One hundred of us stand or sit.
Tables with water, breezes bringing
Coolness to our sweat drained bodies.
Our attention focuses as one man’s life
captures our imagination. Memories
of kindness, cello, trees, choir, painting.
Our hearts hear the message, feel the
pull to not leave this earth without living.
Create while we birth, work, love.
Long time friends, spouse, children, family
saying goodbye to one who has left
his mark in all who stand at his earthen home.
My gaze moves to all that surrounds me,
cool, calm water, lilies, phlox
blooming in this late July heat.
Soil dried from lack of rain; flowers laced
when placed at his side; ashes leaning toward earth.
A haze of smoke from distant wildfires fills our nostrils.
We laugh, we celebrate, we feel gratitude
in our current moment of living. We ponder
death and share from this truth.
In loss we feel love. In dryness we experience moisture.
In memory we experience renewed spirit.
In death we are pulled to the living.
Over the years, I have developed a nurturing healing habit of creating, somewhere in my home, a shrine or an altar for a deceased loved one. I allow instinct, intuition, and the flow of life in that moment to guide me and the objects I choose.
The first shrine I created was in the summer of 1981. It was a spontaneous outgrowth of love for our baby Beth who died a week after her birth. It began with the yellow roses from her burial day and the little hat with a red ribbon the NICU nurses made for her. Then I added the sympathy cards, a candle, the program from her funeral, a photo of her in the arms of her dad and me. The little pink and white rubber teddy bear our Brian and Laura had chosen for her. A small yellow and white flowered blanket that held the smell of her. Pictures our children and the neighbor kids colored. All the items that reminded us of her short life and the comfort and love of family and friends. It stayed on our dining room buffet for months or a year until the day came when I realized I could remove it slowly.
In 2003, I made a small shrine for my dad. Again, a photo, a candle, the program from the funeral Mass, the eulogy I had offered, his three books written about his life including his army years and Soo Line Railroad life and work. Little mementos like a miniature Soo Line train, a cross, his childhood French Canadian prayer books, cribbage board, and a pipe and matches.
In 2006, the shrine was for my mother. The red etched glass candle holder that was in constant flame for the week of her dying, a photo of her hand cupped with my hand and my granddaughter’s hand. The CD of chants we played on loop. Her rosary, the program of her funeral, my written eulogy. The red blanket we wrapped her in after washing her body following her death, and flower petals. I can still smell her shrine as it left a lasting scent of roses within me.
Last September 2020, my shrine was for my youngest sister, Mary Beth. Living her life with Down Syndrome and then adding Alzheimer’s to the mix made for an array of objects for this 57-year-old woman. A stuffed animal, a beaded necklace, her photo with her boyfriend, the eulogy I wrote, flowers, one of her paintings, her ashes, sympathy cards, a photo of our parents, and a photo of all of us siblings. Surrounding it all in the dining room was everything she owned. All her bits of papers she folded and saved, all the jewelry that she would adorn herself with but became lost to her memory as Alzheimer’s settled in. All her stuffed animals, her guitar, paintings, clothes, and trinkets. All expressing both the simplicity of her life as well as the challenges she lived with, in her day to day.
Now in 2021, the shrine is for my mother-in-law, Winnie, my bonus mother. All the objects that have come to symbolize her life for me and her son, Leo. A pair of scissors, a purple yoyo, a bounty of flowers, a memorial candle, her Benedictine Oblate book, a photo of her, a wooden Benedictine cross, butterfly cards, bells, and butterfly towels, always butterflies. This altar started on the kitchen peninsula where we eat breakfast and it keeps growing to be the full peninsula, as we add a necklace, a pair of earrings, a butterfly pin, more cards, her favorite quilt. This one is still fresh and new and will be with us for some time. We will know the day it is right to begin the dismantle.
