Open Book

And on the seventh day...

There is a man outside my window riding a unicycle and juggling fire.

Welcome to my life.

It's a pretty good one, all things considered.

__________

It's the final day of FestivALL here in my town, and the streets are alive with people of every shape and size. Literally. There's one man standing about fifteen feet tall, towering over the crowd, wooing and wowing them as he snakes his way in and out. Granted, he's wearing stilts and a 3 foot tall Uncle Sam hat and is part of the whole street fair background, but still. The man does stand out.

As do the belly dancers. The surprisingly large fleet of them, hips all a-waggle and a-jangle. Who knew Charleston was a haven for the art of "danse du ventre?" Not me. The acrid aroma of the incense they're burning is wafting in the store as the door opens and closes, and it instantly transports me to the old school record-slash-head shop that used to exist around the corner, known as Wonderland. Which, you know, what can I say? It was.

The store is crawling with people, too. Most just popping in for a cup of coffee, or a break from walking around. There are even a few who stumble in from magnetic curiosity as to what's behind the big red front door. Newbies, of both the local and the itinerant variety. They're the absolute best. As much as I love my regulars, I get a huge thrill out of watching someone discover this place for the very first time. It's magical awesomeness wrapped up in a candy-eyed moment.

 __________

Today marks one full week of my return to the real-ish world (see above) that is my life. There were a couple of stumbles along the way, a few balls dropped in my absence (nobody's fault but mine). An adjustment of mindset and frame of reference has been required, from the constant, dogged worry of "Dad is very sick," to the sometimes crushing new reality of the utter void his absence leaves in my every single day. This adjustment is not slight, nor is it the kind of thing a person like me eases into on the wings of time. Instead, it washes over me in great floods of melancholy when I least expect it, leaving me breathless and genuinely - somehow - flabbergasted.

Most of the time, it's okay. Most of the time, the years of preparation and honest talk and awareness serve me well, and I am able to be happy in knowing he is free of pain, mobile, agile, sharp of mind and wit. Knowing he is out there, up there, in here, around, watching over, still guiding, still leading, still managing to show the way without saying a word. Most of the time, I'm realistic and pragmatic and adult; I understand. I know.

Most of the time.

But once in a while.

Every now and then.

If the sun hits the river in that late afternoon way, or I happen to catch my profile - which mirrors his - reflected in a storefront window, or the phone rings and "call from Dad" pops up on the caller ID.

And especially if I'm having a highlight moment, laughing with friends, playing with my dog, hugging my husband, thinking about my grand-baby-to-be.

Then.

That's when I'll feel that determined tug on my heart strings, hard enough to put a big lump in my throat and bring stinging tears to my eyes.

Bam.

They're familiar, though, those panging jolts. It's the same thing that always happened when I would hug my dad good-bye after a too short visit, as I'd get in my car and back out of the driveway, waving and smiling to disguise the tears that would inevitably roll down my face for the first miles of the trip home.

And honestly? I hope those jolts never go away completely.

They're comforting, somehow. Like a big hug, not of good-bye, but of I love you, I miss you, and I'll see you again, soon; a big reassuring hug of we may not be together for a little while, but I'll be with you.

Always.

 __________

The festivities around town are starting to wind down. A little nagging rain has fallen most of the day, and it seems people are beginning to head home, leaving FestivALL behind for one more year. It's near closing time here at the store, too, and I'm looking forward to heading home myself. A nice quiet rainy evening, featuring steaks on the grill, porch sitting with a glass of wine or two and the final chapters of an excellent book - all topped off with an early bedtime...well, it sounds like a little slice of heaven to me right about now.

There's a local band on the stage outside our door, complete with a flautist and a bongo player, and their music is giving off a mellow vibe. Right now, they're singing an eclectic, coffeehouse-on-valium version of Three Dog Night's 'One is the Loneliest Number.'

I'm struggling not to giggle openly.

But I am smiling out loud.

 

Spend the afternoon. You can't take it with you.

