Mar. 12, 2017

Butch was amazing with animals.  He could tame a feral kitty so completely you would never know they had been wild.  When his office was moving, he was concerned that two wild rabbits that lived outside their building and were fed every day would die.  He caught them and found a nice place for one of them to live in a complex where there were outside tables where staff would continue to spoil it.  The other one he brought home.  He built it a huge hutch.  It progressively came to believe it was a cat and hung out with our two tom cats.  He trained it to come and sit on your foot to get a carrot.  It was cute but annoying.  When you went outside it would follow you around sitting on your foot until it got that carrot.  When we were first married, we had a parakeet that followed him around everywhere.  It would sit on the shower curtain when Butch showered and sing and take its own shower.  They ate chips and onion dip together each evening after work.  His favorite cat would fetch balls he made from Kleenex and scotch tape.  A wild robin once built her nest on our back porch and Butch got one of the babies so used to him that he got it to perch on his shoulder as he sat in the back-yard swing.  He would get up each morning and stir the food around in the cat’s self-serve feeder so there was fresh food at the top.  The cat would not eat until he did that each day.  If Butch hit the snooze button too many times one of his cats would climb up on the dresser and start throwing things onto the floor until Butch got up and dressed for work.

He taught all our dogs to do crazy tricks.  Our first dog together was an Irish Setter.  It adored our oldest son and agreed to eat anything our son flicked off the high chair to avoid having to eat it himself.  We lived on a chicken farm for awhile.  He could walk the Irish Setter into the barn with thousands of newly delivered baby chickens and the dog never even looked down.  To sit down, it would wag its tail and swish out a clear spot to sit without bothering one chick in the process.  The dog would lay under the living room window and allow our 18-month-old son to stand on him as he watched for his father to come home from work. We had an American Fox Hound that would back up and sit on the couch.  Butch taught him to sit where he pointed.  When kids came over Butch would point to the space next to the guest and order the dog to go sit next to John.  John would then be amazed that the dog knew his name!!  We have had dogs that rolled over to the command Yoba Kimba and other bizarre combinations.  One of his hounds would roll on its back when he asked it if it was a dead armadillo.  It would then groan. spread all four legs out as far as it could, and turn its head to one side with his eyes closed and his tongue out of his mouth.   He trained the dogs not to go out the front door.  They would sit on the threshold forever but never step outside.  A friend once came to visit and found the front door standing wide open.  Our son, definitely not a morning person, rushed out the door half asleep to get to school and left the door open.  She said the dog was sitting patiently at the door of the empty house.  She would not allow our friend on the porch, but she also stayed behind the threshold to harass her.  His best jeep buddy dog would wear a sun visor and kerchief as they cruised around town together. 

My companion now is his sweet border collie, Olivia (known as Ollie).  She plays soccer.  She is the best defender in the world.  Watching the ball with amazing intuition, you can rarely get a kick away that she does not block or catch.  She dribbles the ball with her feet and nose like a pro, using bushes as opponents to make it more interesting.  She throws her flat soccer ball up in the air for herself as she runs and catches it every time.  When he went outside he would tell her, “Go get your ball.” She would find it and drop it at his feet.  When I say that she sits and stares at me like I am out of my mind until I get the ball myself.  She is a great therapy dog, offering consolation to my clients in times of distress on the days I take her with me rather than leaving her home alone on long days.  He used to tell her to “Go check on Mom.” and she would come find me in the house and demand a quick pat or two before returning to him.  Sometimes, when I would sit in the back-yard swing after he died, it seemed as if he was out there with her, still enjoying her as she played.  When I would become especially upset she would suddenly stop playing and run over to me as if he was out there and sent her to “Check on Mom.” She misses him as much as I do.  I think she still expects him to come through the door.  I don’t know what it is like for a dog to lose someone they love that much.  If it is possible for a dog to mourn, she is definitely in this with me.

Pets are a part of them that we inherit when they die.  Becoming us without them can mean becoming us with their pets.  If we have the option of keeping them, they help us hold onto an important piece of our loved one.  While they offer us unconditional love and companionship, they also trigger memories, both sweet and sad.  Their pets are one more part of the collateral damage that is inevitable when someone dies and someone else has to pick up the pieces.  If we must let go of pets we cannot take care of it is like losing a piece of our loved ones again.  It can feel like a betrayal of their trust in us to care for their beloved animals if we choose to simplify our lives and give them away.  Watching their pets leave pours salt on the gaping wound that was created when they died. We just can’t give them more choices than we have.

If there are dogs in heaven, I’m sure one of them is now rolling over to the command Yoba Kimba.  

