Sarah said I have a type. And then I as we hugged in pain from the news, Steve said the same thing, “you have a type.”
I guess by that they meant that I loved sharing my life with a partner who also shared my curiousity, creative sense of play and exploration, and whose work complemented my own as we supported each other’s pursuits. The implication, however, was that they often worked with materials that were toxic, or shared the habits of their generation such as heavy smoking and drinking, suffering the consequences of the indiscretions of youthful hubris.
The sad part is that there are no guarantees on longevity. None of us gets an assurance on how long we have on this earth, on how much time we have to spend with our loved ones. And no amount of love, no matter how deep, will keep them here on this earth if their fate is meant to be somewhere else.
[N]o amount of love, no matter how deep, will keep them here on this earth if their fate is meant to be somewhere else.
Not Again
Steve had been feeling sick since late September and was finally able to get a telehealth doctor’s visit in late October. That lead to an immediate trip to the ER due to pleural effusion and three days in the hospital. More follow-up doctor’s visits and then another visit to the ER and a week in the hospital, collapsed lung, more thoracentesis, CT scans, pathologies, and finally a confirmed diagnosis – stage IV non-small cell lung cancer adenocarcinoma. Followed by biopsies, colonoscopy/endoscopy, and PET-CT and finally a meeting with the oncologist.
Treatment would be palliative to keep the cancer from spreading further. Depending on the analysis of tissue from the biopsy, it would include immunotherapy, or a combination of immunotherapy and chemotherapy. Prognosis was dependent on the outcome of that treatment – months or years.
In dark times like this, sometimes a morbid sense of humor results. “I thought I had a 10-year warranty on our marriage!” I said to Steven as we shared a quiet celebration of our 8th anniversary this week. “And I intended to renew it with another 10-year extended warranty!” Geez.
Preparing for the holidays…
This past weekend Steve was able to fit in some moments of normalcy between naps and directing from his stressless recliner as visiting family members helped with chores that culminated in decorating a much smaller Christmas tree that I’d ordered. At half the size of the 12′ tree we’ve had the past few years, the smaller 6-1/2 footer allowed me to manage its assembly and grandkids to help with decorations without a ladder. The job was done in a matter of hours instead of days. Although not the grand tree we usually had, it put a smile on Steve’s face and that’s what mattered to me most.
The new 6-1/2 ft tree was decorated with help from family including grandchildren. It replaced the 12-1/2 ft tree that normally fills the room but that takes two adults on ladders to do. This smaller tree was put up and decorated in a day and still managed very nicely to make everyone smile with gratitude and appreciation.
And an anniversary
When we first started dating, he’d show up at my door with two roses in his hand and a silly grin on his face. It always made me smile in return and lightened my heart. Steve gives the best hugs and so it has been my goal to return those hugs and their healing power as much as I can and he’s willing to accept them as his body fights back.
Copper orange roses for our 8th anniversary.
So on our 8th anniversary this week, I brought him a dozen copper orange roses, a box of chocolates, and a Hallmark card. These were what he would have brought me but driving hasn’t been his option for the last two months. So I did it for both of us. His lip quivered a bit fighting back tears as he read the card and saw the roses. I split them up – 8 in one vase for the years we’ve been together, and another 4 for blessings going forward.
Dinner and The Voice
We sit here and watch the finale performances for this season’s The Voice. We’re in the new bed I bought, a split adjustable king bed that would allow Steve to raise and lower his back and legs to help him breath and get a bit more comfortable.
This afternoon, while I was in online meetings and student reviews in my home office, Steve was riding the tractor down the hillside out back with John following so they could hook up the plow blade for the inevitable snowfall we anticipate for the winter, yet haven’t seen much of yet.
I was part horrified when I learned of his joyriding out back while holding back my critique as he looked at me painfully while trying to eat his dinner. He’d been asking me to make this dish he saw on Facebook – baked honey sesame chicken which was basically a sweet and sour chicken – and so I made it. But that pained look told me he was struggling to eat it – not because he didn’t like the taste, but because as soon as he starts to eat, his stomach says “no more.”
