I'm so spent from carrying around all these words that won't organize themselves into any kind of meaning ... .

As the past few entries illustrate, life is extremely intense right now, with few ways to process the incoming emotional strafing!
Being too tired to sort through the overload, I'm finding myself battered by disturbing dreams that bring visitations from my children's dead father, Mel, and our son, Rick. It's as though I'm re-directing all of that into an area that is safer to deal with. I can always force myself awake if necessary, unlike life in the real world right now.

Work has been equally intense with more speaking engagements; more shifting of assignments on the job; the opening of new edges of interest (i.e. the Eugene O'Neill/Paul Robeson connection); the loss of a colleague to a prestigious position across the country; retirement of a staff member and the entry of several new seasonals. I'm becoming increasingly comfortable with a more public role, but there is that quiet self-imposed pressure to excel that persists. But along with that comes a growing sense of confidence in my ability to continue to "do the work."

Dorian has been with me over the past 3 weekends. She's going through a period of uncertainty -- which happens without explanation from time to time. Her closely-cropped hair is growing out nicely. In fact, I've grown to love it, actually. Looks like a sleek black cap and can be cared for with a few swipes of a damp washcloth. Her bald state never bothered her a bit, and I got over her self-inflicted hair-removal adventure within a day or so. We never did get into hats or scarves and I think that's probably healthy.

So much is so wonderful! Having Rosie enter our lives was so unexpected, and so enriching for us all. Going back over life as it might have been; or life as it never was; must be unbelievably disturbing/exciting to both her and to Bob, even while it brings completion and inestimable joy. What an amazing story they're living!

However, the job of carrying around the weight of unspoken words and conversations not entered into -- is taking its toll. I'm trying so hard not to see the yellow flags. Not to be a Cassandra with warnings of where the potholes are down the road. What to look out for -- given my life experience and "accumulated wisdom" over the decades. I guess it's a "mother" thing. Oh how I wish I could turn off the flares, put away the buoys, and just relax into their happiness! Instead I find myself trying to peer around all of the blind corners; imagining all the players who have influenced her life that I've yet to meet; wishing I could remember what needs to be passed along to a son who has missed all of the preparatory struggling that goes into the making of the mature adult from the innocent child. But then I remember that I never really learned those lessons myself, I think, and that few of us ever do.

Maybe the only really wise advice would be to assure them that wherever one steps in or out of the life process is just fine. That there never were any guarantees; that skipping the "what ifs" and living out the moments we're given as they extend out into hours, days, and years, is all that really matters. Maybe they've been given the best part, from now until whenever ... .

One would think that there would have been an owner's manual to pass along ... generation to generation. Any truly enlightened Creator would have thought of that, wouldn't you think? But then we're not really owners at all, are we? In a way we are simply vessels through which life passes eon after eon ... into infinity ... with each of us being absolutely essential to our time.


(...and all the while -- playing loudly in the background was the most unlikely national drama of my lifetime! Not writing about it here took every shred of self-restraint that could be mustered! )

Suffices to say, "Yes we did!"