I have created a new blog called "Culture, Law and Politics" that can be found at:
http://culturelawpolitics.blogspot.com/
Hope to see you there!
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Epilogue
I have created a new blog called "Culture, Law and Politics" that can be found at:
http://culturelawpolitics.blogspot.com/
Hope to see you there!
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Spring Charm
Whatever the groundhog saw or not this year, spring is coming early. The first chickadee of the season is singing outside. The first snow inspired my last blog; the bird acts as a muse for this one. And I should tell you that with the shared news of Denise's and my wedding last summer and with posts last March and June, we have come a full year around the seasons with no new significant medical reports. For this blog, and for reasons which I shall detail below, this will be my last post.
It has been almost two and a half years since the neurosurgery and two years since the first visit to the Boston Amyloid Research and Clinic Program. I have learned a great deal about protein related disorders since then and keep my eye on this dynamic area of medical research. With a confirmed case of MGUS (me a a zillion others), I will personally be sure to have the type of blood test that looks for further elevations in lambda light chain proteins, an indication for any number of disorders from amyloidosis to the statistically more likely multiple myeloma. I can be grateful for the potential head's up on that one, even if I hope the information does not pay off ever, but if ever, many, many years down the road.
I still have pain. In two weeks I am going to the ENT doctor in Ithaca who cared for me after the surgery, Rob Strominger, to explore nerve blocks. I had one back in the immediate aftermath of the surgery and it worked to alleviate the pain as long as the lidocaine was active. Although it makes that side of my face numb, just like when you go to the dentist, it does take the pain away for that period. It is like a wave of relief to have that experience, and I would like to see if that could be done routinely.
Because I did not have a stroke, nor do I have Bell's Palsy, whose effects are observable, most people do not know that I experience pain every day, from at least noon until bedtime. Those who do know I hope forget about it, or at least that is what I try to do. Distraction is a great medicine. But the truth is the nerve damage bothers me every day, only the degree varies. The neuropathic drug I take, Lyricia, has helped, but unfortunately with the notable side effect of weight gain. Alas. For that path, I see no end in sight.
But the amyloidosis feared at the outset over two years ago has not materialized. The Boston hematologist set two to three years, but Dr. Law does not see it and I don't feel it going that way. From our lips and hearts ... At the clinic, I did see some people very ill with the disease. Last August, one man died in the waiting room of the clinic, where I had seen him sitting only moments before I was called into an examination room. Make no mistake: this is a very serious and, when not diagnosed in time, deadly disease. It deserves enormous attention from the medical community, and many be part of a number of protein related disorders that have connections to everything from dementia to cancer. It just does not feel fair to those who endure the treatments and suffer its debilitating effects to continue a blog under this name when the worst fears of it have passed over our house.
So a couple of final thoughts. First, with respect to my creative writing endeavors, such as they are, in this blog, I hope that for those who seek straight medical information -- my original motivation for the blog -- they have not been too distracting. Also, a specific note related to my last entry: I was not writing about my father, but the fathers of many schoolmates. (My father, who as the owner of a restaurant drank almost all day, I saw affected by alcohol only about three times in my entire life -- it made him jolly; and while he had a hair-trigger temper in the kitchen and could be physically combative -- mostly with policemen -- he was never violent with me.) Second, for those who have followed my blog out of friendship or family love, know that I love you right back and am here for you in your time of need. Finally, having come full circle, and loving the written word, I would like to finish with a spring remembrance.
I grew up on the west side of the city of Rochester, near the canal, the railroad tracks and the airport. Some of my fondest memories revolve around those first nights of spring when we would open the windows. Up would go the main window, out would come the storm window, in would arrive the screen, and I would be allowed to go to bed with the cool -- but not cold -- air streaming into my room. Never mind that it smelled like jet fuel, or that the sounds that sung me to sleep were those of the whining plane engines on the runway. Those sounds blend together with the hours that my father and I spent on the observation deck at the airport, ice cream cones in hand, watching planes come and go, each one a minor miracle of levitation. They crest around the time I was six when my father took me on my first plane ride: a jet to Buffalo -- it took ten minutes -- and then to the zoo there, back home again, just for the sake of the ride. These memories are like postcards from heaven. If I can create for my children just a little bit of the magic that my father created for me in this life, I shall have done a good job.
