light dawns briefly

a return to the present and my mom. it has been difficult the past few weeks to talk with her.....she's failing so quickly. frighteningly quickly.

the beginning of the month saw gerry and me discussing the next step for mom. seeing her extremely negative reaction to a move to assisted living. she threatened all manner of bad behavior, insisting there was nothing wrong with her.

this also spawned the ultimately hurtful exchange of emails between hannah and me. that relationship seems close to irreparable. i hope that one day she will be able to accept my attempts to mend the tears in our relationship.

last week, gerry called me. he found the perfect solution for mom (pending oakwood village's acceptance of mom into their program). oakwood would provide more help to mom.....for a fee, of course. they would dispense her meds, thus removing her temptation of digging out extra pills, she would get breakfast and lunch as well as the dinner she already received (meaning she would not have to cook), help her with her back exercises, make sure she showered twice a week......basically she would be getting almost the same services as assisted living without having to move out of her little apartment.

it sounded perfect. the only hitch was that mom had to pass their requirements. they had a list of things she needed to know......like what to do in an emergency, such as a fire. that one just about kept her out of the program. she wasn't quite sure what to do......

luckily, gerry has an uncanny ability to persuade people to his point of view. he astonishes me constantly with this little gift of his. i am often in awe. he tells me i need not be.....we seem to share the gift. i think he's better at it. (although when i worked with juvenile delinquents that particular skill came in very handy).

i called mom tonight.

she sounded terribly sad.

mom, what's wrong?

nothing rose. i'm fine.

you sound sad. why is that?

well, there were nurses here today. i have to go see some doctors.

what's going on?

wait rose, let me get my list.

upon her return to me, with the list, mom tries to explain the changes taking place. the people coming in to help, monitoring her personal hygiene, dispensing her pills......in her eyes, still stealing her independence.

it's my memory, rose. i'm just not smart any more.

mom, this has nothing to do with your intelligence.

i know....and i have no control over what's happening to me.

there it was: her admission. she was finally acknowledging her disease, the devastation it brings.

this has been the most difficult time in the progress of her alzheimer's. watching her decline and slowly, seriously admit what is happening to her. she feels so helpless and frustrated. her forgetfulness is so all encompassing that she can no longer joke about it.

the sadness in her voice, the tears i hear breaks my heart. and tears fall from my eyes at my own helplessness. there is nothing i can do for her, no pills to get her, no doctors to consult.

all we can do is watch her fade away, support her in any way we can and love her. it just doesn't seem enough.

and the pain of watching her finally acknowledge her disease and what it is taking from her is most painful. thing is, i'm not sure who it's more painful for......us or mom.

she talked to me tonight about how lucky she's been.

i've had a good life, rose. i raised 3 great kids......well at least two of you......she laughs. she also doesn't understand hannah's actions in life.

i agree with her....she's been a survivor on many fronts in her life. it has not been an easy one, in many ways.

even when your father left, things turned out well for me. i can't complain. there are a lot of folks who are worse off than me.

that's one lesson i will always remember from mom........i come from a line of survivors and fighters. she has always bounced back from the adversity that confronted her in life.

she can't bounce back from this, but she can leave with dignity......and as the light dawns briefly for her, helping her acknowledge the truth of her disease, she finds a way to see the positive. to strive to keep her independence for as long as she can.

i admire her for her strength and thank her for passing some of that on to me............

the beginning

chuck and i first met during our freshman year. he was dating a friend of mine. i didn't give him much of a look......i was dating someone else. however, due to some mutual friends, we often ended up at the same parties and talked some.

in fact, he came to our "hotel" party. my friends and i rented a room at a hotel in fargo and organized a nice little party. liquor, two beds, 6 couples. some sex, mostly heavy making out. chuck seemed a little uncomfortable in the surroundings. although to give him an out.....he was surrounded with theatre, art and music majors (not exactly his cup of tea).

we didn't see each other much our sophomore year. we were on the outer periphery of each other's lives. he was pre-med, i was psychology and organizational communications. i was involved in theatre, the campus radio station, chairing the homecoming show......he was involved in science stuff. not disciplnes that overlapped much.

our junior year, i was living in an off-campus apartment with 3 friends. that fall there was the proverbial campus rapist. seemed to happen every fall. i was leaving campus late one evening, wondering about the safety of walking several blocks alone. i bumped into chuck leaving the library. he offered to walk me home.

so, we walked and talked about the previous summer, the beginning of our junior year, the mundane of life....oh, and the ever present fall campus rapist.

it was almost midnight when we arrived at my apartment (the finished basement of a single mom making up some cash flow with her extra rooms). we stood in the back yard, watching the aurora borealis sparkle in the night sky (one of my favorite parts of going to college in northwestern minnesota).

i stood on the stoop as we talked and looked at the night sky, chuck's arm all of a sudden around my waist. then pulling me toward him and kissing me. such a romantic first kiss......midnight, watching the aurora borealis, after being escorted home by a tall, handsome man.....who was my protector that evening.

he left a note and a rose in my campus mailbox the next day, asking me out. a total sucker for and believer in romance in those days, how could i resist that? well, i couldn't. we made a date for the weekend......a movie i believe. and of course the walk home.

we seemed to run into each other a great deal that week on campus. we even managed to lunch together a couple days.

three weeks into our dating, his roommate was leaving town (chuck also lived off campus). we decided to spend the weekend together at his place. now, i was still a virgin at this point in my life (thanks to my mom and the fear of god she managed to instill in me).

