Come play at my desk
Today’s post has absolutely no importance in the universe. However, as I was packing up the Mac and cleaning my desk Friday, it struck me I may have an inordinate number of toys at work.
First came the turtle, donated by the Middle Child.
Then came the bear in the duck costume.
Then the Magic 8 Ball, the wiggly frog, the obnoxiously loud duck…
I love them all!
Do you have toys at your desk? C’mon, spit it out. Share. No need to send pictures, but I’d love it if you do. What is your favorite work toy?
TODAY!! This happened…
Two things happened this morning, one huge and one just wonderful. OK! Wonderful first:
Today I realized I have done at least one parenting job right. As we all worked to get ready for the day — which is quite a scene, even with our reduced census, all that hair and makeup and getting Jack into the crate (we hate to say goodbye, so it’s quite drawn out some mornings) — my daughters were talking about some iSomethings (you can add “pod, touch, nano and shuffle” and you will know as much as I do) their friends have.
We, save for one second generation iPod shuffle, have none of those things. And I am not planning to buy them, either.
But my girls were talking about this group of kids they adore and the electronic stash they have among themselves. As I listened about movies on tiny screens and this feature and that, it dawned on me…my daughters had nothing but delight for their friends in their voices. Not a note of jealousy, feigned disdain or whiny entitlement was to be heard.
Like a choir of angels it was! Meaning, somehow, I managed not to blow that parenting assignment. OK, yes, this is a written pat on the back for myself, but I don’t care…it was like seeing the first daffodils outside. Unexpectedly wonderful and a bright spot of hope.
Alrighty then, let’s move on to HUGE! And, yes, I realize I have used up a year’s allotment of exclamation points in this post.
Today, as I applied makeup in the same spot my husband died (well, a few feet higher to be precise), I asked myself my usual question — will mascara be a good idea today? The answer is almost always “No. Nope, forget it, it’s too embarrassing when it runs.”
And, as always, on the heels of that reasoning comes the cloud my guilt trails behind like toxic gas: “If you would have just called the ambulance sooner, David might be alive.”
But today, TODAY, in a blinding flash came another thought, “Yep, alive and in crushing agony.”
People often talk to me about the suddenness of David’s death. And it totally was — sudden and terrible in how it came about.
What I don’t talk about enough is what preceded that Jan. 27.
In April, 2008, David had an industrial accident that caused a spinal cord injury. A severe enough event that a surgeon later told me it was a miracle my sweet boy was able to get up and walk, after being knocked unconscious.
His spinal cord swelled, becoming a Nerf ball crammed into a Lifesaver candy.
It happened just over nine months before he died, a detail I find fascinating — just about enough time to be birthed into a new life.
The surgery meant to stabilize his neck came two months later and added a bonus serving of torture, a pile atop his already-severe suffering.
It never dissipated. In the last months of his life David was, at best, highly uncomfortable. At worst and most, in absolutely excruciating pain.
Hasn’t every loving spouse of an ill person longed to absorb some of the load? Yes, of course, because that’s what a good relationship means — a sharing of woes, an innate desire to alleviate suffering in the other.
I know I said this before, what Grandpa Vern told me, that I was left behind to do the hardest work of all — to grieve.
And TODAY, this very morning, my heart accepted that. I DID take over David’s suffering. He WOULD have continued to be in unbearable torment, wishing he could die and be done. I AM here, Baby Boy, to take this on my shoulders.
Exactly what I would have chosen to do, my love, because you had had enough.
Grandpa Vern is right, David. It’s my turn. Not calling the ambulance in time came at exactly the right moment for you.
And I finally BELIEVE it! But I should not have worn mascara.
I’m buying pizza for the newsroom today, it’s that kind of day. Anyone need a hug? C’mon over! It’s on David.
MAIL ORDER NAG
You may recall that Amazon.com and I had a very touching moment during the holidays when I screwed up my order, they screwed up my cancellation of the screwed-up order, then they magically made everything right at the very moment I was watching Christmas gifts dissipate into thin air.
We salvaged our affair — I love them, they love my money — and came away from the near disaster with the understanding that such a relationship cannot be taken for granted.
Like so often happens, one of us has already forgotten the lesson learned. And it’s not me.
