Schedule A: The Anal Retentive Widow

Look what I found while hunting for this year's tax information.... Notes from the anal-retentive widow, who used to do her taxes herself. Wait, I'm talking about myself in the third person again... which, I suppose, is only appropriate? It sure feels that someone else prepared this spreadsheet....was I this organized once? On the other hand, this remained buried the past five plus years. (On the other other hand, that's what we DO with yesteryear's tax schedules, isn't it?)

Whew. Don't ever tell me that I underthink anything.

Category	Type	Description	Condition	Value	Quan	Ext.	Action
clothing	pants	linen or linen-blend	v. good	$6	4	$24	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	pants	lightweight, dress	good	$8	2	$16	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	pants	lightweight, casual	good	$6	9	$54	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shirts	dress, l.s.	good	$6	7	$42	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shirts	dress, l.s.	okay	$4	5	$20	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shirts	casual, s.s.	good	$5	5	$25	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shirts	linen or linen-blend	v. good	$6	5	$30	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	brown leather	good	$5	2	$10	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	athletic	good	$5	2	$10	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	sandal	good	$5	1	$5	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	white canvas	okay	$3	1	$3	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	black plastic sandals	okay	$3	1	$2	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	black leather velcro	okay	$3	2	$6	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	coat	khaki windbreakers	v. good	$10	2	$20	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	coat	black wool	almost new	$4	3	$40	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shirt	black hoodie	good	$5	1	$15	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shirt	sleeveless gray hoodie	almost new	$5	1	$5	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	black high boots	good	$15	1	$15	Value Village, July 2006
clothing	shoes	brown ankle shoes ll bean	good	$20	1	$20	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	shoes	painty black shoes	bad		2		tossed
clothing	jacket	wool tweed blazer	v. good	$18	3	$36	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	wool hats	good	$5	8	$10	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	wool scarves	good	$5	2	$15	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	warm cotton socks	good	$1	2	$8	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	wool socks	good	$2	1	$4	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	sets thermal underwear	good	$10	1	$20	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	pants	ll bean flannel lined chinos	v. good	$12	1	$12	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	set high tech thermals	okay	$5	1	$5	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	shirt	flannel shirts	v. good	$7	4	$28	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	pants	wool dress pants	v. good	$10	3	$30	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	red wool skirt (Supa's)	excellent	$10	1	$10	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	gray synthetic tunic	excellent	$10	1	$10	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	shirt	lt blue velour shirt (Supa's)	excellent	$5	1	$5	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	pants	green khaki pants	excellent	$3	2	$6	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	shoes	ll bean loafers	okay	$5	1	$5	Value Village, Aug. 2006
clothing	misc.	leather belts	okay	$3	5	$15	Value Village, Aug. 2006
Total	40					$445

So there is your answer to what I did all those lonely nights... a piece of my bureaucratic trash, and one even ABOUT what I threw away... Somehow I have a feeling this will resonate with some others, too, as one of my most popular posts (which I also thought was a throwaway) did.

It does make it easier, as housekeeping guru Don Aslett says, sometimes, to write it down before you say goodbye. I'm a born pack rat: this stuff is hard work. I read his books, including Clutter's Last Stand, multiple times to gain the strength (and techniques) to get rid of hundreds of pounds of stuff, and I'm still awful. (I'm fine, of course, with other people's stuff... which you might THINK this was... but no.)

The feelings I must have had as I put these items down in rows and columns... so much of that is left now as I review this. I am surprised to see that I really did give away so much of his clothing within a month or two (he died 6/2). The spreadsheet makes it seem "verified."

The brief descriptions are so evocative... some of the items reappear in my mind as I skim the list. I remember in vivid color, for example, the day we bought the "gray sleeveless hoodie" at H&M after a long search (it was from the women's department). Others are like-Gavin by their non-specificity: 9 pairs of "lightweight, casual" pants. I always teased him about his affection for his khakis, he was a little obsessed with finding ones made of really thin, sharp cloth. One year I'm sure I gave him a pair of chinos for Valentine's Day. What a picture of the two of us that tells, eh?

I'm shocked I had the pride to itemize socks at $1 a pair and at the same time, the disregard to throw away precious "painting shoes." I can still see their shape in a white plastic trash bag, like everything that leaves the house. Well, nearly everything.

This stuff talks. It really does.

And I only have about 40 boxes (and 200+ drawings) left...

