"There's a 90-year-old woman behind her eyes," Grandma Runyan told Mom and Nanny as they watched me leave our table at the Food Circus and find some little old man ~ eating alone ~ plunking my three-year-old legs down at his table ~ and then having a little chat.
Forty-three years later, and I have not changed.
My Food Circus is now diners across Santa Cruz County, and each weekend, I find myself surrounded by little old men ~ some are widowed, some are divorced, and some are just eating alone while their wives are out with their friends.
I have become a regular at many diners in Santa Cruz, Scotts Valley, and Soquel.
And just like when I was three-years-old roaming around the Food Circus in Arden Fair Mall in Sacramento, I make new friends wherever I go and even know some of the gentlemen by first name.
There's Bob who seems to know all my ups and downs of sudden unemployment last summer ~ from updates on first interviews and temp jobs ~ to upcoming unemployment again. Always asking about the job search and always willing to offer support. He takes a break every morning from his own care-giving duties of his eldery parents, gaining respite through cheery little chats with the diner staff and regular patrons such as myself.
There's Railroad Randy whose wife is named Robin, and we always get a kick of how my name is Robin, and my brother name is Randy. He usually reads the paper, but some days he is quite chatty, telling me about his volunteer railroad repair vacations in Wyoming.
There's a couple of fellows who I don't know very well but always greet with small talk about the weather or what they are eating, Joe and Robert, who I see when I come to the diner late in the morning instead of early. Sweet little old men with glasses ~ quiet and polite.
In Soquel at the Sunrise Cafe, there's assortment of strangers I meet when I squeeze between stools at the tiny counter. A very elegant gentleman ~ all decked out in a fancy tweed suit coat and shiny, silver watch ~ and I recently discussed the difference between the comfort food here on a rainy day versus the "Plastic Parlor" offerings at Denny's. I don't go to Denny's very often ever since they took out the counter.
And then there's Auntie Mames, my old favorite haunt in Scotts Valley.
I inched my way up to the counter this morning and carefully plopped myself down on the chunky stool between one man's jacket and another jovial gentlemen who reminded me of Santa.
All of a sudden, Santa looked at me with bemusement and sprinkled salt on my Santa Cruz Sentinel.
"What? Don't you like what I am reading?!?" I asked half-seriously, half jokingly, looking down at the article about Black Friday.
Santa gave no answer.
Grabbing, the salt shaker, I chuckled, "Now I have to throw the salt over my left shoulder. That's what my Mom used to say we had to do whenever we spilled salt."
"Well, I toss it over my right shoulder because I am left-handed," he retorted.
I giggled like a little girl.
"Next time, I''ll use sugar," he threatened with a gleam in his eye, pointing at the old-fashioned sugar holder.
Still not sure what that crazy exhange with Santa was all about this morning, but I know the counter diner is less lonely whenever I show up.
I plunk my 46-year-old legs down on the stool and greet the little old men next to me. I eat my eggs and have a friendly little chat.
And remember the little girl ~ who is now me all grown up ~ who left her family's table ~ all four generations of Runyan women ~ and sensing his aloneness, wandered over to the nearest widower ~ bringing a smile of amusement to his face ~ as I watched him eat ~ had a little chat ~ then heard Grandma Runyan in the distance ~ telling Mom and Nanny,
"There's a 90-year-old woman behind her eyes."
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Sunday, November 20, 2011
A Mother of Three
I feel the pull again.
The pull for another dog.
Ceci has been gone over three years now.
And the ache for my baby girl seems to get stronger as more time goes by ~
I never had human children.
But when I see a little dog's body, I see a human child in my eyes.
Little Itty Bitty ~ who I visit every week ~ curled up like a little Butter Ball in his blue doggie bed with dog bone decorations. I stare at him in peaceful slumber and see a little boy instead of a dog. I see the little boy I never had.
Little Lou then draws me near with his old wise eyes and worried ears. I turn my attention to holding him close, remembering the dogs of my distant past.
