9 Years a Widow

March 29th.  Today is the 9th anniversary of Jeff's death.  I'm still surprised at how much his effected me, given that I had spent years imagining it and thinking about it at and how I was going to react, thus thinking I was prepared.  But I was completely unprepared for the emotional impact, which was total, enveloping my life and paralyzing me for a long time.

Many people have dropped away.  Certainly all the folks who were around just for the free food and treats and good times.  Some who seemed to be friends, but turned out to be just leeches.   Good riddance to them. Also some who dropped away as my life spiraled out of control and I was making desperate decision that impacted others in a less than positive way.  I understand them and am saddened by my loss.

But there are you who are reading this who weathered my dark night (season, years) of the soul.  You are still with me, having heard the terror and fear in my voice.  You loved and supported me, and watched as I pulled myself back out into the land of the living.  I cherish you beyond measure.

There are those reading this who never met Jeff.  He was a complicated and compelling man, and created lasting friendships of great depth.  He was dramatic, supportive, pushy, snobby, artistic, creative, crazy, fun, harsh, generous, and (as one friend said when he lasted 18 hours after being taken off life support) freakishly strong.  He was my husband for 13 years.

I have a new relationship that is wonderful, supportive, and calm.   I am blessed with many friends, old and new.  My life has much less drama.  This means less excitement, but I'm ok with that.   I am working towards finding out who I am without the whirlwind that was Jeff.  It's a process.  I am, in a large part, the woman I am today because of my relationship with Jeff.

I've been cleaning up my office space to make a "writing dojo" so I have a place to finish my book and do other writing.  In the process, I found old notebooks, and some of Jeff's old stuff.   I am now using one old notebook of Jeff's to write new recipes and menus (appropriate, eh?).  There were only 3 pages used, one a list of his paintings and prices, one a bio he used for his painting shows, and then this.  His notes for his vows for our 10th wedding anniversary:

"Weren't sure if we would make it one year -- strength, love, commitment -- (next page)

"Ever since the first time we met, I have thought about you constantly.  That was followed by astronomical phone bills and visits we could barely afford.

"When I got diagnosed, ten minutes was very important, turned into ten hours, hours into ten months, and finally months into ten years.

"Nothing has come easy for us.  What makes a person look forward to every day?  It's the eternal love and commitment that I pledge to uphold..."

Remembering Faith

I always introduce Faith as a curmudgeon when I talk about Coffee with a Beat and why I keep returning.  It’s an accurate, but shallow description of a complicated woman who was my friend and I will always remember with a warm heart.

I met Faith when I moved into the neighborhood and found the coffee shop within walking distance of my home.  Every morning I’d show up with my two cocker spaniels and sit outside with them while I ate my breakfast, nursing  a resentment of having to leave my coffee shop in Alameda where I had a cadre of regulars who petted my dogs and followed my crazy life as we drank coffee at ate baked goods hot out of the oven.  Every morning, Faith sat in the same chair, inside, nursing a cup of coffee, looking out at the lake and reading her Chronicle.  We started off with a nodding acquaintance. 

Weekends were livelier than weekdays, and I stayed longer, eventually venturing inside and meeting the regulars.  Faith was joined by Sunny and Kathy, who invited me to join them one day.  I found a group of smart, interesting women involved in their community and the world.  Conversation was a lively mix of politics, current events, Oakland happenings, and the takeover of technology.  A self-proclaimed Luddite, Faith hated computers.   The women introduced me to fascinating people as they stopped by the table to say hello.  Coffee with a Beat attracts people from all walks of life and I learned to dig behind the congenial facades to find movers and shakers in the Oakland community.  Gradually, I moved inside, leaving my dogs tied up at the table by the door as fuzzy welcomers, and joined the community.

Often it was just Faith and I in the early mornings, sometimes waiting for Nate to open up.  I learned to see past her gruff exterior and into a person of great depth.  Intelligent and quick, she had a breadth of knowledge that often took my breath away.  She beat throat cancer and refused to be stopped by the limitations it left, speaking with difficulty and not being able to raise her voice, but she spoke with conviction.  A woman of strong opinions, she debated enthusiastically and backed up her contentions with facts.  Her favorite magazine (and a long-standing birthday gift from Kathy) was Scientific American, and she often connected what she read there with the political climate of the day.

