Flying Shoes

Tags

Death, Home, Ice cream, Michigan, Mother, Munising, munising michigan, Texas

 

My blog is many things to me.  I can share photos, stories of my family, trips I’ve taken, food I’ve eaten, a recipe or something I’ve created (on occasion I am creative), my gardens, my environment.  The list for blogs and their content are as countless as the numbers of people who write them.

Today I’ve decided self-indulgence is my entry.  My mother, Audrey Marie Dolaski is dying, maybe today, perhaps tomorrow but very soon.   I live in Texas; she lives in Munising, Michigan.  She chose to die in her home surrounded by the things she treasures.  What she treasures now are the baby squirrels outside her window, the multitude of birds that come to her feeders, Coke and ice cream, she never was a soda drinker but these days, it’s what she can swallow and eating has become painful. She’s always enjoyed ice cream, only in moderate portions (she always watched her weight carefully).  She’s never been one to over indulge.  Yesterday she described butterscotch with generous portions of the butterscotch veins like it was manna from heaven ☺

These are our conversations, trivial but communication just the same and quality time  over distance using the telephone.  I must do most of the talking and listen carefully as her once strong voice is weak and she is also slowed a bit by pain medication.  She is still as sharp as she ever was, it simply takes her a bit more time to formulate her thoughts and a great deal of effort to express them, as her energy disappears.

Before I make my call I become agitated, wander around my house like a pacing panther, I don’t like to make these calls.  Who wants to poke a stick in a wound?  I know that I need to keep our communication going until she dies, gotten her wings, or flying shoes.

After the call I have a period of many feelings, always tears because I cry easily (one of my weaknesses), it’s just me, although a dying mother is sad! I feel frustrated, not because she is dying, she is 89, will be 90 if she makes it to the 4th of July and she’s made a good life for herself.  We will celebrate her life when the time comes.  My problem is  I’m not certain I heard what she said, if I answered her question with the right answer because I didn’t hear well, I don’t want her to think I’m not listening to her.  I’m still looking for approval (at 65) from a dying woman who I always had a difficult time pleasing and it affects my conversations with her as she dies.

I asked her yesterday if she wanted me to call everyday I didn’t want to disturb her.  To me that was a normal question because mom often didn’t like me to bother her, and she was not shy about  expressing  those feelings.  Yesterday her answer was, “yes call everyday, you are my daughter you can’t bother me.”   That’s amazing for me to hear, also emotional seeing five years ago her answer may have been that she was busy, call later, maybe the next day!

It’s getting around to the time of the day I call my mother and I feel myself already becoming anxious.  This is sad, it’s sad for both of us.  I don’t believe she realizes that I feel this way (a good thing) this is something that I need to simply get over, it is what it is, grow up kind of thing!  It’s life, it’s been my life and I’ve lived it quite well.  Most families have some degree of dysfunction, and mine was not an exception.

My mother deserves my respect, my love, and gratitude, she has it. I can return to the past and speculate about what might have been, but  the reality was my life, one doesn’t go backward.   None of us come with a set of instructions how to properly parent, we parent by our past observations, our personalities our faults and hope for the best possible future for our children.

The East Channel Lighthouse, My Babysitter

Tags

Lake Superior, Lighthouse, Michigan, munising michigan, nature, outdoors, travel, Upper Peninsula of Michigan

The light on the East Channel of Grand Island near Munising Michigan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Times they are a changing, in fact they already have and I suspect the process will continue as long as there are people; we continue to evolve.  Seems at a certain age we look back on the ‘good old days’, time has often softened our memories, which is why they are now good!

When I look back at my childhood growing up in Munising Michigan, a small town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula it’s always with fondness, even the snow is not so overwhelming; most likely because I no longer have any need to contend with it; even the snow had magical moments.

Munising Bay (Lake Superior) has an extremely beautiful island called Grand Island.  This island for me and for many others holds many special memories.  Families lived on the island, I’m certain they felt it was their own personal piece of heaven and the burial markers that stay in the small cemetery remind us they were there, spent their life, pioneering a heavily wooded, harsh, sometimes icebound island and at that time it was theirs.

Like most islands in large bodies of navigable water this one does have lighthouses to protect ships with their light in the darkest of night.   When I was a child the East Channel Lighthouse felt like it was my own personal structure, it’s light had long gone out.  I knew little of its history, just that my neighbor lady’s father had at one time manned the lighthouse; it hadn’t been used in many years.  It was in terrible condition in the early 1950’s and there were no plans to save or restore it, it was there in my case as a baby sitter.

Ah, a baby sitter?  How can a lighthouse be a baby sitter?  I am here to tell you how that happened to take place.  My mother and her friend Irene VanLandschoot worked during the summer and they had children that needed caring for, we weren’t little girls but we still needed to be occupied during the time of the day our mother’s were working.