“Did you feel almost normal when you were riding around on the tractor?” “Yes, almost.” “Then it was worth it.”
“How have you been feeling?” I asked. “Crappy all over,” he replied. “It’ll be okay,” I replied. But he broke down. He didn’t like this crappy feeling, he said between tears. “Did you feel almost normal when you were riding around on the tractor?” I asked him, touching his arm gently. “Yes, almost,” came the reply between the slowing sobs. “Then it was worth it,” I whispered.
But deep inside, I wondered how many more of these “close to normal” moments there would be in his future.
Silken Windhounds, Louie (white and tan) and Ralph (dark grey and black) curl up beside Steve as he watches the singers on The Voice between short naps.
As I write this, Steve munches on some Lays Waves potato chips, craved from the power of suggestion as The Voice’s Blake Shelton did a shtick where he steals the Voice award by swapping the award sitting on a pedestal rigged with an alarm with a bag of Pringles. Steve looks happy. And if I didn’t know better, I’d say all was normal as both Ralph and Louie are curled up with their heads against his side. How I long for this moment of normalcy to last.
Dear reader: I know it’s been more than a year since I’ve published anything. Let’s just say my attentions have been elsewhere. But I’m hopeful that with this post, the ice jam has been broken and I’ll be writing more again in the future. In the meantime, I hope you appreciate this brief entry below. _____________________________________________
Fog rolls in on Lake Superior sunset.
Ten years today you left this earthly plane, you left your cancer pain, and you left us heart-broken.
But time hasn’t faded my memory of you – and of us – because still, I can see your smile, still hear your voice, still feel your kisses, and still know the warmth of your caress.
And I know that you’ve been watching over us, too, in spirit. I can feel your presence, and occasionally hear your commentary, as if you were walking beside me. We talk that way, too, you know.
We have so much to be proud of since you’ve passed over in spirit. Two grandsons to start with! They are the light of my life and they talk to you, too, grandpa! Especially T.
Family preparing for sunset photos as the fog rolls in on Lake Superior.
And I know you were there in June up in the upper peninsula when our youngest daughter, now in her early 30s, was married to her own love of her life. We all felt your presence there… the fog rolling into the harbor as we started to gather for pre-wedding photos at sunset. Then there was the bald eagle flying near the window as we enjoyed families together for the rehearsal dinner. It was an interesting choice, Keith, since previously I’d seen your animus in the form of a Great Blue Heron. But the Eagle is a bird of the north and so it was right.
At the ceremony, we knew you were there smiling when your name was mentioned in honor, as Stassia wore the necklace with the cremation diamond you and she helped plan, as the sunshine and blue skies blessed the day on the shores of Lake Superior, and as our grandsons played in the pebbles picking out the pretty ones they wanted to keep as treasures.
But today, this morning, on the tenth anniversary of your departure from this physical plane, you had to have been so proud of Sarah, our first born, who was honored with the college’s President’s Award of Excellence. Five years ago she joined the college where I work as a temp and then as an independent contractor taking on special design projects. She has comported herself with humor, professionalism, and patience even while dealing with the challenges that were thrown her way.
When they called her name, Keith, I nearly jumped out of my seat! Our baby girl (now in her mid 30s, of course) was being recognized on this very day, the tenth anniversary of a very painful dark day. But on this day, today, she was given a bright light to shine on the legacy you helped create.
I miss you dearly, Keith, and I feel your love every day. I have discovered that a heart can grow to love more, to make a new life with another partner, even when my heart had been badly broken. The scars are there, still. But they are worn lines now, serving as symbols of strength and resilience. Today, on this tenth anniversary of a dark day, Sarah accepted this special honor in your memory. Today was a day of light.
I’m lost in my thoughts, sorting tiny pieces of metal type, cleaning the typecases, as sunlight brightens the room from the three walls of windows that filter it into it as I work.
