love

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Seasons Change

There is something very special about mid-September. The sun sets closer to eight pm than nine and the from one day to the next the air cools and warms and cools again until fall officially arrives sometime in October. In the garden, huge Hosta blossoms shrink to less than their average size as does every perennial sharing the garden beds. The potted annuals start to bloom less flowers and as the days get shorter, they shrivel and die.

It is at this time of year, I like to play Russian Roulette with the weather and if I wake to blue skies and a promise of a forecast with a high of at least twenty-two degrees Celcius, I throw the paddle board into the trunk of the car and I set off to my favourite lake. What the spring and summer deems an habitual activity, becomes in mid-September, these chance thrills to see just how much more time on the lake I can get with my board. 

Paddling in September is a solitary act. Like the seasons come and go, so do children who grow and then go. At first, when they are little they go back to school then they go off to college, university or work and then they sometimes go somewhere remote and call it home. I cherish every opportunity I get to paddle on the lake with one or both of my boys and in September, I get another opportunity to cherish — the solo drive to my solo paddleboarding destination. 

Alone but by no means lonely, I am terriffic in a partnership, great in a the company of a few and good in a crowd but I really enjoy my own company and appreciate the times when I am alone with my thoughts, imagination and ideas.

Unlike the summertime trips to the lake that are filled with music, snacks and conversation, reflection starts the moment I leave the drive way, turn down the windows and turn up the music and I take in all the changes signalling that autumn is approaching. 

The reddish-orange of the leaves on the maple trees, the yellowing of the leaves of the birch and the way the foliage begins to get sparse along the roadside that allows me more frequent glimpses of the water as I drive to where I need to be. I think of all that I … we… have done this year — new things, habitual things. I think of the amazing and somehow perfectly timed job opportunities that fell into our laps, and the ones that we missed. I think of the people we have met, good friends that are still with us and the ones we’ve lost and the people we have ushered back into our lives and will hold on to for dear life.

Fifteen minutes into my drive, I pass the long driveway where we used to turn onto long before we moved into the area. A glance in the rear view mirror lets me know that there is no one close behind me and I slow the car almost to a crawl and look at the property that belonged to my husband’s parents. I listen closely and I swear I can hear the sound of my sons’ laughter and the melodic giggles of my niece and nephew when they were small, riding on the tractor or on the ATV with my father-in-law. I glance onto the extensive property and I can still see in my mind’s eye, the dogs chasing frisbees and sticks and I can still smell the char of the beef on the grill. And while the essence of everything in that house — my in-laws’ home could have been so much better, the good times still rise above the times that were less pleasant. Now new owners have knocked down the old yellowing house and erected a new, gleaming white and (from the children jumping into the newly installed pool) a happy home and it makes me smile. The season has changed on the property and there is joy radiating from the house all the way to the roadside where I am slowly rolling by.

Driving away, the music and the wind blowing through the car makes me add singing to my smiling and a feeling of peace settles in my heart. I inhale and I feel like I have breathed in three times the volume of air than I normally would and when I exhale. 

I feel light.

I feel, well, I feel uplifted. And as John Hiatt sings Have a Little Faith In Me, I am back on the open air red clay tile dance floor at Sandals Dunn’s River Falls, dancing with my new husband at our wedding before twenty-two of our closest family and friends. 

I think of our life and I feel proud. Yes, I know people usually describe it as blessed and lucky and all of those sugary things but I am proud because we have stood the test of time and boy were we tested. I remember thinking of our life one new year’s eve in our apartment in Montreal and I remember thinking it was perfect — almost too perfect and I remember wondering when the other shoe was going to drop. And when it did, it dropped like a boulder off a mountain top onto a valley village below. 

We had a tough go of it — REALLY tough but I’m proud we were always able to come back to the one thing that bound us and still binds us now. Our love gave us hope and an ability to laugh even when we felt like crying. Our love gave us faith in each other and very often when we found ourselves at the bottom of a scummy barrel of life shit, we would tell each other, “it’s you and me and we will get through this,”. Love kept me and my husband strong through the days of our son’s diagnosis, job losses, financial distress, big moves across the country, loss of parents and the loss of dear friends. Our love got us through things that would have ended most couples and torn apart families and now, the simple things that bring us joy is a constant reminder that love heals and rewards too. We just had to keep reminding ourselves what brought us together in the first place because that was what was going to keep us strong and keep us together.

North Beach Provincial Park Lake Ontario Photo by D. Barsotti

At the thirty eight minute mark, I get into the Provincial Park seamlessly. The usual visitors from Quebec have returned to La Belle Province and though their absence frees up several parking spaces, I do miss hearing their Quebcois banter and the smell of Bain de Soleil. The September beach bums are all local — perhaps one or two from Toronto — and the pace is slow and lazy. I get my board from the trunk, connect it to the pump, assemble my oar and put on my life jacket. Once the pump shuts off, I lock the car and head to the water’s edge. The bigger, longer beach to the right of the parking lot has waves butthey are not very tall and the more enclosed lake on the left side of the lot is completely still. Not a ripple because there is no wind and the water looks like glass much like it does early in the morning in the summer. The water has receded somewhat — another sign that the weather is changing because the beach is wider and I find myself walking faster than usual to get the board into the water..I step into it and immediately retract my foot. 

Yeesh, so cold! A reminder of the bleaky, cooler and rainy days of the two weeks prior. Though the temperature has risen to twenty-six degrees Celsius, even in this very shallow part of the lake the water is icy. Today would not be an ideal day to fall in so my brain knew that my core had to be engaged at all times.

I dismiss the feeling of sharp knives stabbing into my feet and mount my board and I set off and I decide not to do the circumference of the lake this time but to paddle directly across it as there were no jet skis or boats zooming by today. The cottages in the distance are all empty except for one where I see the elderly couple grilling something on the barbecue, the white smoke looks like a snake dancing straight up to the sky. I pass the family of swans, the babies now free of their mucky greyish-brown fluff are stark white like their parents, and I pass two gaggles of Canadian geese who are quietly drifting beween the reeds and lily pads. Today they aren’t honking, flapping their wings wildly or hissing at people on the beach. Like everyone at the lake, they too are chilling in the peaceful vibe the glorious mid-September Sunday has to offer. 

An hour passes and I have crossed the lake twice and I realize I hadn’t thought of anything while I was paddling. I just listened to the gurgly sound of my paddle and my board moving through the water. I listened to the birds , looked at the sunlight gleaming and dancing on the water and I breathed in the air that didn’t smell of burnt wood, diesel from a boat or food being cooked on the beach.

It smelled like nothing. 

It was just clear — like my mind. And when I returned to the beach, tired but happy, I felt the corners of my mouth pushing my cheeks right up to my eyes, almost closing them. I don’t think I ever smiled like that while deflating my board, dis-assembling my oar or ridding myself of sand before getting into the car. .And even with the little pang of sadness in my chest, not knowing if today was indeed the end of my paddleboarding season, I drove along the wavy side of the lake, pulling over to take some photos of this most perfect mid-September moment.

Perfectly clear and clean water at NorthBeach Provincial Park Photo D. Barsotti

Still smiling.

I smiled all the way home and smiled and sang my way through the grocery store because my husband texted me asking me to bring home a carton of milk.

I smiled as I walked across the parking lot to my car and as I always do — and yes, I really always do, I smiled when I pulled into the driveway and saw him standing there waving and greeting me.

Life gets busy and like my husband, I get caught up in work and managing our finances a lot(kid in university), but every now and then and especially when one season fades and another gleams, I remember that this story of ours, the story of Tom and Daniella full of chapters of Adam and Logan; chapters of his family, my family, our immediate little family and our friends. This story of the places we’ve grown up, the place we met and the places we’ve lived; the places we have recently seen and are yet to see…this story, will end one day. It’s up to us (and yeah, fate) how we write it. It is up to us to figure out how we are going to deal with everything this life throws at us and on a day like today — a Sunday in mid-September when I have time to reflect on our journey, I realize that life is a gift measured in moments and I remind myself that these moments are not meant to be wasted on things that do not matter. I don’t know how many more seasons I will have on the lake but I do know this —  I’m not going to waste time worrying about it. I’m just going to live each day until it pops into my life again.

I hope you find moments of peace in your life. 

I hope you have moments in between seasons when you are able to reflect on the times of your life — all of them  —  and I hope your reflection ends in a smile, with the realization that you are still here — still relavant and still alive. 

You still can both give and receive love and that no matter what anyone says or society dictates…know that you are enough and you are blessed with the incredible gift of life with all its lows and it’s highest of highs.

Now, go find a way to take it all in.

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The Things We Need To Say

One of my childhood nicknames was Hallmark. I was the kid that made greeting cards for everyone and filled them with heartfelt words, expresssed in language beyond my years. As I got older and caught up in the blurr of life, I drifted onto the path where being busy was an acceptable excuse for not reaching out to others. There were more phone calls from telemarketers than from family and friends and text messages devolved from words to letter soundbites to emojis — even Facebook had an options for those way too busy to post by way of the poke or wave. Like so many people, I didn’t have time to talk to anyone who wasn’t providing me with something I needed and once the day wound down by the time I remembered I hadn’t spoken to my family or friends in a while, I’d glance at the clock and realize I was probably the only one who wasn’t asleep.

As we made the leap from television and radio to online streaming, the world became louder. We hear about everything moments after they occur. From people of power called out for tweets gone wrong to every new varient of the coronavirus discovered, to every fire, flood and frivolous fanfare, we are bombarded by the noise of the world. Yet, we are deafened by the silence of our lonliness. Even when I found myself sitting across from friends in person or virtually, I recognized how disconnected I’d become from people I actually had relationships with. We’d bounce from one meaningless topic to another until one of us blurted out the words of saving grace “Well, I gotta get going. Chat soon?” Yeah, right…..more like the Jamaican’s say “soon come” (meaning sure someday, some indefinite time in the future or maybe even NEVER) and as I slipped back into this life of mine that I thought was so busy, I turned up the volume of the noise of the world to drown out the loudness of my lonliness.

As my sons got older, I decided to teach them how to not get lost in the so-called busyness of life. After all, if it weren’t for them desperately trying to be heard by the adults in their lives, I might not have been able to re-direct myself onto a path that allowed me to be a less busy, more attentive human more generous with her time. As awkward as it can be, I make it a point to tell the people in my life regularly how I feel about them. We all want the people who matter to us to tell us the things people only say to each other in the movies. I want to hear how I make others feel. I want to hear that I am loved. I want to be thanked and I want to know that people are glad I’m around. I’m not looking for praise or popularity. I just want to feed the part of my soul that needs the comfort of feeling that I matter and that I have a purpose. If my soul’s yearning for a little uplifting and reassurance occasionally, I’m sure everyone’s is too. So I started with the three men in my life — my sons and my husband.

