Tag Archives: battle

Your friend for life, Bill

Bill Busing was a well respected man in Oak Ridge, TN. Heck, anywhere he went he was thought highly of because of his chemistry knowledge, his humanitarian efforts, and his advocacy for people with mental health issues. He was a positive ask-anyone-about-him type of fellow. Because of this, I don’t want to tell you about that. I’d like to tell you about my friendship with him.

Each Sunday at ORUUC (Oak Ridge Unitarian Universalist Church), I would seek out and find those that needed hugs. It was my thing. Some people, like my dad, for instance, bring candy to church for the wee ones. I brought hugs in abundance. I hugged the old, the young, the feeble, the in-betweens, but I always sought out Bill. Not because I preferred him above others, but because he was born decades but days from my birthday. I felt a special bond with him that I can’t really explain.

When he didn’t show up for church, I’d miss him something awful. When he gave me his phone number so I wouldn’t worry about him, I felt like I’d been given the golden ticket. It wasn’t long before we decided to go for coffee. He seemed both pleased and genuinely surprised to discover that I really did seek his company.

We arranged and met at Starbucks on the Oak Ridge Turnpike. I got there first and I scored the corner seats with a table in between them. When he arrived he insisted on paying because he bought special fund raising cards from the church and he wanted to make sure they got used. I thought that very philanthropic, he thought it very practical.

Coffee in hand, we sat down in the corner and chatted for nearly two hours. We covered topics such as family, life events, careers (mine far shorter and less stellar than his), marriage and faith. He was not one for easy laughter, even with me. But when he did, it was rich and full-bodied and worth the effort to coax it from him. He was quite serious but not really; more like a human paradox (like we all are).

After that initial meeting, we met frequently at different venues around town. Sometimes we’d go to Panera Bread where he’d bring his close friend Cherie with him. It was always a delight to see the two of them interact because she was far more vibrant than he, but he seemed to find her antics amusing. Our conversations never stayed on one topic for very long. We’d cover a gamut of issues from politics to religion. He never shied away from anything. He was a brave conversationalist in that aspect.

Once, after I’d moved away, I had returned for a visit. After I walked him to his car, I hugged him extra tight, his hunched shoulders seemed to melt as he held me warmly.

“Bill, I’m so glad I got a chance to see you again. I want to make you a promise.”

“Oh, you don’t have to promise me anything. It’s okay.” He rebuffed me gently.

“No, really. I want to promise you that as long as I’m able, I’ll write to you every time I get a letter. I won’t forget you.” I said with earnest and sincerity.

“Oh, I thought you were getting serious on me.” He chuckled. “Then I will promise you the same thing. As long as I’m able, I will write you letters.”

From that day on, a card would arrive about once a week, most commonly bi-weekly. I replied as soon as I got one as did he. His favorite way to write letters was on the inside of various greeting cards. He talked about his daughter, Lesley, and his growing concern for her but also his joy that he could have dinner with her during the week. He told me about his adventures with Miss Cherie and the people he helped along the way.

During a particularly rough patch of grief, I wrote to Bill and lamented my despair. “I’m lost. I just feel like giving up some days. I miss my people. I miss my tribe. I miss my home.” Those aren’t the exact words, but they are close. His reply was gentle.

“Knowing grief is just a part of life. It comes and it goes. There is only one way to deal with it, just keep living. Being sad all the time isn’t going to make it better. You have to live. You have a new place to be with your husband and family. Don’t give up when there is life to live.” (again paraphrased).

At that time, I remember just crying harder because he, and people like him, are the very reason I was grieving in the first place. I held on to that March letter, in essence breaking my promise, pondering the words he’d written. By early April I’d decided he was right and I was not going to give up easily. I wrote him a letter telling him as much. I wrote the letter up and sent it out on Monday the 11th of April. He got the letter on the 12th. He passed on the 14th. No letter returned.

As I sit here on the first of January 2017, I think about how many times I’ve cried about giving up in this past year as I’ve battled a scary bout of depression. Even with people I love cheering me on, how he signed his letters is one of the key elements that keep me going. He really did teach me something better than chemistry.

Your friend for life, Bill.

 

The White Way

Lemon sour with bitter bite

Promises we’re safe tonight

Underestimated loss

Overlooking violent cost

All stop signs exploded

Brother’s blood denoted

Sister’s cries devoted

Patient’s quickly bloated

The poor brown villified

The rich white justified

Lady Justice turns blind eye

Media oversimplifies

that lemon sour with vomit bite

will keep their promises tonight.

If I die before I wake

I woke up covered in sweat with the blade of a knife I didn’t own mere inches from the face of my sleeping husband. I’d just stabbed a brown and tan hairless creature, that was trying to eat my arm, with a vicious punch. A child of about two clung to my chest as I adjusted enough to skillfully (Where did I get that skill from?) hide the blade again. I was panting with exertion, as the large brown eyes of the little child (Why do I have a child?) stared back at me with complete trust. I sat up in my bed. The child touched my cheek with a tiny fist and slid from the waking world back into the mist.

My muscles twitched from unusual exertion. My legs, gimp foot, and arms felt like I’d been running for my life. I searched my naked body for the blade I’d held in my hands, I pushed and pulled blankets searching for something that wasn’t there. I looked at the clock on my husband’s bedside stand. In accusing red glare, 4:47, alarm still set, gentle snore and roll over from my husband.

