Women, alone

Today I went down to our cottage to meet a workman replacing a broken window.  Since I was unsure (still am) whether this was an attempted break-in, I let two neighbors know there might be some "issues" in the neighborhood.  Both these women I've known for years.  One is a widow, re-married, and the other divorced, recently retired. They each had 2 children, a boy and a girl.

 The widow has had many tragedies in her family: her husband was killed in an auto accident and her brother in a motorcycle accident.  Her mother died after a liver transplant. Her father re-married and moved away and now he and has wife are dead.   Her son moved away, is divorced. Her daughter moved far away, has one child.  Now her only sister was unceremoniously downsized and is moving away.  I realized this friend has few relatives here: her husband is divorced and I don't think they see much of his children.  She seemed depressed when we spoke and I think it was the loss of the sister that really hurts.  They were very different, the sister a wild child, divorced, no kids.  I think my friend thought they would get closer as they got older but it never happened.

The other neighbor has lived alone since her husband left her many years ago.  Her one daughter lives in Kansas (a two days drive, she says).  Her son who is about a 4 hours drive away is planning to move to Oregon to be closer to his wife's family.  She was contemplative when we spoke, reminiscing about how fast the years go and how scary it is to get old. Her Plan B is to buy a home near her daughter but she is not crazy about living "in the middle of nowhere" in Kansas.

Our small Bay community is sort of like an extended family with an active community association. Our daughter thinks I could downsize and move there at some point because I "love the water" but it is too remote for me, also too far from a hospital.

Change is inevitable

The summer was rainy and hot, especially August.  For the first time ever, we didn't take a major trip, except to Seattle and Vancouver, to visit our daughter and her husband.  Last year we had to cancel a trip to Nova Scotia.  In retrospect, I wanted to take an easy trip to Quebec this summer, never scheduled it.

Maybe it is time to re think trips.  We gave up cruises several years ago.  I don't really miss them although I found the convenience and diversity of stops in Northern Europe fascinating, especially St Petersburg, Helsinki and Norway/Sweden.

Adapting to change is important.  Smaller trips or day trips are easy.  Last year we did that during the week we had cancelled Nova Scotia.

So, walked Zoey yesterday and ran into neighbors our age who just came back from Iceland.  They were vigorously  weeding their yard. She had recently retired as a therapist.  She misses work.  No way did I ever miss work.  We are all so different at this point in life.  Their enthusiasm for Iceland was contagious.  I went home and researched trips to Iceland.  Hiking over glaciers?  Good grief.

But the Orkney Islands are on my bucket list.

Small Losses

We grieve the large ones, of course.  The loss of friends to disease or death.  The loss of our own robustness, taken for granted.  The loss of an endless future and the realization that life is finite.  The loss of memory...slowly eroded at the edges.  The loss of a sense of safety as mass shootings become more common.

But this is about the small losses.  Arriving back to Maryland from Florida and finding that the local Lord and Taylor had closed.  The "go to" store for so much! Finding that the local large Antiques store had closed. Always it was a place where I'd kind of stop off, see the prices, compare everything to stuff I had at home.

Then a loss closer to home.

Many years ago my husband and I went in on a new expensive  "share boat" with our son and a few of his friends.  This was a good sized 24 ft boat that no one really took care of....it just ran.  Once in the beginning we took it across the Bay to St. Michaels.  It had a "galley" and a "head" and could be used for sleeping.  No one ever started the microwave.  After awhile, other partners bowed out and we became sole owners.  We have a community marina so the boat sat there on a lift, periodically being "winterized", cleaned and serviced.  We were never "boaters" so the boat was not part of our lives, really.  So why am I so sad that I think our days with the boat are over?  Yesterday we had company and my husband and son took them out on the boat...for about 10 minutes until it started spewing smoke.  Zoey and I were on the shore as they limped back into the dock, enveloped in greyish brown smoke.  We called the fire dept., the boat was to be towed to a marina owned by our mechanic. As we drove across the bridge over our river, there below was a sturdy little blue and red tugboat with our sleek still proud white boat pulled behind.  I felt unreasonably sad.

Why sad?  I kept saying, we don't use this boat, it is not reliable, it needs repairs.  Let's sell it!! Now I'm sad. I'm sad because of all the memories over the years.  Going out in the boat the evening of 9/11 as everything was surreal, going to watch the sailboat races downtown, going out one fourth of July to watch the fireworks from the water, taking friends and relatives out for wine and cheese on the boat, etc etc.  A long history with the boat.  As she got older and creakier, so did we.

