Pamela Stead Jones

“You know full well as I do the value of sisters’ affections:  There is nothing like it in this world.”

— Charlotte Bronte

When I look back on my trip to Florida, there are many things to remember; but what stands out in my memory is spending time with all my siblings at once.  I thoroughly enjoyed traveling with my brother and learning that we are good companions in spite of our very different personalities.  There is a quiet something that underlies what we have built on the surface that allows us to feel comfortable together as we pursue parallel interests in silence.  Even more striking was once again spending time with my two sisters.  After nearly two years, we found ourselves sliding right back into the relationships that span space and time.  There are few things we can count on in this world, but I know I can count on my sisters’ love.  I also can count on at least one moment when my youngest sister and I descend into uncontrolled silliness and carry on as though we still were ten and five years old.  And I can count on at least one instance when our different views of life will cause a rift between my middle sister and me — a rift that in the end is healed by the lifelong bond of sisterly love.  As the time approached for my trip, I allowed myself to realize how much I sometimes miss having my sisters close by.  I try not to dwell on such things and allow longing for another place or time to interrupt my busy days; but when a visit draws close, I get to indulge myself a little in the anticipation of bridging the gaps of time and distance.  The great thing about sisters, though, is that when I arrive at my destination, there isn’t any overwhelming emotion or sense of relief as we greet each other.  Instead there is a feeling of kicking back and putting on a comfy old pair of slippers and enjoying the sort of relating that says, “now, what were we saying two years ago?”

There is something unique in the bonds we share with our sisters — so unique among other relationships that we women spend our lives adopting sisters along the way.  We seem to attract others who relate in the same ways and at the same depths that we do.  We might share common interests or lead similar lifestyles.  We might seem to have nothing in common but still share the heart-to-heart relating that is the hallmark of being female.  I think of the way that growing up with two younger sisters taught me the basics of sisterhood and how I have used that early experience to widen my circle of sisters.

Truly, “There is nothing like it in the world.” My sisters come in all shapes and sizes.  Some are quite young, and some already have aged out of this life and gone beyond my world.  Some share my town and some live in places I’ve never seen.  Some have been a part of my daily activities, and some I never have met.  Still, at that heart-to-heart level, we are sisters.  We love, we laugh, cry; we encourage, we confide, we celebrate.  We are sisters.  We celebrate being who we are and knowing we are never alone.  Here’s to you, my sisters!  There is nothing else in the world quite like you.

“When I admire the wonder of a sunset or the beauty of the moon, my soul expands in worship of the Creator.”

– Mahatma Gandhi

For those of us who begin to grow extra hair and find ourselves howling, last night was a spectacular night to be outdoors and look skyward.  The Super Moon of March 19, 2011 came really close to the Earth — only 221,565 miles away.  In celestial terms, that’s just around the corner; and as I watched it appear above the horizon, it looked close enough to touch!  As the mirror in the sky looked down at once on the hiding sun and on me, I felt its light touch my own, and my hands moved involuntarily to brush down the goosebumps that caused the hair on my arms to stand up straight.

Only an hour earlier, on that crystal clear night, the sky was filled with stars.  They sparkled against the black darkness like silver shards of daylight splashed against the night sky as the sun kissed the day goodnight.  For a time they owned the sky, and I could feel myself sparkle with delight as I followed their example.  It seemed that all of them had marked their calendars for the big event.  I can’t remember another night when so many stars danced above me.  I lingered under their points of light and sent my dreams flying to them, one by one.  Perhaps while I sleep the stars will return those dreams to me and share my hopes with me as I sleep.

Then the moon arrived.  Each tiny star faded into the background as if deferring to a far greater light.  I looked down and saw that I was bathed in moonlight.  How perfect, I thought, that my friend, La Luna, should capture the light of the hidden sun and reflect it through the darkness to the place where I stood.  Now it was my turn to shine.  For a long time I stood there, glowing with the Light of Creation and feeling very much a part of the circle of light.  I, too, am a mirror of the Eternal Light.  I, too, have the capacity to shine through the darkness.  With a joyful heart, I took my reminder back to the warmth of my cozy house.  Tomorrow I will shine, I thought.   Yes.  Shine.

“maggie and millie and molly and may

went down to the beach (to play one day)

…may came home with a smooth round stone

as small as a world and as large as alone.

for whatever we lose (like a you or a me)

it’s always ourselves we find in the sea.”

— e. e. cummings

“As small as a world and as large as alone.”