1. Hey! It's Thursday! Let's see if we can drum up thirteen bits of randomness, shall we? It's been a little minute. So Annie Dillard...this one is in your honor. I'm going to spend the afternoon emptying the recycle bin that is my brain, so you can take it with you. Deal?
2. A week ago this time, my house was all sparkly in anticipation of a multitude of family and friends visiting and hanging out. Right now, it looks a little frumpy and unloved, and I'm a tad miffed that robot maids and push button cleaning ala the Jetsons have yet to be integrated into our daily realities. I want a Rosie, all my own.
3. Yesterday, I was at work, doing my thing, lost in my own little world, when my phone burped at me. And when I finally checked to see what it wanted, I was rewarded with this:



4. Somewhere in there is the very first photo of my grand-baby. Isn't he/she the most beautiful cluster of cellular matter you've ever laid eyes on? I am so in love with this child already, my heart is doing cartwheels in my chest at a 141 beats per minute pace.
5. Mother and baby are doing fabulous. She is approximately 7 weeks and 2 days along (how they arrived at that estimation, I don't want to know) and everything is as it should be. It's very early, though, so the parents-to-be are still holding their news close for now. Which I understand. It exhausts me to be complicit in the secret keeping, but I understand.
6. February 6th-ish. A snow baby! And also? This child will be born in the same city (Washington, DC) as its favorite grandma (me, naturally). Cool, right?
7. In re: the above, there is one dilemma. I need a fresh title. "Grandma?" The role, yes. But I just can't see myself answering to "Grandma" as a name. Besides, this baby will have five of them, when you add in the Greats. I have seven months to figure out what I want to be called before the baby names me Mee-Maw or Granny of its own volition. Suggestions?
8. I've taken to calling my husband "Grumples." He is not amused. Bemused, a little. But not amused.
9. This is my favorite week of the summer here in my little big city. FestivALL is underway and the place is electric with all manner of arts and culture and people and smiling faces and energy...it's fantastic. Tonight is ArtWalk. Tomorrow is Blues, Brews & BBQs. Saturday is Wine and All That Jazz. Sunday is a street fair, the annual library book sale, and riverboat cruises. And those are just the "main stage" events. There is something fun for everyone, around nearly every corner. Ya'll should come on down! Really!
10. My town's favorite actress/pride and joy, Jennifer Garner, has been in town all week. My bookstore is one of her favorite hangouts, and she's been in every day. Yesterday, she was standing in the coffee line, a daughter on her hip, wearing jeans, a white t-shirt and tennis shoes, with her hair pulled back in a pony tail. Completely unassuming and refreshingly normal. She's good people, that one. (She also dropped $350 on children's books, so, you know: GOOD PEOPLE.)
11. If you don't read anything else today, please read this. Trust me - you'll thank me for it in peals of laughter. 
12. You know? It occurs to me that a whole new set of incentives to get healthy and quit smoking has presented itself to me - dropped in my lap like a bundle of joy, you might say - in these past few days. Must get on that. For reals this time, no? But thinking this master plan might have to wait for one more day seeing as...
13. ...now, I'm off to enjoy the remains of the afternoon. Headed back to the bookstore, with a quick stop at Ellen's on the way. Because, homemade ice cream in the good ol' summertime? Yes, please.

Wherein the words "chapter next" take on a whole new meaning.

I've got a secret.

It's one I've been withholding from these pages for going on a year now. Which - hello, have you met me? - is a damn near remarkable feat. But I can't hold it in any more.

There are a couple of rationalizations for letting this particular cat out of its proverbial bag right here, right now, skittering about my grey matter. The first is the whole bursting at the seams thing. The second is my complete belief that the fine art of saying a dream out loud, giving it oomph and realness, is an honest-to-goodness impetus for said dream coming true. Something about quarks and black holes and exponential cubisms or some such.

At any rate, this thing is close enough that I can touch it now. It's down to the fine print of things, down to the nitty gritties, down to the "will she or won't shes?" It's down to the math. And we ALL know I suck at math. I mean, c'mon. I've confessed as much on these pages AT LEAST 300 times. So, it's down to the math, meaning it's out of my hands, meaning the last, best push I can give this dream off its comfortable, fuzzy perch of maybe-land into "Hello, Real World!" territory is to put it out there.

Put it out here.

For all the world to see; for me to claim.

So. Right then. The secret.

I'm trying to buy this little bookstore. The very one I stumbled into as a part-time clerk for kicks two years ago. The very one I now manage top-to-bottom. The very one that is already my second home. The very one that fills my heart with happy, happy trills of wonder, every single day of the year.

That one.

This one. With its rough brick walls, with its red tin ceilings, with its coffee aroma wafting from every nook and cranny.

This one. With its eclectic collection of people, with its quirky cafe, with its funky art gallery.

This one. With its 16 year history, with its landmark status, with its lovely current owner, who will still live upstairs, still bake the morning scones, still whip up the homemade soups for lunch.

This one.

It feels like it belongs to me already, although there are miles to go before that's an actual statement of fact.

But still.