Blessed. That’s how I’m feeling. Surrounded by antique type, printing presses and cabinets, I’m in my happy place, dreaming of the poetry, creative typography, and other items I’d print in this room. Imagining artist friends, old and new, also working in the space, as our creative spirits feed each other.
My mind drifts to conversations, recent events. Mercury and Jupiter in retrograde and I seem immune. But others in the family haven’t been so lucky. Challenges posed by one thing after another keep coming, some more serious than other. They weigh on my mind as each new issue flows through my thoughts like heavy clouds.
From one side of the family, Steve was managing an upset with one of his grown children who seemed to be having a bit of an emotional breakdown on a sad journey. An offer to come help with a project the following day led to an angry response that his help was needed “now” and a meltdown of personal attacks that were more of a cry of someone feeling like their world was out of control and the lashing out was a sign of despair.
Like the virus that has been plaguing the globe, the anger spread, inflicted on siblings. And then it continued to spread. Swirling from one family member to another, feeding on insecurities and bottled up pain.
But it didn’t end there. Like the virus that has been plaguing the globe, the anger spread, inflicted on siblings. And then it continued to spread. Swirling from one family member to another, feeding on insecurities and bottled up pain. Another who had not yet been vaccinated, flatly refusing to be, siting some Q-Anon type conspiracy misinformation, texted another to “mind his own damn business.”
The storm
All of these things were swirling through my head as I quietly sorted type and cleaned the cases in the studio. A dangerous thunderstorm had hit just last Tuesday afternoon… It came up so fast and I had an impending sense of urgency so I went out and told Steve he needed to send our teenage helper home, having just gotten his license. The helper had left barely 5 minutes and the storm came up too fast. Rain blew horizontally, swirling around corners, winds whipping the trees large and small like a forest of rag dolls. The world looked like layers of grey, accented by the whips of rain-soaked brushes between the fields and forests.
I took a short video as the rains and winds came across the fields and slammed the world around me. But I took cover when it came across the upper covered deck sideways. The time stamp on the video was 1:49 pm. And then it was over.
A video of the storm just as it started, trees whipped around violently as the rain slashed across sideways. It was over in ten minutes.
At 1:59 pm, the time stamp on the first photos I took, we saw the destruction. A huge box elder tree with a gaping yawning mouth lined in red where the smaller trunk split from the main one, had fallen across our fence on the east side, and much of it also landed alongside the house, missing a newly installed exterior lamp post by inches – and the house – by only a few feet.
Views after the storm. Close calls. But no damage to the house or the workshop.
On the west side, a huge maple on the neighbor’s side of the fence had lost a major limb hit by lightning with many extending branches landed across that fence. It also missed the shop windows by only inches. I’d seen the lightning flash and had immediately begun to count. But I didn’t get to “1” before the thunderous crash. Now we knew what it was based on the blackened trunk where the large limb had been severed and veins of burnt bark ran up the tree trunk.
In the backyard, several trees, already weakened from the water that formed a pond whenever it rained, had been blown over, propped up by neighboring trees. Branches and debris were all over, leaves plastered to the house, cottonwood leaves and branches from a tree in the far backyard were found in the front yard.
And yet, as I looked at it all, and as Steve and I walked through the mess, figuring out what we needed to do to keep the dogs safe until the fence could be repaired, once the trees were removed… I felt blessed.
And yet, as I looked at it all, and as Steve and I walked through the mess, figuring out what we needed to do to keep the dogs safe until the fence could be repaired, once the trees were removed… I felt blessed.
It could have been so much worse. The one tree could have hit the house, it certainly could have reached it if blown in a slightly more northerly direction. The maple could have hit the shop more directly, smashing windows and poking holes into the letterpress studio holding our precious type and printing presses. But none of that had happened. I felt like we were in a protected bubble that had kept us and our home safe.
Now we wait for the tree guys to come in the next week or two to cut and clear the downed trees. Another blessing. I told Steve that he should not have to deal with this giant mess. That we had the funds to cover it. I’d spoken to our insurance advisor who told me what the break-even point was for filing a claim, or not. Based on that information we decided to cover it ourselves. Now we wait. And it doesn’t bother me at all. The broken limbs and leaves all around my view are a real reminder of how well we’d faired. We didn’t lose power – at least not long enough for the generator to even kick on.
