a fine line. the place between pre-joy and joy. for mike libecki there is no space on the continuum between the two. it is merely one or the other. pre-joy or joy.
mike is a mountain climber. because i am an obsessive mountain-climbing-video-documentary-movie-watcher, we watched him and cory richards in their national geographic antarctic mountain climb to summits not reached before. it was brutal. the wind. the weather. the elements of the climb. agonizingly difficult.
but mike was adamant, stating above the furious wind again and again, “it’s either joy or pre-joy.” any moment of torturous climbing or bearing the effects of the weather was a moment of ‘pre-joy’. all other moments were ‘joy’. it’s an amazing way to look at things. an amazing way to look at life. everything leads to joy. you are always in joy or on your way there.
in what we would describe as a watershed time, this short quote is a lesson in staying grounded. in sentiment i have heard before, but never as succinctly shorthand, a reminder to look always to the light, the horizon, not backwards, not at the dark, not measuring in the negative. re-group, re-center, re-evaluate, re-perspective-arrange and move through pre-joy to joy. a cup always with something in it, never empty. always a portion waiting for you to add to it, make the best assumptions, hope, appreciate, carry the jug to the next waterhole for it is there. “we must live sweet,” mike says.
we carry the torch so often for the negative. we moan and complain and gossip and pick fights. in this roller coaster of life, what about carrying the torch for joy? what about lighting the way for yourself, for others, helping to find the light, the joy? believe that we are only an ice-pick or a few carabiners or a length of rope away. we are on the mountain. all of us.
i would like to try to remember this “it’s either pre-joy or joy” and live and work and play by it.
because i believe in joy and the sheer power, potential of joy; it’s a force. i just need remember to believe that all roads lead there. one day is joy. the next is pre-joy. it is all on the same continuum. it is all the same life. we all share the same possibility. all paths summit.
it beckons. the moon, no matter, will seek you out. it has no agenda but to light your way. it has no preconceived notion, no prejudice. it is out there for all, for anyone who looks up. it offers stability to this good earth’s axis, regularity to the tide, illumination to the inky sky.
the moon’s romantic presence is the stuff of wishes and the pronouncement of love all the way to it and back. its moonline will find you, wherever you roam. always, always, it appears to light a path directly to you. each of us must be equally as important, then, for the moon shines for and to each of us. a gleaming line, luminous, brilliantly reaching to us. reminding us that no matter, on this big beautiful earth, we are all under the same dark sky, the same unlimited galaxy of stars, the same moon. we are closer to each other than we think and we all have even – at very least – these few things in common. how reassuring to know that we all, despite where we are, stand on different ground but gaze at the very same moon.
were the divine-in-all-the-universe to have a living room and be gazing out the window, i suspect the divine-in-all-the-universe would say, “i see the full moon out my window and in it, you.”
i sleepily rub the dreams from my eyes. coffee helps. and the snowy world outside comes into focus. no longer immersed in the land of nod, all things rush back: the casts, the worries, work task lists, bills to pay, the world around us. before i peruse the news and the weather, though, i mind’s-eye blow my children a kiss and wish them good days, i hug the dog and the cat lying by my side, i thank sweet d for the coffee with the ernie straw. it all starts. the day has begun.
this past week has been extraordinary in so many ways; more on that another time. i’m buoyed by a hopeful spirit, by connecting with people, by sheer love and the sureness-of-foot taking one step at a time, moving forward; the tide is predictable – it ebbs; it flows. i am wide awake now, thinking.
“we should be wide awake.” yes. for all things. we should have our eyes open. we should monitor our response to the positive, the negative. we should be mindful. just as worry pervades our time, so does hope. we need lead with kindness. we need remember we are sharing this good earth with a hard-to-fathom 7.6 billion or so other souls. we can’t avoid the reality that the narrative we each individually choose must be deliberately and painstakingly vetted with the truth, with awareness, with sensitivity, with fairness. not sleepily, not uninterested-in-all-but-the-reactionary-anger-dramatics, not without due diligence. we must guard against the bandwagon of lackadaisical; we must avoid the geared-down rhetoric of hatred. we are human beings and we have a responsibility.
just as certain as the tide, it is predictable that the two factions in any division will aggressively forward their agendas. it is up to each of us to stay informed, to discern, to ask questions, to speak up, to make intelligent, educated choices based on civility, impartiality and honesty, equality, democracy and freedom. no matter the venue, no matter the place of division.
to be wide awake.
woke: increasingly used as a byword for social awareness.