I'm trying to buy this little bookstore.

It's down to making the dollars work. I've been diligent in keeping my emotions in check, out of the equation, telling myself that if it doesn't work, it wasn't meant to be, and I can accept that.

But still.

I'm trying to buy this little bookstore.

It feels right. It feels possible. It feels...real.

I'm trying to buy this little bookstore.

Chapter: next.

Indeed.

 

 

Father's Days

I was sitting in the passenger side with a 12-pack box of tacos in my lap when my brother called to tell me Dad was gone.

It was a few minutes past 11 pm on Sunday, June 5th, and my husband, sister-in-law and I had left the hospice ward at the  hospital in Lexington about a half hour before, headed to my mother's house for some sleep. After eleven long days spent huddled in my father's room, waiting, together, my mom decided she needed to spend the night with him. At the last minute, she asked my brother to stay with her, and he readily agreed. The five of us pulled out the sofa bed, rearranged the recliner, collected extra blankets and pillows, hugged our good-nights. I kissed Dad's damp, warm head and told him I loved him. "Sleep well, Daddy," I whispered in his ear. "Rest well. Please, rest."

It was a thirty minute drive back to Mom's. We had just pulled into the driveway when my cell phone rang.

And suddenly, after weeks, months, of hurry up and wait, it was over with one last breath.

_________________

It's been the impossible dream, writing about these last few months. Since my daughter's beautiful wedding in April a year ago, Dad's health - already precarious, at best - had been in a state of steady decline. At Christmas, he was able to sit at the dinner table with us, laughing, telling stories, centering the holiday scene. But within weeks, his body grew more fragile and his mind more feeble. The descent into a horrible, pitiful near bed-ridden state was rapid and complete by the end; a mere blink of an eye.

Those stories of his last months are not treasured memories, easily documented. Those stories will live on only in my head, and in the safe keeping of  my mother - easily a candidate for sainthood, were there such a thing in the Methodist religion - private and painful.

I feel so very lucky to have spent nearly two and a half weeks of his last month with him, helping my mother. He had a lot of lucid moments in between the delusional tales of unnecessary grandeur, and sharing those with him meant everything to me. He knew - knows - how much I love him; and there is zero doubt in my mind that I meant the world to him.

My mother was wearing down, physically and emotionally unable to maintain the 24/7 pace of caring for her husband that she'd been exercising for six solid years - her whole life, really - and just as she began to feel the overwhelming burden of watching her husband break, Hospice stepped in and took charge. They are the ones who made the decision to move him from his home onto the hospice ward of the hospital in Lexington, one Thursday morning in late May.

And this decision was a gift so great, on so many levels, there are no words that exist to describe it.

_________________

He was a big man, my father.

Yes, he was physically imposing, standing 6'4" and 200 lbs. in his prime. But that's not what I mean.

His spirit - that's what was larger than life.

The outpouring of love and well-wishes has been damn near grandiose. Mom has received hundreds of cards and letters. I received more than 250 Facebook comments, private messages and emails. The National Marfan Foundation has received thousands of dollars in donations in his honor.

His first memorial service, held in Frankfort, KY, where my folks have lived for some 28 years, was attended by more than 200 people. And his second memorial service, held in our hometown, where both my brother and I live, was attended by 300 more.

The services were perfect. The first was traditional and somber, by Mom's design. The second, held this past Saturday, was  an uplifting tribute, as organized by my brother and I.

He was interred in his church's bell tower and celebrated by all those who loved him on Father's Day weekend, which feels completely right to me. It feels like a final, glorious gift we were able to give him, and I am going to treasure the words, the hugs, the memories of the weekend for the rest of my life. And that I can walk by his final resting place, less than 2 blocks from my house, every day for the rest of my life and know he is here, watching over me, feels like a final, glorious gift from a beloved father to his eternally grateful daughter.

I am sure in the belief that he is, at long last, resting well.

_________________

Yesterday was Father's Day. Before heading out of town to go back to their lives, my daughter and son-in-law took my husband and I to lunch. As we were leaving the house for the restaurant, she handed her daddy a bright blue bag stuffed with yellow tissue paper and said, "Open your present before we go."

Inside the brightly colored package was proof that God exists and life does indeed go on.

Our baby is going to have a baby.

On Wednesday, they are having their first ultrasound, after which we will be free to share the news with the rest of our big, larger than life, wonderful family.

On Wednesday, Dad would have turned 72 years old.

Life, full circle.

And my heart pounds out a song of joy, in time to the magical rhythm of it all.