the weekend came, and i arrived with a small bag of clothes (which i didn't use). we left to pick up some groceries, wine and other needs before snuggling in for the next 2 days.

i lost my virginity to chuck that weekend. okay, not a really big surprise.

i remember the evening so clearly. we made some dinner......that i don't remember. i did dishes and then we curled up on the couch with wine to watch a movie. we never saw much of the movie.......we ended up on the floor, making out like kids.........his shirt came off, my sweater came off. we spent time getting to know each other's upper bodies.

we took a break for the news and nightline......the iranian hostage crisis was in full swing at that time. as nightline wound down, we found each other's mouths again. the kisses led to more exploration and soon my jeans were off and his hands were exploring the wetness of my pussy as i gasped with pleasure.

before i got to taking off his jeans and exploring his hard cock with my hands and mouth, chuck suggested we head to the bed. naked, i got up to go wash my face and brush my teeth as chuck locked up for the evening. he followed me into the bathroom where he went through his own bedtime preparations.

he took my hand and led me to the bedroom. folding down the bedcovers, he gently lifted me up and laid me down on the bed, lowering himself on top of me. i remember his kisses......the tickling and roughness from his beard, our searching tongues, my nervousness. i also remember my pussy being so wet and aching....our hips were pressing hard against each other.

i raised my legs up to his waist, crossing my ankles behind his back as his cock seemed to just slip right into my pussy. i gasped, he moaned, and in typical 20 year old fashion.....he came quickly. and i'm thinking......okay, that felt pretty good, but is that all there is? he fell asleep......i masturbated and fell asleep.

we woke up fairly early, falling into kisses and more exploration. this time, chuck actually wandered south, tasting my tits, and ending up with his tongue on my clit. he stayed there for a bit, but before i came, he stopped, moved back up and fucked me again. he was blissed and i was frustrated.

we spent the weekend naked in the apartment, getting up from bed to eat, do a little homework (and chuck had to watch some of the 3 stooges. what is it with men and larry, moe and curly?). but, we spent most of the time in bed.

during the making of dinner saturday evening, chuck came up behind me as i stirred something on the stove. his hard cock pressed into my ass, his hands on my breasts, lips on my neck.....we ended up on the floor of the kitchen, fucking like there was no tomorrow. and finally.......finally, chuck got me to cum.......with his fingers as he kissed me. that did it for me. i'd cum before with boyfriends in high school.....mostly from fingers slipped beneath jeans and panties (with one, naked in bed, hoping his parents wouldn't come home too early).

but cumming like that, then having him fuck me again......i was finally blissed and in a thick sex haze. the rest of saturday and part of sunday, we played, we explored and learned each other's bodies pretty well.

that was the beginning of our four years together (two of them married). as we left his apartment sunday night, i commented to chuck, laughing, that since he'd taken my virginity, we had to get married.

sometimes, when i look back on those days, and all the things that transpired during our four years together, i wonder........did he marry me partially out of some strange obligation?

during our divorce, he did own up to marrying me because he figured my parents had enough money to help put him through med school. alas, my parents' divorce fucked up that little idea of his.

i wonder if we ever loved each other really........

family lore

mom and her sisters seem to have a special talent for telling family lore, some truth, some myth. we've found, as a family, to "trust but verify" as mr. reagan put it, before taking their stories as gospel.

my uncle, gerry was in wwII. he spent his tour on iwo jima. he was proud of his service. my father was a bit envious. he spent the war stateside, stationed at west point (that's how he met my mom.....but that's another story). needless to say, dad didn't see any action. he'd wanted to be a fighter pilot.....bad eyes kept him from his wish.

when gerry died, mom and i went down for the funeral as did her sisters and last remaining brother. the funeral is another story in itself. my aunts and uncles can be a handful and loud! but, i digress.

as we sat around the kitchen table at the neighbor's house we'd inhabited for the days surrounding the funeral, my aunts told many stories about their beloved brother. the one that stood out for me was about his time on iwo jima.

you all know that famous picture of the soldiers raising the flag on the island at the end of the war? well, the sisters had somehow gotten hold of the "fact" that gerry was at that flag raising. not only was he there, but he was part of the picture. (which by the way, i learned from jefferson was a posed photo. the photographer missed the first flag raising, so they restaged it to capture it for posterity). they were so proud of their little brother being such a big part of history. hell, i was pretty impressed myself. i had an uncle who was part of history in a big way......every body knew that photo.

when gerry's daughter, tori came up to stay with me during surgery, she brought all her family tree research along with her. she figured she'd share it with me in my more coherent moments. she's done an amazing amount of research about our family and it's beginnings outside of naples, italy. our grandparents were immigrants to this country coming through ellis island, in it's heyday.

i was blown away by all the material she'd collected. as we sat, the third day after my surgery, going through birth, death and wedding certificates, naturalization papers for grandma, i decided to ask tori about the iwo jima story.

tori, have you ever heard the aunts talk about your dad on iwo jima?

no, why?

well, story has it that gerry was at the flag raising....you know, the famous one in the picture.

she laughed so hard, she had to catch her breath before looking, wide-eyed at me:

you've got to be kidding? they've been telling that tale?

god yes.....it's been circulating in the family for years. i heard it at your dad's funeral.

well honey, he was on iwo jima. but he wasn't in that photo!