Whenever I join the millions of grains of sand on the beach, I am taken to a place that can only be found by the sea.  Local Floridians will tell you that March is no time to walk barefoot in the surf; but my northern body was feeling Springish, and my sneakers were brand new.  Did I really want to be finding sand in my socks for the next year?  I left them behind with socks tucked inside and made the trip across the sunbathers’ sand to the edge of the water.  I began to think that the locals might be right as I stepped onto the still-wet sand above the water’s edge; but soon my feet were numb with cold and the water felt less icy as I let it lap gently around my ankles.

Except for a few joggers who passed quickly and then disappeared, my sister and I had the beach to ourselves.  The tide was receding and the castle-building, sun-worshiping swimmers were still asleep.  The only measure of time was the rhythmic song of saltwater over sand; and we walked silently, scanning the shell-line for treasures.  It always amazes me to see the endless supply of  seaweed and sponges and shells that appear as the tide flows out.

Farther and farther we walked, and soon two sisters were engaged in catching up — not only on the news, because we know the happenings of each other’s lives, but on the mutual feelings and joys and sorrows that are part of our shared past.  We bring them into the present as we make our way along the shore, and only the sea birds are there to hear our words.  This is not the first time that I have brought my sadness to the great ocean and found something of myself in the sea.  We walked and we talked as our hopes, our dreams, our disappointments, our griefs, and our sisterhood poured out in waves.  I thought, as I spoke, with the water rising and falling at my feet that perhaps the sea was washing some of our words away and carrying them out to the place that makes the world seem so very small.  I thought of the similarity between the whooshing of a mother’s womb and the whooshing of the waves flowing in and out.  I thought of the way that life mimics the motion of the sea — coming and going, ebbing and flowing, swelling and retreating, ever changing — and leaving behind a never-ending supply of the most surprising treasures.

Perhaps I find myself in the sea because it takes a little piece of me out with its tide to a place where the “me” becomes small as I join with the “all.”  I love that on this one quiet morning I was able to walk with my sister and we were able to share the magic of losing ourselves as we walked and then finding something fresh and new in the cleansing waves of the sea.

Springtime Sunrise

High atop the copper beech,

A solitary robin sings

His trills and warbles

Chirps and cheeps

Usher in the dawn of Spring.

◊

The chickadees call, “Marco!”

“Polo!” Back and forth

From tree to tree

Ever moving, ever closer

In their game of hide and seek.

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All at once, the curious Sun,

Hearing his familiar friends,

Stretches forth

His pastel arms

And fills the sky with light again.

◊

My feet keep cadence with the song

Of green, melodious, fragrant earth..

I breathe

The pastel air of Spring

And celebrate my own rebirth

© Pamela Stead Jones 2011

“Love is all, it gives all, and it takes all.”

– Soren Kierkegaard

I’ve just returned from spending five days with my parents and my three siblings.  It is always bittersweet to make the trip to Florida and see everyone face to face instead of just through emails and phone calls.  As we all get older, the parting at the end of the visit becomes more meaningful for us all; and it is especially hard to say goodbye to Mom and Dad, knowing as they approach 90 that each embrace could be our last.  My little Mom, once such a strong and guiding force in my younger years now seems smaller every time we meet.  She sits in her recliner doing her best to follow our conversations with the assistance of hearing aids and struggles to find the words to express the thoughts and feelings that must cross the barrier of dementia and be disassembled and reassembled into something her children can decipher.  To see my mother, whose love of words always made her such a precise communicator, unable to remember the words she wants to say is difficult.  To see the woman who taught us all the rules of etiquette cut a bite of pie with her butter knife and then use the knife to bring it to her mouth, licking it clean on both sides before returning it to the table, makes the child in me giggle and the daughter in me realize how unfiltered Mom has become.  I wonder how it is that the chair where she sits and dozes and works Sudoku puzzles has grown a half-size larger since our last visit; and then I remember that it still fits in the same space and that it is Mom who is melting away.  My own maternal instinct flies into full swing as I stand in front of her, smiling, and let her touch my wild curly hair as she exclaims to each new person who enters the room, “Did you see her hair???”  How free it must feel to be unfiltered mom.