I do not feel the same pull when I see the babies of strangers, friends, or family. They are cute little beings, but I have never really felt the longing to have one. And now at nearly 47 years old, I never will have one.
I saw a lady walking a medium-size, vanilla lab mix dog downtown last week. I watched the doggie's legs trot swiftly beside her, and that movement of that doggie's legs filled me with a longing for a dog all over again. I was drawn to the sweet dog's beautiful little body, and again I saw the dog as if he or she were a human child.
All dogs' eyes are soulful. I look at nearly daily pictures of my doggie cousins on Facebook. Sweet Buddy and Alex even have their own Facebook page! And although I have only met them twice in my life, I feel a connection to their doggie souls from their daily antics posted on Facebook. I feel the same closeness as I do to my human cousins, their doggie mothers, Maria and Denise.
This human connection to these animal souls brings out my maternal instincts in ways the possibility of having biological children never did.
I only felt my biological clock "tick" once. My parents surprised me with a loan to go to New York, my childhood dream since I was 10 years old. In the summer of '93, when I was 28 years old, I boarded a red eye plane and began living my dream from the moment I waved goodbye through the plane window to Mom and Dad in the San Francisco International Airport.
My one month journey was interrupted daily with the sight of New York City children. I was enchanted by them as they played in Central Park or walked together in long parades down the streets during summer day camp outings. I stopped and stared. And cried.
I cried for the children I would never have. I looked at their sweet faces and knew I would never be a mother. I did not want to be a mother. So I mourned the loss of the souls I would never bring into this earth.
The experience was life changing, and I never looked back or cried again at the sight of any children in California. I accepted my choice and moved on. I had two relationships with men who had children. Some of their children were little, some were teenagers, some were young adults. I never married any of those men, so I never became a stepmother either.
But suddenly in my forties, the pull to have a dog in my life got stronger and stronger. I was blessed to be surrounded by dogs in my abusive relationship. They, along with the cats, were my only saving grace.
And when the relationship finally ended, so did my contact with my precious animals.
Until I found Ceci. She side-glanced at me with big round eyes, showing mostly the whites of her eyes, and thumped her tail excitedly at the sight of me peeking over the railing to see which dogs had been surrendered that day.
I did everything in my power to adopt her. I did not stop to reconsider my decision when I found out she was already 12 years old. She became the little girl I never had. And for the first time in my life, I felt at peace with the decision I had made to not have children. My daughter was my dog, and I was as happy and content as animals usually are on a daily basis. My life did not need any extra trimmings. I did not need to buy new things or take fun vacations. My whole world ~ my whole routine ~ revolved around caring for her and my two cats, Lil' Red and Jack ("The Flying Cat"). I finally had my own family ~ my little fur family.
Sadly, my sweet little world would come crashing to an end with the sudden illness of Ceci one August morning when she woke me up having violent seizures. It was my cousin Maria who convinced me I had to let her go ~ as the vet had wiped me of my savings in 48 hours in their only guidance of treating a brain tumor.
A few months later, Lil' Red died of old age.
My little family of three was now one.
Jack keeps me busy with all of his antics, but I long for more.
I look at the doggies wherever I go and see my future children.
I see the fur family that I long to recreate.
But that dream will have to wait.
And until then, I will pet those precious souls wherever I go. I will hit the "Thumbs Up" button on Facebook for the hilarious pictures of my doggie cousins. I will remember Ceci and Lil' Red and those precious 17 months we were all together with Baby Jack.
When life was pure and simple and sweet.
When I was a mother of three.
The pull for another dog.
Ceci has been gone over three years now.
And the ache for my baby girl seems to get stronger as more time goes by ~
I never had human children.
But when I see a little dog's body, I see a human child in my eyes.
Little Itty Bitty ~ who I visit every week ~ curled up like a little Butter Ball in his blue doggie bed with dog bone decorations. I stare at him in peaceful slumber and see a little boy instead of a dog. I see the little boy I never had.
Little Lou then draws me near with his old wise eyes and worried ears. I turn my attention to holding him close, remembering the dogs of my distant past.
