scenery

I wake up every morning, and I say, “Ugh.”  Sometimes it’s “Uck.”  Sometimes it’s “Fuck,” truth be told.  I don’t wake up much these days with a song in my heart, unless it’s a melody-less song with ugh and uck and fuck in it.

 

Last Monday, my dad took a fall and wound up in the cardiac care unit.  He’d had a heart attack, but it wasn’t the typical exertion-related kind, and there’s no—according to today’s heart catheter procedure—blocked anything. 

For nearly a decade, he’s had aortic stenosis.  The aortic valve becomes calcified, narrowing, and it causes a backup of blood, resulting in very low blood pressure and heart episodes like these.  Eventually, the dopamine drip will no longer work to keep his blood pressure up to 85/69.  But if he can’t get off the med, he can’t go home.

During his heart cath procedure, the doctor discovered that more of his aorta is calcified, so he’ll need a CT scan to determine whether it’s operable.  If he passes that test, he’ll need to fail the next one.  Two heart surgeons will need to agree that he’s not a candidate for open-chest surgery due to his limited lung capacity (he has COPD and asthma).  If that goes well, he could have a percutaneous valve replacement, which is a brand new (like—yesterday) treatment.  It wasn’t available before his chemo began, or it’s likely that he’d have had one of those years ago—possibly avoiding all these extra trips to the hospital to bring up his blood pressure.

That’s Dad.  Me?  Well, I am due for my six-month CT scan to see if the cancerous nodes in my stomach have grown.  If you were to look at my actual stomach, you’d think they’d grown the size of a watermelon, because it’s clear I have a giant squash growing there.  At the same time, I’m ditching my oncologist because, after making me wait an hour to see him, he spends my visits with his back to me, asking me questions, typing the answers on his laptop, and addressing the multiple laptop crashes.   Then he turns to face me, pokes my stomach and underarms, and sends me off.  I need a little more bedside manner.  A little more face time.  A little less technology.

One year ago in August, I started to get some bad leg and back pain, so I went to see my back surgeon.  He looked at my MRI and said I needed two fusions.  I fretted.  I told him I really didn’t want another back surgery, and, as I was still talking, asking him what else I could possibly do, he was getting up and walking out of the room, telling me to call him when I was ready for surgery.  So I ditched him, too.  When I told my second-opinion doctor the story, he said, “Did he really do that?” but it didn’t sound like a question.  Unfortunately, he agreed that I needed two fusions.  The issue that took me to see the back doctor in the first place—some nerve damage and leg pain—has returned with ferocity.  Back surgery looks imminent.  Hooray.

Dad and I are both feeling a little overwhelmed.  We’re a little depressed.  We cry.  We wake up and say, “Ugh.”  If will were the only thing we had, we probably wouldn’t wake up.

Sometimes the pain isn’t worth it.  Sometimes the scenery just ain’t so good when your bed is facing the hallway and not the window, and you don’t know if it’s day or night, and the beeping is incessant and not even in time with the seconds so that you can precisely count the minutes of lying there, and the only thing good you have is the pure oxygen streaming from the cannula.  But even that loses its sexiness after a few days, especially without a companion opiate.

But I’m not 75 and in the hospital.  My scenery has a gorgeous, talented daughter in it, some sweet dogs, a good husband, so many friends, a comfortable home, and a good job, where people appreciate me—and tell me so. 

I’m not ready to stop looking.  At least not until I stop writing.

social disease

On June 28, 2011, one year ago today, my dad was diagnosed with large cell B lymphoma.  It was just two weeks after I was diagnosed with small cell B lymphoma, a less aggressive form of cancer.

Unlike me, my dad needed treatment right away—tumor removal and chemotherapy.  I was instructed to "wait and worry."  And that's still what I do, one year later.

Since last fall, after Dad's third chemo treatment, he has gotten sicker and sicker.  He has had so many visits to the ER that I think he has been more in the hospital than out since Halloween. 