Unfiltered Dad is another story altogether.  Dad stayed filtered until a couple of months ago.  Which came first, the chicken or the egg?  I noticed that Dad was having a harder and harder time figuring out how to plan the days of his life with mom.  Then he took a fall; and in the aftermath of falling, his ability to reason seemed to drop off the radar.  Although it has followed his physical healing back to a more functional level, there is a part of Dad’s executive function that remains lost.  He no longer seems able to step back from his own thoughts or behavior and see himself clearly.  Unfiltered Dad is confused, angry, and bitter about growing old.  We have no magic wand to wave that will make him twenty years younger, and his relationship with his children has deteriorated to the point where it is chiefly a gripe session complete with anger that we can’t change the world to accommodate his wishes.  Sadly, Dad’s inability to see himself clearly led him to allow his argument for continuing to drive a car to become the theme of our short time together.  The last day of our family reunion, Dad’s final filter dropped as he launched a personal attack on my youngest sister.  Although each of us expressed our reservations and concerns about our dad driving in the heavy tourist traffic, he singled out one of us as the symbol of his loss and said such hurtful things that it was hard to imagine he hadn’t chosen them with a specific intention to make her suffer.  How that anger must have eaten at Dad behind the filters of clear-headedness.  I suppose unfiltered Dad also feels free, but we see him far differently from the way we view our mom.

I ask myself whether this is the final step in growing up.  Is this the final way that we, the children of our parents, separate from them?  I think of my toddlers and the way that “no” seemed to be the only word they knew.  I think of how I grew in patience as I continued to love them through that stage of life.  I think of my teenagers and the return of opposition as they struggled to find their identities in the midst of the structure we had taught them.  I think of the way they taught me that I had much to learn about patience and love.  I think of the way they taught me to move from “I love you, but…” to “I love you, AND…” in our more adult relationships.  I realize as I reflect on this that my parents could tell the same tale about their own children, and that they were the ones who first modeled for me the part of love that respects who the other person has become and allows for growth and change.  I have relied on my parents for support and encouragement throughout my life.  Now, with no polite filters remaining and no ability to see even one side of a debate with clarity, encouragement has become frustration and respect has turned to confrontation.  I find myself digging deep for the sort of love that saw me through the terrible twos and the terrible teens — my own and those of my children — and I consider whether the unfiltered elderly stage of life is the next chapter in my lifelong learning about love.

When the toddlers said “no,” we loved them.  When the teens fought us in order to declare their independence and become adults, we loved them.  When we fumbled and bumbled through our adult years and needed encouragement, our parents loved us.  Maybe, in the end, all that is left is the love.  Behind the unfiltered final rebellion against the end of life, maybe what we long for and cry out for is simply to be loved — not conditionally, not in spite of who we are, and not even for who we are.  Maybe we cry out to be seen and to be loved simply because we are.  In the end, all that remains is the love; and when the filters are gone, we are challenged to remove the conditions from the love we offer.

I think I may have grown up just a little last weekend.

“Look at us, said the violets blooming at her feet, all last winter we slept in the seeming death but at the right time God awakened us, and here we are to comfort you.”

Edward Payson Roe

I am heading for home today.  My visit with family done, I will return to my sweetheart and all the friends and family who are part of my life at home.  I have put them on hold for five days, a luxury that grows out of the gift of time my loved ones have offered me so that I could see my parents and my brother and sisters.  Although I know their life has gone on in my absence, for me it feels as though they have been waiting in a state of suspended animation until the time I walk through the door.

I think about the seasons of life as I move closer and closer to home.  I think about the separate world I have inhabited while my usual life has slept.  It reminds me of the solitude of winter, when the snow-covered land lies sleeping under its white blanket in a muffled world that is more dreamlike than real.  I think of the way I feel on those quiet winter days when it seems that I am the only being still warm and living and breathing in the midst of a frozen world.  I feel that sensation now, my longing for home making me painfully aware that in the dreamless sleep of winter I have forgotten how much I love the place I now return to.

As the distance shortens, I think of the violets of Spring and the way they do appear at just the right moment and bring us joy and comfort as we return to life after our long winter’s sleep.  I round the corner that leads to my house and jump out of the car.  I see my garden patch in the back yard and think of how wonderful it will be to see this year’s vegetables begin to sprout.  I think of the garden I call “family” and imagine that I carry with me a watering can.  I open the door, listen for familiar sounds, and call out, “I’m home!”

“Every great dream begins with a dreamer.  Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.”