What he was thinking, 2

(What he was thinking, 1, is here)

After Gavin died, I found a post-it note at his desk that stated:

Ataraxia: a tranquil indifference to the world’s vicissitudes.

I can’t think of anything he strove for more than this: calm and ease with the world.

As time went on and I sat in his office where I'd found the note, doing "estate business," (har har!) I wondered how he had managed to stare at these words all day long during his frustrating and futile fight with cancer (which angered him on many, many occasions). But I had, somehow, lost the note (I’d put it in a “special place” #yeahright). So I looked it up. Wikipedia had a different view of its meaning:

 … For the Pyrrhonians, owing to one's inability to say which sense impressions are true and which ones are false, it is the quietude that arises from suspending judgment on dogmatic beliefs or anything non-evident and continuing to inquire. The experience was said to have fallen on the painter Apelles who was trying to paint the foamy saliva of a horse. He was so unsuccessful that, in a rage, he gave up and threw the sponge he was cleaning his brushes with at the medium, thus producing the effect of the horse's foam.

I could compare the two definitions and try to psychoanalyze him, but probably, actually, I couldn’t. And I’m not sure it would be useful, since I THINK he wrote the note before his diagnosis and I don’t know where his version came from.

But I love that the example quotes another artist. Gavin was always using his work to explore, and he was often, often frustrated. Looking for definition, and finding Apelles, was for me and probably for him, too, like running into an old friend.

I remember how often Gavin wanted to tear up his beautiful sheets of Arches (and how often he did), when all anyone saw was the tranquil and pristine result. How often his struggles were with the page or his idea, and NOT with the wicked and messy world we live in. It’s a kind of transcendence that the artist has, even with cancer and the whole bit.

He knew how lucky he was to be an artist, allowed to use his energy this way. And I know how often putting it on paper helped him find peace.

Which is nice, because I tend to dwell on the hurt.

Which might be what makes writers.

Junk mail for the dead, or, YOU CANNOT BE TURNED DOWN!

Sometimes a piece of junk mail can really make your day. Widowed people are pretty used to receiving mail, email, and phone calls for their late spouses. At first, these situations can hurt, and be another occasion to "break the news" yet again… but as time goes on, the picture gets a little funnier: the dumbest marketers are the last to catch on. And once in a while, it's downright HILARIOUS.

Like the other day, when my late husband received a bulky envelope from United of Omaha Life Insurance Company. On the envelope there was no question who was being addressed — or what they wanted from him:
"Here's that second chance you hoped for, Gavin O'Shaunnessy!"

I open it up to find a direct and engaging, yet serious letter. There are lots of small official looking bits of paper, some that look like certificates, an easy card to fill out, and oh my — a prepaid business reply envelope. As a widow, I can really use that 44 cents somewhere else. It's just so hard not to talk back to this solicitation, which often puts words into my mouth, like: 

"Why didn't I get more life insurance when I was younger?…. "

Or maybe when I was alive?

"… And when it was cheaper?"

Well, um, gee, err… it probably won't get any cheaper than THIS.

"Now you've got the opportunity to get up to $10,000.00 graded benefit whole life insurance protection at an affordable cost… Your acceptance is guaranteed and your application is pre-approved."

Should I laugh or cry? When he was diagnosed with cancer, I would have killed for some life insurance -- he had just a tiny bit, because he'd lived with a heart valve defect and was self-employed. We couldn't find any that he qualified for. We kept our eyes peeled for envelopes like this. Too bad this offer arrived more than four years after he died. So, you know, I'm skeptical when the letter intones, in green gothic type,

"You can't be turned down."

RILLY? I say. Wannabet?

So I strongly considered filling the policy out. After all, as the letter states, "this insurance does not require a medical examination." And they make it so easy… that envelope was really (I had no IDEA) an IMMEDIATE ACTION ENVELOPE. The application was a big piece of paper, legal sized, two colors, but I only needed to fill out a few fields, and read the attached Post-it with Gavin's special preapproved authorization number: 519 858 890.

The forms were peppered with grown-up (if not senior-citizen) phrases like "beneficiary," "estate," "protection," "cash value," and an assurance that he'd be protected till age 121. (Suicide, of course, was excluded.) One table contained the word "GUARANTEED!" nine times in a row.

The whole package just left me feeling… I don't know. Confident. Comforted. Covered. Except for the fact, of course, that it was addressed to someone who couldn't, um, read.

Such a simple offer, a no brainer, with practically no effort required: payments could be made via "Easy Pay Option." I mean, even a dead guy could fill this out, right?

