Borrowed Joy, Daily Hope

Ever since I was old enough to reach the mailbox I have always loved checking the mail. It's a little Christmas every day: whose special message awaits inside those envelopes? Since the advent of e-mail, personal mail seems a thing of the past—I'm lucky to get a handwritten signature on a computer generated Christmas card— yet hope endures. Anticipation burbles within me each day as I walk down to the end of my long drive to see what the postman has brought.  

The other day, sandwiched between our bills, a new manuscript to be edited (always a treat!), and the typical influx of holiday catalogs, was an unexpected gift: a 9 x 12 white envelope from the University of Mississippi, addressed to a young woman named Alexis. This was a mistake—her address placed her just over the hill from me, about two miles by road. I had put the envelope back in the box and was raising the flag when red words at the bottom corner of the envelope caught my attention. Important Documents Enclosed: Letter of Admission, Housing Application...

I remembered waiting for my own sons' letters of acceptance to colleges a few short years ago. And before that, awaiting their SAT scores. Awaiting word from my own college applications 34 years ago, and before that hoping that re-taking my SAT had raised my score. But this is only November, I thought, and most schools don't notify until early spring. Mississippi might be one of those schools that markets themselves by sending out fake acceptance letters saying, "Dear High School Senior: This could be you!"

I couldn't help myself. It was just a flat white envelope, after all. Not that I had done anything like this before in my entire life, I pulled it back out of the box, pressed the envelope to the first page beneath, and held it at a slight angle so I could see through it better. 

"Dear Alexis," it began.

Personalized!

"We are pleased to be able to inform you..."

Ooh—it's good news!

"...that your application of admission to the University of Mississippi..."

Oh my gosh, she really applied...

"... has been accepted."

Woohoo! WE ARE IN!!!

I couldn't put that letter back in the box. If it ended up there once, where might it land the next time? How long would this exciting news be delayed?

I ran up the hill to the house and grabbed the phone book. Unfortunately Alexis had a common last name for this area and there were four columns I had to cross-reference for her address. In my excitement, I missed it the first time and had to go through them all again. My heart pounded as I made the call. A girl answered.

I was still panting from my run up the hill. (Note to self: get back to walking regularly.) "Hello, Alexis?"

"Lexie isn't here, she's at work." 

"May I speak with her mother, please?"

"Yeah." The phone clunked down. "MOMMY!!!"

It took the mother several minutes to get to the phone. I kept hearing an odd whacking sound in the background. I heard the woman interrogate her young daughter thoroughly about who it is and what they wanted. I almost hung up.

But it turned out Alexis' mother was thrilled I had called. "No, don't put it back in the mail. We've been waiting for this. Tell me how to get to your house and I'll be over as soon as I get my younger daughter out of her tap shoes."

I took the letter to the end of the driveway and paced until the minivan pulled up, as excited as if the university had flown me in to personally offer a full scholarship. I smiled, shook the mother's hand through the driver's side window, and handed over the letter. I asked where else Alexis had applied.

"University of Virginia and Penn State." As we spoke, the chubby girl in the back seat fought for a moment in the spotlight by lowering her electric window and trying to climb out of the car. Her mother told her to stay put.

"Alexis likes the south, then?"

"Not exactly. She wants to be a forensic scientist, and these schools have the best programs, according to our research. Mississippi is the last to accept her, and her number one choice. I don't know how I'll wait until she gets home."

Without saying a word I reached into the car, pressed the envelope to the page beneath, and tilted it just so before her—and watched my joy spread to a new face. 

Maybe I was so excited because, as a writer, I spend way too much time alone. Maybe it was the fact that the preponderance of my personal mail of late, due to a new flurry of submissions, has been rejection—but Alexis' news buoyed me through the rest of the day. Earlier that day I had never heard of her; now I'd met her mother and her chubby tap-dancing kid sister and I knew she lived just over the hill and worked at the local Wal-Mart. But most importantly, I had been allowed access to her dreams.

Because I have a good memory for emotional highlights I can almost always access remembered joy. And when my own dreams seem so far away that I have trouble sustaining hope, Alexis reminds me that I can latch on to someone else's as they enter one of the pure moments of unadulterated hope life offers us. Like marriage. Birth. Baptism. Graduation. Publication. College acceptance.