“when we choose to be parents, we accept another human being as part of ourselves, and a large part of our emotional selves will stay with that person as long as we live. from that time on there will be another person on this earth whose orbit around us will affect us as surely as the moon affects the tides, and affect us in some ways more deeply than anyone else can. our children are extensions of ourselves.” (mr. fred rogers)
i simply cannot think of a more succinct way to say this but for the words of mr. rogers.
forever changed, i am sensitive to every little thing my even-as-grown-ups-children are experiencing, celebrating, enduring, adventuring, loving, suffering, yearning for, achieving. i feel their joy as my joy, their sadness as my sadness.
parenthood, a profound honor, in all its diamond-facets is no small feat. the vexing complexities, the moments of sheer joy, the heart-wrenching worry, the holding-on-letting-go-ness, the unconditional love. all of it.
like the moon, their tide surely affects my tide. and i would have it no other way.
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not being a real true climber, i’m not sure if the above statement is really true. what about the “hit. climb. hit. climb.” of ice-picking your way up? what about crampons? what about ropes and aluminum ladders perched against the icy pitch?
i do, however, know this quote has good intentions.
we are hikers. trekkers. i/we have never used a rope or crampons or ladders or ice picks to get from point a to point b. and watching a mountainload of everest and k2 videos, documentaries and movies hardly makes us experts in the area of climbing. we are not even novices.
but, in terms of the metaphor of this quote, i can relate.
surely, climbing a mountain with nothing to grip onto would be nearly impossible. all organic. all analog. i’m sure alex honnold would agree that if there is nothing at all to hold, with either his hand or his foot, that would make free-climbing such a face a feat of the imagination. there has to be something. some overlap. some crevice. some tiny blip of rock. something.
so. enter the rough. or, in the case of the metaphoric quote, rough times. how would we ever get to the top without them? would we actually recognize the top? would we appreciate the top? would we scale the uphill were it smooth? could we?
or did some smart-ass mountaineer quote this just to mess with us?
clearly, the men and women who have climbed everest with all its personality traits, its twists and turns, its icefalls and crevasses, its sharp ridges and its deep snow have dealt with all of it. they have not turned away as it was too smooth. they have not turned away as it was too rough. they have persisted.
and maybe that there is the point. despite the rough, the smooth, the easy, the hard, the oxygenated, the death zone, the chilling cold, the sun heating the seracs, the avalanches, the perilous altitudinal affects, the glorious summit stands ready.
the mountaintop. it’s there for anyone who just keeps on going. through it all.
it doesn’t matter that they aren’t now attached to doors. a display of doorknobs, all lined up at an antique shoppe, beg you to wonder what doors they opened. what old house was it that had all its doorknobs changed? are the doors still there? these knobs removed; knobs that likely welcomed sticky toddler fingers, trembling arthritic hands, dutifully, solidly a part of history. what new hardware has replaced these knobs that had countless hands turning, opening, passing through?
the joy of having an old house is just that – the history of what has gone before you. how many times was this closet door opened? how many people passed through the front door? how many times did someone come home and walk in, close the back door and sigh?
we cannot think of doorknobs without thinking of doors. we have 22 doors in our old house, a few less than when we bought it, and not counting cabinetry. we have extra doors in the basement. beautiful solid six panel doors, some sporting their knobs, some knob-naked.
i think about the rooms of this home that they all have led to, these doors, the conversations that took place in those rooms. the babies, the plans, the family elders. the hugs and cherished moments, the arguments, the worry, the celebrations, each room a time capsule of lives lived in this very place. doors in, doors out. how much did a hand hesitate to open or close the door?