I laughed for a day solid, and so did my new husband, and I wondered if it would be even more fun if I applied, filed a claim, and had the requisite phone calls: this time, finally, with me at an advantage. Aren't they asking for it?

I mean, this is a company that bought a very very cheap mailing list. How careful could they be? They might even pay!

Then I realized that they would probably, at some point in the process, and possibly before issuing my check, ask for a death certificate. They'd probably notice that he was dead before the postmark date on my reply OR their offer.

It would probably be fun, but even United of Omaha was probably not dumb enough to fall for it.

And you know what? I've got better things to do with my time.

But it's hard to get this good a laugh out of a mailbox these days.

Market outlook

"Of course, these numbers would look a lot different if you'd sold it in 2005 or 2006," he said with the bright kind of regret that makes you know he had a good year that year. He was nice enough -- more than nice, really -- the real estate agent. The knife didn't even cut that deep.

But it's not that easy to hear that my single largest investment (which was really supposed to be simply HOME) is going to be worth so much less than I'd thought, hoped, and scribbled idly on the back of so many envelopes. 44 years and this is the one thing I did right: buying low. 13 years ago, wrapped up in my first life, trying to build dreams.

What we went through there! The tries to procreate. The birth of our child, the opening of his dream studio out there past the mud. What we ripped up and destroyed: the channel above was for our only really big home improvement, his studio, the muddy trench where they'd lay the electrical conduit. Then the cancer, the numb, the passion, the hope, the surgeries, the failures over and over again. The little things, the shingles, the thrush, our child's first words, the times alone home when he was in the hospital. 2006 was the year he died, but the entire year was downhill fast, and sliding, and murky.

Time went on, that bubble burst, and now, more than trenches, I think of the tranches of debt that made up the CDOs into which most of us lost money, and homes, and security. The financial foundation that fell out from under us, or was shown to be missing. I didn't care much about that economy, though it was golden and blooming while my honey fell apart and broke before my eyes. I didn't notice that bubble of real estate money, which was real for some, briefly, grew and grew and then leaked some air in a series of small burps. It hardly mattered among everything else; I was falling in love again. A few hours after Lehman fell, in fact, we went out shopping for a diamond.

Widows are bulletproof, did you know? Or at least full of contempt for the small things, and after what we've been through, everything's small.

But that trench is the earth bleeding, a wound that had to be dug to build something new, a something new that was never fulfilled and will soon be sold. For so much less. And with it, I'd like to let go of all those disappointments, all those losses, and everything that didn't work well. I'd like to heal, and patch them all, but I wish I had a bigger band aid.

Very superstitious: one more omen, manmade

There was one more omen, and it was fairly early: after the second surgery, but before the failure of the first miracle drug, which was when I really started to ignore the drumbeat.

Gavin was a lot older than I was, and this ball was leftover from his childhood. Handpainted, blown glass, so fragile -- what glorious colors. It broke as I unwrapped it this last Christmas of his. Short Stack was nearly 2, so I don't know what I was thinking to hang this most precious of relics on our wobbly real tree. The last few pictures I have of Gavin are at this holiday, showing her his favorite wind up toys on top of a photography book, a gift that weighed as much as our little girl did. Little dear, she greeted our Christmas tree with joy as "apple doo!," for what reason, we never figured out (though it might have had one red ball on it).

He wasn't attached to this ornament, but it was one of my favorites, including from my history, and you may remember that I am a nutball about Christmas. And we had our eye intent on other round things, the pills that were promised after the new year, a long awaited investigational drug, just after approval, and in the nick of time: O holiday miracle medical.

I might have never forgiven myself for breaking it, but it's only a "thing," and I was sure, at this point, that I had even thrown out the photo.

But here it is. Isn't it lovely?

Very superstitious: domestic omens toward the end

Almost from the moment Gavin was diagnosed, I was more superstitious than usual. Perhaps it's the absence of any formal religion in my history, perhaps it's just a safer way to "admit" what I could see but not say: the writing on the wall, that he would die. A way to externalize the stresses, and pretend that the rational observations I made (a medical establishment without solutions for his cancer, a man running out of 2nd choice options, a husband under 100 lbs) were actually spooky, perhaps even a bit silly and therefore somehow less real.

Is superstition a sign that your rational mind is falling apart, or manifestation of uneasiness, or a way to really know what's true?

