Don't Forget to Call Your Mamma... *
NOTE: This entry was written Saturday, 29 August 2015. In the wee hours of Monday morning, 31 August 2015, my mother died peacefully. I am so grateful for all of the readers - friends and those who don't know us - who honor her and my family by reading this.
My mother has been one of my greatest teachers throughout my entire life. For years, since I got my first email account, twenty-five years ago as a college freshman, my mother and I had a nearly daily (and sometimes multiple times a day) email correspondence. In time, this became a sharing of struggles and mutual support. Always, she shared insights -- about her life, the lives of people we know, and life in general -- that helped me to grow and change inside. Nearly three years ago, that correspondence, and our ability to talk on the phone (we definitely needed bulk long distance in the days before cell phones), disappeared in an instant. She was in the hospital, I called to talk and comfort her, she picked up the phone, and -- with my dad and the doctor in the room there, she suddenly couldn't speak.
Since then, despite her inability to speak, my mother has continued to teach me, day in and day out, about the strength and will to continue to live, to always strive to move forward, to get back up on one's feet literally and figuratively.
And so it breaks my heart that this past Thursday my dad and I finally had to be the ones to say "it's time to let go." She knew, too. I'm sure she did. In her last conscious moments, she looked deeply at each of us gathered in the room. My dad**, my brother, my husband, me.
We continue to watch vigilantly, as her body pulses on.
"If I have done anything to harm you in the past year, please forgive me." My mother taught me to always ask these words out loud, each year in season of Awe. We have usually asked between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
"Repent one day before you die," taught Rabbi Eliezer (Avot). There is no time like the present. I don't expect my mother to live to see Rosh Hashanah, two weeks from now. Right now it is Elul, the month preceding these days -- and a time of preparation for those upcoming days of awe.
Last night I sat by my mother's bed and asked her forgiveness. This is the hardest year, yet. Did I imagine the slight raise of eyebrows, or a minute squeeze from her hand?
I sang to her from Psalms:
עשה עיני אל ההרים מעין יבוא עזרי
I will lift my eyes to the mountains from whence my help comes.
(among others)
and also from the prayers of forgiveness:
סלח לנו מחל לנו כפר לנו
Forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement.
(among others)
My mother has taught me to live tradition, not just to know it, by living it herself.
Any sins I commit, by omission, by neglect, or by intent, are my own. And I have plenty.
It occurred to me last night when I returned home, and was trying to find sleep, that there is another way in which my mother has lived that I have not fully lived up to.
I have never once heard my mother say "I don't want to...."
(There is one exception, and it is only in the past year when she has been entirely dependent on other people for nearly every aspect of her life from access to food and entertainment to personal hygiene, and I do not count this as a lapse, but rather as a part of her ongoing desire to have some control and sense of safety in her fragile life during this time.)
I know that I regularly feel that "I don't want to." When I would express this as a kid, my mother would make me do things anyway -- but she always stood behind me, sometimes literally, as I did them. A silly memory of this is when I went to get my driver's permit. I was nervous, it was a new thing, I didn't know what to ask or how. She coached me, but she wouldn't go up to the desk for me and ask for the paperwork -- she made me do it. Nearly thirty years later, I still remember that moment, and am grateful for it. Her coaching from way back continues to guide me when I encounter new things.
But I can be stubborn, and sometimes it takes me a long time to go up to that desk, to step up to the plate as it were.
As my mother lies unconscious, as we watch her body wither, I cannot help but think how I have already missed in the past few years since she lost her ability to speak and write, and how greatly I will miss, her coaching, her conversation, her stamina.
In my mother's honor, I want to strive harder against the "I don't wanna" feeling in my life.
Don't forget to call, talk with, write to, connect with your loved ones. Don't forget to call your Mamma! I'll be sitting by my mother's side as long as I can. I love her more than anything in the world!
Notes:
* Don't Forget to Call Your Mamma...I Wish I Could Call Mine is the title of a book by Lewis Grizzard.I once had all of Grizzard's books, collections of his syndicated newspaper humor column. I laughed heartily through my late teens and my twenties to his work. This is the only book I have kept through the years, though I haven't reread it in at least a dozen.