we had a good laugh over the aunts and their rewrite of history (seems a family trait with some).

a year after my surgery, tori sent me a package.

i sat on my bed, opening it......wondering what she could be sending me.

laying on top of all those polystyrene peanuts was a note:

dearest rose,

i'd meant this to be a get well present for you. it was my intent to send it right after your surgery. it's been sitting in my kitchen for a year.

however, in the year it's been sitting here, i found the perfect thing to put in it. i thought you might like an updated picture of dad.

love,
tori

ps: feel free to change the photo.

well, i knew it was a frame. and i was happy she'd sent me a picture of my uncle. he always made me laugh.

i dumped the peanuts on my bed to get to the frame. she'd put it in the box upside down. as i turned it over, all i could do was laugh!

in the frame was a copy of the black and white photo of the soldiers raising the flag at iwo jima. i've never changed the photo. it sits facing my bed and is one of the first things i see in the morning. it makes me laugh...........

four aunts, an uncle, mom and......

my mom is one of 10 children, born to italian immigrants. she grew up in newark, during the depression. once she married my father and moved to the midwest, she didn't often make it back east to see her family.

one fall about 15 years ago, mom and her sisters arranged a trip to go visit my uncle gerry down in mobile, alabama. i decided to go along. due to distance and other factors, i didn't know my mom's family well and they could be riotous fun. we planned four fun-filled days in mobile.

gerry was the favorite sibling. he had a great sense of humor, cooked better than his sisters (he owned a restaurant in mobile) and could keep the sisters from arguing too much (an amazing feat for one man).

mom and i were the first to arrive and gerry picked us up at the airport. the others arrived a few hours later. gerry made another trip to the airport while mom and i spent time with sylvia (gerry's wife).

dinner that night was my uncle's chicken cacciatore, family stories and wine. i sat back and listened to the family lore......my grandmother's legendary temper, only to be outdown by my grandfather's.

the one story that stands out from that evening was grandpa getting so angry during dinner. now, imagine 12 people sitting at a long dining table, eating spaghetti with red sauce, steak, wine....grandpa gets angry and upends the table, sending children flying back from the table and food flying. seems this was a semi-regular occurance. they must have gone through a great many dishes. however, the tale as told by the aunts was pure hilarity.

after a long time at the dinner table, wine flowing, espresso with anisette finished, every one was pretty much ready for bed. it had been a long day.

the next morning started a 4 day tradition: the sisters arguing over how exactly to make the best pot of coffee. i clearly remember walking out of the bedroom to my aunts marie, kitty, lee, anne and my mom surrounding the coffee maker:

no, no......you need to use cold water.

that's too much coffee for the amount of water!

no it isn't! you want coffee or dark water?

that's not the right coffee filter!

well, it's the only coffee filter they have!

it took them an hour to make the coffee. five adult women who have been taking care of their own families and making coffee for years. they couldn't agree on exactly how to make a lousy pot of coffee. gerry sat and laughed as i begged him to just take over.

geez jerry, it's the only way we're ever going to get a cup of coffee.

ah rose, this is vaudville at it's best. relax and enjoy the show.

he was right....but i wanted my damn cup of coffee. the funny thing was, they went through this every bloody morning! they all seemed to think they knew best. an obvious family trait (inherited by my brother and me).

the other thing my mom's family had a penchant for (besides food, wine and talking) was playing poker. it was a nightly occurance during our visit.

before i continue the poker story, there are two things you must know. my mom didn't smoke....well, unless she had too much to drink and others were smoking, and she can't hold her liquor well. we always tease her........one sniff of the cork and she's already tipsy.

on friday evening, after a dinner of spaghetti with marinara sauce and shrimp, we sat down to play penny ante poker. there was plenty of wine (actually uncle gerry and i had to make a wine run, also picking up cigarettes for my aunt marie and me).

my aunts were sharks at the poker table, as was my uncle. mom and i were the odd men out. neither of us played poker well. my aunts made regular visits to atlantic city, getting in plenty of practice. marie and kitty always did the best....they each had a stash of money from their trips down to a.c. surprisingly, they often left a.c. with more cash then they went with. good poker faces, both of them. another surprise for such an emotive family.

so, we're playing poker, drinking wine, marie and i smoking. as the wine flows, the talk gets louder. i never figured out exactly how my aunts and uncle managed to play cards and speak. none of them can talk without using their hands (another inherited trait....i express myself much better with my hands).

all of a sudden mom turns to me:

rose, let me have a cigarette.

what?

you heard me.....light me a cigarette.

um, okay.

i light a cigarette and pass it to my mom, staring in disbelief. i have a great pic of my mother, cigarette in one hand, glass of wine in the other, smiling at the camera. of course, after that she took a drag and turned a lovely shade of green.....coughing like mad. we teased, so she made herself smoke the whole darn thing. i refused to give her any more that night. needless to say, mom was the loser that night.....i actually did pretty well, finishing with more money than i started, but that evening's real shark was kitty. i think she left the table with 20 bucks. pretty good for a couple hours of penny ante poker.

saturday was "family" day. gerry's daughters were all coming for dinner, bringing their respective families. there would be 17 of us for dinner. i hadn't seen gerry's girls for about 10 years. i couldn't wait to see them again. we were a great deal alike and had many things in common.

