luz y paz

 Luz y paz

Luz.  Paz.  

Light.  Peace.

As a non-native Spanish speaker I'm drawn to the sounds of those two words together.  The three letters ending with the softest of zees, subtly escaping into the air to worlds of possibility.  I often wonder if those raised with hearing their basic words for our "light" and "peace" would find me crazy to be mesmerized by the combination of such simple sounds.  

Luz.  Paz.

This first evening of Hanukkah I prepped to light my menorah - alone.  My niece texted me, "Happy Hanukkah!" which warmed my heart.  I am the solo practicing Jew in my family, and to have my twelve year old niece recognize my holiday at her age made me feel not so lonely.  Earlier in the day I'd decorated cookies with the Jewish Student Union Club, and later attended my synagogue's "Giant Menorah" lighting, as one of my students described it before.  The feelings of luz...of paz... were present for all these occasions.  

(Yes, this is a Menorah cookie and you'd love it b/c is is FULL of sugar!)

Here in front of my menorah now, I wonder if I'm breaking some rule of the use of technology while the menorah is lit.  I'll admit - the idea of being alone while celebrating Hanukkah - and before Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah - has been a bit daunting.  But tonight as I look at the luz, the light, I feel a true sense of paz, of peace, that I have not felt in a very long time.  When I listened to the music and read the prayers for Hanukkah, a sense of calmness...paz...came over me once again.

There are ups and downs and sideways to life.  When I was at Lawrence University for undergrad I was fortunate to hear Elie Wiesel speak.  His words have become a beacon - una luz - many times to the darkness I face as I work as an educator.  This quote especially is the backbone to my soul.

"Think higher.  Feel deeper." - Elie Wiesel

Be the luz.  Bring about paz.

I'M GOING TO MAKE IT THROUGH THIS YEAR!

 

I'm going to make it through this year

If it kills me

The Mountain Goats - This Year

This song came up randomly on my Spotify list today.

This is what many call a "G_d wink." Why? Because for me, music gets me through each and everything I need to.  This song may refer to a seventeen year old's issues, but I can relate.  

I broke free on a Saturday morning
I put the pedal to the floor
Headed north on Mills Avenue
And listened to the engine roar

So many times.  Even just to go to the post office, the supermarket, during COVID, as a cancer patient.  Do people freakin' get this?  To hear the engine of my Volvo XC 90 once again? The car that I love? It is amazing! I don't even care if it's 25 mph.  It's my baby.  She's mine.  And yeah. Watch out.  She's badass.  Just like her owner.

I am going to make it through this year
If it kills me
I am going to make it through this year
If it kills me

There is so much this year that has been, well, wow.  For me, personally, it goes way and beyond COVID.  I appreciate all who are struggling with the pandemic.  This is like no other.  I truly wish we could have more compassion for each other - above and beyond political lines.  Humans be humans be humans. 

My dad.  In hospice.  Not being able to drive  him to the library and post office anymore, and joke about the horrendous drivers on the Chelmsford rotary.  His cane out the sunroof, giving the M@ssholes something to think about.  He and I - the four wheel crusaders in a Swede mobile!  

People tell me - "It's for the best."  But have you ever thought what it's like to have your best friend taken away from you? The one who has believed in you since you were little?  But now isn't sure what's up?  Alzheimer's.  The worst.  

I'm angry.  Yet at the same time I refuse not to be.  Please STOP IGNORING THE ELDERLY!  They have so many stories to tell us! We're in the craptacular situation we are now because we haven't listened to history - haven't learned history.

LEARN

LIVE

LOVE

Little Sis Taylor & the Journey of Tears

We can never go back to the way it was.

I can never, ever go back to the way it was.

Some may have read the above lines and immediately thought of COVID. They are appropriate, aren't they?  I think of teaching in this new world, and remind myself again and again that I will move forward.  Change.  

This.  This life.  My life. Since mid-June of 2019 when my diagnosis came my idea that days could progress they way I wished they would?  Shattered.  

About a week ago I started thinking about freedom.  I challenged myself to take photos of ordinary things that I usually don't notice, and how someone who lacks freedom - those in elder care, incarcerated, those who have lost their sight - no longer can experience.  Looking at these photos tonight I realize how magnificent details are.  Concerts, festivals, parties, weddings.  These are all monumentous.  The ordinary are truly extraordinary.  The things we all take for granted.  As well as the people...

Taylor Swift seems to know ***just*** when to release an album.  I joke that she's the little sister I never had, with her own emotional ups and downs that many times have mirrored my own, except with bank accounts in excessive digits.  Last night at midnight she released "folklore."

