Remember that PSA? "Words hit harder..."

Before I launch into what's currently on my mind, I'll give you a very brief tour of my romantic life:
I met my first husband when I was in the third grade. We went to different schools, but were both in the school district's gifted program, so we ran into each other through the years at district-wide 'gifted events' (science fairs, field trips) and competed against each other in Math Bowls every year. That said, I didn't really know him until we went to high school together. A very rapid synopsis goes like this: we married insanely young (we were 16. Seriously), had four beautiful children, beat the odds and were still happily married when he had a sudden and unexpected brain hemorrhage. We had been married for ten and a half years when he died. Our youngest child wasn't quite a toddler.

I remarried much, much too quickly and before I had fully grieved Ron's death. Joe (not a very original fake name, eh?) was absolutely nothing like Ron and I was glad--marrying someone too similar would feel like I was trying to replace him. In retrospect, this is silly. If you find all these fabulous traits that you like and have a proven compatibility with, why would you decide it's best to marry someone without them?!

A side note: All of that aside, I loved Joe. When we decided to have a baby, we both believed we'd be married forever. I know that despite my best efforts, our beautiful daughter may someday find this blog and read this post. If she does, I want her to know that she was conceived by two people who loved each other and wanted her very much. 


Despite that love, our incompatibility became more and more obvious as time went on. By the time he asked for a divorce, we were tainted by the weariness that came with hanging in too long and the pained effort of trying to get along with each other every single day. To be sure, we had some really great times. But we were (and remain) a portrait of extremes. Our good times were really good, but--and I think he'd agree with this--when he's mad, he's very very mad. And when he's very very mad he's also very, very frightening even if for no other reason than his size and his verbal lashings.

To this day, what's more intimidating than his size are the extremes of his words. I remember a PSA spot that used to show up on daytime tv. The tagline was "words can hit harder than a fist." I can attest to that, although now that we've been divorced for years, they don't usually bother me as much anymore. The words that get to me now are those that describe me as the exact opposite of who I am. People say I shouldn't let it get to me, because I know who I am and my friends have no doubt about who I am. And maybe they shouldn't bother me but they do, because if he believes what he says when he's angry, he never knew me at all. It's eerie to think  I went to bed every night, had a child, and tried to create a life with someone to whom I was a stranger. Because I told this man my most intimate secrets, protected insecurities, and deepest fears, he can cut me to the core in five words or less. He doesn't consider these intimacies 'protected' when he's angry, so he doesn't have a problem using them to hurt me when he’s angry.

Our marital problems were not all his fault, and my therapist has made a good deal of money on my role in our falling-apart. I've analyzed and dissected my own character flaws to the nth degree, because I never thought I'd be divorced and wanted very much to make sure I never made the same mistakes in another relationship. I wish I could redo a lot of things, but I believe our basic problem was that we are simply fundamentally incompatible. Even if we had a rewind button, we'd fail again.

He has plenty of good traits, but his worst one--and the one that still affects me and those around him--is black or white thinking. When he's angry with someone, he believes that person is deliberately doing things to him, can't see any good in the person, and forgets all he really knows about him or her to focus, magnify, and extend that person's bad traits. Most of the time, he'll eventually calm down and apologize for what he said, but too often, the damage is done.



I do nearly the opposite. When anger is eating at me, I very specifically tell myself that whatever happened probably didn't happen with the specific goal of hurting me. It's like this: there's no point in getting mad at my child for throwing a ball through the kitchen window while playing out back. The kid would really rather it not have happened and it wasn't done with malice. When I'm really angry with someone I love, I often journal and list everything I like about the person. It's not selfless--I hate conflict and dislike my own discontent when I'm angry. My thinking is that the person will probably remain in my life. I love them after all, so I tend not to lose track of people and keep them around for a very long time. Many of my good friends I've known since elementary school. There are only two people with whom I used to be friends until we had a 'falling out.' One of those fallings-out was because she didn't like my (now ex) husband, and we've since reconnected.

Anyhow, if I want to get over the anger quickly, it's good to remember why I love these people. In theory, this is a great idea and it works. But being too eager and willing to forgive is not always a good trait. Taken too far and done too many times, it can turn you into a doormat. Forgiving the kid who threw the ball through the window is all well and good, but if they've done it five times and each time you just repair it, say "that's okay Johnny, it was an accident", and buy them a new ball, you can be pretty sure it's going to happen a sixth. Eventually, you need to put up barriers or forbid Johnny from playing ball in the back yard! 