the menu: homemade manicotta, stuffed pork roast, fried zucchini, fresh green salad and for dessert, a homemade cheesecake. now, the cheesecake recipe was courtesy of marie. back in the 40's, she'd made a trip into new york city. she stopped in a jewish deli to grab some lunch and ordered a piece of cheesecake. as she tells it, that piece of cheesecake was the best darn cheesecake she'd ever eaten.

my aunt marie was a beautiful woman and a bit of a flirt. she managed to cajole the recipe out of the deli owner. it's been passed along in our family since then. and i'll tell you....it is the best darn cheesecake i've ever had.

in preparation for saturday's meal, friday afternoon was grocery shopping day. gerry took his sisters and me shopping for the needed ingredients. i went along purely for the entertainment value. mom and her sisters did not disappoint. actually it was gerry that added the amusement.

as we went through the store, mom and her sisters each had their own opinions about what ingredients, brands were best. there was a friendly argument in almost every aisle.

we need to use contadina!

no, heinz!

parmesean cheese with the riccota!

no, romano.

and on it went..........as we walked through the store, watching the sisiters argue, gerry would (with a smile on his face, laughing and speaking in his southern over jersey accent) apologize for the "girls".

sorry for the noise. i have no idea who these women are. just picked them up along the way to the store.

and one of the girls would turn and correct the story.

what a site that must have been. 5 women arguing over everything that went into the shopping cart, being trailed by gerry and me, laughing at the spectacle.

dinner preparations started that afternoon. they were making the manicotta shells from scratch. that went off without a hitch. it was the next day the friendly arguments started again.

first it was how to flavor the ricotta cheese mixture that would fill the manicotta shells. then it was the cheesecake recipe. the atmosphere was almost carnivale like as the sisters argued, cooked and tasted the fruits of their labors.

dinner was a success though. there was more food then i think i've ever seen in one place. my family doesn't know the meaning of cooking small........the stories flowed as the food disappeared along with the wine. jerry kept us in stitches with stories about his restaurant and teasing us all. we also watched some college football that day......bama playing ole miss. oh the loudness while we all rooted for bama.

that was the last time all the sisters and jerry were together. marie died a couple years later of lung cancer and jerry a couple years after that from prostate cancer.

today, mom and kitty are the only two left out of that family of 10 kids. and mom's facing the darkness of alzheimer's.

i love thinking about that trip. the memories make me laugh, and be very grateful for the time we all had together.

desertion

i was seven years old. we'd been living in the minneapolis area for three years and my father had started a new congregation for the church.

in outward appearances, my father was a great pastor. charismatic, good public speaking skills, could give a fine "hell fire and brimstone" sermon one sunday and the next cover you with grace.
his secret was that he was self-destructive. and his acts of self-destruction was to have affairs with the women in his congregation. often times, women that he had been "counseling". (i think that's one of the reasons i was never a bill clinton fan. he reminded me of my dad).

my mom did a relatively good job of shielding us from dad's indiscretions....well, me at least. my brother discovered his secret during this little story. hannah chose to deny my father's indescretions.

i remember being awakened late one night by an argument in our living room. i could hear my parents yelling at each other.....but there were other voices i didn't recognize. i got up and teary-eyed, walked into the living room to see what all the ruckus was about.

my brother caught me, picked me up and returned to my room with me. drying my tears, trying to soothe my soul, he sat with me until i fell asleep.

the next day, my parents took me to a friend of my mom's. mom wanted me to meet them. they had a daughter just a year older than me. i was game.....new friends were fun!

mary and i played as the adults talked. we left after a couple hours.

a week later, my parents sat me down for a serious talk. things had happened and they had to move to illinois. they couldn't take me with them. they were setting up legal guardianship with this couple and leaving me in minneapolis. then they packed my things and piled me into the car.

being seven, i didn't really understand all this. what i did understand was that my parents drove me to the home of relative strangers, unpacked my things, kissed me goodbye and drove off.........

i remember standing on the slate steps of the house, where i would spend the next year plus, watching my parents drive away, wailing.......refusing to go into the house. my parents were deserting me......and leaving me with total strangers.

ruth had to drag me into the house, crying and screaming......wondering why my parents didn't want me anymore.

to complicate matters, ruth's daughter mary had been adopted. mary knew that. but as i moved in and needed some extra attention, mary got jealous. we had terrible fights sometimes. she was afraid i would take her place. i was afraid nobody would ever love me again. after all, my parents just dropped me off and left. if they didn't love me, who would?

i remember one morning as ruth was changing the sheets on my bed (i'd started to wet the bed....something i'd never done in my young life), mary came in crying about something. and she yelled at me for taking up too much of her mom's attention.

ruth, patient ruth, sat us both in her lap. she carefully explained to mary that nobody could ever take her place in ruth's heart. mary was lucky.....they'd picked her from many little babies to be theirs. but, ruth explained, rose is feeling very abandoned right now. we have to help her understand that she is loved and that her parents still love her even though they are far away.

that particular memory is so very clear in my head.....i can see the three of us as plainly as if this all happened yesterday.

while adjusting to my parents' desertion, i also had to get used to a new home, rules, school, find new friends, new piano teacher. but the other thing i noticed was that in this house, nobody yelled, slammed doors, walked out, left me cowering under the dining room table.

my grades in school initially dropped, then went back up as i adjusted to my new life. i remember life becoming almost carefree. they had this big backyard that abutted the apple orchard of the neighbor's house. he let us pick apples if we asked.