A Call From a Friend

An old college friend lost her husband last winter after a short illness.  I invited her to come and visit us in Florida and get a change of scenery.  She lives in California so I was surprised when she accepted the invitation.

We had a pleasant time doing Florida things - taking the boat to the beach, eating dinner out and sitting on the lanai drinking wine.  She needed to talk and I listened. It was often hard  and scary since, in addition to watching her husband die,  there were mistakes from the medical profession and lack of compassion from financial entities.

She called yesterday to organize another visit...this time in Maryland with old friends  In discussing her previous visit, she said it was one of the most helpful experiences she had this year while coping wih grief.  The reason, she said was that Florida was so different and new that she never looked around for Mike and wondered where he was since he had never been with us in Florida,  So she could enjoy the new experiences without missing Mike. She had no expectation or feeling of loss that Mike wasn't there,

Positive People

Our son has a neighbor, a young widow, who is always positive but not in a cloying, artificial  way.  She seems to find things to appreciate and enjoy.  She loves our granddaughters.  She loves my garden.  Yes, she'd love to have some extra ostrich ferns and is enormously grateful that I give them to her.  It is uplifting to be near her.  I think simply joyfulness goes a long way.

Closing retail stores

The first to go was our local Lord and Taylor in the mall.  Like an old friend, it was my go-to place for a myriad of items including sportswear, cosmetics, etc.  Items were more upscale than Macy's, more diverse than Nordstrom's  . In my mind's eye I can still see the sections, including the men's items on the second floor.  Traveling through the now empty space (in my mind's eye) is unbelievably sad.  Then there was was the local antiques mall which had multiple vendors and just interesting stuff to peer at and exclaim over.  I came back in April to find that gone.  The building is still empty.  Then today I passed a vacant Country Curtains store.  It was the kind of place that had good quality items and a diverse selection. Gone.  Vacant.

The worst was the closing of my favorite antique store in an older neighborhood that used to have many shops.  The selection was upscale and tasteful.  I bought our bedroom furniture there and other items.  Last week I drove there (a distance) with a funny feeling in my heart.  The historic building is being sold and the owner is doing some kind of periodic antique sales at a small stall place an hours drive from here.

Antiques I understand....but the other places are a consequence of Amazon.  Still, who buys clothes from Amazon?

Me.

So more and more small and medium sized store fronts are empty.  The days of "recreational shopping" and impulse buying are over.  Damn.

A Good Time Was Had by All

It almost didn't happen. A good friend and her son and DIL were planning to stay at our house one night while en route to another friend's home.  The second visit was cancelled and I told them to come and see us, anyway.

They did, arriving on a Friday night and at first things started off badly.  Our sons couldn't leave work and come over until 6 or 7 p.m..  Our friends arrived at 2 and the  grown up "kids" seemed at loose ends, just sitting around. My friend and I walked to the water.  The "kids" didn't seem to want to do much.

However, when our two sons, their wives and one granddaughter arrived, the gathering got lively.  We had crab cakes, red skin potato salad, and corn on the cob out on the deck.  One DIL had a birthday so we had cupcakes and sang Happy Birthday, and gave her gifts.  Granddaughter gave a gymnastics presentation on the front yard.

At times like this, I'm glad we still have our house and yard in the summertime.  Winter - that's another story....

Remembering an old friend

I have an old friend I don't see very often.  This year, while back at home I am making an effort to re connect with many friends we have almost lost touch with.  This old friend is one of them.

Today I called her.  She is going out to lunch with a mutual friend's son.  It is his birthday and the 10th anniversary of a horrific auto accident that killed his father.  The son had taken the day off and he and his father were driving locally during the daytime.  A truck ran a red light and killed the father and severely injured the son. The owners of the truck had no insurance and no assets.  His wife was left alone on a large property she had inherited from her parents, a beautiful spot on a river north of us. Somehow she coped but was devastated beyond belief.  This death was beyond senseless. She nursed her son, a single guy, back to health over several months.  He stayed on and lived with her, helping to maintain their extensive property.

