2011 - A Retrospective

 

As years go, there have been better and there have been worse.  

1999, for example, was a wonderful year.  1999 was the year I remembered my worth and reclaimed my strength.  After years of living a “less than” life, I gave the rudder a mighty jerk and set sail in a completely different direction.  And I never looked back.

Given what I now know, I might have chosen to skip 2003, altogether.  I had emergency surgery in March.  Four weeks into my six-week recovery period my mother died.  And while she’d been ill for most of the previous four years, her death came suddenly as the result of a blood clot.  I learned she had died while shopping at Target in what was my first foray into the outside world since my surgery.  My daughter and grandson had left me in the house wares department.  He needed t-shirts.

I remember a voice inside my head shouting at me to breathe and finding it difficult to follow directions.  That same voice reminded me my family was counting on me, if for nothing other than a ride home.  And then there was the question of when to tell them.  Did everyone need to carry that knowledge around Target?  Or would waiting be more appropriate?

The words flowed from me as soon as I saw my daughter’s face and everything after merged into a days-long blur, with a few exceptions.  I remember sitting, powerless, around a polished, wooden table meant for a high-powered board room, wondering why my sister hadn’t removed her sunglasses.   I remember my dress.  It was vintage, late 60’s I think, and gray.  Embroidered flowers trailed down the right side of the skirt.  And, I remember standing under a large, green tent, alongside my sisters, next to the casket holding my mother.  The four of us sang “Amazing Grace”.  It was her favorite.

2011 was significant in its own way.  This year, for the first time ever, I drove several hundred miles across several states alone.  And, before I did that, I drove several hundred miles across several states in the company of a friend who, up to that point, I’d only known online.  The two of us were on our way to meet many more friends with whom we’d had years-long online friendships. The experience was wonderful and proved what I’d always felt; online relationships are real and can be every bit as meaningful as those we experience 3D.

   

Here are a few other things I learned this year:

• -          I do not have to react.  In fact, in many cases its better I don’t.  Action, in almost every case, is preferable  to reaction.
• -          I can be most childish with those I care most about.  Not behaving in a childish manner is a decision that benefits everyone.  And it’s easier to do than you might think.
• -          There is a place in my life for religion, and participation in a group of spiritually like-minded people feeds something in me, making me more whole.
• -          You can’t fully appreciate the angst of desire until you’ve wanted something for your child that you are powerless to provide.
• -          Acceptance, in all its forms, is a major component of happiness.
• -          I’ve spent a considerable amount of time looking for something I already had but wouldn’t see.
• -          Despite disagreements, disappointment, and geography some people will always have a place in my heart…because they live there.

© Copyright 2007-2011 Stacye Carroll All Rights Reserved

30 Days of Gratitude - Day 2 - My Job

Mitchell Steiner wore his jet black hair combed straight back off his swarthy-skinned face.   His coal-colored eyes either danced or snapped, depending on his mood.  His nose was aquiline.  His mouth never stopped moving.  Mitch was a talker, as in smooth talker, as in car salesman, or motivational speaker, though he became neither.  Mitch claimed his destiny early on.  He was headed for a career in medicine.  At the age of fifteen, a stint in the Explorer Scouts was, for him, a logical move in that direction.  For me, it was a way to be closer to Mitch.  I had no idea my destiny, too, was being set.

My father didn’t suggest I go into nursing, he insisted.  He had a litany of reasons to support his position; a litany he cited, ad infinitum, whenever the topic was broached.  I, on the other hand, had never even considered it.  As soon as I could stand, I did so in front of a pint-sized chalk board that turned round and round in its aluminum stand; a feature I found most irritating, as a glimpse at the magnetized side of the board, with its cacophony of many-colored plastic letters, only served to remind me that it wasn’t a real chalk board in a real classroom, and I wasn’t a real teacher.

Sometime during my mid-twenties, possibly between baby number one and baby number two, it became evident to my father that my career in nursing would never come to full fruition.

“I can’t believe you’re just going to throw it all away!  You’ve wasted so much time!”

“I don’t see it that way.”, I answered him.  “I’ve gained knowledge I’ll always have, and use.  It wasn’t a waste.  I just never wanted to be a nurse.”

“What do you mean you didn’t want to be a nurse?  What about all that time you spent in Explorer Scouts?” 