the metaphor is obvious – doorknobs and doors. the old and wise adage – “when one door closes, another opens.” the words sometimes seem like hollow reassurance. and i look up the adage and realize that there is more to this and is quoted by alexander graham bell, “when one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.”
the patina of the knobs shows wear. hands, hands, grasping and turning, opening. each door an invitation to the next moment, whatever that moment might be. choosing a door, choosing to walk in. standing. waiting. hesitating. we often wonder about the doors. maybe paralyzed with indecision, with grief, with confusion, we often pine after a door. we are often blind.
those doorknobs. if only they could speak. the stories they could tell, the lessons we could learn.
recently i heard someone say that she was glad her parents weren’t here to see what is happening. i would have to agree. my sweet momma and my poppo would be appalled by today’s incessant and prevailing lack of decency. it’s embarrassing and mind-numbing to witness. this is not just a simple lack of kindness for others; these are displays of a complete lack of regard for the sanctity of human life, the privilege of living together on this good earth.
i am relieved that my children are grown so that i don’t have to explain to them the ugliness that is pervasive, accepted, even overtly encouraged. name-calling, lying, undermining, blatant cruelness aimed at others; egregious acts aimed at those less fortunate, elitist prejudices and judgements loaded into automatic weapons spewing vitriol at others, vindictiveness toward people who have a different opinion, who stand up for something different, who live different lives, who are courageous and whose bravery shows up in truth-telling.
we find that this is not just poisoning the outer limits – the circles we don’t belong to, the social or financial ladder-rung we have not reached, the country we belong to but the government by which we are not employed.
no. this sinister lack of decency has reached its slimy tentacles into our communities, our work, our friends, our families, our homes. people, who we would not expect, displaying reactionary anger – jousting their epee of mean-spirited words at the unsuspecting, stepping over the boundaries of democratic principles, over the clearly-now-elusive stopgaps of doing-what’s-right, over the limit of how-i-would-want-you-to-talk-to-me-is-how-i-will-talk-to-you or how-i-would-want-you-to-treat-me-is-how-i-will-treat-you. there is no conversation. there is righteous indignation, cavalier disrespect, face-down-i’m-not-listening-to-you body language. there is anger. there is hate.
and, instead of being struck down by an army of goodness, a wealth of kindness, even a modicum of fairness, this indecency has become normalized and it seems rewarded. whether outwardly applauding or quietly complicit, the indecency is forwarded on. and the tentacles of this corrosive nastiness, unchecked, reach both inward and outward into the concentric circles surrounding each of us; the incivility is a contagion and it wins.
the ernie straw. this straw has lived in the kitchen drawer for decades. it served the sesame-street-zeal of My Girl and My Boy when they were little-little and has made various appearances back in the sunlit-world from time to time since then.
this summer when The Girl was here house-sitting i came home and into the kitchen to find her using it to sip her pre-workout drink. she laughingly told me, “it’s a good straw!” i can’t tell you how happy i was that ernie was still in the drawer when she went searching for the perfect sipping-utensil.
in the last week, ernie has become my constant companion. positioned carefully in my coffee hydroflask or perched in my water glass or teetering out of a wine glass, ernie and i have done beverage-life together.
they say necessity is the mother of invention and, particularly, this past week with two broken wrists, i would have to agree. stuck closer to the right side of my brain as a creative thinker (although admittedly there is quite a bit of ny-style-left-side there as well) i have had to sort out how to do things, let’s say, in-a-different-way.
i can proudly say that i can put on my socks, eat my own meal with a fork or a spoon, cut a steak (with the steak knife lodged into my RH cast), put on a little eyeliner and mascara with my LH steadying my right hand (not easy, but some things are just necessary), and type. last night i squeezed (!) the toothpaste out of the tube and surprised d with his toothbrush pre-pasted. in bigger news, i have played my piano four days in a row. i have 9 fingers to use right now; my right thumb is immobilized. but there are a lot of notes you can play with nine fingers, especially at the right angle and taking your time.
ernie and i are trying to keep a good attitude. his curlycue-ness is pretty cute and his smile engaging. he keeps me from feeling too sad, too limited. he reminds me that the constraints i feel right now are exercising my creative juju (he’s a ridiculous optimist). and he, most importantly, ties me to all the years backward, where he, yes, an inanimate object, has been a part of my life and the life of my children.
i couldn’t be more grateful to have found this life-gossamer-thread in our kitchen drawer last monday, the day i was injured. once again, something profound and something simple – and both remind me of what’s important.
i sent My Girl a photo of ernie in my coffee vessel. she quickly replied, “it’s a good straw!” yes.