I know at any time, someone in our little family pod could die and should I go first, I don’t want them to wonder what they meant to me. I tell them I love them of course, but most of all, I hilight what it is I love about them, why I admire them, what makes me proud and why they are important — not just to me but to our community and to society. I believe that people, especially young people need to understand that they are important and that their existence is vital to the world. I think people need to hear that whether they are blessed with a long life or a concentrated one, what they think and do and what they bring to the table truly matters. The look on their faces as they process this information, the pause in the phone conversation after hearing these words allowed me to see and hear that my words have stirred up something positive within them. My younger son told me that the day I told him why he was important, they weight of the burden he was bearing became more tolerable. He told me knowing he was important made him feel stronger and more confident and he was able to say the same to others in his life. When I said the same thing to my older autistic son, he stared at me for what seemed like an eternity, smiled and hugged me and whispered “thank you Mom,”.

There are two songs that come to mind when I think of how necessary it is for us to un-busy ourselves so that we can connect with each other. I think of Five for Fighting’s 100 Years that reminds us that in the blink of an eye we are 15, 35 and 99 and I realize that if we don’t remember to say what we need to say when it matters, which is the essence of John Mayer’s, Say, we may go to our graves saying nothing at all. I don’t want that to happen to me so I make the time to reach out to that person who pops into my mind while I’m working or driving around. I try to plan some kind of outing for my group of girlfriends every two months or so and my bulletin board has post it notes to shoot person A or B a text to see how they are. I remember at the end of every staff email I send to thank them for bringing their unique talents to my autistic son’s life and remind them that we see and appreciate how much they do to enhance his life every day. These are the people who show up everyday to help my son and they do it not because they get paid, but because we give them the same love and kindness they show our son.

We can reverse drug use, depression, sadness, anxiety and suicide if we make the time to show love and kindness. A text, an email, a phone call or a face to face conversation brings as much joy to the giver as it does to the receiver. Mindfully chattting less about myself and finding out more about someone else lifts me up in ways material things cannot. Even people who begin a conversation by telling me they don’t have time, take a breath and slow their speech and they tell me the truth about how life’s been treating them. People need to talk. We need to listen. It’s important because they are important and life is short and they need to know while they are alive that they matter.

So I challenge you to realize you aren’t busier than anyone else. I challenge you to tell someone the things you would like someone to tell you…tell them something that you thing would lift them up and bring a smile to their face or give them that little confidence boost they might be looking for. If you do it once, I promise you you’ll do it for the rest of your life.

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The Power of Words – “Parenting” Young Adult Children

Our son’s have flown from the nest — both fully gone since their nineteenth birthdays, (yes, even the son with autism) and we were pleased and proud to see them launch their lives as young men.

As when I was young, they were ready to leave because their father and I made it so. They knew how to do small repairs about the home.They built a back deck and a front porch with their father. They were shovelling snow to clear the driveway at six years of age. When they turned eight, they started doing chores around the house like dishes and laundry, yardwork and light housework, lthough the younger’s room was always a perfectly-livable-to-him, disaster.

When it came to preparing meals, Adam, (the older, with autism) did have staff to help him, but he knew how to make simple meals on his own using his smart oven. He could set the time and temperature to prepare chicken; he could make a pizza; re-heat left overs in the microwave and could make a heck of a tasty, hearty sandwich, and always washed fruit and vegetables before consuming them.

Adam NEVER went hungry.

His brother, Logan, (with eye-rolling reluctance at first) learned to cook during the Covid 19 pandemic and all the dishes I taught him are documented online, right here on Medium, fully accessible to him, with photos. Pulling out an old, dusty notebook with mother’s handwriting on yellowed pages is part of my nostalgia and will never be a part of theirs and that’s quite fine by me. My sons are young men in a digital age so anything I want them to hold on to and reference is NEVER documented on paper.

It was incredibly important to me that my children learned as they grew, to take care of themselves — especially Adam. When he was diagnosed with autism, I made it my mission to cultivate many qualities in my sons; the most important ones being happiness and independence because to me, you can’t have one without the other. When they were young, I was haunted with the idea of me not being around to get them to adulthood. Life is unpredictable and can be unkindly short, so it was a priority of mine, not to put off teaching them all I could so that they could handle themselves as adults.

At that time, some of my friends thought that I was putting a lot pressure on myself and the boys— that I seemed to be in some race with time when it came to making Adam and Logan capable of so many things, and when I reflect on my sheer physical and mental exhaustion of raising them the way we’d chosen, perhaps they were right. But it wasn’t like their lives were devoid of fun and fantasy. I was married to the king of fun and he made sure their childhood was not misspent or lacking in awe and wonder. I might have taught them a lot of life skills quickly but it was the only way I knew how to parent the children we had by being myself and sticking to my beliefs. I was, and still am a person who is always thinking two or three years ahead, especially when it concerns parenting someone with special needs.

I spoke to Adam’s psychologist about this and he told me not to be insulted by his observation of me, as he went on to explain that in his professional opinion, I was quite male in my outlook and that it served me well. I knew what he meant right away and had quite the chuckle.

I am an ‘if it’s not bleeding or broken dust yourself off and give it another go’ kind of mother. I have a deep voice and while I was able to use it to soothe and comfort my kids, I was never able to speak to them in light, higher-pitched baby speak. They were large, strong babies, toddlers and kids who enjoyed rambunctious play, and I was happy to indulge their roughhousing as much as I was happy to read and sing to, hold, hug and kiss them. I look, and present as Mom but I do share traits possessed by their father whereby I see things in a cause and effect way. So, in my mind, as their mother it translated to I loved them, ergo it was my duty to teach them. I believed that by teaching them I would foster their confidence and independence and they would be better prepared to take the one foot that was still planted in teen-hood and place it with the other in adulthood as they exited adolescence.

Adam’s psychologist agreed I seemed to be very A or B in my outlook on most things and he was right. I guess having a child with autism does not afford you the opportunity to procrastinate or be wishy-washy about anything. Living with Adam’s autism meant we had to be decisive. In a crunch when he was not coping well with a situation (remember we also had to take into consideration how Logan would be affected by what was going on with Adam) it was imperative that we asscess quickly, think quickly and act and move forward quickly and without doubt.

For us, there was never any value in negotiating with our children when they were young — especially Adam. Talking too much, being overly emotional was useless in parenting disastrous behaviorial moments that were stressful to all of us. Tom and I had to treat and street . We had to shut down behaviors firmly, calmly and later when the young ‘perpetrator’ converned was in a receptive mood, briefly and simply explain why we did what we did, always reminding him that we corrected him because we we loved and cared about him. We saw no point and no gain for our sons through coddling and I suppose if you can put any belief in Adam being born to us because we were the right parents for him, then I am proud that we chose our parenting path and stayed on it.

If I had to choose my greatest strength as their mother, I would pick my ease with language. I have always known how to talk to each of my sons in a way he could understand. As they got older, I embraced the power of my words through emailing and particularly texting with them because of its immediate delivery. The bumps, bruises and their tearful chats with me at the kitchen table or lying beside them in their beds were the problems of a childhood past and their adult burdens are now soothed by the healing and encouraging power of my words.

In a time when the world is moving so quickly and there is so much violence, hatred and pain, it can be hard for my young men to see the joy and the good that I promised them will always exist. My words, help them find the serenety they seek, and help them make sense of the confusion that is presented to them sometimes on the daily. My words remind them of who they are and that they are loved.

My younger son is supposed to be living his dream right now and for the most part he is. He is playing NCAA ice hockey and studying kinesiology. He is strong on the ice and is strong academically and has been on the Dean’s list every semester. This however is the hardest year for the team. The losses have been insurmountable and it is clear that after eleven seasons (this being the worst) the coach is struggling to find ways to utilize what is a collection of very talented and highly skilled players in the most effective way to produce wins. The players know it and have approched the athletic director of the school and while parents have spoken about it amongst themselves, (and I am sure a few have reached out to the athletic director as well) our sons are adults and as parents we are merely spectators and must behave accordingly.

As his parents, my husband and I can only listen to, and support our son and give advice if and when he asks for it. We have noticed that often when there has been an issue when we would have stepped in and helped him in his youth, the phone call we get now is merely an account of what happened and what he did to rectify it. We have now had almost four years of him calling us to tell us about a problem he has solved. Whether his approach was different from the one we would have taken, we listen and appreciate that he has learned to manage himself in his still, new journey as an adult.

I am sharing the text messages between us this morning.

With just three games to limp through before they put this dying season to rest, it has been difficult for him and his teammates to play for this coach, who albeit a nice person, is in over his head at this level of competition. My son and many others on the team are already weighing their options with their advisors as to where they should play and continue their academics next season and you can feel the tension these decisions are creating when you go to the games. Disbanding a brotherhood and disrupting the camaraderie is anguishing and as Mom, all I have to offer are my words.

This is what I said to him –

“Good morning, my son. Today is day two of the snow storm in our area and unfortunately we will not be able to see you play in person as planned but we will live-stream the game tonight and cheer for the team in the warmth and safety of ‘the sports-cave’ — lol.

Today, I woke up early remembering how you would run into our bedroom and whip open the curtains and say, ‘it’s a morning day!’ You were ready to play at 5:30 a.m. every day — lol — much to your tired dad’s exasperation. 🙂

I know you are an adult now but whenever you can, tap into that 4-year-old kid and embrace the joy of being alive. Every day is a new opportunity no matter how crap the day before and remember to just enjoy what you do and who you are. Because the truth about you, Logan, is joyous and beautiful. No one and no situation can ever take that away. I see it in you even now, so today, enjoy EVERY moment. Enjoy everything learned, every step you walk, every bite you eat, every word you say and every time your skate blades hit the ice. Enjoy it because YOU are happiness. YOU are joy and even if things don’t go exactly your way, know that you were still able to be healthy and alive to experience it.

Have fun tonight.

HAVE FUN.

Skate and play with joy, and if you don’t skate for whatever reason or decision, just know that you are still YOU, and you are still LOVED and this is just one night and there is still so much for you to do in the world. HAVE AN AMAZING DAY, SON! Love you more than you know, ❤ Mom.”

