My Daddy

It's been two months since my Daddy passed away. I cry every time I see a group of beautiful trees or a small stream or even a NASCAR bumper sticker; things that remind me of Daddy. He was a quiet, patient, caring, eccentric man. One of my favorite recent memories of Daddy I wrote about in a status update on Facebook last November: "I'm home from visiting Mom and Daddy today :) It was a very good day; my Daddy is feeling better. He opened the gate for my car as we were leaving the driveway this evening and as I was driving by him I looked up to see him throwing kisses at us as we drove away. I love my Daddy :)" My Daddy was a good man who loved unconditionally. I wish they all could be as good as my Daddy was.

Going back to old, non-healthy places...and then moving on.

I chaired an Al-Anon meeting last night. It was my home group and I love them. We talked about Step 6 and thinking.

I often am reminded in meetings that I'm not unique. I'm just like everyone else. I may be the only red-head, the only teacher, the only artist, but I'm not the only one who gets stuck in my head. Everyone that spoke last night talked about getting stuck in his or her head in a whirl of insanity. We discussed thinking and THINKING! I like to think out loud with my sponsor. Others in the group like to think out loud while praying. We have many options when thinking; we can allow ourselves to go to the old behavior of "stinking thinking" or we can choose the path of listening, not reacting, thinking and then behaving rationally. Sometimes that thinking requires other ears.

On Saturday night J.W. was at my house spending time with our daughter. I usually leave when he comes over to visit so I can remain in "NC." When I got home that evening at the end of his visit he began to criticize my recent behavior. He criticized my turning his phone off, he criticized my decision not to let our daughter go to his house for overnight visits, he criticize my "fearful" nature. I usually put on the armor of God when I walk into that kind of situation with him but I was off guard on Saturday. When he finished his diatribe I jumped in with my own criticism of him. I told him that I didn't know his new roommate (who he met on Craig's List) and that I didn't trust him with my daughter. I've done a background check on this person and he doesn't exist. I don't think J.W. gave me the real name of the person with whom he is living because as always he just doesn't want me to know the entire truth. He came back with, "how do I know that your brother isn't a child molester?" My brother is my best friend and of course J. W. knew this would push my buttons good. And it did. I lost my mind and went right back to the insanity. I screamed, "get out of my house, get out of my house!" As I slammed the door behind him I called him a few choice words.

So today I work on that hole in the armor. I work on not becoming completely numb but how to know when he is working me and I'm allowing him to by going back to old, non-healthy places. I work on placing his option of me and my family in a really low position. I remember the phrase, "I just doesn't matter, he just not that important."

Heartbroken.....and just plan broken....

When I was a kid summer was spent outside. My bro and I would leave home early in the morning and not re-enter our home until almost dark some days. We would play baseball hitting cow patties instead of balls because our dog, George, would steal our balls and hide them from us; we would explore pastures having adventures for hours on end; or role play cowboys and Indians. Mom and Dad knew where we were or at least knew within about 200 acres of where we were.

Those were the days before Adam Walsh, Somer Thompson, Charish Perriwinkle, and sadly, many, many, more. Who are these children? These are children who were abducted and killed by sex offenders. There are mean, evil, broken people in the world who do unthinkingly awful, horrible things. Sex offenders are definitely broken people. These broken people do things that render innocent, helpless people heartbroken.

Adam Walsh was watching some older boys play video games in Sears while his Mom shopped for a lamp. He was out of her sight for seven minutes. Somer Thompson was walking the mile home from school with her twin brother and older sister as she did everyday. Somer got in an argument with an older girl and ran the other direction. Her sister thought she would catch up with the group. She didn't. Charish Perriwinkle was with her Mother, brother, and sister in Wal-Mart last Friday night when they befriended a creepy but nice man who offered to buy Charish a cheeseburger at the McDonalds inside the store. Charish disappeared with the man before her Mother could even give her permission to walk away.

My heartbreaks for the families of these children. My heartbreaks for the Mothers. I can honestly say that to lose Kate is my greatest nightmare.

When in a store I NEVER take my eyes off of Kate, I wait to watch her enter in the doors of her school every morning when I drop her off, and I NEVER let her go outside our house in our neighborhood by herself. There are many other precautions I take  to keep her safe but none of this is a guarantee.

I don't blame the victims or their families in these cases. I do think part of the issue is that we feel safe. We trust the people in our communities. Another part of the issue or problem is lack of education. We know our neighbors and love our neighborhood, we love our school, we know many of the people who work in the stores in our area. BUT for us there's a registered sex offender who lives three miles from our house.