I do not feel the same pull when I see the babies of strangers, friends, or family. They are cute little beings, but I have never really felt the longing to have one. And now at nearly 47 years old, I never will have one.
I saw a lady walking a medium-size, vanilla lab mix dog downtown last week. I watched the doggie's legs trot swiftly beside her, and that movement of that doggie's legs filled me with a longing for a dog all over again. I was drawn to the sweet dog's beautiful little body, and again I saw the dog as if he or she were a human child.
All dogs' eyes are soulful. I look at nearly daily pictures of my doggie cousins on Facebook. Sweet Buddy and Alex even have their own Facebook page! And although I have only met them twice in my life, I feel a connection to their doggie souls from their daily antics posted on Facebook. I feel the same closeness as I do to my human cousins, their doggie mothers, Maria and Denise.
This human connection to these animal souls brings out my maternal instincts in ways the possibility of having biological children never did.
I only felt my biological clock "tick" once. My parents surprised me with a loan to go to New York, my childhood dream since I was 10 years old. In the summer of '93, when I was 28 years old, I boarded a red eye plane and began living my dream from the moment I waved goodbye through the plane window to Mom and Dad in the San Francisco International Airport.
My one month journey was interrupted daily with the sight of New York City children. I was enchanted by them as they played in Central Park or walked together in long parades down the streets during summer day camp outings. I stopped and stared. And cried.
I cried for the children I would never have. I looked at their sweet faces and knew I would never be a mother. I did not want to be a mother. So I mourned the loss of the souls I would never bring into this earth.
The experience was life changing, and I never looked back or cried again at the sight of any children in California. I accepted my choice and moved on. I had two relationships with men who had children. Some of their children were little, some were teenagers, some were young adults. I never married any of those men, so I never became a stepmother either.
But suddenly in my forties, the pull to have a dog in my life got stronger and stronger. I was blessed to be surrounded by dogs in my abusive relationship. They, along with the cats, were my only saving grace.
And when the relationship finally ended, so did my contact with my precious animals.
Until I found Ceci. She side-glanced at me with big round eyes, showing mostly the whites of her eyes, and thumped her tail excitedly at the sight of me peeking over the railing to see which dogs had been surrendered that day.
I did everything in my power to adopt her. I did not stop to reconsider my decision when I found out she was already 12 years old. She became the little girl I never had. And for the first time in my life, I felt at peace with the decision I had made to not have children. My daughter was my dog, and I was as happy and content as animals usually are on a daily basis. My life did not need any extra trimmings. I did not need to buy new things or take fun vacations. My whole world ~ my whole routine ~ revolved around caring for her and my two cats, Lil' Red and Jack ("The Flying Cat"). I finally had my own family ~ my little fur family.
Sadly, my sweet little world would come crashing to an end with the sudden illness of Ceci one August morning when she woke me up having violent seizures. It was my cousin Maria who convinced me I had to let her go ~ as the vet had wiped me of my savings in 48 hours in their only guidance of treating a brain tumor.
A few months later, Lil' Red died of old age.
My little family of three was now one.
Jack keeps me busy with all of his antics, but I long for more.
I look at the doggies wherever I go and see my future children.
I see the fur family that I long to recreate.
But that dream will have to wait.
And until then, I will pet those precious souls wherever I go. I will hit the "Thumbs Up" button on Facebook for the hilarious pictures of my doggie cousins. I will remember Ceci and Lil' Red and those precious 17 months we were all together with Baby Jack.
When life was pure and simple and sweet.
When I was a mother of three.
Ceci at Sunrise
Saturday, November 19, 2011
A Community of Compton Cousins
It's this time of year when I remember I never created a human family of my own to start traditions.
Since Mom's passing, my immediate family often ~ very often ~ celebrates holidays on other days of the year. In the beginning, it was because Christmas was too sad to celebrate really big. So we would meet up for a movie on Christmas Day and open up gifts on New Year's Day or some random day before Christmas.
Then the idea came that Rhonda should have the opportunity to create traditions with her own kids, so again the holidays got shifted around.