Now I'm not a denial kind of person.  I do things deliberately, consciously.  But with every new development of my father's myriad conditions—bleeding ulcer, sepsis, pneumonia, pseudomonas, aortic stenosis—I go to a place of obliteration, denial, debauchery.  I see in him my future, whether that's rational or not.   It's fairly easy to go to that place.  In fact, after his first serious incident, when he was barely still alive and hardly able to talk, Dad said to me, "Don't worry.  This won't happen to you."  It was probably one of his last truly lucid, unselfconscious moments. 

But Dad is a salesman.  I am used to the games he has played.  And I have learned that honesty, no matter how sincere my dad appeared, was never his actual policy.  Love was.  Hope was. 

With each of his trips to the hospital, I became more social—going to bars, concerts, clubs, friends' houses.  I upped my daily beer to two sometimes.

My dad fell on Monday night and wound up back in the hospital.  I had company Tuesday night and went out with friends last night and tonight.  One year after his diagnosis, we are now discussing how to treat the heart attack that, apparently, caused his fall.   

I suppose we all deal with these things in our own ways, and who can say one way is  proper.  Should I lie around crying?  Rest assured I do plenty of that. 

In winter of 2008, I had back surgery.  The slow recovery and medications and lack of sunlight and exercise created a suicide incubator.  The night I broke my tooth (trying to force myself to eat something) had me plotting my own death: by motorcycle exhaust in the leaky garage. 

Maybe this method of social stress release is smart.  Maybe the constant reminders of friendship and laughter and the great taste of food and ale are how I keep from getting swallowed again by the darkest thoughts I've ever had.

So—who's up for bowling?  

no balloons

My husband’s aunt is 85, and she was just diagnosed with ovarian cancer.  It’s late—the cancer, the time, the life.  But the life is precious; they are all precious. 

We visited her on a Wednesday night, just after she’d had a reaction to one of her medications.  It left her stranded beneath herself, somewhere between sleep and panic.  It was temporary.  Did she know?

I sat on the chair beside her, and she reached for me, squeezing my hand. When she fell asleep, I took my hand back, and she awoke again and held both arms out toward me.  I hugged her.  When she fell back to sleep, I got up and surveyed the room.

On the guest’s sofa, far too small for anyone to sleep (though a daughter or granddaughter slept there every night), were magazines and candy bars and assorted toiletries.  In the corner of the ceiling, seven foil balloons, adorned with cheer and imploring Margaret to GET WELL SOON, floated.

1.  Don’t buy me balloons.

I started a list that moment.  No balloons.  These are for children having their tonsils out.  Anyone who brings me a balloon while I am being treated for or recovering from whatever ails me enough that I am in a hospital will be strangulated with their cheerful pastel ribbons. Am I giving too much weight to these helium-filled mood lifters? 

2.  Tell me over and over and over again the truth about my condition.

Make sure you know I understand.  I will squeeze your hand once for yes.   

3.  Ask me lots of yes questions.

“Do you understand?”  Yes.  “Do you want a pizza?”  Yes.   “Should Chuck Prophet come sing at your bedside?”  Yes. Yes. Yes.

4.  If I am never going to get well, get me out.

Don’t let me die in a hospital.  Take me home, and get my daughter to play me out.

I need a longer list: rules about hygiene (mine and yours); lasts—last food, last beer, last song; quality of life stuff. 

Do you think about these things, too?  Does your mind go there when you are beside a loved one’s hospital bed?  Do you look at her gray skin, then at the perky balloons on the ceiling and feel a little bit of rage?

My back hurts. I feel the impending doom of a two-disc fusion.  I worry about the CT scan that checks the progression of my lymphoma.  I fear the fear.  At work, I take a pill and try to put all my black thoughts into a bubble, float that bubble up toward the ceiling. 

But the bubble hits the built-in sprinkler and pops.  Words fall out—on my head, my shoulders, my desk.  I build them into poems. And directives.