There have been other altars over the years, for a friend, an aunt, an uncle, and always an ongoing altar in my meditation space. Other shrines or altars might be for a beloved pet, a job loss, a physical shift with a move or in health. And there are altars for joy, new life, new relationships, all the little ones that spontaneously form from the bits we collect on a dresser top or bedside table. In many ways, in our humanness, we are natural collectors and many objects that are chosen are from nature. Each of my altars/shrines for these loved ones display the small objects of physical existance that help me ground in the reality of this particular life. They are the tactile bits of a personality, a spirit, a soul, that help me to connect for some time to the loved one’s energy, smell, and feel, anchoring me in my body and into the earth.
The secret sauce to any altar/shrine space that we create is in the intention, the choosing of the objects, and the awareness of what meaning they have within us. The symbols we imbue with the loved one’s memory help us to understand and value the life they have lived. As can be seen from these five shrines above, the items are random, some fun and frivolous with others more heart centered in faith, but they all speak of a love story that was lived out with the one who is missing from this physical world. I see myself in what I have chosen, as the items speak to our relationship and are reflections of my own inner life. They represent the story of one who has impacted my walk on this earth, be they in loving or in challenging ways, and brought meaning and enhanced the world within which I live. I stand before each altar gazing at what is displayed, feeling sadness in my loss, allowing my tears when they come forth, and trusting the inner smile that might arise at the memory. This space also offers me a place to feel my anger, resentment or any other troubling emotion that needs and asks for expression. It becomes the sacred container for all of it.
When it comes to the day when all the items are put away, there might be an inner sigh, a smile, a recognition that this life has meaning, has consequence, has touched my heart and soul in ways that are now integrated into my being. My soul is larger for the effort. My being expands in the awareness and compassion for the life lived. The relationship expands as the symbols create a narrative that is imbued with meaning.
Conversely, I might find that when I remove the shrine, I feel deep within me that there is more to come. The objects go away, or narrow down, but I still have more understanding that needs time to be realized. I draw comfort in knowing that I have a lifetime to be in relationship with the memory of the loved one and healing may come in a totally different way, on a totally different day. There is no timeline in grief only a spiral that moves and flows and allows, as I journey forth. As long as I lean into the grief as it arises, I can trust that it will work with me; it will have its way with me until that story, my story, feels complete.
“Walk slow and walk like you’ll never be back again." Loni Bergqvist, as stated by an elder on El Camino
Day 3: El Camino de Santiago
I do not personally know Loni, but I felt her fellow pilgrim spirit as she shared her story recently. She walked the Camino in 2013 and I walked in 2017. As do many, she was walking at a fast clip toward her destination, Santiago, and her feet were “rotting away, filling with blisters, cuts, and deep pain.” She sat on the side of the road and wept. Along came an elder gentleman walking with a cane. As he stopped to inquire on her state of being, he stated that he has walked the Camino 6 times. His sage advice was, “Walk slow and walk like you’ll never be back again.” She did and she healed.
This story brought forth the memory of a visitation from my dad seven days after his death on December 2, 2003 and recorded in my journal.
I am driving a car and dad is in the passenger seat. I am maneuvering through a winding, precarious maze. I look over at Dad as he looks deep into my eyes. He says gently, “You can slow down, take your time.” I smile and feel comforted. I awake and sit bolt upright. The dream was a visitation. Dad is a wisdom guide. I can go slowly. I have always felt a need to rush through my life like I am being chased. Thank you, Dad.
In these days, which have been termed a polycrisis, we are reminded to slow down, to assess where we are in our own individual life, and how we are connected to this web of all life. To gaze deep into our own eyes and say, “Walk slow and walk like you’ll never be back again.” While we are steeped deeply in a grieving world, now is precious time for all of us to assess, take advantage of this imposed slowing down on a global level, and be fully in this time, a time that may not be here in the same way again.
What do we want in our individual life of relationships, work, creativity, and our penetrating connection to the plant and animal world within which we live? Are we allowing that which is outdated within us to die off while giving ourselves space and support for opening to new ideas and new ways of being? We won’t know what the outcome will be in any of our inner or outer work and that is the treasure, allowing growth from these seeds we plant today as we attend, bring attention to, and create conscious intention in the process.