And here's my rant: We have a new neighbor. She's eight years old. She moved in to the house two doors down on April 1. Kate loves to play with her.  When school was in session our neighbor, who we will call Jane, came out to play when her Mom or Dad got home around 5:30pm. She and Kate could play for about an hour until we had to go in to have dinner. Now that it's summer and most children aren't in school Jane has no bedtime or curfew. She rang my doorbell on Friday night at 8:20pm looking for Kate. Kate goes to bed most nights at 8:00pm.  "We  have a schedule," I told the girl.  She said, "Why? It's summer."

I'm not really bothered that she rang my doorbell at 8:20pm, I'm bothered because she and a five year old boy from the neighborhood were running the streets without ANY adult supervision at 8:20pm! I don't know her parents and I've only seen them a handful of times but the next time I see them I'll fill their ears full.

Friday night while a little girl was losing her life in Jacksonville, FL these children were wandering our neighborhood alone. I'm heartbroken that Charish won't have a chance to start third grade, to graduate from high school, or go to college. AND I'm heartbroken that some parents don't see the danger that lurks in our quaint, safe neighborhoods.

I'm also heartbroken that Kate will probably never know the freedom that my bro and I knew as children.  Running through pastures without a care in the world and certainly without fear. I can still remember the smell of freedom.

These are certainly different times with different sorts of people.  Broken people as well as heartbroken....

Too much information.....

Too much information…well, maybe.....but it's your choice to keep on reading....

This is called “Survivor’s Journal” and I’m a survivor. However, along the journey there are bumps, big ole pot holes, and blow-outs. This is my journey and since I’m sharing it with you all in this form I’ll share not only the triumphs but also challenges.

These days I’m working hard to keep smiling and to think positively. I’ve been really sad for the last several weeks. We just passed the two year anniversary of my Daddy’s death, in that same week I turned 45, my Mom is not doing well, and it seems that everything I touch breaks.  

I miss my Daddy so much. With all that is going on in my life I so wish that Daddy was here to talk with me on the phone everyday. I also wish I could visit him and take a walk with him in the forest all the while listening to a funny story he had to tell.  Being around my Daddy was very calming. I wish he was here for my Mom.  I miss him.

I talk to my Mom almost every day.  Everyday she complains of being lonely. She’s sad because I can’t just jump in the car and drive to Fort Payne during the week to see her. She’s sad because she knows that she is losing her memory.  I feel helpless…

I know that I have a great life.  I have the wonderful opportunity to work at something I love.  I have a wonderful family. I have a sweet, happy daughter who loves me as much as I love her. I’ve done so much and I’m proud of the art that I’ve made,  the relationships that I have built, and the lives I’ve touch through university teaching.  But at 45 years old I struggle financially because I chose a profession that I love but that is not lucrative. It makes me sad.

In the last several months it has become apparent that I’m going to have to buy a car, probably a vacuum cleaner, a laptop, and a dishwasher. Kate’s mini-DVD player is also not working. I feel as if everything I touch breaks. I feel overwhelmed…

But as I wallow in my negativity I cannot shake off the positive energy that in essence I created. I sat Kate down last weekend. I wanted to explain why I have been in such a bad mood; why I had shed so many tears. I told Kate that I missed her Paw, that I was sad because I had turned 45 years old, and that we were going to have to buy a car so we would have to only buy the things we really needed.  We needed to save money.

Kate sat there for a moment and then she reached over and wiped my tears away with her tiny fingertips. She smiled as she looked me straight in the eyes and said, “Mommy, well you know what you need to do? You need to stop buying me so many presents.”

I said, “But I like to buy you things Kate.”  Her eyes got wide and bright as she had this idea and said, “Mommy, I know what I need to do! I’ll sell lemonade and juice. I can make some money, Mommy!” I said, “Would you want to donate it to your school or Shelby Emergency?” Kate said, “No Mommy. It would be for you. For your new car.”

So…my journey may have bumps, holes, and flats but it also has so much positive energy, love, unconditional love, that I cannot stay sad, overwhelmed, and helpless for long!

Friday, Friday, Friday…..

The last couple of Fridays have been days of enlightenment for me.  I was enlightened, awakened to the fact that I was being really hard on myself about my work, performance in the fall. The fall semester was very difficult for me for many reasons.  

Artistically it was very fulfilling; I directed an incredibly rewarding production of THE HEIDI CHRONICLES.  I couldn’t have been more proud of the cast, crew, and production team. There were definitely glitches here and there but everyone supported the process and kept working to make the show beautiful, entertaining, enlightening, and empowering. I loved almost every moment of rehearsal and performance.