“i shall pass this way but once. any good that i can do, any kindness i can show to any human being, let me do it now, let me not defer nor neglect, for i shall not pass this way again.” (etienne de grellet)
this saying is tucked into my wallet. it hangs in our kitchen. it was my sweet momma’s favorite and she lived by it like a mantra. she did not procrastinate kindness until it was convenient; she lived it.
we pass the deer tracks at bristol woods. often we are first after the deer. i wonder what they are like as they pass each other, as their paths converge and diverge.
emergency room to the right. urgent care to the left. it was a choice point.
as we drove from the ski hill back to our town, i was worried. terribly worried. but my worry was less about my two broken wrists. it was less about the pain. it was less about all the things i could see – already – that i couldn’t do for myself. it was less about my piano and, thus, my life. it was less about how long it would take to heal and what that healing would look like. it was less about how important a role david would play for me in this process of getting-my-wrists back. it was less about how this injury would impact me.
my worry? it was about what it would cost.
i wracked my brain for all the research i had done in selecting this year’s healthcare plan and how the deductibles work and what is covered and what is not covered and whether x-rays were completely billable sans satisfying our deductible. i worried about the cost of the emergency room, the cost of the ER staff, the cost of radiology, the cost of casting. there was a moment, driving through paddock lake, that i began to sob, thinking of the financial worry of all this. my wrists throbbing, our health “insurance” a whopping $29,000 a year out-of-pocket, and i was sobbing, in the middle of post-injury shock, at the worry of the additional burden this would put on us.
and that’s pretty pitiful. what a pathetic country in which we live that the first set of thoughts when injured is not getting well, is not healing.
i believe in an effort to more fully understand what i was going through, ptom told me he read a few blogposts written by or about people who had broken both wrists. it occurred to me that might be a good idea so i googled them.
the first post made me made me frustrated. after telling the story of her injury, deborah, who lives in new zealand, spoke about her experience with the socialized healthcare in that country. i wept as i read the motto is “prevent, care, recover,” and there was no cost to her – at all – through diagnosis, treatment, healing, extra care helpers, rehabilitation, transportation. she lost no work salary during the time of her recuperation. every single thing was covered and paid. she states that, “this has been a huge relief to me and has definitely aided in my recovery, because I’m not stressed.”
why am i so amazed by such a humanitarian approach to a nation’s care of its populace? is that not of utmost priority? should our population have to worry about seeking care to remain in or regain good health? what kind of country does not put the health of its people first?
as we approached the hospital in kenosha we had a choice. emergency room or urgent care. i asked david to park by urgent care. in the middle of pain emanating from both my wrists, two slings fashioned by ski patrol around my neck, i thought i remembered that maybe the co-pay or coverage would be more palatable in urgent care. we sat in big red for a few extra minutes; i repeated i wasn’t sure what to do or not do. not sure about the differentiation between urgent care and the emergency room, i thought we could at least ask if urgent care could handle what i presented – a need for x-rays and exam and treatment.
we walked into a crowded waiting room. indeed, they could handle my injuries. we waited hours with all the others there, many of them with masks covering their mouths and noses. everyone looked worried.
a very kind doctor examined me, did x-rays, cast me, gave me directions and sent me on my way with follow-up to an orthopedic doctor in a few days. at that office, a very kind doctor examined me, re-cast me, gave me directions and sent me on my way with a follow-up and more x-rays in ten days, a likely change of cast-type in four weeks, physical/occupational therapy on its heels and a standing invitation to see the reigning hand specialist whose expertise had been proffered.
and, of course, we haven’t received any billing yet. i’m quite sure that will be the icing on the cake, well, so to speak.
or maybe i should say – that will add insult to injury.
reverse threading 