The Season

The little tree is up, lights twinkling.  Every year, as I put it up, I have mixed feelings...

It is such a homely little thing; all scraggly branches that are squashed and pitiful when I first pull it out of the box.  The little old tree looks just about as bedraggled as I feel as I stumble along toward the holiday season.

The transition from pathetic little fake evergreen to sparkly, quirky display of well remembered bits and pieces happens slowly -- so slowly that I hardly notice it at first.  I got new lights this year.  The old motley collection of various kinds of twinkly lights had really seen better days, and it was time.  I actually decided that last year when I took it down and put it all away.  I tossed out the old lights, promising myself that I'd get new ones for this season.  Of course, by the time I was ready to go this year, I had totally forgotten that.  I got the tree out and all the branches on it and sort of fluffed up.  Then I pulled out my boxes, and started hunting for the lights...  Hunting and hunting and hunting...  What the heck????

Yeah. Slow on the pick up.  I have CRS (Can't Remember Shit).

So.  The naked, pitiful tree sat there, on its little table for a couple of days until I could get out and buy some lights (because I REFUSE to enter into the Thanksgiving Day / Black Friday Shopping craziness).  With its bright new lights, that sort of look like the old-fashioned lights I remember from my childhood, the little tree was ready for decorations.

My ornament collection is "eclectic," to put it kindly.  There are ornaments that I painted by hand as a child.  There are cookie-dough ornaments that I made and painted with my own small children one year long ago when we had no money at all, and nearly everything was made by hand.  They are all dated and signed on the back; humble, sweet, silly little lumps of memory.  There are bright yellow and orange yarn pom poms that I made with my college roommate when we were both freshmen.  Living in a dismal old dormatory that had been converted from and old, old, old fraternity house, we were determined to have a Christmas tree that year.  We pooled our money and bought a long, skinny, very tall, but very sparse pine tree.  We hauled it back and propped it up in a bucket full of rocks.  We decorated it with those silly little, handmade yellow and orange yarn fluffs, and then strung popcorn and cranberries to make garlands to string on it.  It was a sight, but we loved it anyway.  Years later, long after I was married and working to raise my little ones; long after she'd gone on to become a wealthy engineer married to another wealthy engineer, A small package came to my door.  Inside were those same old silly decorations with a note:  "How many memories come tied with orange and yellow yarn?"  There are the shiny, gold, abstract angels; each with some sort of unidentifiable musical instruments.  They are tiny; only an inch and a half tall.  I have half a dozen of them; all different.  They were given to me by my brother, Gregg, who somehow thought that they were "queer."  "Just like me," he told me with a mischievous wink.  Gregg's angels fly proudly around my tree each year, and every year I keep the promise I made him as he lay dying -- "I will never forget you..."  And so many little oddities that have come, over the years from students.  I hang them all and remember Katie and Jacob and Samuel and Tim and Barby and Shelly and ...  So many young lives that have touched me along the way.

So the season has begun and, even better, today was a snow day.  No school.  We are home, tucked in warm and safe, with the cats and the trees -- watching the snow fall outside our windows.

Wishing you all the best of the season, Friends.

October Birthdays

In my family of origin, that was the phrase we always used, "The October birthdays."  The October birthdays were a beginning point for what, in that long ago era, was known as the holiday season.  It was a slower and simpler time, and in those days, the Christmas shopping madness did not begin until after Halloween.  So, the holiday season, began for us with The October birthdays, and then proceeded through Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, The New Year, Mother's birthday, and finally, in February, my birthday.  In my memory, that time of the year was always fraught with a wash of conflicts, and emotions.  It was never a settled time; never easy to navigate.

Next week, on Thursday and Friday, I will mark the passage of The October birthdays...