750 choice words about my feelings for the Beatles

I do not like them in a car. I do not like them in a bar. I do not like them in my yard, in a singing card, in a concert hall—or on my Facebook wall.

I do not like the Beatles.  I do not like them.

If you are alive and American or English, you probably know this band—a.k.a. The Fab Four. You may have credited them with the invention of pop music, of four-part harmony, of heavy metal, of MTV, and of, well, everything!

The Beatles are the best band ever, and here’s why: They are popular. They have sold over a billion records and have the most top albums and singles and number one hits and successful songs, and they wrote their own songs and used all kinds of crazy instruments (dude, a sitar! a mellotron!) and were on the Ed Sullivan Show. They were fucking popular, damn it!

And 42 years after they disbanded, they’re still fucking popular, damn it. From 1962 to 1970, they released about 24 albums and about 213 songs. Prolific popular motherfuckers. With all that going for them, why don’t I like them?

1. Their lyrics, for the most part, suck.

“Because the wind is high / it blows my mind” “And anytime you feel the pain, hey Jude, refrain” “She told me she worked in the morning and started to laugh” “Here comes the sun / and I say / It’s all right” “Baby, you can drive my car / yes I’m gonna be a star”

In general, I want more from my lyrics, though I don’t always need more. Bands like Led Zeppelin, who overflow in a bunch of categories, can be forgiven for things like “The Lemon Song.” Of course, there are exceptions, like "Let it Be."

2. They have no tasty guitar solos.

The only Beatles song that has one of those (and it ain’t all that) is “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” and non-Beatle Eric Clapton played it. Fans will argue that guitar solos are not what the Beatles were about. Yes. And I don’t like that about them.

3. There’s no edge, no emotional conflict, no real passion.

The Beatles are suits. They had some longish hair, and that’s swell. But they are buttoned up and sound buttoned up. Again, not what the Beatles are about—and another reason I just don’t like them—in a car, in a bar, or in my room while I groom. Of course, there are exceptions, like “I Want You/She’s So Heavy.”

4. They’re not my cup of tea.

I like coffee, not tea. And it really comes down to taste and preference. Do tea drinkers dress better, think better, love better? It’s not about better. I like George Clooney, but I don’t like Brad Pitt. I take the cake but leave the pie. I like gerber daisies but don’t care for roses. It’s really as simple as that.

I have never, ever said, “I’m in the mood to hear some Beatles right now.” I’ve never put on an album. I have, however, turned them off. Some of the best Beatles songs I’ve ever heard are covers of Beatles songs, and I still don’t like them all that much.

My husband doesn’t care for the Beatles. My best friend doesn’t care for the Beatles.

I do love your passion. It might rival my passion for a hoppy, snappy IPA. What I don’t love, though, is your righteous indignation. What’s it to you? I hold no stock in Brewer’s Art or Rogue or Flying Dog, so if you’re drinking wine instead or, worse, Coors Lite, what’s it to me? Will I look at you funny? Maybe. Will it keep me from being your friend? Nope. I’m sure we can agree on a few other things. (Everybody loves Bruce Springsteen, right? WHAT?!?!?)

If you dislike my favorite bands (Chuck Prophet, Marah, the Black Keys, the Kills, Cheap Trick, Pink Floyd) or my kind of beer (Resurrection, Dead Guy), you won’t find me posting links to them on your Facebook wall or heatedly extolling their virtues. As I like to say: more for me. I won’t have to worry about fighting you for the last concert ticket or six pack.

I hate the Beatles. I do not like them in my ears. Or even after several beers.  And my last thoughts on this matter are whispered words of wisdom: "Let it be."

the new "about me" section

I have always liked to break things and put them back together in a random, yet tasteful, order.  You can apply that to art—mosaics, poetry, music—and life.  I rearrange the physical and metaphorical furniture of my life not just whenever necessary but  whenever possible.