This year, for the first time I guess, I shrugged off my hesitation to use Amazon’s marketplace, buying from other vendors listed at the ginormous Web store.
Am I sorry now. About every ten days I get an e-mail from Amazon, on behalf of an affiliated vendor, begging me to go online to review the product I purchased. That amounts to about 10 products, including some calcium chews that were in the right place at the right price.
“Dear Sheila Hagar,
Thank you for your recent purchases from Amazon.com.
We invite you to submit reviews for the products you purchased or share an image that would benefit other customers. Your input will help customers choose the best products on Amazon.com.
It’s easy to submit a review–just click the Review this product button next to the product.”
This actually started before Christmas, when the gifts I bought had not even been given to my children. And it hasn’t stopped, not as of this morning.
I don’t WANT to review my purchases. It’s like Safeway calling me and saying,” Hey! Howja like those frozen vegetables you bought from us last week? Huh? Huh? You gonna recommend them to some friends? Are ya? Are ya?”
No, Safeway and other grocery stores don’t do that. Why? Because they know if they just leave well enough alone, I’ll come back when the cupboard is bare.
Just now I finally clicked the link and hit the “Opt out” button. I can get all the nagging I need from the kids and the dog. 
Thanks anyway, Amazon.
Positively spudacious
Maybe you’ve seen this, but a friend sent this on and I thought I can’t be the only one who hasn’t. Plus, who can resist a Gilligan’s Island reference?
Please excuse me, I have some potato salad to prepare.
Rated S for sad
From Tuesday’s Home Place column:
On the day you read this, I’ll be getting ready. Ready to walk through the one-year anniversary of my husband David’s death. His unexpected, unprepared-for death.
I started chronicling just days after David left me on Jan. 27. My first blog entry, written at 86 hours post-death, was titled “That phrase, ‘I’m no longer someone’s wife,’ is not rolling off the tongue.”
The posting was a mass of pain and the only sure move I could make at that moment, spilling my trauma all over your monitors.
I’m at a loss how to adequately describe these last 365 days, so I hope you’ll forgive this stream-of-consciousness writing. Just getting the words from head to hand took all the effort I could expend — there was no leftover energy for structure. No spirit to try for the tightly woven or delicious turn-of-phrase that makes writing so fun.
The first item on my list is to give praise. The love, the pure grace that has been extended to my family has been life-changing. I’ve said to any number of people, “If you have to lose your spouse, I don’t think there is any better place to be.”
The community on both sides of the state line has buffered this loss, given us all manner of physical, emotional and spiritual gifts. Amazing mercy has been poured out, bringing “Love thy neighbor as thyself” to life.
There are too many examples to record in one newspaper column, but understand that every light you lit for us, we hope to emulate — it’s too beautiful not to share.
But even as David is arguably the most written-about, recently dead guy in the Valley, I’ve refused to relinquish some things. Example: Except for a handful of paragraphs, I’ve not read a single self-help book about grieving. I’m sorry for the hard-earned money some of you spent and I do expect to one day be able to pick those up. But not yet.
By every account the local grief support group run by Hospice is great medicine, but I turned down that invitation, as well. In dissecting my response, I found I wanted this pain of mine to stay pure, undiluted, to sear me to the core. Why? Because when you lose the love of your life, it seems like it should hurt like hell. The way ripping off one half of your heart feels … pain insurmountable, unsurvivable. Never wavering.
When that finally eases, it will be by the grace of God. Maybe I’m the guy on the rooftop shunning lifeboats while waiting for rescue from the flood … we’ll know if I end up drowning.
I have learned some quirky things about this situation, which I suspect are not widely known. They seem too weird to put in writing. Like going into the closet and donning my husband’s shirt, hoping some of his skin cells fall on mine. Who can say why.
Or hugging his pillow to my side, saying “Get over here, you.”
I run my fingers over the pages of last year’s calendar, thinking, “The last time I touched this page, I was married.”
There’s the Jan. 19 square — 11:30, XXXX Pleasant St., blue/white, flat roof, before bridge.
When I wrote that appointment, I was writing as a whole person. I was going home to a husband. I haven’t touched the squares past Jan. 26, 2009.
You find yourself playing the most awful games with yourself. If I go into Safeway and lose track of time, will David somehow be in the dairy case, waiting to scare me when I reach for the milk?