mary and i became friends. i finally had a "sibling" my own age. it was fun. life was all of a sudden not such a frightening prospect. except when my parents called. those calls always snapped me back to the reality of my parents deserting me. i was hurt and it showed in our phone conversations. mom would talk to me about being a good girl for ruth and her husband merrill, i would cry and dad would get angry that i cried.

the only time my parents came for a visit was at christmas. again, a strong memory for me.

i can see the church, plain as day.....the glass windows that surrounded the sanctuary, the chairs instead of pews.....and that night, snow was falling outside. i can hear my mom singing "silent night". all i could do was cry. (up until last year, every candlelight service when "silent night" came up, i cried. i don't anymore).

i don't remember how long my parents stayed. i remember them leaving and going through the same horrible scene.....me crying as they left me again. wondering why they didn't love me enough to take me along. what had i done that was so awful?

yet, ruth, merrill and mary seemed to care. it was too much for a seven year old brain to wrap itself around. after adjusting to my parents' leaving again, life returned to some semblance of normal.

at least i had become accustomed to living with the tommerasans. they watched out for me, cared for me, seemingly loved me, even. they became my family. hannah was still in the twin cities and never visited (maybe that was the beginning of the end of our relationship). gerry visited occasionally. he was in college and working his way through. he came when he had the time.

but the tommerasans became my family. i understood their rules, i felt loved, i had a "sister". i became pretty comfortable there. my fantasy became that they were my real family. i cut my own out of my mind. they didn't exist.

yet, they did. and when my parents came to take me home with them, to illinois, it was as traumatic for me as their leaving me the year before. i was being uprooted again, by two people i no longer trusted. forced to leave a family that had loved me and made me feel safe.

my sister hannah chose to move to illinois with us. i don't know why.

so, there we were.....a "family" again. but not really. i remember hearing my parents argue through the paper thin walls in the duplex we were living in. i'd cry and cry, afraid they would desert me again. hannah would tease me......

if you keep crying, they will leave you.

that certainly helped bolster my confidence. it took me a couple years to finally trust that my parents weren't going to take off again. but, as a family, we never discussed this time in our lives. it was years before i knew why they needed to leave me. sadly, it didn't come from them. i had to hear it from my brother and his wife.......a month before my wedding.

here's what precipitated the desertion:

my father'd been caught having an affair with a woman in the congregation. her husband showed up at the church president's house with a rifle, threatening to kill my father if the church neglected to deal with this. (nobody can ever say life was dull at our house).

the church's solution: my parents had to enter into therapy. not just any therapy. but intense therapy at lutheran general hospital in park ridge, illinois. they would be required to live in subsidized housing, work factory jobs and attend several different types of therapy: group, individual, couple.......

my mom decided it wouldn't be a good place to have her "baby". it seemed to make more sense to her to leave me with strangers. when i finally confronted her about the whole issue, mom denied it ever happened. to this day, i don't know why she refused to discuss it......guilt i guess.

the sad thing is that my father refused to complete the counseling. he was banned from the church (well that segment of the church). he went back to being an electrical engineer. that is, for two years, until the other faction of the lutheran church came to him and offered him a church. and the pattern continued.

i look back on that time in my life and can't help but wonder what life would have been like if things had been done differently. then i remind myself that wondering about the "what if's" won't ever change what happened. our family broke then......badly and because of the silence, the denial by my parents, things were never really put back together.

we limped along as the pastor's family......seemingly happy and healthy to outside observers. the secrets, fear, mistrust and anger......well, they came out over and over in different areas.

as an adult, when my insecurities surface, it's this time in my life that i think about. the feelings of being unlovable by my own parents.....and for a brief moment i feel like that seven year old again, standing on those slate steps, watching my parents drive away.

training "annie oakley"

as i mentioned in my previous post, my in laws lived in the middle of oglala sioux reservation territory. when the indians received their government checks they often headed to town to drink and party.

on a fairly regular basis, a car full would stop at the farm looking for many things......most often gas. but this was a farm. the only gas pump on the property held diesel fuel for the farm equipment.

chuckles related a story to me, early in our dating, about the time a car full of indians stopped to try and get some gas. they threatened the old man who owned the farm and cornered him in his barn. chuckles was, thankfully there, and with a few well aimed blows of his fists and then picking up a tire iron, he scared the indians off the property. (chuckles was a big guy....6'4", about 195 lbs).

chuckles and i were visiting his parents during a med. school break (chuckles was in med school). every one was going into town but me. i was cooking my family sauce for dinner....it was an all day...more or less....project.

prior to everyone leaving, it was decided that i needed to learn to shoot a gun.

del: chuck, she has to know how to protect herself in case the indians come by.

chuck: yeah, you're probably right. you bring your gun?

now, del was chuckles half brother and a cop in a nearby nebraska town. you'll love this.....their uniforms were: blue jeans, a work shirt, stetson, cowboy boots, along with the usual police stuff in their holsters, with the exception that they all carried .357 magnums as their official side arms. oh, and their squad cars? old yellow taxis painted blue and white. i kid you not. i laughed so hard when i saw those. and my in laws couldn't figure out what was so funny.

and honestly, being in that particular nebraska town was like walking back into the old west in some ways. i half expected to see james arness (ya know...."gunsmoke") walk out of the police station.

but i digress......if any of you have ever shot a gun you know there's a bit of a kick to most. but a .357 magnum, well......that'll land you on your ass if you aren't prepared.

i'd never held a gun in my hand.