When you grow up in Munising you learn to do many things, I don’t even remember how I learned some of my skills, seems they came naturally and many skills did come by trial and error seeing we had much more freedom to explore, and as I’ve mentioned, those times have changed.  One of our abilities was rowing a boat, doesn’t every 10 or 12 year old know how to row a boat on Lake Superior (having learned on smaller lakes I hope).

The VanLandschoot family in Munising, to this day are fisherman, and fisherman set nets way out in Lake Superior (at least they did back then), I believe those laws have changed along with the many other changes that were to come.  Irene, mother’s friend was part of the VanLandschoot fishing family and her daughter Paula Rae was two years younger than me.  Paula had a little brother (his name is Paul but he was called ‘Brother’ at that time) I assume he went with the men on the boat.  It must have seemed a great idea to get these two little girls together for the day and they would be out of trouble and our parents would know exactly where we were!  Problem solved and adventures for Paula and me.  Soon we would be teenagers and most likely wouldn’t have been a way they could have even tempted us to spend the day on the island alone, boring! I don’t remember how many of these trips we took, but enough to give me fond memories and amazement how free we actually were.

On a day that nets were to be set or maybe lifted, I’m not certain, it was a long time ago, it wasn’t one of the fisherman’s longer days, Paula and I would be on the fishing boat, dropped off with a boat to row ourselves onto the beach of Grand Island, pull up our boat and make it safe so the waves wouldn’t blow it away (a real problem) and we settled in right in front of the old lighthouse.   I’m amazed that we even knew how to beach our boat well enough and then to know when we would see the fishing boat returning to get back in our rowboat and meet the boat!  Amazing!  No wonder I won’t leave home without a watch!

We were armed with a bag lunch, some ‘pop’, chips, and cookies or something tasty, our mothers were excellent bakers.  My sandwich was most likely liver sausage and mustard on good old white Bunny Bread.  A great meal for growing girls and as I remember it tasted pretty darn good.   There is something delicious about eating outside!

The freedom to explore an island, walk along the shores of icy Lake Superior, inspect the caves, stand under water dripping from above and to go inside the very ‘spooky’ old East Lighthouse took a lot of time and occupied for the hours we were there. Surrounding the lighthouse  the field was filled with Sweet Williams, still one of my favorite flowers.  My grandmother had them in her garden and at one time someone must have had a flower garden around the old lighthouse.  Have you ever had the pleasure to enjoy the scent of an old-fashioned Sweet William?  I was born a gardener; if there were flowers I would be sure to find them.

Flowers from my garden. Common name: Sweet William Dwarf. Scientific Classification: Class: Magnoliopsida, Order: Caryophyllales, Family: Caryophyllaceae, Genus: Dianthus, Species: Dianthus barbatus (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I do remember a thunderstorm coming up one day,  if you’ve ever seen a storm whip it’s self up on Lake Superior you would know why Paula and I were a little nervous. We simple got ready and waited watching for the fishing boat and knowing we had to row to meet it.  We always knew that Paula’s father knew where we were and he’d make sure we were safe.  I doubt anyone told us that we were safe, it  was unsaid but understood that Mr.VanLandschoot would let nothing happen to us.

These are wonderful memories; the lighthouse has remained with me always, as special to me today as it is to so many others.  Caring citizens seeing it was going to slowly erode into Lake Superior and of course there are vandals’ even at such pristine and peaceful places have restored it.  It was not long after this time that all Pictured Rocks, which had been free for us to roam, was taken under the protection and preservation of the parks system.  Some of the residents didn’t like this, some did, it is progress and times really do change.

As I write and think about this time in my life all the possible worrisome things that Paula and I could have met left to spend the day on Grand Island with our babysitter the East Lighthouse it’s not with any thought why we were allowed to do such things, It’s how wonderful it was that we could.  Do any of you think that a child today would be allowed to take this venture?  Would parents be considered neglecting their child’s safety?

Pictured Rocks National Park, Miners Castle Photo taken on summer vacation, wonderful weather hot and sunny! hike to misquote bay was wonderful except for of course the misquotes! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

March, In Like a Lamb, Out Like a Lion

Tags

april showers bring may flowers, green bay wisconsin, mild heart attack, munising michigan

As the March winds howl outside my window I’m reminded of a March in 1995,  many years ago.  That year March came in like a lamb (in Wisconsin). It was to go out like an angry lion.  I had completed the cleaning  my spring garden required, spring bulbs were popping, starting their early show, the weather had been agreeable, even the lawn was ready for an April shower. And we all know April showers bring May flowers.  In my mind life was good, nature in its usual order, one thing after the next,  a comfortable pattern.  On occasion I had troubling thoughts, but had come to accept a hiccup here and there.  One carries on and I rarely thought of Mike dying, although both his parents and his sister had died young.  Maybe we do whistle in the dark?