The 17th of October would have been my Dad's 92nd birthday.  He has been gone twenty-one years now; taken at the age of 71 by the ravages of rheumatoid arthritis.  He was a quiet man; a veteran of the second World War.  Although both of my parents were drinkers, my father tended to be the voice of reason, holding my mother's rages in check.  He seldom raised his voice, but when he took that deep, quiet, serious tone, people listened.  He was my champion and my hero and the deep connection of my childhood.  I spent many happy hours standing on a stool next to him, as he tinkered under the hood of the car.  Although I had three younger brothers, I was the one who went with my Dad to the baseball games he loved.  With him, I learned to rejoice in the double play and the throw down to pick off a runner trying to steal second.

The day after Dad's birthday, October 18th, was my brother, Gregg's birthday.  He was the middle one of my three younger brothers, five years my junior.  He and I were, in temperament and appearance, like twins.  Except for the years that separated us, we were mirror images of one another; the only two in our family who saw the world in the same ways.  Gregg, who, because he was a colicky baby with a very healthy set of lungs, was dubbed "Moose" by my Dad, was always a bit of a loner.  He was a child who thought his own thoughts and went his own way.  He was the little tag-along behind the oldest of the boys, Hank, and I.  We were forever getting him into one fix or another, and because he was younger and more gullible, it most often ended up with him being injured in some way.  We would take him sledding on "the big kids hill," even though he really wasn't old enough.  All of us knew to bail out before we hit the bottom, because there was a ditch at the end of the run.  None of us thought to tell Gregg about that little detail before we launched him down the hill for the first time.  Our frantic shoutings from the top of the steep slope were useless, and he rode that sled right off the edge and stuck it, like an arrow, in the dirt wall on the other side of the ditch.  He was a mess when we dragged him home.  It was always like that.  The great wonder is that he survived being our little brother.  Gregg was always an odd child, and he grew into an interesting and awkward teenager.  Theater was his passion... and music.  He was a natural born showman.  His attempts at traditional dating, the boy meets girl thing, were just awful.  He was terrible at it.  When he finally "came out," at the age of 19, it was an absolute "Duh" moment for most of us.  My parents, sadly, were appalled, and never, ever came to terms with the truth of who he was.  That rift was painful in the extreme.  For a number of years, Gregg and I worked as a team, speaking and presenting to church groups and others who were confronting the issues of accepting and loving a family member who was gay.  We were a good pair, and we loved doing it together.  I don't know what difference we made for others, but I know it was a time when he and I were intensely bonded to each other -- a bond that I will forever treasure.  When Gregg died of the complications of AIDS, 22 years ago, he was just 31 years old.  It was the anniversary of the death of President John F. Kennedy.  I believe to this day, that he chose that date.  When I arrived at the hospital that morning, he was sitting up in bed, paging with his sardonic wit, through what he always referred to as the "Needless Markup" (Nieman Marcus) catalog.  He was quite tickled by the 24-carat gold, jewel encrusted, Hummer.  That was morning, by evening, he was clearly dying, unresponsive, pale and wasted, just a shadow lingering in the room.  And yet, he would not let go...  Finally, at about 10 PM, I went out to the nurses' station, and begged them to let me bring his beloved dog up to the hospital so he could "say goodbye."  They reluctantly agreed that we could bring her up the stairs.  I called my husband, at home with our two adolescents, and he went over to Gregg's house and got Teela, the golden retriever.  He brought her up the six flights, and we walked her down the dimly lit hallway to Gregg's room.  The dog crawled into Gregg's bed, laid her head on his chest with a whimper.  He put his hand up to pet her head, and was gone.  Just like that...  It has been 22 years and I still see him every now and then -- in the face of a stranger; peering out from an intense and beautiful face.  How I miss him...

So, Thursday and Friday will be days of intense remembering.  Longing.  Missing those parts of myself.

swan

Bob and Jan's Collaring Song

Years ago, when my "then" husband and I were still living in Colorado, we hosted a group of kinksters from around the country in our home, and together, the bunch of us spent the weekend at Thunder in the Mountains.  Tom and T were with us that weekend, along with a couple that lived in Toledo, Ohio, and another set of online friends from Eugene, Oregon.  We had people all over the house, and mealtimes were quite the production, gathered around our big table.  We rented a mini-van, and so we managed to shuttle back and forth across town to participate in the play parties and presentations.  It was a wild and busy time.