** For family, and others who wonder or know, he is my step-dad. See my father's day post from this year.
Showing posts with label forgiveness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label forgiveness. Show all posts
Saturday, August 29, 2015
Sunday, August 16, 2015
Wake Up, Elul is Here! -- with Writing Prompts
רבי אליעזר אומר, יהי כבוד חברך חביב עליך כשלך, ואל תהי נוח לכעוס, ושוב יום אחד לפני מיתתך
Rabbi Eliezer would say: The honor of your fellow should be as precious to you as your own, and do not be easy to anger. Repent one day before your death. (Sayings of the Fathers (Avot) ch.2)
Asked his disciples: Does a man know on which day he will die? Said he to them: So being the case, he should repent today, for perhaps tomorrow he will die; hence, all his days are passed in a state of repentance. (bShabbat 153a)
Mindfulness is a hot ticket word in contemporary American culture. It goes along with meditation, yoga, contemplative practices. Some of us may roll our eyes at the term, others may say, "yeah, I do that!" and still others — perhaps most of us — have a desire to increase our mindfulness.
In the ancient wisdom of Rabbi Eliezer we find the call to be first of all mindful in our relationships. Hold the honor of our fellows high, and try not to get angry. And, knowing we will err, as surely all humans do, Rabbi Eliezer offers a way out: repent. Now.
But don't we all get caught up in the rush of daily life? Don't we sometimes rush to grumble about the person in front of us on the road, or in a grocery store? Don't we sometimes yell at our children out of exasperation even when we know it won't help anything (I did that the other day at the park, and I'm still thinking how ridiculous I must have looked to all those — one of my less pretty parenting moments)? Aren't we all sometimes selfish, sometimes abrupt, sometimes hot, sometimes judgmental? Haven't we all acted before thinking?
The blasts of the shofar, from this first day of Elul into the coming new year, call us to wake up, to check in with ourselves and see, just how mindful are we? Just how aware are we in our daily lives?
Even if we have a daily practice of self-reflection and self-improvement — even if that practice has us turning to those we have been angry at, or have judged poorly, in the process of our daily lives — even so, very few of us don't need a reminder.
Elul gives us a month to reflect on the last year and to renew our mindfulness in preparation for the new year, and another ten days to seek forgiveness before we rehearse our death at Yom Kippur.
Wake Up! shouts the shofar. Pay attention. How are you being in the world?
One of my spiritual teachers regularly asks the question How be you? Sometimes this sets my inner grammar police wriggling uncomfortably. But just now, I'm hearing it differently. "How are you feeling" is not the question she is asking me. Rather, I am sure, she is asking How are you being in the world? How be you?
And this is the question I offer to you. How are you being in the world?
WRITING PROMPT: If you don't have a journal, find some blank paper. Write down the question, How am I being in the world? How was I in my interactions with people today? Now spend 18 minutes (my timer is set there, but chose your amount of time) reflecting on one or more encounters you had with other people today. Focus on how you were in those interactions; let go of how they were, only judging them with honor.
And this is the question I offer to you. How are you being in the world?
WRITING PROMPT: If you don't have a journal, find some blank paper. Write down the question, How am I being in the world? How was I in my interactions with people today? Now spend 18 minutes (my timer is set there, but chose your amount of time) reflecting on one or more encounters you had with other people today. Focus on how you were in those interactions; let go of how they were, only judging them with honor.
Repeat this exercise throughout the week. If there are days when you feel like you don't have much to say, reflect backward; is there an experience from the last week, month, year that you are still thinking about, that is still bothering you in some way? Reflect!
Sunday, July 12, 2015
Matot-Masei: On Vows and Vowing
Oh, how we try to wriggle out of vows.
I do it as a parent: "If you don't stop, I'm going to take away x." And then I feel guilty, or like it was a harsh punishment, and I find myself backing off. Another parent recently reminded me, "the trick is never to promise or threaten anything you don't intend to follow through on."
I do it as a partner: "I promise I will be better about a." And then I try to narrow the circumstances where a actually applies.
I do it to myself: "I promise to give my body the chance at a full night's sleep." And here I am staying up past my bedtime to write a blog post.