I believe that what I put out into the world will come back to me—and who knows, it might just arrive in my mailbox. From now on I'll always think of Alexis as I check my daily mail. The excitement it holds may not even be for me—but hope for one of us is hope for us all.

Do the Right Thing

Every now and then we are blessed with the awareness that we are stepping into our own small moment in history. That happened to me today, when for the first time I went to the polls with my entire family—among us both Republican and Democrat—unified in our intent to vote for Barack Obama.

Should he win, of course, we have taken a role on a much larger world stage. But as a mom trying to raise responsible citizens in the shadow of their father's alcoholism and suicide, it was a notable moment in our family history when today my two sons voted in their first presidential election by my side. These are the same little guys who ran their Matchbox cars down our dog's back and kept cool on Pennsylvania's wickedly humid summer days while belly-flopping in a plastic pool out in the side yard. Now they are 19 and 21, voting for president. Where has the time gone?

Marty is living at home while on co-op through Drexel University and Jackson drove home from Princeton, NJ last night after work so he could vote first thing this morning and get back to Westminster Choir College for class—despite my best efforts, he missed the absentee deadline. For once, however, missing a deadline was fine with me! Somehow it makes me feel more secure, knowing the great lengths (like a four-hour round trip in a car with a front bumper held on with Gorilla tape) people will go to to vote Obama.

Overheard at the polls this morning, as one man in line recognized another coming out of the booth: "Hey man, I hope you did the right thing."

A loaded question. I was pondering it when my husband Dave spoke up for all to hear:

"He did the right thing. He came out to vote."

Integration Puzzle

Might we not say to the confused voices which sometimes arise from the depths of our being: Ladies, be so kind as to speak only four at a time?

~Anne-Sophie Swetchine

Reading from my yet-to-be-published novel The Girl Who Fell from the Sky at The Speckled Hen in Reading, PA last week was so much fun. The event was put together by Sue Lange with other Pennwriters Area 6 members including Liz Clarke, Pam Garlick, and Carol Haile. Yes, the food was great, yes, the room was packed to overflowing, and yes, I got a wonderful response from both friends and strangers. But beyond that, as I looked out into the audience to begin reading—and I had a long moment here, as a woman struggled to pry her four year-old daughter from the room against her will—the most amazing feeling washed over me. Of course this sensation wasn't random. While we can't always predict their arrival or intensity, feelings aren't buckets of water rigged by some prankster to wash over an unsuspecting stooge. Feelings have sources deep within our psyches that can usually be made available to those who seek them.

First came an awareness: Like many writers, I am not one woman. This was apparent to me in high school as I threw myself into gymnastics, cheerleading, dance, high school musicals, chorus, Russian club, student council, and a short and misguided stint in intramural basketball. I was painfully aware of the fact during my six attempts at choosing a college major that would lead to an outwardly desired career path, and even more so during subsequent years spent subconsciously avoiding said career path working low-paying jobs (in 1982 I was the highest-educated head waitress the Hotel Macungie ever had). Until my 40s, I never realized that as a writer, I can honor all my lives—on the page. I am a wife, a mother, a daughter, a stepmother, a neighbor, a co-author, a workshop leader, a book group leader, a former equestrian, a church member, an editor, a walking partner, and former dance critic. This kind of self-concept is the opposite of simple. On any given day, a little piece of me fits into a lot of other puzzles. Some days I feel spread so thin and yanked in so many directions my head starts to spin. But I love my multi-faceted life; it keeps all of my creative cylinders firing.

Then, an observation: The night of my reading, representatives from all of my various splinter lives were either with me in the room or with me in spirit to share in the first public reading of the project into which I've poured all that creative combustion for the past five years. For those 15 minutes, they offered pieces of themselves to me: they fit into my puzzle.

Oh, that feeling: I am no stranger to public speaking, and I have read several of my essays and short stories aloud to audiences of one sort or another. None of my previous experiences compared, though, to the feeling I had at The Speckled Hen on Tuesday as I shared part of my story with people from so many different aspects of my life. Familiar faces tilted up toward me in expectation, their bodies tipped ever so slightly forward as if offering themselves to the story. I felt a wave of glorious integration wash through me as I shared with them a project born of my passion and intellect, experience and imagination. That strangers connected with the material as well was motivation enough to keep slogging down the road to publication.