chuckles: rose, come here.

me: what honey?

chuckles: del and i want to teach you to shoot. you should be able to protect yourself when you're alone on the farm.

me: you're kidding, right? i've never held a gun, and you want me to be "dirty harry" with that .357 magnum?

del: you'll be fine. come on. we'll go out across from the barn.

so there we stand; del, chuckles and me. del takes the .357, shows it to me, explains how to sight an object, and shoots off a couple rounds.

he hands me the gun as i beg him not to make me learn. the gun scared me. actually, it was more the thought of actually having to use it that scared me. they were both very insistent.

gun in right hand, left hand gripping my right fist to keep it steady, feet apart shoulder width and i look down the sight. the first round i fire off lands me on my ass, the kick was so powerful. oh, and the bullet just missed the cat.

chuckles and del are laughing as i get up and wipe off my ass.

me: ya know, you really shouldn't laugh at a woman holding a gun.......

chuckles: oh yeah, after watching your first shot, i'm really worried!

okay, back in my shooting stance. this time expecting the kick, i fire off my second shot. it hit the front tire of our car......i was aiming for the barn just beyond the car. hey, but i stayed on my feet this time!

del and chuckles exchange glances.

del: okay rose, try a couple more shots. focus on the sight. steady your shooting hand with your left. you can do this.

back to my shooting stance. i'm still aiming at the barn.....the big flipping side of a barn....red. not easy to miss, right?

i shoot and the bullet hits the ground right in front of the poor dog. scared him to death. and i'm on my ass again.

del: guess we don't leave her alone or with a gun.

chuck: yeah, i'll stay home with her......

and they both got a good laugh at my expense. sheesh, i really did feel like i was living in the old west sometimes out there........

i didn't pick up another gun until about 5 years later, when a boyfriend tried to teach me to shoot his gun. i didn't fair much better. guess i'm not cut out for the use of firearms.

wedding carnivale

22 years old, two weeks after college graduation. chuckles and i are getting married. forgive the "chuckles", i just can't call him anything else anymore. it fits him so very well......

we'll save the colorful background on chuckles for another time. suffice it to say he grew up a poor kid, his folks farm hands, living in the only white community in this particular area of south dakota. they lived smack dab in the middle of oglala sioux reservation territory. eight miles from wounded knee.

whoever tells you that that battle of wounded knee is over....well, they are plain mistaken. but i digress.

we met in college and dated for two years, living together our senior year and married right after that.

the wedding planning was done over the course of my senior year, by phone and as many visits back to illinois that i could muster. hannah made my dress, which i designed. being a music major at one point in my college career, i picked wonderful music. very non traditional by "normal" weddig standards.

as the year progressed, a rather large white elephant landed in the midst of my planning. my parents separated. actually, dad walked out.

hmmmmmm, not happy news. amidst trying to understand why the split after 37 years together, i also thought about how i should change my wedding plans. my father was to officiate. that would certainly upset my mom.

as the months sped by, mom assured me it was not an issue. dad could officiate. however, when i learned that he was leaving my mom for his most recent affair, i balked. how could i let this man officiate? he'd been living a lie most of his adult life. not the best man to start us on our path of marital bliss (is there such a thing?).

the family discussion ensued......how to save face and make sure rose is comfortable with the wedding? you see, mom didn't want anyone knowing that my parents were divorcing at my wedding. she didn't want that kind of cloud hanging over the festivities. well, that was clearly a mistake, but we'll get to that.

the family solution.....my wedding ceremony was now a 3 ring circus.......my father would offer the homily, my brother would do the vows and the church's pastor would do scripture readings, etc. with 3 pastors officiating, you'd think the marriage would have stuck, huh?

fast forward to early may, after graduation when chuckles and i arrive at my mom's to finish the details and prepare for our wedding. welcome to the carnivale!

my father informs me that sandra (his wife to be) was coming to the wedding.

dad, if she sets foot in the church on my wedding day, i swear i'll call the cops and have her bodily removed. she is not welcome. do you understand?

rose, that's not fair.

no, dad. your request isn't fair.....to mom, to me, to any of us.

sandra had the nerve to call to ask that i change my mind. needless to say, she got an earful from me about the audacity of her request. i also returned her wedding gift. what a bitch!

chuckles.....poor guy is just standing, mouth agape, taking the drama in. probably wondering what kind of nutcase family he's gotten himself mixed up with. to give the guy some credit, he did soothe the tears that fell regularly through the mess that was our wedding preperation,

hannah calls a week before the wedding:

rose, i fired greg (my soloist).

you did what?!?!?!

well, he dumped me. i don't want him at your wedding.

god damn it, hannah! that's not your call. it's my wedding for chrissake. not yours.

but, in deference to my sister's feelings i called friends of mine. they were a great trio and knew my music. tragedy averted.

the week before my wedding, berdina arrived. she was an old friend of my mom's from dad's first parish in page, nd. she was the acting grandmother as all my grandparents were gone.

one day i was doing lunch dishes. chuckles was running some errands with my brother. i looked at mom with tears in my eyes.

can i ask you a question, mom.

sure honey. what's the matter?

well.....haltingly i ask the question that has haunted me for years.......dad said that when i was born you didn't want me. is that true?

mom dialed the phone to yell at dad. berdina hauled me to the couch, sat me down and proceeded to tell me how much effort it took my mother to get pregnant with me. she recounted how happy both my parents were when i was born. how scared they were when i got a staph infection and almost died.

