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Together for 40 years

March 17, 2012

My husband and I have been friends and lovers for 40 years now. That is hard to imagine. We met in a church parking lot. After my father died at age 50, just after my 16th birthday, my mother moved us back to Indiana and we happened to join his family’s church, the United Church of Christ. I remember my image of him from that first meeting. He was tall and energetic, throwing his head back as he talked, and full of ideas. He kind of made my head spin. I was rather amazed he was talking to me and stood there and listened to him talk. He seemed rather “stuck up”. And he wanted to change the world.

We both became members of “Up With People,’ a national singing group organized locally, that supported the oneness of humankind. We sang songs like “If MORE people were FOR people, all people everywhere, there’d be a lot less people to worry about, and a lot more people who care…” It was hokey but positive. He first talked to my sister, who found him interesting as well, but then he talked with me on a long walk home from a group choir practice. I think our hearts were connected on that night but it was just the beginning. We had NO IDEA what we were in for!

I cannot begin in this post to tell our 40-year story. But what I know is, from that first night to today, his enthusiasm for causes and being involved has never faded. He has only matured in practice. I have had to learn to develop my own skills and interests, and we have both had to mature GREATLY, in order for our union to survive. We have managed to do that, only through the grace of God. We now have 4 adult children we are proud of, a daughter-in-law and son-in-law we love, and 4 absolutely AWESOME grandkids with more expected. We have the most solid friendship ever. It’s been a long, hard road, but we have reached the point of no return and now share the joyful memories of love over a lifetime.

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memory of my mom

December 10, 2011

I just had a memory/vision of my mom which made me briefly break down crying.

My mother was very child-like. She accepted whatever her pastor told her. She accepted what other women in her own Bible study told her, as if they knew more than her. In reality, her faith was larger than most of them in her later weeks, months, years of life. Her best friend once told her, “Marti, we won’t know each other when we die — we’ll be ANGELS!” And my poor mother accepted that. I personally think her friend was “dead wrong”. 🙂

My mother was also a recovering alcoholic. She learned that term in treatment. She almost died that week that my brother & sister drove her in. She learned that an alcoholic is always “recovering” and not “recovered”, and, like a child, she believed them when they told her, “If you take ONE DRINK, you’ll be RIGHT BACK WHERE YOU WERE when you came in here.” She was technically dead when she came in there. She knew that too, and believed that if she ever took ONE DRINK, she’d be right back at death’s doorstep. And so she never did take another drink and lived 22 years after leaving the facility.

She went to a live-in, residential treatment facility, without which I believe she never would have quit. It took her body a week to get sober. Then she started in on “treatment”. In the facility, they focused on acceptance and love. Acceptance for the condition they were in and their addiction, and complete forgiveness and love for the self. Addicts are inherently self-centered. The world revolves around their addiction and their next drink, and all else is secondary. Recovering addicts are the same. They have to be! The world revolves around their staying sober and all else is secondary. It is my belief that this self-centeredness carries over into every other aspect of their lives, which makes them damn hard to live with. But it makes them possible to have a relationship with. My kids would not have known their grandma if she had not quit drinking. When she stopped, they were just barely old enough to start seeing the alcohol, and I would have stopped taking them there. They would not know their grandma drunk. But she stopped, and that made a relationship possible, and is one that they cherish to this day.

In a hallway in the treatment facility, they had a little bell. Any time anyone wanted a hug, they could ring that little bell and stand there, and someone would come and give them a hug. Many times, visits with family members are restricted while they learn to deal with themselves and their addiction. My memory/vision of my mother is of her standing there in that hallway, by that little bell, and ringing it. She would do that. She told me about it. It just breaks my heart right now to think of her standing there in need of a hug. Sometimes I really miss my mom.

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joyous news, such love

November 8, 2011

Today my son and daughter-in-law put aside their fears of miscarriage. Baby is 10+ weeks and developing perfectly normally. Such joy, such love, such a tiny little one, who has no idea how much she is already loved and cherished.