And within five minutes I received —

“Thank you so much Momma. I really loved reading that and I really love you. Thank you for being you and that is, not only the best mom ever, but the best human on this earth. I love ya and I can’t wait to play for you guys tonight and to have fun doing what I love and what I was meant to do.”

As flattering as his comment was, it’s not about me scoring points in the mothering department. Far from it. My older son cannot express himself the way his younger brother can but when I text him or speak to him in the car, the gentle squeeze of his hands on mine, lets me know that he too has felt my love and support.

That’s all they need from me and their father moving forward. These days, I can’t give them much more than a listening ear and occasionally, my words. I can only hug them and kiss their stubbly cheeks when I see them and that is not often. They have grown and they are gone most of the year. They have new people in their lives who fill the voids their father and I cannot.

I look back on our parenting and I am proud of the way we chose to raise them and acknowledge all the mistakes and misteps made along the way knowing that without apologizing for them to the boys, we would not have developed the strong rapport their father and I have with them today.

I love our sons and I am proud of them and even if all I can do is bandage their adult wounds with my words. I take comfort in the thought that my words will boost them in some small way to live confidently trusing their intuition and having the courage of their conviction to be their best selves.

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IMPORTANT!

My sons are entering what I like to call full adulthood. They are at the stage where they tackle problems on their own and let their father and me know the outcome. This is great to see, because we have all done the work to prepare them to do this and while they are relatively open with us and seek advice occasionally, more and more they’re trying to involve us less and less. It is a natural progression that is both beautiful and slightly unnerving to witness this carving of paths and shaping of lives and as their mother, I have to accept this aspect of their independence. Their father is far better at it than I am.

I check myself before I convey how I feel about them or when I want to give that boost of confidence they might need. The innate desire as their mother is to go back in time when I would hold them in my arms and tell them how special they are and how proud I am of them and end the pep talk with a big hug and a kiss on the cheek — but we’re not there anymore and those moments are what I refer to as fond foundational memories. I know they have dark moments. We all do. If you are alive you have dark days. In a world with so much failing around us, it’s impossible to avoid dark days when you feel like no matter what you have done right, everything is piling onto you. I am from the generation where we were told that we shouldn’t whine,that no load is too heavy to bear, that we had nothing to complain about and to suck it up. Today, we can go to the extreme if we are not careful and we can fail to teach our youth how to cope. Other times we can disable them by jumping in and disarming them of problems by solving it for them, parent-style. We walk a fine line as parents no matter the age of our children and we have to come up with ways to lift them up without patronizing them or disregarding their ideas and opinions.

Last week, one of my sons was working through an issue and we could tell in the initial phone call, he was upset and was making rash decisions and spoke about giving up on something he has been working so hard to achieve. He had done nothing wrong but the circumstance in which he finds himself is unfortunate and out of his control. All he could do is be his best self within the organization in the midst of the disarray and work on ways to get out and transfer to another that would be a better fit. After listening to what he had to say, we gently reminded him that over the years when we opened the door for him to quit, he never did and that he needed to give himself twenty-four hours to cool down and look at it with fresh eyes and not give in to making rash decisions.

The next day we listened to a much calmer young man who reiterated that he was not a quitter and that he was thinking with a clearer head and planned to take things patiently, day by day and continue to do his best until something better came along. We were happy to hear this but not surprised and it was then I recognized I needed to tell him something I hadn’t outrightly ever said to him or his brother in their teen years and this was the perfect time to tell him why I agreed with his plan. I simply said,

“This plan makes sense to me because of how important you are,” I began. “I hope you know that you are important, son,”

His silence indicated he was waiting for my explanation. I told him that beyond his academics, job and his sport; beyond his importance in our family and his circle of friends; he is important to society. I told him I was aware that he knows he is a good human being and I want him to remember that society, our community and any future community in which he finds himself, needs him. The world society needs humans like him. He is important for the survival of our species and our planet because he is a human who wants to do the right thing and knows how to get things done. He is a human filled with compassion and patience and he is a kind, loving and always-willing-to-help human who spreads happiness and joy. And while we are all flawed, he makes us proud parents because he is the best of us plus all the innate goodness he showed up with nineteen years ago.

I imagined what it would feel like to be told how important I was at a young age. If sometone tells me that now, I believe it because I am a parent, a provider,I provide service to clients, I am knowledgeable and I have the means to teach and to help. But when I was young and had nothing tangible to show in order for me to feel important…man, if someone explained why my mere existence and my actions made me important, hmmph, that would have lifted me up beyond the stars. We need to tell people they are important. We need to let them know that we see the role they play in life and why they are vital to our existence.We need to tell them that they don’t need material possessions or titles to be important because they are one unique and special piece of a much greater jigsaw puzzle that is life and we can’t be whole without them. We need to show them how their very presence on the planet is key to the success of many other people and that everything they are a part of would be worse without them. And while everyone is important, our young people are especially so, because they are the ones to take us into the future — a future, I might add, we have severely tarnished — a future they have to fix. We need them. We need them to cope so that they can survive. We can save their lives if we tell them how important they are…tell all of them, not just the ones who appear vulnerable. Tell them all!

You are important. You are needed. You represent change. You represent hope. You are the best of us and we are here to help however and whenever we can because you are important and the world does not work without you.

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Unleashed

A couple weeks ago, plans with my sister changed due to weather and we decided on a rain check. Looking at the overcast sky and the drizzle sprinkling the back deck, I was about to settle for a day indoors when I realized, it was perfectly still. No wind rustled the leaves of the trees. The air was thick and humid, the smell of the rain soaking into the earth, ripe. Feeling the discontemtment with the possibility of an indoor day, I gave into my urge to be outside and on the water. After all, I was on day two and a half of the eighty two hours I had to myself and I wanted to use this time to unleash myself from my usual routine. There was to be no cooking or cleaning up during this time and knowing that this unusually hot weather (no matter how strange) in Canada should not be taken for granted, I didn’t want to spend all my time at home. The confirmation that I had to get out and do something came from my reflection in the mirror while brushing my teeth. I was checking out the mop of curls atop my head (no hair appointments during covid), and looking at the transformation my hair has been undergoing. In my case, dark strands are turning red and over time, red to yellow before settling into a permanent state of white. Unlike my face, my hair isn’t deceiving when it comes to my age and nothing says get out and utilize your time like graying hair. I got in line with a parade of SUV’s at Starbucks and treated myself to a fancy coffee; went back home, changed and threw my paddle board gear and my stuff (wallet, phone, water bottle, comb, towel and a cotton slip-on dress) in the car and headed for the beach. Listening to lyrics being belted out by Amy Lee and other thought inspiring music streaming via Bluetooth, I was really inside my head, watching the road, of course, but thoughts a million miles away. When I have downtime from work and my family I spend a lot of time thinking deeply about my life, the world and my place in it. Like everything else over the years, in moments like these I recognize how much the deep thinking has changed. I remember times of solitude whether I was driving or just sitting on the deck, my thoughts would would classify more as worry or concern …concern over my autistic child’s future, concern for my other child, my husband, my parents, my marriage, my ever changing ways of making a living…it was all based on concern and problem solving. Now, at 54, I’m in the roller coaster carriage going up the last couple not-so-steep inclines of the ride of life and my deep thoughts bring a smile to my face and peace to my soul. This is the we’ve-made-it-through-the-toughest-times incline and it is the one where we get to experience and truly appreciate the things that make us feel love, happiness and gratitude and although everything that goes up must come down and I know there will be loss and sadness to bear, the ride will plateau and eventually come to an end. If it ends with me feeling the way I feel now, then I would have succeeded in truly living.

As I drove through the county’s winding road to my destination, I appreciated the gift this region was to me and my family. I have never warmed to the town we settled in after having lived in some of Canada’s most fabulous cities. I have never understood or accepted the cliquish and rather frivolous nature of the people who were born and bred here but I’ve learned to live my life in this small place while keeping the small minded at arm’s length. The county is home to some of the best vineyards in the country and best stretches of beach front, cosy coves, inlets of Lake Ontario. Being from the Caribbean, the Provincial Parks in my area draw me to their shallow clear waters and white sands. It feeds my passion to play in the water and hear the shushing of waves as I’d done in mychildhood, albeit without that briny taste of the ocean so dear to me. This piece of perfect real estate is one of the reasons I am able to continue living here. 

In spite of the grey skies and spotty showers, the colours of the vegetation along the way were vibrant and lush and I could see that there was no turbulance on the water in spite of the rain. The water was flat and almost motionless like a sheet of glass and the beaches were not crowded but they weren’t deserted either. It seemed, like me, people were intent on having their day at the beach in spite of the weather. Some people took shelter from the rain grilling their food under pop up tents or canopies while others were enjoying being in the warm water, being baptised by the rain.

I inflated my board and paddled out into serenity, my oar slicing through the water, the sound of tiny ripples overiding the ambiance of music, people chatting and kids playing. It didn’t matter that the drizzle had turned into a shower. It was peaceful and where I needed to be. Not having much experience as a paddle boarder, the initial tense legs and overly engaged core were now relaxed and I was looking ahead at the scenery and not at the water. I thought about the last seventeen months of this global pandemic and what it had done to the world. I thought of all the suffering and death it caused and while I recognize and acknowledge our privilege and good luck, I thought of what it did to my sons. I thought of how their goals screeched to a halt, shattering everything they were planning to do post high school. My sons are on the brink of independent adulthood and 2020 was supposed to be the year that bore the fruits of their labour. But, instead, like everyone,they had to wait and wait and wait some more. They had to find ways to stay motivated and positive and the toll it took on both their mental well-being was overwhelming, especially for my autistic son. And then came change. Some much needed relief in the form of vaccines. Now fully vaccinated, we can do a bit more. We can gather with a select few and we can be outdoors and we can get a taste of the daily life we took for greanted. Two strokes to the left, two to the right I’d covered a decent distance from my spot on the beach. “We did it,” I thought and a smile came to my face. We made it through the toughest sixteen months of our lifetime; especially my sons, especially Adam. We followed the protocol, we kept our distance from everyone outside our family and we found a way to make the lockdowns worthwhile. Those were the good days. I taught the boys how to cook, their father showed them their way around power tools and home renos, they studied, they trained and we all stayed healthy. And then there were the difficult days, especially for Adam. After all those the days when his inability to communicate what was bothering him resulted in destruction and pain, just like the rest of us, he made it through. One stroke on the right, one on the left, I kept paddling and I felt my shoulders drop and the tightness disappear and in that instant I realized that we’re all okay and everything with everyone I love was as it should be.