The first sign was domestic. Setting up my studio, above his studio, Gavin wrestled with reinstalling my Ikea shelves. "Ivar," he said. "They should call it Beelzebub. Damn thing tried to kill me again today." I'd installed it once already, inside what was now the baby's room, and it wasn't easy, but he was not very handy. I was 8 months pregnant and had given up on moving big pieces of wood, no mattter how bad he was going to be at it, he'd own all the heavy work from this point out.

One day an Ivar upright smacked him in the shin for a bruise that lasted weeks. It was only January, but when he was diagnosed in September I felt sure, somehow, that this injury had led to either the cancer (no one dared guess for us how long it had been growing in him) or its metastasis (which happened before we found it out).

Why? I needed something. LIke the what-if's of a widow whose lost someone to a car accident, I had to have alternatives, objects, other parties to place in my story, whether or not they could hold blame well or be held to account.

Then there were his careless placements of aesthetic objects that might be good or bad, depending. The first was a Bolivian devil mask I'd purchased for him one Christmas as an apotropaia.  (I think I felt entitled to buy one solely because I alone knew what the word meant.) I wanted it hung facing our busy front door to keep bad spirits out, but he thought that was corny, and hung it in his office. It was staring down his neck.

After diagnosis when he wasn't looking I unmounted it and hid it in the attic, then after he died, exiled it farther to his vacant studio, where the oil smells settled, cold. I wrapped it in silk to keep it from hurting anyone else. 


Another was a drawing of his own, one of my favorites, beautiful and striking but: one in a series of 5 illustrating Yukio Mishima's The Decay of the Angel. The drawing is called "The body ceases to give off light," and he hung it, again in his office, looking down on his right shoulder. What could be more wrong? He could not see the problem.

I let him stare at just the picture hanger for the rest of the year, till he'd gone so far downhill that he was never in his office.

To compensate, I placed two works of his that I'd sort of considered "too good" for us: his two lamps. I think he had to frame them himself, displacing lesser works and cutting mats, to get them to me, and unsell one that had been promised, for a pittance. But they were my favorites, and I hung them above the bed. The light that swelled from the paper in these drawings at least let me know we were doing our best, even if he didn't see the difference between one and another.

I've written about these lamps before -- they were a great comfort to me for a long time in that bed after he was gone.




(Now you, too, can see why he hated the way his work looked in photographs: they look gray, dim. These lamps are absolutely glowing, silencing more than one viewer with a gleam that comes from inside the paper).

Nature gave us one more sign, just awful in every single way, but that's a story for tomorrow.

Dear Peter and Susan,

Dear Peter and Susan,

I have before me a Christmas card you sent to me and Gavin in 2006 from your home in Italy. While it was addressed partly to me, you'd never met me, and Carolyn, I'm not sure Gavin had ever met you. But I feel obliged to write you, anyway, and to be familiar.

You see, widows do the strangest things. For some reason, your red card, "Buon Natale," has been asking me to respond for nearly five years. I don't know why; It isn't that different from many of the cards we received the previous year, and most of the cards from 2006, I responded to right away.

Yours, I've held onto as if it mattered, and as if I could do something about it.

But your Christmas card from 2006 arrived six months after Gavin died. There was one other person who didn't know, one other holiday card inquiring, GAVIN HOW IS YOUR HEALTH? I had the heart to answer neither; but at some point, she received one of my many memorial emails at a defunct address and gently we talked it through with less drama than I'd expected (she was always dramatic: her notice I really dreaded). Yours was the only "regret to inform" letter that remained. If I could have found you easily online (still can't… what am I doing wrong? Or is your life really idyllic?) I might have said something sooner.

It's very hard to have this duty, and yet, harder to discharge it.

And why? Other than your bright card, I know nearly nothing of you. You were friends before Gavin and I met. I know you, Peter, are handsome, happy, easygoing, and brilliant. You work(ed) in communications and I had a fantasy you could straighten my career out. It's a frail image. The main picture that comes is a fantasy of the Italian mountains, wine, and good friends in the golden light: Gavin and I really hoped to come visit you in your semi-retirement, in Italy. It was going to be lovely: it was a "someday."

And now that I've no thread to you, I suppose that dream is dead, too. Perhaps keeping this glossy red rectangle on my desk, in a pile, lost with a hundred other things that may or may not be of tremendous consequence (I didn't know when I saved them "special," or lost them, which of those two I was doing — and I still don't) was my way of trying to keep that line open, to keep alive some little hope of someday being invited to your home in Piemonte. Or perhaps it's my perverse way of holding onto the mere memory of having once dreamed of five days outside (is it?) Torino.