I feel it is a girl. For all mine & all my grandkids so far, I’ve always been right, even before ultrasound days, & with my daughter who never wants to know until the birth. Usually I never guess this early, but this one has ALWAYS been girl. If it changes, then it changes. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong, it doesn’t matter. But this one is STRONG GIRL. That’s just how I feel.

hi Mommy hi Daddy

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this precious life

October 14, 2011

Recently, 2 things happened that made me once again realize the absolute preciousness of life. Every single life. First, we found out grandchild no.5 is on the way. How precious is that?? We are so excited! They had 2 ultrasounds and 3-4 blood tests for the doctors to tell them: normal baby developing as it should. Just smaller, younger than you thought it was! And so, we have a picture of this little one, this precious life. Welcome to the family, may you grow and grow and grow, can’t wait to see you!

isn’t life WONDERFUL??

baby grandchild

Now I am not a “right-to-lifer”. I find abortion absolutely appalling, however, I believe the mother carrying the child has to have the right to choose. I respect her right to make that decision. I just don’t see how you can FORCE any woman to carry a child she does not want to carry, plus there are too many questions still on the table for folks to know in any way except your own spiritual beliefs, when exactly that growing embryo is a human being with full protection of the law. I FEEL PERSONALLY it certainly is a human being. But I respect any woman’s right to make that choice, that decision, for herself.

Secondly, I saw “YOU DON’T KNOW JACK” a film about Jack Kevorkian’s crusade to assist people in their own suicide. I am still struggling to put into words on a page the internal thoughts & feelings about the sanctity of LIFE that arose from watching this film. To help with this, let me put some thoughts into the form of questions. Perhaps that is the best way:

When someone has a debililtating, fatal disease, at what point, on what day, does their life become worthless?
If it is a fatal disease, why not wait out a few more days and allow your loved ones to care for you? Maybe this is their task, maybe it is their calling, their joy. Is it your decision when to take yourself away from them? They will never see you again in this world.
Suffering is a part of life, always. For some, it seems they receive way MORE than their fair share. Still, we all are susceptible to that. None of us CHOOSE to be the one to suffer the most. It is available to all, and could strike any one of us at any time. None of us are immune. There is no Superman or Superwoman. There is no Bionic Man. So whoever is suffering, in a way, is ALL of us, it is who we are, it is our humanity.
When in the process of dying, should we choose to die, to take our own life away? We all will die, it comes to each and every one of us, and when it does, we must go through it alone. It is inescapable. There are no promised rose gardens, no guarantees in this life, in this world, when that time will come to any of us. It could be tomorrow, tonight. It could be 50 years away. None of us know. Why should we suddenly be able to decide the exact moment? What if we were to meet someone tomorrow and affect their life? How do we know? How can we be sure our time is up?

It is questions like these that struck me while watching each person in the film decide the moment they would die. I thought, “How selfish,” really. How presumptuous. Why not let life take its course? You know why? Because we want to die with DIGNITY. And this is oftentimes what is denied to us in hospitals, especially if we have INSURANCE to cover treatment! More treatments, more unnecessary surgeries, at the end of life, when we SHOULD be given time with our families, time to say good byes, time to somewhat adjust to our upcoming loss. Time to reflect, time to make ammends, time to forgive. So often we do NOT get that, because doctors do not even share WITH us what is happening!

Also, we don’t want to be a burden to our families. But perhaps this is part of our humanness as well — taking care of another human being, especially when they are HELPLESS and when they are suffering, because that is when they are in need. Do we really trust our families, our loved ones to love us enough to see us at our most vulnerable state? I think it is a matter of wanting to feel in control, and fearing loss of that control. Of course. I feel it too. But this is part of what we need to LEARN, while still breathing in this world — to fully and completely, totally trust another human being enough to have them take care of us, even when we can no longer take care of ourselves. Isn’t that what happens when people grow old? They become, once again, a child. They are more interested in playing and enjoying simple pleasures than worrying about this or that problem or event happening perhaps next week.