Follow the arrows of the heart; they know the way.
“One has to be in the same place every day, watch the dawn from the same house, hear the same birds awake each morning, to realize how inexhaustibly rich and different is sameness.” Taoist Philosopher Chuang TZU
A sage reminder and words of hope in the midst of a global pandemic. As I contemplate these verses, I reflect on my morning routine of waking and climbing the ladder to our cupola for a few yoga stretches, journal writing and meditation. The ladder is called a monk’s ladder as it is created in the style of each step, left and right, being at a different level. The cupola sits at the top of our geodesic dome home and in this way, I am sitting on the roof of our house in an enclosed space with windows in all directions. This daily journey to the top brings me comfort in its sameness and grounds me in this new day.
Through this circle of windows, I look east across the ravine out our front door to the rising sun. I look south to the stately elder birch tree and to the road winding out to eventually meet Hwy 65. I look west to the last remaining oak tree clumps holding a squirrel nest, then let my gaze move beyond our neighbors’ home and back yard to the bank of trees on the other side of the Rum River and to where the setting sun will appear later in the day. Finally, I move to the north with a meandering look following the banks of the river while watching for the eagles who like to fly down to our house and either circle our home or continue on down the river.
The windows, the sunrise, the sunset, and the river are present every day when I arrive with each day totally new in its sameness; the sunrise and then sunset show themselves in their daily dependability but different in their reds, yellows, oranges and maybe a hint of lavender or a simple greyness; the air is moving or calm or whipping and whistling; the earth is green or brown or white with snow or covered in deer tracks or filled with dandelions, lilacs, and hydrangeas; the river is full and flowing fast or shallow and slow with the contours shifting just a bit with the level of the water. My pen moves on paper and new words arise each day with varying emotions, thoughts, reflections and gratitude’s. In meditation the breath I rely on might feel slow or rapid as I settle in and my thoughts might act like monkeys flying from limb to limb or resting like a floating lily pad.
I look out of the same window and can tell the time of year by the slant of the sun and how it reflects on the trees beyond the river. I can see how the wind will alter this day and what it might do to the temperature. I can see what damage the deer have wreaked in the garden and reflect on the changes this brings to all the work we have put forth. I observe the cardinal pairs with ever surprising awe as they show in their jaunty coats, striking against the new snow on the hardy spruce.
We did not realize a year ago that sameness is what that year and this new year would bring to us, day after day, and that this experience of sameness could bring us such riches. The day to day ordinary is not always what we want to live in as some days bring forth so much struggle within us to stay grounded and aware that we would rather be able to jump in the car and make a run for it. It is a comfort to know that this experience of my world is available to me if I make myself available to it. If I pause and look. If I breathe and open my eyes.
Challenging doesn’t come close to describing the pain of these times for so many in our communities and in our world, testing us to the depths of our resilience. I and many have the luxury of staying home and waiting in place but that has its own struggles as well as it challenges our emotions, our psychological reserves, our social needs. Rather than being bored by the smallness of our lives while sheltering in our homes far longer than ever imagined, we can begin to explore our environment like reading a favorite book for the second or third time, different with each reading, finding something I had not understood or felt in the same way, allowing it to surprise me, challenge me, and open me to what I need to see or to learn. We might then, within our own story, find a new way of seeing something as if for the first time. A new perception, awareness, or insight into this one life I am living. This is my life. It looks different and it feels different and it has taken quiet and slow living to see it, but I am alive and breathing and filled with the richness of this moment. All so familiar, abundant and alive.
This week we are up on the North Shore of Lake Superior. The previous week we were in Upper Michigan sleeping along the shore of Les Cheneaux (the channel Islands) in Lake Huron and drove by and played in Lake Michigan. It feels both a privilege to be in the presence of such bodies of water and humbling at the enormity and power of each while we experience them with their own unique vegetation, shoreline, and personality.