Our friend never really recovered from her husband's death. I didn't connect with her and the other friend as much as I should.   Two years ago, our friend died and I dropped out of connecting with our other friend. My telephone call was a start in re connecting.

Chronic Undifferentiated Overhelpfulness

I have an old school friend, a widow, and we get together periodically for lunch, museum excursions, etc. She is a family therapist and what my husband says is that she treats everyone in that oozy sympathetic how are you doing kind of family therapist way.  He is not crazy about her so we rarely go out with her and her boyfriend.  We got together yesterday and she had me over for lunch. It soon became clear she had a hidden agenda. She had an article she had printed out from her computer.  This article was on neuroplasticity in the aging brain.  She had noticed I seemed to be more distracted and anxious lately.  Well, I haven't seen her since before we left for Florida (more than 8 months ago) so what exactly is "lately" and how did she just happen to have an article waiting to share with me? In fact, I had noticed the same thing about her since she chatted away non stop when she first saw me (chatting too much is a sign of anxiety).  Maybe she is projecting?

It gets better. She reads the article to me (doesn't just make a copy and give it to me), skipping parts but basically reads the whole thing.  Her behavior was very patronizing.  As she was reading it, I was thinking why am I still friends with this person?  I told her the article was very interesting and I left soon after.

What is going on feels uncomfortable.  She has been a therapist so long she needs to diagnose and fix everyone. We go back many years but our lives have diverged. Pulling out an article and relating it to my faults felt hostile, particularly since this was out of the blue, not related to anything I said or complained about.

I decided to act interested in the article, not defensive or annoyed,and even made comments on how interesting it was.  We don't live that close and  don't see each other that often, fortunately.

The Hedgehog

Just a postscript to my Hedgehog story.  We found a spot for it in our yard, nestled in some ferns on a hill and it looks splendid.  A new neighbor came over to look at our garden and the first thing she noticed was the hedgehog which she loved. So now I love it,too, and am thinking of getting a few more to tuck among the ferns.

Meanwhile, I get the granddaughters gift certificates for birthdays etc. since there is not much sense getting gifts for someone who grumbles.  Saves me time and keeps me from being annoyed at them.

No good deed ever goes unpunished

Some days are close to perfect.  Today was one of those days since the weather was ideal, cloudy overhead, but good for working outside.

My husband and I headed for the cottage we have owned forever down on the Bay.  I had been there once since returning from Florida but had only checked it out for any winter damage, and did not turn on the water.

First we stopped at a garden center down there that is always absolutely redolent with plants.  I stocked up on the plants I still needed.  We actually needed two carts to carry everything.  As we left, my husband spied one of those garden statues - a gnome like thing - that he thought the granddaughters would like.  It was unique - a hedgehog with a cheery smile.  I was not so sure the girls would appreciate it and pooh - pooed the purchase (it was fairly expensive). Leaving the store, I asked, do you really want it, and he said yes.  So I went back in and got it.

Then we went to our cottage and ate crab cake sandwiches on the deck overlooking the creek.  There was a water leak (we found out when we turned the pump on) but that didn't diminish the day. On the way home we stopped at our son's home. I carried the hedgehog to the door since my husband was lugging up a plant we had gotten for our DIL to commemorate her grandmother who had recently died. The oldest granddaughter opened the door and said, what's that, in a snarky voice.  I explained it was something her grandfather had gotten her and her sister.  Both of them were underimpressed.

We got home and I said to my husband, we are taking that hedgehog back. He was hurt. After we discussed it he said, let's return it and we will go out for a nice dinner.

older women, alone

My friends becoming widows and the situation of women getting older alone has consumed my thoughts lately.  Of our three visitors to Florida this winter, all had a good support system of family, friends and church/community. Not everyone is so lucky.

I think of my free spirited 70's something film instructor. She has led an interesting life but is estranged from her three daughters.  Teaching adult ed classes doesn't pay her living expenses.  A grandson took her in temporarily for a few months.  Her situation is actually dire.  What safety net exists for someone like this who is living on a pittance and charity?

I think of my quirky dog trainer/walker.  She is in her 70's, borderline anorexic and fiercely independent.  She almost died from pneumonia last winter, was put into the hospital but left AMA.  Back again to the hospital, near death's door. Bad judgment.  Maybe a lifetime of bad judgment, 3 marriages and no family except a son she doesn't see. At least she has a home and a somewhat reliable income.