The pandemic is not over and it will be a while before we have a handle on Covid 19. There is a lot going on in the world along with Covid 19 and it’s repercussions. The climate has changed and the west of our country is burning, while tornados touch down in South West Ontario and Northern Ontario is on fire too. Greece is burning. Germany is flooding. California is burning again and it is easy to think that our planet is just going to turn to ash one day, but in that moment, as I paddled, I was able to unleash it all and let it go. And I felt it leave me too. You see, I might not be able to change the world, but I can do my part; I can do my best to not add to the problems that plague our world. There is still a lot of good and a lot of beauty to behold and therefore, there is hope in spite of all our problems. 

One stroke to the right, one to the left, over and over and over until I felt like I was floating on a cloud rather than on water. I thought of the love of my life and our love that has deepened over the years and how much more I love him each and every day in ways I never knew existed. Paddle left. Paddle right. Love, like life,has evolved. Love is easy, always available and is uncomplicated at my age. Marriage, like me on my board, floats, bobbing over ripples easily. Marriage, is friendship, comfort and well…its home, welcoming me with open arms everytime and it’s where I want to be. Children are grown and starting their adult lives and we are starting a new chapter together that still includes and cares about our boys, but is mainly focused on us and the time we will spend together until one of us leaves this life.

Like a loud noise, or a flash of lightening, a jet ski’s motor and heavy wake disrupted my peaceful thoughts. My board bobbed and wobbled on the waves and I lost my balance and plunged into the water as did two screaming little girls from a paddle board about 80 metres away. Beginners all, the sudden waves made it difficult to pull ourselves back onto our boards. The more I tried, the more my legs bobbed and kicked the more tangled my leash became in the tall weeds. A strong swimmer, even with a life jacket, I grew tired. I stopped. I took a breath. What was the plan? Looking into the water, I could barely see my foot. Reaching down I tried to remove the velcro ankle cuff. What a bitch that was! Who knew weeds were that thick and strong? Third time was the charm. With my foot free, I tried to mount the board again, but when I pushed my weight onto it, the tail of the board would sink because the leash tethered it so strongly onto the weeds. I was tired. I was done with this shit. I reached up and unhooked the leash from the board and glided towards the shore. I glanced over at the kids whose father had come into the water to detangle their leash from the weeds and bring them to shore. They left their leash behind too but they were safe. I hoisted myself onto the board and lay face up. A big breath released the tiredness and frustration of dealing with the weeds. I was unleashed. I was free. So, I lost a thirty dollar leash. Whatever. It was holding me back. Binding me to disgusting, prickly, slimy, octopus- arm-like weeds. Weighing me down. I remember my cousin Nicole would say, “just free it, Danie. Free it” and I did and everything was so much better. 

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There is No Colour : Learning to Un-Learn

 

There Is No Perception of Colour in an Autistic Person’s World

 

Throughout his life, my autistic son who is brilliant has been perceived as being less so. The people that matter in his life, know the truth about him and I have never wasted any time trying to prove his worth to anyone not intelligent enough or anyone who is too self absorbed or frivolous to understand. Over the years of rejoicing through the great times and wading through the murky, thick mud of the heartbreaking times, I have come to know that the truth about both my children is beautiful.  In a time of chaos brewed by racism, terrorism and hatred I feel their father and I have managed to put a sliver of hope for better on this planet.

Two days ago sitting in a cloud of misery borne out of merely watching a half hour newscast, I heard Adam in the other room in full *echolalia going on happily about something that was happening in the Big Bang Theory which is the latest show he likes to binge watch.  His *scripting had something to do with the character Raj and I thought I would do a little test.  I called him into the living room and asked him what was going on in the episode he was watching and he proceeded to tell me how funny it was and that it was because Raj was saying silly things.  Feigning ignorance, I asked him which character was Raj.  He turned to go get his tablet in his room so that he could show me when I stopped him and asked him to describe Raj. What you have to understand is that Adam hates being pushed into descriptive language but it is something we are working on and I wanted to see what he would say.  He twisted his mouth, scrunched his nose and then he said,

“He is the tall one,”  to which I responded,

“So Leonard is …”

“Leonard is short. Raj is a guy,” he offered.

“A guy like Leonard and Sheldon and Howard?”

“Yes. Howard is short,” he replied.

“But I still can’t place Raj. Which one is he?” I pressed on.

Adam proceeded to say adjectives like tall, skinny, silly, funny, jokey…he never said that Raj was brown. Not that he does not know his colours –  I remember vividly when he was 5 and he was  learning colours he certainly realized that mummy was brown but that was it. It was an observation when he was 5 and to this day, Adam has never used colour to describe anyone because he has never associated a person with their colour – ever. I have however had to un-teach some of the derogatory words he has heard in school over the years. Words that sometimes were directed towards him when misinformed or rather poorly-informed kids saw that I was his mother. He would say the words completely out of context and I would have to spend weeks purging them from his vocabulary by teaching him in the most basic of terms that some words are just so very bad.  I hope I never have to un-teach him words such as those again but I shan’t be naive because this world is getting worse.

People who don’t know Adam or those who know him and have labelled him, will never see beneath the surface the way those who know him do.  He may have to struggle through some days sometimes because of his autism, he may have to do things differently to get by and he may have some days when having to adjust things to suit him or to keep him successful is a real pain in the ass for whomever has to make the adjustments but one thing is certain –  Adam sees people.  He sees their soul, he sees their personality and he sees their beauty because even with perfect vision my son cannot see their colour. There is a purity about him that I attribute to his autism that I wish every human had.  He knows what pretty is but he never calls anything ugly although he understand’s the meaning of the word. He does not place any emphasis on riches but he certainly understands that he has to help someone who may be poor. He is paid in self satisfaction, happiness and pride for every job he does and he works harder than most from beginning to end.  Hmm…autistic with a work ethic. Chew on that for a while.

I shake my head and laugh so many times when I think of the resolute therapists who incessantly repeated the importance of integrating Adam into the world by working on reducing or stopping his “inappropriate” behaviors and quirky actions so that in essence he could be more like other people in society.  I think it should be the other way around because I have seen what my boy sees.  I have laid beside him in that little playroom as I waited on him to meet me halfway; doing what he did, stretching out our hands to the light streaming through that tiny basement window, watching the little specs of dust dance between our fingers. I remember feeling a glorious release when we would roll down the hill at the playground near our house when he and his brother were little.  I remember the giggles and the all out raucous laughter, the smell of the grass and the feel of the dirt on my body. I’d forgotten the abandon of childhood and I am eternally grateful to my children for re-introducing me back then to just how much fun and how freeing life can be. I remember laying on our backs in that playroom staring at the ceiling, humming and becoming so relaxed that my body sank into the carpet as I was lulled to sleep by my little boy’s sweet voice.  We met each other halfway in that playroom – he, discovering the wonders of the world as I presented it to him; me, recognizing just how over stimulating and bombarding the world actually was. In that playroom where I taught my son everything he knows, I learned from him how to let the noise go, how to hear what was within me and how to tap into moments of peace.  Adam knows how to get back to his soul.  Even when it is most difficult for him he knows how to tap into that place of goodness, knows how to let go of all that has him tangled and twisted up emotionally in order to restore himself and dwell in a place of peace and love. Shouldn’t we all figure out how to do that? Think about how much less pain we all could cause if we are able to release anger and horrible, hateful or violent thoughts from our minds and hearts and return to a place of peace and love and restore ourselves and each other. Yeah, right…integrate my son into society as it is, my ass.  We should be so lucky to be more like him.

 

 

Learning to Unlearn

 

It is no secret that to me, my second son Logan, is one of the best people I know. My aunt Meiling would call someone like Logan “too mannish” because he is far too young to be this miniature man of integrity and depth.  He has a sensibility that I have not seen in anyone so young.  His ability to discern bullshit from truth is something I did not have mastered by the time I was a teenager and to quote my husband “Watch for our son because anyone who ends up involved with him will be beyond fortunate because of  the human he is,”

I have tried very hard to raise Logan to not see race, creed or colour.  It was easier with Adam being autistic but by the time Logan got to grade 2 he learned what colour was unfortunately.  Looking back on my own childhood, I would say I was lucky to have grown up in a multicultural, multiracial society and be raised by parents who had friends from all walks of life, all colours and religions but like Logan, when I was 5, even sweet T&T way back then had it’s structure and divisions that were somewhat subtle at times blatant at others.  I remember what living with that was like – bouncing in and out of acceptance, hearing derogatory racial slurs in conversations, in traffic, putting up with disgusting comments from idle limers as my mother and I walked by them. My childhood was a good one but there are things I learned about the world that I was determined to do something about.  I knew there was no way to protect my children from these lesser things but I could teach them to be better and also be better than me and those before them. It may be naive of me but I like to think if I could just put two decent and good humans on the planet, I could make significant change.

So with Logan, I also did a little test.  I was in the living room when his friend came to the door.  He had just come from work on the reserve and he made a crack about delivering watery gas to our door.  The boys bantered back and forth with little jabs about each other’s ethnicity and then went out to grab a couple lemonades from the store.  When he got back, Logan joined us to watch the unfolding of events in Charlottesville and he was, like we were, disappointed in what we were witnessing.  Pausing the broadcast, I told him that I had something I needed him to do for me moving forward in light of all the hate and racism in the world.  I asked him to stop the light jabs among his friends that had racist tendencies.  He assured me they were all best buddies and no one took anything personally but I counteracted his point by pointing to the television.

“It can start with simple jesting and it can evolve into this,” I told him. “We say stuff among our friends and no one is really offended so we accept it and then it gets a little more pronounced and we accept that too and then we have a difference of opinion and someone says something in anger and even though things may cool down and you are still buddies, it was blurted out and there is a dividing line in the friendship.  We cannot accept racism and lighthearted racist ribbing is not to be done anymore. It is not accepted and if you end it, it will end in your circle of friends.  The same way you do not tolerate the use of the word retarded to describe mentally challenged people, you must not participate in or tolerate racist jokes or jabs at all,”

My boy looked me in the eye and told me he understood and he would change it. Two days later when the friends were at the door, I was in the kitchen and one of them greeted the other with another native joke and my boy said,

“So, here’s the thing.  We can’t do that anymore, okay? My mom spoke to me about it and I agree with her.  She wasn’t mad or anything but she’s right. We are friends and we don’t want to get into talking like this so no more racist jabs. We cool?”