This week's Parashah, the combined Matot-Masei, opens with "If a man makes a vow to God...he shall not break his pledge." (Never mind that it then diminishes a woman's vow, saying her father or husband can negate it, or allow it to stand. I'm going to assume we all agree that men and women are equal, and thus nobody owns the vow of another.)
Torah has plenty to say about vows. Indeed, it is pretty serious about them, especially those in which we obligate ourselves to actions directed at God or in God's name, but also those in which we obligate ourselves to our neighbors, our planet, even ourselves.
Later Jewish custom wriggles, just like we (I) do in everyday life.
Kol nidre (All Vows) - the title prayer of the service that kicks off Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) - asks that our vows be annulled, that every serious oath we have taken be wiped out, that we not be held accountable.
No, Judaism doesn't say we can get out of our obligations so simply. Indeed, there were early concerns about the notion of annulling vows. The Jewish Encyclopedia discusses a medieval change in the prayer:
What I fear (and I am not alone in this fear) is that we lose the meaning of vows, and even smaller promises - to God and to people - when we assume we are free because of a prayer recited months ago.
I see this diminishing vow-lue -- in the person who goes into a marriage saying, "well, if it doesn't work out, we can always get a divorce," and in my own practices of self-care, be it what I feed myself or my lack of exercise.
The Kol Nidre prayer does not, in fact, ensure us freedom from our vows. Even with the prayer, we must still be careful with our promises, and we must nonetheless atone for our failures before we can expect forgiveness.
A vow is a weighty thing - and it should be. Whether we are promising something to a friend or to God, we should feel the obligation of the relationship. We should not enter in expecting that we can simply wriggle out from under that weight easily, lightly. Still, it's nice to know that, if we make a promise and cannot fulfill it, we can be forgiven, even if it takes some emotional, spiritual, even physical work on our part to get there.
I do it as a parent: "If you don't stop, I'm going to take away x." And then I feel guilty, or like it was a harsh punishment, and I find myself backing off. Another parent recently reminded me, "the trick is never to promise or threaten anything you don't intend to follow through on."
I do it as a partner: "I promise I will be better about a." And then I try to narrow the circumstances where a actually applies.
I do it to myself: "I promise to give my body the chance at a full night's sleep." And here I am staying up past my bedtime to write a blog post.
This week's Parashah, the combined Matot-Masei, opens with "If a man makes a vow to God...he shall not break his pledge." (Never mind that it then diminishes a woman's vow, saying her father or husband can negate it, or allow it to stand. I'm going to assume we all agree that men and women are equal, and thus nobody owns the vow of another.)
Torah has plenty to say about vows. Indeed, it is pretty serious about them, especially those in which we obligate ourselves to actions directed at God or in God's name, but also those in which we obligate ourselves to our neighbors, our planet, even ourselves.
Later Jewish custom wriggles, just like we (I) do in everyday life.
Kol nidre (All Vows) - the title prayer of the service that kicks off Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) - asks that our vows be annulled, that every serious oath we have taken be wiped out, that we not be held accountable.
No, Judaism doesn't say we can get out of our obligations so simply. Indeed, there were early concerns about the notion of annulling vows. The Jewish Encyclopedia discusses a medieval change in the prayer:
"An important alteration in the wording of the "Kol Nidre" was made by Rashi's son-in-law, Meïr ben Samuel, who changed the original phrase "from the last Day of Atonement until this one" to "from this Day of Atonement until the next."The implication in this change is that we shouldn't be making vows to God in the first place, because we are sure to falter. But while this might be a relief (since we might make vows in the heat of a situation), it does effectively wriggle us out ahead of any actual vow-making. And we might therefore think that we can go ahead and make those heat-of-the-moment vows, and other vows, and not really worry about the consequences.
What I fear (and I am not alone in this fear) is that we lose the meaning of vows, and even smaller promises - to God and to people - when we assume we are free because of a prayer recited months ago.
I see this diminishing vow-lue -- in the person who goes into a marriage saying, "well, if it doesn't work out, we can always get a divorce," and in my own practices of self-care, be it what I feed myself or my lack of exercise.
The Kol Nidre prayer does not, in fact, ensure us freedom from our vows. Even with the prayer, we must still be careful with our promises, and we must nonetheless atone for our failures before we can expect forgiveness.