I started watching American Idol because of Faith.  I was startled to find out she watched religiously, and then discovered it was a bonding experience with her daughter.  They called each other during the commercial breaks to discuss the performers (this was back when the show was more about the kids singing than it was making them media darlings).  I started watching to find out what she was talking about and got hooked.  So that’s why this show is so popular, I thought.  It’s not watching the show, it the conversations afterwards.  We watched James Durbin, a young man with Asperger’s and a hard rock edge progress and Faith talked about how her daughter’s at-risk students were following his progress and how inspired they were by him, as she misted up briefly.  But the year Adam Lambert was cheated out of the title put an end to her watching.  Just like that, Idol was dead to her.

My husband passed away a year after we moved to Oakland, and Faith was comforting in her gruff way.  Adrift after the first couple of weeks, and having no family to turn to, Faith’s stability provided a sense of security, seeing her at her seat as I walked up the street and tied the dogs to their post outside the door.  That December, when I threw myself a birthday party, she paid me the supreme compliment of attending.  Knowing that she rarely left her house and only attended the most important occasions for her nieces, I knew the honor she paid me and am still deeply touched.  I started thinking of her as Mama Faith, but only to myself.  She was certainly there for me in ways my own mother never was.

Later, when my life careened out of control, Faith provided a defining moment.  I’d been complaining again about something and she had enough.  She slammed her coffee mug down on the table with enough force to stop all conversation across the coffee shop.   She couldn’t scream, but it was clear she was screaming on the inside.  “I refuse to listen to this crap anymore,” she said forcefully.  “You are creating all this drama and then come in here bitching about it.  Stop it!  Just stop it!  You have to start taking care of yourself.”

The coffee shop had gone silent, except for Dizzy Gillespie wailing softly in the background as she stomped out.   I was stunned and hurt, but later, as I thought about what she said, I realized she was right.  I was creating a lot of unnecessary drama in my life.  And no one else cared enough about me and had the balls to point this out. I realized that the drama was a residual effect of my husband’s death and living in crisis was comforting in a weird, albeit unhealthy way,  and  I embarked on a long-term effort to take better care of myself and cut the drama out of my life, which has led me to the contented life I lead today. 

When I moved back to Alameda, I told her how she was instrumental in my getting my life together, and how much this means to me because I wanted her to be proud of me.  She, of course, batted away the compliments like they were annoying flies.  She was, and was not, an easy woman to love.  

Fiercely independent, she refused all the help I offered her over the years.  Her gruff exterior, cynical understanding of human nature, abhorrence of all things computer, her vocal opinions and stubbornness all fed the conversations those mornings at Nate’s.  These traits were off-putting at first, and sometimes hard to get past, but gradually I found her warm, fuzzy secret heart, fueled by her passion for knowledge, her delight in children. Her eyes lit up with love when talking about her three nieces, or young neighbor who had taken quite a shine to her, or watching a young one careening around the coffee shop with parents in tow.   That, and her caring for me, made her easy to love.

So here’s some advice from Mama Faith to take us into our futures, those of us left behind.  Subscribe to Scientific American and read it.  Back up whatever you say with facts.  Don’t get your facts of the internet where people can say whatever they want and often lie.  Get everything, and I mean everything, in writing when entering an agreement with a friend that involves money or a place to live.  Never give up.  Take care of yourself.  And never, ever stop learning. 

The Slow Art Experience

 It turned out to be a beautiful day for slow art. To recap from my earlier post, (Slow Art), Slow Art is the practice of stopping in front a work of art and looking at it for seven to ten minutes, allowing you to see complexity and nuance you would miss just whizzing past.

So having signed up on-line, the BF and I motored over the the Frank Bette Art Center on a sunny Alameda Saturday.  We were greeted by a friendly volunteer (everyone at the Center is a volunteer -- someone needs to fund a curator position for that fine establishment) who explained that Slow Art didn't mean Silent Art, so we were free to talk about the artworks as we looked around.  She then introduced us to Brian Frus and Michael Gifford, two of the artists whose work was in the show!  I decided that I would pick their pieces as some of the works to be slowly enjoyed.

By a happy coincidence, the current show was Alameda 48-48-48, in which the City of Alameda was sectioned into 48 pieces and 48 artists had 48 hours to take photos, the proofs of which were submitted to a committee, who chose the pieces to be included in this art show.   The artists then had 6 weeks to create something wonderful.

We started by walking through the entire gallery, glancing at all the available art.  Since the Frank Bette Art Center is only two rooms, this did not take long.  We each picked out a few pieces we then wanted to spend more time with.  By happy coincidence, the BF and I choose the same pieces.