(Did Gavin ever tell you of my follies, that for many years I manufactured by hand, in my own artist's garret, the Socks of Turin?)

Yes, I feel some guilt over not "telling you" (doubtless you knew by now, somehow, even across the ocean?), over failing in my widowly duties. But I'm also proud that as many jobs as I've neglected in five years our daughter, our most important "someday," is alive and well, and learning to read.

And so it is without the slightest desire to cadge an invitation from strangers, even to Paradise, that I am writing to connect with you around the loss of our own dear Gavin.

I'm very sorry for your loss, and very sorry to be introducing myself in this cowardly, moved-on new life way. These letters should be written by the proud but broken wife of the departed while she's still in her weeds, so she can take a humble tone but stay a little bit official. In both my old and my new lives, it seems I hardly ever do things the way one should.

I am very active online — as is Gavin's career — and would be happy to stay in touch, as long as it's okay with you that this feeble hello from a stranger is something only barely connected with Gavin's widow, but more from a new person who had a good friend in common at a different time. If there's anything else we share, it will all be a surprise.

Warmly,

Supa

Untitled (Cancer Drawings), 2005

I didn’t want these works in the show, really. Please take something else, anything else.

They're just not representative of his work.
They were personal drawings, never meant for public exhibition.
I don’t think they’re really very resolved.

That’s not it.

I fucking hated these drawings.

Left to right: 1) With cancer, 2 + 3) getting better, making the cancer weaker, 4) without cancer.

Why?
They’re not successful.
How?
That fourth drawing. Maybe the cancer’s gone, but so are YOU. I can’t look at them.

He was doing meditation and visualization exercises. He conjured with line and color. He’s an artist, for chrissakes. And if this series worked? He would die. That fourth drawing doesn’t show a body any more. It’s a vapor, a wisp, a spirit. Perhaps something living, but nothing solid, not an ounce. And he was losing so much weight at the time. He was vaporizing in front of my eyes. At one point that winter he got below 100 lbs. He didn’t tell me till he’d gained it back, in the early spring. Sometime in January he’d lost the use of his right arm. AN ARTIST. He wasn’t writing me phone messages — he’d tell me, and usually forget to. I didn’t know that his actions were to prevent me seeing his handwriting. But that was it: tumors blocking nerves.

So I hated these drawings because they were a failure, they were supposed to show him getting better, but they showed him dying, and as art is always magic, they would work and I could at last blame him. I could relish my rage with him no longer around, but I couldn’t stand to see them. People saw them when they visited the studio those last few months, and at my Day of the Dead event. 

It was a year or two later when the curator mentioned he must include these moving, powerful pieces in this show, this big retrospective of the organization where we met — where I worked for five years, where Gavin had served on the board for six. I wasn't happy about his choice, but it was hopeless to persuade him to take something else. They gave him chills and he insisted they needed to be shown.

I had the better part of a year to get used to the idea of people seeing the four drawings, nearly the last ones Gavin touched. On the way to the loading dock I opened the portfolio and laid them out on my therapist's Aubusson. She looked them over with a gentle smile and a nod. “He knew he was dying,” she said.

The sky above the sea opened up. “Yes, I think he did.” The drawings had been a personal statement and his way of telling me, that I didn’t want to hear. The dance was over at that moment: the tension of what we couldn’t say, wouldn’t share, of his body departing. I’d been hoodwinked, but not really. He hadn’t LIED. He just didn’t say it directly. He didn’t push me. He didn’t want to leave. But he knew he’d lost power over staying.

I mean, why else a horizon line? There’s no horizon line if you’re going to live. It’s infinite, a glimpse of the divine, hope and hopelessness mixed up, but no joy, no physical body. The weather changes over this sea but there’s no sunlight. Gavin’s light always came from within. 

And he hadn’t said, I don’t think, that drawing four was himself, cured. It was the cancer, gone. He knew it before I knew it: of course he did. He had to. We couldn’t look straight at it. It was how we got by.

But knowing that he knew the end of his story, at least during the hours he worked on these drawings, makes it possible for me to see their loveliness and depth. Accepting what they were — how their failure was all in me, and not in his intention — enabled me to drop them off that afternoon, to look forward to showing them to you, to knowing I could tell this story without doom or pity, and that I could go back to admiring his eye and hand again, as it should be. The works were re-imbued with the normal mystery that it needs to hold your eye, once my rational distaste had left.