A vow is a weighty thing - and it should be. Whether we are promising something to a friend or to God, we should feel the obligation of the relationship. We should not enter in expecting that we can simply wriggle out from under that weight easily, lightly. Still, it's nice to know that, if we make a promise and cannot fulfill it, we can be forgiven, even if it takes some emotional, spiritual, even physical work on our part to get there.
Sunday, June 21, 2015
Father's Day Isn't All Happy (but it isn't all sad, either): A Personal Story
Happy Father's Day!
It's all over ads in my email inbox - it's impossible to get away from. My Facebook status update even says, "It's Father's Day, what's on your mind?" and wants me to add a cute little handholding graphic to my update.
And I don't say I want to get away from it. But maybe, a little bit, I do...and if you do, too, I hope you will read through the happy beginning that comes next. Because:
I wish a very Happy Father's Day to my stepfather, who has truly been a Dad to me, throughout most of my life, through thick and think. He has indulged in all the right fatherly moments, and he has been fiercely loving when I needed it - and always. He has stood by my mom in sickness and in health - his love for her is steadfast, and has taught me how I want, how I deserve to be loved in this world. He has loved her, and me, through both storm and sunshine.
I wish a very Happy Father's Day to my husband. It is awesome watching him be Dad to our son, even (or maybe especially) in the moments where we aren't completely on the same page about parenting styles. I am glad for him and for our son that he has had the flexibility in these first few years of parenting to really be available throughout the week, to pick him up after school and take him to the park or other play places. I see father and son learning the world together, teaching each other, playing and reading and snuggling - and it is more beautiful than I could imagine.
And then.
And then, on Father's Day, I inevitably think about my father, the man whose DNA is in mine, who was married to my mother the first handful of years of my life, who lived within spitting distance my entire childhood, whom I saw in the old-fashioned custody arrangement of every other weekend (and who seemed at other hours of the week to be unapproachable).
Somehow, in my childhood, he made me uncomfortable growing into a woman. He left me with vulnerabilities I am still patching over. As an adult, I tried reconciling a couple of times, and each time he, unintentionally I am (fairly) certain, ripped open wounds I thought I had healed, leaving me feeling stupid and insecure. During one of these reconciliation periods he seemed really to want to get to know me - so much that I felt others in my life weren't listening as well as he. And then.
And then.
And then, I forgive and I move on with my life. But I do so without him in it.
And then, I think maybe I should wish him a Happy Father's Day. After all, I really don't think he ever intended to alienate me. I don't think he set out to hurt me or to open up those vulnerabilities that are so fragile in me to this day. I don't think he ever wanted me to feel uncomfortable being a woman in this world, though his actions contributed greatly to my awareness of and distaste for the deep-rooted misogyny in our society.
And then, I wonder how on earth I can wish this man a Happy Father's Day. How could it possibly be happy, even to hear from me? Perhaps he can go on blindly, and not wonder about a possible relationship with me, his daughter, or not grieve my brother, z"l, dead now nearly twenty years, who would have been 48 tomorrow. Perhaps his stepdaughters will wish him a happy father's day, as I will to my stepfather - and perhaps that will bring him joy; I really don't know his relationship with them, as I have had none for more than 30 years. Perhaps. And it really isn't fair for me to imagine him dwelling on what could have been, though I inevitably return to it year after year.
Would it make him happy to hear from me, even if I don't intend more than three words? Does it even make sense to send those three words - "Happy Father's Day" - in an email to a man I don't even know anymore (if I ever did)?
And so - if you, the man I called Dad through my childhood, are reading this - I do think of you, and I sometimes wonder how things could be different. I don't know, after all these years, if it is possible to change the way things are, given the way things have been. As I know you wished me no harm, even when you managed to say and do things that left me very hurt - I wish you no harm, no pain, even though I know simply by not being in your life I must leave you with vulnerabilities. For that, I am sorry.
And so - to all out there who have stories that make Father's Day (or Mother's Day, or any other days like this) difficult, or not particularly "happy" (thanks, Hallmark, for telling us we ought to feel a particular way) - I hope you find strength and support.
And also - to all who have read this all the way through despite having wonderful and deep relationships with your fathers and stepfathers - or despite being incredible fathers or stepfathers who are making your children feel safe and secure - thank you for reading, and most of all, Happy Father's Day.
