I love the passing of time

And like it was just yesterday. We’re all meeting for a memorial service at the accident site this evening.

Obituary

On the door, at the foot of the stairs, going up to Allison’s room, is a sign that says ‘Allison’s Room’. It’s written on plain white printer paper, with a few different colors of marker making a kind of rainbow effect for the letters. In the lower right-hand corner, in smaller letters, it says ‘Amanda Elkins’.

Sometime in the first summer when Jim & I married, back when Amanda used to come stay with Allison, while I was at work & Jim was napping. It probably took Amanda about 5 minutes to make it. I imagine that, when Amanda made it for her, Allison thought it was really cool. It’s been hanging up there ever since.

It’s been there through Allison’s first years getting used to it all. It’s been there through Brandy sharing the room and then leaving. It’s been there through Shelby & Annie’s births. And, it’s still there now.

It’s not much. I’m sure she didn’t even think about it much after she made it. And, most of the time, I don’t even notice it. Sometimes, I can’t even see it for months at a time, if there is something hanging on the hook above it.

And, it’s not that we’re leaving it there as a memorial to Amanda. It’s just there, a little piece of Amanda that’s become part of our daily lives. It’s part of the canvas that makes up our memories and the memories that will come in the future.

And, to me, it’s symbolic of everything that she did through her life. Every way she touched us. Every word she said that will come up, from time to time, as a memory to make us laugh or cry. She is a part of who we are, now.

It’s a reminder that she was here. And, it’s a concrete object that reminds me that she is still here. Her physical presence is gone. But, everything she ever did is still here. Nothing can take that away from us. Ever.

Even if we take that room sign down, the memories of it’s being there can never be erased.

It’s care-bear-a-riffic!

We had a RAD kid living with us for a while. Jim & I were talking about her the other night. Remembering how she would go blank when we’d be working with her on her homework & when she had to do word problems. She knew *how* to do all of the different math functions. She knew how to add, subtract, multiply & divide (for the most part), but she had no idea how to decide which one to use in which situation. We would read through the word problem & then ask her what she thought she should do. She would randomly choose numbers from the problem and math functions & put them together for her answer: I should times the people and the time, right? I should add the cows to the bottles?, etc.

And, I got to thinking, it was the same for her with social behaviors, too. She *knew* how to be polite, how to be assertive, how to be independent, how to behave, how to be responsible, how to have fun… She just had no clue *when* to be each of these things. She was just randomly choosing behaviors, or, choosing the ones that might have worked before, or that were fun. But, seldom did she seem to be choosing a behavior because it was the appropriate behavior for the situation. She could get the easy ones (pious in church, for example), because of sheer repetition over the course of her life. But, when faced with something where she hadn’t made repetitive successful choices, she was lost.

I wonder if they are related somehow

Last night I dreamed that someone (allison, annie, me?) accidentally clicked on ‘buy it now’ to buy a horse listed on E-bay. The horse cost $4900!

I decided that we really couldn’t afford it & that it was too far to go pick it up, anyway, even if we were going to go ahead & buy it. It was in Iowa or Ohio, I think.

I retracted the bid. And, decided that, instead of emailing an apology, this deserved an apology in person. So, Annie & I drove there & apologized to the woman (at that point, I told her that Annie was the one who clicked on ‘buy it now’, but in the dream I felt like I was lying, then). She was like, “Well, you’re here, now, anyway - do you want to buy it?”. I said that I couldn’t because I didn’t have a horse trailer.