So I stood in front of them last night, in my Mexican shawl and good boots, and shared with strangers: “My husband the artist made these drawings when he knew he was dying. They were hard for me to look at for a long time, but four years later, I can accept them and understand what they were saying. I just didn’t want to hear it then, but denial helped me stay sane, and I’m okay now.

"Yes, I’m doing well, thank you.”

My Day of the Dead: We’re not religious

If we aren’t religious, why did I sort through seven boxes labeled “holy objects” to get this smorgasbord? Looks like my faith vomited on the ofrenda. But it’s history and relic and color:

Top table, starting from 12:00:

• Stenciled virgin of Guadalupe on tin paneling, Christmas card from 80s by artist friend, Mark Clark
• Flanked by two ceramic virgins (local types) from the Aguilar sisters studio near Oaxaca, which we visited on our honeymoon

(Center) Otomi embroidered placemat (folded) from one of Gavin’s 70s trips to Mexico, which holds:

• Tiny lady of sorrows in black wood frame set up by Gavin for one of our home offerings
• Portrait of Gavin from my desk at my last job
• Gavin’s baby moccasins, Navajo, from when they lived in Albuquerque
• A special stone from his desk
• One of Frances’s many rosaries, this one in a neat little zippered leather pouch

Continuing from upper right corner:

• An important book
• Black Oaxaca vase, Gavin earlier trip to Mexico
• Tin fish which was our “kitchen god” from our first apartment together
• JFK pencil sharpener that used to live with the kitchen god on top of
• A cheat sheet with chords for all his old band’s songs
• A bronze award from a photo club in the 50s with red candles in it (used to be on kitchen shrine in our first house)
• Salt from Albuquerque salt-and-paper
• His yarrow sticks wrapped in some decorative Asian paper
• (Back to the left corner) Pepper
• Buddha
• Angel pin by Gavin, hand drawn on Shrinky Dink material
• Black Oaxaca pottery mug, earlier trip
• Shiva

Bottom table, from 12:00:

• Worry object I made in infertility treatment, red beads and milagro of baby
• Note I wrote to call baby
• Photo of him and his mother at one of her many October beach birthday parties
• Our enormous silver wedding rings we wore during the ceremony and reception, by artist friend Linda Hesh
• Two miscellaneous rubber duckies (Gavin had a “thing”)
• Male and female sake cups from Gavin’s desk
• Broken antique clock from Gavin’s desk
• Two lucky Chinese cats
• One of five paper mache skulls painted by little girl
• His daily wear wedding ring by Linda Hesh
• Another skull
• A lock of Short Stack’s baby hair
• My daily-wear ring
• A cup with a surprise duckie in it (art)
• Marigolds
• Another skull
• Another small black Oaxaca vase
• Arm milagro, one of scores of milagros from different countries
• Suede pouch (Frances) with a modest Navajo raw turquoise necklace in it

Arranged by my daughter, who believes in symmetry, even if it means the wedding rings are on opposite sides of the offering and the salt and pepper have divorced.

Still need to find something to represent my grandmother, something to represent Goldy (did I mention…?), and the skeleton crafts, two sorts, that we made over the weekend from Kim Go’s instructions. Something for Amy. Something for Don. And the Christmas lights from the attic.

The Day of the Dead: Top Ten Items to Include in your Offering

Photo by Batty aka Photobat via Flickr

It's not difficult to create an offering for the Day of the Dead. While we have a habit of calling these dedicated religious areas "shrines," the Mexican artist, Felipe Ehrenberg, who taught me the Day of the Dead as an artistic and healing tradition in 1992, insisted: shrines and altars are for Gods, offerings are for the ancestors, and this tradition calls the ancestors. It looks the same, anyway.

Your offering can take any form. The elements that you must include are love and intention, everything else can vary, and you needn't buy anything new. Decide on an area of your home that would be appropriate, and think about what you would like to include, how this activity fits in with your religious beliefs and your ways of grieving. Where will you be able to see it? How childproof does it need to be?

