I am inclined to look back, always have been.... An astrologer once warned me that I had perhaps a troublesome tendency to dwell in the nostalgia of the past, and when I heard this, I agreed immediately. That was many years ago, and I'm still doing it. In fact, I recently spent two years writing a memoir, trying to dig through layers of memory in order to make sense out of my life's trajectory -- to answer the question: just what has this life been about really? What kind of story does my life look like?
But what has been interesting about this year 2015 that is now passing is that certain life events have forced me to plant myself squarely in present time and pay attention. It has been a difficult year as years go, but I believe insight has occurred and with that some sense of ease. On February 22, I passed the 70 year mark, sometime in the late spring my right leg and ankle showed signs of inflammation, and fatigue, in the fall I quit a job I had dearly loved after a ten year stint, and at some point a little later I fell into an insidious pattern of sleeplessness.
Instead of celebrating seventy years of life, I had chosen a darker view, one where I looked behind me at the very long succession of happenings, many of which I couldn't remember clearly, and at the same time saw the path ahead becoming shorter and shorter. I went about my normal daily life with this somber weather inside my head. And then, the body spoke to me, its injury forcing me to pay attention. It would appear that it was time finally for me to attend to this body that has been carrying me around all these years with some respect and compassion. And so I embarked on a journey of doctors and tests and physical therapy, struggling to summon lovingkindness for myself. Leaving my ten year job of tending the dying was a big and painful step, and a necessary one. The gifts of those ten years of witnessing were huge -- the equanimity, patience, love, and spaciousness of mind -- but I knewI had to move away from death and put my attentions elsewhere. It was in the end like leaving home... And then came all those nights in the dark when I couldn't sleep, as time slowed down to a painful crawl while I tossed and turned, wavering between meditative acceptance and outright anger. My Buddhist practice couldn't stop me from feeling really angry at both body and brain that were denying me the rest I needed. And rather than be irritated that I was a bad Buddhist, I returned again to lovingkindness, and patience, as I tried to find medicinal help.
The circuits in my brain seemed to be permanently set to fire, with the "on" switch refusing to be turned off. And so, problem solver that I have always been, I pondered and reflected about just why my brain was locked into perpetual vigilance. What was it trying to protect me against? I am not sure I've found an answer, but I am pretty sure a clue lies in the past - yes, the past, my old stomping grounds. As a neglected solitary child I was always watching the comings and goings in the world around me in order to feel safe. They now call this hyper vigilance. And all the recent excavating of my young story just might have opened the door to some very old fear. Fear of what? Running out of time? A failure to create one last meaningful thing? Inability to attain real love? The unspeakable mystery (challenge) of dying alone? Whatever face this vigilance takes, it is all about fear. And fear is about what's ahead of us. The future. Which of course doesn't really exist ... it is forever just ahead of us.
As I look ahead to 2016, I'm happy to report that my body has found rest, my mind is clearer, while the melancholy still walks with me. And as I look more closely at melancholy, I realize it is rooted in a deep love of my life ... a love so big and beautiful I can't bear that it all will end. My authentic self is fairly young, really; she didn't show up until I could carve out work and practice for myself that would allow me to express my deepest (truest) feelings and thoughts. I was probably in my fifties when the real Mag emerged, having endured growing up with a difficult mother, trying out motherhood and marriage herself, finally landing in academia, a place which gave her great comfort and knowledge. How many more years she has to express herself in the world is of course unknown. But the good news is that right NOW she is here, paying attention to messages from her body and brain, breathing in and out, and looking for beauty wherever she can find it: in friendships and family, cats, music, traveling, or watching the stunning little hummingbirds that whiz by for a little nectar in the late afternoons...
I wish all who read this ease and peace and love in the "new year," as we navigate a complicated, painful, and beautiful world.
My Elephant Friends
Amboseli elephants
Thursday, December 31, 2015
Sunday, December 20, 2015
Generations
I have a box of crinkly black and white photographs in my closet that tell bits and pieces of my mother's and my far distant past, going back to a time before I was born. I've had grandiose plans to turn them into a chronicle of a long lost past, introducing all the characters, and making insightful and clever quips about their characters.
The photo that comes to mind now is of a very portly couple: my great grandparents, the McCarters of New Jersey. They are both dressed in black, and he holds a cane resolutely even though he is sitting, and both their mouths are set in a grimace-like expression. They were certainly not the relatives whose laps you would leap up into and smile disarmingly. There was a time I went to their house, I must have been about 4 or 5, and I remember lots of dark wood, a musty smell and heavy paintings on the walls. They were formidable each sitting in their respective arm chairs, and I was daunted. I don't recall why we were there, my mother, grandmother and me, but I do remember feeling as though we had no connection and I playacted at being a good little girl as we sipped our afternoon tea. That was the only time I saw them in person. Later as I grew up I remember bragging to my classmates that I actually had great grandparents -- this wasn't all that common then. Also later in my life I realized that my grandmother, who liked to call herself Gigi, was a grand wealthy woman who grew up in a household cold as ice, and who very likely was not cuddled, caressed, or read to. It helped me to forgive her for how she raised my mother, who along with her younger sister grew up under the watchful eye of a series of stern governesses, and had very little maternal tenderness in her life.
So this is what my lineage looked like on my mother's side of the family... the dazzlingly rich yet barren emotional landscape these women in particular traveled through. Though my mother made an attempt to rearrange her identity from rich heiress to bohemian artist, she failed to hone a warm, motherly heart. So lineage matters, you see. It is the baggage we carry as we move through our lives. Somewhere inside my lonely young heart I knew I wanted a different experience when I had children, and I stumbled though the 60's and 70's trying on alternative this and that, baking cookies and bread, and involving myself with my two girls. It often seemed to be an experiment, at times quite imperfect and helter skelter ... And we all survived it, and became close in the end.