I think of my daughter, actually.  No children and an older husband. Friends and colleagues, yes, but she tends to be selective about who she associates with.  Her only family is 3,000 miles away. She has a few cousins on my husband's side she was never close to. She is financially secure, which helps - greatly.

I think of all this as my husband and I increasingly have medical procedures and appointments.  In two days, I'll put Zoey in the vets and travel 30 miles to another city take my husband for a medical procedure. He might be overnight.  I hate the idea of driving there at 5 a.m.  I hate driving him home.  I wonder how long both of us will be able to do this.

Oh well, as one friend, a widow, said, "There's always Uber".

Death and Dying: 4 hours to remove the body

Life evolves in chunks: the school chunk, the marriage/family chunk, the career chunk, the empty nester  chunk, the retirement chunk, the dying chunk.

The Psychologist Eric Erickson stated these life stages more elegantly.  I forget all  Erickson's stages except the last: integrity versus despair.  This is the stage that tries our souls and sears our memories.

Three friends, all widows, visited us this year in Florida.  Friends at home are dying, dying all over of course, an inevitable march toward annihilation.  That's the despair part.   So,  I say to myself, don't despair, focus on integrity, there is still much to look forward to.

These past few days were hard.  They tried my Integrity.  An old college friend who moved to a distant state lost her husband from glioblastoma last December, three months after the diagnosis.  The  problem with this condition is 1. It is rapid.  2.  It is always fatal.  The victim is aware of this painful reality and how the condition creates is a moving target of interventions.  In the end, it is 24 hour care, not covered by Medicare.

My friend needed to talk, she was still traumatized by it all, she talked about the unreality of losing her husband, saving his clothes in case he needed them when he got out of the hospital.  The finality of death. She talked about what she learned about medicare etc and I wish I took notes.  But some parts are forever in my memory track.

What happens next

1.  Embalming is a disgusting violation of the body, stuffing unnatural  substances in your body after disemboweling you.  Cremation is now preferred.  There are Mauseleums for cremation, something like those cemetaries in Buenos Aires where you have a visiting room near where the body is interred.

2. No wakes are preferred.

3.  Costs are exhorbitant for a funeral.  My friend spent 25K,including a luncheon. "It's like planning a wedding", she said

4.  But here's what keeps me up at night: after a person dies, you must remove the body.  To where you ask?  That's where pre-planned funerals come in.  You have your chosen funeral parlor on your cell, and you call them, say, at 3 a.m. and they will get the body.  Otherwise it's 1-800-call a Funeral Director.  Or something like that.

Death of a son

My husband's college friends are a close group, aided and abetted by a savvy college development office that stays in touch with alums.  One person my husband hadn't seen in years became an orthodontist and lived well.  Over the years, we heard about him from another classmate. Usually the stories revolved around his sumptuous lifestyle.

Today my husband's college friend called with a different kind of story: this classmate's son had died.  My first thought was a car accident, or maybe even cancer.  I went on the website of the funeral home in his hometown.  Under his name, a smiling red haired youth looked rakeishly at the camera. No information except a church ceremony and private cremation.  Nothing about his life except his birthdate and deathdate. No next of kin, a statement about his life, where to call to express condolences. Nada. His age was 45, much older than that smiling youth.

I went to buy a condolence card and the lady at the store pointed one out to me while saying her son had died in January.  We never think when we have children that this could be how it will end, us saying goodbye to them forever.

Feeling nostalgic

Last week I attended a birthday luncheon for a neighbor in our former Florida community. My husband was out of town for meetings. A very small group of friends gathered at a waterfront restaurant and I realized I was extraordinarily fond of all of these people.  I miss seeing them, socializing with them.  But the ranks are thinning. A good friend has dementia and she struggles to carry on a conversation. Another friend has a subdural hematoma and is on bed rest.  Even when everyone is/was well we are just far enough away (about 10 miles) that we have to make an effort to get together.

Yet I love our new condo and it makes good sense.  It is ground floor, handicapped accessible.  We have a little garden in front and back.  We have privacy.  We don't know many people and we never will.  This isn't a social, golf club community. I think many people moved here because friends/relatives moved here from New York, or wherever and told them about this community which is dog friendly.  We have friends and family visit and get together with other friends who are down for the winter.  It really is a nice balance. Not too much or too little.  Still I miss the old crowd from the old community.  But....you can't have it all.