We do not celebrate Thanksgiving as an immediate family anymore. That tradition ended five years ago. I really miss getting together with my father, stepmother, sister, brother, nephews, and niece on Thanksgiving. But I have learned to accept this change in my life.
Thank Goodness, I have Mom's cousins in town, or I guess I'd be like Randy with those Hungry Man T.V. Dinners when he had to work at the video store on Thanksgiving when we all piled up to Rio Linda to see Nanny.
I realize I never created my own traditions as a single person. The isolation, the aloneness, seems more pronounced this time of year. And although I am a loner by heart and the isolation does not make me sad, I am simply so much more aware of how my life turned out ~ after nearly 47 years ~ during the last two months of the year.
I look around these four walls in my tiny studio and hear Bubbie describing her granddaugher, Izzie, to the matchmaker in my favorite movie "Crossing Delancey":
"She lives alone in a room, like a dog."
I smile at how true that image is for me.
Randy is back in Hollywood for several years now, so he only randomly gets back to Santa Cruz for holidays. But he has a circle of friends even wider than our extended family. So he has built his own community of friends that are like family, and he always seems content.
Rhonda developed a community of women friends who are like a second family from her connection to the Walnut Ave Women's Center twenty years ago. She now has to juggle all of her other plans with keeping up new traditions with them.
I am so grateful for Mom's cousins who have always extended a warm welcome to me every Thanksgiving and every Christmas that they are in town. It is like Mom can sense my aloneness down here on Planet Earth and is now busy orchestrating my social scene way up in The Big Sky.
God Bless My Cousins, The Comptons, for always remembering me this time of year.
My time spent "alone in a room, like a dog" is only for a brief moment as I have something to look forward to each holiday.
My Community is My Cousins who my mother loved so dearly.
Cousin Gregg always teasing me and embellishing stories of all "my antics" back in the day.
Cousin Barbi ~ so much like another mother ~ filling up her cozy beach home with all the scents of Thanksgiving.
Cousin Melody always giggling at all of my jokes.
And Cousin Joy ~ a sweet voice on the end of the phone line in Idaho ~ as we each take turns saying hello after dinner.
We need each other more than ever now that Great Aunt Pearlie and Nanny passed away during the last couple of years. I believe I help them as much as they help me in filling up a room with some holiday cheer.
I am truly grateful.
I am truly blessed.
Since Mom's passing, my immediate family often ~ very often ~ celebrates holidays on other days of the year. In the beginning, it was because Christmas was too sad to celebrate really big. So we would meet up for a movie on Christmas Day and open up gifts on New Year's Day or some random day before Christmas.
Then the idea came that Rhonda should have the opportunity to create traditions with her own kids, so again the holidays got shifted around.
We do not celebrate Thanksgiving as an immediate family anymore. That tradition ended five years ago. I really miss getting together with my father, stepmother, sister, brother, nephews, and niece on Thanksgiving. But I have learned to accept this change in my life.
Thank Goodness, I have Mom's cousins in town, or I guess I'd be like Randy with those Hungry Man T.V. Dinners when he had to work at the video store on Thanksgiving when we all piled up to Rio Linda to see Nanny.
I realize I never created my own traditions as a single person. The isolation, the aloneness, seems more pronounced this time of year. And although I am a loner by heart and the isolation does not make me sad, I am simply so much more aware of how my life turned out ~ after nearly 47 years ~ during the last two months of the year.
I look around these four walls in my tiny studio and hear Bubbie describing her granddaugher, Izzie, to the matchmaker in my favorite movie "Crossing Delancey":
"She lives alone in a room, like a dog."
I smile at how true that image is for me.
Randy is back in Hollywood for several years now, so he only randomly gets back to Santa Cruz for holidays. But he has a circle of friends even wider than our extended family. So he has built his own community of friends that are like family, and he always seems content.
Rhonda developed a community of women friends who are like a second family from her connection to the Walnut Ave Women's Center twenty years ago. She now has to juggle all of her other plans with keeping up new traditions with them.
