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Yesterday, Loca and I got up and headed out to the park. Our long journey began with an errant turtle who had lost its way from the lagoon and was about to get crushed as it crossed the street. I picked it up to bring it back to the lagoon but noticed that a fishing line had gotten caught on it and so then began my search for a knife or scissors to free the poor guy. Two fisherman didn’t have a knife – how is that possible? So I headed to the cafe in the park and as I got there a couple was entering with their two small children and I asked if they could get me scissors because I had a turtle in one hand and a dog in the other.

They guy quickly brought his baby in and returned saying he had one of those all in one gadgets in the car. So we went over there and turns out he had never used the thing – most likely having gotten it for a holiday gift as I think they were the trend one year. He tried and tried and couldn’t figure out how to open it and then he read the instructions, but we ended up improvising and just sticking the line into a knife we could see in there that had teeth. Wala, free turtle. I brought him back to the lagoon and he dove right in.

Then because I was in the mind to move my body having just seen a young woman running the other morning with such a carefree gait that I wanted to feel that way again, mobile, agile, strong, energetic and since I had put on my great Newton running shoes, I started sprinting and then stopping to stretch, then sprinting, and Loca was with me the whole time, up and down and all around. We then went over to the exercise area and I hung upside down for a bit on the bar and stretched and then sprinted some more. We exhausted ourselves and on the walk back through the park, we decided to sneak across the railroad tracks that are over the lagoon by the sculpture garden.

And then we ran into the mayor of the neighborhood as we are want to call him and he wanted me to take a spin with him, so we walked some more as he told me about his recent trip south to help poor children. It was quite a tale and inspired me to want to do good work myself. Loca meanwhile was jumping in the lagoon and running around like a nutball. By the time we got home, we were ready to relax but we had been out so long that we had to quickly just head out to the hospital to make visiting hours for mom.

But for that moment in time, in City Park that is so beautiful with its big oak trees and heavy moss hanging from the branches and its big meadows and lovely new big lake with all the new plantings, we had found our muse I and Loca, and we passed a good time.

Mortal sins were created by Catholics to educate believers on acts that might destroy their state of grace – the seven no no’s are “Lust”, “Gluttony”, “Greed”, “Sloth”, “Wrath”, “Envy”, and “Pride”. I have one more to throw into that fire – “Ingratitude”. How come that is not on there? In our discussions and dreams about our child, T and I realize there is much we might not know about how this person will develop but the one thing we do hope for most of all is a grateful child.

Today in the midst of what I dubbed War of the Worlds, once again the elder member clashed with the younger member of our visiting family and in the midst of everyone reaching pitched height of emotions, I found myself arbitrating much in the same way my mother did in our household many years ago when my father roamed the earth. Picture a rage-a-holic father prone to violent outbursts and six children who could bring the house of cards tumbling down and throw in one soft spoken mother who was anxious and prone to drink who tried to negotiate peace.

The other day when mom was going through the DTs really bad and Wendy the sitter was there, she told me late in the afternoon that she and Brenda (she called Wendy Brenda the entire time) had had words and she said at me with a frown, “I hate conflict you know.” I sort of laughed at the time because I thought, hey, you signed on for the wrong family – drama, guns, rage, gypsy blood – you hate conflict, good grief. It’s almost like saying I hate my skin.

But today, being the peacemaker, I saw myself in my mother’s role, I heard even her voice come out of my mouth – in a different way of course. My mom would beg in a drama scene for my dad to quit yelling and for us to apologize for imaginary crimes. The whole family fit together like that – one screaming, one begging, one crying – on and on and on till my father dropped dead of a massive coronary, which I have to say I presaged when I was having lunch with three of my sister in laws four days earlier.

I don’t feel like I am an ingrate – I love my family despite their troubles and I love my mother despite the Chardonnay-colored glasses she wore against the reality she could not suffer – and yes, sometimes I have been angry and frustrated because I selfishly wanted her to be healthy – but all in all, I’d have to say I have been grateful for the life I was handed.

My aunt told me that a neighbor of hers was adopted and that her father loved for her to sing and while he was dying, she sang to him.

I went to the late night visiting hour to see mom and make sure she went to sleep a little more comfortable than I had seen her midday. I walked into a gaggle of girls, nieces and sister-in-laws all lined up around her bed. Which is good. In the center was my niece who chose to lecture me and turn away from me because of my affair – now mind you, she met her own husband when she was engaged to be married to a very nice man, but I digress. She named her daughter after me too. Again I digress. I wanted to tell her that she and her dimwitted husband who called me to tell me he thought I was coming onto him are both out of their blooming minds. But instead, I watched her seeing my mom for the first time since she’s been in the hospital, tears in her eyes, and I thought, families are so fucked up and so are people, and so are situations that can suddenly make or break years old relations and you know what, I just left the hospital feeling like I had a tube down my throat and I wasn’t quite sure I knew if living to see all of the grand plan worked out was really that noble a cause after all.

