he was undoubtably using drugs and alcohol again, totally against our agreement, as I saw garbage strewn from the back door to the street with bottles and other trash.

The grief and anger I felt at that moment was tremendous along with the huge disappointment of discovering what a liar my son had become. It affected my relationship with my boyfriend at the time, who has had years of dealing with ex-cons, and who tried to help me understand what had been going on. But my rage got directed at him and we split up for awhile.

In time, now over six months since that day, I have come to accept that my son is troubled, and that I can no longer fix him. He is an adult who is entitled to make his own choices, which does not include getting help. Many times in the past ten years I have encouraged, cajoled, pleaded, even threatened all to no avail.

But more than that singular event, which was a turning point in my life, there are all the wonderings and wanderings that I have done since then.

As parents (or aunts, uncles or cousins) we see a child growing and have no idea what life choices will be presented or how the path will unfold. And we don't see how we may play a part in that drama  and sometimes because the life is foreshortened the stage is quickly cleared.

It has not been pleasing to see how many peers of my son have not made it to 37. Some have died from being enlisted to fight a war, some fighting wars on home turf, some from despair, some called accidents, and a few were the consequences of a high school celebration gone horribly wrong.

Ten years ago in Everett, WA during SeaFair when things
appeared to be going along better.

So to celebrate this achievement of one child surviving 37 years, I am making a donation to a local fund that provides hope for young men and women to better themselves and to realize their full potential. And I hope there is someone somewhere who is donating to a similar charity that will benefit my son, wherever he may be. And if he should read this, I want him to know that nothing stops a mother's love and prayers for his protection.

Only Hurricane here is the Ridge

I am more than grateful to not have to board up my windows and stock up on water and food like my son and friends in Florida have to do for the next two months.

You see, it's hurricane season there: June, too soon; July, stand by; August, a must; September, remember; October, nearly over; November.... well, who knows what it was for November? Pretty rare for intense storms in November.

So the only hurricane I think about out here is Hurricane Ridge... is it open? Are the roads clear? Can I go up in my car or do I have to take the shuttle (because there's too much snow).

Deer are unafraid of humans on the Ridge. 

Going up to Hurricane Ridge reminds me ever so faintly of the family trips up to Miller State Park on Pack Monadnock in Peterborough, N.H. (And I find it interesting we have a Miller State Park here in Clallam County, too, but not for the same guy.)

Driving back down from the Ridge taking photo from sunroof.

First, there was the decision to go, and sometimes it must have felt to my parents like herding snakes to get all four of us into the station wagon.

Then there was the food, coolers of beverages, fruit, ingredients for cooking over the campfire and as I'm remembering it, I was 9 or 10 and probably not a lot of help.

The drive from our house to the base of the mountain was less than half an hour, but as most kids remember things, it seemed so much, much longer.

The road was winding, and sometimes when I have dreams of roads up mountains, my brain uses that one as a backdrop.

Once on top, we charged around on the smooth granite looking for the best site to claim as our own for the evening, expecting it would get cool enough for a campfire. I know we usually went up there late in the summer because the hunt was on for blueberries on the low-growing bushes.

And the best part of all was climbing up the forest ranger lookout tower  (The link will take you to Chuck's webpage about the park and you can see his photos. I don't have any to share.) to see how far we could see without binoculars. For me that was the stair in front of me because I was so nearsighted.

But I could push my coke bottle glasses into my face and increase the clarity a little bit that way. Honestly, I didn't mind it because I didn't know any different. My life was a haze from early on and only by the light of the moon at home in bed could I read without straining my eyes. Strange.

What moves this even more into the Twilight Zone is that the park was named for General James Miller, a hero of the Battle of Lundy's Lane in the War of 1812, and a native of Hancock. I was unaware of the humor of the Universe that would 10 years later march me down the aisle with a guy who had the same name, but I'm not sure if the joke extended to his being a distant relation of the General.

Coming down the mountain after running around, eating all kinds of foods, including marshmallows, melted chocolates and graham bars, it was almost a certainty someone would call out, "I'm feeling sick..." and my father would rush to find a wide enough spot to pull over before his vehicle was permanently sullied.

And my last visit to the park was when we drove my mother up there for a picnic with assorted other relatives and by then she was getting a haze in her eyes as she was approaching 90, I think. As we reminisced about 'the good old days,' she reminded me that coming up to have a cook-out was no picnic for her. I said, "Yup, that's pretty much what I'd think about it now if I had to bring a wild bunch up here, but I am grateful for the memories I have."

I'm not sure if I knew then that might be my last visit as well... who knows when I might return? But my memory carries me up and over that last hump in the road to the parking lot and I don't have to ask permission to get out of the car and rush to the highest rock to look down on home.

Canceling a Membership

Most of us are members of clubs, organizations, groups or fraternities, sororities. Some of those memberships serve us well and some are just verbal clutter in the background of our lives.

I have become aware of being a member of a club that no longer serves me, so I'm withdrawing my membership today, here and now.

That club is the "Clean Plate Club."

I was joined against my will when I was too small and vulnerable to object.