– Harriet Tubman

I remember being in elementary school.  We would be assigned classwork — endless repetitions of the same ten Math facts — and the teacher would caution us, “No daydreaming now.  Everyone get to work.”  Just the facts, ma’am, as Joe Friday would say.  Just the facts.  Just the things we already know and must commit to memory so that we will one day be able to pass just the facts on to the next generation.  Personally, I think we might have done just as well with only one or two repetitions followed by the admonition, “Okay, kids.  Enough facts for today.  Everybody dream.”  How much more creative our stories might have been if we had written them about our dreams!  How much more creative our artwork might have been if we had drawn our dreams.  How incredible might our lives have been if we had learned early to dream big and follow our dreams through to fruition.

A friend of mine has a son whose creativity is boundless.  His mother tells the story of a day when she hadn’t seen her son for a while and opened the door to his bedroom to check on him.  As she began to speak, he held a finger to his lips.  ”Shhh!!!  Don’t bother me.  I’m imagining!”  Because she is a wise woman, she closed the door quietly and walked away.  Later, he shared with her the play he had written — the one he was imagining all alone in his room.  It is a lucky child who is encouraged to dream.  The world is fortunate when it is inhabited by dreamers who have not forgotten how to see the things that might grow one day from the seeds of their dreams.

Another childhood memory returns to my mind.  I was in fifth grade, and I was lucky enough to have a teacher who not only appreciated the facts we learned but also encouraged us to reach beyond her expectations.  When I received my report card at the end of the year, Mrs. G had written in the comment section, “Pammy has quite a flair for Creative Writing.”  She might just as well have written, “Pammy has the most creative excuses for not doing homework that I ever have heard,” but instead she told me something about myself that I was only beginning to dream.

I often think of that comment when I sit down to put my thoughts on paper.  I think of the way that my teacher dreamed success for me, in spite of my spotty homework record.  I think of the contagious nature of her dream and the way it gave me the strength, the patience, and the passion to pursue my dream of sharing my thoughts with others through the written word.  I think of all the places my dream has taken me, all the people I have met through pursuing my passion, and all the chances I have had to encourage other dreamers.  It is a magical thing when a dream becomes reality!  Whatever your dream might be, remember that if you are strong enough and patient enough and passionate enough, you just might reach the stars.

“Flight by machines heavier than air is unpractical and insignificant, if not utterly impossible.”

– Simon Newcomb

Is there something in your life that seems impossible?  Have you looked at it from every angle you can think of, but a solution still escapes your grasp?

Can you think of other times when you have felt stymied by a problem and simply stopped trying to solve it, only to discover later that you were able to find the answer?

Simon Newcomb was a respected astronomer and Mathematician.  In spite of the fact that he had little formal education, he proved himself to be a creative thinker who worked on calculating the speed of light.  He also was versed in Economics and authored a Science Fiction novel.  It seems that there was no limit to Newcomb’s ability to think outside the box, except that the box did enclose him when it came to the idea of inventing a flying machine.  In this area, Newcomb found his impossible problem; and he voiced his opinion that even if such a thing could be invented it would be of little or no practical use.  Later discoveries and further thought about Newcomb’s impossible problem did, of course, lead to the flight of heavier-than-air ships that have served us for several generations.

The longer I live, the more I see examples that indicate that there are few problems beyond solving.  Is anything really impossible, or do we judge it that way because we still have some learning to do?  Let’s not be discouraged by the frustration we feel at the limited knowledge we bring to a problem.  Let’s always allow for the idea that one day we may discover something that will move all the boundaries we use to define impossibility.

In 1888, Simon Newcomb was quoted as saying:

“We are probably nearing the limit of all we can know about astronomy.”

My stars and planets!  I am thankful that his successors didn’t take him too seriously.

“Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that is where I renew my springs that never dry up.”

– Pearl S. Buck

If you ask just about anyone who knows me to tell you something about me, the word, “family” will probably be a part of their response.  That would be fair, since I am now in my forty-second year of actively parenting.  Although I have done some jobs for pay from time to time, my career has been as a mother.  By the time my resident granddaughter graduates from high school, I will have forty-five years under my belt, and I guess I will be ready to retire.  I have been fortunate to have a husband and partner who has encouraged me to pursue my career with gusto, even though it leaves him with sole responsibility as our family’s breadwinner.  I have loved my chosen work, but it only expresses me — it does not completely define me.  When people try to define us by what we do, it is always good to know who we are.

Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that is where I renew my springs that never dry up.