God bless.
It has been almost two and a half years since the neurosurgery and two years since the first visit to the Boston Amyloid Research and Clinic Program. I have learned a great deal about protein related disorders since then and keep my eye on this dynamic area of medical research. With a confirmed case of MGUS (me a a zillion others), I will personally be sure to have the type of blood test that looks for further elevations in lambda light chain proteins, an indication for any number of disorders from amyloidosis to the statistically more likely multiple myeloma. I can be grateful for the potential head's up on that one, even if I hope the information does not pay off ever, but if ever, many, many years down the road.
I still have pain. In two weeks I am going to the ENT doctor in Ithaca who cared for me after the surgery, Rob Strominger, to explore nerve blocks. I had one back in the immediate aftermath of the surgery and it worked to alleviate the pain as long as the lidocaine was active. Although it makes that side of my face numb, just like when you go to the dentist, it does take the pain away for that period. It is like a wave of relief to have that experience, and I would like to see if that could be done routinely.
Because I did not have a stroke, nor do I have Bell's Palsy, whose effects are observable, most people do not know that I experience pain every day, from at least noon until bedtime. Those who do know I hope forget about it, or at least that is what I try to do. Distraction is a great medicine. But the truth is the nerve damage bothers me every day, only the degree varies. The neuropathic drug I take, Lyricia, has helped, but unfortunately with the notable side effect of weight gain. Alas. For that path, I see no end in sight.
But the amyloidosis feared at the outset over two years ago has not materialized. The Boston hematologist set two to three years, but Dr. Law does not see it and I don't feel it going that way. From our lips and hearts ... At the clinic, I did see some people very ill with the disease. Last August, one man died in the waiting room of the clinic, where I had seen him sitting only moments before I was called into an examination room. Make no mistake: this is a very serious and, when not diagnosed in time, deadly disease. It deserves enormous attention from the medical community, and many be part of a number of protein related disorders that have connections to everything from dementia to cancer. It just does not feel fair to those who endure the treatments and suffer its debilitating effects to continue a blog under this name when the worst fears of it have passed over our house.
So a couple of final thoughts. First, with respect to my creative writing endeavors, such as they are, in this blog, I hope that for those who seek straight medical information -- my original motivation for the blog -- they have not been too distracting. Also, a specific note related to my last entry: I was not writing about my father, but the fathers of many schoolmates. (My father, who as the owner of a restaurant drank almost all day, I saw affected by alcohol only about three times in my entire life -- it made him jolly; and while he had a hair-trigger temper in the kitchen and could be physically combative -- mostly with policemen -- he was never violent with me.) Second, for those who have followed my blog out of friendship or family love, know that I love you right back and am here for you in your time of need. Finally, having come full circle, and loving the written word, I would like to finish with a spring remembrance.
I grew up on the west side of the city of Rochester, near the canal, the railroad tracks and the airport. Some of my fondest memories revolve around those first nights of spring when we would open the windows. Up would go the main window, out would come the storm window, in would arrive the screen, and I would be allowed to go to bed with the cool -- but not cold -- air streaming into my room. Never mind that it smelled like jet fuel, or that the sounds that sung me to sleep were those of the whining plane engines on the runway. Those sounds blend together with the hours that my father and I spent on the observation deck at the airport, ice cream cones in hand, watching planes come and go, each one a minor miracle of levitation. They crest around the time I was six when my father took me on my first plane ride: a jet to Buffalo -- it took ten minutes -- and then to the zoo there, back home again, just for the sake of the ride. These memories are like postcards from heaven. If I can create for my children just a little bit of the magic that my father created for me in this life, I shall have done a good job.