My father and mother didn't realize what that club had for rules when they ordered me to "clean up my plate," and they have cast off their mortal coils and any rules they issued are null and void now.

One of the philosophies of the club was that children starving in Hungary, Armenia (Does that place still exist?), Africa and other remote places unlikely to be visited by a five-year old from New Hampshire, would directly benefit from my consuming everything on a dinner plate for an adult.

Cruel and unusual punishment? It was never deemed so by the grown-ups, for whom a full plate was an affirmation that the war was over, there was now plenty for all, so celebrate and EAT UP!

Questioning a Leo father as to how my eating all my food could possibly help someone so far away was deemed insubordination.

So was refusing to eat something that either looked or tasted peculiar to a five-year old. But Taurus stubbornness is hardly a match for Leo's pride. Or was it?

One Friday evening my mother and father were about to sit down for a French 'apéritif.' consisting of fresh, bright red sliced tomatoes (pronounced toh-mah-toes for this occasion) and sliced hard-boiled eggs with a light vinaigrette sauce and some freshly cut up parsley. (This prepared by my mother when she was still interested enough in furthering her relationship with my father; not to say that there is any blame her in any direction, but at some point, they both did things to each other that caused her to stop making an effort with food for him.)

This lovely plate was put on the coffee table in the living room, and I wandered over to see what it was. Expressing an interest in tasting it, my father insisted that I have three slices of toh-mah-toe and three slices of egg on my own plate and that I sit down and eat it.

The re-created French aperitif plate which launched the
War of the Toh-mah-toes of circa 1950's.

Never realizing that this would become the War of the Toh-mat-toes in the early 1950's, the battle was joined. Of course I sat down, and upon taking one bite decided that was enough. The red thing, years later, might hold some small appeal, but my youthful palate thought it was disgusting. And those delightful hard-boiled eggs were sullied with a nasty-tasting bitter juice.

"Yeuchhhhhh!" I called out, and my father and mother's evening was about to be ruined. Putting my fork back on the plate, I got up and started to leave.

This was the affront that the Leo was not about to tolerate.

"Young Lady, sit back down and finish what is on your plate." Taurus feet (mine) were firmly planted in the negative, and arms crossed against my chest, I refused.

Prison was a better alternative, and that was where I was sent.  "Go to your room and you will stay there until you decide you are going to finish what is on the plate," my father ordered.

Dinner time came and went, and my father directed my mother to bring that very same plate out for my breakfast on Saturday morning. As he was going fishing with my older brother, he wasn't around to watch the tears and refusal that ensued. Back to my room I went without any breakfast.

Act II, scene 1: lunch was a repeat performance. By now the eggs had absorbed all the sauce and some of the tomato juice as well, giving them a peculiar color and an even nastier taste. My mother was looking at it with the same disgust but for some reason she was in cahoots with the jailer and was following his orders.

Act II, scene 2: Being in my room all day wasn't healthy, either, so I was let out mid-afternoon and I knew right where to go to find nourishment... the raspberries were in season and off I went to the patch.

Act II, scene 3: Everyone else at dinner was served from the variety of fresh things on the table, but I was subjected to a cold plate of withered up Toh-mah-toes and soggy hard-boiled eggs and an equally withering look from my father, ordering me to eat what was on my plate or go to my room.

It wasn't hard for me to decide what to do and I left the table. As I was going up the stairs, I could hear my mother arguing with my father that his intractable daughter was not going to bend to his pride and it should end now.

It did... but in a secret way: when the dishes were cleared from the table, those wicked no-longer red things went into the trash. I expect even Super-Pig (a creature we had out in the back) might have turned up his nose to them, but I don't know that for a fact.

Years, really almost 20 of them, went by and one evening when my father had invited me out to dinner, I told him this story. He was astounded that he could have behaved in such a way, and worse yet, his common phrase at dinner "Have some lovely toh-mah-toes," had become a trigger point for me to NEVER want to eat those garden vegetables in their fresh form again.

Curiously, talking about it with him, receiving his apology as well, was the curative, the forgiveness, that made it possible for me to eat them, but only if I put them on my plate myself. From then on, whenever we were at a table together, he would lightly say, "Won't you have some lovely toh-mah-toes, dear?" and we would smile at what was now part of our bond instead of our fence.

Silly that decades later I am still dealing with food issues and the consequent weight that accompanies them. But I am working on a variety of solutions and one of them is to cancel my membership in the Clean Plate Club. Now I can leave something behind without guilt. Or better yet, by making donations to food programs that allow that guilt to be assuaged, knowing that someone somewhere locally or far away is getting something to eat and I don't have to eat it for them.

And, although I re-created this dish for this blog, I don't much care for the combination today. But I do have my mother to thank for giving me the incentive to be creative about food and its presentation. Whatever complications my parents had between them, there is much good that each of them passed on to me and with some distance from the immediacy of their energies I can see that now.

What contracts have been made in your life, with or without your assent, that are playing out in the background of your life? Do you want to share?

And, to my children, who might be reading this... my profuse apologies for anything I may have said or done that created any contract that is negative in your life. Consider this the dissolution of it for my part in it.