Eileen's Memories

Here are some memories written by Mom's good friend Eileen Maresh, who worked in the lab with her in Valley City and also took care of Mom at our house during the day (in shifts with others) after Mom came home from the hospital in 1989.

Everyone remembers Diane's perfect penmanship and how she could fit everything on the little lines that were on the lab slips when the rest of us would take at least 2..

One day Diane and I were working early shift..I thought something looked different, but couldn't figure it out.

About 2 hours later it hit me--her wig was on backwards! We laughed about it all day, but then I had my sweater on wrong side out and no one told me until 2:00.

Glenny and I took Diane out for coffee. We got her back in the car and Glenny bumped the automatic locks locking Diane in the car and Glenny and I were standing outside. After alot of coaxing Diane got the lock undone, but what was really funny Glenny hadn't closed the backend of her Suburban tight so we could have just crawled in that way. All of this happened on our way home.

When we first got to Kenny's (Restaurant) we had Diane in her wheelchair and a gust of wind blew her down the frontage road with us chasing after her.

One of my most favorite things is the day I asked the girls if they had all the stuff they needed for school as I had made a couple of trips to school with stuff. We were going through the list and Kati asked me how come I knew to ask about that stuff.

Kari looked at her and said, "Experience!"

How about the time the twins made salads with rhubarb leaves and had to have their stomachs cleaned out and how they wouldn't eat anything green forever...do they now?? (Ed. note from Solveig - this was Kati, not both twins. Kati does eat green things now! :-)

I hope this helps out a bit..We all loved working with Diane and she was like a little detective when working in Bacti.

Eileen

Dream triggered by CS memorial, relating back to childhood

Not sure if this dream really fits in this blog but I wanted to write it down while I am still worked up about it.

First of all, people in the dream talk about wanting Mirabel to be better taken care of, I wanted to clarify that Mirabel is standing in for myself and the twins when we were little - I don't think anyone could stand up and say anything bad about Mirabel or David and Segen, like this. David is doing a great job. My dad did a great job too.

So the beginning of this dream, I was in a library - I think it was the Valley City library but it was bigger. People from high school who I recently connected with on Facebook were there, like Troy Durham, others, but no one was talking to each other because it was a library. I thought I would touch base with them later.

Some other stuff happened and then the whole thing changed to a big auditorium. It was a church service, but with people more like the ones we went to church with in the past, not UUFRC people. But Julia was the minister.

I was up in the balcony of the auditorium (or a stadium? Like Billy Graham) and there was a time announced for Joys and Sorrows/like comments.

This older couple were sitting near me and the woman stood up and said that she just wished those Stoutamire kids were better taken care of. That they looked all messy. She didn't offer anything to help the situation (even if it was true).

I could not believe she would say something like that! So I stood up and said something like "How dare you! She's just a little girl! I think she looks fine. Shut up!"

And I sat down and thought - "wow, now all these people will hate me, they probably agree with her, and it's me who's the freak show". At least I thought it was over.

But Julia stopped the whole show and said something like - we really need to talk about this, and asked me to continue talking more. (Here I think Julia has probably morphed into Cornelia, my therapist).

So I talk more and I say, "Even if she did need that kind of help, and I don't think they do, then offer something that will help! Go over and see her more often, or do something, but else just shut up! How can you say something like that! Aargh!"

People did turn around and give me supporting looks so I didn't feel as alone but part of me was still so angry at that woman. Who let her into this place? How could she be so superficial and judgmental? Did she not know what had happened? WTF!!!!

(my suspicions that people were thinking stuff like this about us probably kept me from wanting any kind of organized religion where you have to "dress up" and come to church).

Sometime after this I woke up and I was still mad at that f'ing woman.
Who was she to say anything like that? I realized that obviously she wasn't anyone at UUFRC - I think she represents people at our church/town that I was afraid were thinking this about us when we were growing up.

We probably did look like the "wild women from Borneo" more than my mom would have wanted, but it felt like we were doing our best. I had the feeling that people were judging us (or at least pitying us) - watching us walk back and forth to and from the Care Center every day in the summer, etc. Very few offered us rides, only the people who knew us, probably to avoid us being freaked out by accepting rides from "strangers".

"you can do it, kiddo"

Today is Charlotte's memorial. The clarinet quartet, now dubbed "The Charlonets" after last night, is ready to go.

I woke up this morning not feeling very ready to go at all. Being a grown-up and one of the supports (hopefully ), in this really hard time, was feeling overwhelming. Plus hosting Ian and Jo, talking to Lisa about the photos, trying to help David if I can (who is the "onsite coordinator" for the service? I don't know).

And hoping everything will go well and David and the kids will have this as a relatively good memory that represents Charlotte, or at least tries to. (Note that I think the only thing I remember from Mom's funeral was Pastor Darrell's closing about the end of The Last Battle, and being so impressed that he actually read it).