God bless.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
The First Snow
The first snow. I am not immune to its charms. It brings back cherished memories of building snow tunnels, walking to school on the top of the banks and shoveling endlessly with parents and neighbors and childhood friends.
One late afternoon stands out in particular. It was the last day of school before Christmas break. I stay after to help my teachers erase chalk boards but mostly to talk with them, to soak up their magnanimous authority, which I squirrel away in my heart to be summonsed when amidst the duller spirits that can arise at home. It is the first snow of the season, late December, and as it always seems to do, the snow brings a hush to the city. Already late, the sun is down, a luminous twilight hovers over the neighborhoods through which I walk the mile home. I am at the top of my street, two long city blocks of what once stood for the best of the mid-century's middle class, but is already ever so slightly turning into a dark night of poverty, crime and want. That is all in the future. This experience was truly in the moment. The snow is falling softly. I decide that my best view is taken while walking down the middle of the street.
An eleven or twelve year old Catholic school girl, in uniform, suspended between school and home, alone, gloriously alone for a few minutes that are neither a nun's or a priest's, a mother's or a father's, no matter what is good or bad about any of them, this is a young person's moment to be alone, safe, quiet, and slowly sucking on a piece of the sweet Christmas candy that we all waited for every year as if it were a pot of gold, all the love in the world, the nourishment needed to sustain us through confessions and masses, multiplication tables and spelling bees, the sting of adolescent gossip, the dictation girls took from obedient mothers and blows boys absorbed from abusive and often drunk fathers, and for one night in the first snow of the season, it was all beautiful.
One late afternoon stands out in particular. It was the last day of school before Christmas break. I stay after to help my teachers erase chalk boards but mostly to talk with them, to soak up their magnanimous authority, which I squirrel away in my heart to be summonsed when amidst the duller spirits that can arise at home. It is the first snow of the season, late December, and as it always seems to do, the snow brings a hush to the city. Already late, the sun is down, a luminous twilight hovers over the neighborhoods through which I walk the mile home. I am at the top of my street, two long city blocks of what once stood for the best of the mid-century's middle class, but is already ever so slightly turning into a dark night of poverty, crime and want. That is all in the future. This experience was truly in the moment. The snow is falling softly. I decide that my best view is taken while walking down the middle of the street.
An eleven or twelve year old Catholic school girl, in uniform, suspended between school and home, alone, gloriously alone for a few minutes that are neither a nun's or a priest's, a mother's or a father's, no matter what is good or bad about any of them, this is a young person's moment to be alone, safe, quiet, and slowly sucking on a piece of the sweet Christmas candy that we all waited for every year as if it were a pot of gold, all the love in the world, the nourishment needed to sustain us through confessions and masses, multiplication tables and spelling bees, the sting of adolescent gossip, the dictation girls took from obedient mothers and blows boys absorbed from abusive and often drunk fathers, and for one night in the first snow of the season, it was all beautiful.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
My NYT Op-Ed
That never was ... but if it had been, this is what I would have said on the second year after the neurosurgery:
Two years ago today I had ten hours of neurosurgery at the University of Pittsburg Medical Center. For two years prior I had numbness and tingling on the right side of my lip and chin. The symptoms were perfectly asymmetrical, and as the numbness progressed down my chin an imaginary line separate the left side, which was fine, from the right side which grew increasingly more numb. When a MRI diagnosed a "schwannoma," a fatty benign tumor, on my right trigeminal nerve I choose UPMC because of their pioneering surgeon, Dr. Amin Kassam, for the endoscopic (via the nose and sinuses) approach to the Meckel's Cave region of lower brain -- perhaps the most difficult area of the body to access given its interior location and juncture of spinal chord and brain stem.
Ten days later pathologists discovered that instead of a schwannoma the biopsied tissue revealed amyloid. Usually enthusiastic, Dr. Kassam presented this information to me in a somber tone. I had never heard of such a thing and asked him to spell it! He then suddenly headed for the door and said, "Go home." "To my apartment?" I asked, the one we had taken in Pittsburgh for a three week recovery period. "No, Ithaca."