I re-read this entry and think perhaps I am making too much of it. Evidence of two more pieces of me—critic and child. But today I 'm going to let the child have her say. Part of being a writer is to recognize a "moment," and that's what I had on Tuesday. I know I'll be drinking from this replenished well of affirmation for quite some time, drawing from it inspiration and renewed determination to share my work.

Emergency anniversary

Eleven years ago today my first husband and the father of my children, Ron, committed suicide after a day-long stand-off that turned the trees and bushes and outbuildings on our pastoral gentleman's farm into hiding places for specially trained police dressed in camouflage and toting rifles with sniper scopes. It is choosing to move on after this event that inspired both the title of this blog and the memoir I am currently writing.

The memoir writing has resulted in some unexpected closure concerning Ron that was so powerful that despite the "stage being set" to recall his death (the October days shorter, the nights cooler, the fall sun growing more golden—all those details that subconsciously say, "It happened at this time of year, brace yourself") I honestly hadn't thought about it—until Thursday night, while following an ambulance to the hospital ER. It carried my husband Dave, critically ill with septic shock and blood pressure of only 65/48. There's something about those flashing lights that grabs you by the throat and won't let you go: Emergency. Emergency. Drop everything. Surrender: Life is not going to go the way you planned. It was that echo of trauma that brought the suicide anniversary to the fore.

I remember thinking on the way to the hospital: I can't do this. People say that all the time, right? Yet I have never figured out how to skid along the surface of an experience, let alone turn my back on it. Perhaps because of its very mysteries life sucks me deep into its unpredictable folds, where I must literally "feel" my way. "I can't do this" was a way of honoring my feelings at the moment—I didn't want to be frightened so deeply—but I knew as soon as the words formed in my mind that a truer expression would be, "I can't avoid this." Such is the risk of love, a risk for which I willingly re-enlisted, for my mature self loves Dave as deeply as my younger self loved Ron.

Today I am completely alone in the same house where the stand-off occurred. My children, who were both here that day, have moved on with their lives: one son is at college, the other is at the co-op job his college arranged. Once surrounded on this farm by chickens, horses, goats, and numerous domesticated animals, I no longer have even a dog or a cat to comfort or distract me. I will join Dave later at the hospital, where he is out of intensive care and holding his own. The emergency, it would seem, is over. And in its wake is a feeling I recall: jangled nerves still scanning for previously undetected clues of imminent danger. The heavy exhaustion of an adrenaline hangover. An inner peace that's hard to reckon with, given the circumstances; perhaps a side effect of swiping one's pre-planned activities to the side to live in the moment.

I am suddenly aware that I have witnessed Dave's own stand-off. But where Ron drowned himself in consciousness-numbing booze until the only thing standing between him and death was a short muscular action applied to a trigger, Dave fought to retain his consciousness, even as the odds and his own vital statistics stacked against him. His heart, strengthened by love and determination and attention to what he eats and some thirty years of running, prevailed. It was my privilege to witness Dave's struggle to survive. While Ron's death had many lessons for us, Dave's stand-off is a better story. Next year and in years to come, as the October days shorten and the nights cool and the fall sun grows more golden, I'm sure I will take time to remember Ron. But I no longer suspect that his death will take center stage. Thanks to Dave's brave fight, and my willingness to go with him wherever the dark night led us, the stage will now be set to honor life.

Should I smile?

Recognize me in this picture?

I thought not.

Thanks to my stepson's third Middle Eastern tour of duty in the United States Army, served in Afghanistan, I received an unusual present last Christmas: a burqa. Davy's wife Amanda delivered a message from him: "I figured you'd be the only one who would appreciate it."

Well, I did. Putting it on, and then looking in the mirror, was a profound experience: all physical manifestations of my "Kathryn-ness" were gone. I once read O magazine columnist Valerie Monroe say that when she had tried going for a week without looking in the mirror, she missed herself. No doubt going mirror-less is a good way to start defining yourself from the inside out. This was different, though, because I was looking in the mirror, yet felt severed from my image—and this was not a comfortable feeling.

