"Saint Anthony, Saint Anthony....."

I have Saint Anthony to thank for a few things.

It started last week. A regular morning. Opening the top drawer of my dresser to rummage through the hundred pairs of underwear I own. I won't get into details of types and colours and how I simply adore undergarments, that doesn't have to do much with this story, if you will.

But as I sorted through the undies, there to my utter surprise, was the back of my 'missing' journal/notebook/blackbook peeking through the thongs. I knew it was the notebook. The unmistakeable green back. I knew I would turn it over and reveal it's front, the Anne Taintor picuture of the woman with the funny female quote. But what I didn't know is how the book got there.

My book had been missing since August 2011 when I was rearended on the long weekend, when I still had barely a memory after my father's death. I didn't know where I had put that book. And dammit, I had looked, had obsessed, had told friends about "the missing journal", had even called up that rental car place to see (after stupidly bringing my beloved journal out of the house on one stupid occasion) if my book had fallen into those black leather seats. All to no avail. No book.

But I swear I had looked in that same underwear drawer, swear I had, at least once since August when I had seen or used it last. So why did Saint Anthony put it there now?

Whatever the reason, one I will never know, the timing and the fact that my 'lost' book turned up out of nowhere, out of thin air, made for a happy day and made for happier final days of 2011. And not because I wanted to relive old memories or look up old phone numbers, but simply because there are parts of the past me that I want to just simply remember. With the reappearance of the book, it was a reminder that it is time for new memories, rekindling of some former friendships, and some more alone time as well to just find that happier version of myself that was with me just a few years ago. Time for work, school, writing and parenting, and thinking, no, knowing, it will work out this year, all of it. Saint Anthony was proving something to me, and I was reminded of that today, the second day of the new year that was for me a bit less happy than the last few weeks. Blame it on the anti-climactic or not-as-happy-new year's eve that I just experienced ( I really swear this time I'm not going "out" on another NYE or even trying to make plans for anyone but myself for that silly year end night), blame it on the death of a friend's father, or painfully remembering yesterday and today the death of my own father, but I won't let the next few days of 2012 be unhappy, sad or full of trying to make everyone else feel better about themselves. That's not what this year for me is about.

Thank you, Saint Anthony. You returned to me more than my journal.

Loss, Life and Love

It startles me when I find out that certain friends are not as happy as I thought they were, or made them out to be in my mind. The grass can seem greener in anyone else's yard, true, but really, there are people that have more angst, less love, more hurt or broken dreams than I had imagined.

I try not to be that girl that thinks, Well, no one has it as hard, I lost my father. Those moments come perhaps when someone me or my sister knows who is ill, sick, complaining maybe, of something we don't find to be as tragic, as deadly, as the cancer our father fought. But I remember that everyone's pain or ailments are their own, they don't know differently and they still take their own stuff, their own problems on as just that-their own. Who am I to judge who has it harder or worse?

Lately I have been happier than I thought possible for this time of year. Yes, I have the "moments". The sucker-punch, come out of nowhere moments that only hard memories and the complete loss of family can create. But for the most part, especially after a tough November, I am okay.

I have friends who's dreams are lost. I know mine are (for now). But for some of my friends that have been steadily working, climbing, and searching in different ways, the reality is just as harsh, maybe harsher, for them as it has been for me being home for years I didn't plan. Careers or no careers, life happens, flies by, we age, we get lost. We lose battles and we lose love.

We also lose sight of what we have.

I sometimes look adoringly at my friends who are in love. I find it interesting to see where we all are, see even those who don't know where they are. I wonder if there are only three kinds of love. There is the new love. Not the just-met-him/her-last-night love, but the love of a newer relationship that you see in flight. It's going somewhere, you both feel it and people see it in you, hear it in your voice, that you are in love, that you do love.

There is on-going love, or maintained love. The kind where the two people have been together so long but there is still that spark, still that feeling of newness even when dishes take precedent over dates. Neither of you are going anywhere, no one is leaving and it's all happening the way it should.