That night I search the Internet for this strange term. Alzheimer disease rose to the top of the searches. Over and over again I read about proteins unfolding, burrowing into the brain, forming plaque and destroying the tissue. Common knowledge taught me that doctors diagnose the disorder from symptoms not tissue because no one has a brain biopsy. Except me, almost sort of. It turns out that the amyloid on my nerve consists of a different type of protein, a lambda light chain, produced by plasma cells and which lead to another protein-related disorder, amyloidosis. I have since learned that there are numerous disorders for which proteins are implicated.
In light of President Obama's pledge to find a "cure" for Alzheimer's it may be important to recognize that this disease is not alone in the constellation of protein disorders. Medical researchers already recognize Lewy Body Demetia in which plague affects the lower brain steam. That disorder may have a close relationship to Parkinson's Disease given the similarity of symptoms involving motor control. Owen Thomas's tragic death has also thrown a spotlight on amyloid deposition believed to be related to traumatic head injuries. The entire National Football League grabbles with the consequences of head trauma on its most distinguished players. I could not authoritatively say how many other recognized diseases exist directly involving proteins, but simple Internet searches reveal many strange and unusual names.
Protein disorders in general require the kind of public support and attention that we have given cancer and AIDs in the past and now, as us baby-boomers grow older, Alzheimer's. Not only do we need financial support for the research and clinical trials, but a coordination of these efforts in such a way to connect the dots of these various disorders to create new diagnostic tools and treatment protocols. That the need exists is clear to me. Months after the diagnosis in Pittsburg I went to the Boston University Amyloid Center for a follow up, which I now do annually. When I was there this past August a fellow patient died in clinic's waiting room.
Two years ago today I had ten hours of neurosurgery at the University of Pittsburg Medical Center. For two years prior I had numbness and tingling on the right side of my lip and chin. The symptoms were perfectly asymmetrical, and as the numbness progressed down my chin an imaginary line separate the left side, which was fine, from the right side which grew increasingly more numb. When a MRI diagnosed a "schwannoma," a fatty benign tumor, on my right trigeminal nerve I choose UPMC because of their pioneering surgeon, Dr. Amin Kassam, for the endoscopic (via the nose and sinuses) approach to the Meckel's Cave region of lower brain -- perhaps the most difficult area of the body to access given its interior location and juncture of spinal chord and brain stem.
Ten days later pathologists discovered that instead of a schwannoma the biopsied tissue revealed amyloid. Usually enthusiastic, Dr. Kassam presented this information to me in a somber tone. I had never heard of such a thing and asked him to spell it! He then suddenly headed for the door and said, "Go home." "To my apartment?" I asked, the one we had taken in Pittsburgh for a three week recovery period. "No, Ithaca."
That night I search the Internet for this strange term. Alzheimer disease rose to the top of the searches. Over and over again I read about proteins unfolding, burrowing into the brain, forming plaque and destroying the tissue. Common knowledge taught me that doctors diagnose the disorder from symptoms not tissue because no one has a brain biopsy. Except me, almost sort of. It turns out that the amyloid on my nerve consists of a different type of protein, a lambda light chain, produced by plasma cells and which lead to another protein-related disorder, amyloidosis. I have since learned that there are numerous disorders for which proteins are implicated.
In light of President Obama's pledge to find a "cure" for Alzheimer's it may be important to recognize that this disease is not alone in the constellation of protein disorders. Medical researchers already recognize Lewy Body Demetia in which plague affects the lower brain steam. That disorder may have a close relationship to Parkinson's Disease given the similarity of symptoms involving motor control. Owen Thomas's tragic death has also thrown a spotlight on amyloid deposition believed to be related to traumatic head injuries. The entire National Football League grabbles with the consequences of head trauma on its most distinguished players. I could not authoritatively say how many other recognized diseases exist directly involving proteins, but simple Internet searches reveal many strange and unusual names.