I am so grateful for Mom's cousins who have always extended a warm welcome to me every Thanksgiving and every Christmas that they are in town. It is like Mom can sense my aloneness down here on Planet Earth and is now busy orchestrating my social scene way up in The Big Sky.
God Bless My Cousins, The Comptons, for always remembering me this time of year.
My time spent "alone in a room, like a dog" is only for a brief moment as I have something to look forward to each holiday.
My Community is My Cousins who my mother loved so dearly.
Cousin Gregg always teasing me and embellishing stories of all "my antics" back in the day.
Cousin Barbi ~ so much like another mother ~ filling up her cozy beach home with all the scents of Thanksgiving.
Cousin Melody always giggling at all of my jokes.
And Cousin Joy ~ a sweet voice on the end of the phone line in Idaho ~ as we each take turns saying hello after dinner.
We need each other more than ever now that Great Aunt Pearlie and Nanny passed away during the last couple of years. I believe I help them as much as they help me in filling up a room with some holiday cheer.
I am truly grateful.
I am truly blessed.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Chemotherapy Circle
I always remember the date of that particular Easter ~ April 3,1994. Really the last day before her cancer journey was in full swing.
We all joined Mom on that first day. Dad, Rhonda, Randy, and I. Yes, Middle Child Me ~ The Worrier ~ The Fretter ~ The Emotional One ~ who somehow showed such strength around a woman who clearly was terrified about what was about to happen.
Reclining chairs ~ all in a circle ~ and hanging I.V. bags just waiting to drip. I squeezed in beside her as Dr. P started to hook up the tubes. I noticed he never used gloves and that bothered me then. Today it would not bother me now to know his human touch made my mother more at ease ~ more than any risk of infection from her not feeling rubber fingers on her wrist.
Still, at the moment he inserted the needle, she bit her lip and started to sob.
"Oh, My God!" she wailed.
"Oh, Mom, I'm so sorry. I love you. We're all here for you. We'll help you through this," I whispered to her gently.
But she knew. The nightmare had officially begun. The poison that would try to kill the cancer would end up making her even sicker than she already was. Yes, the nightmare had truly begun.
Once the tears had subsided, we made the aquaintance of another cancer patient, Dear Phyllis, Stage 4 Breast Cancer which had already spread to the bone. She was tall like Mom with short, sassy hair and a mom to two 12-year-old daughters ~ her own daughter and the daughter of her husband Geoff. Geoff worked at Union Grove Music downtown. He was with Phyllis for part of her appointments. When he left for work, Phyllis would talk up a storm with all of us ~ ever so cheerful and upbeat ~ that the time would pass more quickly with all of her good energy in the room.
Phyllis was the light that we needed on one of the darkest days of our lives.
We would see Phyllis on each cycle of Mom's chemotherapy and get to know a little more about her husband and daughters. Her husband was Jewish; she was Christian. He had adopted her daughter after they got married. I think I remember she was a school teacher.
On Mom's third cycle of chemotherapy, Phyllis told us that Dr. P was trying a new "Chemotherapy Cocktail" because all the other drugs had stopped working. She said she was sleepy that morning from the Benadryl she had to take during the infusion. Phyllis fell sound asleep and did not chat with us that session. Her snoring soon took over where her chattiness had ended.
I felt that familar feeling come over me ~ that I knew the end was near ~ for Phyllis this time ~ I just knew this would be the last time we saw Phyllis.
And so the call came just before 9:30 a.m. a couple of days before Mom's next chemotherapy appointment. Dr. P was calling to tell us Phyllis had died. Mom was in the shower. And through my tears, I wanted to desperately pound on the bathroom door and tell her that Phyllis was dead.
I paced the upstairs hallway ~ back and forth ~ listening to the sound of the water pouring out the shower ~ knowing Mom did not even have one single lock of her beautiful wavy hair to even wash anymore.
I wanted to tell Mom right away because in my heart, I knew my dear mother was next. Next in line.
Next in line to fall asleep during her chemotherapy appointment. To rapidly deteriorate. And then to have us call people to tell them she had died.