There is much more I could say and write, but I will close for now. I could talk about being with my mother the last 5 days of her life, or my brother for the last 3-4 days of his. I could talk about how the hospital told us we had to move our mother when she had less than 24 hours to live, and our refusal to do so, after which they found us a hospice space within the hospital. She was in no pain, they couldn’t do anything more “for” her so they wanted us to leave. I can’t imagine the horrific scene that would have been while she died in the process of trying to move her into a “rehabilitation center”. Thank God my brother had the common sense about him to look them straight in the eye and say, “Well, we’re not moving. So find us a room.”

We didn’t know at the time that she had less than a day to still be breathing. But we were starting to guess. They don’t confide in you, don’t tell you these things. And so, we were given that last night to be with her in her room, and she passed the next morning before we had a chance to eat breakfast.

So yes. We deserve to die with dignity. But I do not think taking one’s own life, or assisting others to do so, is what a physician should be about. My mother had a worsening heart condition. She could have decided herself that she was not going to get any better, and to end her own life sooner than it happened. But why do that?! She was very accepting in her later days. She accepted her condition, and spent time with her family as much as possible and just enjoyed her life at home. She prayed and studied her Bible as well. I feel happy for her to have this time. And she was there when her new little grandson came to visit from North Carolina and played in her living room, some of the last pictures I have of her smiling, with her oxygen tube in her nose in her own living room.

This is life! It is wonderful, it is great, and it lasts as long as it lasts. In each moment there is value, in each precious life.

Posted in Family, grandchildren, various personal musings | Leave a Comment »

Levin Thomas is born

August 27, 2011

My youngest son was born today, 26 years ago. His name is Levin Thomas. But he was not named until the 3rd day of life. Each of our children has a unique name all their own. The first one’s first name starts with a “J”. The second one, an “L”. The 3rd one, again a “J”. It makes sense that this child, our 4th, should have a first name to start with an “L”. However, I had the name JOEL in mind. Joel Thomas. His father had the name Levin.

Levin, or Lev, is the friend of Anna Karinina who tells her story in the book by Leo Tolstoy. Levin is also Leo himself, put into the book. Levin means “Leo-like”. So he is named after Leo Tolstoy, and also my husband’s favorite literary character in any novel.

The middle name Thomas was my father’s middle name (John Thomas). It was also the name of a childhood friend of my husband’s, who died in a tragic accident. Thomas as a young boy was killed by a tractor tire his father had been working on, that suddenly flipped out and up, coming down on Thomas at about age 10. He was a good friend of my husband’s.

So Levin was born at home. When we say that in our hometown, people assume we mean “Home Hospital” one of the 2 main hospitals there at the time of his birth. That is not what we mean. We had a “home birth” with a midwife and a few friends and family around us. For Levin’s birth there was Molly Witt, who actually wrote a poem about the experience called “Peaceful Thomas”; Shirley Morris, a good friend who herself died in a car accident years later. These two milled about, cooking for everyone, helping with our other children, then ages 8, 5 & 3, and being very calm and peaceful themselves, that day. Their presence was much appreciated. My sister Sue got there. She was at our first home birth for our oldest son, Jamal. She came to this one, I remember, to stay a few days afterward. The midwife’s name was Sharon and she had one assistant.

I won’t put down all the details now but the labor took about 26 hours total. The first part was mild and I couldn’t imagine we would be holding our new baby within a day. It is always hard to imagine, the baby will really be here within a few hours. I was 32. It was our lowest time ever, financially, during those years soon after Levin’s birth. Downsizing of managerial jobs hit us hard. I was a stay-at-home mom & had been home with my kids for 10 years. I stayed home one more year with Levin, then went back to work.

Where is he now, you ask? He is a newspaper reporter in an oil boom town in northern North Dakota, making use of his telecommunications and journalism degree from Ball State University. Still single, he has lived in Indiana, New Orleans, South Carolina and now North Dakota. He has a very strong personality, like his father. The word “headstrong” has multiple meanings. Being strong in the head may also mean being smart, with a natural propensity to analyze every situation. That’s our son alright.

