Good karma can be yours

Memorial day, my friends Kiley and Jeff came home to find that Percy,  their beautiful Maine Coon cat, had been horribly injured. Kiley tells me that the injury is so severe that the vet can't even determine what exactly caused it: car, coyote, or something else cataclysmic. A signed, special edition of Mooncat is being offered to help offset the medical costs incurred by this family. $20 of each print sold will go directly to help in Percy's care. For more information, visit  Percy's Surgery and Recovery Fund at gofundme.com. To get your very own signed Moon Cat print, visit czukart.com.

I get by with a little help from my friends

I've hurt my arm. The details are unimportant, and yes, it's healing. What is significant (for me, at least) is that it is my right arm, the lead hand in all my artwork. Typing can be done one-handed. No one takes off points for wiggly lines. Autocorrect can actually be helpful in fixing some errors (though it has made some extremely humorous changes a few time, of the sort that could get me on one of those "21 most hilarious autocorrect" lists had I not caught them.) But the kind of artwork I do, on egg or on a flat surface, takes a fairly steady hand. 

Even though the injured area is recovering, I realize there may be a day when recovery only goes so far. For most of my adult life, predating my pysanky writing, I've had compression of the ulnar and medial nerves on the right. Surgery wasn't recommended until I was out of my childbearing years, as the condition can reoccur with the changes of pregnancy. But, by the time I was "in the clear", I'd developed a pulmonary condition and was advised to not have elective surgeries, if at all possible. So I puddle along, hand pain rolling in and fading out. I have exercises I do daily, braces, therapies for exacerbations-- a full regime to call upon. The nerve trauma was flaring up when the injury happened, so this is a double whammy.

I've been thinking that should the time come when I can no longer hold a kistka in my right hand, I should start training the left. In other words, I want to become an ambidextrous pysanky writer. It's ambitious, I know, and there are many folks who can't master the art even with their dominant hand fully functional. But I want to try.

Yesterday, I started my first egg with my left hand. Got a few lines done, then pretty much wept, because I was so far from where I am on the right. I'm like a soprano with too much vibrato. But, I decided to post the picture to a pysanky group I am in. These folks are wonderful. Some, I've known for almost 20 years, and we've migrated to this group. Some I know only a few short months. A couple, I interacted with for the first time yesterday.  Since my post (above), encouragement, sympathy, suggestions, and humor have poured in. 

And that's not all. Some of these marvelous souls are taking up their kistkas, too, in their  non-dominant hand, to try and write a pysanka-- joining me on this weird one-hand-behind-my-back journey. I read that and teared up. I seemed to have gotten a little bit of fellowship in my eye.

Years ago, at a BookCrossing Convention here in Charleston, a friend I only knew from the internet, who'd just flown in from London, looked around the room at all the names she knew from our online group and said, "All my imaginary friends are real!" All mine seem to be real, and those who aren't sharing books with me, seem to be cheering me on as I learn to write again. Friends do indeed take you places you never thought you'd have the courage to go, and if you're very lucky, they travel the journey with you. Thank you incredible eggers of Incredible Eggs and of Instagram.

A Cuppa Love

Back in the day, maybe fifteen years ago, my elder brother and I wandered into what was, in his view,  the height of coffee culinary cuisine. There was something about the coffee that was served there which he adored.  Javaczuk and I speculated it was because when left to his own devices, he often left the mocha pot on the stove long enough so that the house reeked of slightly burned beans, or that in Erico's mind, coffee could never be too dark or too bitter. He liked to add condensed milk to his, which counteracted both the dark and the bitter. Our thoughts were somewhat confirmed, because his favorite name for the establishment we were in was "Charbucks".

We were standing in line, when my eye was caught by some  stainless steel travel mugs. I'd been in search of a travel mug, thwarted because many used natural rubber latex in the seal, which, for me, with a severe latex allergy, would have meant that any beverage in the mug would become a true killer cup. But these mugs had silicone seals on the cap. They were colorfully painted, and curved in such a way that they felt good to hold.

Let me back up to explain that just the day before, Erico had found me in tears, self esteem completely gone. Thanks to the steroids that had actually saved my life when my respiratory function plummeted (a gift from that severe latex allergy mentioned above), I had gained a significant amount of weight. (How significant? Let's just say I stopped getting on the scale when I passed a number on the scale that is 40 pounds heavier than my current weight. And I got even heavier, until I was well enough to start exercising regularly again.) I was in tears, because in desperation, I'd pulled out my maternity clothes to find something to wear, and even those were tight on me. I felt like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, Pillsbury Doughboy, and Bibendum's sister.  I wallowed, waddled, and wept. It was as if I gave ginormous new meaning.