A remarkable event occurred in my life this last Friday. A baby was born to my eldest granddaughter in Oregon which magically turns me into ... yes, a great grandmother! I think it's something I will have to practice saying, sort of the way I had to admit to becoming 70 years old earlier this year. In a Portland hospital, there is a cherubic little boy with wisps of reddish brown hair who has a most peaceful demeanor from the images I have seen, and he is now part of my lineage. He gets to take his place in this quirky family drama that is filled with everything from joy to chaos and sadness. His emergence into the world fills me with a sense of possibilities, despite what I feel about the cruelty and violence we are surrounded by these days. Yes, return to the positive ... how can you not, when you look at the innocent countenance of a newborn? Each of us was once a tiny helpless infant with no clue of what the world was or how to survive in it, and because we were shown to use our own best instincts and emotions we found our path. As serious and contemplative as I've become, I know for certain that for a few precious years in my life I had that sense of the possibilities and the wonder.
I have been learning to listen to the 70 year old voice inside me which tells me what I really want to do, as opposed to what other people wish. It certainly seems like it's time to do that in my life! If not now, when? I have been practicing, or certainly trying to, lovingkindness in the face of my own nagging physical limitations (the sleeplessness, the angry tendon), and the failings of others whom I care for. I am going to return to my work as a writer because that is truly something I want for myself. There is a book that is so close to being finished... I am blessed to have given myself the chances for self-expression and creativity that my great grandmother McCarter would never have had available to her. It's no wonder she looked like such a sour puss in many of the old photo! And speaking of those photos, I think I'm going to get cracking on that book of ancient family images, so I can finally honor my complex family lineage. And if I do this, then my new great grandson when he is much older will be able to gaze curiously at all those characters who preceded him, including Great Grandma Mag!
This little guy whom I have not yet touched, has brought a warm ray of light into what has felt like a very unsettling year, and I'm grateful...
The photo that comes to mind now is of a very portly couple: my great grandparents, the McCarters of New Jersey. They are both dressed in black, and he holds a cane resolutely even though he is sitting, and both their mouths are set in a grimace-like expression. They were certainly not the relatives whose laps you would leap up into and smile disarmingly. There was a time I went to their house, I must have been about 4 or 5, and I remember lots of dark wood, a musty smell and heavy paintings on the walls. They were formidable each sitting in their respective arm chairs, and I was daunted. I don't recall why we were there, my mother, grandmother and me, but I do remember feeling as though we had no connection and I playacted at being a good little girl as we sipped our afternoon tea. That was the only time I saw them in person. Later as I grew up I remember bragging to my classmates that I actually had great grandparents -- this wasn't all that common then. Also later in my life I realized that my grandmother, who liked to call herself Gigi, was a grand wealthy woman who grew up in a household cold as ice, and who very likely was not cuddled, caressed, or read to. It helped me to forgive her for how she raised my mother, who along with her younger sister grew up under the watchful eye of a series of stern governesses, and had very little maternal tenderness in her life.
So this is what my lineage looked like on my mother's side of the family... the dazzlingly rich yet barren emotional landscape these women in particular traveled through. Though my mother made an attempt to rearrange her identity from rich heiress to bohemian artist, she failed to hone a warm, motherly heart. So lineage matters, you see. It is the baggage we carry as we move through our lives. Somewhere inside my lonely young heart I knew I wanted a different experience when I had children, and I stumbled though the 60's and 70's trying on alternative this and that, baking cookies and bread, and involving myself with my two girls. It often seemed to be an experiment, at times quite imperfect and helter skelter ... And we all survived it, and became close in the end.
A remarkable event occurred in my life this last Friday. A baby was born to my eldest granddaughter in Oregon which magically turns me into ... yes, a great grandmother! I think it's something I will have to practice saying, sort of the way I had to admit to becoming 70 years old earlier this year. In a Portland hospital, there is a cherubic little boy with wisps of reddish brown hair who has a most peaceful demeanor from the images I have seen, and he is now part of my lineage. He gets to take his place in this quirky family drama that is filled with everything from joy to chaos and sadness. His emergence into the world fills me with a sense of possibilities, despite what I feel about the cruelty and violence we are surrounded by these days. Yes, return to the positive ... how can you not, when you look at the innocent countenance of a newborn? Each of us was once a tiny helpless infant with no clue of what the world was or how to survive in it, and because we were shown to use our own best instincts and emotions we found our path. As serious and contemplative as I've become, I know for certain that for a few precious years in my life I had that sense of the possibilities and the wonder.
I have been learning to listen to the 70 year old voice inside me which tells me what I really want to do, as opposed to what other people wish. It certainly seems like it's time to do that in my life! If not now, when? I have been practicing, or certainly trying to, lovingkindness in the face of my own nagging physical limitations (the sleeplessness, the angry tendon), and the failings of others whom I care for. I am going to return to my work as a writer because that is truly something I want for myself. There is a book that is so close to being finished... I am blessed to have given myself the chances for self-expression and creativity that my great grandmother McCarter would never have had available to her. It's no wonder she looked like such a sour puss in many of the old photo! And speaking of those photos, I think I'm going to get cracking on that book of ancient family images, so I can finally honor my complex family lineage. And if I do this, then my new great grandson when he is much older will be able to gaze curiously at all those characters who preceded him, including Great Grandma Mag!
This little guy whom I have not yet touched, has brought a warm ray of light into what has felt like a very unsettling year, and I'm grateful...
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