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poem for my father-in-law

August 10, 2011

Life Sneaks Up on You

Life sneaks up on you,

You’re not thinking about it,

You turn around,

And your kids are grown,

Your kids, in fact, have grandchildren,

And they are telling YOU

what to do,

You wouldn’t listen to them,

except you’re having trouble

getting out of your chair,

Your neck is in a 24-hour brace,

And they can’t figure out how to cure the infection

That sends you running to the bathroom,

Just yesterday, you took your wife

on a Caribbean cruise,

Drove out of state for family weddings,

Walked 2 miles when you felt like it,

Now, there are more pills to take

than you can remember,

Your body aches from constant pain,

You leave the house with a diaper on,

Your friends and siblings

Disappear,

One by one, they desert you,

You spend more time at the funeral home

than you do in your own living room,

Inside, you feel like the same young man

who years ago, returned from the war,

married the pretty young girl you loved,

and started your own home,

Hopes and dreams melt into

days gone by,

You turn around

And the years are gone,

You have no idea how this happened,

Yet, in everything, there is a season,

a time for every purpose under heaven,

the less time we have, the more we value it,

— the more precious the hours we are given.

CF Black, 7-30-2011

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summer projects

June 16, 2011

Well, I just started writing this entry and my computer decided to update itself and shut itself down. NIIIIIIIIIIIIIICE.

I have these left for summer projects, each one being something that could take the entire summer:

1. Finish research and write a journal article, sending it in for publication. 🙂

2. Prepare for Fall semester. I always look forward to Fall because these are classes I love and this will be the 4th time I have taught the main two. Social problems I teach every semester so I am prepared for that already, though there are a few changes I will make to improve it this time. Social Theory– my FAVORITE, and students are usually all sociology majors who need to write a 10-page paper. Stratification we have fun with.

3. Think thru Criminology and Criminal Justice, one I taught last semester and One I will teach next Spring. For all my classes, I plan to get them down to the day in planning, with lecture, film, guest speakers, assignments, tests and class activities.

4. Put together my booklet of 15 Children’s class lessons on Virtues. Organize my children’s class materials, which are vast and totally disheveled right now in various containers and boxes. 15 lessons = 1 weekly lesson for a semester. They are virtues lessons with a base of spirituality adaptable to children of any faith background, incuding my own, the Baha’i Faith, which has a universal viewpoint.

5. Do more work on the mystery man, James Agnew, my great grandfather, more work on Family history, including some more on the Black’s, my husband’s family. Maybe copy pictures I have for siblings.

6. Find a few more gravesites for those looking for their family history gravesites, from findagrave.com.

Family vacation 1 week in July.

Meanwhile, my husband just lost his job. He earned employee of the month 3X in the past 6 mos., but he is laid off. Some new man in charge decided to make a name for himself by getting rid of all remote recruiters, even tho’ my husband has been doing this remotely for the past year. THAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANKS!! Thanks a bunch. If we have to live on my salary, we are screwed. I really don’t want to move again. I could get a better paying job in my field, but for now, we’re cutting expenses as much as possible and seeing how it goes. He is 59 and unemployed.

Besides that, I am having some other serious problems I won’t mention here. All I know is, wihtout prayer and trust in God, I’d be a goner. WITH those things, we are always winners. There is nothing that can harm me if I have my Lord’s love and guidance. This is all I can count on right now.

Our house is once again childless, quiet and empty. We miss our grandkids who were here, but at the same time, we are older and they do wear me out. Glad to have time once again for reflection, prayer to myself, quiet walks out in the nature of South Carolina. I have restarted my 3-mile daily walks. But I have not yet been able to go to the pool without them. The kids in the pool will make me sad my grandkids are not there as well, saying, “Grandma! Watch this!”

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poem for oldest daughter

May 22, 2011

Distance

Distance does separate.

My heart aches to come visit,

Sit down, have a cup of coffee,

In your kitchen,

Talk as we go to the grocery store,

Which is when we truly share,

But there are 4 states

And 800 miles

Between us,

The sun rises here

36 minutes

Before it reaches you,

Your computer, depending on your paycheck,

May be on, or off,

And we do not do well on phones.

But there is no Winter where we are,

And Spring begins in February,

I have not scraped ice off the windshield of my car

Or felt my fingers go numb with cold

In three Decembers now,

There is something to be said for that.