As the show went into technical rehearsals I started feeling more and more pain in my right side. The pain became almost unbearable as we opened the show. The day after opening Kate came down with a stomach virus.  I thought that I had given it to her and that it was the cause of all the pain I was having. As she got better my pain remained. I felt sicker and sicker. In addition to the pain in my side I was so nauseated that I found speaking almost impossible. I would feel as if I was going to vomit at least once during each class. Finally after the show closed I went to the doctor. I was given prescriptions as we waited for results from blood tests. The next week the test results were still not in and I was in so much pain that I was climbing the walls.  I called the doctor’s office for the third time since the original visit.  Finally, an appointment was made for me to have a CT Scan.  A couple of days later I received a call from the doctor; I had a massive ruptured cyst in my right ovary and now in my uterus. There was infection. I was given a prescription. Later that prescription of antibiotic would cause the lining of my stomach to become enflamed.  I also had a series of mammograms because of cysts that were found in my breast as well as an Upper Gastro endoscopy.  

As you can imagine the illness made teaching difficult. However I never missed class when I was sick. I missed several times to have procedures done. So overall I didn’t feel great about my work in the classroom or as a professor during the fall.  It’s hard when you are passionate about something and that passion isn’t enough.  When your performance is lack luster because you are ill.  I guess I thought the students would understand that I had to take care of myself. I shared as much as I could with them. And most of them were understanding and concerned but there were a few who got offended or hurt or angry when I wasn’t as available as I normally am.

As a professor I work to educate the whole person; not just the artist not just the actor but the whole person. Sometimes it takes and there are instances when it doesn’t. This was another moment of enlightenment on a Friday a couple of weeks ago. I will never give up my dream to share what I know about living as an artist but do have a better understanding that not everyone will be open to this concept or this kind of learning. And that’s okay.  And those are the selfish, self-center ones who will not understand when they can’t be the focus for a minute.

There was a time in my life when it was important to me to have my name in every program. It’s a self-centered desire. One time my name was left out of a program in grad school and I was bitter until one of my professors asked, “What do you want? A balloon?”  Immediately I realized how ridiculous my bitterness was.  There were years when I left my name out of the program after program.  I was practicing putting the process above my own glory or whatever. Today, I don’t care about programs and I joke about hearing my name at the Tony Awards or Oscars but the biggest goal is not to be in a program or to hear my name in an acceptance speech-- it’s to raise an empowered woman, make art, educate artists, and to make enough money to survive and perhaps travel a little.

And perhaps most importantly….Last Friday I became aware that because of the sickness and bitterness of students last semester and because I miss my Daddy when things like this happen…I haven’t been happy.

So for now my goals are to be happy, raise an empowered woman, make art, educate artists, make enough money to survive, travel, and not to let the bastards get me down…..

I thought we were all in this together.....

So I just finished directing a wonderful production of a wonderful play, THE HEIDI CHRONICLES. This play means a lot to me not only because of what the play says about women, as well as humanity but also because I'm a Heidi. I'm very much like the title character; I'm a career woman, a single mom, I believe in women, I believe in equality for all people, and I believe in love.

There have been times in my life when I was told that what I was doing to help the world was a drop in the bucket. I would reply with something like, "enough drops will fill the bucket." And there were times when I got down and I couldn't see the fruits of my labor. I've even doubted that all the work, trials, pushing was worth it. So like Heidi in the play, "I'm just not happy, I haven't been happy in some time."

I have goals. I have goals for my life, career, relationships, and I also have goals for the world. There are changes that I would love to see occur and to achieve these goals I work from within my classes at our little university to encourage change in the world. I teach understanding, tolerance, the celebration of diversity, and may other concepts that probably scare the crap out of college that I once taught at. I teach the whole person, not just the artist. And I see change. I see change in my students. I see most of them going into the world with the goal of making it a little bit better. I believe in them too. They are more than a drop in a bucket.

However this wouldn't be my blog if I didn't mention Kate. I believe strongly in her. She's smart, funny, energetic, but most of all she's compassionate. Kate is much  more compassionate than I am. If anything I have given to this world will make it a better more loving place Kate will. Kate loves big.

A few weeks ago Kate and I went to a friend's birthday party at the local skating rink. Kate was having an allergy attack that morning but regardless of how she felt she begged to go to the party so we went. She got there and immediately felt better because she saw her friend, the birthday girl, and off they went to the rink. At the rink there was a little girl and her Mom who I didn't know. The little girl was a friend of the birthday girl and had been invited to the party too. She sat there on a bench next to the rink with her Mom and she sobbed. She was a little shy and according to her Mom had had a difficult morning.