Protein disorders in general require the kind of public support and attention that we have given cancer and AIDs in the past and now, as us baby-boomers grow older, Alzheimer's. Not only do we need financial support for the research and clinical trials, but a coordination of these efforts in such a way to connect the dots of these various disorders to create new diagnostic tools and treatment protocols. That the need exists is clear to me. Months after the diagnosis in Pittsburg I went to the Boston University Amyloid Center for a follow up, which I now do annually. When I was there this past August a fellow patient died in clinic's waiting room.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Thanks, Georgia, for writing, here are some pictures!
 |
| Moments before the ceremony ... I lost my son, Nikko, on Commercial Avenue in P-town, looking for a table cloth and had to rush back just in time to the site! |
 |
| With Denise, here are our boys, Nikko, and Sam, shaking hands with our priest, Terry Pannell of St. Mary's of the Harbor who officiated. |
 |
| And here is our wedding party all together! |
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Results!
The results from the Amyloid Clinic at BUMC where I went again for a battery of tests early last week are in and good! The increase in lambda light chains in the circulation noted this spring turns out not to be significant; the bone marrow appears steady too. That means that there is still an imbalance. Too many lambda plasma cells are creating too many lambda proteins that go out in circulation, but there is no change from what was discovered after the neurosurgery in November of 2008 and subsequently for tests at BUMC in February of 2009. Hurrah!
The BUMC doctors did recommend another MRI, which I will have sometime this fall, to see if the amyloid has grown in size or is affecting any other nerves or tissue in the area Lyrica still has more of a salutary effect than any other neuropathic medication I have tried for the trigeminal pain. Living up to its reputation, Lyrica also has the unfortunate effect of changing brain chemistry that slows down metabolism, hence a much unwanted weight gain. I am going to try diet and exercise to chill this deleterious. I needed weight gain like a whole in the head! (Did you parents use phrases like this one? Mine did, and they come in handy sometimes!)
Denise and I were married on the anniversary of our blessing in 2003 this month, on August 9, at a quiet ceremony in a lovely garden on Commercial Street in Provincetown, MA. We would have like to have married in New York, but the disappointment of the state legislature earlier this year put us in a mind not to wait. The Rev. Terry Pannell of St. Mary's of the Harbor officiated. I am very glad to think of him now as a dear friend.
Nikko is off to school soon at RIT; my friend Norma at NYU, a parent too, suggested one thing: bring kleenex.
Sam is starting high school this year in Ithaca. I am encouraging him to run for student government because he is very social and has lots of friends and opinions too!
For those inclined to meditate or pray, I thank you all for that which you have offered me. Please include in that vein the doctor's at BUMC. Many of them, and Dr. Rosemary O'Connell in particular for me, are living saints, people who dedicate themselves with skill and compassion to the ecology of this disease. Please also think of those with amyloidosis in a far more dangerous presentation than mine. On Monday at BUMC, one patient in our "class" (which is every Monday when people come from around the country for the standard battery of tests, support group and general getting to know each other and the families) died in the waiting room! Others are struggling with different stages of the disorder and its effects on vital organs. But there is hope: One man there, perhaps in his 40's, reported that he is 11 years out from a stem cell transplant. He looked great, had a lovely and loving wife with him and two beautiful children!
The BUMC doctors did recommend another MRI, which I will have sometime this fall, to see if the amyloid has grown in size or is affecting any other nerves or tissue in the area Lyrica still has more of a salutary effect than any other neuropathic medication I have tried for the trigeminal pain. Living up to its reputation, Lyrica also has the unfortunate effect of changing brain chemistry that slows down metabolism, hence a much unwanted weight gain. I am going to try diet and exercise to chill this deleterious. I needed weight gain like a whole in the head! (Did you parents use phrases like this one? Mine did, and they come in handy sometimes!)
Denise and I were married on the anniversary of our blessing in 2003 this month, on August 9, at a quiet ceremony in a lovely garden on Commercial Street in Provincetown, MA. We would have like to have married in New York, but the disappointment of the state legislature earlier this year put us in a mind not to wait. The Rev. Terry Pannell of St. Mary's of the Harbor officiated. I am very glad to think of him now as a dear friend.