Mar. 10, 2017

When Butch and I were first married and he was stationed at Ft Hood, TX, we found lots of differences in grocery stores between California and Texas.  One of our first trips to the grocery store together we had garbanzo beans on our list.  When we asked where they were, no one had any idea what we were talking about.  He amused himself as we continued shopping by chanting, “Garbanzo beans, where are you?” My cousin informed me that if we had just referred to them by their proper name—chick peas—we would not have had any problems finding them.  If someone asked for a price check on an item and he happened to be near a microphone (they had them hanging at various locations throughout the store back then) he would pick it up and offer some random price before the store employee had time to respond.  Having spent years organizing groceries in the trailer for delivery to the stores, he automatically organized the groceries in my cart.  It was much faster to put away groceries when he went because he arranged them in the cart the way they were at home.  The bags were generally packed so that all the items in a bag belonged together on our shelves.  I, on the other hand, just fling things into the cart.  He never stopped being a fun grocery store date, his quick humor finding something funny all the time.

Delivering to grocery stores for 50 years, he had a lot of stories to share.  Like many Californians, the first shaft of sunshine and he broke out the shorts.  With all the bicycling, he had very well defined muscles in his legs.  There was an employee in one of the bakeries who would regularly comment on what great legs he had.  It really started to bug him.  One day, she reached over and fondled his thigh just above the knee.  He was horrified to hear himself say, “I never in my life thought I would say this, but if you ever touch me again, I will file a sexual harassment claim.”  It seemed very unmanly to him.  It changed his perspective forever.  He was especially annoyed when he would be moving a heavy pallet of groceries down an aisle and someone would suddenly cut in front of him or stop directly in his path.  He could not imagine that people don’t get how hard it is to get that much weight moving and how really hard it is to get it to suddenly stop.  He was once moving a large pallet down a narrow aisle and a group of store employees working their way through the store discussing products suddenly came to a complete halt right in front of him.  There was no way around and no room to turn around.  He looked at the important looking person they were all listening to and said, “You are obviously very important.  But would you mind being important in another aisle?  I need to continue delivering your products.”  Another time, a bakery manager had a small but loud temper tantrum because he would not take her pies out of the cases and arrange them in alphabetical order on the shelf in the freezer.  His job was to drop the cases in the freezer, period.  After she had her little outburst, he said, “You obviously get people to do what you want when you act like that.  If you expect me to be intimidated by your female manipulations, you guessed wrong.  You haven’t met my wife.”  He cleaned that up by saying he was talking about the pre-therapy wife.

The only time I have any fun in the grocery store now is when I have my granddaughter with me.  She is currently in love with the movie Zootopia and the Bubble Guppies.  She recites lines from her favorite scenes constantly.  Listening to her singing the barely discernable lyrics from Zootopia (You can be anything) as she passionately makes hand gestures and claps for herself at the end is priceless.  It does wear on you as she loudly says, “Big Bubble City!!” 50 times though.  There were years when I was allowed to go with him in the truck.  It was a great escape from life to just ride along and watch him do his thing.  The view from up there is spectacular.  The interplay between the drivers and the dock crew and store managers is fascinating.  Mostly, though, it was a chance to see him in his element. 

I used the bathroom at Bel Air today.  It is inside the storage area in the rear of the store.  Walking back there, the part of the store I went with him, brought lots of memories rushing in.  The smell.  The sound of the receiver moving pallets around.  Squeezing through narrow passages and remembering how good he was at navigating those spaces.  Just remembering him.  Always knowing there was a joke just about to be told, a laugh just about to be shared.  And now, it’s just a walk to the bathroom. 

The shopping itself is another mine field.  It took months to stop reflexively picking up his favorite things.  It struck me as so sad that I would never again be able to bring him treats when I shop.  Who knew that aisles of groceries could be so laden with pieces of him? I just want to hear his voice again.  Learning to shop and cook for one is a much more difficult transition than when we first married and I had to learn to cook for two instead of the seven in my family.  It is alarmingly easy to become robotic and habitual about food.  Even the things I really enjoyed cooking or eating when he was with me have lost their flavor without him. I can so clearly see my family’s generational belief that food is love and eating is fellowship rearing its ugly head in this.

I am told by my mentors in grief that becoming us without them very much means creating a new world around food.  People suggest taking a cooking class, trying new recipes, inviting friends to share a meal, and talking to our support people so they understand what’s going on for us and include us in their lives more mindfully. Like so many other parts of our new lives, this is one problem that cannot be tackled alone.  If we withdraw and sink into the misery that comes with our loss, we will be trapped in that misery for the rest of our lives.  The only way out is through.  Most people are more than happy to help someone who is proactively working to build a new life.  They grow weary of supporting us when their help doesn’t seem to be helpful.  Our grieving peers are infinitely patient with us, remembering what it was like for them.  They can walk miles and miles with us as we work through the pain.  Some people best support us as we learn things like how to have fun, laugh, and create new rituals and memories in the grocery store.  Others are able to walk with us through the catacombs, while we make peace with the ghosts and goblins.  Becoming us without them means figuring out who goes in which group and letting that be OK for us and for them. 

Just remember, it is never a good idea to pour out our whole story on the lady at the Kentucky Fried Chicken when she says, “How can I help you?”