From my favorite poetry site:

[the aquarium deserted now,]

the aquarium deserted now,
this is the song at dusk I write in the notebook:
strange skin
not quite seal
not quite dolphin
inchoate
texture like
something you forget
something you didn’t even see
the first time
old shoe
sentient being with others in watery caves
lights off
with motive & mind up a ladder
mouth moving
quixotic mind
quick flick
who are me
who haunt me
please haunt me
summoned by the dream
the kusha grass instructs
you might say a kind of ceremony
gather up these nightmares
this in a public space
where many minds meet
& pass around the objects of this dream
a blindfold, a crystal, a card with a bodhisattva upon it
gather them up & making an offering
all the bikkus going down on their knees for this
in this world marked out by the augur
interstices between living & dead
an initiation on the nature of time
& of continuity in a dark time

mean world: humanity
dream world: manatee
secret world: om mani padme manatee hum
om mani humanity padme hum
the center of reference becomes movement in this ritual

ANNE WALDMAN

Okay, a friend whose summer started with a distant relative throwing herself from a window said she was wondering if this summer is worse than last when she had three relatives die in a row and spent her summer vacation going from one funeral to the next. I ask myself the same question – why does it seem as if I turn to the right and my friend went home to check in on her parents and ended up with both of them in the hospital and her dear aunt dying. And then I look to the left and my friend lost her son suddenly. And then I look to the news and celebrities are dropping like flies – and then I look to my mom and I am trying to figure out if my selfish desire to see her alive is worth the hell she is living right now which basically looks like it doesn’t get much better either as let’s just say she gets off the vent and then what, she has to learn how to walk again, breathe again and even swallow and they want her to do all of this within the confines of the hospital not in her little apartment with her little table and the pleasures she’s known.

I think of the aunt that died unexpectedly waiting for her expensive skin cream to arrive any day – isn’t that better? Better than the ones who have found their way into assisted living or the nursing home where they wait out their days in Depends?

I don’t know about quality of life for the elderly – I do know they are all at our mercy and wow, I’m not sure I want to be there. Ugh.

I’m trying to take those deep breaths right now. I got up and went to spin class because I need to exercise to control the running dialogue in my brain. Then T and I went to see mom and visit with her for the mid day time – she was in a poor mood as you might suspect. Afterwards, we swung by brother’s house and visited with my two nieces that were – oh my – sunbathing, if you could believe it. T and I went outside with a major umbrella and sought shade to chat. Then my niece brought out her pet pythons and of course, that made T’s day – she said she found holding the snake so relaxing. We almost brought the pythons home because we would do anything to relax around here these days.

Last night, we fled out of the door to find some privacy and go have a bite to eat at Meaux Bar – just the two of us and baggage that weighed about 80 tons. What to do, where to go, no where to hide from what is front of us. It’s kind of like that Eli’s Coming feeling except it sort of never ends. The family is here for one more week and the reality that this might be T’s mother’s last trip hangs in the balance. My mom continues to struggle against the pricks in the hospital and can’t come to any peace with where she is. The adoption process feels almost like the Pompidou Center where the inner mechanics have become so revealed you are either repulsed or amazed – meanwhile, I feel like I’m on the basketball court and someone keeps throwing me the ball but I don’t want it – so I toss it back only no one is there to catch it and the ref keeps yelling FOUL.

Not sure what to make of all of this but I think about what someone told me this week – don’t mistake not getting worse with getting better.

Last night, T and I introduced our 14-year-old niece to the vast world of attitude adjustment via a wig:

My goal today was to take the afternoon off and go see the movie about Julia Childs only it isn’t playing in New Orleans yet. My other goal was to not work this afternoon only I had a bunch of stuff pending on my desk. I spent two good visits with mom who is frankly miserable in the hospital and wants to get out of bed, off the vent, and out of there. Well, frankly I want the same thing for her but I’m taking a deep breath and learning how to accept baby steps with zigs and zags. She’s not. Which is a good sign that she is recovering because as her muleheadedness returns, I have to believe she is improving.

Now about this afternoon, I was standing in my office on the phone and looking out at the bayou and the flotilla of ducks went by and I said to myself, self I said, fuck those ducks. But I really have no emotional energy to be upset about a duck no more than I have to even contemplate why adopting a baby is like just writing checks to one attorney after another and meanwhile what? I also don’t have the emotional energy to have my sister call from another state and tell me just how I should be caring for my mother – make her laugh, my sister informs me on the phone. Oh really?

So in the meantime, after a very long week, and an aborted afternoon off, I have only this to say to every last one of you – T G I F F.