Nikko is off to school soon at RIT; my friend Norma at NYU, a parent too, suggested one thing: bring kleenex.
Sam is starting high school this year in Ithaca. I am encouraging him to run for student government because he is very social and has lots of friends and opinions too!
For those inclined to meditate or pray, I thank you all for that which you have offered me. Please include in that vein the doctor's at BUMC. Many of them, and Dr. Rosemary O'Connell in particular for me, are living saints, people who dedicate themselves with skill and compassion to the ecology of this disease. Please also think of those with amyloidosis in a far more dangerous presentation than mine. On Monday at BUMC, one patient in our "class" (which is every Monday when people come from around the country for the standard battery of tests, support group and general getting to know each other and the families) died in the waiting room! Others are struggling with different stages of the disorder and its effects on vital organs. But there is hope: One man there, perhaps in his 40's, reported that he is 11 years out from a stem cell transplant. He looked great, had a lovely and loving wife with him and two beautiful children!
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Been a long time ...
... since I have posted; many distractions emerged along the way. Most significant is a decision about a position in California. I spare my friends and family the details that would not be interesting. What I want to share is how I came to the decision. Largely, it was through friends, tremendously kind and deeply thoughtful people who were willing to dive into the many issues that came into play and work through the discernment with me. The denouement came magically.
Herons have long held a spiritual, some may say superstitious, grip on me. When I was pregnant with Nikko through the fall and early winter, I would drive to Syracuse to visit my doctor. I had chosen to go to Syracuse because the doctor was in a solo practice and because the hospital where he had privileges contained a neonatal unit. As most of the readers of this blog know I have a brother who half a century ago was born very prematurely and suffered severe brain damage as a result of the consequences, and, at that time, underdeveloped understandings of those conditions and few genuinely salutary assistive technologies. Not knowing the reasons for my mother's premature labor I thought that the least I could do was to be sure that if it were my condition too I would be at a hospital that had the facilities to take care of the baby. Hence, every few weeks I trekked through Route 366 along Fall Creek on my way to the Interstate. And when I saw a heron I interpreted that sighting as a sign that everything was going to be okay. Nikko was born with 10/10 APGAR rates exactly on his due date in late January.
It is no wonder that over this weekend, after I had taken the boys with me to California, I retreated finally to one of my cherished locations on the planet: Upper Buttermilk State Park, not .2 miles from my house and where I have hiked frequently. The day before, Friday, had seen much rain, breaking a record heatwave, and so the marsh was unusually full. That circumstance might explain why there stood at its edge a heron as I happened by. Denise was with me, but in the mood for a power walk, I invited her to push ahead. I stood for some time, silent, unmoving, watching the heron. Looking for a sign.
Those who know about or have watched herons recall that they are a model of poise and patience. They can stand in leg deep water motionless for a very long time until one svelte strike at something of the fish or amphibian species. If you are not watching consistently, you will miss the move because it happens so quickly. Apart from a swallow, the bird hardly alters its position. Unlike other species -- mammals come to mind -- they don't dance around and make of show of their victory. If they did, the second, third, and on infinitum victim would undoubtedly be alerted to the danger and swim or jump away.
I walked on. When I met up with Denise, she asked if the heron had a message. "No," I said, "it just kept fishing." On we walked, and on we talked together and then later with Carrie who has been especially helpful all along the way. By the end of the day Denise and I weighed factors and explored feelings and priorities. The next day I returned to the park (Denise having gone back to Rochester for services on Sunday) and again the heron performed the same way. That night a conversation with my friends Annemarie and Meredith (from Hawaii) stirred my thinking. I returned early in the morning the next day. There was the same bird, just standing. I had another friend on my mind, someone who had recently written me by email of the very unfortunate and unexpected death of his beloved wife of over 50 years. I had responded to his email. I had informed mutual friends and colleagues, but because I was so overwhelmed with the job question I had not done as much as I had hoped to in order to acknowledge his grief. While in California I had thought of him often and had decided on exactly the one card I wanted to send him. I resolved to quicken my walk to write him.
