Clutter vs. Mindfulness

Clutter collects even when you are not a hoarder.  Flat surfaces are the enemy.  It helps to close my eyes and work on being mindful.  Then I peek, see the papers scattered, mail sorted, well sort of.  Magazines reproducing like rabbits.  Trying to cancel subscriptions becomes a whirlpool of ineffective action.  Stuff is oppressive.

Added to the chaotic accumulation of stuff is my effort to be more serene, mindful is the catchword.  I do deep breathing, play mindless music in the background, go into a room my cats can't invade.  Close my eyes again.  The doorbell rings.  The pharmacy delivering my prescription.  Great.  But there are two prescriptions.  I didn't order the second, in fact I no longer take it. A conspiracy, like cancelling subscriptions, now I have to call the pharmacy and slip out of my serene state. 

A to do list catches my eye.  Call the tax guy, send a memo to the women's fellowship to settle agendas about sign-ups, who does what, when.  By the way, I am the president, an election I won by default.   A guilt list stares back at me.  The cards I plan to send to encourage people on our sick list.  There's my walker, luring me to take a walk around the block before achy joints and a daughter lectures me,  not to mention the memberships I have at LA Fitness and the Y.

Have to go online now to order stuff from Amazon.  My prime membership allows me 2 day free delivery.  Such a deal,  Need to charge my Smart Phone and Kindle.

Gotta go.  Catch you later.  Yeah, Right!

Rainbows

The class on Rainbows taught me that there is no pot of gold at the end of any rainbow.  A case where too much information bursts a bubble. Thanks a lot. 

The highly educated instructor explained that rainbows are round and have no end. His dazzling slides demonstrated this scientific fact. 

 I was glad that Des didn't hear this.  At least I hope he didn't.  You never know what gets around up there in yonder land.
Des loved to make rainbows with a garden hose when he sprinkled the lawn.   He would call me to come out and see his marvel.  Good thing he isn't around now or the water police would fine him for wasting water.

Since I am signed up for other classes besides the Rainbow class, I am getting worried.  One class is about Fairy Tales and another about Country Music.

Fairy tales would be hard to dissect.  We already know they aren't true.  I never did believe that anyone climbed up Rapunzel's  hair with or without hairspray

As for Country Music, that's about heart break and standing by your man.  Heck that's a no brainer.  Even Hillary stood by her man.   And she was no Dolly Parton.

That brings me to another event I joined.  Mended Hearts.  I qualified because my heart was mended once with two stents in my major artery.  I wonder if they can mend my heart that was broken when Des left our heavenly home to frolic with the angels up yonder.  I bet he is still trying to make rainbows up there.

So Says Sassy

Suicide Is a Family Affair

     I was thirteen years old when my grandfather committed suicide.   With all the publicity in recent days about Robin Williams final act, memories return about my grandfather, a morose Italian immigrantwho  never truly adjusted to life in a  Chicago neighborhood where family lived in and around him.

     He called me occu de bugia.  Eyes like a bug.  They were brown like  his.  Pressed quarters in my hand and pinched my cheek.  Who knew what demons rode his shoulders?  His suicide caused a buzz in our neighborhood.  It was messy, shooting hmself in the head with my father resting on the couch in the next room. Woke up screaming, relatives swarming down the stairs in the two flat grandpa owned. he lived alone, my grandmother had died a few years back. his 2 other sons overseas, in the army.

    I wrote a short story about him when I became a writer,  I called it Grandpa's Last Stand.  Hard to understand his deep depression.  No shrinks in those days to talk to, not much of a church goer, even though my grandmother went to mass daily.  For years, I avoided the stairwell where his apartment was, the bullet hole still in the wall.  Eerie.

     My father brooded a lot,  unable to overcome his gambling addiction.  I knew he had a gun somewhere in our house in a new neighborhood. Fearful that he, too, would do this drastic deed.  He never did.  Just lost himself in long shots, beating himself up for his weaknesses,  I loved him so much. Who knew his heart would do him in, a respectable way to go.

     I think about Robbin Williams family now.  I wonder if they worry about each other.  About themselves.

   Years ago,I suffered a deep depression.  Fortunately, resources were available to help me through it,Mentors, counsellors, church, faith, meds that worked,  And my unfailing sense of humor that crept back into my life.

    We never know what others are grapling with, when kindness and love is all we can offer.

     My guru visited me this week and had me write this sentence down and repeated it myself often.  I share it here with you.  "May I be forgiven for any harm I may have casused  conciously or unconsciously."   It resonates with me.  It works if you work it.

     So Says Sassy

The Finality of Loss

     This is the witching hour.  My eyes begin to smart around 5:30 p.m or 6 p.m. Vague sadness drifts over me.  Des has been gone well over a year but missing him comes over me in waves.  Grief, mourning whatever.  A rose by any other name would sting as much.

     Most of the time I go on with life in this new category of widow.  Go to church, meet friends, laugh, write, read   a ton of new books, visit one or another of the medical pros that keep me above the grass.  

    Manage to keep up with the onslaught of paper work, bills, ads,coupons, plea for money from a litany of charitable organizaions.  I am tempted to cross out the name of the ones addressed to my husband and write forward to local cemetery.  Haven't done it yet.  Still might.

     Tomato plants are growing in my back yard.  Des is shocked, mouth agape.  A play on words since he developed Agape Therapy, Greek work referencing  love--the unconditional kind.  Wrote books about it. gave them away, charging money was not his long suit.  Good at giving it away.