Between these lake visits, I attended a funeral for Walt, a man who had been both a client of mine and a hospice patient. A large gentle man, bound to his wheel chair and oxygen, who deeply grieved the loss of his wife the year before. It took almost a year for Walt to go out to his workshop alone as he was always with Sharon even while he was out tinkering and inventing. He is now resting in peace next to his beloved and the thought of him brings a smile as he touched the hearts of our whole team who grieve his passing. As I write this, I pause as it is challenging to paint a portrait of this man not knowing the day to day life he lived previously. I can only say it was his gentle tears, his inability to put his feelings into words, it was his smile, his loss of his beloved lab, Mitzi, along the way, his passion for good toffee, his decision to bring the outdoor cat in the house after Mitzi died and the cat’s partner died and admitting he didn’t really like this cat but felt sad for the cat’s loneliness in its loss, his deep appreciation for all the attention he received in his illness and loneliness, and in the end maybe it was the peace we all felt when leaving his presence that brings such life to his memory.
I purchased two books this week that are entertaining me between bike rides, hikes, fishing, and exploring along Highway 61. The books are by Kathy Rice, owner of the now closed Pie Place Cafe in Grand Marais, MN. Delightful cookbooks with many of their famous and favorite recipes of salads, sandwiches, soups, fish, and of course pie! I loved that she wrote that she did what she had a passion for, which was make pie. We share that passion. I could have a bumper sticker that reads, I brake for pie. Each recipe begins with a portrait and a story of an individual who entered Kathy’s cafe. Some were local and some from other locales but each captured her imagination in some way with story, art, personality, and life history. Many became life long friends.
In the end, we become a smattering of who, what, when, how many kids, where did I work, who is left behind and on and on in a dry list offered as some form of identity in the newspaper or funeral program. Reading Kathy’s portraits of individuals she has met, I realize each portrait of a life she offered us could be the obituary for that life lived. Kathy captures, as best she is able, the soul of the individual through her words. It puts me in mind of Heather Lende (heatherlende.com) who was introduced to me by my sister, Di, and who is, among other talents, an obituary writer for a local newspaper in Haines, Alaska. Heather’s obituaries paint a portrait as do Kathy’s words. I would say each has a passion for people and take the time to open their hearts and minds to that one before them or the one who is being grieved for by a loved one.
Kathy states “the soups flavor will vary according to what you choose, but that is part of the fun.” Thoughts: What am I choosing this day, this month, this year, this life, that flavors my life? My grandson loves making soup and throws in many questionable items without a recipe. Most often it works, sometimes not. It takes courage to choose but if we do not choose others choose for us. To paint a portrait that captures the essence of the person we have to have the courage to see and portray what the individual might perceive as a flaw. Maybe that is what creates the wholeness of a life. Maybe it is merely that particular “spice” that adds the flavor to a life well lived.
The pavement rose bushes are in full bloom and the waft of rose scent in the air feels like an intake of blessing on each breath. I missed the peonies as rain hit hard on their opening. The lilies are in bloom with splashes of color everywhere.
The last couple of weeks have simply been hard labor with scooping a few ton of rock into our landscaping around the back of the house. What seemed insurmountable in the beginning is now two thirds complete, one shovel of rock at a time. My body still holds a few aches from the job but also pride in accomplishment while realizing the enjoyment of sweaty dirty focused labor. The job was made fun with two grandkids to help us, keeping us focused and laughing in the midst of it all.
During the week, I called Margie, a newly bereaved late 70’s woman whose husband died a month ago and has been told she needs to vacate her rental as fast as possible as it is being sold. Distress, tears, disbelief, stuff to be sold or given away, no time to grieve, panic, all this I heard as I visualized Margie trying to move a ton of rock with very little support. I remember those first weeks of deep grief and the fog we move through as we try to find our bearings with a brain not functioning well as we forget things, have a hard time focusing, and find ourselves melting in tears at the small reminders of our loss. We can feel buried under an insurmountable weight.