All of that preliminary stuff was leading up to something, but I typed more than I meant to and I can't even remember exactly where I was going with this. Broadly, I was writing about love. Relationships. Ex wives. New lives. It doesn't really matter now anyway, because I'm out of time. Even if I remembered right now, my lunch break is over and I have to get back to work.

It'll come to me and I'll write more, I'm sure. So consider this, my unedited Part I, a cliffhanger.

For now..back to work..

Excuse me while I lacrimate.

I'm not a emotional mess, usually. And I'm  not depressed at all. But there I was this afternoon, doing the dishes and minding my own business, when Marry Me by Train came on the radio. By the end of the song, I was a sobbing mess. Later, I burst into tears over a stupid car commercial, and a few days ago I broke down while complaining to Sears about the furnace part I ordered never arriving.

I wish I could blame that time of the month. If cyclic hormones had seized control of my tear ducts and all of this was entirely normal, I'd feel less insane. But the scientist part of my brain demanded proof. Sadly, after searching PubMed, I could really only blame my period and the corresponding hormonal fluctuations if I were taking hormones (e.g. on the pill). That's not to say my hormones aren't raging out of control or that I didn't get a kick of prolactin anyway, but I concluded this isn't PMS. That was actually an obvious conclusion, since the P stands for "Pre" and not Post. And because I've been doing this whole monthly thing for long enough to know it's not a normal cyclic thing for me.

I'm not pregnant. I'm not menopausal. I'm not particularly sad. So what the hell is wrong with me these days!? I was about to go search Google and PubMed some more, but the UPS guy is at my door and that has me a little verklempt.


 *J Psychosom Obstet Gynaecol. 2003 Dec;24(4):247-55. Self-reported crying during the menstrual cycle: sign of discomfort and emotional turmoil or erroneous beliefs? 

Error 400 (a poem)

(This page is safe to view at work)

Bushtit - ©2007 Walter Siegmund. 
Available under the Creative Commons ShareAlike License

Error 400**
    ~Mari Nichols Haining
I admit we are sharing a moment unplanned
if you followed a link, I quite understand--
you were searching for boobies or a fuscous bush tit, 
not photos of birds or a writer's weak wit.

But sit for a moment. You've been Googling hard
though some of your search terms are...shall I say scarred?
     (I'm aware you've been wondering if Morgan Freeman is dead.
     But men with dark thoughts about "blonde thoroughbreds"?!
     He's not, as I write this, just slightly banged-up.
     And there's a chance someones looking for ponies or pups.)
The internet is huge, with its chatter and chitter,
and Spaces and Faces and blogs all-a-Twitter.

yet if you stop for a byte, the stories unfurl
among hyperactive places in this deficit world.
Still, if Google misled you and you're determined to go
here's a tip: change your settings, set your filter to low.

**Error 400: An HTTP client error. 400 Bad Request - The request cannot be fulfilled due to bad syntax.

The monsters have taken names

Back then, the gremlins under my bed were not a concern.
What I feared were the stuffed bears that shape-shifted after dark
and the demons who threatened from corners
where the walls and dust and shadows intersected.

The monsters in the closet were less threatening than empty spaces.
Those voids hovering between the church dresses and Sunday shoes,
wedged between the boxes of clothes I'd grow into
and a summer of childhood I'd never wear again,
those voids scared me into insomnia.

Even then, it was too obvious a betrayal
when a snake formed from the trinkets on my most loved bookshelf
taking my diary key for a tongue,
while my Just So Stories and Little House became angry eyebrows
over stern lips from The Great Brain and Nancy Drew.

Now, in my unkeyed  journal
I've written my fears without mention of closets or trinkets or books.
But obvious, too, are my lies by omission --
without darkness or shadows now
the shape-shifters remain animate; the voids still hover.

While my demons avoid the cobwebs and corners now,
my serpents don't bother to hide among the books,
        and the monsters have taken names.

       ~Mari Nichols Haining

Check out other poetry posted on this blog.

Hungry for more? A host of talented contributors participate in  One Shot Wednesday - it's a online poetic flash mob. Go check it out!

And as always, comments, constructive criticism, and links to other writing are encouraged and appreciated!

My house hates me

Forget 2012. Did I miss some big 1/1/11 doomsday prophesy?!