Some suggestions for what you might be offering:

1. A picture or icon representing a deity (or more than one) as appropriate for your household or the deceased one.
2. A photo or other image of your deceased loved one. (No need to restrict it to one person - you remember them all).
3. Mementos of your loved one or of your life together.
4. Flowers (fresh or fake).
5. Crafts or images of saints, angels, hearts (You don't need to have Mexican stuff, or Day of the Dead stuff: whatever is true to you).
6. Things that will "call" the loved one: food, drink. You might also play music that they liked or that remind you of them on the event.
7. Fancy or colorful fabric or paper. A scarf, a scrap or special piece of clothing?
8. Source of light: candles or holiday lights. PLEASE be safe with paper, fabric, and hanging things around!
9. Something orange - you can select a few other colors if you like, or just go Mexican and mix it all together, choosing as bright as possible.
10. Something that smells good (incense, candles or fresh flowers, or the food or drink).

Join in our blog carnival as you prepare and celebrate. Share your thoughts and your pictures with others, online or offline. Sign up your blog on our Mr. Linky. Spread this idea: that you want others to share stories, and not just now.

Think about what you'd like to do for a small event on Nov. 2. Would you really prefer to do something private and have your warm thoughts to yourself? Can you invite someone you haven't spoken to in a long time? A family member who's hurting? Can you reach out to someone else who's scrambling through loss?

(One thing I've found lately is the importance of personal contact. If I send out a big group email, I usually end up feeling rejected - but a phone call (not even leaving a message) is very intimate after months of Facebooking and brings an earnestness and commitment to my request that makes people respond differently. Try it.)

Set your mind, above all, on a dream of what you'd like to eat and drink in the honor of your loved one. What would you share with them if they dropped by for a moment? What smells and tastes would call them, and what would they be holding to tell you?

Day of the Dead 2010: MASTER POST with Linky

This is the HOME POST for the Day of the Dead 2010. This post will be updated every day or two with new participants, new activities, photos, and other sharing as part of our individual rituals and memories.

We got started, you can catch up EASY

Join us! (Call to action)

This post (wait, you didn't miss it!) which includes the badge for your blog! Pick up the badge here: <a href=" http://freshwidow.blogspot.com/2010/10/day-of-dead-2010-master-post-with-linky.html"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEie2H-blWIbMvQbsEmQ7ogEhv3M8v5slIy8NUMqYe5we1HfACRdBDr_tLVx2cBEQ7nhq21jdkptpewXEELnjA57EiK14wCIcBm8mTHEgsvis4tfIPl2tNa4p6Ug2Sltt4ktq7D7sJGXaN4/s1600/FINALDOTD.jpg" width="150" /></a>

Example: Ofrenda for my daughter.... (Alive and Mortal blog)

Book review: Rosita and Conchita (for kids)(Alive and Mortal blog)

Top 10 items to include in an offering.

It’s not Halloween! (Cultural overview)

Craft project: create marigolds, the traditional Mexican flower, from crepe paper. No skills required!

NEW Craft project: Skeleton flags for kids (easy peasy!) (Alive and mortal blog)

What’s coming up

10/25 – Gather objects that will call all souls.

More examples of work in progress or thoughts...  including YOURS?

11/2 (Tuesday) – night of the festival – join us on chat or Twitter, or gather a few friends or family members to share memories of your loved one(s).

Sign up and visit the others who are participating! (If you aren't sure how to participate or don't have a blog, write to me at Supa DOT Dupa DOT Fresh AT gmail DOT com and we'll figure it out together. I GA-RON-TEE it!)

The Day of the Dead 2010: Join us!

Otilia y sus muertitos, originally uploaded by lacho.flores.

Join us as we remember those who’ve died. The Day of the Dead is a Mexican festival of remembrance that dates back thousands of years. Similar to All Soul’s Day, it is believed to be a special time when the veil between the worlds grows thin and our loved ones visit us. The week before the holiday is spent in a fury of gathering mementos, creating crafts, cooking and cleaning, and sharing memories with friends and family.

I believe that grieving people today need this ancient festival that brings together the living and the dead with love and joy. It’s a safe time to share memories and may turn into a new family tradition that is more harmonious with our real experiences of grief than any celebrations or rituals we share in the U.S. today. Day of the Dead rituals and crafts can be adapted to suit nearly any household’s skills, interests, and can include every generation.

How can you participate? Simple!:

• Follow along with us every few days as we walk you through creating an offering to your loved ones. You can pick and choose the activities that work for you.
• Plan an event (small or large) on Nov. 2, the night of the festival. We’ll also have a chat room open that evening for sharing.
• Display the badge (coming soon) for our shared virtual festival on your blog or website.
• Create a craft, cooking something your loved one enjoyed, or otherwise sharing traditions, new or old, with family and/or friends. Nothing will be difficult, everything will be adaptable, and it shouldn't be expensive, either.
• Share your experience, process, and memories on your own blog and Facebook and updating this post (coming soon) with links.

