2014.12.04 _ 6

Grateful for the ability to open up, even if just for a few seconds, in the midst of all this busyness.

Running rather late, appreciating the sunlight and shadows as I walk in this morning

It is my moms birthday.

My relationship with my mom is perhaps the most complex of my life, because I am simultaneously many people with her: there is the me who longs for her approval and affection; the me who has lived long enough to understand her contradictions and whose character has developed sufficient non-attachment to wonder at the dramatic landscapes of her unique story in a way that I would wish for my own children to be able to do; and among other less prominent expressions, the me who wishes to honor this core relationship without basing that honor on anything conditional.

I still fail at the last one too often, especially when I meet challenges that bring me back to that first mentioned place/mind-movement of longing, when I revisit key decisions in my life and puzzle over why I didn't seem to have needed skills, when it scares me that I have failed to impart those skills to my children.

This morning my son A and I listened to a short RadioLab program with R. Dawkins, in which they discussed foresight as a distinctly human trait. But the first thing that sprung to my mind was that foresight is inseparable from hindsight ... that we realize we do not know all we crucially need to know and that we feel this regret or longing to do better. edited 16:47, 4 Dec 2014

A lovely day, had long lunch with an old friend of 50 years. Appreciate eternal friendships.

Electricity has been out for more than one hour now. It's so quiet. The sky is turning pale pink and it's minus 10 Celsius ( 14 Farenheit). It's getting cold & it will be dark soon.Thankful for warm sweaters
& socks, flashlights, candles & cell phone connection. Will call my companion who is attending the Guadalajara Book Fair in Mexico before the guests of honor's party tonite. Over there it's 24 Celsius ( 80 Farenheit) all year long.The city of eternal Spring!

Will be late in my work but I appreciate the unexpected slowing
down of the pace. edited 21:38, 4 Dec 2014

Listening to Richard Thompson sing "1952 Vincent Black Lightning": amazing picking stop and go emotional tempos on strings, intense singing the moments of two people's lives ("simple boy meets girl story, complicated somewhat by the presence of a motorcycle"), creating avatar lifetimes in sound, thinking: music is not just origin of language, but of self-awareness. We see a living story in someone's voice, and see ourselves for the first time.

( Oh yes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0kJdrfzjA )

my mother has been on my mind lately. Eliza's post about her mom brings this up to me. In February 2009 my best friend was killed in a car crash, on the day of the funeral my mother disowned me because I wouldn't see her at the funeral. Since then I've had only 2 very short email conversations with her, both of which ended not good.... Some days it's really hard not to have my mom... In a way it's like she died but she's not dead...... She feels she hatched us kids and flew away... It hurts deeply not to have a mom to turn to and talk with... Pain sits with me as I grieve... sometimes I feel that I really need a mom to talk to... And there is no one there...
.
I miss my mom............ edited 02:07, 5 Dec 2014

(((Catrina)))
It is such a primary bond, and can be difficult to navigate. The only way I have been able to manage is to often imagine if I were to meet this person, this woman, in another context. What if she and I were to sit as strangers or new coworkers and she would share her story... her struggles to bond with her daughter, her home life growing up, etc. What if there were no expectations that as a mother she fill A, B, C, but rather isnt it interesting that she likes such-n-such books, and that she has such a gardening gift, like her grandmother? Wow the changes in the world and especially for women in the time she has been on the planet and my goodness the limitations, etc.

That sort of idea. :) I bet she misses you too.

Today in session we talked about starting at the end, and maybe this is a bit of what we meant... visualizing where and who we want to be, and stepping into that more and more. *I still aspire to see...* edited 02:54, 5 Dec 2014

Watching Peter Pan tonight:)
I appreciate the discussion around mothers...
Rejoicing that we found the rat that has been in our house for over a week...
And we were able to send it out the front door!

I almost didn't post "today" (actually, I'm posting this the next day - Friday the 5th) - Thursday was super-busy, but when I read these remembrances of mothers, my own memories came galloping in (or up?) I decided to watch "Dear Frankie" last night (for maybe the 7th time.) Emily Mortimer's role as Frankie's mom [in the movie] is powerfully healing for me -- and is THE reason that eight years ago I traveled to Greenock, Scotland, where the movie was filmed. Appreciations all around! edited 18:19, 8 Dec 2014

Coming back to read this 3 months later. I do wonder if I knew somehow that a few short weeks after I wrote my comment here that she would be dead for real and just not feeling it. I have passed though so much emotion in these few months but I feel that I really have come to some peace as to what our relationship was. At least I don't have any regrets, I tried as best I could to have a relationship with her, she just wasn't able to be in relationships with anyone. And she really was happy in her life, that much I could see from reading through her papers, she had made her own peace with who she was.
Rest well my dear mother, I do love you