The burqa is bright and pretty, but this is its common color, so every woman's garment in an Afghani marketplace looks the same. The satiny material slips easily so the part that fits down over your forehead to hold it in place is tight, causing "necessary discomfort" for the uninitiated like me, since the screen must be centered if you're to see at all where you're going. My eyelashes caught uncomfortably in the screen. You can see fairly well—I suppose your brain compensates for the woven threads that block part of your view—but your peripheral vision is lost. Should a little dog or child run in front of you as you walked down the street, down you'd go. 

While fenced in by the burqa I was keenly aware that I define myself by actions that extend my influence beyond the perimeter of my body: looks I give my husband that only he and I can decode. Watching others as they speak to show I care about what they have to say, and encouraging them with lifted brows and nods of my head. Smiling for the camera to let my spirit shine forth. 

While protected by the burqa, though, I suddenly had a greater sense of the power contained within me—a power rarely reflected in the mirror these days, as waning middle-aged attributes demand I rely more heavily on artful draping and cosmetics to perpetuate a visage I can recognize. The burqa removes the need for flirting in all ways, even with one's self. Exposed skin cells that typically interact with the very molecules in the room, now covered, radiated their energy toward my core, toward the place where baby ideas and feelings and dreams germinate. Like a child in the womb these were mine to nurture; I need not share them with the harsh elements of the world. I became more aware of my inner fire, and my skin as its protective barrier—important awareness for one who so highly values the right of personal expression. 

I thank Davy and the burqa for its lessons, which I have shared with people in my church and colleagues at a recent writer's event. But I'm happy to put it away now. While I would have been eager to don one in the painfully pimple-dotted years of my adolescence, it's no longer for me. I have found my voice, and it requires movement for support—so while I still can, I want to walk, run, and dance through my world unfettered to appreciate all its glory. 

Of course our culture has its conventions, too, so what I have previously done grudgingly I will now choose to do with newfound appreciation: I will drape this aging body artfully and willingly, in clothes that won't bind or restrict or contain, because I still need room to grow, to interact, to express. Through my actions and writing and spoken words, I will project my voice so others can hear me—not because an oppressive garment intended to stifle women's voices has taken lip-reading off the table, but because I live in a country where a woman's voice is valued.

Please join me in celebrating our freedoms on November 4 by getting out to vote! 

September's Writing Partner Retreat

Pictured above are the women who attended the inaugural Writing Partner Retreat for Women last month at my summer home on Trout Lake in northern New York. About to take a break from writing for a paddle on the lake, and modeling straw hats from the camp's collection, are (l to r) Fern Hill, Melanie Gold, me, Linda Glaser, and Amy Krause.

Just look at the mirror surface of that lake! Mother Nature blessed us with just the right weather for this event. 

Thursday: Fern, Melanie and Amy, driving together from Pennsylvania, arrived late afternoon in bright 70-degree weather. With the same mirrored surface pictured above, the lake showed off a perfect duplicate of the scenery it has to offer. Once everyone had found her room and unpacked we went for a walk to stretch out legs cramped from the 6-hour drive. I served dinner, then afterward we sat in the living room in front of a fire, drinking Sangria and getting to know one another better by sharing the nature of our current projects and our expectations of our writing time at the lake.

Friday: It poured all morning and I couldn't have been happier—what better excuse to stay in and write? After a breakfast of yogurt, granola, and fresh fruit, we met again in the living room to jump start our brains with a writing prompt. Rather than share right away, we kept the momentum going and wordlessly segued into our own writing projects. Linda arrived at noon, just as we were clearing the front porch of rockers and turning it into a studio by carpeting it with exercise mats. Amy, a yoga instructor, lead us in a series of stretches that simultaneously felt loving and empowering. 

It stopped raining during our smorgasbord lunch so afterward we took advantage of the opportunity to get out on the glassy lake pictured above in a canoe, a kayak, and two "Wee Lassies" (lightweight one-woman canoes). While on our paddle we saw a bald eagle take off from a dead tree with prey in its talons! We got back to shore without anyone tipping over and returned to our individual writing projects. After I served dinner we re-convened in front of the fire to share readings we had brought along with us.