If I go to St. Mary and skip down the up staircase, might he not still be cooking in the cafeteria, his infectious grin like dessert?
The worst came when the kids and I finally played Wii again. For those who don’t have this Nintendo game, you need to know that each player creates an animated character, an avatar, called a “Mii.”
Typically you design it to look like yourself — mine is chunky, wears glasses and can’t decide on brown or blond hair.
So we selected Wii baseball, and who comes trotting out onto the field? David, in Wii fashion ¬≠– gray hair and beard, square-framed glasses, blue eyes … it took my breath away. How can David be alive in Nintendo land but not here? He’s batting, for goodness sake! He pitched a no-hitter inning! How can he be dead?
I’ve called the old cell phone number to see if someone else has it. When someone answered I said, “I’m sorry, I have the wrong number.” And now it is the wrong number.
There is the stack of pictures I keep handy to look through, searching for any hint in my husband’s eyes of what was ahead for us. Here, on Christmas Day, was there something foretold in the way he didn’t quite smile the same?
It’s enough to make me crazy, which seems like a nice respite from the darker moments.
Did you know, when you’ve lost the love of your life, that flickers of suicide will jump out at you without warning? When you’re waiting to pull out of a parking lot, say, and your brain registers a Kenworth truck barreling down toward you. Your foot thinks about lifting off the brake for a slimmest slice of time. It’s unnerving and seems disconnected with my real self.
Because my real self is too exhausted to do more than pour milk for the kids and wash my face before bed, frankly. My real self can only read fiction, for the most part, and watch happy movies. More than one sad country song and I switch stations. And no NPR, it’s damned depressing.
Suicide would just be too much to manage.
I know some of this is simply raw and I’m sorry about that. You’ll recall I worried early on about how much to say, when it would be too much sadness. But you guys … I don’t know how to say all that should be said. You’ve let me be myself, you’ve taken it all and no one — to my face, anyway — has said, “Enough.”
You gave me permission to be brutally honest and I’ve taken it to my broken heart.
I no longer cry every hour, not even every day. I suspect soon I’ll write a little less about David’s death, that life will offer up new material. Because, I’ve been assured, that’s what life does.
I wonder if I’ll ever date again, if I would ever have the courage to let someone into my life in that way. If I’m attractive enough, how I feel about dating while I have kids at home, if anyone else will ever make me laugh “that way.” Or if that time is over for good. If there even is “someone.”
I’m guessing you’ll know when I do.
I think she may own some words
Maybe some of you remember something I wrote here not long after the dead guy became the dead guy — that when David and I used to argue (oh, I long for a good argument), he told me it was impossible for him to win because I “own all the words.”
I don’t, but dang it if I’m not still flattered that he thought so.
If only that guy could be here now and witness a new wordsmith rising up. Today, while I was brushing on some make-up, the baby waltzed into the bathroom with her latest song.
She’s in a songwriter phase and they just keep coming, but this one…well, it’s special enough to share with you, on the eve of the first anniversary of her daddy’s death.
It’s sweet and it’s sad and I wasn’t going to wear mascara today, anyway.
A Year Ago
by Sheila and David’s youngest daughter, age 11
Just a year ago, I didn’t know it would happen so quickly,
I didn’t know I should be counting the days.
I knew this day would come, but I didn’t know when.
Right now I don’t understand, it’s almost a year and I don’t know why.
That was the worst of my life, that was the worst day.
But it was your best, you got to meet Jesus Christ.
I should feel happy for you and I do.
Just a year ago, I should have counted the days.
Yah.
“Click”
Here I am, sitting at my desk, sending up a thank you to the dead guy. Why, you ask, scrunching your nose slightly — “Why does she call him that?”
I sometimes say that as a way of acknowledging I keep David in the loop, but he is, after all, the dead guy.
Anyway…a frantic call came from one of our daughters, who shall remain unidentified to most of you. This lovely young woman is gently maneuvering into adulthood, independence, a universe separate from her mother’s.
I applaud it all. And this kid, for the most part, is doing a great job of transition. She borrows money, but less often than she used to. She turns down dinner invitations, but she doesn’t haul her dirty laundry home. She drops by work with a vessel of steaming coffee and asks me out to lunch — my treat.
