~Upstream and Down~

Some days I don't make time to read the paper; others I go from front-page headlines, to Op Eds to obits. The obits I scan, mostly to see the age of death and maybe the cause. Some days are "good" days. The good died old. Other days . . . not so good. Today there was the story of a 17-year old girl whose last hours were spent in a swamp . . . I can read dry-eyed the stories of the men and women who die in their 90s with accolades and acknowledgements. But a child's death brings a pain sharp and cold to my heart. It matters not that underage drinking likely played a part. Who, reading this, can say they have not, by the grace of God, or the luck of the draw, or fate, escaped the consequences of a foolish act? Not I. But this girl paid the consequence of partying with friends, drinking, and then saying good-bye . . . but wandering into a swamp instead of her car. "This is why you have to know where your kids are at all times," my husband says as I read the sto...

My daughter Joanna called me on her way home from work. She does this to touch base, to let us know her plans. She's 23, living home after college, which means she sleeps here Monday through Friday, is out of the house before I'm up in the morning, out until I'm asleep some nights, and away on weekends. Not a bad deal for both of us, although I love having her here. We probably talk more by cell phone and email than face to face. We share commonalities, but we are really very different in many ways. That's why I don't write about her, usually. She's very private, and I try to respect that. She tells me, "You have no filter, Mom!" This is usually hissed in a shocked whisper after I've offered a laughing comment in public that she feels is too . . . I don't know . . . unfiltered. I don't agree that I have no filters, but my privacy sieve has larger holes than hers. I let more through. I learned to do this when I discovered how lonely it was t...

It's Father's Day. Fathers are important. I've learned that even when they're dead and buried, they really aren't gone. Mine isn't anyway. Happy Father's Day, Dad. Love, Ruthie ~~~~~ The call from the nursing home jolted me awake at 3:19 on a snowy Sunday morning. Pearl Harbor Day, December 7, 2003. I knew before answering that my father had died. “Is this Ruth?” The voice was soft. “Yes,” I said bracing myself. “Ruth, your father passed away a few minutes ago.” This call was not unexpected, but still I froze into silence, listening to the wind and whipping snow outside. I needed to be led through the process by experts familiar with wrapping a lifetime into a public package for the wake, the funeral, the burial . . . “What’s the next step?” “Well, with the storm, the undertaker won’t be able to get here for awhile, so you needn’t rush over.” But of course there would be no curling back into sleep’s warm cocoon. My husband got up with me, and made coffee....

We have a cherry tree. It's a baby; its crop of cherries increases slowly each year. This year we might get as pie out of it-- if we don't eat them one by one as they ripen. Its first year as a sapling, it presented us with one dangling red orb. My husband and I each ate half. A small thing that brought pure pleasure. We have to protect the tree from insects and birds if we expect to get our dessert. We covered it with plastic netting that keeps birds out. This morning my husband, picking cherries, called out, "Can you bring me the scissors?" I did, wondering what kind of cherry could cling so stubbornly to the tree as to need scissors to harvest it. But it was a bird, a small house sparrow, tangled in the netting. It relaxed in my husband's grasp, not struggling or even blinking its shiny eyes. He held the bird, and I snipped the net. We anticipated the grateful flutter of wings when the bird was set free, but it couldn't fly. Instead, one wing dragging, it w...

Yesterday when school reopened after spring vacation, teachers learned through a whispered grapevine that a high school girl-- a junior in the district-- had died during vacation week. The details were sketchy as they often are in such stories. People try not to be overly graphic when sharing details, which is probably for the best, but this leaves me grappling with images that come anyway. She was crushed by a car, we heard. Later a friend said the girl had been sneaking out. Not wanting to wake her parents she didn't start the car. Instead, she shifted into neutral to let it roll silently down the driveway. Something went wrong-- she was half in, half out of the car. The car wouldn't steer-- and she was crushed somehow. The paper carrier discovered her body at 4:30 in the morning. Her family was still asleep. Her friends know things-- and her family must, too-- that I don't know. Like, where she was going. To meet a boyfriend? To get together with girlfriends? To drink? S...