I heard the pseudo-manly voices echo in agreement and just like that they went down the street in front of one of their houses and started shooting hoops.  I didn’t tell him I heard them that night and in the car yesterday, Logan told me that he spoke to his buddies and they all agreed not to make anymore dumb jabs about race.  He said they actually agreed they didn’t really know why they were doing it.  They didn’t think it was funny and they didn’t really like it. I know Logan has struggled with the answer to the occasional question “So what are you? “from some idiot after they realize I am his mother.  Today he answers quite simply, “Human….a guy… a person,” and if they persist he suggests they “might want to do some travelling…read a book…get exposed, eh?”

There is so much going on now in the world. Our time is as filled with turmoil as it is with bliss – sometimes it is so overrun with turmoil that we have to do all we can to find bliss so that we can hang on to a shred of decency and sanity.  I am in the middle of my life and one day it will draw to an end but my children’s lives are just beginning and I can see that so many young people are trying hard to hold on what is real, to what is pure and what is true. It is an uphill battle and I understand why so many of our youth have difficulty coping with life as it is. They have so much more to deal with than we did and everyday they try to separate what is good about living in their time of technology from what is heinous and all I can do in my middle age is try and stay abreast of it all and not criticize them or compare their time to mine but truly support them however I can.

If there is one thing marriage and parenting have taught me is the importance of communication. In all my years of raising my boys I have never talked and listened more than I do now.  Every week there is something I learn that was not a part of my vocabulary.  Forget learning French, German, Cantonese, Spanish or what have you, I have had to master “youth speak” in ways I never imagined and as un-cool as I know I am, my husband and I are the first stop when my boys’ world come crashing down around them.  Their father and I won’t be there for them every time it happens and one day we will not be here at all and I hope their coping skills continue to be strong.  It’s like my husband says, “Parenting is 50/50. We can only hope that they hold on to that fifty percent of what we instilled in them the question mark is what they do with the other fifty and we can only hope they have the strength of character to navigate it in the right direction,”

In Logan’s lifetime he is going to learn and experience many things.  Some will be great and some will not and he will have to choose between doing the right thing or the easy thing, the right thing or the popular thing and the right thing or the wrong thing. He will soar and he will crash and he will soar again and his life will roller coster on just like any other life. My hope for his generation is that they can learn from the mistakes of past generations as well as their own and that they can release or un-learn some of the things we may have carelessly and mindlessly taught them. I hope they are better than we are and better than their grandparents.  I hope they put humanity first and that they operate from a place of love. I hope their generation sees an end to terror and most of all I hope they un-learn racism and bigotry and learn acceptance.  Who knows, maybe…just maybe theirs is the generation to turn the world around and propel us upward from the downward spiral we seem to be on.

 

*Echolalia is the repetition of words or phrases with sometimes no meaning or function attached to them. … Sometimes this behavior is termed “scripting” because the words and phrases the person is repeating comes from tv or movie scripts.

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Couldn’t Come Up With A Title.

love-1

As 2016 morphed into 2017, work surged. Busy at work is a good thing but there is also an ugly side to it as well.  An increase in volume means an increase in revenue, an increase in expenditure and in working hours, increased tiredness and shorter fuses.  Add to that raising 2 teenage boys, one a bit more difficult at times than the other, perimenopause, running a household and well, living life.  I thought I had a head start when I made sure we transitioned from the Christmas mode early enough in anticipation of the workload, but really, we all know you just can’t be ahead of the game all the time, especially when you want to be or feel like you have to be.  Very quickly things began to get on my nerves and while I tried to stay even keeled and patient, I was feeling like I just wanted to scrape off everything and everyone close to me. I literally felt like life was clawing and scratching its way all over me and it was overwhelming.

Needless to say when that happens around here, so do some pretty intense and “spirited” arguments followed by most certain tension.  Over the years Tom and I have been very real.  We have a good, strong marriage but certainly not a perfect one but we work at it and have fun with it as well.  I have known people who have said they never argue or fight ( oddly enough one person who has said this to me so many years ago in my living room in Brockville with her cutesie, shitty little smirk comes to mind.  She has since divorced her husband … go figure little Miss goodie Two Shoes Critical ).  Living together and working together has been a skill my husband and I have mostly mastered over the years and I say mostly because there are some damn days when mmmmm boy….OYE!  Alas, we are human.  It’s been better lately and we are getting through the crunch of the workload and we are getting back to the system we are used to but occasionally we both sense that the other is at the edge of tolerance.  We haven’t really made time to do our usual Netflix marathon.  We have been out to lunch but have been too mentally wiped to really talk and of course we are being supportive of Logan as he writes his first high school exams – being available to listen to his presentations, be there to help him if he is stuck with the studying and of course to drive him and Adam to practices and meets and appointments.  Add a dash of Adam’s occasional particular brand of autistic adolescent B.S and you get two people who generally enjoy spending time together, just happy to sit in different rooms and of late, fall asleep long before the other comes to bed.

This self preservation and intentional and mindful increase in patience and tolerance of each other has shown me that working towards building a successful business is draining.  Don’t get me wrong, we earned it, we want it and we are doing it but the lesson here is the same lesson one learns when times are tight and there is not a dollar to spare.  The lesson one learns when the baby has colic and has screamed for 24 hours and you instantly had him off without so much as a thought or even a “hello” to the person who has been grinding it out at work all day.  It is the lesson that teaches you about making an even greater effort to keep the relationship healthy.   You have to make a greater effort to smile, to greet and to listen.  You have to make a greater effort to know when you have to cut into your unwind time, tablet time, computer time or TV time and include that person you fell in love with.  You have dig deep inside yourself and make a great effort to make the time you spend together become time spent together and you have to make a greater effort to leave work at the doorstep.

We have a good but busy year ahead of us.  The tension is there but we have a better awareness of it, I feel.  I’d like to get back to being mushed together on the couch watching some TV series and I’d like us to be in bed at the same time, falling asleep at the same time and waking up late and staying in bed chatting about our random heavy duty topics without having to jump out of bed and get a head start on the workday.  I hope our lunches and dinners out can be free of the distraction of these initial busy first months or that these months will fly by and we can re-connect over a meal the way we usually do.

At least, though we …he… has taken a step toward that in the form of the grand gesture of us going to New York for my 50th birthday.  He has never been and I love going there and I am looking forward to sharing this experience with him.  I hope when we are there we let go of everything for the four days and I hope that time away from our usual environment will allow us to experience that familiar feeling we both love about marriage – the feeling of being “at home” when you are with the person you love. We are lucky, Tom and me.  We have had a hell of a ride on the fastest of roller coasters. Anyone who knows post-baby Daniella, will tell you I am no longer a willing coaster rider but on the life ride with Tom, in this marriage, in this crazy world with these two humans we are trying to raise to be good men, I have always felt safe with him.  As much as I may question or doubt, I can honestly say, he has always stuck to his word when he says everything will be alright.  He makes things right. He makes them better and he makes bad experiences fade into the past.  We have loved passionately, fought passionately, been worried, afraid,  hopeful  and happy on this life ride.  We have seen dark times and the brightest days and his optimism and my perseverance have complimented each other in a way that is demonstrated by the characteristics of our sons.  In some bizarre way, we work and well… we fit.  And as maddening as we can be to each other, and as polar opposite as we are there, is no one I would rather love, kiss, hug, lay beside, work with, sigh at, roll my eyes at and be frustrated with. I was reminded of that this week when I heard that my friend’s husband passed away and just this second when Tom told me one of his radio bosses (not much older than we are) also passed.  I have seen my clients go through it and I have seen my mother deal with it and I can see how painful, frightening and unfair it is to have the person you love leave you behind.  Life is so unpredictable and can change in the blink of an eye.  I hope for the retirement brochure image.  You know. that idyllic scene of two people travelling and exploring a new phase of life in their more mature years.  I yearn for it, pray for it, though I know it is only 50% up to us to get there as the other 50% is pure fate. I also fear not getting to experience it because I want it so badly.

So, tomorrow is another busy day.  He is booked solid with appointments and I will divide my time between getting my office into work space condition, touching base with a few clients about some projects on the go and going through and responding to our e-mails.  We will be working as a unit in the most separate of ways, ploughing through this next month, coming up for air when we get to the Big Apple. This is our life.  It’s not perfect and it is not always fair and it is not always all shits and giggles but I think it’s pretty great, even when it sucks because I’d rather it suck with my three men than without them.  Whether you are in a state of bliss, state of despair or in some kind of weird funk like me, I wish you peace and I wish you the good sense to always reflect on what you have and what you stand to lose.  ( Of course, if your situation is utterly shite and you need to move on, please do, because this is not about putting up or being content to settle with a terrible person or situation no matter what  – let’s be clear on that).  Here’s to clarity, to ploughing through tough times to get to the better times and here’s to time well spent with those well loved.

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Four Months to Fifty: Looking Back on Summer – for Me, Smart Continues to be Sexy.

goofy-us     He is a joker 99% of the time, making all kinds of weird faces but I think I have a handsome dude.  I mean that’s what starts it, right?  You like the way a person looks according to your taste and then you keep looking at them, taking them in  – their gestures, their smile and then you get to know them and if you are lucky, really know them before you decide you want to spend your life with them.  I think love has a lot to do with using your head as you follow your heart.  It is a combination of so many things including luck and intuition with a little dash of abandon.   In addition to the way he looks, what I fell crazy in love with was his mind.  We have had, and continue to have, the most fascinating conversations and at times wonderfully solid, prove-our-point intense arguments, usually in bed on a Sunday morning, through the time we walk the dog to the last bite of breakfast. When Adam and Logan got old enough to grab a bowl of cereal and head to the TV and eventually morph into late sleeping teenagers, our Sunday morning conversations became more frequent.