What’s less smooth is her relationship with the little truck she drives, formerly my husband’s favorite toy. About once a week, the phone call comes, just as I’m heading into the shower. My daughter is either at work or trying to get there and it’s all OOHMYGOODNESS! THERE IS SOMETHING WRONG WITH THIS STINKING TRUCK!!! I HATE THIS TRUCK!
You need to know that we have a wonderful mechanic, whom I consider a little kickback from God for removing the car dude at my house. Kevin understands that I’m scared about auto failure, that I need a tremendous amount of guidance and reassurance…that I need to have someone I can totally trust and not feel like an idiot around.
He provides all that, tossing in a little humor, patience, warmth and good suggestions. A dose of Kevin is tonic for all my mechanical worries.
My daughter knows all this, knows she can trundle in with the truck and get anything checked out. Even better, I write the check. Meaning all that is left up to her is just get the truck to Kevin so he can make everything all better.
This morning, that seemed like too much, apparently. And she let me know in an amped-up voice.
Which never flew well with her father. “You will not,” he has said to each kid at some point, “talk to my wife like that.”
Years of hearing that allowed me today to put the receiver down once reason had left the conversation, disconnecting the hysteria from my ear. No worries, she’s a smart and caring young woman — we’ll reconnect and work it out.
The dead guy…still speaking, it seems. I’m listening, Honey.
Who prayed for the fish?
It appears we have a real miracle right here on top of my desk.
Just a week or so ago, I was begging Gilligan’s Uncle Andy to check the fish bowl before I arrived at work, in case any flushing needed to be done.
It was that bad. Every time I came in, I had to jostle the bowl to be sure the-best-betta-in-the-universe was still glugging along. Which he was, but not so you could notice.
I did what I could, futzing with Gilligan’s water, getting him a fresh plant, cooing until my coworkers were thoroughly irritated. But as I said here, it seemed likely I would not celebrate the first anniversary as Gilligan’s mom.
And, as you all know, I’ve had about enough of that for, oh, the rest of my life.
As you can see from the video, however, things are much better! By Monday, Gilligan was eating all his breakfast and snack and beginning to flit to and fro. He’s darting through his plant and once again flinging himself at the glass to get my attention as soon as he spies my morning entrance.
He sent out a thank you email to the office for all the kind wishes and support. Who could ask for more in a pet?
Tigerlicious, or, what IS it about Colorado?
First Balloon Boy and now an artist full of hot air…
This just in.
A Colorado man was arrested Wednesday for apparently using Gatorade bottles to send a message about America’s favorite punchline of the moment.
Jason Eric Kay, 38, was arrested on charges of misbranding and altering food labels with intent to cause serious injury to the business of any person, sayeth the government.
The crime? Authorities say Kay changed labels on bottles of one quart Tropical-Mango Flavored Gatorade bottles. The tampered bottles contained unauthorized labels depicting in part, a photograph of professional golfer Tiger Woods and his wife on one side, and the word “unfaithful” written in bold on the other side.
Internet buzz says discovery began a few days ago at a store in Colorado. The bottles were immediately confiscated after the brand refused to have anything to do with them. The police reported that the bottles were found sealed and the contents had not been tampered with.
This came after Kay initially approached Pepsico with his label vision, insisting it was a win-win situation. He left his phone number and email address for company officials, in case they changed their collective mind. Or called the police, whatev.
The artist, in an attempt to emulate Andy Warhol, reportedly used a Kinko’s photocopier to emboss the pictures. He apparently bought some of the product and slapped the labels on them, sticking his Yahoo email address so fans could contact him.
Kay is not denying the charges against him. Indeed, he claims he chose to take the now-tarnished image of the golfer so he could make people understand the dealio over Tiger’s trysts is nothing but mindlessness. He also commented that it was a good way of marketing and getting recognized.
Maybe about $100,000 in recognition and a year behind bars to bask in it, should prosecutors go the the maximum hand slap.
Colorado must just be excited at the marketing its native sons are providing.
One good deed deserves several others
From Home Place at www.union-bulletin.com
There’s not a lot Bill Dunham hasn’t seen in nearly 20 years of work at the Walla Walla Police Department.
He’ll be the first to tell you he’s not a police officer. But as evidence-minder and record-keeper, Bill is aware of the ebb and flow of the business at the station on Third Avenue. Often that business is conducted by people in high stress who would much rather be just about anywhere else.