Part of the festivities of the weekend included a collaring ceremony between Bob and Jan, our friends from the west coast.  We all gathered one evening, before we headed for the play party, to witness to their promises to one another, and to support them as they embarked on a new phase of their journey in their life together.  It was a simple ceremony that included, at one point, a paraphrase of a hymn that they had heard at their church.  At the time, I'd never heard the hymn by John Ball called "The Summons:"

Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?
Will you go where you don't know and never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown? Will you let my name be known,
will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?

Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?

Will you let the blinded see if I but call your name?
Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same?
Will you kiss the leper clean and do such as this unseen,
and admit to what I mean in you and you in me?

Will you love the "you" you hide if I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside and never be the same?
Will you use the faith you've found to reshape the world around,
through my sight and touch and sound in you and you in me?

Lord your summons echoes true when you but call my name.
Let me turn and follow you and never be the same.
In Your company I'll go where Your love and footsteps show.
Thus I'll move and live and grow in you and you in me.

Now, there is plenty of discussion, within the "church music" types about the relative merits of this song.  Some find it insipid, sing-songy, badly written, and derivative.  Church music people seem to take this stuff awfully seriously.  I don't really care that much, to tell the truth.  I "attend" mass once each week with my Catholic school students, and the music is part of the experience that I can sometimes enjoy, given that I am the resident heathen...

But every few weeks, with amazing regularity, I'll head over to church with my kids, and there, posted on the board, part of the music programme for the service, is "Bob and Jan's Collaring Song."  It always makes me smile...  if they only knew!!!

swan

Feelings and Words -- Sense

In commenting on my Abject Obedience post, Malcolm wrote (in part):
...Somewhat like me, you always want to think things out and put them into words ... I'm not sure that is very profitable ... Trying to make word sense of life is not the same as making feeling sense of it ... the feeling way is more useful. Words ... narrow down one's experience of life and even make it kind of second-hand - experiencing the thoughts about life instead of life itself.

Malcolm is, I believe, my oldest blogging friend.  The very first comment ever left at The Swan's Heart, way back on December 27, 2004, was from Malcolm -- and he has followed along ever since.  He and I have listened to each other, and on occasion, growled at one another across miles and over some eight years of our lives.  Somewhat older than me, I think Malcolm tends to wax "paternal" with me by times -- and that is sort of sweet and endearing.  We have learned, over time, to understand (and sometimes even appreciate) the differences in the ways we see the world.  This is one of those times, when Malcolm and I see this very differently.  

I do try to make "word sense" of life and the experiences of life that come to me.  Words fascinate me, and I absolutely believe that words are intrinsically human.  We are animals that make language and share language, and that makes us unique of all the creatures that share this planet with us.  

The words we use define our reality.  The feeling sense of things, that Malcolm claims is somehow "better," occurs inside of us framed by the words we use to express it, explain it, evaluate it, and remember it.  What we SAY about things, to ourselves and to each other, colors how we FEEL about those very things.  I can describe a hurricane in the language of the meterologist, noting the symmetry, describing the path, going on about the eyewall and the outflow bands and the storm surge -- and the feelings that are evoked by my words are likely to be very different than the emotions I might experience if the same weather event is described in terms of potential threat level and likely path of destruction and fears for the impacts on me personally, should I find myself in the path of that "weather event."  We feel and we talk, and I do not believe that the two are really separable.  What I say about what happens to me may reflect how I feel about that occurrence, but it will also shape those feelings.

Malcolm, I can assure you that there is no dearth of FEELINGS around the events of the last two years.  We have felt every gust and downpour of the emotional storms through which we passed.  That hurricane might be a very good metaphor for the tempests that we endured -- except, I don't recall ever passing through anything that seemed calm (as I have been told one finds in the eye of a hurricane).  There was plenty of "feeling sense" around here -- and plenty of "feeling nonsense" as well.  We each earned advanced degrees in FEELING by the time we fell out the other side of that mess.  