In the midst of all this overwhelm I hear a voice in my head saying "you can do it, kiddo". Which I think must be from Mom since really I don't know Charlotte well enough for it to be Charlotte.

Or maybe it was both of them in a chorus. Anyway, I guess the real answer is that it is the part of me that holds my mom inside and tries to preserve her.

macaroni and cheese is comforting

I am having way more triggers back to Mom's sickness and death than I was expecting.

I don't want people to think that it is all about me when I bring up this loss - I think people are getting that. It is just so much stuff.

On Friday David called and asked if we could hang out with him on Saturday, so we did. I fielded some emails about the memorial book proposal for Charlotte and asked him directly in the car, responded back to the group.

I'm really glad we were able to help in some way even if only just being around with him. He actually ate while he was out with us - he hadn't been eating much of anything at all. It's just hard to know what to do. So I was pretty emotionally wiped after that but Saturday was still mostly about David and Charlotte.

Sunday I went to church and so many people approached me to thank me for pushing them to send memories (and also some comforting re: my mom too) - it realy started to trigger some of the stuff from my mom's death. David Z thinks it's because so many people did this at that time for me and there's really no where to put that feeling - "Yes, thank you for your concern," etc. You just want to get done with all of this grieving and get back to whatever the normal is.

After church we went to Fresh Choice and I had macaroni and cheese and I had this feeling sunk deep in the pit of my stomach, it was all numb, but I was still hungry and wanting the macaroni and cheese but just eating it mechanically as if I wasn't really there. I'm guessing that DS can relate to this feeling perhaps.

Then just now i got an email from the woman who's in charge of religious education at church - one of my students from my youth class just lost one of her mothers suddenly too (she lives in Japan).

Anyway. It's just a lot of stuff. I feel like there's no room for me to be feeling this now, I am "supposed" to be all done with this since it's 20 years later. I'm supposed to be a grown up and focusing on work and getting stuff done. Luckily I have my back to a window and am invisible back here behind my monitor at lunchtime.

remembering another young mom and friend

Our friend Charlotte S from the UUFRC congregation, just died today, very suddenly.
She was 39 (confirmed after DS sent out her birthdate - she was turning 40 in June) and was also married to a David. Both Dave and I really like(d) both of them. They are in the kindred spirits group (Cthulu dolls for the kids, Maker Faire attendees, musicians who play clarinet, piano, drums plus both scientists). They have 2 kids, a 5-year-old girl and 1 year old boy.

Dave and I feel a bit useless today because we can't focus on anything else and had heard there was a lot of support right now so we didn't go over to their house today. We plan to try to go over with food tomorrow.

I am writing a letter, mostly to their daughter Mirabel (and son Segen, but I am identifying more with Mirabel right now in solidarity as the oldest daughter).

I know the cards and letters that we got when Mom was sick and when she died, were most valuable if the people actually wrote something of what their memories were of Mom. Most of the cards just say "So sorry for your loss... The So and Sos." Or, they just signed the card "The so and sos".

That's great that they sent it and probably made them feel better that they did something, but at this point looking back from the future, I know I would have really appreciated more heartfelt thoughts - what were their memories of my mom? How did she touch their lives? Why exactly are they so sorry for our loss?

So, that's why I'm trying to write this letter but I realize I'm writing a lot of stuff that this family probably doesn't care about and is really only for me. I'm writing a draft of it in my journal so I can weed this stuff out and make sure the letter is a good one with less mistakes and cross-outs (which again is following in the footsteps of my mom - the draft letters I've found in that one notebook tell the tale).

Part of me is still just really mad. Why does stuff like this happen to people like Charlotte, as well as my mom, and the cancer that Anna O, Mieko, and now Claudia are dealing with?
They are the "good eggs" - they've got people depending on them, they inspire others (Charlotte just this week helped push me into clarinet again, along with Claudia).

Also I have my old recurring fantasy that has popped up more often in recent years with other friends losing loved ones. That regardless of the fact that Mom obviously does not know all these people, she knows them through us, and she's there (in wherever "there" is) to greet them and say hi.
Scott's mom, Scott's dad, Miryam, Abby Karow, Elisabeth R's dad, Shannon's dad, just all these people. Julia's Spot.

3 things I think Charlotte and Mom would find in common (just fyi for the intros there, you two!):
1. motherhood (and actually I think this is one of the reasons why I was drawn subliminally to C when first meeting her, is that she reminds me of the vague memory of my mom and the kind of mom she was.)
For example, my sister wrote this post about how independent and resourceful our mom was, and I saw a lot of that in C too.

2. science (metallurgy and medicine! Also Charlotte did what looks like a cool research project in Greenland that I suspect my mom would be curious about. And I think my mom would like things like the Maker Faire if she were here).

3. music - Mom played violin and loved music enough to get me into piano and clarinet (and thusly to inspire the twins as well)
Charlotte played piano and also clarinet which she was just now resurrecting via her clarinet quartet. She probably also played other instruments too...