For many of us it is the people surrounding us who help us with each shovel load, helping to ease the burden, keeping us focused, and we are grateful. At other times we find ourselves alone in our grief, sadness, and confusion. Whether we are alone or surrounded by loved ones, we ultimately find we must look within to our own resources, that which guides us daily. Finding in our own stillness the quiet moment releasing the waft of roses arising from our own heart, that which is connected to all life and loving and living and that which draws us forward to live and grow into the only thing to which we can become, ourselves in full bloom. Our own wholeness of being.
I am finished with the drawing class and grateful; grateful for the learning and grateful to have some space in my life. Learning was often a struggle as when it is possible to see where one wants to go but not sure how to get there. I did learn and am both proud of and surprised at what I accomplished. Finally, it all came together.
I lost a rhythm to my life when the class started and have not painted in months, have not been writing, and have not picked up the pencils again. Life is full of distractions and usually those distractions involve people I love and care about or work that needs to be done both paid and in the home.
Today is a day to begin again and find the courage to write and push that muscle to contract and expand as the thoughts rise to the surface and bring focus to the inner realm. The class taught me to see. There will be days when I will be blind to what is before me but the work in this class taught me that looking and then looking again is a good exercise in allowing the brain to make the connection with the perceived object. When drawing from a photo of the north shore, what I thought were some complicated branches in the lower right hand corner and had decided to ignore were on second and third look, a week or two later, large boulders with veins and rust. All being important features to the whole that I merely cast aside as being “too hard” and dismissed as not important. When I realized they were boulders, I could not fathom how they could be seen as anything else as they were so clear. When opening my eyes with an open mind, I felt excited by how interesting these features were and they turned out to be fun to draw.
This habit follows us and happens many times in life. We see or hear based on what we believe not by what we truly see or hear. In the moment of looking, when not fully present, we add judgment to the act of looking. We define and categorize what we believe we perceive. We add another layer to the moment of experience. It is like looking at a rainy day and deciding we do not like this day for the rain. When we open our hearts to the day, we see the way the world becomes more green with the watering; we delight in the puddles; we explore the play of hiding under an umbrella; and, we connect as one with the experience of life.
We sit at the dining room table eating our breakfast on a Sunday morning. The geese are flying in, following the river from the north to our house then they turn and head back up the river. Is it spring or is it not? That is the burning question these days. The goldfinches are in their full yellow splendor. The eagle makes a swoop down the river to our house and then she also heads back to the small island and to her nest. The deer across the river are more visible as they dine on the promise of new grasses with hopes for a heartier fresher meal.
We believe it is fully spring despite the heavy layer of snow. Each day we can do more outside, today leaving the storm door open to take full advantage of the warming slant of the sun into the doorway.
Those who are grieving are telling me they are needing a break from the long winter, wanting to move their grief into the soil of the garden, planting something that offers color and promise of harvest, digging with their own hands, heart, and soul. This last storm left Dan with a stroke of which he is making some recovery with a long journey ahead. This last storm also dropped a barn roof on a barn of 100 milk cows. A devastating loss for a farmer. Dan is working hard to regain use of his body. The farmer is assessing his loss and with help restoring his barn and herd. This is our human resilience, our movement toward light, health, spring. Restorative spring.
Could we be like the geese and simply move toward the rays of spring light and warmth, simply because? Or the warbler who makes her nest ready for her new young, as it is time to do so? Could we merely stand in gratitude for this new day of snow, sun, puddles, and returning geese because it is a new day of life?
In the words of poet Mary Oliver, let us..
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
As we allow the day to enter us fully we feel the day in every cell of our being. How can we not sing it out, draw it out, share the joy of the story of our life even if it is in the quiet of our own heart. Even if it is the warbler who alone understands our song.
This morning’s waking gift was the pink horizon anticipation of the sun along with the crescent moon with a reflection on mother Superior. It reminded me of St. Francis prayer, Canticle of the Sun.