The next post here (coming soon) will be updated every day with new participants, new activities, photos, and other sharing as part of our individual rituals and memories.

This will be FUN, easy, and satisfying! Questions?

Miscellaneous.

(About the image: This is a sign telling the mosquitoes not to come in our house. “Can the mosquitoes read the sign?” I ask. “That’s why I made it a PICTURE,” she says with confidence.)

This morning as I rearranged my closet in the new house for the hundredth time, just to find a pair of socks, I spilled a box. Boxes in my house are interesting because they usually contain all the things that can’t be filed somewhere, that don’t seem to fit in an easy place – sometimes they bear a label that attempts to bind them up as if they belonged somewhere. I box them because I want to understand them, or at least, get them out of the way without learning more from them.

This box that broke open on my foot let go some of its usual, box-like insufficiently described complexity, remnants of life, odd ends too good to throw out, including home medical supplies. A pillbox with 28 compartments that was expensive. Gauze pads, plain and backed, two sizes, two different types of medical tape. Tiny alcohol swabs to clean injection sites for follistim or IL-2 (or umbilical cord stumps).

Four years after death, 5 years after IL-2, 6 years after cleaning her tiny stump, 7 years after fertility treatment. Am I ready to throw it out yet?

How many other topics are resting, sort of labeled, sort of shelved in my computer and in my other brain, the meat one?

My anniversary season ends tomorrow with the fourth birthday after Gavin’s death, one month after the fourth anniversary of his death. It’s as good a time to clean house as any and there are fireflies all around that house, reminding me that random flickering can be gorgeous. (Why can’t they sneak inside instead of mosquitoes?)

Here are some of the balls of string and broken clocks I haven’t wanted to talk about:
• Gavin’s ashes and their disposition.
• My daughter’s current attitude about our loss.
• All the observations I make of my child at the same age I once was.
• Bloggy content about TV shows, movies, and celebrity mortality and morbidity.
• Philosophies of life, learning, and faith.
• What I’ve done wrong and who I’ve hurt.
• My many non-blog projects.
• My paying work.
• All the really smart, brilliant, wonderful people around me doing the good work.
• Insights about working with social media for maximum bang and buck and deepest connections.
• My delays, my procrastinations, my pains.
• Stories about how different we are or how I’m alone.
• The day we went back to get Shortie an X-ray at the same place where Gavin got his scans (including the ones that were bad, the ones that were misread, the ones that gave us hope).
• How I’ve developed a health issue with every part of the body that matches Gavin’s faults, piece by piece and system by system.

There are others that I will fix up to show you:
• My hopes for the world, my fears for my body.
• Stories that you have asked me to tell about dating, about parenting, about rising back up.
• My big ideas about grief and my keys to change the world so we can fit better in it.
• Your brilliance and your shining light and how I’ve watched you learn from each other, how bravely you’ve shared (I’ll never use anything without your permission).
• Introductions to some people I have loved, dearly and deeply.
• Surprises from my child, and what I’ve learned, and what I look forward to.
• And it is only fun, I think, if once in a while I can preach, pretend I have the answers, and act like I think I’m smarter than other people. I’m sure those are the times I fool no one, but some of the ideas are gems, and some of what I’ve learned in life so far is true, and I know I’ve helped a few people, on some odd days, to find their lights.

Writing is, at its best, like opening a vein. Having an audience gives you better odds of responding with the right tone, the right story, but it has its own dynamic. Before the internet most writers wrote their first work alone and only met the audience and its crippling desires and pulls afterwards. Strangely enough most authors only make money after the first book, if they have proved to even have an audience.

Blogging is different, much faster, much less finished. Writing on computer makes it easy to collect and lose ideas and notes if you want to, if you aren’t sure what you’re doing. A lot of blogging is about stretching your ideas out for as long as possible to create the most impressions. I’m not sure I’m cut out for that.

Writing for you is hard work (work I’ve chosen and which I love). My voice turns ponderous so often, and sometimes people respond to the stuff that’s the heaviest at the time when I don’t want to let it out, and sometimes you laugh at my jokes when I’m succeeding at distracting you or myself.

Sometimes I’m contradictory. Occasionally I have incredible focus and a great idea.

But that box's contents are all over my foot. I have to throw some things out. The deadline is tomorrow. Which means, what, I start then, right?


* * * Please connect! I love comments! * * *