Saturday, April 30, 2022

Tapestry

 


Listen to excerpt from Carole King-- Tapestry


40 years
The 2 of us
Since my retirement in 2004, it was 24/7
Everywhere together
Tackling projects together
In the kitchen cooking together
Grocery shopping together
In his hospital room following his surgery together 

Each complementing the other
What my shoulders couldn't stand, he did
What his legs wouldn't cooperate for, I did

"Our love is woven
Of a thousand strands—"
-The Dark Night (XVIII) May Sinclair - 1863-1946




An extraordinary tapestry created by those years together
The warp, the weft, the thousand strands--- so inextricably woven, strong and beautiful

"Weaving involves crossing two threads, the warp and the weft, one vertical and the other horizontal, one stretched taut and the other undulating and intertwined with the first. To produce the textile it is necessary for these two threads to be bound, otherwise each will remain a fragile and fluttering potentiality...if the meeting of opposites does not take place, nothing is created, for each element is defined by its opposite and takes its meaning from it."

--Dario Valcarenghi, Kilim History and Symbols, as quoted in
ZATI The Art of Weaving a Life

I think that for us, sometimes he was the warp 
And at others, it was me.  
That only added to the depth and majesty of the weave.

Then he was gone

the "weft interrupted" 
And I wondered on that tapestry
That for my life was still unfinished--

"Kilim or slit weave leaves holes in a way that keeps the fabric strong. It teaches us that where there are places of loss, where the weft is interrupted, and there is a hole in the fabric of our lives, that fabric is still strong.The gap in the fabric becomes an opening through which to see from another perspective. In our woven lives, the empty spaces are the very places where we can see with new eyes, where we can look behind the day-to-day weaving for a moment to see our deeper truths within." From http://www.weavingalife.com/about/weaving/

An opening through which to see from another perspective 

"Isn't that the challenge for all of us who have lost people we love-- to keep them alive, to enable them to speak to us from a measuring cup or a breeze, a smell, a taste, a dream; to let them see life, and to live life through us? ...See it, see it all for them. You who mourn lost loves, let them dwell in the pupils of your eyes, let them live in memory."  p. 205, Leder, The Beauty of What Remains

A blossoming belief that perhaps I can continue the weave on this tapestry in ways not previously considered before, yet one true to his memory and to me. But what?

Encouraged by Carol and Butch, I turned to the web to find out more about weaving itself and how I might engage-- for I had long thought (years ago) I might like to learn to weave. 

To my delight, I discovered The Creativity Patch and Lucy
What a gift as I continued weaving the threads of the new stage of my life and as I began to learn a little about weaving. 

Starting tiny (and I do mean tiny)
Moving up a bit
Sending bookmarks and mug rugs to family members yet always challenged by the selvages
Picking Lucy's brain to graduate to a larger loom and placemats, gradually increasing the difficulty of the weave. 

Seeing through another perspective-- 
Looking out through my window on the world now 
With him always with me, living in memory

That window on the world often dismaying me 
As the hate, the violence, the polarization
Continues to tear the fabric of our nation

And Carol, in one of our conversations on weaving and the state of our nation, points me to We Are Weavers, a group founded by David Brooks,

"But Weavers share an ethos that puts relationship over self. We are born into relationships, and the measure of our life is in the quality of our relationships. We precedes me.

They want to live in right relation with others and to serve the community good.

I guess my ask is that you declare your own personal declaration of interdependence and decide to become a Weaver instead of a ripper." 

That idea "we precedes me" and "to serve the community good" speaks to me--
Is that what was missing in my new weaving of the fabric of my, of our lives?

Not one for coincidence
 
New York Times op ed from Bill McKibben caught my attention
 



For those over 60 who want to work together to stabilize the planet and our democracy 
There it was---  "we precedes me" and "to serve the community good"  and more

Thinking together on Elderhood and how that suggests a different perspective

Espousing these working principles
1) Be kind
2) Be humble (a little)
3) Be inclusive—really!
4) Boost others!
5) Take care of yourself
6) Back up the youths!
7) Be generous, but not to a fault!
8) Be accountable
9) Be creative!
10) We’re all in this together
It felt right when I read about it
It feels right now
And I think it adds just the right thread, especially with an educator affinity group collaborating, to this tapestry.

"My life has been a tapestry
Of rich and royal hue
An everlasting vision
Of the ever-changing view"

I'm wondering how that tapestry might grow and change in the coming days, weeks, and months of the weaving threads together?

Seeing through another perspective-- 
Looking out through my window on the world now 
With him always with me, living in memory




Saturday, April 02, 2022

The trough

September 22, 2021, the day my life was altered forever

My beloved Gus, husband and soulmate of 40 years, left this life

But for my sister, Carol, who has called every night and sent me myriads of poems and readings via US mail, and Butch, Gus' son, who skypes daily, I think I would be lost, drowned in the trough as Judy Brown so beautifully writes. Carol sent this poem at just the right time I think -- after a really tough day at the 6 month mark.  And yes I do keep count--


Unable to put feelings to words
Chest heavy and hurting
Trying to keep so busy to fill the emptiness (the house is cleaner than it's been in a long time)
Laughing with Carol or Butch and then later sobbing alone
Staying up late enough to just collapse into bed so I could sleep
This image depicts me in the first few months and intermittently now


Grief flickr photo by HerryLawford shared under a Creative Commons (BY) license

As I nodded, sometimes smiled, and wept, 
And underlined and turned down corner pages
As Steve Leder's writing spoke to me
I was more able to make that choice, to choose what I remembered
Rather than be haunted by the hard months prior to his death and that night
But the joy, the love, the special times we had -- and those abound
The beauty of what remains

Each day my conversations with Gus
Focus more and more on that
And it seems that perhaps now I realize I am growing around my grief



That I can now write this, and hopefully actually be able to verbalize it soon to Carol and Butch
For that I am grateful--

As Judy writes:
But if we rest there in the trough, in silence, 
being in the low part of the wave, 
keeping our energy and noticing the shape of things, the flow, 
then time alone will bring us to another place where we can see horizon,
see land again, 
regain our sense of where we are, and where we need to swim.
I'm feeling maybe I can see the land again and may be able to regain my sense of where I need to swim--