Meditating on anger
As I rearranged some of the funny advertising cuts, illustrations, and halftones in the cases – ones I’d like to play with in my own art vs. ones I’d likely never use – other thoughts went rolling through my hive mind. Anger and stress, depression and flaring tempers have been fed by more than divorce and is fed as much by the pain of pandemic politics and fear for the health of those we love. Yet, how could someone send a text to their grown offspring saying “your stuff is on the porch, taco dinners at 6, don’t bother showing up.” There is so much to dissect from this statement, especially within the already divisive pain caused by misinformation about the veracity and threat of COVID19.
My mind went to how one handles anger, revenge and spite. Maybe it’s because I’ve matured. Or maybe I’ve found that responding in anger or spite is a no-win game. There is nothing to be gained by it. Have I gotten angry, lost my temper? Yes. And it wasn’t something that served me. I didn’t feel better about it. Just the opposite. I felt awful. It didn’t bring me peace. It took a lot of painful work to try and heal the rifts it caused.
I’ve been wronged terribly and in very painful and even expensive ways. Yet I see no point in being spiteful, or seeking revenge. …Each person’s spirit will face their own path, their own hard lessons.
And it’s been awhile. I’ve been wronged terribly and in very painful and even expensive ways. Yet I see no point in being spiteful, or seeking revenge. I believe that each person’s spirit will face their own path, their own hard lessons. All I can do is attempt to do my part to support growth, not harm. And to separate myself from those who only offer selfish toxicity rather than love.
As I gathered the metal type borders to move to their new location in another typecase, I tried to also gather my thoughts on how someone could so intentionally hurt a person they loved. I couldn’t do that. As angry as I might be with someone who I thought had hurt me through their actions or words, if we had love between us, I couldn’t hurt them back.
I’ve since learned to try and listen – and think – about what and why they were saying and doing what they were. Was I missing something? Were they also hurt? Were they trying to help me with something? Perhaps I needed to understand more from their perspective and not just be caught up with my own hurt feelings and ego. This is how my brain works these days. I live by the Four Agreements (Don Miguel Ruiz) and it has been instrumental in how I’ve addressed conflicts for many years.
A story from before times
It wasn’t always that way. I remember a time not long after we were first married that my dear first husband Keith had done something to upset me. I don’t even remember what it was. But I was really upset as I washed a glass Pyrex lasagna pan in the sink. He kept at it, picking at the wound that I felt was being inflicted. I held the pan up as if I was going to smash it against the edge of the sink and stopped. I didn’t want the glass to hit him. I didn’t want to hurt him. I just wanted him to know how upset I was. I looked down and saw the rag rug I was standing on and, with both hands, I threw the pan down flat onto it hard.
The glass flew off in all directions and I stood there dumbfounded. I’d forgotten it was a concrete floor underneath the rug at my feet. Keith was shocked as well. But he quick regained his composure, taking me by the elbow and walking me into the living room to sit on the sofa. “I’ll clean this up,” I remember him saying. And he did, as I sat there with tears streaming down my cheeks. I’d ruined a perfectly good lasagna pan, and now there was glass everywhere, even three feet up in the pots of the hanging houseplants in front of the far window of the kitchen.
Keith knew how to push my buttons. There was a bit of a cruel streak in him. But I soon learned that I could push back. That he loved me. I just needed to not push with cruelty but with love. And sometimes he just needed space. It took many years for us to find balance. And it seemed like we were just starting to really find our groove after nearly 30 years of marriage.
He’d learned that bravado and machismo can have consequences for the one you love and I paid the price.
He cared for me when I broke my back and wrist. Guilt played a role. He’d learned that bravado and machismo can have consequences for the one you love and I paid the price.
He was so proud of me when I was accepted into the doctoral program. “My wife’s gonna be Doctor Fulmer,” he’d tell everyone.