I wrote from a thin place, the metaphorical name for a state of being closer to a spiritual sensibility than the world that is too much with us usually provides. I started to tell him about the job but quickly turned to the bird and when I related my conversation with Denise on that first day, the meaning became clear (as it probably has for you already): keep fishing.
I have just returned from my fourth consecutive day walking around the trail around Upper Buttermilk. Even though it was sunrise, the usual heron hour, the bird was gone. That's okay. I have my decision. And most important, a meaningful network of family and friends and community.
Herons have long held a spiritual, some may say superstitious, grip on me. When I was pregnant with Nikko through the fall and early winter, I would drive to Syracuse to visit my doctor. I had chosen to go to Syracuse because the doctor was in a solo practice and because the hospital where he had privileges contained a neonatal unit. As most of the readers of this blog know I have a brother who half a century ago was born very prematurely and suffered severe brain damage as a result of the consequences, and, at that time, underdeveloped understandings of those conditions and few genuinely salutary assistive technologies. Not knowing the reasons for my mother's premature labor I thought that the least I could do was to be sure that if it were my condition too I would be at a hospital that had the facilities to take care of the baby. Hence, every few weeks I trekked through Route 366 along Fall Creek on my way to the Interstate. And when I saw a heron I interpreted that sighting as a sign that everything was going to be okay. Nikko was born with 10/10 APGAR rates exactly on his due date in late January.
It is no wonder that over this weekend, after I had taken the boys with me to California, I retreated finally to one of my cherished locations on the planet: Upper Buttermilk State Park, not .2 miles from my house and where I have hiked frequently. The day before, Friday, had seen much rain, breaking a record heatwave, and so the marsh was unusually full. That circumstance might explain why there stood at its edge a heron as I happened by. Denise was with me, but in the mood for a power walk, I invited her to push ahead. I stood for some time, silent, unmoving, watching the heron. Looking for a sign.
Those who know about or have watched herons recall that they are a model of poise and patience. They can stand in leg deep water motionless for a very long time until one svelte strike at something of the fish or amphibian species. If you are not watching consistently, you will miss the move because it happens so quickly. Apart from a swallow, the bird hardly alters its position. Unlike other species -- mammals come to mind -- they don't dance around and make of show of their victory. If they did, the second, third, and on infinitum victim would undoubtedly be alerted to the danger and swim or jump away.
I walked on. When I met up with Denise, she asked if the heron had a message. "No," I said, "it just kept fishing." On we walked, and on we talked together and then later with Carrie who has been especially helpful all along the way. By the end of the day Denise and I weighed factors and explored feelings and priorities. The next day I returned to the park (Denise having gone back to Rochester for services on Sunday) and again the heron performed the same way. That night a conversation with my friends Annemarie and Meredith (from Hawaii) stirred my thinking. I returned early in the morning the next day. There was the same bird, just standing. I had another friend on my mind, someone who had recently written me by email of the very unfortunate and unexpected death of his beloved wife of over 50 years. I had responded to his email. I had informed mutual friends and colleagues, but because I was so overwhelmed with the job question I had not done as much as I had hoped to in order to acknowledge his grief. While in California I had thought of him often and had decided on exactly the one card I wanted to send him. I resolved to quicken my walk to write him.
I wrote from a thin place, the metaphorical name for a state of being closer to a spiritual sensibility than the world that is too much with us usually provides. I started to tell him about the job but quickly turned to the bird and when I related my conversation with Denise on that first day, the meaning became clear (as it probably has for you already): keep fishing.
I have just returned from my fourth consecutive day walking around the trail around Upper Buttermilk. Even though it was sunrise, the usual heron hour, the bird was gone. That's okay. I have my decision. And most important, a meaningful network of family and friends and community.
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