I’m thinking that I actually made the purchase, but then regretted it thinking about the pickup and about where we would stable it & how we would feed it.

me: I really want to sew when I get home - i figured out the hat pattern (i think)
me: and, annie wants that sleeping bag
jim: yeah, she asked me when you were going to be home.
jim: i had been napping, and we were cuddling on the couch
jim: and i asked her if it was because i was so boring today
jim: and she said no, she wants her sleeping bag
jim: and she showed me her pillowcase

Every time I write about something like this, I think: I should really get a life. I shouldn’t be thinking about message boards so much, that I feel I need to have ideas about them that I feel I need to ‘work out’ or write out. But, I do. Over the years I’ve got so much from them. And, I’ve had so much fun with them. But, it’s just so ‘virtual’, so unreal sometimes, so much like a text-based computer game…

There’s this one message board that I go to that prides itself on it’s ‘no blowing sunshine up people’s asses’ attitude. I haven’t been there in almost a month, now, though. Weeks ago, someone from that board saw that I had blogged about some issues that I was having with some of the replies on that board. She said, quite rightly, that if I had issues there, I should talk about them there, because everyone there ‘can take it’. I guess that I was afraid (?) to post there, or didn’t want to post an opposing opinion there, because I just don’t feel like arguing my point or trying to justify my feelings. And, as that person had me thinking, if that’s what they are & if I don’t feel like I fit in there, then, why go there? And, why blog about it?

If I enjoyed arguing, I might have said that I blog about it because it’s my blog & that’s where I write what I’m feeling. If you don’t like it, don’t read it. But, I can understand the ‘why go there’ part, I guess. So, I just kind of stopped going there. Problem is, there are so many people there that I have come to care about. :sigh:

Now, on a completely different message board thing, but I think they kind of fit together in the end… I think that I’m starting to see something that is a real problem with the way some posters approach some support sites. Especially support sites that deal with day-to-day real life issues that can be approached in a variety of different ways. What I’m seeing is a lack of real empathy & real active listening.

Some people on support sites are really great at this. I don’t know if I was ever or am really good at it myself.

But, what I think I’m seeing is two different kind of replies and, really, not too much difference in their fitting into a real ’support’ system.

The first reply is the ‘You’re right, honey!’ kind of sunshine blowing that lets someone post about how they hate their stepkid just because they exist & that existing makes the OP feel bad. I’ve seen quite a few message boards, lately, that :soapbox: about how unsupportive this kind of reply is. In this kind of post/reply exchange, the original poster might as well just be blogging what they have to say. There is no growth, no resolution, no change for them.

The other reply that I think is just as unsupportive, is the ‘You’re wrong!’ kind of automatic ‘this is my opinion and no matter how you feel, I’m not even going to try to understand why you’re doing what you’re doing’ reply that, really, takes just as much concern and empathy as the first. In this kind of post/reply, the replier might as well just be blogging what they have to say. There is no reaching outside of their own beliefs to try to really understand the OP enough to give advice that might actually resonate with the OP.

In both, there is no real exchange, no growth, no sharing. No active listening to the OP or repliers. No consideration on the part of the ‘listeners’ or the OP that the OP or the repliers might have something to teach them, too. Just people saying what they’re going to say & people replying & no listening.

At least, that’s what I’m thinking about & feeling right now.

Of course, there are good, empathetic listeners on every board that I’ve ever been on (and in real life, too). There are some awesome support boards out there. And, some awesome friendships have come of them. There are boards that are just plain fun, whether there’s support going on or not. But, I dunno, I guess I’m just feeling & thinking about the hypocrisy of the ’sunshine blowing’ and the ‘no sunshine blowing’ more today than usual. Probably because I’m missing some of my friends & some of the fun we used to have, all because I’m not able to get over my own issues enough to either try to effect change or to ignore the things that I think need changing.

Two nights ago, Jim & I watched ‘Hedwig and the Angry Inch’. I loved it. I watched it again last night, when he was at work.

The songs totally rock. Each one more beautiful, more fun, more wonderful than the last. ‘Wig in a Box’ is so perfect & so sad.

I love the myth of the origin of love. And, I also like when Hedwig is talking to Tommy about love being immortal & says “Love creates something that wasn’t there before”.

An on-line friend of mine is trying to fit polyamory into her life. Whenever I talk to her about it, we both acknowledge that love would not selfishly keep the person that they love from the joy of loving others. We both know that, intellectually. But, there something that I can’t deny inside of me that believes or wants to believe that there is one special love, that I would feel something missing from a love that could also seek to find love somewhere else - that was not complete with just two. And, I try to find the right words for that feeling - soulmate? missing piece? What is it that is so special about the love that I share with Jim? When I think ‘he completes me’ - that sounds so co-dependent, so needy. I was OK before he was in my life. I was not incomplete then. But, now that I know the completeness that I feel with him, I would be empty if he was gone. I know I’m still not using the right words to say what I’m feeling about it all. But, I think that the idea of ‘Love creates something that wasn’t there before’ is a part of it.