Mar. 8, 2017

We were married in 1972.  Butch had to be on duty for the Army days later.  The car we owned at that point in time was a 1958 Ford.  The car was very special.  First, it would not start if I was in it.  When we went for our interview with the pastor that was going to marry us, he walked us to the door when it was time to leave.  I stopped at the door and Butch continued to the car.  “Aren’t you going with him?” he asked.  “No, the car won’t start with me in it so I have to wait here until it is running.”  He looked at me like I was crazy, shook his head, and walked back into the church.  This was not a joke.  The car would literally not start with me inside.  I carried jumper cables everywhere so I could get it started when Butch was not around.  Even crazier, if you passed a speed limit sign and were going faster than the posted limit, the car would die until you were going the right speed and then start back up.  That car died in the west Texas desert on our way home from visiting Butch’s uncle a year later.

Next, we bought the only new car we would ever own.  It was a 1972 VW Beetle.  We paid $2650 out the door.  It was the first year that they claimed that VWs would float.  I proved that one day during a Texas downpour when I drive through a flooded intersection.  The car, lifted by the too deep water, floated lazily across the intersection carried by the momentum, caught traction on the other side and continued down the road.  When we moved to Minnesota after Butch left the Army, we thought we were off Scott free because we did not have a radiator that would freeze.  We had much to learn about living in freezing Minnesota.  Little did we know that oil will freeze below a certain temperature.  Fortunately, a neighbor explained that to us before we blew up the engine.  We could not afford an oil pan heater until he got his first paycheck.  Every morning for 10 days, Butch would wake up, light a couple of charcoals in our tiny hibachi, slide it under the oil pan, then go back inside to finish dressing while the oil thawed so he could drive to work.  We bought the car in Texas in the spring, planning to move back to Sacramento.  To save money, and because we had not originally planned to move to Minnesota, we did not buy a heater.  Mild California winters would have made the natural flow of the warm air from the engine, which we could blow in with a fan, work well enough.  As we drove around on freezing Minnesota nights, however, there would be a small semi-circle of clear windshield on each side while the rest of the windows were frosted up inside the car.  I would have to use an ice scraper on the inside windows for visibility.

His favorite car of all was his Jeep.  He loved to drive around with the windows and doors off in the summer with his dog.  He got her a sun visor, which she patiently wore.  Not long after he got it, he had his first back surgery because of being clipped by a car on his bicycle and landing on his head—thank goodness for helmets.  The only car he could get in and out of without a lot of pain was mine, so I was driving the jeep to and from work most days.  In the boredom of convalescence, and against my request not to, he insisted on taking the doors and roof off in April, despite the very strong possibility that it could still rain.  As I was driving it home from work the next day, it did just that.  The bikini top popped a snap, which allowed the other snaps to come undone one by one.  It would have made a great America’s Funniest Home Videos prize winner if someone had been filming it.  I was quite the sight, as the bikini top progressively came unsnapped, then tore, and began flapping against my head as I was completely drenched.  The subsequent discussion was not one of our happier moments.  Our youngest son has it now.  He loves it as much as his father.

I have not managed to sell his pickup truck despite its having been more than a year since his death.  He loved that truck.  It makes me very sad to drive it.  I am consistently flooded with memories of him driving it and our trips together. I delivered bicycles and kayaks at transition points for practices and races for years in that truck helping him do what he loved so much. I hear his music playing, his talk shows yammering on, his voice as we drove along.  His dog still stops and sniffs at the door as she walks past it, hoping he will open the door and get out.  She was his dog through and through and will happily jump into any pickup truck that parks in the driveway and go home with any man who shows up.  We knew he was home when we heard the beep of his door locking.  It is hard to hear that sound when I lock it myself.  There is no part of driving the truck that is not a reminder that he is gone.  I figured out how to load it for trips to the dump with the tricks he used to get more in each load, using the knots it took forever to learn, and even backing into narrow spaces between other trucks.  I have also been proud of myself for asking the people next to me for help with the heaviest stuff rather than killing myself being a tough guy.  The truck and the dog are the last pieces of him that I have left.  I have trimmed all the trees, cleared out all the junk, hauled away everything that is going, and still it sits in the driveway. 

So much of the story of us is written in our cars.  So many places we travel now, we traveled together in the past.  So many trips we will take in the future will be the fulfillment of plans we made together.  Even if we go places we never went with them, never talked about together, or planned to go, we are not guaranteed that the sadness will not find us.  Enjoying something amazing without them is still just that, us without them.  How many times have we thought, “I can’t wait to tell them about…..”  “I wish he/she was here to see………….” “I can’t wait to get home to see them……….”  How long will it take before our car really feels like our car and not a car without them?  When will arriving at an airport or train station, pulling in the driveway, or walking into the house not include that sinking feeling that comes with not being greeted by them?  Ever again.  We are told by those who are farther into this journey that such a time does come.  We are promised that as the pain of the loss grows more faint, the sweetness of the memories intensifies.  The pain, they say, grows softer but does not go away.  Becoming us without them means making peace with the pain, not escaping from it.  It means accepting the pain as a new companion rather than wasting time trying to get rid of it.  Ultimately, we use what we have learned and what we have become to help others. 

God tells us that we are to be light and salt in the world.  Surviving this will make us just that.