     I should have realized what I was getting into when he took away my credit cards during our brief dating days, paid off the balance of $700 - serious money in 1971- and declared over the years to everyone we knew that he bought me.

     A few years ago, I put seven crisp one hundred dollar bills in an envelope, put it under the Christmas Tree and declared myself free.  He just smirked and asked where the interest was.   Did I mention that I miss him?

     Just noticed that it is now past the witching hour and my weepy mood has passed.  Will turn on the TV, laugh with the Golden Girls, warm up with the Walton Family...my rerun entertainment to chase away the blues.   See you in the funny papers.

   So says Sassy

     

des has been  

My Dad....DOB 3-1-1909..

Father's Day tomorrow stretches across time with no one to buy a card for or his favorite shaving lotion, Old Spice. My dad died at the age of 64 from heart problems that did him in. 

Of course, a lifelong smoking habit didn't help.  Neither did his gambling addiction that gave him an adrenal rush and  a roller coaster ride of wins and losses.

I miss him  and his fierce and partial love for me, his only child.  I never doubted that.

He graduted from Lane Technical High School in Chicago, the only one of his siblings to do so.  Smart, sly and cunning,  the bookies in our neighborhood were his pals and downfalls.  Everybody liked him, even my mom most of the time.

He was a master mechanic partial to Chrysler products.  We always had a Dodge or DeSoto.  Other makes were not mentioned.

He was my companion on long evenings when my mother worked the night shift on a factory assembly line. We sat by the radio and laughted at Fibber McGee and Molley, and were captivated by Mr.  District Attorney and The Shadow Knows.  He did crossword puzzles in ink.

Loved to barbecue chicken on a grill, boasted about his fig tree, fixed cars that lined up in our alley on Sundays, for friends and family.  Protective of me, he greeted my dates with steely eyes and wasn't shy about mentioning his mafia connections.

Big hearted, affectionate,he beamed with pride at his two grandkids, David John and Judith Debra.  Italian men were partial to the boys in those days, but he treated them as equals.  Told Judith someday she would be  princess in the Rose Parade.  Slipped money to each  of them with the warning not to tell grandma.

Called me up one day at my office--ironically I worked for the District Attorney--and said he was on a winning streak in Las Vegas.  I said great, quit and go home.  Nope he said, promising to give me 10 percent of his winnings.
Yeah, right, I thought.

He won $2000  and gave me $200.  

In spite of money worries, he left my mom with the  house intact, a car and money in the bank that she managed to squirrel away,

That was my dad, handsome, trim with a mustache, soulful brown eyes, and Clark Gable ears.

Love you, Dad, 
Ann Marie

Overdosed on the Waltons

  Memorial Day was long so I fed my addiction.  Not what you think.  I never left the house.  Non stop Waltons were on the Hallmark Channel.  My vicarious family through the seventies,.  No brainer to figure out why this only child would love a familyof eight siblings plus grandma and grandpa and parents who loved each other.  

  I did do a load of wash on occasion to stretch my legs and feed my hungry cats, checked the email, paid some bills.  Since I gave up guilt for lent, I didn't have a twinge indulging my Walton marathon.

The day before David and Barbara barbecued in my back yard, hauling in all the burgers and fixings.  A wonderful  surprise to warm the cockles of my heart, whatever the heck cockles are. My other kids were up north and  the great grandkids were frolicing up in San Luis Obispo with their parents.

Holidays are fraught with memories, sweet and bittersweet.    Over the years, Des and I had picnics down at the Marina, our big brown van filled with food and family around to share the time.  That Van carried us across the country to his New York family nearly every couple of years.  Picnics back there took pl;ace by Zirkles' pond in Brocton.  In fact, Joyce told me that is exactly what they did yesterday.

Come to think of it, I married into a big family, not unlike the Waltons.  Des was the youngest of seven so I was enfolded into their warmth. His brotheer Dick, 13 years old, was a psuedo father to him Nieces still call me Aunt Ann.  They scattered to nearby small towns, - Ripley, Westfield, Brocton, Jamestown. and across the state line to Erie,Pensylvania.

Last Fall we held a graveside service for Des in Ripley, had a memorial celebration at niece Trudi's diner (Meeders) and and wound up at a picnic at one of the nephew's barn..

I am ending this on a Walton family goodnight. Good night everbody, especially Des.
So Says Sassy

Incognito

When a dermatologist decides to use liquid nitroglycerin on a portion of your face, it stings.  Who knew it stung so much that you stifled a loud scream.  Obviously,I, your local coward, was unprepared for pain.  Remember me?  I was the one who never got her ears pierced until age fifty.

Beyond the pain, the area has turned blushing red.  Soon,  it will blister and my eye will bulge.  Not a pretty sight.  Next, dead skin will flake away. Not to worry soothes said dermatologist.  I will look normal in seven to ten days.  See you on church.  Maybe.

I checkedwith my live-in grandson, Andy and he predicted that things were going to get real ugly soon. His slogan is "keep it real."   I should tell him that reality sucks .  Grandmas shouldn't talk like that, but sassy ones do..

So here is my plea.  Where does one get those hideous oversized visors that celebrities and other nefarious characters hide behind to avoid recognition? It is either that,or I will hide in plain sight at my humble abode until the mirror says it's okay to go out and about.  By the way, the pierced ears have closed  up again.  Where can you buy those clip on earrings?  Must be an oldies store around.

One positive note:  I'll never get a facelift, tumy tuck or any thing painful.  Reminds me of an old saying of husband Des when we discussed  diets.  "Costs just as much to bury a fat guy as a skinny one."  That goes for ugly as well.

So Says Sassy