We talk about the strangest things sometimes – random things that usually start with me blurting out questions about stuff that just flies into my mind.  There have been conversations about the Hadron Collider, politics; audio; every genre of music, architecture; athletes; history; Einstein, Dalton and Darwin; why plaid was ever a concept, modern medicine; parenting and finances. We’ve talked about people, clothing and cars; art in all its forms; movies; growing up in Trinidad and why our avocados are also called zabocas and why they are so much bigger than the ones in California and Mexico.  We’ve talked about growing up in Canada, the TV shows that were unique to where we grew up and the ones we watched along with the rest of the world.  Of course we talk about our children, our parents and siblings and what we hope the future will bring.  We talk about sports and food and the places we hope we are fortunate to see together and what the other should do, if the day we are to become a single unit, comes sooner than we would like it to.  I would like to think every couple talks and have healthy arguments like we do – that every couple finds their spouse interesting after the first 5, 10, 15 years and beyond. Do we get fed up with the stuff of family life? Of course, we do. That’s to be expected because it can really wear you down but you can’t let it grind you down.  If I had to pick two things to tell people getting married it would be these –

If you have a fight, and I mean a good old all out, drag down, spit-out-hurtful-crap kinda fight…stop and take a moment to remember why you fell in love in the first place.  You should be able to find the answer and realize that it is greater and more powerful than what caused you to fight in the first place. (if it isn’t, then of course, you have a decision to make)

and

Never let tension drag on. Talk about how you feel no matter how long it takes even into the wee hours of the morning…talk it out and apologize if you are wrong.  Umm … I have to throw in one more …must be the Trini in me …

Definitely have make up sex.  Have lots of sex … you are married after all.  Keep it spicy. Keep it fun. Keep it alive.  Make your partner feel special because they are because they have chosen to put up with you and most likely one, two or more children!  Marriage is hard work man … may as well have all kinds of fun.

But as usual, I digress.  Back to Tom and his mind.  As creative as he is, and as avid a reader, Tom enjoys everything numeric.  He speaks the language of numbers fluently and loves that with numbers there is always a conclusion, a definitive answer and to him, that makes sense.  Numbers don’t scare or confuse him and after a neurofeedback test we all did, it seems that numbers keep him quite calm and happy.  This ability is what makes the difference in the way we run our business and when you sit with him, you see how his plans to save, grow and protect your income make sense.  Sometimes, if you find numbers as fascinating as he does, the meeting becomes more of an interesting conversation between two similar people and next thing you know, you realize you are fond of the same music, games – the list can go on. However, if you really, really, really are not numerically inclined, but you know you need help and you are open minded and you find yourself meeting with him, you also have the opportunity to sit with me, the translator.  I help intimidating jargon that tends to pop up seem more friendly and together Tom and I will make the numbers relatable and user friendly to you so you can leave our office with a sound personalized plan that makes sense.  It’s a win/win situation …plus we have a giant jar of Skittles in the office.

This past June, Tom was asked to speak at our company’s Congress.  It is a 2 day forum where business ideas and strategies are discussed and we come together as a region to share our thoughts and learn from each other.  Tom’s topic was about getting your Financial business up and running.  He titled it ” Breaking Ground – Tips and Strategies for your First Five Years of Business”.   Adam was busy finishing up the last week of his Grade 10 year but Logan was able to join us as he was on a field trip in Toronto (close to where Congress was being held) to wind up his Grade 8 graduation year at Elementary School.  I think it is important for children to understand what their parents do and and how their work impacts people’s lives.  I think it is important for them to know just how it is parents manage to keep a roof above everyone’s heads, clothes on their backs and food on the table and I think it is an important part of their education and I want my children to also understand the importance of giving a family member support by their mere presence.

Tom and I knew by 2003, it was time for us to get out of Radio and Television.  The industry is not what it used to be and with the internet being as powerful as it is, the industry will continue to have a hard time engaging the current younger generation and future generations.  Salaries shrank, many jobs became redundant and the job (whatever was left of it) owned you and each month the hours you put in were not reflected in your pay slip.   The lack of creativity and shift to reality television that literally airs everyone’s dirty laundry on international TV is another example of the drastic change in the business and we knew in order be a part of something we were proud of and in order to continue to provide for our children the way we want to, address Adam’s needs and to retire the way we hope to, we had to make the shift to a different career. With my banking background and his flare for numbers and interest in economics, Finance made sense and though we still dabble in creative writing and voice work as paid hobbies, we have never looked back.

One of the beautiful things about training for a career in Broadcasting, is the ability to speak in front of a crowd.  We each are capable of doing that without boring people to tears (let’s face it, even if you love it, numbers is a pretty dry topic). To Broadcasting, we attribute our ability to make our presentations interactive and entertaining and our effective use humor –  a skill we are developing in both Logan and yes, Adam as we have helped him come out of his shell and deliver speeches to his elementary class back in the day, about topics he loves.  Tom’s workshop at Congress was divided into two sessions and each time the room was filled. Blessed with one of those unique, richly textured broadcasting voices that makes you want to listen to him, he was engaging right away and as such, no one was distracted by their phones or whispering to their colleague beside them.  He spoke about his first year in the business and how important it is to develop a strong foundation in the early months of advising.  He spoke about how to look beyond what you read in a person’s portfolio and looking for ways to help clients, save them money, what were the right questions to ask in a review and how to really listen to your client and how to find out about their changing needs and goals.  He spoke about why he attributed the success of his first two years to the methods he used and segued into his difficult third year, which to be honest, was mostly because he had to put parenting ahead of work more than usual that year because our Adam not only had to deal with autism but puberty as well.  He then moved on to the following years and what he did to right the business ship while helping me keep the family vessel and Adam on track and he said something I will never forget.  He said,

” If anyone should have failed in this business, it should have been me.  The odds were always against me because I don’t have the easiest of families because of Adam’s autism. We had very little respite in place for Adam at the time and we have always had to keep life as normal as possible for Logan with all that we have to do for his brother.  When we decided to start on this new career path, to help me get started, we took the plunge and had Daniella leave her part time job to come work with me.  There was no steady spousal salary the family could rely on and we had very little savings we could tap into.  In our family, we tend to jump in and swim because sinking is not an option. There are no great excuses for not trying or not performing.  As humans, there are many traps that we create for ourselves that we can fall into and use as excuses for failure if we allow ourselves to do so.  I knew all I had to do was work, serve my clients in the best way that I could and just keep going.  If I had a bad day, I gave myself some time to take a break and have that bad day but the next day I would re-group and get right back at it again because three people at home were relying on me.  If you do right by your clients, if you do everything in their best interest, if you are honest and fair and if you have a good support system, you can be successful at this job and anything you put your mind to,”

The last part of his presentation was centred around financial planning for an overlooked group – families with children with special needs.  He explained how to use the tools we have as advisors in the most effective ways for these families and how to use them so that families can be tax smart.  He spoke about wills, probate, special needs assistance grants and by the way everyone was taking photos of his power point and writing notes, I realized they were learning something new…something that had been right under their noses the whole time but they just did not see it.  He was showing managers and “big wigs” how to do it right and looking at this realization on Logan’s face, I could not be more proud.  Tom was also teaching his son, how to teach other people.  He was showing him how to share his knowledge and showing him how to deliver his ideas in a strong, dynamic and effective way … humph… it was quite the effective “take your kid to work day” session and Logan was honored and proud to be a part of it.

I am quite an internally emotional person.  I am not a crier, in fact I come off sometimes as cold and sometimes a little unfeeling as I don’t always show outward emotion and when I speak, I can sometimes be quite blunt and honest but Tom is the only person who can make me tear up by the videos he creates.  He ended the session with a couple videos one of which featured Adam to bring home his point.  Now throughout the presentation, he had video clips from movies, he had images and clips of various people and situations, that allowed him to prove his point in a light visual way in between his statistics, tables and charts.  The videos, which I had seen many times while he was preparing for the presentation came on the screen and they simply showed the value of the life of a person with special needs and why helping their families continue to give them the enriched lives they deserve was so important, and why in our business compassion has to be the first ingredient.

My tears were ones of pride and joy and out of much admiration for him in BOTH of his sessions because Tom does things for the right reasons ALWAYS.  He was put on this earth to help people and even though in our situation, we need help ourselves, he always gives and gives and gives  – of himself, his money and his time.  What was even better was that Logan (who is so much like him) got to see this and got to see that nice guys do finish first … it may take some time but it DOES happen.

Tom got a standing ovation after both sessions.  There were lines of advisors wanting to express their gratitude and shake his hand.  There were advisors wanting to know more, asking for his business card, wanting a copy of the presentation etc., so Logan and I had to go to work dealing with that.  As I think about each moment in those two presentations, my heart gets so full.  I was never looking for a husband.  I never pictured the white dress or walking down the aisle. I had dated a couple nice guys before Tom and a couple bozos and I had gotten to a self comfort where I was happy to just be. I was capable of taking care of myself and was interested to see how my life would play out.  I would say sometimes I am not an easy person to figure out or be with.  I have my ideas and opinions and I am proud of who I am and I don’t bend easily so I never thought I would find anyone who would be a great partner, soul mate or husband … but here he is and there he was in a damn fine black suit, “awesoming” all over the place delivering what he knew, quite eloquently in an entertaining and informative way with passion, humor and his great laugh. He was talking about work but he made it human and he made the clients human and he made his peers care and while doing all that, his math was impeccable and the numbers made sense and I could have had him right then and there he was so smart and so damn sexy!

Now, as I drift into the coolness of fall, sip my chai and reflect on the summer and its special moments, I smile at the thought of my math geek and the complete package that he is to me.

cheers-to-us

He tries to make us happy every day.  If there is a problem, we can count on him to fix it and if we need a dose of fun, he will provide it.

cropped-509773400071.jpg   He loves life, he loves his parents, his brother and sister,  he loves their family, loves my family, he loves our boys and he loves me.   cheers-after-vows      tom-and-daniella-ready-for-10-morelast-resort-dinner

He honors the vows we recited in front of twenty-two people nineteen years ago on one beach and the vows we renewed nine years ago, on another.

My 10 year renewal vows to Tom

My 10 year renewal vows to Tom

Toms 10 year vows to me

Tom’s 10 year vows to me

He can give me a potato chip and make me feel like a queen and the only way I know how to honor him is to put my thoughts into words especially for his sons to read. No one is perfect (my God, I am hopelessly flawed) but we can learn how to treat each other like we are the perfect beings we were created to be.