Amusement Park by Susan Lee Hocket
Mixed Media/Paper Cloth
$800

 We started with the delightful "Amusement Park" by Susan Lee Hocket, which is a patchwork quilt-esque piece combining fabric pieces quilted together mixed with pieces of photographs of the Park Street Bridge.  I set the timer on my phone to 10 minutes, and we sat in on the chairs thoughtfully moved in front of the piece.



This is a complex and wonderful piece which this photo does not do justice to.  The BF and I talked about how the colors of the fabric were perfectly chosen and sewn together to give a rather cubist look at the bridge and the estuary water and banks.  They flow together in a disjointed, but ultimately pleasing whole and I was very surprised to find the 10 minutes up so quickly.

But Slow Art waits for no woman, so we moved on to "City Hall" by Brian Frus.



City Hall by Brian Frus
Photo Print
$250

 The title is intriguing, because it is a photo of an abandoned art deco building -- but wait!  As I slowly look at the photo, City Hall appears as a reflection and the BF points out that the photo must be of the old gas station on Oak and Santa Clara.  We gaze at the photo, which is rich and layered, with the building facade, the empty shelves behind the glass windows, the building next door, visible through the glass, and the reflection of City Hall on the right.  We discuss the layers, the angles, the pleasing proportions of the building and the photographer's skill in capturing the.. bing!  the 10 minutes are up again.

We wandered around the 2nd room and found Michael Gifford's "Night Light" in both a large photo print and a jigsaw puzzle.



Night Light by Michael Gifford
Jigsaw Puzzle of Photo
$75

 

I started with the large photo of the High Street bridge at night.  I liked the photo, which also had more layers the longer I looked at it.  However, when I looked at the same photo on the box of the jigsaw puzzle, I experienced it in an entirely different way.  I was drawn into the photo and felt like I became a part of the scene.  I told the BF about this experience, and Michael Gifford himself came up and joined in the conversation.  We talked about how the color contrasts were slightly different when printed for the jigsaw puzzle and how others had felt that same pull I felt with the puzzle when looking at the large print.  Michael talked about standing on High Street Bridge at night, which was slightly scary, and how the photo was exposed over time.  The streak of light along the left side of the bridge turn out to be headlights of cars crossing the bridge into Alameda.  It was wonderful to be able to ask the artist questions and hear about how the photo was made!

We were unable to stay for the potluck lunch to discuss the art further, but were nonetheless very happy with our Slow Art experience, and determined to see more art in this way in the future.  I enjoyed participating in this international event on such a local level. 

And I'll bet the folks who participated in the International Slow Art Day at the De Young did not get to talk to their artists!

It Will Cost You to Pay

I finally had the experience I knew was coming when digital money first arrived.  I walked into a Sprint store to pay my bill and ask a few questions, and they told me they would charge me to pay in cash.  Banks, of course, have been charging for what used to be standard banking practices (like talking to a teller), right after ATM's came out and they charge for them.  Ooh, ooh, a new revenue stream!  But seriously, charging for taking a cash payment?!?

In January, when my old phone crapped out (planned obsolesce after 2 years), I went to the Sprint store and found the iPhone 4S on sale for $99.  Cool!  The monthly fee was more than I was paying Virgin Mobile, but I was expecting that anyway, so I bit the bullet and ponied up.  When I pulled out my credit union debit card, the helpful saleslady told me that I got a discount for being a credit union member! 10% discount on the phone AND the service.  Holla!!

Sadly, she didn't input the information correctly, so Sprint thought I was a credit union employee (which would have been a 25% discount for anyone who knows a credit union employee) and I couldn't get verified (not surprisingly) and they took the discount away.  After a couple of phone calls, they said I should take my credit union statement into the store and they would fix me up with my promised discount.  Score!

So Sunday, I finally got around to taking the printout of my statement (with all the numbers blacked out, thank you very much), and it turns out that no, actually, they can't do this administrative detail in the store.  But they gave me a form to fill out and fax along with said bank statement.  *sigh* 

So I pulled out my bill, and said I'd like to take care of this, and he told me they don't accept payments by credit card at that location (my local mall).  No problem, I said, whipping out cash.

Folks, there is a $3 charge to pay my bill by cash at this store!  W.  T.  F.??

So, I'm at the retail location, where they can't clear up the mistake that was made At That Store, and they can't take my debit card to pay my bill, and they will charge me to give them cash.