I settled my breathing as my mind tried to sort through what had awakened my physical being. My little dog snuggled closer to my left hip. My cat paraded with pride up my body to curl at my right shoulder. But I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I was in the middle of a war I knew nothing about in the waking life.

The night before this happened, in the sleeping world there were three men, one a sheriff who had given me false hope that he would rescue me, chasing me through swamps. I’d hidden low tide in a bunker. There were so many dead bodies in this bunker. Across the rising water against the opposite wall was a girl who was long dead but her blonde curls, like mine, were still mostly in tact. She wore a pretty dress like an Easter one I used to get. It was blue and had a white lace “bib” on it. She was wearing Mary Jane shoes with most of the patent leather shine gone.

If I’d been wearing shoes, they would have found me, but I drowned in the water. I was mercifully gone before they discovered my body. I woke up vomiting swamp water, barely making it to the toilet before it launched.

Why am I suddenly entrenched in a battle? What mysteries are laying behind my dreams? I need to figure out a way to keep control of the violence before it wanders into this world.

Fighting

ONE, TWO punch

ONE, TWO punch!

I’m being hoodwinked

I’m being mislead from

my firm belief that EVERYthing

matters

It is irrelevant how tattered

my vision becomes or my

failing belief that *I*

can make a difference

that *I* matter

I pick up the tape

and wrap my hands individually

like Halloween candy

Protecting them from

broken fingers

fumbling grasps

Reinforcing my purpose

as if it matters

to ANYone else but me.

I wrap my hands in justice

eliminating foes

with ONE-TWO punches

Powerful with animosity

Strong with furious passion

of faith and

conviction

Does it matter?

Damn right it matters.

It ALL matters

It matters when my eyes

open in the morning

with deep breathing snoring

lovers wrapped up warm

against my ample body

It DOES matter when

I grab my fists from the floor

where I carelessly threw them

after another violent day

of fighting

for what matters.

It doesn’t phase me

to hear the onslaught

of rage streaming

silently from his lips

second thing in the morning.

It doesn’t occur to me

to let him remain split

into shards of himself

It doesn’t push me

But it pulls me

yanks me

spanks me

drags me

slams me

punches me

infects me

bashes me

beats me

thrashes me

It pummels my beliefs,

stomps and screams

tantrums LOUDLY

FURIOUSLY

But I take it because

it matters. It all

matters

I tape up my hands individually

like pocket tissues

cd’s

candy promises

of sweet

sweet

returns

My taped hands protect

them from

broken fingers

fumbling grasps

reinforcing my purpose

with paladin-like

integrity

honesty

all in perpetuity

all into discarded

thoughts of coffee ground fantasies.

It’s all good.

It’s all real.

It all matters.

*I* matter. THIS matters.

October, 2011: The Spider Dance

Every night for the past two weeks we’ve had a large garden spider build its web on our porch post. I’m not a particular fan of spiders, but this one was large enough to witness many events of its life. I watched as it caught bugs in its record album web. It pulled huge holes in its hard work to wrap up its latest victim.  If I blew on the web, it would raise up its front legs with the second set waving violently to protect its domain. I sort of “adopted” this spider because it carried on despite my fascination with it.

 Last night, however, there was an epic battle in the circle of life that I was fortunate enough to witness.

The web was built in the spiraling pattern with my “pet” sitting square in the middle. He had already enjoyed a tasty snack on a couple of larger bugs that landed and promptly became trapped. For most of the evening a smaller wolf spider kept trying to get up into the center only to be chased off by the larger garden spider that called my porch home.

The pushing of boundaries didn’t seem to be working for the wolf spider all that well. Whenever it would get close, the garden spider would drop down, hiss (if that’s what that noise was) and the smaller spider would back off by turning and spinning away smoothly on it’s own addition to the web. This repeated for a few hours. Test, guard, retreat, try again.

I wasn’t feeling well so I went out on the porch to sit in the noisy night. I noticed that the little wolf spider was still trying to take over the larger spider’s domain. This time, the tactic had changed. Instead of the wolf spider attempting to move in from the bottom of the web, it had climbed up the post and was trying a horizontal instead of vertical approach. Cautiously, the wolf spider crept farther and farther towards the center where the garden spider sat, seemingly unawares of the invasion.

The wolf spider rushed towards the center, but the garden spider, realizing his peril, pushed back the onslaught with wildly waving forefeet. The wolf spider turned and ran, but not to the edge of the web as he had been doing. He only retreated a few inches before turning to once again attack. As the wolf spider moved forward, the garden spider refused to retreat. He pushed forward and again drove the attack back.

When the two spiders did get close enough, the waving of the front four legs from both of them was truly amazing. I’d never seen spiders fight before, so I was quite fascinated. Waving madly, they both held their part of the web with violent tenacity. Neither one would allow any give. If the garden spider moved forward, the wolf spider’s legs would seemingly get stuck in the web. If the wolf spider moved forward, the garden spider raised up to its full height and punched viciously.

“Oh my God!” ripped from my lips when the wolf spider, without warning, leaped forward and had the garden spider wrapped tightly within its deadly embrace. It appeared to be stinging the garden spider with its rear end. The front legs of the garden spider were waving madly and not finding any purchase as it hung from a strand of its own web. The wolf spider relentlessly gripped the garden spider’s hind quarters. A shiny jelly-like substance oozed down the garden spider’s belly. The once frantic legs twitched slightly as the wolf spider ate. A few more twitches and my “pet” spider became the hunted and killed.

UPDATED THE NEXT DAY: Spider okay, turns out they were just mating rather violently. I feel dirty.