And to everyone - a very happy Solstice - may this day of long daylight shine light and love and healing throughout our imperfect and sometimes awfully broken world.
It's all over ads in my email inbox - it's impossible to get away from. My Facebook status update even says, "It's Father's Day, what's on your mind?" and wants me to add a cute little handholding graphic to my update.
And I don't say I want to get away from it. But maybe, a little bit, I do...and if you do, too, I hope you will read through the happy beginning that comes next. Because:
I wish a very Happy Father's Day to my stepfather, who has truly been a Dad to me, throughout most of my life, through thick and think. He has indulged in all the right fatherly moments, and he has been fiercely loving when I needed it - and always. He has stood by my mom in sickness and in health - his love for her is steadfast, and has taught me how I want, how I deserve to be loved in this world. He has loved her, and me, through both storm and sunshine.
I wish a very Happy Father's Day to my husband. It is awesome watching him be Dad to our son, even (or maybe especially) in the moments where we aren't completely on the same page about parenting styles. I am glad for him and for our son that he has had the flexibility in these first few years of parenting to really be available throughout the week, to pick him up after school and take him to the park or other play places. I see father and son learning the world together, teaching each other, playing and reading and snuggling - and it is more beautiful than I could imagine.
And then.
And then, on Father's Day, I inevitably think about my father, the man whose DNA is in mine, who was married to my mother the first handful of years of my life, who lived within spitting distance my entire childhood, whom I saw in the old-fashioned custody arrangement of every other weekend (and who seemed at other hours of the week to be unapproachable).
Somehow, in my childhood, he made me uncomfortable growing into a woman. He left me with vulnerabilities I am still patching over. As an adult, I tried reconciling a couple of times, and each time he, unintentionally I am (fairly) certain, ripped open wounds I thought I had healed, leaving me feeling stupid and insecure. During one of these reconciliation periods he seemed really to want to get to know me - so much that I felt others in my life weren't listening as well as he. And then.
And then.
And then, I forgive and I move on with my life. But I do so without him in it.
And then, I think maybe I should wish him a Happy Father's Day. After all, I really don't think he ever intended to alienate me. I don't think he set out to hurt me or to open up those vulnerabilities that are so fragile in me to this day. I don't think he ever wanted me to feel uncomfortable being a woman in this world, though his actions contributed greatly to my awareness of and distaste for the deep-rooted misogyny in our society.
And then, I wonder how on earth I can wish this man a Happy Father's Day. How could it possibly be happy, even to hear from me? Perhaps he can go on blindly, and not wonder about a possible relationship with me, his daughter, or not grieve my brother, z"l, dead now nearly twenty years, who would have been 48 tomorrow. Perhaps his stepdaughters will wish him a happy father's day, as I will to my stepfather - and perhaps that will bring him joy; I really don't know his relationship with them, as I have had none for more than 30 years. Perhaps. And it really isn't fair for me to imagine him dwelling on what could have been, though I inevitably return to it year after year.
Would it make him happy to hear from me, even if I don't intend more than three words? Does it even make sense to send those three words - "Happy Father's Day" - in an email to a man I don't even know anymore (if I ever did)?
And so - if you, the man I called Dad through my childhood, are reading this - I do think of you, and I sometimes wonder how things could be different. I don't know, after all these years, if it is possible to change the way things are, given the way things have been. As I know you wished me no harm, even when you managed to say and do things that left me very hurt - I wish you no harm, no pain, even though I know simply by not being in your life I must leave you with vulnerabilities. For that, I am sorry.
And so - to all out there who have stories that make Father's Day (or Mother's Day, or any other days like this) difficult, or not particularly "happy" (thanks, Hallmark, for telling us we ought to feel a particular way) - I hope you find strength and support.
And also - to all who have read this all the way through despite having wonderful and deep relationships with your fathers and stepfathers - or despite being incredible fathers or stepfathers who are making your children feel safe and secure - thank you for reading, and most of all, Happy Father's Day.
And to everyone - a very happy Solstice - may this day of long daylight shine light and love and healing throughout our imperfect and sometimes awfully broken world.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)