As I was leaving, another patron asked to see my iPhone because none of the phones in the store were turned on, so she couldn't get a sense of what it looked like and how it worked.  I spent a few minutes enthusing over my phone and assuring her that her battery life would NOT be the advertised 15 hours, even if she turns off all the app push notifications.  I explained how I solved this problem with a quick trip to Amazon for cheap car chargers and extra power cords and have no problems keeping the phone up and running. 

THIS is why Brick and Mortar Stores are dying -- they are outposts of corporations that are not able to do anything except an initial sale.  And they're not even doing that well.

Slow Art

Following up on my determination to find out more about Alameda, I checked out the calendar on Alamedan.com.  It turns out that 4/27 is Slow Art Day.  Color me intrigued.  Is Slow Art creating art slowly, like the slow food movement?  If so, I'm out, because I'm a writer, not a visual artist, like my late husband.

I poke around the site and there seem to be two rules -- look at one piece of art for ten minutes, then go to lunch to talk about what you saw.  Both of those rules seem well within my skill set.

I clicked on the link to find that over 252 venues world wide are participating in Slow Art Day.  The last time I participated in something on that scale, it was the release of the last Harry Potter book (and proud of it!).

First on the list of participating locations is Aberdeen, Scotland.  Third is Alameda, CA.  I feel so international all ready.  Although I wish I could go to Aberdeen, this year I will stay close to home and travel 1/2 mile down Lincoln Avenue to the Frank Bette Center for the Arts.  If this year goes well, maybe next year in Aberdeen!

I've been wanting to go to the Frank Bette Center for the Arts every since I moved here.  I support art and artists, but have not yet found the time.  Perhaps after I'm done looking slowly I can take a gander at the gallery and the outdoor garden.  This sounds like the perfect opportunity.  I register as "Commitment to attend" since the event is free here (although other locations seem to require payment).  I enter my name and email and Boom!  I'm registered.  So this Saturday, from 10 - 2, I will be doing the slow art thing.

I've been asigned a volunteer host who will help me out.  Evidently, there is pre-assigned art to view.  I assume this is to facillitate the discussion at lunch afterwards -- it will be a lot more interesting if we all slowly looked at the same pieces of art.

They've asked me to spread the word, so I am doing so now.  There are locations in SF (Legion of Honor and SF Moma and three locations in Oakland, for those of you interested in wandering farther afield.  If anyone want to join me here in Alameda, I'd be delighted.  This Saturday.  Let me know if you want to go. 

I'll be posting about the experience here and would love to see your comments.  Has anyone done this before?

GoT Overload

That's Game of Thrones Overload - not Got Overload (like Got Milk?), although I am enjoying the double-entendre.

Recently my cable company opened up On-Demand to show Game of Thrones and Downtown Abby to hook people so they would then pony up the money for HBO.  I happened to be really sick that week and  I watched two seasons of GoT in three days.  Awesome!  Engrossing!  Fascinating characters, snappy dialog, plots thick with intrigue!  Damn you, cable company, I got HOOKED!

I posted on FB, hoping to find someone with HBO who was also hooked so I could invite myself over to watch every week.  I planned on offering my brownies as bribes (I'll bring delicious brownies if you let me come watch...). But alas, no response.  Did I cave?  NO.

Because, I READ.  Yes, folks, before there was the HBO series, there were books, but the same author, with the same story line and the same characters.  Imagine that!  I was jonesing to find out what happened to Tyrion and Arya and Dany, so I pulled out my Kindle and, just like the ads on TV, had the book in my hand in 30 seconds.  Oh joy!

I started with the third book (A Storm of Swords), which picked up where the 2nd season left off and started racing through the chapters.  The third book in the series introduces a few new characters, but is set mainly in the same places as the first two seasons, so I easily picked up the narrative thread and devoured the book.  Still recovering from the illness, I dragged myself home from work, crawled into bed, and went off to Westeros.

From my recent Advanced Writing Workshop (shout out to Linda Watanabe McFerrin), I admired the way each chapter is it's own short story, with an intriguing start ("The invitation seemed innocent enough, but every time Sansa read it her tummy tightened into a knot."  "He woke to the creak of old iron hinges.") and bang-up finish.  Then you jump to another character in another corner of the universe and the first line is so intriguing you get sucked in again. Great writing, great technique. Very hard to put down.