Peace.  

Our coming-of-age has come and gone

Suddenly this summer, it's clear

I never had the courage of my convictions

As long as danger is near

And it's just around the corner, darlin'

'Cause it lives in me

I have been losing my father for a long time because of CLL, and then Alzheimer's.  Now we are spinning towards a place.  A location where time, memories, at times logic, do not exist.  For my beloved dad, his life is the here and now.  Some days that here and now is simply what has gone on within the past hour.  Yet still, like tonight when I saw him, I catch a glimpse of that mischievous grin and a light in his brilliant, blue eyes that people have always noticed.  MausiGal and her dad somehow, within the mixed up particles of brain matter that he has, still connect.  He laughs.  

When I am sitting in the Swede mobile heading home, the tears.  I do not stop.  The sobbing where your nose starts to run.  My Irish skin, which I inherited from him, turns bright red.  

Forward.  I am truly blessed that right now, at this moment in my existence, I have those in my life who will move forward with me, to go into the unknown.  Step one.  Step two.  Step three.  

Love you all from the bottom of my heart, those who are on the journey with me.

xoxo MausiGal

Sammy Loves Sandi

My mother, Sandi, hates squirrels.  This fact has become quite well known, as she's put it out there on Facebook in various posts.  Why her detest of these cutest of rodents?

Her beloved gardens.  Sandi's gardens are her pride and joy, and with due reason.  When strangers pass her yard they ask, "Who does your gardening?"  It's her - all her.  My mother is the epitome of what can be accomplished when one takes their stress, frustrations, and loss of control and channel it into one their passions.

A relationship between mother and daughter can be tricky.  In films we see this dynamic duo portrayed with either extreme love and friendship or the height of hatred.  Sandi and I have gone through both.  I'll fully admit I haven't been the easiest hija to raise, with the idea of flying off to Finland for three months at the age of sixteen, and all sorts of other adventures I did to drive my mom to the point of extinction.  Having my brother and his friend bury me up to my neck in the sandbox in the back yard? Good times for us.  My mom? Not so much.

Years of appreciation and understanding of my mom have led me to see her the person she is - not the mother.  Sandi has a past, present, and future.  Her struggles with my father and his leukemia and Alzheimer's are always at the forefront, causing her to make sacrifices that she never could have imagined.  So often when thinking of mothers we consider them in relation to ourselves, as if the umbilical cord never detached and they owe us.  As children, our mothers are there for us; they're not human. Emotions? A life? Did they have one?  Are they people?  Coming to the realization of the strengths and struggles of my own mother has opened my mind.

Long Point by Lake Champlain - Years Past

Sandi and I are united through blood but also a bondage of mother and daughter.  I do know I somewhat torture her with my political rants, a lifestyle that consists of chaos, and snark that only I can deliver.  Over the years, though, she knows that this is MausiGal - complete with three dogs, two cats, three fish.  And I know she is the constant gardener, yelling at squirrels and banging on her kitchen window to scare them away, much like her father did years ago.  Sandi has also been here for me during the lows and the highs, and those flat lines in-between.

Mother's Day is not about the raising of children.  These twenty-four hours are meant as a reflection of the journey we have taken with the women in our life who have made us realize our greatest potential, the ability to grow, and the way to reflect and accept.

Sandi and I have the connection of Sammy the Squirrel, her "special friend" that visits her often.  Smile on this Mother's Day - and every day.  There are women out there who value you more than you could ever know.  And Mom - I am your biggest fan! xoxo MausiGal

Will I Die? Will I Fly?

I had the Blogger post of "Cancer Teaches."  That was really profound, wasn't it?

Yeah, and then on my first day of my radiation consult they found another lump.

"I've never known anyone going through chemo to get cancer again, but we'll still check it out," the doctor informed me.  An ultrasound.  A mammogram.  Six months from now, more of this.  The lump is there, and I can feel it.  Why didn't I feel it before? Seriously? Do you think I was doing breast exams while going through chemo? Do you check for cops when you've been pulled over for speeding?

My new mantra is, "Cancer Changes."  Yes.  Yes it does.  Lately I feel most at peace with my rescue dogs, Saul, Seal, and Chappy.  Each of them had to overcome horrendous conditions to survive, especially Chappy.  Above all? They needed to learn to trust after being abused, neglected, and left to die.

Die.