dad, in typical fashion, denied he ever said that to me. i got on the extension:

how the hell could you lie about this now?

i don't know what you're talking about rose?

fuck you dad!

i was beginning to rethink the whole wedding.....but gifts were there, our bridal party was arriving, the in-laws were there. i think i spent most of the week prior to my wedding in tears.

three days before the wedding, chuckles and i are walking into the house with his parents. i don't remember where we'd been. as we approach the house, gerry comes storming out. the anger evident.

he gets into his car and literally squeals out of the drivway. i swear he hit 50 before the end of the block.

mom, what's wrong with gerry?

nothing. dont' worry about it.

what's wrong?!?

your dad's threatening to bring sandra again. he's just gone to head that off.

i was beginning to think we should sell tickets to our little wedding. it would certainly provide entertainment to outsiders. the drama was almost funny if you looked at it from the outside. inside....not so amusing.

my maid of honor showed up sick....she had mono. great! my sister fit her dress, so mom suggested that hannah be my maid of honor. oh yeah, she was my first choice! i acquiesed to mom's wishes.

our wedding rehearsal and groom's dinner.......my parents are giving me away together. dad in his robes. well, there's some honesty for you. chuckles and i spend most of our time with our bridal party....all college friends. that helped relieve the family drama tension.

rehearsal done....without any major issues (amazingly enough), we set out to the restaurant for the rehearsal dinner.

my soon to be sister in law: damn del (chuckles' brother), there's so much goddamn silverware here, i don't know what to use. (said loud enough i think the whole restaurant heard).

my father in law chewed tobacco through dinner. as he did through the entire wedding. he swallows....how gross is that?

the groomsmen got drunk......my father called his girlfriend and was caught by my brother.

who you playing kissy face with, dad. it certainly can't be your accountant. i don't think he works this late.

dad was pissed as hell at being caught. i didn't need to know, but......why keep that little tidbit from the bride the night before her wedding?

my wedding day itself was lovely, weather wise. that was about it.

the groomsmen and my husband to be were hung over. the husband of one of my bridesmaids took them out for a little bachelor party. they all got pretty wasted and the wedding was at 11 am.

besides the fact that all the men looked green the wedding went off pretty much without a hitch. well, it was hot that day.....i almost fainted in the middle of the ceremony. thank god gerry had smelling salts nearby.

oh, there was one little thing......my mother in law:

what the hell kinda music they singing up there? can't understand a word. (it was the ava maria in italian....guess that little prayer went unheard as well).

well, that and my father in law chewing his tobacco and swallowing. sitting there, in his suit from the '40's with a bolo tie. sweet.

we had a small reception at the church than a catered party at mom's. the reception was fine. well except for chuckles changing from his tux shoes to his cowboy boots with the tux (with tails). a great look for those of you planning a wedding.........

the party at moms: we sat to open gifts (chuckles had now added his cowboy hat to the tux and boots). that finished, we started mingling, talking to all our guests.

next thing i know, i can't find my new husband. an old boyfriend who was a dear friend had come to the wedding and i wanted them to meet. we wandered outside. ah, there's my charming husband....changed into jeans and a t-shirt, playing basketball down the street with his groomsmen.

i grabbed a beer, lit a cigarette (my parents had never seen me smoke), sat on our car and talked to eric (the old boyfriend) as the ball game went on.

should that have been a sign to me to run.....fast?

i went to retrieve chuckles as our guests were starting to disperse. we needed to say good bye and pack some last minute stuff for the honeymoon.

as we enter the house, we run into my dad. he has picked this time to move the remainder of his clothes out of the house. my new in laws, my new husband, our friends, old family friends are all there. and he has to move now.

i burst into tears and shut myself in the bathroom. chuckles and gerry get me to open the door. dad passes at that precise moment....

what's wrong, honey?

gerry looks at him in disbelief:

are you kidding? do you even realize what you're doing to her and her day?

well, i needed these things. here's a couple hundred bucks for your honeymoon. i hope you have a good time.

and dad departs as i sob. chuckles pockets the money, and gerry goes after dad.

so, that was the day. my wedding carnivale. one for the books. i look back, shake my head and think.....no wonder the marriage didn't survive. look what we had to start with......although, when i think about it, i must admit to laughing. it was such a bizarre couple weeks. and so surreal................

the current drama

if you've read my other blog, a life restarted, you've read the occasional post about my mom, her alzheimer's disease and it's rapid progress the last few months.

gerry is the steadfast caretaker of our mom as she falls into her abyss of darkness. i do what i can from a distance: calling regularly, visiting when i am able, supporting gerry and helping him with the tough decisions.

with mom's quickening descent, gerry and i have been discussing the inevitable move to assisted living. he asked that i email hannah about mom's "progress", along with requesting that she try and help a bit with mom. after all, she's only a hour away.

my email detailed mom's decline: forgotten showers, forgotten toothbrushing, trying to curl wet hair.....and the list went on.

...it would be nice while gerry and hope are on vacation that you could go up and check on mom a couple times in those two weeks. she shouldn't be without visits or being checked on for that long and i can't leave my job for 2 weeks at this point. besides, you are an hour away and haven't seen much of her......

her response was vitriolic, along with a little history rewrite. nothing uncommon for hannah when she's faced with the truth. however, i was seething when i read her response. she takes no responsibility for anything. one of my little pet peeves.....