I must say, however, that I'm glad I started with the HBO series.  There are a LOT of characters and having seen actors in the roles, it made it a lot easier to keep them straight.  I finished the Storm of Swords in a week (I read freakishly fast.  According to the Kindle, it's print length is 1216 pages.)  No problem!  Back to the Kindle store and in another 30 seconds, A Feast for Crows is available for my reading pleasure.

I jumped in eagerly, but started getting bogged down.  This book introduced a lot of new characters, and by introduced, I mean described them, explained where they were from and the entire history surrounding their tiny part of the world, sometimes going back centuries.  And religions!  Fire ("the night is dark and full of terrors"), Water (the drowned men), the Old Gods (trees), the New Gods  (The Seven), then the holy place where Arya finds herself where all gods are One. Some of my favorite characters became minor actors while these new characters took center stage.  We followed Brienne, the Maid of Tarth on her ill-fated search for Sansa Stark, which was by-and-large pretty boring.  George (R. R. Martin) is really, really into details in this book.  Or maybe it's just the slew of new characters.  The plot stops at the 91% mark, and the remaining 9% is list upon list of characters, separated by House, with info about the houses thoughtfully provided.  Still, I slogged through and followed the plot lines, hoping that more Tyrion and Arya and Dany would appear.  But no, just a lot of Brienne, Jon at the Wall, Bran being carried by Hordor, and Jamie Lannister, whose golden luster is wearing off.

Wanting to find out What Happens Next, I went back to the Kindle store and got A Dance with Dragons, thinking that Dany would finally get to riding her dragons, and THEN, boy, some interesting stuff was going to pop!  But alas, a lot of this book was also full of boring details, and I found myself paging quickly through most of the book without reading.  A whole NEW set of characters, three slaver cities, all with people and history, a long sea voyage for Tyrion (boring despite the storms), and Dany going about the boring task of ruling, when she should be out riding dragons.  I sped through the book, skimming to get the gist of the plot line, and was disappointed that nothing was resolved at the end.

A trip to Google assured me that the 6th novel in the series will be out this summer.  I'm hoping that there's a lot fewer new characters (we have enough history already), a lot fewer descriptions of traveling (boring) and a lot more plot (pretty please).  George has promised two battles, one North by the Wall and one South in the slaver cities.

Even with the overload, I'm anxious to find out what happens. These are really fascination books, well written and take me to a place I've never been.  I feel the cold at the wall.  I feel dirty and cold when the characters ride through the rain.

But what I really want for Dany to take her dragons to the Wall and waste all the Others with their fire.  Alas, it looks like that is going to be a good 2,500 pages away.

Authentic Being

I have a like/hate relationship with Face Book.  I've reconnected with old, dear friends with whom I'd lost contact (Annie Leung, Jill Williams, Susan Oldland) and found some great pages (I Love it When I Wake up in the Morning and Barak Obama is President, Thug Kitchen, I Fucking Love Science).  On the downside, I have to wade through ads; first it was ads for things my friends 'liked' and now just random sponsored ads. Dr. Oz must be making a gazillion dollars based on how many times his ads show up on my feed.

But there are moments that are wonderful and connecting and transcendent, like this one, which I like so  reprise here.  A FB friend posted wondering why some people had unfriended her after she posted a photo of one of her art pieces -- a non-offensive, delightful piece made of waves of color.  This is a theme I've heard often over the years, and have wondered it myself on occasion.  But then I moved to Chico for a job, where I connected with only two people (who were also new to Chico), felt very, very isolated, and spent half my time there trying to figure out how to make friends.  Finally, I realized that was never going to happen, not because of who I am, but because of who they are.  So here's what I commented on my friend's post, with a bit of expansion (because I'm not typing on my iPhone):

"Fuck 'em.  If there's one thing I've learned in the past dark years it is:  not everyone is going to like you.  And a lot of times, it's not even about you, as strange as that sounds.  It's about who they are and what they need in their lives at this specific point in time.  Someone told me there are friends for a reason, friends for a season, and friends for a lifetime.  So people come and go.  A lot of people left my life after Jeff passed away and I was no longer throwing huge and wonderful parties flowing with wine and party favors.  Those were friends for a reason (gluttony :-) ).  I was hurt initially, but now find I do not miss them at all.  In the flow of life, they have been replaced with people who enjoy my company, even if it's just a phone call.

So now I work hard at being my most authentic self.  I have people in my life that love me.  I conduct my business transactions with integrity.  And that is enough."