It’s never been more true than now.  Every inhalation I take these days is a subconscious meditation on having cancer and turning fifty, and every exhalation is a breathy profession of my goals.  They are so simplistic that they can be summed up with a trite Bob Schneider lyric from "Captain Kirk":  “I just wanna feel good / I don’t wanna hurt nobody / I just wanna get a good time / out of my life.”

To that end:

·      I am funny, and I laugh all the time—even at my own crude jokes.

·      I keep your secrets.  I used to have no secrets of my own but am now working on generating a few.  Please return the favor and keep them.

·      I indulge my addictions.  All addicts say they can live without [objects of addiction]; they simply choose not to.  That’s the addiction talking, of course.  My addiction chooses to drink a beer (sometimes two) just about every day.  Until it interferes with work or life, 6:00 is Resurrection time.

fun at our last middle school PTA meeting

·      I am honest.  I ask for what I want, and I say what I mean.  I won’t waste another minute wondering what if.  If I want to know, I ask.

·      I am a poet.  There’s a beautiful and precise way to talk about anything. 

Lest you think this post is all about me, rest assured it’s all about you.  Even if you’re not turning 50, even if you don’t have a serious illness:

·      be funny; laugh all the time

·      keep people’s secrets, and generate some of your own to entrust with others

·      indulge an addiction that does no harm

·      ask for what you want; tell people how you feel

·      find poetry everywhere—a flower, a peach, an old salmon-colored Danelectro guitar with a moldy case, pickles, your friends.

And eat a salad and get some exercise, too, damn it.

Senior Citizens Ball

“We all wanna be big stars / but we don’t know why / and we don’t know how” —Counting Crows, "Mr. Jones"

British Invasion, February 2009

Last night, I attended the Senior Citizens Ball. The place was full of rockers. It was a bittersweet celebration, because the honorees would soon be gone. This was the last seasonal performance of thirteen graduating seniors of the Baltimore School of Rock.

We joined SoR because I was working on a book proposal—something about how you can be a rockstar at any age. (Because who didn’t dream of being a star something at one time? And who doesn’t have a midlife crisis and a spare ten grand to attend a fantasy camp to address it?)

Serena was ten and learning how to play guitar, so I dragged her to the 8x10 for the SoR’s tribute to David Bowie. She was reluctant but, by the end of the night, convinced. She’d go for a season to help out her mom. 

Show Team, Jr. Hunt Cup, April 2012

Four years and nearly 20 shows later, Serena is on the School of Rock’s Show Team and is about to start her sax-ademic career at the Baltimore School for the Arts. She is a confident, well-adjusted, creative, smart, nice girl. She’s a leader and a team player. Of course, I can credit her ultra-hip, uber-great parents. I can credit her education. I can credit her community—friends, family, relationships, neighborhood. But a good chunk of it goes to the School of Rock, who influences her for upwards of ten hours a week.

Awesome Ted Merrill, Graduate

In the last four years, we’ve seen some pretty average kids come through SoR’s doors. But we have seen so many of them turn into remarkable kids with extraordinary talent. They work hard. They play harder. But you know what else? Most of them are nice. Really nice. They are kind to us. They are respectful. They are good to my daughter.

Nice doesn’t get nearly enough credit. But think about it: Are you rooting for the nasty brat to get a Grammy? Should The Voice belong to a bitch? Should the American Idol be a back stabber? We have enough of those.

My agent and a few of my friends have always been a little suspicious of this cult that is the School of Rock. How rock and roll is it, they want to know, to have your parents pay for lessons (as if there were another way to get them)? How cool is it to play a club in front of your family and friends?

Phenomenal Ian Viera, Graduate

Cooler than singing into a hairbrush. Cooler than playing air guitar in front of a mirror. Cooler than being good at Rock Band. Even cooler than teaching yourself to play electric guitar in your bedroom. 

Nothing’s perfect, but it’s hard to argue with these results. Last night, thirteen kids played 22 songs, tunes from bands as diverse as Incubus and Rhianna, My Morning Jacket and Stevie Wonder, Toto and the Black Keys. They were as good as any professional rock band you’ve ever seen. (One of the best of these kids deserves his own shoutout: Ian Viera, the only drummer graduating, played every song, and if he wasn’t perfect, only he knew.)