The last kind of love, is the hardest kind. It's secret, it's unconventional, it's spoken but mostly it's not. You wait for moments that don't always come with a pretty little bow. There are excuses or reasons but there is always passion. Pining for the person when maybe the other is not. It's complicated, crazy or maybe short-lived love. I have been in that third category too much the last few years but it isn't all bad, I won't let it be. I have had men make me smile a smile I didn't think I had in me anymore. Where simply hearing my name from their lips melts me.

I have stopped dwelling on the possibility that the marriage card may never be in the cards for me again. Instead, I have marveled at the joy, really told myself to realize, the ecstatic memories I have built from my unconventional loves. Even the one who doesn't know I pine.

At this time of year, it is easy to be lost. We rush, we purchase, we briefly catch up. I am trying to take stock. That it isn't that bad, we are not as out of touch, out of our place as we think, and sometimes love beats out other kinds of loss.

Yesterday was my dad's birthday.

B-side

I should be sleeping but I'm still on this damn laptop. After a month, (almost two) of losing my data, losing my contacts, losing my addresses, losing my phone numbers, losing people, losing my shit....where was I?

Tonight I turned to Pearl Jam, and listening to music I now remember as my high school days. Tonight I caught the glimpse of marijuana grow-ops on National Geographic. Tonight I saw Tom Ford talk about his life, while always wearing a shirt with at least the first three buttons undone. (Thank you Oprah for telling us how to live). Tonight I recall New York. Tonight I almost call the ex. Tonight I feel like Charlotte, sitting on the couch, watching the doc about Elizabeth Taylor.

The laundry is half in the washer, half in the dryer. I tried to finish it, but it can just be added to the list of what I haven't done.

I should be happy for today. Happy of the better-than-usual alone time with my mom. Happy that there was sunshine. Happy my boyfriend didn't blow up along with his motorcycle. Happy I am, to those degrees and for all those fleeting moments of good times and good news. But now I know happiness doesn't stay or keep (like the fruit I still try to keep in that bowl, on that table) so it's kind of bullshit to the bin in the end.

J

I did not write anything for the months of June and July. One entry in August and I painfully try to write now. When I log in, I see my sister's and friends' entries. I read them, I read them again. Sometimes I look for the hidden meanings I think may be there. Other times, they are too painful to see.

I have taken almost no photos this year. I don't know what I have done, accomplished, or what goals I have set. I have made small strides only this week, when I finally kicked myself in the ass and just went for the things I should have went for months ago. This of course, doesn't include the personal life. God plays tricks on me with the Scorpions he places in my lap.

If it weren't for my sister or close friends of late, I'd be on the ledge, rather, actually, maybe off. I have drank more this year than any other. Stopped and have just sat idle. Cry at anything, laugh at everything, (tears of a clown?) but still, I go on.

People ask how my mother is. The fact is, even for me, her second daughter, I will really never know. I have more of a clue, a peek inside than others, but if I'm struggling, how the hell is she dealing? She spent every night, except for a few, with him by his side for a married life of just over forty years. Forty. I don't know how empty a bed like that would feel.

Last week, I cried hard. Grocery shopping is still a terrible thing. I parked the car in the driveway and almost forgot the kids were there, hearing me sob. My son voiced his almost agitated concern this time. "Mama! Are you crying over Papa again?" Sometimes he just tells anyone that, "her dad died, she's sad", a constant reminder that yes, I am.

I am sorry for the lack of communication to some friends, the dropped plans, or the drunk conversations. It could be worse. I am still oddly, myself to some degree, but just not enough of the old me. I am lost, I will admit. Maybe I will emerge a new person after all of this.

Unaccustomed

The things that evoke memories are random. Why, at my therapist's office, had I picked up a novel, asked about it because of its cover (of course, there was an image of water on it), and then after taking it home, realize the first short story was about a stay-at-home young mother who had just lost her own mother?