Kate walked up to the sobbing little girl and put her arms around her. She told her that it would be okay. She went on to tell the little girl that she would skate with her. And within a minute Kate had the little girl by the hand and they were out on the ice. Neither of the two of them had ever skated before but they both did very well. They depended on one another; if one fell the other waited and helped. They laughed and had a lovely time.

When it got time for cake Kate sat by the birthday girl but when her special friend came in Kate offered half of her chair to the little girl. They sat together in the same chair and ate cake to celebrate.

Most of us wouldn't stop to ask someone crying if they were okay much less put an arm around them. Most of us wouldn't spend time at a party with someone we didn't know. Most of us wouldn't offer half our chair to someone who had no place to sit. But wouldn't the world be a little better if we did?

My favorite line from THE HEIDI CHRONICLES is from Act II, scene 4:

I don't blame any of the us (for how I'm feeling). We're all concerned, intelligent, good women. It's just that I feel stranded. And I thought the whole point was that we wouldn't feel stranded. I thought the point was we were all in this together.

So can we stop judging, hating, overlooking one another for a minute and just love each other because aren't we all in this together?

The hard stuff....

Yep, it's birthday month for Kate again. She turned the big "6". It's been a great year. She loved her time at the CSC; she learned a lot, made lots of friends, and undoubtedly ran and screamed for hundreds of miles. We had a fantastic summer; we saw plays, we saw movies, we spent a week in Baton Rouge, and spent a week with our favorite people at the beach. Kate did all of this without a father. July 31 marked the one year anniversary of Kate's last visit with him.

The first couple of months she spent without him were the hardest for her. After her birthday last year I think she sort of got over not seeing him. I don't think I did a very good job of explaining where he was; I was unsure of exactly how much I could say or should say to a five year old. So I simply told her that he wasn't well, that he was sick, and that he loved her. She was okay with that explanation and went on living her happy little life. The year was spattered with phone calls from him. He was frustrated with me because I refused to be in charge of his relationship with her. The last thing that I was going to do was to act as his secretary and set up phone calls with her. If he wanted to talk to her he had to call her which he did occasionally. The last phone call was at the end of April.

The year was also spattered with court dates to "change the custody" agreement. I believe there were five hearings that I went to with my attorney which he missed. Finally the judge allowed us to change the custody agreement without him present. I was awarded full custody. Period. Finally.

After the above agreement was signed by the judge he got an attorney who filed a request to dismiss the agreement. Boom. He doesn't show. He doesn't care enough to come to court. When it's changed he will pretend to be interested. Pretend to be interested after missing two birthday (no presents, no cards, no calls), a Christmas (no presents, no card, no nothing), valentine's day, Easter, first loose tooth, first day of kindergarten, and many other occasions.

So after over a year I saw him in court last week. The agreement was indeed dismissed by the judge. We will have to recreate an agreement. We will have to do a lot of expensive "discovery" since we don't know where he lives or who he lives with. We will have to schedule a number of court appearances which I will inevitably have to pay for. Me, the Mommy who is there for her child. I feel okay with this, I have a great attorney. She assures me that we will not agree to anything that would put Kate at risk. More than likely he will get supervised visitation but this might not happen until sometime next year. The courts are slow. But in all of this I felt the need to do a better job of communicating to my sweetness.

Today after church I took Kate to lunch. She wanted to go to Olive Garden; her favorite restaurant because of the mints that you get with the check. She wasn't feeling well. She has been having an allergy attack since Friday evening. I said to her as we sat waiting on the bread sticks, another reason she loves the place, "I need to talk to you when we get home." I think she thought she was in trouble because she replied a little sheepishly, "Go ahead Mommy, tell me now." So I mustered as much tact as I could and I said, "Kate I love you more than anything in the world and I will always take care of you. I take really good care of you. You will live with me as long as you need to. If you ever, ever need anything I want you to ask me. I'm here for you." She said with a little grin, "I know Mommy." And then I told her the hard stuff, "Kate, your father left because he was sick. He can't take care of you. He loves you and someday you will be able to visit with him again but he will never be able to take care of you the way Mommy does." Again Kate looked at me and said, "I know Mommy, I know."  And then she put her forehead on my shoulder with her face toward my arm and there she sat for the longest two minutes of my life.

Parenting is full of joy, full of trials, full of teaching, and most definitely full of the hard stuff.