Every so often, we get an opportunity to take in the essence of someone we love, or someone we call friend.  I like to think of those moments as golden moments because it is so easy to get caught up in the busyness of life and lose sight of what is special about a person.  And this past summer, the last one in my forties, Logan and I were given one of those golden moments.  It was wonderful to “see” Tom again and know how very important, and kind and good and loving he is.  In marriage you get to see the struggles and the little annoyances often.  They add up and piggy back on the responsibilities of adult life and they spill over in a big sloppy mess onto the relationship and if you are not careful, they cover up the golden moments, those precious lifelines that keep couples in contact with each other at a deeper and more significant level.   Watching my widowed mother over the past 8 years, I am more aware of the importance and power of the golden moments because in a month, a day, an hour or a second a person can be out of your life forever and wouldn’t it be tragic if we never took the time to see them for who they were, to see what made you love them or to not take the time to tell them what they meant to you and that you just simply loved them no matter what.  My mother and father appreciated and loved each other and as my sister and I got older and moved on, it was apparent that their love and friendship knitted them even closer together.  On the 17th of this month (October) they would have been married 52 years and I know there is not a day she doesn’t wish he was here.  I know one day Tom or I will find ourselves alone and like my mother, we will survive because like her there will be no regret about not doing what we should have done for each other or not saying the right things to each other.

Who knew this lone wolf would ever have gone down this path of partnership and love with someone who makes the hard times bearable and the good times, spectacular?  Marriage is hard, grueling work. Two people from completely different families and backgrounds come together and are supposed to find a way to co-exist for years sometimes even bringing children into the mix. At first glance it is a scale that tilts heavily on the side of failure but we are more sophisticated animals than those in the wild (at least we are supposed to be) and we are responsible for communicating and compromising and being honest and fair and nurturing and most of all loving, so … we persist and some of us fail and maybe some of us try again and sometimes it takes some of us to hit the third or fourth time before it becomes a charm.  I remember when I first took Adam to Trinidad, my uncle Kit looked at me, smiled and shook his head and said,

“My goodness, look who’s married with a child.  What a thing!”

My family knows me well but I am glad I turned out to be somewhat of a surprise. Surprised myself too but I am ever so grateful things unfolded the way they did, for richer or poorer, sickness and health, till death do us part, Tom James, right?

I am yours; you are mine. It is as it should be.

(“Elephant shoe“)

~Yella~

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From Home Straight to Heaven, Making No Stops in Between.

*(This piece was written yesterday, September 9th, and just as I was about to post it, I had an emergency with my younger son.  He is okay and now that I am home and all is said and done, I thought I would post this, as the whole time I was sitting with my own child, my mind was also on someone else’s.)

I had so many plans for this morning, yet I find myself sitting here in my living room, my house quiet, my heart broken and a million questions and thoughts in my head.  I suppose I am fortunate to be able to write freely.  Words swim in my head all day long, ideas, memories, phrases, dialogue.  I have been like this all my life, so to me, it’s as normal as the dizziness and the neck aches that accompany the endless movement of words in my mind some days.  I am sitting here, tears flowing down my face and I can’t stop them because of the news I read on Facebook – that maddening forum that updates me on everyone and everything way too often, interrupting my day like chronic hiccups, yet I cannot leave it. I have had to pare down my friends to the people in my life who I need to stay in touch with – my friends who live in cities where I once did, my dear sisters from my high school Alma Mater, St. Joseph’s Convent, my cousins, my Trinidadian friends, some people from Syracuse University and Ryerson and a smattering of people in the community where I live.

Today I read that the son of one of my SJC sisters passed away.   I have known this woman since we were children in Maria Regina Grade School on Abercromby Street, Port of Spain, Trinidad.  She had always been this artistic, tall, beautiful creature with a huge smile and bubbly personality.  I don’t remember Leisel upset in school.  Ever. She was fun! She was life! … One of those unforgettable people and it was wonderful to be able to reconnect with her after all these years.

Time did what it does and we all grew up, some of us moving to different places, some of us staying in Trinidad, all of us going our separate ways, yet thanks to a 30 year reunion and two remarkable women who stop at nothing (Carla and Debbie) we were all connected by Facebook in a matter of months. Though we all could not attend, many of us did and the connection on Facebook strengthened the bond between those present and those present in spirit.  We were in each other’s lives again at an age when we were all fully women – no longer high school girls but women with lives that had history and stories of good times, hard times, times of real struggle, failure and success.  We were mothers, aunts, some were grandmothers, career women, friends, wives, ex-wives,care givers and no matter where we were, or what we did with our lives, we all had a common approach to handling the journey that is life.  We turned out to be an army of the strongest women I will ever know, whom, I feel I can count on always and as maddening as Facebook is for me at times, it has allowed my true friends…my sisters, to be just a click away.

I thought I’d be done sobbing by now, but I can’t stop, it seems.  In my head right now, I see us sitting in class in Form 1M, with a ceiling fan struggling to oscillate to keep us from melting in the Caribbean heat.  I can see Leisel next to Lucette facing the giant patio style sort of French doors that allowed them to look onto the school of our male counterparts at CIC (St. Mary’s).  I can see Lorna and if memory serves me correctly, I think Karlene was in my class too. In my mind I see us in the white blouses and strange sea blue, greenish ( I think gabardine) skirts we wore in our first year, before the material changed, white belts, our “washikongs” powdery with Whitening and white turned down socks.  Young girls dressed with so much white, perhaps to maintain some purity of spirit and mind as we teetered on the brink of becoming young women.  Who knew that in one class 4 of us would mother children who were special.  Knowing what I know of people’s lives, who knew one girl in our year would not live long into adulthood, or that others would have to fight terrible illnesses, deal with difficult marriages, deal with judgement from loved ones, would lose a spouse and another girl just a year ahead would lose her adult daughter in the most tragic of ways.  Where was that crystal ball?

Life is a strange, perplexing, meandering river.  As we float from bend to bend, we sometimes bounce off the rocks and miss out on some things.  Other times we bank safely on the sand and achieve greatness and everybody, everybody hits the rapids and capsize once in a while, getting something that they have to deal with for a long, hard time.   In life, there is no answer to the question Why me?  No answer to Why us? …Why my child? … Why my sister(s)/ brother(s)? … Why my husband? … Why my parents? … Why my friend?  When you get the hand you are dealt you have to get out of bed, rub your eyes, take a breath, get to your feet and start the day and the next and everyday from there on end because even if you didn’t sign up for it, the life you have is the one you got, every damn day and you just have to make the best of it and make it work.  Every single one of us who went to our school, (and I am sure women attending other schools in T&T will feel the same about their camaraderie) …all of us posses the mettle to stand up and deal with our lives and move forward. While a situation might really rock us, none of my SJC sisters ever crumble. No matter what our faith or beliefs are we are strong and when we are not not, we acknowledge the moments when we are weak, we accept them and we find strength in others and in our God, knowing “this too shall pass,”.

I am perplexed by life all the time and particularly today.  As a mother of a child with special needs, I wonder what it must feel like for my friend now that her boy is gone.  Today she must be very busy as there is a lot to do when a person passes away. It will be punctuated by tears and sadness, but what is she going to do a few days from now after he is laid to rest.  There is a routine with special kids. Mind you, her journey with her son was so much more involved than I could ever imagine.  I cannot fathom the things she had to do to care for her boy while raising her other children.  I can only imagine she needed more than 24 hours in her day and that there was never enough help and not enough dates when her and her husband could just go out and have a coffee and were there ever enough moments when she could just sit and be still for a decent amount of time?  The routine she once had is gone and a whole lot of stuff that she had to deal with will gradually not need her attention, and while it will provide some relief to her, and her husband and allow more time for them and their children, it will be a huge void after years of doing all that they did for him.  I wonder what will she do now? How does one go from doing so much to not doing it anymore?  But, she is one of us and she will know what to do.  There is one consolation I will mention here but I must warn you, reader, I am not being insensitive.  I am speaking as a mother who has a child that will always need me albeit not physically or emotionally all the time, but he will need me to make decisions for him, major decisions for his whole life, beyond my grave.  I feel that if there is any consolation in the loss of her son, my friend can always know that he passed surrounded by parents who were there the day he came into this world. He was ushered into the world by love; he left it in love.  My son is a physical phenomenon.  It is part of his autism, actually.  He will out live us and it will not surprise me if he outlives his younger brother and younger cousins.  I will not be there to usher him out of the world and if there is no family to do so, I can only hope we set up our Will effectively enough that at least a compassionate stranger will be there for him at that time.  We live in a world that has shown me time an again that good struggles to trump evil.  Kindness is not as abundant as it used to be and there is little time for anything, especially for those of us who need just a bit more time.  When my thoughts go to that day,  I occasionally wish that my husband or I could be with him, because no one will ever know him or love him the way we do.  No one will know the right things to say to him, or how he likes his arms squeezed or remind him how to breathe deeply so he can deal with pain.  No one will know the right song to lean in and sing quietly into his ear, that will ease his anxiety.  If life goes the way it should, I will not know who will be there. I can only hope it’s a relative … someone who loves him or at least cares a little.

The world of special needs is so involved and heart wrenching, so crazy and frustrating and draining yet so rewarding and filled with love. Reading my friend’s post today is the stuff that shakes my faith. On days like today, I do not understand why people say God does not give you what you can’t handle. On days like today, I don’t understand what I am supposed to do on this journey or why special children comes to some people and not others, or why after years of difficulty, pain and hard work fueled by love and determination, my friend’s son could not get better?  Why could their family not have a fairy tale ending?  I read of miraculous outcomes all the time.  Why couldn’t he be cured miraculously?  Well, “that’s life”, right?  I will never know why and I will leave it at that.

My heart aches for my friend, her loss and all the days ahead that will be so strange and difficult.  I know she will feel release and I hope she will feel a sense of calm come over her in time.  We connected occasionally (as much as time allowed) and I know she worked so hard at raising her kids, caring for them and she put her all into her job… she is a force of nature and when I learned a bit about her life, all I have is an abundance of admiration and respect for her.  She does it all and she does it with such grace.  Her beautiful boy is at peace now. No more discomfort.  No pain.  I wish her peace over time to heal her sadness.  I wish her joy in his memory, in his spirit and the spirit of her other two young ones and I wish her and her husband endless love to strengthen their bond for years to come.

Like every child, her son was s a gift and a source of love and a a beautiful opportunity. He went from his home on Earth, straight to Heaven, making no stops in between. He went to rest in peace and joy knowing he was loved throughout his journey and if heaven is what we think it is, he will watch over his family for the rest of their days.

Leisel, it is such a simple statement that does not do justice to the way anyone feels right now, but we are all so sorry for the loss of your son and we are all just a click away.  Blessings to you and your family my darling.  ~Danie

.angel-investment-club-ray-hope-capital

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Five Months to Fifty: Me, My Mother,Myself.