As a child growing up in Munising, Michigan one of my neighbor hood friends, Mike Kennedy, would later in 1966, become my husband.  He was two years older than me so we didn’t talk that often, our ages being so far apart:-)  He was shy, handsome and had a lot of friends, very cool friends in my mind.  I was a skinny girl who didn’t attract a lot of attention from cool boys.  However, I would grow up and become an acceptable young woman.  Evidently we eventually talked to each other, we loved one another and intended to spend our lives together, we wanted children, we were friends.

We married when he was 22; I was 20, without a penny to our names. Between us we had two new cars (foolish young people), a little furniture and a few household supplies.  One U Haul trailer and we left Munising immediately after our marriage and headed to Green Bay, Wisconsin, on the day of a Packer Bear game, there was no room to be found. We did find a rather humble place to stay and set out the next day to find an apartment.  We found one, the best apartment in the world for our last $90. There we would seek our fortune.  We had many adventures and there are many stories, but this is about March 1995, 28 years later.

While playing racquet ball with a friend late one Friday afternoon Mike had a mild heart attack.  He drove himself to the hospital, he was an EMT, understood what was happening and that was his usual behavior, get it done fast, take care of it, stay calm.  He stayed at the hospital until the following Thursday, released given a clean bill of health, no damage due to quick action on his part, and eat a diet low in fat. We felt he had dodged a bullet.

Thursday evening came around, we went to bed happy dad was home and he was going to continue working as always, life was good, off to work in the morning.  He was a stockbroker and his clothes were laid out before he went to bed that night, wingtips in place, suit and tie ready for the day.  I woke at the usual 6:30 to find the house somewhat quiet seeing Mike was always up early and ahead of me.  I called him, looked around, and found him.  Sometime in the night he had silently died along side the bed.  My reaction was as anyone would expect, I didn’t panic, I was in total shock and moved like a robot.  I knew he wasn’t alive.  I felt like a character in a very bad movie.

Mike had been a member of our village rescue squad and I immediately called and told them who I was and what had happened, please come without any lights and sirens please, he was already gone. They did just that, were there quickly and confirmed what I and the youngest of my three children already were trying to comprehend; Dad was gone. The rescue staff called my friends, my oldest son Mike had to be told  and brought home. My husbands youngest brother Dennis on his way to work, was found by the Michigan State Police and appeared in what seemed a very short time.  In the blink of an eye our lives had changed and each of us had a path ahead of sorrow, pain and eventually growth.   Memories would be searched, anger would surface, sadness would be overwhelming, and many months fear and loneliness  were my constant companion along with decisions that were at times overwhelming.  I had a lot of growth ahead of me; I wasn’t aware. Amazingly enough during this time we also found moments to laugh, remember a story, or poke fun at something we thought was silly about one process or another that needed doing.

In the span of a week my husband and childhood friend died, a funeral  was planned,  my daughter Christina turned a sad seventeen, Conor had a senior ball to attend, and I found myself at the end of that week, alone.  Listening to Emmylou Harris’s newest CD, Wrecking Ball, how right for my mood and emotions.

Anyone reading this may wonder why in the world would I go over all this, death happens daily to so many people, it’s a condition of life that we live so we must also die. My family and I are not unique.  The musings that I have are that death of a loved family member is only one of the extremely painful events in life that people must face. Life does resume, and you discover it has never stopped, around you in your sorrow and grief people are living and loving and enjoying.  I would like others to know that life does get better; you slowly go forward, taking baby steps and look to the future. Sometimes the future is only a day, or a week, eventually you return to normal, at least what does become normal.  Time does heal and friends  the rocks of our life, but one goes on alone forging a different future.  I made mistakes by the dozens; I also got the help (professional) I needed to  figure out who Trudy Lee Dolaski Kennedy was.  What I had done right, what had I done wrong; for some of us it’s  difficult to look at our own behavior, our own history.  My first husband’s (notice I write first) death was among the most traumatic events in my life,  not the most traumatic others may face, these are only my observations.

The  March wind is still howling outside my window today, my  current window in  Cedar Creek, Texas.  My husband Hal is working on a lecture. New gardens are growing.  My animals are sleeping in the sunshine, my children are grown and I am a stronger, smarter woman than I was in 1995.  And Michael Richard Kennedy is still missed by those who knew and loved him. I do not write this without a tear nearing the anniversary of his death.  Our hearts are large with a great capacity for love.  Loving once and losing doesn’t mean not loving or being loved again.  And the April showers will bring May flowers, if not this year, than the next.