Losses and Beginnings
We’re having our first snowfall of the winter. With most of my Christmas lights up, and most of the heavy-lifting done at work, at least until after the holidays — unless, of course, we get a little Christmas present from congress and they furlough us on the 22nd — I find myself beginning to reflect on the year coming to a close.
2017 was a year of loss, and a year of new beginnings. The losses weren’t all bad, but the beginnings were mostly good. The biggest loss, for me, was the loss of my favorite place to tell and read stories, Cowbird. Such a special place, a place I invested a lot of my time, love and talent into, and that I ultimately felt abandoned by. I’m mostly over it. It was great while it lasted, it was just never built to last or be sustained over a long haul.
I’ve had a lot of those kinds of things in my life, so I’m used to it. But, its loss still stings, I think mainly because I thought it was unnecessary to shut it down like they did. I loved it so much, and I miss the community it had brought together. I still see some of that community, some on Facebook, some on Medium at the Story Hall, stories still are told, we still have that — but, there was just some magic something about Cowbird that I can never really adequately define, that none of these other gathering places quite achieve. I do miss that.
It feels a little bit like when my family moved to Connecticut from Pittsburgh when I was 17. At first, the new place was exciting and new, but then a big part of me began to miss a lot of things about Pittsburgh. When I went back, even just a few months later, it was no longer the same place, for me. The essence of what had made it home was no longer there. It took a long time for me to find an essence like that anywhere else.
Where I live now has it. Wherever I go actually has it. The essence really lives in me. It took me a long time, but I eventually learned that I just had to tap into it, and realize that, wherever I am, it’s home, if I want it to be. But, here in Vienna, that essence is stronger than anywhere else. This is where I find the true comforts of home.
It took us a long time to find this. I suspect it might take some time to find that writing community place that possesses the essence that we once enjoyed at Cowbird. But, I do believe it will eventually happen. It may well be even better than before. Let’s just say I’m open to that possibility. Someday. Some way.
Another loss was actually a good one. I lost my chronic vertigo. A successful surgery in April did the trick. They went into my eustachian tube and opened it up, and they rebuilt the sketchy area behind my left ear drum with some cartilege borrowed from the outer ear canal, and my world stopped spinning out of control.
The level of comfort and quality of life this has added has been beyond what I ever hoped was possible. The sense of relief from this has been even greater than the sense of relief I enjoyed after discovering that my brain tumor had just gone away, late last year.
The support and comfort I received, while going through the recovery from surgery, from both family and friends, was pretty great. It was the first time I ever had a surgery where I had to go under anesthesia. Between that, and the pain meds I had to take for the first 24 hours, I was really whacked out for about a week. Fortunately, a lot of people in the fellowship I am now a part of, and my wife and son, really stepped up and were there for me, as I went through that.
During that week of recovery, I learned of the loss of a couple of people who played significant roles at different times in my life, and would have really liked to attend both of their memorial services, but couldn’t in my condition of recovering from major surgery. That was difficult. I wanted to be there, in both cases, with others who their lives had touched, to share in the celebration of a couple of exceptional lives, lived well. There was simply nothing I could do about that, and had to just accept it.
Oh, and I made the mistake of wandering onto facebook while I was in that whacked out state of mind. Suddenly, I had a lot of new facebook friends who I had no idea who they were. I just kept accepting friend requests, because I was stuck at home, out of my mind, and feeling talkative. I now have hundreds of facebook friends who I still don’t know who the hell they are. Whenever any start getting freaky with their posts, I just unfriend them. I’m slowly whittling my friends down to the ones I actually know.
Before I get off the loss side of the equation, I’ll just use a blanket statement to say, we lost a hell of a lot of civility in how we govern in this country, this year, and we’ve lost a hell of a lot of standing in the world community, for reasons that are obvious to anyone who has been paying attention.
I still assert that none of these are permanent losses — I do believe that the forces for a better world and universe will eventually overtake the dark forces that currently seem to be moving it all in the wrong direction, and, in fact, I see all of this current insanity mobilizing those forces more than anything else could have, so I believe that we will come out of this dark period in much better shape than it possibly looks like, from right here at this juncture in time.
We have to, or we’re all fucked. I’m hanging onto my belief that we will find a way. I just hope there’s something left for us to work with, by the time we do. They’re burning the existing structure down at an alarming pace. Maybe it needs to come down — I just don’t like, nor trust, what they want to build in its place. I pray every day about this.
Enough with the losses of 2017. Much was gained, much turned in a positive direction, despite the above mentioned political goings-on. Several friendships deepened and went to new levels this year. Most notably and thankfully, the most important friendship in my life, that with my wife of 32 ½ years, took a major turn for the better in the second half of this year.
It took a sudden wake-up call, precipitated by the equivalent of a two-by-four upside the head, but I woke up. I reached out to a couple of friends for help, realizing I was really off and clueless about what to do about it, and the one, especially, was exactly the right person to have reached out to. He knew just what to say to me, and pointed me in a couple of directions that have helped make the second half of this year incredibly enriching for my soul, and for our relationship.
Right around the same time I was getting whacked upside the head with that two-by-four, I got a wake-up call at work that made me realize, shit, I was off in several areas of my life. I kind of knew I was, but I didn’t think anyone was noticing. They were. Since then, work has taken a decided turn for the better, as well. When I’m there, I’m THERE. I’m in a job where I need to be there when I’m there, or it’s just not going to work.
There’s something about realizing the truth, even if the truth is that you are really messed up, that puts one in a position to open their minds, and to up their reliance on the spiritual principles one knows work. I knew, but wasn’t really applying them, fully availing myself to them. I was trying, but I was putting more energy and attention into my fears, and trying to avoid the harder realities of my life. This just doesn’t work.
The guy who helped me out, suggested a particularly good meeting on Sundays, that focuses on the 6th and 7th steps of AA. He characterized it as the equivalent of the PhD program of AA. I cracked, “and me still just working on my Masters”. He immediately shot back, “That’s okay, everyone gets here with a B.S.” (could mean bachelor of science, or bullshit — more likely the latter, in most cases, myself included!) That meeting was just what I needed. I subsequently found another one, on Saturday mornings, that focuses on the 6th, 7th, 10th and 11th steps, that has proven to be a real gold mine.
He also suggested counseling. I wouldn’t have thought of that myself, but my friend was striking all the right chords, so I followed that one, as well. Kathy had just done a lot of research, as she was planning to find one for herself, too. She suggested I try the guy who I’ve now seen close to twenty times. What a game-changer that has been!
The other thing that has taken off since my mini-crises, has been quality morning meditations. The best, most consistent meditations I’ve experienced in 33 years of regular meditation. I don’t know if the fact that I no longer have something in my head, physically causing considerable turmoil in there, has anything to do with it, or if I was just ready emotionally to go deep. I don’t know, and I don’t care. All I know is, I’m there now, and really grateful that I am.
2017 still has three weeks and a day to write its full story, but at this point, most of it is in the can. All in all, I believe the ledger for the year leans on the side of progress made, and for that, I am most grateful.
As one of my friends whose friendship went considerably deeper this year, said as we were parting ways from our usual Thursday night meeting at McDonald’s for hot fudge sundaes and catching up with each other, last week — “I can’t wait to see what happens.”
“What happens when?” I asked.
“Just what happens. I can’t wait to see it.”
Me neither. I’m looking forward to whatever is up around the next bend. I can’t wait.