I traded my scrubs for a “burp rag”, which is Southern for the cloth diaper worn over one shoulder from the time a baby is born, until she takes her meals with the rest of the family, preferably in a high chair that has been sat upon a large piece of plastic meant to catch the food that missed her intended mark, her brother’s faces.

Mothering was a fine career choice, and I was fortunate to be able to do just that while my kids were very young.  When I did return to the workforce outside my plastic-lined domicile, I managed my hours in such a way as to avoid using childcare.  I worked during the day.  My husband worked at night.  One of the two of us always cared for our children.  I did it alone, but my husband, apparently, needed help.  His girlfriend often visited on her lunch hour bearing pizza from the pizzeria she managed.  I found her generosity maternal and oddly comforting.  There’s still a very small, warm place in my heart for her. 

Ricky and I signed divorce papers on New Year’s Eve.

Twenty years later, Ricky is deceased, three of my four children have homes of their own, and I work in a business my father helped to get off the ground .  I started part-time during a soon aborted attempt at beefing up my nursing degree.  I should have known better.  It wasn’t my idea in the first place, remember?

I used to say, when asked about my job, that I was paid way too much money to do a job a chimpanzee could do.  I don’t say that anymore.  The job hasn’t changed.  My duties are still well within the primate learning curve.  What’s changed is my compensation.  As the first rocks began to fall off our soon to crumble national economy, my employers explained their decision to switch me from a salaried to an hourly employee as a form of simplification.  Benefits, too, proved complicated.  I haven’t had a paid vacation, holiday, or sick day in several years.   My 401K was frozen. 

But I get a paycheck and, even though ten percent less, my earnings afford my son luxuries such as organized sports, music lessons, an IPOD, an Android, and a PS3.   I have a place to go every day and a job to do, which is more than many people have today. 

 

I’m not doing what I thought I would do, but maybe that’s because I didn’t set my sights high enough.  One look at my son and I know I have more than enough, and there’s still time for chalkboards in my future.

© Copyright 2007-2011 Stacye Carroll All Rights Reserved

30 Days of Gratitude - Sisters

I don’t post a Facebook status every day.  Some days I don’t really have a status.  Some days, I spend part of the day just trying to decide what my status would be if I really had to have one…which I don’t, of course.   I’m comfortable subsisting in a status-less state.  After all, I spent the better part of my life without a declared status.  Most of that went okay.

Today, and for the next twenty-nine days, I will declare my status on Facebook.  I’m calling it Thirty Days of Gratitude.  

I participated in thirty days of music.  It was fun.  It brought back a lot of memories.  Memories and music always mix with me. 

 

I got halfway through Project 365, an exercise in posting a photograph every day for a year.  My computer went on the fritz somewhere around photo number one-sixty. 

I was tempted to join a friend in posting a different, meaningful film everyday for a month…until I remembered I have no memory for titles, or actors names, and only retain tiny snippets of plot that prove to be ungoogleable. 

So why not do Thirty Days of Gratitude?  One thing’s for sure…I can use the reminder.

Today, I am grateful for sisters.  I have three of them.  All are younger, some more than others.

Laura and I are eighteen months apart which means sometimes I am two years older, and sometimes I am one year older, but I am always older.  Many parenting blogs suggest eighteen months to be an ideal age gap between babies one and two.  I’m thinking this estimation is made from the point of view of the parents whose workload, while doubled, isn’t complicated by diversity.  Basically, it’s like having another kid along for the ride.

Lower to the ground, though, the view is very different.  The competition began the moment she entered the house disguised as a puff of white organza and lasted until, as an adult with children of my own, I realized that with deference comes responsibility.  My mother shared things with Laura she never shared with me, but that doesn’t have to be because Laura was her favorite.  It might also be because Laura was interested, and a better listener and…well…there.

Today, Laura rarely wears organza, choosing instead easy-to-care-for knits, and scarves.  We both like scarves, but we wear them differently.  That’s what we are.  We are alike, but different.  I think that’s why we have so much fun when we are together.  Whatever the reason, the years have stripped away all the things that don’t matter, leaving us with our scarves, love for our kids, and the ability to make each other laugh…at most anything.