And so we remain, alone, apart,

While grandsons grow up into men,

I am not there for “Grandma’s Day”

And we miss every game of their soccer season,

Life is always bittersweet,

Joy always comes mixed with tears,

We must gather the strength that lies within,

Trust in the Wisdom that brought us here,

Trust in the love that connects our hearts

In spite of anything.

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things I’ve learned

February 27, 2011

I’m thinking of writing something about “things I’ve learned” by age 57. It would go something like this:

1. Nothing in life really surprises me anymore. Just about anything can happen, at any time. The lesson in this is to never take life for granted, to appreciate each day, and to take life as it comes. What matters is your response to those inevitable things that happen to you and those you love.

2. Bad things happen to good people. All the time, every day. I do believe in karma, but it may not be resolved in this world, and it only goes so far. You could do nice things for people all your life long, & still be treated unfairly. Even so, you should do nice things for people. It makes a difference in their lives. And God knows all.

3. Live your life in honesty and always do your best. Some people will always think you are not as honest as you are, because they are dishonest themselves and will treat you with suspicion. Others will think you are trying to prove you are better than they are. It doesn’t matter what they think. Do your best and move forward.

4. When you live honestly and sincerely, the truth often comes out eventually. People who treated you badly in the past show up years later, and apologize. This has happened to my husband and I many times. We have been through some pretty hard times and have been severely wronged, many times. The truth often comes out. See no.1.

5. Personal integrity matters. Over many years’ time, your integrity is the thing that people remember. It has to be consistent, and you do become known for it.

6. Health matters. The older you get, the more you have to be willing to fight for it. Nature is not kind, and once you go past a certain age, it’s a battle that is impossible to WIN. All you can do is fight it off for as long as possible. Focus on health, because of no.7.

7. Beauty fades. It just does. There isn’t a whole lot you can do about it. See no.6.

8. Your life partner and lover is your one and only true friend. As you get older, the friend part becomes more and more important than the lover part.

9. Never, ever take any relationship for granted. Every love relationship, be it friend, partner, or parent/child, needs CONSTANT work. Work at communicating, and listening. Never take their caring for granted. Be willing to give them the time they need. Do things together, reconnect. Be open and honest about how you feel. Let the little things go.

10. Spend time with your kids when they are little. As they get older, they will then want to spend time with you. Nothing else matters more in life, not one thing. Time is your greatest gift. Trying to explain why you had to be somewhere else is NEVER a substitute for just BEING THERE when they needed you.

11. Age 14-15 does pass. By the time they hit 21-22, you are once again their friend.

12. Grandkids are the best thing in the world. Visit them often.

13. Some people will hate you, despise you or just plain not like you. There is nothing you can do about this either. Know yourself and develop your best intuitive talents. Your personality will clash with some other types and it has nothing to do with anything you did wrong. Try to see what you can learn from them. Don’t expect them to like you.

14. You will fail at some things. You will mess up. We’re all human.

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Dec.29

December 29, 2010

This is an Indiana week. There is snow on the ground the entire time we’re here. Haven’t seen any new snow, it just comes & stays, never melts.

Have spent the last 2 nights at my daughter’s, sleeping in Caspian’s bed. He sleeps on the couch. For him it’s a big treat. Was sick Tues. all day, feeling better today. Have not hardly been out of this house for 2 days. We are getting ready to leave for Al’s parents again.

Nothing much happening, just sitting around at relatives. World going by. Sat. we leave for home.

Our daughter is enjoying a fast, new computer, courtesy of us and 1 of our sons. She is working as a fork lift truck driver, gets to work by 6:30am daily.

Have done more work on fam. history while here, it is mind boggling at this point, expanding everywhere. No end to it, and no siblings or parents of James Agnew yet. Next project is to try to find living relatives my age who may know something– anything– which will be a link to any of his siblings. Those siblings will link me to which family line he is from that I see on old census records. It is quite the puzzle.

Have lost faith in political systems of the world. We rec’d a new 16-page document from the Universal House of Justice this week, which is amazingly significant in itself. Why now? Why at the end of 2010? Who knows.

Haven’t walked one mile all week.

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Doctor Grandma