You remember the blizzard that wreaked havoc on the airlines last week? If you lived in my neck of the woods, you were probably waiting it out inside with a nice cup of hot chocolate. Maybe you popped some popcorn and watched a movie with the family. A few logs crackling in the fireplace? For ambiance of course, because we all know that the average fireplace isn't really going to heat much more than the three teenagers vying for marshmallow-roasting space in front of it. So the thermostat was still set to keep you comfortable, right?

Of course, the furnace has to actually work for the thermostat to do any good. Aye, there's the rub.

Mine didn't, and it didn't LOUDLY.   Imagine every time the blower started up, you heard 100,000 angry bees buzzing simultaneously in your basement. Actually, make them wasps, because being a little more worried than usual is part of the experience I'm recreating for you here. So are you imagining that? Pretty loud buzzing noise you have there, eh?

Now imagine those wasps are roaring around a monstrous A380 jet engine and you'll get a better picture. Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a little. A commuter jet then. You get the point though: it was is really damn loud.

It seems the problem may be a teeny little capacitor no larger than a flip phone.  
The good news: A replacement capacitor runs about 20 bucks. It could be worse.
The bad news: it's worse.

While I was the down there, I noticed the water lines leading to my condenser furnace had been turned off.  I sat down to ponder how that happened and realized the answer when a dream woke me from my nap (did you know your body starts to shut down at 37 degrees? Seriously not cool.).

Forty

When it was young, The Story wanted to tell her
    with elegant wrinkles in the final chapter.
Gentle lines that framed her eyes with wisdom and sadness--
    not cracks that split her face and whispered of capture,
    nor crevices to remind a gentle reader
    of furrows like dried Arizona mud,
dug by the wild madness of the sun.

By the time The Story became the story,
    it asked the narrator to leave editing
    to the children or to another day. She agreed.
She could let the climax stay, though discrediting
    her truth: lives not plotted intersect long before merging.
She feared only that the gentlest would read
   of destiny between the lines.

Soon enough, a studio was completed
in one bare room marked by a red glass door,
  somewhere between the attic and the root cellar.
There, the story danced on the parquet floor
   while waiting for her to begin transcribing.
Instead she paused to ask, "But who will write the end?"
    as though she hadn't wondered it before.

And as though it hadn't also considered this,
the story shrugged and gently, gently offered
                                                              "Destiny?"
   before mutely deciding she needn't write at all.
With an elegant pirouette, the final elegy renounced,
   it danced her through a vast hall.
Spinning, she found it easy to ignore memory
   as it fell from the stairs and dared her to catch up.

Now danced, she doesn't care to understand
   why life tried so hard to convince her.
Instead she paints rivers and moist Arizona mud
   on glass with colors that wouldn't dare to occur.
She ignores the narrative when it chants
   and she can't find the straight lives that once intersected
   so she doesn't try to paint the people or their truths.

Through gently wizened creases, she sees the irony
  of pigment drying on stiff brushes
   as she tells The Story, climaxes too.
Words pause, hopeful she'll give them consideration.
In time, the end will offer its own narrative
 but she'll be too busy painting life between the lines
   to hear the storyteller.
------
Loosely related: Before this, came Fifeteen.

The Fall from an Almost Empty Nest

(Here)
            "And now for something completely different..."  ~Monty Python

Gravity seems weak, but weaker still here--
     is his grip.  I'm free-falling toward the stars.

     Minutes hail from the rails of the clock face,
     while my boys find time to hand out blue cigars.

     The air? It is thin enough to drink here,
     where the horizon falls away to give me view.
     My girls stop playing for a moment, or a decade,
     to pen an honest analytical review.

     The atmosphere gulps in another year here,
     while paper dolls are decomposing in the lawn.

     I write in crayon on the moon I find eclipsed here,
then fall to watch the majesty of dawn.

~Mari Nichols Haining 

        It's another One Shot Wednesday.

her first untimely death

her first untimely death
   (Or: A teenager mourns a death)
 
She couldn't have known it was Childhood's last night.
So she stood on the wet grass and sang to the evening
as though it was any other.

She should have realized when she noticed,
in grown-up thoughts,
the stars arcing above her had shifted
and were marking time like the hands of a clock.

Then somewhere far away a boy died
and the moon winked a minute.
She could not have known she was waiting for a shooting star
to note the second on the asphalt sky.

In ten hours, the phone will ring.
She will step outside her body without effort. To watch,
because events like those need historians.