Bill was on the way to somewhere else himself last week when he came upon a man tapping at the window of the daylight-basement offices at lunch time.
That man — Bill would learn his name is Don — asked for garbage bags. Please.
Upon stepping off the Grapevine bus from Pasco, Don had spied a boy tossing a banana peel on the ground. A look around the area proved the youngster had plenty of company in littering little Crawford Park, next to Valley Transit’s transfer station and home of the seasonal farmers market.
Could Bill spare a few trash bags so he could tackle some of the problem?
He could and did. Bill offered to hang onto Don’s single suitcase, then watched in amazement as the older man worked through the wet afternoon, harvesting a crop of fast food wrappers from the dense bushes, plucking grimy coffee cups from the asphalt.
Don returned to see if Bill could find him a broom and dustpan. With those tools, the stranger cleared leaves and moved piles of exhaust-coated snow.
He worked like he was getting paid for it, Bill said. Don eventually filled two 30-gallon trash bags and cleaned beer cans from behind the dumpster before coming into the police station to rest.
As he warmed up, he told Bill why he was on that bus from Pasco. Homeless, Don goes between the Tri-Cities and here, alternating between shelter beds. Last week was Walla Walla’s turn.
It didn’t fit, Bill thought. This guy just spent hours in the cold, cleaning up after other people and asking nothing in return.
It’s not like Bill hasn’t seen a whole lot of human behavior on the job, either. Enough con artists and scumbags to last a lifetime, along with perfectly decent people in bad situations.
Don seemed to fit the latter category best, so Bill up and asked Don the big question — “Why are you homeless?”
He wasn’t always, Don said. Indeed, he had worked for Schwan’s “to-your-door” food delivery company for 21 years. He had raised a family, gone through a divorce and retired to Central Oregon.
There, Don fell in love again and the couple was on their way to Salem to visit her family when a girl high on heroin hit them head on.
Hard enough, Don told Bill, that the other driver went through both windshields and ended up in his girlfriend’s lap. But that girl lived and Don’s partner did not.
The girl living with addiction — and now her actions — went to prison while Don went on to try to find yet another new life.
“So he buys a big pickup and was planning to live the high life on the road,” Bill explained to me. Don was on his way to visit his mom in the Midwest when he picked up a hitchhiker. The two stopped at a gas station and Don went in for coffee.
Don couldn’t know his rider had plans to end his own life. The young man took off while Don sought out coffee and headed for the front grill of the first logging truck he could find.
And, it seemed to Bill while listening to his visitor, the hitchhiker took the last vestiges of Don’s will to find — or define — “normal.”
Now Don was here, sitting in the police station, drying out and drinking the coffee Bill poured for him.
“He already told me he had $4 in his pocket. He said his son in Boise wanted him to come live there, but he didn’t have the money to get there.
Like most officials who hear hard luck cases on a regular basis, Bill knew Helpline might be able to, well, help. He outfitted Don with a rain poncho and sent him over to the emergency social-service agency.
Bill didn’t know what Helpline might be willing and able to do. He soon found out, when Don returned with a ticket to Boise, a well-fitting sports jacket, decent jeans and sneakers.
When he complimented Don on his appearance, the older man told him, “Bill, I haven’t looked this good in years!”
There is no way to know if any of Don’s account is true, Bill reminded me. As a writer of a few such stories, I know what he means. You can try to do some investigation, but ultimately you’re at the mercy of your intuition.
Which is what made Bill pick up the phone to call me. In the span of his career, it’s been rare to see a complete stranger clean up part of your town, for “just because.”
It’s unusual to hear a history that doesn’t blame woes on some legal authority or the government.
Uncommon to see the gratitude Don displayed, with no manipulation for more freebies.
So, yeah, Bill listened to his gut. But even more, he considered the lessons the day had brought: Walla Walla needs to clean up after itself better and that Helpline continues to do its good work day after day, mostly under the radar and largely unrecognized.
And that sometimes people really do have a streak of bad luck.
As far as Bill knows, Don is warm and cared for right now at his son’s home in Boise. “I saw him run for a bus,” Bill said. “My assumption is he was on his way and that’s all I can say.”
