In the last hour of the 8th day of the fast. 11 more days to go.
My hands go cold at this hour. They are like ice. Of course, the pouring down rain of the afternoon doesn’t help either. Couldn’t quite get myself into “work mode” yet today, so I took a few hours to find 2 gravesites for 2 different people, one in C. and one near D. Island. This is my new hobby. I am a contributor to other people’s family history searches, hoping that someday, this valiant effort on my part (catch the humor here) will be rewarded in solving the mystery of my great-grandfather James Agnew. I am resigned to the fact that this may never happen, and if it does it will be after much tedious effort on my part with little reward. I am at the end of the easy search part. The rest, if there is anything out there to find, will not come easy. The few remaining survivors on my Agnew side do not answer my calls or letters. It is a family doomed with some secret curse of unrelenting antagonism that never goes away. So, I find a relative’s address and even their phone number, but they don’t answer my letters, and do not take my calls. If they really are out there, they are either too old to remember who I am, too young to know who I am, or they just don’t care.
Spent a couple days in Charleston which was a fun little break w/ my husband. We found time for a walk on the ocean, 1 museum, 1 poetry venue, the only tea plantation in North America, and a 300-400-yr-old live oak tree that sprawled all over a small park. It was a good time and a good getaway.
I wanted to write a poem for my husband’s poetry night tonight, just for fun, not polished, just spew something out. Here it is:
Life at 57
I would like to write a brief synopsis
of life at 57.
Last night, I heard a woman read,
Her poems full of small children
and the wonders of playing with a 2-yr-old,
watching her children take their first steps,
wondering who they will be when they grow up,
She called home
As soon as she finished reading,
To see how they were doing,
A few brief hours without her,
Were they still alive??
— Oh, okay, GOOD, fine,
She left soon after,
And I wanted to tell her,
She could have sold more books
If she had stayed,
MY children are all grown up,
Two happily married,
One never married,
One now twice divorced,
Four children
in four different states,
My husband and I in yet another,
Come together for vacation once a year,
Post pictures and statuses
On Facebook,
Four grandchildren –3 boys, and a girl,
Decorate our office walls,
And I – I have made it
To each and every birth so far,
One time traveling by greyhound bus,
Which is all we could afford,
My intuition telling me not to wait,
I left a day early,
Received the call at 2am,
Her water broke,
She was in labor,
I arrived, my daughter kneeling by the bed,
Her moaning telling me there was not much time,
We barely made it to the Birthing Center,
Four years later, I held that one in my arms
When baby sister arrived –
I have outlived the age of my father’s death
By 7 years, so far,
I have buried my mother, my older brother,
A woman in her 50s has a certain perspective
on death – and life,
She perhaps picked up some wisdom along the way,
You don’t care to PLEASE so much anymore,
You don’t always feel the need to smile,
There is not as much DEMAND to look your best,
Men don’t honk, or proposition you,
when you go walking,
Life slows down,
You notice a flower blooming,
A walk by the pond will make your day,
You develop an appreciation
For an evening with friends,
THIS evening –right now– is as important as any other,
And NOTHING, anymore, surprises you.
You know that no matter WHAT you do,
Some people just plain WON’T LIKE YOU,
There is nothing you can do about it,
And it doesn’t even matter.
Life is not about that.
It is more about moments – and your response to them,
And it is very, very sweet. …. To be continued…. 3/09/2011 Carol F. Black
Doctor Grandma 