Detached, she'll consider it theatrical.
And when she falls to the ground
she'll wonder if the wail filling the room and straining against the walls
really comes from her.

Somewhere, innocence just isn't anymore.
It will be too late for her to know
she's wishing she were outside, singing to the stars again.
Oblivious to the clock.

~Mari Nichols Haining

This is my contribution to One Shot Wednesday - a poetic flash mob. Go check it out!

Text from early labor. Bonus photo included!

This text  came from my daughter-in-law about 4.5 hours after her water broke. She was at the hospital in early labor with her first child.

This is bbbboring.

 I responded:
No worries - I bet it will be more interesting three hours from now!

-----------
I was right. An hour later, after an emergency c-section, she and my son became parents and I met my first grandchild. Mother and baby are doing fine.

Congratulations Jonathan and Sierra! You will be phenomenal parents. In parenthood and life in general, I hope you both remember to let the small stuff go; pick each battle carefully and choose your words as though they'll be the last the other person will hear; and most importantly,  to really live each moment, because they are the memories you'll treasure each tomorrow.

Welcome to the world Baby Alex! I'm crazy about you already!

Alexander

7lbs 10 oz

20 1/2" long
 8:38 PM

To-do list

To-Do (in order): Charge video & still cameras. Prep spare room for arriving family. Sleep. Go to the hospital. Meet 1st grandchild. Cry.

A game! Brought to you by YouTube and Japanese zit tools!

I'll start! digusting (dg-stng)adj. Something a user of digg.com would find abhorrent.

YouTube has standards?  And a Japanese commercial for a zit popping tool violated those standards? Weird. I glad they draw the line at digusting content, because we all know there's plenty disgusting stuff up there!

Newly edited: The Second Kind

After you gave me her poem, the name replaced,
I said there were two kinds of women:
those who inspire sonnets
and those who don't.

And then I laughed;
the tension was too much to bear.
It's fine, I said.
I tried not to sound like a martyr
but thought,
Why have I never inspired
art of any kind?
Not even a charcoal sketch or quick haiku.

Once, I convinced myself I was a rough draft
living  in the coffee-stained pages of your journal.
On that occasion, I didn't mind --
because we were a draft
and romance can be rough.

I am aware of my own gracelessness.
Yet grace is required of a muse.
Still, consider that I have desire,
and what is love without desire?
And here is patience,
because what is art without patience?

I remember now. Again.
And the uneasy laugh escapes again.
I conclude aloud
(with melancholy, not martyrdom)
that if I had been the first kind,
I would have abandoned beauty and art
as just moments.

Moments as transient as our forever.

Becoming Ms. Fix-it - Handy tip

Another Becoming Ms. Fix-it Tip:
Before using that circular saw you left on the patio for months, check that stinkbugs haven't claimed it as home.

The grass sighs

Melancholy floats in the wind today.
Memories are deposited by the rippling breeze,
and the waving grass sighs.

I remember when fall winds
brought fairy songs twisting around me
teaching me to dance and fly in concert.

Later, zephyrs nudged me to the future,
before towing me urgently by my whipped umbrella.
Yet, aren't I too young to hear the sigh?

These days beneath the crimson,
I see the dust has settled now as crystal morning frost.
These evenings, no nanny in the wind
and no longing for the memories.
But the grass?
It still sighs.

From somewhere: a bird.

I am cold, my sweater damp,
but I am only here.

Without decision,
I stay to watch a leaf parachute
and listen for the wind to shift

until the sighs fade in to day.

~Mari Nichols-Haining

One Shot Wednesday: A poetic flashmob.

There once was a lady who lived in a boot, after Jacobs and Kors took all her loot...

I love fall. The browns and golds and burnt siennas. Those reds and blacks--oh..all of the season's colors--they enliven me. I find myself inhaling deeply to catch the sweet leathery smell that permeates the air this time of year and wakes up my soul. Oh sure, the changing leaves are pretty too, but I'm talking about boots. I admit it: I love my boots and look forward to pulling them from the back of the closet each fall. Like the unique love felt by that mother (the one who lived in a shoe) for each child, I love every pair of boots I own for some unique quality.  Some might claim I have an unnatural obsession with them. 

Sometimes, I want a wife too!

The satirical essay below has been floating around for 40 years, so there's a good chance you've seen it before.  It was originally published in the first edition of Ms. in 1971.  A friend's status message reminded me of it tonight, so here I am. It's worth a reprint every now and again.