Let me tell you something about my brother, Erico. He was a master story-teller. He could spin a yarn like nobody's business. Paul Bunyan and Blue had nothing on him. His response to his little sister in a melt-down was not to cajole and coddle me. He told me stories. And by the time my son got back from school, my mother up from her nap, and my husband home from work, we were deep in story-land. It was a wondrous thing and I was no longer a huge ball of mess, just huge.

That day at Charbucks, Erico grabbed up one of the pink travel mugs and announced he wanted to get it for me. It reminded him of me, all pink and curvy.

I carried that mug many places. Sometimes it held a beverage I brought from home, sometimes a brew I picked up from one of the wonderful coffee places that have sprung up here in Charleston. In 2008, when my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, the pink of the mug took on new meaning. The following year, when both she and Erico were no longer with us, it became a talisman that gave me happy memories when I sipped from it.

But as with anything that gets constant use, there is wear and tear. That pink paint got chipped and scratched. By this year, it was looking a little ratty. Other mugs, sexy and sleek, beckoned, but I held on to my pal, even though it was rather tattered looking.

One day, while talking to a friend, whose art I love, a scheme was launched. He would repaint my mug for me. I told him of Erico, and of "pink and curvy" and placed the mug in his care. I knew this was right, for though I love the memories associated with the giving of the mug, I am not the person I was back then. I've shed the weight, reshaped my life, and kept the memories. I am stronger, and hopefully, a better person. It was only fitting that this talisman transition, too. 

It's still got some pink, kept the curves, the memories,  and a gotten a touch of the vibrancy of street art I love (there's some stenciling along with the spatter). With this mug travelling with me, I'm ready for new roads, new adventures. Thank you, Crosby Jack, for painting new life into a old companion. I've been blessed with wonderful brothers, lots of memories and good friends.

Remembering Ruthe 2014

Ruthe and her firstborn 1950

Remembering Ruthe 2014
1921-2008

I spent a long time looking for a yahrzeit candle to light today to honor a woman who was perhaps the greatest influence in my life. But like that woman often did, I squirreled it away somewhere so special and safe, that I can't find it. So, I improvised; Bumma would have approved, I am sure.

The other day, my grandgirl, who is with us for a bit this summer, said something that surprised me. She commented how I often am nice to complete strangers, saying things to them that just make them happy. (Undoubtedly to counter act the times I am utterly evil.) So I told her this story.

As a girl, I noted how my mother easily engaged complete strangers in conversation. She was quite inquisitive, and had the ability to chat with almost anyone. (Her eldest son also was very skilled this same way. My brother  Jim tells how he'd go into the same shop, weekly for years, and receive no special acknowledgement from the shopkeeper. Erico visited it once, and was recognized immediately ever after, on return, and Jim, the regular patron, became "Eric's brother.") 

As my mother got older, she grew even more charming, engaging, and rememberable.  Somewhere along the line, in my adulthood, I made a conscious decision to emulate the gift of making a complete stranger feel good.  I began slowly, maybe once a month saying something nice. I included it in my practice as a nurse, making sure I found something positive to say about the children I encountered. I worked with disabled children, and sometimes I was with a parent early on after their child's birth. I reminded myself that no one dreams of having a house with a white picket fence, a beautiful family, and a child with a disability, but you play the hand you're dealt, and you play it with all the skill you can. Sometimes it was easy to find that wonderful feature to focus on ("What beautiful eyes!"); sometimes it was tough. I remember one child, whose father had fled from the room unable to look as his baby -- whose mother looked at her offspring with dismay. I, too, was hardpressed, but then the baby began to cry, and I put my hand on its head, to comfort it. "Don't you have the most perfect set of lungs!" I said. "Listen to you!" The baby quieted at my touch, and I murmured, "See? You just want a little attention and loving. What a smart baby!" Mama's eyes lit up, and she took her baby in her arms for the first time. Yes, that was an odd looking child, but before my eyes, I saw love bloom.

As I grew older, I began making it a weekly, then daily event. Sometimes it is as simple as telling someone that a particular color they were wearing becomes them. Sometimes it is more. But I try to remember my pleases and thank you's. I try to complement good service. I thank police, firefighters, military folks for what they give to our community. Meter readers on the street are particularly fun to say thank you to, or to buy a cool bottle of water for on a hot Charleston day. Everyone usually shouts at them. 

One day, when I wheeling Bumma to the Hollings Cancer Center, in the last days of her life, she turned to me and commented how  I always found something good to say to someone, even if they were a bumbling idiot. My jaw must have dropped in astonishment, and if I had my wits about me, I might have said "apple, tree, not far" or "pot kettle black". She sat back in her chair and said, "I like that. Finding something to make someone else feel good. I think I'll try doing that."

Ah, Mama, if only you knew....