….Praised be You God for all Your creatures,
especially Brother Sun,
Who is the day through whom You give us light.
And he is beautiful and radiant with great splendour,
Of You Most High, he bears the likeness.
Praised be You, my God, through Sister Moon and the stars,
In the heavens you have made them bright, precious and fair….
This appeared as my morning reflection (by Jon Kabat-Zinn):
The rehabilitation of the body, in the sense of fully inhabiting it and cultivating intimacy with it is, however it is, is a universal attribute of mindfulness practice… Since it is of limited value to speak of the body as separate from the mind, or of mind separated from body, we are inevitably talking about the rehabilitation of our whole being, and the realization of our wholeness moment by moment, step by step, and breath by breath, starting as always, with where we are now.
This spoke to me this morning as three events of the week came together in this quote. I enjoyed a spirited discussion yesterday with friends over lunch about the body/mind relationship as it relates to our compassion and caring as individuals and the gun violence which we live within our culture. I watched the 2010 movie “Temple Grandin” this week and I have been learning about contour drawing and how to fully enter that experience.
In my early years, as for many of us, we received distorted information and education about the body from our churches and therefore handed down through parents and educators. The body being an “occassion for sin”, “the body is the devil’s playground.” Women in particular learned that they are the temptress, the vehicle for men to lose control of their reason. We learned of saints, who we were told to emulate, who used self flagellation to punish their bodies in an attempt to keep themselves in control. We were taught fear and left in ignorance about our bodies and believed that it is best to be disconnected from this physical home, ignore this body, and be more holy for the leaving of it behind.
This belief system belies our own experience when we are more fully present with ourselves with awareness of our physical selves. There was a time when I was experiencing anxiety attacks. The release of the anxiety came when I could learn to trust and breathe into my body and be present with each breath, bringing mind and body together and sitting in that awareness. Temple Grandin was born with autism in a time when this condition was greatly misunderstood. As she observed her world, she found peace, comfort and an ability to navigate this world as she learned how to be more fully present in her body thereby increasing her ability to understand compassion, caring, and kindness. Compassion is the ability to feel another’s pain and bear that pain with them. Temple learned this through her witness of the pain of animals and bringing that to a level of understanding through her own body. Rather than further disconnecting from her body, she went more fully into her body and revolutionized animal husbandry and opened a door into greater understanding of autism for future generations. Her work in the world was through her body/mind connection, the wholeness of her being. As is ours.
In my art class, one of the first things we were taught was contour drawing. Drawing slowly, with each breath, as if you are touching the edge of the object which you are observing. This has been a challenge for me as I have a quick, sharp mind and I do things quickly and efficiently. I tend to see things whole first and am quick to get to completion. I have had to greatly, consciously, slow down. It is painfully slow and yet there comes the moment when I am with the breath and the sense of time and space change and dissolve in the now.
It seems the conflict lies in our identification with our body, mind, emotions, and thoughts. We are not any of these. We live in a day to day sense of false identity; I am fat, I love this, I hate that, I am sad, I am happy, I am bad, I am good. We hold the body, emotions, and thoughts as who we are rather than a vehicle that requires good care, maintenance, and respect. Within that awareness we can let go of identifying with what we think, feel, and look like as these are merely energies of mind and emotions passing through. We are spirit born into this body, this mind, these emotions, moving through life seeking our true selves. A grieving individual will ask me, how can I grieve and be done with these feelings? There is no circumventing our grief or our lives. We can only go through, honestly feeling what we are feeling, not believing every thought that goes through our head, not identifying ourselves with every emotion that runs through us, not holding firm to what we perceive as absolute truth.
It is by fully being in our being that we then transcend into a more full sense of self as Self, a spark of God, Atman, Nirvana, however we name that which is wholeness. When we are fully aware of ourselves in our experience, a door opens to a more expansive understanding, realization, freedom. We live the compassion we seek. We breathe in the love that is boundless.
Love yourself. Then forget it. Then, love the world. Mary Oliver