Counting my blessings

My daughter in law's uncle committed suicide last week.  Shot himself.  Our son described the funeral, in a stupendous mega-church in a rural area of Virginia.  One brother gave a rambling guilt and grief filled eulogy that included the confession that he (the brother) decided he could no longer  shoot a deer so he gave his guns to the brother who shot himself.  Apparently, said our son, these families have "Paw's" and "Grand-paws" guns that are handed down like precious heirlooms.  Worse, the funeral was diminished by the acrimony of half of the family who consider suicide a disgrace and a sin punishable by hell for all eternity.

This family is plagued by mental illness and the uncle who shot himself amazingly  appeared to be the most stable member of the family, according to our son..

I grew up in New York in an upper middle class community where most of the Dad's had an Ivy League education and where no one I knew had a gun and no one I knew went hunting.  There was one suicide.  Our next door neighbors had two little boys my age (like 6 and 3).  The husband was rather handsome, as Dads go to a 6 year old eyes.  Then the wife was told by her husband, a Pan Am pilot,   that he wanted a divorce. Another woman, of course.  She put on her pearls and her mink and went in to the Waldorf Astoria in New York City , checked in and checked out with an overdose and took an overdose.  Very lady like and not messy.

New York had strict gun laws but even beyond that I think maybe I have been traveling in a bubble my whole life - a private college, graduate school, colleagues, friends and neighbors who were intelligent, sensible people. If they weren't intelligent and sensible we just didn't associate with them.

But it's scary in the real world.

A neighbor's sorrow

Our upstairs neighbors are Russians, now living in Canada for 22 years.  Both are scientists with kids who are scientists.  We have gotten together with them intermittently in the past couple of years. They typically rent their condo out.  This year they are not renting it, just going back and forth to Canada every few weeks where he has his business.  They love it here, jogging, bicycling, always at the beach, grilling outside, etc.

Then I saw them as they entered their condo.  Her mother in Russia had a stroke.  My neighbor was devastated.  She has to go back to Russia to see her mother who appears to have been given a tracheotomy and is possibly on life support in the hospital.  She must be moved to a facility but where and how. The grief, I sense, is complicated by fear.  My neighbor no longer knows the system in Russia.  Her stepfather is an experimental physicist totally wrapped up in his work.  He considers his step daughter a traitor since he hates the U.S. and Canada and is "200% behind Putin".  He is "brainwashed" she says.  So she is essentially going back to a hostile environment.  She has a step sister living in Canada who is back with the mother and is "drained".  No help there.  Her husband has decided to go back to Russia with her and I'm glad.  She seems so fragile and overwhelmed.  I wonder if they might be detained in Russia on some charges. She seems discouraged and frightened by the political environment there and current hostilities (sanctions) with the US.

I hope we see them again. I promised to water her plant on the lanai.

We forget how precious our democracy is and easily it can be lost. Just as Russia reverted to a dictator, we can be subsumed by fascism and autocratic rule.

There comes a time....

Months later, in Florida, and now saying again,where has the time gone?  Suddenly that happy-to-be retired and having fun experience is morphing into something else.  Friends are getting sick or dying.  Many, not just the random friend here or there.  Many are dying.  The most recent was a former neighbor who had been ill for several years.  We had not seen him in maybe three years.  He and his wife had been part of our children's growing up and sports experiences, particularly the two oldest.  Our son went to the funeral (to represent the family) and said it was really heartwarming to see so many people he hadn't seen for years. 

We lose touch - and then a person is gone.  An old college roommate who married a man we went to school with was a long time neighbor until they moved to California.  He developed glioblastoma in early 2017 and was dead in a matter of months.  I wrote and invited her to visit in Florida if she needed a change of scenery.  She is taking me up on it and said everything has been so hard and yet at the same time she has been incredibly busy re-titling the house, etc. Bluntly, she said, "I still can't believe he is dead.  I see his clothes and say, I'd better get these to the cleaners so he will have them when he is out of the hospital".  I said, I can't believe he is dead, either.  When you have not seen someone for awhile, it is easy to think they are still "out there".

In speaking with other friends, I'll say something like, oh I'm so sorry' and one or two have said,  well, we are at that age....so, there comes a time.  Now I just hope I don't have my dog out live me since she is a "special needs' dog.