Like the songs that my father loved or that reminded me of him, playing instantly after his death in every supermarket I visited, the memories that flood my mind are more vivid than anything in my lifetime thus far. I know now that when the memories first rushed in, during the first days and weeks after he died, I pushed them away. It was unbearable, even with all the good, feel-good memories. I pushed them away. Now I let myself remember, and cry, which I have not done in weeks. I let myself talk about him, talk about my immense sadness, let my children hug me when I cry out of the blue. This morning, River gave me his magnetic drawing board and said I could draw myself a new Dad. I wish it was that easy to bring my old Dad back.

I am learning to deal with the anxiety attacks that have come since his death. Foreign feelings and physical waves of anxiety and panic that I have never had in any of my 36-years. Like the memories, the attacks come out of the blue. A sudden surge of adrenaline-like power in my chest that overtakes my breathing and calmness. It's like I have been running and became out of breath, only I never actually moved, never even jumped up. I have had a bad attack on and off for the past two days, today will make it three days. My heart will race, skip beats at a time, and it's like I am having a heart attack behind my heart or drowning in my own breath. I don't want to take pills for it. Being mindful of deep breathing helps, but hard to do on my own it seems. Being around people takes my mind off the attacks, distracts me, I guess. Maybe I just need closeness in ways I haven't known before. Damian got worried last night when I told him how bad the attack was Sunday night. I told him I never get them when I'm with him and it's been noticeably true.

I wish coping, wish life, was just easier, right now. For now I will drink my pretend tea and remind myself to breathe.

Making Up

I am making up for lost time
Lost chapters, lost entries, lost words.

Weeks have gone by and I haven't any idea how I have felt. I became numb in late March. I had the lifeline of a friend far away, but he reeled that line back to safe ground in April. I guess I don't blame him. I'm a lot to handle.

I haven't known what I have wanted to say to my dad but I know he knows this and what I don't say is still conveyed.

The talks in the hospital did me good, did both of us good. I get tired of family saying, Say It Now. I know, I know, but it isn't always that easy. Sometimes the words just don't come out.

I read my friend's blog tonight, the guy that does everything really well, writing being one of them. He wrote about his father, a recent and precious exchange they had, and also of a gift bestowed, but more importantly, the chance they had, or took, to say things that all of us usually don't manage or have the chance, or find the time to say. I really wanted to tell my friend, (and even his dad), that I was proud of them, of THAT and what that means, but I couldn't find the words to even post a comment on my friend's touching story. But I am glad of all nights, I read his words tonight.

I sat across from my father on Sunday at the dining room table of his house. I knew my sister and mom had taken the kids purposely out of our way, to give us, (or maybe, me), the time I have needed alone with my dad.

I never thought I would have to ask my father if he wants to die, if he is holding on for us and doesn't want to, if he would rather just sleep but hasn't let go. He is ready, has made peace, but won't interfere with the higher power of God. This is my father. This is what he said. This wasn't a surprise, but I had to ask, had to ask for many reasons, especially wondering if he was holding on to be valiant, for me. My dad wants to let God control things but I know that is also hard. I think God has given my good father the chance to Say It All before he dies. We didn't do that all the time in my family. Maybe this is the time for all of us to Say It Now. The times we did this, I do remember, thankfully.

My dad impressed that he was proud of me. That he had raised two daughters so well that he can die now. Is happy at how blessed he was because of me and my sister. The things he says of my children are poetic, and he has loved having grandchildren beyond belief. He takes responsibility for them, (as he should). He was the man in my life that didn't leave, never would have.

When I don't think of what to say, I remember things that were done. One thing for example, small to some, but the world to me, was when my dad picked me up from Glendon Campus so I could come home weekends to work and just be off-campus and away from university. We would go first to the Keg, on the way home and obviously when I wasn't working there. It was just us. We didn't need an occasion, he just pulled off the highway some evenings and took his youngest daughter to dinner. I remember the table, the talks, and him.

So I continue to make up for things, lost words, lost hugs and am trying slowly do it in other aspects of my life. For now, my dad is the first priority, even when I have to let the mundane of my life take over for short bits of time. When we hugged good-bye, him on the chair, me standing over, sadly feeling the sharp shoulderblades of a frail back that used to be hard and strong, he kept my stare, and told me empathatically that he loved me, and I did the same.

Making up for anything lost doesn't take a lot when you mean it all.