Holly came after Laura, and we both thought we’d never seen anything more beautiful.  Compared to us two tow-heads, Holly, with her chocolate brown eyes and curly locks to match, appeared downright exotic!  She had a sweet disposition and a smile to match.  I’m willing to bet both Laura and I carry the same image in our heads of Holly as a toddler, standing tall and proud next to the pencil-drawn line on the wall in my mother’s sewing room.  She couldn’t have been much over three feet tall.

Holly and I were always the closest of the four sisters.  We were the renegades.  We smoked and drank and made bad choices in men…and spent hours together on the telephone justifying our misguided decisions.  We’re not as close as we once were.  She doesn’t know how proud I am of her and the way she set a course for her life and stuck to it.  Years ago she told me she wanted to live on a mountain-top, faraway.  She does now, and she is surrounded by the things she loves best, animals.  I always knew that’s what she would do…what many of us never do.  She found happy.

Candi is the youngest.  She prefers to be called Candace, but after years of Candy, Candi is the best I can do.  Her middle name is Jane, so of course we called her Candy-Jane.  Mom even made a song out of it.  I didn’t realize it at the time, but now I’m not so sure she liked it.  I always think we are ten years apart but when I count it’s actually seven.  It feels like ten though…

What with the age difference, we didn’t actually play together much as children.  I remember worrying about her a lot.  I expressed this to our parents and checked on her at night, when she was in her crib.

Even as a girl, I loved to concoct stories.  Once when I was about thirteen and Candi was three…no, make that six...I brought her to tears with one of my stories.  I remember the mix of feelings; the horror that I’d made my baby sister cry, and the thrill of doing something really well. 

Though not evident on the surface, Candi and I are probably the most alike in temperament.  We both march to music others don’t necessarily hear.  And, we are okay with that.  The tunes Candi hears are very different from those that play in my head, and we are okay with that, too. 

We live less than thirty minutes apart and only see each other about four times a year.  We addressed this issue a couple of years ago by instituting a monthly get-together we referred to as “Sisters”.  After about a year, conflicting schedules and, yes, priorities got in the way.   What with Holly living on her mountain-top, regrouping will be a challenge, but I hope we’ll find a way to do it…soon.  Whether eighteen months, ten years or seven years apart, we’re not getting any younger…

© Copyright 2007-2011 Stacye Carroll All Rights Reserved

Homecoming

“Honey, it’s at least a month away.  It’s too early to ask her.  A million things could happen between now and then.”  

I felt an overwhelming urge to reach out and pull the words back in before my son heard them.  It wouldn’t matter.  He wouldn’t…no, couldn’t understand. 

 

“Yeah, but if I wait, someone else will ask her.”

And that’s when, for the first time in a very long time, I began worrying about Homecoming.

You might think “worry” an unusual choice of word.  If so, you probably had a date.  You probably went to all four Homecoming dances with a date or one of those groups of kids who exude wholesomeness via cohesiveness. 

I did neither.  Homecoming, for at least the first couple of years of high school, was something to get through.   It marked a period of avoidance because it wasn’t just about a dance.  It was all of the things leading up to the dance.  It was decorating committees, and “Wear Your Favorite T-Shirt Day”, and hallways covered in poster-boards advertising candidates for Queen and King, and of course, “Who are you going with?”  For two years I spent those two weeks with my head down, mostly inside my house.  

My son likes to talk to me while I’m online.  Rolling around the room on a big, blue exercise ball, he is like an over-sized gerbil that chatters. 

“Here’s what happened.”, he starts as though the previous conversation just ended.  “I asked Molly and she said “No”.  You know she really likes me and everything but she probably won’t go and if she does go she’s just gonna go with some friends, you know?”

“Uh-huh.”

“So then John asked me if he could ask her and I told him, “Go ahead, but she’s not gonna  go and if she does go she’s just gonna go with some friends.”, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“And so then he asks her and Molly says “Yes” because John has a six-pack.”

“Huh?” 

 

“A six-pack.  Girls like guys with six-packs.  John has a six pack.”

I started to ask how Molly, or anyone else for that matter, knew John had a six-pack but decided the answer would probably take our conversation in a whole different direction…a topic for another day, perhaps. 

“Well, that wasn’t very nice, was it?”, was all I could think to say.

“No…well, I don’t care.”, he answered, rolling towards the closet.