Brilliant Jack Averill, Graduate
Janet Decker, Mom and SoR Director 

Between songs, some of the kids spoke of their experiences at SoR. You can guess what they said: “I wouldn’t be who I am today without the School of Rock.” “Thanks to my parents for paying and for driving me to the School of Rock.” “Thanks to the School of Rock teachers for inspiring us to be our best.”

A friend asked Janet Decker, the school’s director, which kid was hers. “All of them,” she said. And she wasn’t exaggerating. They’re my kids, too. And I am proud of every single one of them.

So congratulations to my kids: Jack Averill, Lindsay Baer, Evan Cooper, Will Fedder, Jordan Lagana, Meghan Malenski, Ted Merrill, Imari Miller, Caroline Myers, Andrew Potthast, Ian Viera, Nick Vogt, and Max Yates. And while we tend toward the figurative use of this phrase, I can say it here literally: You all rock.

And thank you, not just for the entertainment but for being such good people. That puts you way ahead of the crowd.

practice

By the time I kissed someone I liked, I was good at it. Pillows, posters of Peter Frampton, record albums with David Cassidy on their covers don’t kiss back, but you can press your lips against them with force or gentleness. You can make your mouth a powerhouse. Kiss your forearm, though, and you can imagine the give of another’s lips. Practice that. Kissing feels as good as being kissed. This is both.

This week, Rob Brezsny’s spiritual advice to those born under the sign of ADD (Libra, if you didn’t know) is to embrace quality over quantity. Sometimes—with the exception of having babies and infections—quality emerges from quantity.

Practice.

Practice isn’t a devil. It’s what separates the good from the great. I don’t need to prove anything, don't write about studies and such, but if I did, I would point to a particular book about what separates world-class performers from everybody else.

To become a better musician—whether you have natural talent or not—you work at it, and that means finding the time to practice. And practicing means doing. You play. You repeat the same song over and over until your wife or daughter or mother or dog wants to strangle you with your guitar strap or whack you on the head with the microphone.

If you’re a photographer, you take more pictures. You pose your dog, your daughter. You fidget with the lighting, her hair, his one floppy ear, the backdrop. You take the same picture 47 times until it’s exactly the picture you saw before you began.

Why do doctors practice medicine? Why do lawyers practice law?

If you’re a writer like I am, you write more: a story, a letter, a poem, sentences. You edit the words. You massage them. You fuck with them until they are sore and tired and smoking beside you on the bed.

On April 1st, because it was the start of National Poetry Month, I started practicing poetry again. It’s been a long time since I’ve thought like a poet for any length of time. I write nonfiction and advertising—in both my day work and my freelance life. The first can be poetic, but it doesn’t teach economy. The second is economical, but it’s rarely poetic.

Poems are not stories with random or even planned line breaks. They aren’t born like babies (though they are sometimes emotionally painful)—all perfect, if a little wet and icky. They would need more than to be cleaned up: chiseled, sculpted, molded, rearranged, cut, dissected, tortured. Even my happiest poems need to ache a little.

For the last ten days, I’ve written about a poem a day. I share them on Facebook but not publicly, in case there’s a chance I can torture them into a publishing opportunity. But it’s not, as some have surmised, about quantity. It’s about practice and discipline and the hard work of thinking in precise, power-packed words. They’re like astronaut food. They’re like the little sponges before they take on water and become bathtub dinosaurs.

The words I use in poems need to combine to form a drug. You need to blister a little while you read it. The last line should give you some euphoria. Or some despair. I want you to wonder when the next one will arrive. No, to crave it.

We don’t need to be the best at what we do. But we should always want to be better at doing it.

I never did kiss the real Peter Frampton or the real David Cassidy. I’m still practicing, but I think I’m ready.



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("Kissback Bob" CD manipulation by Steve Parke)