I love that Pearl Buck says “springs,” not “spring,” because that is exactly how it works.  When I go inside to the place where I sit alone, I am able to find who I really am — a being of Light living my life in a body made of flesh and bones and possessing thoughts and emotions that allow me to interact with others.  In the times of renewing meditation, I can shed the earthly vessel that confines me and let the Light fill me beyond the limits of my physical existence.  It is then that the springs begin to flow from the fountainhead in the center of my heart and move outward to carry the essence of who I really am to the world where I live and work.  I am not the springs, nor am I the fountainhead — I am the Light that flows with abundance from a place far beyond my understanding and fills me from a stream that never runs dry.

It is vital that we visit our “alone” place again and again.  It is only when we are renewed and our springs flow freely that we can bring who we truly are to the things we choose to do.  We live best with others when we first have learned how to live alone.

“Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways.”

– Stephen Vincent Benet

I am traveling this week to a land far, far away.  Two-thirds of my family of origin — my mom, my dad, and my two sisters — live in Florida.  For several days this week, my brother and I will fly South for a visit.  The last time we made the trip was  in July 2009, when we celebrated our parents’ 65th wedding anniversary.  Although we stay in touch daily by phone, this will be the first face-to-face meeting we will have in two years.  I’m sure that I have changed since that time; but I am far more aware of the changes my parents have experienced since our last reunion.

I’ve been thinking about life a lot as my departure approaches.  By the time this post is published, I will be leaving my hotel for our first day of visiting.  The last time we traveled to Florida, Mom and Dad were 87 and 86 years old.  They were living in an Independent Living apartment in a three-tiered retirement community.  Although Mom was beginning to slow considerably after the onset of dementia, Dad still was coming and going at will.  He and Mom would attend meals in the dining room and take daily walks around their building, greeting friends and neighbors.  Dad would read in church on Sunday and Mom would sit quietly in the back and listen to him.  ”You did that very well,” she would tell him.

Two years later, my folks have moved to an Assisted Living facility.  The strain of holding things together for both of them finally caught up with Dad this winter.  There were times when he could tell that he also was slipping into early stages of dementia.  He was having trouble keeping track of the details of living; and some of them, like medications, were vital to their well-being.  The transition has been difficult.  Although I have heard Dad in our phone conversations and know too well how desperately he wishes his life could be what it was twenty years ago, I shudder in anticipation of the first time I will see them — face to face — in their changed condition and way of life.

I think of my babies.  I think of how quickly they changed in the early years of their lives and how we welcomed each new milestone with celebration as they matured from infancy to childhood and finally to adulthood.  I think of my own middle years and the way it sometimes seemed as though nothing changed but the seasons, as life was filled with work and family and the sort of busy days that left me tired and satisfied but wondering what it was that I had accomplished each day.  I turned forty, then fifty, and still life kept passing at a mellow sort of pace as my children became adults and the demands of family were replaced by thoughts of what I would do with all the extra time that suddenly appeared in my days.  When fifty became sixty, I found myself thinking of how many years I might have left to do all the things that interest me.  Although the pace has slowed a bit, the limits of time begin to make each day more precious than the last.

I remember my parents at the age I am now.  I think of their vitality and love of life.  I think of their anguish in dealing with my father’s parents as they aged in ways that sometimes were less than graceful.  It was then — at the age I am now — that they made the arrangements to live where they do now, so that their children would know what they wanted for their later years and not be torn by the emotions that they felt with Grandma and Grandpa.

Now we  have arrived at the place they planned for so well when they were young and vital and loving life; but they are elderly and they have trouble remembering things and they have trouble trusting others to provide for their needs.  I am struck by the irony that at each end of life there are periods of rapid-fire change.  When babies change rapidly and radically, we celebrate.  When we move from 87 to 89 and experience radical changes, we mourn it as loss.  I see my Dad fighting so hard for the life he no longer can have that he is missing the one that now belongs to him.  I hear him feeling less than worthwhile as all the things that once defined his success and independence fall away and he is left to rely on the kindness of others.  ”What goes around comes around,” I tell him, “if you can accept the kindness of others, you will be teaching them to be kind.”  But my words fall on deaf ears.  Without his independent life, my father feels worthless and defeated.  How can I convince him that he still means the world to me?

I ask myself how I can reassure my folks, the way they used to reassure me, that everything will be all right.  I ask myself if there is a way to learn how to embrace changes even when they seem to indicate that the end of life is near.  I will hold back my tears as I did when my children were fearful and wrap my parents in the warmth of the love they have given to me.  Now I return it to them; not only as a daughter, but also as a fellow traveler who maybe has learned something from watching their journey.  ”Don’t worry,” I will tell them, “everything will be all right.”  I hope I will be listening to my own words.