.....i'm busy with work and am starting school again. i can try to call her and maybe get up to see her. it's expensive and my finances are limited.......

she lives a bloody hour away from mom. it's gas money! okay, so gas isn't exactly cheap these days, but it's her mom for god's sake!

....besides, i was the one to drive and see dad at least weekly when he was sick and dying. nobody bothered to come to see him.......

that was it for me. we'd all seen dad regularly while he suffered through his emphysema. it was an awful, slow and painful death to watch. thankfully, dad did have a wife to take care of him. he could still think, remember, read.....i learned a great deal about strength, dignity, forgiveness and love during those two years. all hannah seemed to be able to see was that she spent so much time and energy driving to be at his side.

hannah has always seen life from one perspective: how events will effect her. such a self-involved way to view the world. even as her daughter is looking at possible deployment to the middle east, germany or korea, her lament is:

....what am i going to do without marie? who will i talk to?

and i'm thinking......honey, your daughter's getting deployed. shouldn't you be thinking about her?

what's most upsetting in this little family drama to me is hannah's short-sighted view of things. our mother is slowly leaving us. her worry is whether there will be money left for us to inherit, what she gets from the "estate"........

i have trouble understanding that. as i watch my mom lose what makes her my mom....memories, knowledge, beliefs, i am saddened, often to tears. my thoughts are not on what i may or may not get out of my mom's death. i don't care. i don't want to look into mom's blank, unknowing eyes. yet, that day is coming.

i'm angry with hannah for her cold, seemingly unfeeling reaction to mom's decline. i know that's not typical. she could have rivaled the paid italian mourners of old with her tears and wailing at dad's funeral. i don't understand her cold response to mom.

and, as we face the loss of our last parent, it also saddens me to think that i will lose my sister. our relationship has almost always been difficult, yet we managed to stay friends and speak regularly.....mostly about the mundane. now, we can't even seem to share that. and i'm at a loss as to how to repair things..........there is so much anger, hurt feelings and judgment between us, i'm not sure how to get around it. or if we even can......................

meet the family

welcome to my rabbit hole. sometimes that's how i feel about my family......that it's been a long trip down the rabbit hole, wondering when the strangeness will stop. yet, it goes on.

so, without further ado, please meet my lovely family......both living and dead (as the story just isn't complete without dad):

speaking of dad, let's start with him. he's the spectre that continues to haunt the family. in ways both good and bad. but he's our dad, for better or worse. he's been gone for 9 years now. however, his legacy continues to play an important role. dad was a lutheran pastor for all of my life (prior to that an electrical engineer), who couldn't seem to keep his pants zipped. now, i realize that extramarital affairs are not uncommon. however, one should not screw the women in one's own congregations. tends to bite one in the ass......over and over again. he divorced mom after 37 years of marriage. he lends a great deal of levity to the family story.

mom.....wow, she was a tough lady. her italian temper was legendary as was her constant judgment of all of us. sundays, the standing joke was that mom served up "roast preacher" for dinner. her way of showing love was to pick and judge until we would change. you can imagine the effect that truly had on all of us. however, if you weren't a family member, you'd best be prepared to suffer her anger if you said a bad word about any of us. now, suffering from alzheimer's and heading into the late stages, those hurtful tendencies are gone. in their place is a loving, caring child. it's sad that she had to suffer from such a disease to learn to enjoy life and her family without judgment. that was the one silver lining in the early stages of the disease.

gerry.......the first born, and still feeling the weight of that responsibility. we are 13 years apart. i didn't know him well growing up. he thought me a spoiled child until i turned 30. now, we share a bond, actually forged when i was a very small child, before the craziness tore the family apart for a time. he's the one who's living the "normal" life. 2 kids (grown boys) , a wife of 36 years, a dog, the house in suburbia.......he's also a pastor (but keeps his pants zipped). we make each other laugh and are able to honestly communicate (until recently a rare thing in our family for anyone).

hannah.......we've decided that she's the one the milkman actually delivered. maybe it's the typical middle child syndrome. personally, i just think it's her decision not to face life in any realistic manner. we are 10 years apart and have always had a difficult relationship. presently, she's slowly cutting herself off from the rest of us. she is divorced with one very bratty 21 year old daughter. can you tell we get along really well?

and then there's me, your guide on this journey.....rose: the youngest......in some ways an only child. i pretty much raised myelf from about 10 years old, on. mom was too busy worrying about dad. dad was too busy screwing other women and trying to keep congregations afloat while keeping his secret. the family consensus is that i'm the "black sheep"......leaving the midwest, moving to new york, chasing my dream (acting) which has since changed, breaking with the family expectations. the family rebel....yup, that's me.

oh, i suppose i should introduce you to gerry's wife, hope. i should actually call her hopeless. she can be the most pessimistic person i know. oddly enough, more judgmental than my mom ever thought of being. she's a nurse. the daughter of mennonite missionaries who lived in africa the first 8 years of her life. due to hostilities in papau new guinea, her parents sent her stateside and she grew up with an aunt and uncle. more "holier than thou" than anyone i know (well, with the exception of her father). she can be a challenge.

of course, there are other characters you'll meet along the way. my nephews and niece, friends, the occasional aunts and uncles, the ex-husband.

the stories won't come in chronological order.......but hopefully the rollercoaster ride down the rabbit hole will amuse, bemuse, provoke thought and maybe insight........

welcome to my rabbit hole.......