Origin Of Love Lyrics

When the earth was still flat,
And the clouds made of fire,
And mountains stretched up to the sky,
Sometimes higher,
Folks roamed the earth
Like big rolling kegs.
They had two sets of arms.
They had two sets of legs.
They had two faces peering
Out of one giant head
So they could watch all around them
As they talked; while they read.
And they never knew nothing of love.
It was before the origin of love.

The origin of love

And there were three sexes then,
One that looked like two men
Glued up back to back,
Called the children of the sun.
And similar in shape and girth
Were the children of the earth.
They looked like two girls
Rolled up in one.
And the children of the moon
Were like a fork shoved on a spoon.
They were part sun, part earth
Part daughter, part son.

The origin of love

Now the gods grew quite scared
Of our strength and defiance
And Thor said,
“I’m gonna kill them all
With my hammer,
Like I killed the giants.”
And Zeus said, “No,
You better let me
Use my lightening, like scissors,
Like I cut the legs off the whales
And dinosaurs into lizards.”
Then he grabbed up some bolts
And he let out a laugh,
Said, “I’ll split them right down the middle.
Gonna cut them right up in half.”
And then storm clouds gathered above
Into great balls of fire

And then fire shot down
From the sky in bolts
Like shining blades
Of a knife.
And it ripped
Right through the flesh
Of the children of the sun
And the moon
And the earth.
And some Indian god
Sewed the wound up into a hole,
Pulled it round to our belly
To remind us of the price we pay.
And Osiris and the gods of the Nile
Gathered up a big storm
To blow a hurricane,
To scatter us away,
In a flood of wind and rain,
And a sea of tidal waves,
To wash us all away,
And if we don’t behave
They’ll cut us down again
And we’ll be hopping round on one foot
And looking through one eye.

Last time I saw you
We had just split in two.
You were looking at me.
I was looking at you.
You had a way so familiar,
But I could not recognize,
Cause you had blood on your face;
I had blood in my eyes.
But I could swear by your expression
That the pain down in your soul
Was the same as the one down in mine.
That’s the pain,
Cuts a straight line
Down through the heart;
We called it love.
So we wrapped our arms around each other,
Trying to shove ourselves back together.
We were making love,
Making love.
It was a cold dark evening,
Such a long time ago,
When by the mighty hand of Jove,
It was the sad story
How we became
Lonely two-legged creatures,
It’s the story of
The origin of love.
That’s the origin of love.

A most excellent wedding song by They Might Be Giants:

Love is Eternity

Dan and Lisa, hi
We kind of know you guys
But you still might wonder why we’re here

You see we’re certified appointed fans
Of this thing called marriage, and
We’ve got a short list of the facts
You’ll need

Don’t say it’s okay then go to sleep mad
Don’t act like the other doesn’t know how to drive
Patience is a virtue best shared with a spouse
And remember love’s a verb
And love can be eternity

Dan, when you’re surrounded by nothing
In a pitch meeting
Think of your love for Lisa on this day

And Lisa, when you’re surrounded by debt
Trapped on a cellphone
Think of your love for Dan on this day

So, Dan and Lisa, bye
We hardly know you guys
But we’re excited for you still, it’s true

Though there’s more we could report
Our time on earth is short
So let’s keep it to the facts and review

Don’t say it’s okay then go to sleep mad
Don’t act like the other doesn’t know how to drive
Patience is a virtue best shared with a spouse
And remember love’s the verb
And love can be eternity, Dan and Lisa

Wiki stuff on it here: http://www.tmbw.net/wiki/index.php/Love_Is_Eternity
Listen to a sample here: http://www.theymightbegiants.com/mp3/LoveIsEternity_sample.mp3