I wonder, how often, people realize that cancer patients of all sorts wonder if they'll die.  Of course it's the human condition that we all think of this.  Why would we not? But as I've said in the past, once one is diagnosed with a "situation," it hits you in the face that mortality is real.  It isn't the boogie man in the closet that stays there until you least expect it.  This boogie man showed up just as I got out of school.  Now the boogie man haunts me on a daily basis. I will be in the supermarket and cry about the thought I may not be around the see my sons marry, or have children.  That at the end of the day for seventh grade, because of my radiation treatments, I have started to forget names of students.  My energy level peaks around 1:30pm, and after that I am so exhausted I put on pajamas, despite the fact I want to do pilates, barre, and yoga.  I don't have a choice.  My body has decided for me.

I miss my kidlets like no other.  They are off, off, off!  I am so incredibly happy for them, and cannot wait to see them until we are all together on the most magnificent of lakes, probably months down the road.  My house is quiet, except for the squeak of Chappy's "Alien Toy."  The home that I once boasted I would keep for grandchildren now seems excessively big.

Crossroads.  Me.  Do I fly?  Or do I simply crawl and perish?

Here We Go KIDLETS!

The 802.  The Green Mountain State.  Where my love lies for so much of the year, even if I do pretty much only spend only four weeks out of fifty-two within the borders.

Lake Champlain.  How can you ignore it? A United States lake with its own monster and myths abound?  I grew up on this lake, each summer not only hearing tales, but being soothed to sleep by the sounds of the light waves against Long Point rocks.  We heard boats every now and then.  I speak to friends who summer on Lake Winni, and tell me of the ever present boats. Boats, boats, boats!  No, not on my beloved Lake Champlain.  Yes, we have our boats, but not to obscenity.  I always like to think that along the 802 there's some sort of gentleperson's agreement about boats and being kind. Am I naive?  Perhaps. 

In July I have quiet mornings on the lake.  I think about my year gone by, and what will be in the coming year.  The year for 2019?  This?  Truly difficult.  How can one define cancer?  I was comforted so many times by the images by the lake, but at the same time?

Cancer.

Cancer.

Up until recently, I truly did see myself as a badass against cancer.  I have all of my supporters (YOU!) to thank for that. Why? Honestly? I could never have thought of that on my own.  Although I had a few very rough days through chemo, you kept me going and kept me remembering how wonderful I was!

What happened?

You were still more than wonderful.  Gosh, I can never express this more than enough.  The cards.  The messages.  The gifts.  There are so many days where I would do is cry.  Why?  I felt I could never repay you or even find time for a decent thank you note.  Between getting kidlets for college, teaching, and radiation...I feel a failure.

But alas (gosh, that sounds so freakin' formal...), life changes and many times it changes for the better.  One kidlet is back at a Vermont college, and the other back at another.  What's my point?

You be you.  And ignore the haters.  Wherever they may be. Because in reality, they just kinda make you more and more like Taylor Swift.

That gal has her crapola together. Her lyrics? It's like middle school / high school / pregnancy on freakin' high drive:

"All the king's horses, all the king's men couldn't put me together again, 

'cause all of my enemies started out friends." 

So, there ya go.  Preaching from the heart.  Where am I going with this?  Bring it all back, MausiGal...

Kidlet is heading off again to his own adventure.  And I am letting him go.  But not without acknowledging all he has been through for the past few months.  Seeing his mom go through chemo  And severe chemo reactions.  Waking up at 5:00am with a hug to tell her she will always be loved and ok.  I am forever grateful for your care and understanding, especially at your young age.  I am sorry you had to go through this now -  so freakin' sorry you can never now. I hope it can help you somehow somewhere. 

Agreeing that her new rescue dog, a corgi German shepherd mix (no joke) that survived a head on car crash really is ok for her.  And that he is a cool dog, despite his metal plate in his leg and five screws. And drive him home from his pick up while you hold him, with his head on your lap, and cry that this dog finally knows he is safe...

Joking about memes and shirtless memes (you know the joke, kiddo).  

Knowing your sons - both of them - are both to change the world in ways that you just started.  You tried, to the best of your ability.  You would come home and cry that it wasn't enough. But you know what? You never realized that one day you would have two amazing sons that were there to fulfil every dream you wanted.  Both sons - near and far- giving you the most amazing support you could ever have, as you could only have it.  #blessed

Why?  It is NEVER because of you, Mausigal.  It is because you have two amazing sons who are off to change the world, even if its one person at a time.

In the supermarket.

In the classroom.

In the United Nations.

In the CIA.

Or in YOUR living room.

My sons are going to change YOUR lives.  And I hope you're ready for it. Why? Because I prepped them since they were born.

#bringtheword

#loveyouall