There was very little intellectualizing about what we were involved with.  We lived, for all of two plus years, in survival mode -- we raged and we sobbed and we considered the END of us all.  We hurt; inside of ourselves -- and then we took that hurting and flung it outward at one another, seeking to somehow ease our own pain by spreading it around.  Does pain shared become somehow more bearable?  We felt shame.  And fear.  And anger.  And loneliness.  And despair.  And guilt.  And outrage.  And bitterness.  And grief.  And, more often than not, we felt just too tired to go on.  We didn't write much here during this passage -- not compared to what we had done in the days before.  As you point out, it takes words to make a blog happen.  No one is going to read very long if all that appears here looks/sounds like:  AAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

But yes, I will grant you that I am inclined to sort and sift through the debris -- just a little bit.  I want to find the mementos that might be salvaged out of the rubble left behind by the storm.  Might there be the "language equivalent" of a family picture or a child's toy or an heirloom piece of Grandmother's jewelry to be unearthed from the heaps of stuff piled everywhere?  For me, Malcolm, that is part of what the exercise of poking at WORDS is about.  The language that I used before, and the language I used to stay afloat through the worst of it all -- those words seem like important bits of self that I hope to retrieve, and I do feel protective and sentimental about that self.  I doubt that there's much left behind that will be very useful in my new life, but still I find I want to gather up the bits and pieces and catalog them and tuck them away safely in mental bins and boxes and scrapbooks, so that, someday, when I've forgotten how it all felt I can pull up the collection of memories and look at it all again from a safe distance.

swan

Ottoman

In the early days, when I was newly arrived here, quite often I'd find myself over the leather ottoman, restrained and whipped/spanked with almost everything in the toybag. The ottoman is so solid and stable that it provides a secure anchor point in a world that shrinks down to include the things that create sensations. In that world, the feel of the leather on my skin is a comfort -- a place to draw comfort and strength. The ottoman is soft, cushioned, almost like a cradle. There is nothing about the ottoman that is uncomfortable or difficult. I never have to think about something that pokes or pinches or bites. I can rely on the presence of the ottoman.

We don't use it anymore. It is in T's space. It isn't accommodating of His knees. It takes planning and intention and volition to get to where we can use the ottoman. Simpler to simply pull out the pillow, get myself over it, and hang on. Lots of reasons why the ottoman has faded from our repertoire, relegated to the background of memory. I understand, but I miss it.

swan

The World's Most Expensive Cane (or Why We Might be Too Old for This)

The vacation was nice. We got home. We unpacked. We settled in to catch up on email and pet the cats and just sort of ease back into our lives.


He was surfing His favorite blogs, and had just settled in to read at Spanking Blog when all of the sudden He looked at me and said, "Did you pick up the cane?"


It was an immediate "OH SHIT" moment for me. I knew exactly where the cane was -- hanging in its sheath on the door knob in the bedroom of the cabin that we'd checked out of this morning at about 10:00. A two-hour drive from us. And that was IF they had found our cane and it was still there.


I knew -- knew without any question -- that I would go back there today, and retrieve that cane. I got on the phone and called the cabin rental office. No answer. I left a message, saying that we'd left a cane hanging on the door in the cabin bedroom, and stating that I was on my way back to try and get it. I said it would take me a couple of hours, and I asked if they would please call me back.


He insisted that He WAS ABSOLUTELY going with me. No way on earth He was letting me drive up to get it alone.


Before we could get it together to leave the house, they had called and assured us that they did have the cane. They were a little surprised I think that we were coming back to get it tonight.


I know. It probably sounds a little crazy to most people. But it is THE cane that we just got -- THE cane that took us so awfully long to find -- THE cane that replaces the one we broke over a year ago.