Saturday: The morning schedule was the same as Friday's, with breakfast, prompts, individual writing, lunch, more individual writing. Stretches of time to write: that was the dream that pulled us together for this retreat and the reward for devoting ourselves to it. While Melanie was on an editing deadline and had to work, the rest of us met late that afternoon for a 3-mile hike to the bluffs of neighboring Cedar Lake. The loons had stayed out of sight during the retreat, but we heard that recognizable, mournful cry while hiking through the woods. The view from the bluffs was stellar: rocky, wooded cliffs, a blue sky thick with white clouds above us, dark blue water more than a hundred feet beneath us. We sat without speaking, listening to the insects and birds. The only sign of man was a canoe, tiny from our perspective, trolling soundlessly across the lake surface below. 

We had dinner when we returned. That evening in front of the fire, a bowl of hot buttered popcorn in hand, we reveled in one another's creativity by sharing the writing that resulted from our two morning prompts. (And I want to go on record, ladies: I did not intend to add a political charge to my sci-fi romance by naming my character "Algor," but subconscious thought can often lead us in unexpected directions. I haven't laughed that hard in ages!)

Sunday: Yoga before breakfast this day, with our final writing time after. I served apple cinnamon pancakes with New York State maple syrup for lunch, then participants packed up to head home.

I want to thank Fern, Melanie, Linda and Amy for being my guinea pigs—their presence and their feedback helped me fine-tune my retreat concept. I had such a great time getting to know them better through their interests, observations, and writing styles that I hope to continue to host retreats at the lake each May and September. If you're interested in furthering your writing by retreating from everyday chaos to an idyllic location where you can commune with nature, your inner voice, and other women writers, e-mail me and I'll send you a pdf brochure when the next retreat is scheduled.

Signature design

I was weary to the bone from closing up the camp and took a moment to sit and read what my friend had written in the Trout Lake Journal—a fancy name for the spiral notebook my sister designated for this use some quarter-century ago. Now nearing the close of its second volume, the journal has outlived my grandmother, Uncle Bob, Aunt Jane, Ron, several marriages, and the very camp in which it was housed.  I opened to the last entry, where Doug, the architect from Lifespan Design Studio who helped me design the new camp, had laid fresh ink on a musty page.

He referenced how stressful it had been for me as, one decision at a time, I left our old camp behind. Why copy it? he'd ask me. He wouldn't settle for a murky argument like "sentimental attachment." Slowly I came to see his point—that structure had never been designed in the first place, but patched together to meet new needs over a century of use. Envisioning the new camp required mimicking the very process that allowed personal growth after Ron's suicide: I needed to set aside "the way it had always been" and make purposeful new choices. This was not easy. Coping is in my blood, and readily accessible. I find it much harder to access the kind of deep knowing that can turn into a vision.

But that was old news. I was eager to know what it was like for an architect to walk into a building he had designed. Yes, he knew the floor plan, and yes, he had created a black and white sketch of the exterior, but what did it feel like to be surrounded by its 3-D surfaces, in living color? Doug wasn't just my architect; he and I had been friends for 36 years. I knew he wouldn't let me down. I scanned the entry until the following words, so loving in their intent, pulled me up short:

When I walked into the camp I immediately felt at home. I designed the camp for Kathy; it is her. 

I sought the truth in these words as I finished what I used to call "chores" but now regarded as a fitting expression of loving care for this place. I mopped surfaces that are practical and frugal and easy to care for; I'd no sooner spend money on a manicure than furniture wax. The pine paneling is new and strong and displays precious family heirlooms. The interior is open and welcoming, large windows making parts of it almost transparent. While the sleeping porch and open living room/kitchen area encourage togetherness, bedrooms with closing doors create needed boundaries. The kitchen and laundry room encourage optimism; the necessary work of daily living can be a joy. The simple line of rocking chairs on the porch allows the work of a writer—observing, dreaming. The building is protected by materials that compliment the natural setting, and while they may look old, they are plenty strong enough to deflect storms—the numerous pots placed around the old camp to catch the rain are now solely used for cooking. A new bird feeder and flowers in a rotted stump celebrate the surrounding nature.

Fond as I am of extended metaphors, these weren't the thoughts that brought tears to my eyes when I read Doug's entry. It was an immediate association to words I'd uttered time and again since the camp had been rebuilt; words many others unaware of this metaphor had echoed.

It is her, he wrote. Could this really be true? Because this was my gut reaction: It is beautiful.