 

In May, I took  trip to Vancouver with my mother.  Neither of us had been there before and considering she is 76 and retired, she’s healthy and has the time to spare and I could make it happen so off we went.  We did all we could in four rainy days and I am glad she is a trooper because we could have easily been sidetracked and stuck indoors with the constant down-pouring.  Armed with our umbrellas (like everyone in Vancouver) and raincoats, we got to Stanley Park, to Gastown, to the Art Gallery, the Olympic torch at Canada place, the harbour, The Classical Chinese Gardens … we crammed everything we could into our time together including catching up with my cousin, Natasha, whom we don’t get to see very often.

20160527_104351_Richtone(HDR)

I live about an hour and 15 minutes away from my mother and sister, so anytime I can spend with them … with her …has to be planned and is very valuable to me.  Like anyone with a family, there are many things about our loved ones that make us sigh, or shake our head and roll our eyes but the love we have for each other is fierce and glues together the fragments of our frustrations with each other to keep us whole.    My mother is a unique character.  She is very much the verbal martyr and tends to be very defensive.  She is stubborn, does not always pay attention and talks while you are talking.  She over-packs because of the “you never know” and “just in case” scenarios she has in her head  and she just does not understand how I travel so light and how nonchalant I am about not having an oversupply of band aids in my purse or sample sizes of Advil, Tylenol, Gravol and Immodium.

“Why put yourself in a situation where you would have to buy these things?”  she would ask, astonished.

“Because on every block there is a pharmacy and all these things are like 2 to 3 bucks”, I would reply, casually, sometimes cheekily.

I hate bulk. I hate having excess shit and as annoyed as she is about my empty handbag, I am annoyed by her incredibly overstuffed one that she has to dig into every five minutes.  Still, she is my mother and I do have a lot of her in me, although to toot my own horn, with help over the years from being married to Tom, I have it under control.  From Lumlin (her Chinese name), I got my sense of organization.  Rare are the occasions when I leave something to the last minute.  When I travel, I am packed about a week ahead of time because a week before that, I made certain everything that needs to come with us was clean and pressed.  I get my need for order from her as well.  I like and have to have a clean kitchen.  If you want me to cook, the kitchen has got to be clean and tidy and I insist on a clean bathroom and made beds.  After a long day at work, or a long day on the road, my eyes need to fall on certain things that are ordered and neat so that my brain does not go into visual overload (hmm…a little Adam-like I suppose).  Unlike my mother, I can leave the dishes for later if I want to leave and go do something fun on a nice day.  I have never let the traits I have, distract me from having a good time and I am okay leaving things for later when I have something else to do.  My mother also passed onto me some very old school lessons in etiquette which I am proud to say I have been able to pass onto my sons.  They know which fork to start with first when we are out for a meal; know when they need to wear a tie and dress shoes, shirt and pants and when to dress down.  They often remember to stand when a woman joins the table and they open and hold the door in public and are polite with their actions and words.  In a world so adamant about not doing things the way our parents did when it comes to raising our children, I am proud to say (while I understand why some people feel their parent’s way is archaic), I raised Adam and Logan pretty much the way my mother and father raised my sister and me and I am not sorry I did.

Like my mother, I adore my children and would kill for them as any parent would but I also believe there is a time and place for them and that they should not always be the centre of attention.  I spend a lot of time with my boys to the point where, as they separate themselves from me as they get older, I am not sad to think that one day they will move on with their own lives, on their own path – I am actually proud that they are moving on and I am happy for Tom and me because it means that our uninterrupted time together is approaching.  Children are wonderful but they can be draining if we let them be.  Like my mother towards us , I have no guilt when it comes to Adam and Logan but respect for the men I am watching them become.  I also have bought into her take on marriage, considering she had 43 great years with my father.  My mother always made time for Dad.  She was his greatest listener, advisor, friend and love.  That time when they were sitting together, was their time and unless we were bleeding or near death, we NEVER interrupted them.  Neither one of them contradicted the other when it came to the rules and expectations of our family and our home and the other thing that has stuck in my mind about their marriage was trust.  When they were together, nothing could phase them – not money, not friends, not mauvais langue, not sickness, not death.  I feel that way about my own marriage.  I feel that with Tom in my corner, there is nothing that can harm me.  We have this saying between us “It’s you and me.  It’s always been you and me and we’re still here”.

From Lumlin, I have inherited a strong sense of loyalty.  When I am your friend, I am a good one, to the point of being taken for granted sometimes and then if it gets past a certain level of tolerance, I end the friendship.   Like her, I may be an ex-pat but I am a “Trini to de bone” because as we say in Trinidad, “one must never damn the bridge they cross”. When you move away from the land of your birth, it is imperative to stay true to your roots to help you meander through the culture you have chosen or rather, have suddenly found yourself.  Like her, I feel one of my biggest obligations to my children is to make them confident in themselves and to teach them that they can do anything if they work hard.  Like her, I am teaching them to dream and to reach and to know that even if they fall, they won’t fall far and like her, I have learned to give them these skills even on the days when I don’t feel 100% confident in myself.  Mom raised me to be accountable for myself and my actions.  She trusted me to do the right things and for the most part I did because I could always hear her voice whenever I was in a tricky situation, guiding me to make the right choices.  She had a confidence in me that I never wanted to betray or let down and I see that in both my sons.  They know that I know I gave them the right tools that they need for society and I know they work very hard to do the right thing.  That being said, I have inherited a not so sweet side from my mother as well.  Mine I think is a little darker than hers, lol, but it is in check. Let’s face it, my mother, like everyone on the planet has her “bad ways” too.  My girl ain’t a perfect angel by any means.  She can sting you with words when she’s ready and because I learned by observation, so can I and so can my sister but one discovers how to rein that shit in and release only when necessary – and in this world we live in where selfishness (most times) trumps selflessness and when people are just downright asinine, you might get a little venom from our direction … oops.

These skills (hopefully only the good ones, right? lol) my mother gave to me, are the skills I am giving to Adam and Logan because they need to be strong to face every single day in this world. They need to be strong to handle the dark times life will throw their way and I know that because I have lived through some dark days and I’m still here, in one piece, dependent on nothing more than my own will power because I was not raised to be weak or give up but rather raised to keep getting up and keep trying and keep moving on to the next day, next thing, next opportunity … just like my mom.

This trip gave me a chance to see Mummy.  To see what makes her, her now and what has changed about her as she has gotten older.  Her tech confidence isn’t what it used to be since she stopped working and she likes to lean on us for the simplest things regarding the computer and her phone, but we remain patient and we teach her and she comes around as we know she can.  I think she has just decided there are some things she does not want to give too much of her attention to anymore and that is okay.  She is still a busy body around the house, always cooking something (you never leave her home without a container of something tasty) or she is always cleaning something and though she does not have to, I understand the need to feel useful, so we let her (within reason – moving things in our house to suit her short stature does not work when the shortest person living here is 5’7″ and the tallest is 6’2″).

Mummy and I are extremely different.  We are not besties.  We are mother and daughter.  I call her to chat and occasionally for advice or just a listening ear (as long as she does not talk over top of me lol) and we go places together.  We cook together when we can, drive around together when we can and it’s nice.  It’s comfortable. There are times I feel sorry that her all time love has passed away and I get frustrated when we talk about things Dad might have done that made me shake my head, and she jumps all over me defending him –   but then I know it is her grief that’s talking.  As an adult, I lost a father but she lost the man she loved and I have no idea how she feels, so now, we only reminisce about good things and that is fine because that is what she needs.  There are things I prefer not to discuss with Mom because a) sometimes I don’t want her to worry about my stuff at her stage in life, and b) there is a strong generational difference of opinion regarding some things but I respect where she is coming from although I don’t think she respects where I’m coming from sometimes – oh well – old dogs, new tricks. She speaks like a 76 year old and is often politically incorrect  – again – old dog, new tricks  – and those are the times when she talks like she knows all about the topic and is right  as right can be – so I take her comments with a pinch of salt, right?   But the bottom line is, she is my mother and she has her moments of wisdom when she speaks to me from her heart.  I admire the strong faith she has that buttresses my wavering one and when I am in doubt, when I need support; a confidence boost; when I worry about something; when I am faced with a tough decision, when I need prayer, she is there.  I can count on her to always be there and I hope when she is gone, I can close my eyes and hear her voice and hear what she would have said to me so that I can right myself.   She gave me the strength that so many admire and some, deep down inside themselves hate about me all at once. She told me from the moment I could understand words, that I was beautiful on the outside and exquisite on the inside. She is the reason I have so much compassion and the reason I have no fear of the stuff of life. There are things that make me scared but nothing that scares me enough to quit. She is me. I am her, I am Dad.  I already see myself  in my children.  I know like me, their mother frustrates the hell out of them and I see them roll their eyes and I notice when my opinions bounce off of them because they are too strong.  I might see myself as a watered down version of my 5 foot maybe 2 inch powerhouse mother but to my children, I am her.

I can do a better job of being a daughter – we can all be better adult children to our adult parents.  If you think you are a perfect adult child, you are a hypocrite.  If your adult parent does not make you sigh and shake your head, you are a hypocrite.  If you think you are drastically different from your parents, you are in denial – wake up.  And if you think you do things better as a parent than your  own parents did because you have read some new age bull-shit parenting books, you’re a damn fool. If you are lucky to have one or both of your folks around, put your arms around them and be thankful for them and in some way show them how much you appreciate them and all they did for you.  If your folks were a disaster and they messed you up royally, find a way to forgive them, if you can, for your own salvation and sanity.  Forgive and free your soul.  Remember, you are going to be an adult parent to adult children before you know it. What treatment would you want from your adult son or daughter?

So … thank you Mom, for irritating me, harping on me from the time I could talk, showing me how to do everything from run a house, mix a drink for your guests from the time I was 4, to holding a job, and being amazing at the best job, in a cynical world that views being a good wife, mother and life partner as an underachievement, even though we all know that the problem with the world is that work takes way too much precedence over family and many people have no choice but to let it.  Thank you, Mom for banning me, for vexing me; punishing me; kissing me and hugging me; thank you for telling me when I was being an ass and telling me when I was wonderful.  Thanks for the confidence and bravery you instilled in me and the pride I see in your eyes when you look at me and mine.  Thank you for what you still are able to do for me. You drive me crazy and you make me laugh. Thanks for coming on this trip with me and being so game to do whatever came up next. That was very cool of you and I will never forget that.  Thank you for still ever so subtly showing me the way.  I am you in so many ways and you know what?  Nothin’ wrong with that at all.

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~ For my mother, Angela  – Thank you. Love you. ~