We made several unsuccessful attempts to replace that first cane -- ordered and paid for probably at least three, or maybe four canes that were of unsatisfactory quality. Finally, He gave up and ordered the "Deluxe" model cane from Adam and Gillian's. It was an investment of $70.00 + shipping, but given what we'd already invested in junk, we were ready to do it. So figure at the point where we ordered that cane, we had a couple hundred dollars invested in the search. Today, given the cost of gas for the approximately 200 mile rescue trip to and fro, we've spent another $20. That's one expensive cane.


Anyway, we got up and our weekend hosts had it. Handed it right to us with a grin. Of course.


Personally, I am thinking that when you get too old to remember your toys, it is possible that you are getting too old.


On the other hand, traveling with Master is a major event for our household -- shoes, knives, clothes, food, toys, computer, radio, grill and grill tools, beverages, and just basic clothing flung all over the place. It takes T and I, and some significant planning and organization to pull it off. We both scour the place once we are packed and loaded -- trying to make sure we don't overlook some bit of important stuff that He's brought along and then put somewhere that we won't notice it and pick it up. I actually remember waking up in the middle of the night, seeing the cane hanging there, and thinking, "I need to remember to grab that in the morning." I really should have just gotten out of bed and picked it off the door right then. Of course, I never even thought about it in the morning, and the hanging place on the back of the door, just didn't catch either my eye or T's. Absent minded? Or just buried in the details?


Whatever. We have the world's most expensive cane back, safe here with us.



swan

Happy Nanaversary Babe

A little more than 7 years ago today a good friend contacted me and told me there was a man moving to Cincy. He was broken. His marriage was dissolving and his job had moved. He was relocating to an unknown community. He was a good guy with a great heart and never stopped talking. And she said he needed a friend. She told me to contact him. "Sure, I will when I get a chance." Was my response.... And a few days later she asked me if I had contacted him, and I hadn't, "Too busy" was my reply. She said I really needed to get in touch with this man and I said I would. And a week later she tracked me down and asked me again...and again....well, you get the drift, right? Well, she, being the Dominant that she is, said "Stop talking to me and write the damned email RIGHT NOW!!!"......so I did. And got a response from Tom. He was relocating to Cincy that week and starting his new job the following Monday and maybe we could meet that Sunday for dinner.

I had given up the search for the "ring and the white picket fence". I was destine to share a home with my best friend/mom and our cat. And I had figured that was ok. I had worked a difficult career and gave it up to come home. I was tired. I was not looking for anything more than a potential play-partner and friend. Someone for an occasional dinner and movie.... BOY! Was I wrong!!

We met the Sunday after he returned from a depressing trip back to visit his family for Thanksgiving. Half way between our two homes at an Olive Garden. We met at 6pm and left the restaurant at 10:30pm, after many glances from servers trying to go home, since they closed at 10. We talked about anything and everything. We had our entire lives in common. We found that my career followed him around as I traveled. I worked 9mos. about 1hr away from where he was born. He lived about 15mins. away from me when he was in high school and I was in grade school. His Dad and my Mom worked in the same building for several years. I lived in the same town with his parents for over a year during my travels. And finally, during my last stint as a restaurant manager, I probably assisted with their family for several meals, as I was managing a restaurant in the town where he and his family lived for many years and the restaurant was one of their favorites. Yet we had never met until that evening...but it seemed we had been together forever.

We spent weekends together. I lived in a town about an hour away and would work Monday thru' Friday and leave from work on Friday with the car packed with treats for Tom. And on Sunday evening, after dinner, I would drive back home to start it all over again.... and cry all the way home. He kept asking me to move in. And I kept saying "No." You see, he was not very comfortable alone. I didn't want to be a rebound. I wanted him to see that it was ok to be alone. That it wasn't so bad to have private time. And to know that I would always come back. Then, when he finally got comfy, I was offered a transfer to his town.....and I moved. We have been together ever since.