I hugged Mom as she got out of the shower ~ towel on her head as if she still had hair ~ and broke that news that Dear Phyllis had died that morning. Mom took it well, but of course she knew, too.
The Chemotherapy Circle had been broken.
One by one, the patients went to the hospital or went home to die.
No more chatting while poison was dripping into their veins.
Chatting like life would somehow still be okay despite all this madness.
No more Mom bringing the staff and the patients a basket full of snacks from Costco ~ little fruit rolls and Quaker Granola Bars. Something to take the edge off during the long hours of poison infusion.
Because Mom could barely walk an inch the next time we took her to Dr. P's. He took one look at her, ordered a wheelchair, and then had us take her to Dominican. The end was here. She was never coming back.
There would be no more chemotherapy. Just pain control.
A different kind of drip. The Morphine Drip. Where she could push her little Jeopardy-like game button and give herself a jolt of drugs. Swoosh the medicine right through her veins. And make herself fall asleep within a few minutes.
A Peaceful Snore to my ears.
"Be careful how you touch her
For she'll awaken
And sleep's the only freedom
that she knows ~"
From "Wildflower"
Sunday, November 6, 2011
You Know My Name. Not My Story.
"You know my name. Not my story."
I saw the statement above on Facebook.
My blog has generated a few Facebook friends from across the miles ~ ladies who are survivors of domestic violence like me ~ kind souls I have never met but feel a kinship through this common bond of survival.
One of them shared the quote above, and the words really resonated with me.
I worked so hard to finally share my truth, but I feel that so many people in my life that I want to know this truth find it too emotional to read my words. So my blog sits in cyberspace generating hits from strangers around the world, and I cannot even share my own story ~ even verbally ~ to some of the people I spent so many years hiding this truth from on a daily basis.
I thought I had ended "My Silence on Domestic Violence" (to quote Dr. Phil), but have I really ended my silence if my truth is still unread even after a whole year of stories?
I carry this burden with me lately.
I think about printing out the blog and giving copies away at Christmas. Would that be bizarre to give away stories about Mom's dying from lung cancer and my getting my head bashed into a wall a mere 9 years after her death?
But how else am I going to get people to know my truth?
The subject of domestic violence still seems forbidden to discuss face-to-face. Is it simply too uncomfortable, or do people just simply do not want to know what happened to me?
I question it all.
Or maybe it does not matter that only a few family members and friends want to know my truth ~ and that the people that need to hear my words the most are those ladies that went through a similar ordeal and then became my friend on Facebook?
They know the real me even though we have never met. They had the courage to survive, so they have the courage to read my story.
They know my story.
They lived my story.
I saw the statement above on Facebook.
My blog has generated a few Facebook friends from across the miles ~ ladies who are survivors of domestic violence like me ~ kind souls I have never met but feel a kinship through this common bond of survival.
One of them shared the quote above, and the words really resonated with me.
I worked so hard to finally share my truth, but I feel that so many people in my life that I want to know this truth find it too emotional to read my words. So my blog sits in cyberspace generating hits from strangers around the world, and I cannot even share my own story ~ even verbally ~ to some of the people I spent so many years hiding this truth from on a daily basis.
I thought I had ended "My Silence on Domestic Violence" (to quote Dr. Phil), but have I really ended my silence if my truth is still unread even after a whole year of stories?
I carry this burden with me lately.
I think about printing out the blog and giving copies away at Christmas. Would that be bizarre to give away stories about Mom's dying from lung cancer and my getting my head bashed into a wall a mere 9 years after her death?
But how else am I going to get people to know my truth?
The subject of domestic violence still seems forbidden to discuss face-to-face. Is it simply too uncomfortable, or do people just simply do not want to know what happened to me?
I question it all.
Or maybe it does not matter that only a few family members and friends want to know my truth ~ and that the people that need to hear my words the most are those ladies that went through a similar ordeal and then became my friend on Facebook?
They know the real me even though we have never met. They had the courage to survive, so they have the courage to read my story.
They know my story.
They lived my story.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)