We danced at our oldest daughter’s wedding, and I knew dancing was not something he liked to do. Yet he did it. For me. And for our daughter. I will forever treasure that moment, captured in a photo, where we were looking into each other’s eyes and saying “How did we get here?” How did we get old enough to have a married daughter? We did well!
All the heartaches of the past had been just bumps in the road on the way to our next chapter in life as true empty nesters. Just one more year to get the youngest graduated from college and we were on our own again. Blessings were upon us, for sure. And then… and then…
Worry when life’s good
Is it no wonder that I now look at Steve with worry and occasional bouts of melancholy, worried that our time together will be unexpectedly brief? I worry for his health. I worry for his strength. I hear him say such and such an activity “takes the life out of ya” and I think – “not too soon, I hope.” Sometimes I think we’re on borrowed time. Perhaps it’s the blessings I feel, their abundance and good fortune. I worry that, like those days over ten years ago, that within a year or two it’ll all be crushed and my heart will be broken once again.
And in a most prescient way, I feel it, that doom. And I try and chase it away. Thankful of the sounds of the antique riding lawnmower he drives by my studio as I continue my sorting. He smiles in a cheerful shy way as if to say “I’m just having fun with my old toys.” And I smile back at him, not wanting to ruin his fun by mentioning the exhaust that pulls into my studio from the fans I have running. So I go and open a few extra windows to help air it out.
It is also the silence that brings me a feeling of dread. A feeling that I have imagined my life with him, and that I am actually living alone in this giant house. It’s a feeling that I must be out of my mind for having imagined this whole life with this sweet man who brought me love when I needed it most. Together we healed each other and I wonder sometimes if my sanity is undermined and that I have dreamed it all up.
Sometimes I think we’re on borrowed time. … I worry that, like those days over ten years ago, that within a year or two it’ll all be crushed and my heart will be broken once again.
And then he smiles and gives me a hug. And I wonder… if this is my reality, who am I to question it. I just cannot wrap my head around inflicting pain on those you love. There’s enough pain in the world… and in life… already. Count your blessings, spread love, not pain.
I go back to my typecases and admire the mix of order and disorder. There are stories here, yet to be uncovered.
Woke up at 4:52 am to a blazing light shining upon me. It was a huge full moon low on the horizon so that its light reached inside my bedroom. I smiled and said Happy 60th Birthday, Keith! We miss you here on this life’s plane. Hope you’re enjoying all our shenanigans from your view on the other side. ❤️
Keith taking his solo pilot flight test, upstate NY. Instructor decided we should all go to dinner in Keene, NH.
Postscript: When I awoke later in the morning daylight, I looked out the window and saw the trees and wondered how I could have seen the moon so clearly earlier. And yet, there it had been! When he passed, it was a huge blue moon (a second full moon in the month) and I always associate the strong light of the full moon as his embrace from beyond.
A cacophonic symphony of frogs, birds, and forest rises from the green lush view outside my window at early dawn.
My mind drifts upon the fog back to a distant rainforest, the sounds carrying upon the light breeze of memory. The cool damp night air grips my lungs, my shoulders, my skin. It reluctantly gives weigh (sic) as its foggy embrace lets go slowly from the deep green blanket unfurling from a long winter’s sleep, released in a tsunami of sound and fragrant damp spring. I sigh.
That sound…that sound…
It fills my ears with nature’s symphony, as I dream of another place and time.
The cool moistness of the air fills my lungs and I breath it in deeply, grateful for the damp balm as it coats my airways, and soothes my soul.
The cool damp music of the early morn will soon give way to an incessant red heat, of this I am certain.
But for now, I travel back to that other place as I pull the blanket to my shoulders, made heavier by the damp night air, an embrace from beyond the veil, a fog whose feathery tendrils drift across the lush green landscape.
This is an icon I created when working in Fiji. It was one of 24 icon-style illustrations with Pacific themes. Being my favorite, I adopted this one as a psuedo-logo.
Mara Jevera Fulmer's Blog 