I am not lying when I say that Tom saved my life. We have discussed that before, but I owe my "Everything" to him. He give me strength when I just want to lay down. He has the most infectious laugh, it lights up the room. The best place in the entire world is snuggled in his arms, resting against his chest. My hand on his heart.

I am home. I am loved.

One of my favorite songs is "Sleep" by Melissa Etheridge

After your laughter like thunder
After your skin like coffee and cream
After it takes our bodies into the night
After we've come to the extreme

I want to lay down on your shoulder
Just inside your arm
I want to listen to your heart beat
And your breathing on and on
I want to lay down on your shoulder
Surrender to your peace
And go to sleep

And when we've gone a million miles
Made true our dreams with sweat and bone
After we've built it up with our bare hands
Made strong a place we can call home

I want to lay down on your shoulder
Just inside your arm
I want to listen to your heartbeat
And your breathing on and on
I want to lay down on your shoulder
Surrender to the peace
And go to sleep

And when the light in my eye is fading
When running water becomes too deep
Finally angels turn my fire to dust
And when my soul's no longer mine to keep

I want to lay down on your shoulder
Just inside your arm
I want to listen to your heartbeat
And your breathing on and on
I want to lay down on your shoulder
Surrender to the peace
And just go to sleep

Mores & Mores,
T

Dad in My Dreams

I had my Dad in my dreams last night... He's been dead these 14 years.

My Dad, strong and Jack Kennedy handsome; played minor league baseball. My Dad, WWII vet who landed in the second wave at Normandy, never ever talked about his experiences there except in the most general terms. My Dad, with his high school education, read voraciously and could discuss nearly any topic -- he was one of the brightest men I've ever known. My Dad, who was shaped by the Depression, worked his whole life to make a life that was secure and sure; who waited for the time when he and my mother might retire and finally "enjoy" life -- who by the time he reached that promised day was so debilitated by the rheumatoid arthritis that finally killed him, couldn't enjoy anything much at all...

In my dreams last night there were two copies of my Dad. One for whom I waited in some sort of odd bus depot style surgery center, where patients were picked up at the "ticket counter," transported by ambulance to the surgical site, and returned to the waiting area when they were "done." The other Dad was there in the waiting room with me, well, and strong, and whole... The surgical patient Dad got suddenly dropped off, post-surgically, all dressed in clothes I remember him wearing quite often, seeming quite disoriented and very unsteady. The second Dad and I rushed out to him and helped support him into the waiting room and into a chair so that he could rest and recover his bearings... It all seemed quite matter of fact to me.

Dad was the hero and antagonist of my youth. He raised me on liberal, union-organizer politics, but then couldn't understand why I sympathized with the hippies that sprouted all over The Hill on the CU campus in Boulder, or why I insisted that it was only my too late February birthday that would keep me from voting for Eugene McCarthy in the election the year I turned 18. He taught me to hold a baseball bat, throw and catch a football, and cast a fishing line, insisted I attend an engineering college rather than a teachers' college, and yet couldn't fathom my feminist leanings. He read me bedtime stories, cleaned up vomit when I was ill as a child, and chased the nightmare spiders from my bed, and never ever once stopped my mother's abusive predations... He was and remains an absolute enigma...

He was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis when I was in junior high school. I watched it take him apart piece by piece by piece. I saw him come home the day of the diagnosis, sit down in his rocking chair and decide that his life was over. My Dad taught me many, many things, but the most important, most lasting lesson he ever taught me is this -- life is precious and life is too damn short to waste it waiting for it to happen. It happens while we are planning it, while we are hoping for it, while we are wishing for the better opportunity. Life is for now. We are life, and joy and breath and love are here for the taking.

I don't know for sure what Dad #1 and Dad #2 were all about last night. I'd like to believe that the one who was there to help was intended as assurance that I'll always have the strength that I'll need for whatever comes, and that I've made the right choice in seizing the life that is here before me now. I feel like that is what He came to tell me last night.

swan