“You could go with a group.”, I suggested as a picture of my sister’s “group” flashed into my head.  My sister went everywhere with the “group”.  Even as a memory they exuded cleanliness.  “Or you could go alone.  Lots of people will go alone, you’ll see.” 

   

He rolled out of sight.  “I’ll think about it.”, he said from somewhere behind me.

When Homecoming week arrived, I took heart in my son’s participation in “Wear Your Favorite T-shirt Day”.  It didn’t matter that he might have worn it anyway.  At least he was engaged.  But when Tuesday came and went without any declaration regarding attending the dance, I couldn’t help myself.

“So?  Are you going?”  I was a talking bundle of laundry, floating down the hall on its way towards the laundry room.

“Nah…I’m not going.”  His bedroom door, closing behind him, provided punctuation.

An argument ensued as I continued my trek towards the washer.  

“He should go.”, I thought.  “He’ll be sorry he missed out.  I hope he’s not isolating himself.”

“You can’t say anything.”, I thought.  “Talking about it makes it a big deal.  It’s his decision.”

I said nothing, and the day of the dance became just another Saturday.

I didn’t see the women until one of them spoke, waking me from the sleep walk that had propelled me from my car to the inside of the market.  They were “Football Moms”, like me.  Our sons had been teammates for years, and now they were freshmen in high school. 

And it was Homecoming Saturday.

“Can you believe I still haven’t found him a suit?”  The mother of “John Of The Legendary Six-Pack” spoke. 

“Aren’t these things a little less formal now? “, I asked, lightly.  “He could wear a shirt and tie.”

“What about Shane?  Is Shane wearing a suit?” 

 

Did I imagine her eyes widening just a bit, as though anxious for an answer?

“Shane’s not going.”, I kept it light.  “You know, he asked Molly before John did.”  

Was that a flush of color on her freckled cheeks?

“Yeah…”  

She congratulated her son with a smile he wouldn’t see. 

The exchange sparked anxiety that would stay with me for most of the day.  Several times over the course of the afternoon I had to force myself not to find Shane and ask him one more time, “Are you sure you don’t want to go?”  There had been talk of an after-party.  All his friends would be there.   I knew because, earlier in the day, I’d surveyed him about their plans.

But I didn’t.  I didn’t ask him.

On Sunday, the day after Homecoming, we went for a haircut.  As I drove, it occurred to me we wouldn’t have to wait long since all the other boys would have had haircuts the previous weekend, in preparation for the dance.

“I’m really glad I didn’t go to that party, Mom.”  Shane spoke into the passenger side window.

“Really?  Why?”

It seemed things had gotten ugly between several of the boys.  One of them left early.

“What about his date?”, I asked.  

“He went with Vicky.”, he groaned.  An image of a diminutive fifth-grader with manicured nails and perfectly placed highlights came to mind.  “Vicky’s a slut.  Everyone knows that.”

Despite his confirmation of my earlier gut reaction, I suggested he find another way to describe the girl. 

“That’s why I didn’t want to go, Mom!”  He turned to face me, pummeling me with the full force of words that left him in a kind of angry whine.  “They all wanted me to go with Amy, Vicky’s friend.  And she’s just like her.  I didn’t want to do that.  I didn’t want to put myself in a situation I don’t know how to handle.”

Overwhelmed, I remained silent.

“Maybe I’m weird…but I don’t want it to be like that.  When I have sex, I want it to be with someone I at least like, you know?”

I wanted to stop the car.  I wanted to stop the car and scoop him up in my arms the way I always did when he faced uncertainty.

But I didn’t.

“You’re not weird.”, I said in measured tones.  “You’re not weird, you’re smart.  You made a good decision.”

I pulled into a parking space next to a motorcycle that had the Batman insignia on the engine cover.

“Good!  Kevin’s here!”  Shane bounced out of the car and placed his hand on his favorite stylist’s bike.

He stood straight.  There was a quickness in his eyes.  He smiled.

Homecoming, indeed.

© Copyright 2007-2011 Stacye Carroll All Rights Reserved

Finally Determined: TBD, Facebook, and Girls Gone Mild

I’m not the most social animal you’ll ever meet.

Just ask…

Okay, there are a couple of people you could ask. 