-------------------------------------

I WANT A WIFE

Judy Syfers, (1971)


I belong to that classification of people known as wives. I am A
Wife. And, not altogether incidentally, I am a mother.

Not too long ago a male friend of mine appeared on the scene fresh
from a recent divorce. He had one child, who is, of course, with his
ex-wife. He is obviously looking for another wife. As I thought
about him while I was ironing one evening, it suddenly occurred to me
that I, too, would like to have a wife. Why do I want a wife?

I would like to go back to school so that I can become economically
independent, support myself, and, if need be, support those dependent
upon me. I want a wife who will work and send me to school. And
while I am going to school I want a wife to keep track of the
children's doctor and dentist appointments. And to keep track of
mine, too. I want a wife to make sure my children eat properly and
are kept clean. I want a wife who will wash the children's clothes
and keep them mended. I want a wife who is a good nurturant attendant
to my children, who arranges for their schooling, makes sure that they
have an adequate social life with their peers, takes them to the park,
the zoo, etc. I want a wife who takes care of the children when they
are sick, a wife who arranges to be around when the children need
special care, because, of course, I cannot miss classes at school. My
wife must arrange to lose time at work and not lose the job. It may
mean a small cut in my wife's income from time to time, but I guess I
can tolerate that. Needless to say, my wife will arrange and pay for
the care of the children while my wife is working.

Once Gold

Like Midas in this world
far removed from myths and gods,
your touch consumed it all--
time, the past, then even vague dreams.
In their places
are thoughts like statuettes.
They stare, unnerve me, remind me
that value is often measured differently.

So, once reminded, I think
Perhaps I didn't understand you.
But of course, I did.
And perhaps I didn't love enough?
But of course I did.

It is reflected in the obscene glint of all that is left
unconsumed.
It is in the grime that settles after droughts and dusty summers;
a blanket on the golden of the decayed.

In Passing: For my complicated friends.

A repost from my other blog...

It's time now to admit that if I'm lucky
these are my middle years.
That while watching the obvious enormity
of each morning rise,
this other life I couldn't watch
became the one I'm living.

Before I thought to look, four decades passed,
while people wandered in and out of doubt
and of these years.
And while I thought I was moving
(or knew I was standing still)
I met the people who will become
my old, complicated friends in another cycle of time.

In our complications then
we'll play chess and talk of now with nostalgic fondness
while watching the imperceptible shadow of each day fall.
And if we're honest, we'll admit we're content
with enduring our passions
and with the passing decades.

It's then, I think, that time will stall.

~Mari Nichols-Haining

Is it a roar, or a meow?

I'm not going to lie. I get a thrill when I successfully fix something around the house, especially if it's something that seemed daunting to me when I considered trying. Being single has been educational: I've learned to use a propane torch, sweated pipes, fixed a dishwasher and a washer and dryer, wired lights and doorbells, and deconstructed (then reconstructed) a box spring that was too tall for a stairwell. I just purchased my own multimeter and electric receptacle tester; I purchased and own my own circular, jig, chain, miter, and hack saws; and I literally carry the scar of someone who has learned, through trial and huge error, how not to cut her finger off when the protective plate for the electric hedge trimmer is broken.


The cycle of concentration-frustration-elation (wash, rinse, repeat)

Travelers will understand...

One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things. -Henry Miller

At this very moment (who knows how I’ll feel tomorrow), I have a great need to get away. From what? I’m not sure. Actually, I think I have the need to wander; it’s a subtle difference, but the need to go is different than the need to get away. I call it my ‘gypsy blood,’ although there's no evidence that I actually have any real gypsy heritage.

Between the ages of 16 and 30, I moved around often. I don't think I spent more than two consecutive years in the same house or same town, and I convinced myself I needed to move. Now I think I get the same relief from traveling without a firm itinerary. What I didn't know back then was that I didn't need to physically relocate my household, I just needed whatever it is I get from interacting with other travelers, meeting people with different experiences, seeing things I’ve never seen, feeling life happening again after I've let it stagnant around me in my tiny hometown, watching the sunset from a different horizon (or from a horizon at all, considering I don't have one at home)....

It's time for a trip and I don't care where I go. My feet are getting twitchy and my lightest suitcase is beckoning from the back of my closet. The world is vast and I have an urgent need to see more of it.

“Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things – air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky – all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.” – Cesare Pavese