Forgive me. It’s been almost three weeks since my last post which is a record. I’ve kind of let myself go on a lot of levels since Cam died, including eating somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen to twenty pounds of chocolate and sugar in various combinations…which I admit I thoroughly enjoyed but in a probably perverse way. Still, sometimes you need to stop doing everything and just float for a while. Let the wind blow you around. Drift. Rest. Think. Remember. Digest.
There’s much to digest here.
But this morning I feel myself returning to the world again, both figuratively and physically. The hubster and I spent nine days out of the last twelve running away to the wilderness every chance we got and there’s nothing quite like getting out on the water surrounded by snow capped peaks, and paddling for miles and miles and miles to help rebuild a crumbling perspective.
I think everyone develops their own way of finding a path back to that feeling of home at their center when they’ve become lost…prayer, meditation, service, gardening, cleaning house, work, family, friends, community, etc.
For the me the way back has always involved the silence and deep mystery of the natural world. It’s where I instinctively turned as a child for congregation and confessional and where I’ve returned ever since, especially when a wound needs tending. The stars and storms, mountains and forests, wind and waters have a way of taking the torn, raggedy edges from any injury and pulling them gently back together again, giving them a chance to meet and knit and eventually scar over.
The hubster loves the wilderness, too, only for slightly different reasons. He feels the silence, too, and needs it as much as I do, but his nature is more wild than mine, or at least wild in a different way. Where I crave the wonder and mystery of vast and ancient forces, he’s after all the grand adventures that wilderness provides, and over time he’s taught me a little of that particular joy he finds in throwing himself, over and over, against inclement everything…weather, conditions, terrain, the absence of any kind of safety precautions.
Looking back I have to both laugh and shake my head at some of the stupid, stupid, STUPID things we’ve done over the years. The hubster is naturally fearless and impatient of anything that stinks of planning…which I, on the other hand, tend to be a little obsessive about. (My basic nature exacerbated by the depression.) But he was always so irresistibly charming and relentlessly persuasive that I followed him anyway, over and over again, into situations that were way over my head. Often over his head, too, but then he loves that.
But since we were lucky and actually survived it all, I now have a treasure cache inside me of memories when I followed him blindly through the labyrinth of all my clamoring terrors to emerge in breathtaking places of grace that were magical and impossible, as if I’d flown there.
My God. I shudder to think what the darkest years of the depression would have done to me without him there to drag me along behind on his adventures, bumping and pointing out every last, little, innocuous threat along the way. I’m pretty sure I would have ended up as a shut-in. It’s really too bad that the man can’t be bottled.
I owe him much, this beloved husband of mine.
Happy anniversary sweetheart and thanks for our continuing grand adventure together. I do so love you.
The Odd and Unmentionable 
Hugs to you both!! Bless you!!
Thanks Becki. We can feel it from here. 🙂
You can never sum up 21 years of marriage, but one of the contexts from this anniversary Marilyn Monroe said so well: “I’m selfish, impatient, and a little insecure. I make mistakes. I’m out of control and at times, hard to handle…But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you don’t deserve me at my best.” Although her list of “worsts” is different than yours…I get to be with you in your “bests”…and that makes me the luckiest
man on the planet. Happy Anniversary Sweetheart! 🙂
Did you look up the rest of that quote?!! 🙂 And here I thought I could hide the list from you. 🙂
Much love and many more happy decades dancing with the elements!
Sweet! Great to hear from you. Hope everything’s good up your way!
It has been a mixed bag, but much better than no bag at all. Everything is looking brighter though.
I’ve been soaking in the beauty of the vivid leaves to keep my perspective. Maybe that is where our common ground begins.
I’m so sorry for the turbulence…and curious about things. Always curious. 🙂 Is your thesis done then? Thank god for the natural beauty of this state, no? I’m not sure what I’d do at times without it.
xox
Ah, well this may be tmi, but I’m the curious type as well, so I understand. The turbulence was an impromptu trip home to see my dad. He’d had a stroke and waited 3 days to tell anyone. Of course he didn’t want us spending the money to come see him as there was “nothing” we could do. (To be frank I enjoyed all the nothing I did with him while I was there.)
Then not long after we returned from IL I started having back spasms. They went on for a couple of weeks, I even went to quick care once, but all my blood levels (and even an EKG) came back fine. Labor Day I was shopping with a friend who convinced me to go to the ER after I told her it felt just like when I had my gall bladder out (in 1993). But we had tested for elevated enzyme levels and all was fine… right?
Nope, an ultrasound found two stones hanging out in my common bile duct. I received an ambulance ride to Spokane and a quick surgery. As warned, the surgery “angered” my pancreas and I spent most of the week in Sacred Heart riding out pancreatitis.
We are pushing my dissertation back to Spring, because of everything. It will all work out, though. Maybe better than it would have otherwise.
Oh owwwww! A little like getting swept up in a tornado, whipped around, then dropped again in a debris field, eh? Recovery efforts underway. I trust your Dad’s stroke wasn’t too serious? And thank God your friend talked you into returning for another check! Sometimes I wonder if there’s a little too much diagnostic dependence placed on blood tests. My mother had advanced colon cancer but wasn’t diagnosed until two weeks before she died because one of the standard blood markers kept coming up negative. The earlier doctors she saw thought it was first pneumonia and then congestive heart failure. A lesson in seeking second opinions I suppose. Take care of yourself! I’m sending waves of healing/strengthening/cooling thoughts to your pancreas. 🙂
Sending love and cyber happiness..with a little strength thrown in! x
Thank you so much for your kind thoughts. I can feel the love from here.
BTW, I followed your party from down the block somewhat…what a fabulous, generous thing to do for everyone! I’ve only visited a couple of the blogs yet but you seem to have attracted quite a collection of vivacious writers. It was all so very fun! Bravo on your successful portage and a party well thrown.