My oldest/dearest would regale you with stories of sardonic avoidance.  While she’s talking though, remember she’s not exactly the life of the party herself.  We met at work.  I believe the ice-breaker was a question about fellatio.  That kind of thing will bond a girl…

My “Spirit Mother”, a Native-American woman who tackled the job of growing me up within months of my thirtieth birthday, will tell you it’s a ruse.  She’ll dub me magnanimous and explain, in great detail, the ways in which I’ve proven the depth of my caring, my intelligence, and the innate generosity of my nature. 

And, they’d both be right…depending on the day, my level of self-confidence, and the number of days since I’ve been alone.

Really alone.

Because, I have to be. 

Not all the time.  Everyone knows doing anything all the time is unhealthy.

But I need it some of the time. 

Strange as it may sound, being alone actually takes me outside myself.  When forced to associate for days on end, my emotions become jumbled.  Thinking becomes hard, and sleep, evasive.

Alone time, whether spent writing, reading, or inside the cocoon provided by nose-cancelling earbuds, allows my mind to rest, to find space for the tornadic detritus produced by the effort of showing up.

And, speaking of showing up…

Almost five years ago, I joined a social website on a whim.  I’d been surfing the internet, for what I don’t remember.  But, I came across an advertisement for a social website built for Boomers. 

I’m a Boomer…barely.  It gives me a modicum of comfort to be able to say that I qualify by just a few months. 

I joined.  I conjured a catchy screen-name and used, as an avatar, a photograph taken by my daughter.

Photogenic, I am not.  My daughter caught me on an upswing…literally.  The photograph was taken while I shared the porch swing with my eldest son.  He always makes me smile.  She clicked at just the right time. 

Over several years, for several hours, several days a week, I forged relationships with people in exotic places like Goshen, New York, Lincoln, Nebraska, and Sydney, Australia. 

And we shared.  We learned about families, argued about politics, supported artistic effort, and congratulated achievement. 

And we laughed.  We told jokes, poked fun, and honed our already razor-sharp, sarcastic wits into instruments of cohesive amusement. 

And we played…really played…like children play…with abandon, and the certainty that tomorrow, after the responsibilities of “real” life were met, the gang would be there, and we would play again.

And, speaking of real life... 

Websites cost money, and ours wasn’t making any.  Despite our founder’s best efforts, our playground closed.  Seeing the handwriting on the “wall”, several of us joined Facebook in an effort to maintain contact.  And then, a few more joined.

“And they told two friends, and they told two friends, and so on, and so on…”

It’s not the same, but its okay.  And, when I think about it, I’m amazed.  We come from very different backgrounds, different demographics, and various socio-economic strata.  We are African-American.  We are Asian.  We are Christian.  We are Agnostic.  We are musicians.  We are Stay-At-Home-Moms. We are self-employed.  We are grandfathers.  We are disabled.  We are yoga instructors.  We love music, sports, and high-heels. 

Well, not all of us love sports, but high-heels suffer no such prejudice.

We do all the things we did before, only now we do it under the watchful eye of “3D” family and friends, who read our walls in amazement at the bonds we’ve forged with people far-flung in so many ways. 

A couple of years ago, one of our group suggested a meet-up.  Meeting at the beach, combined with the aforementioned wit, suggested the title “Girls Gone Mild”.  This year, regardless of social ineptitude, I’m one of the girls.

I’d tell you I’m excited, but the word isn’t big enough.  I’d say I’m nervous, but that word suggests anxiety...

Okay, I’m anxious. 

There are the pounds put on as a result of dying glands and overworked ovaries. And, there’s my hair.  It’s long now.  He likes it that way.  But the color’s all wrong and, in this heat, it hangs.

And there are the shoes.  We’re going to the beach.  No one wears heels at the beach…but I’ve got this reputation. 

For days now, sleep has been elusive. Last night, after what seemed like hours, I finally turned the clock around to see “4:15”, large, blue, and LCD.    I’d been awake for a while.  The alarm was set to go off in forty-five minutes.  I gave up.

A double-click opened my home page.  It had been hours since any of my friends posted.  I scrolled and read, and didn’t think I’d given myself away, but a red “1” lurking over the message box said different.

“What’re you doing up?”

That’s when I realized that since joining “TBD”, I’ve never, really, been alone.

And, they’ve made all the difference.

© Copyright 2007-2011 Stacye Carroll All Rights Reserved