BEEN A WHILE

Lots going on in life right now, or, actually, maybe not much. Some who observe me believe that I'm slowly becoming certifiable. I continue to pack my worldly belongings and make arrangements for the move to Iowa with gusto! There would be no questions about my behavior if I had a job and a place to live. My practical partner and friends have given up on "bringing me to my senses." I've come down with a huge case of the power of positive thinking and the simple-minded belief that I'll get a job. Any evidence of that? Not at the moment, but I believe it will come. What, I ask, is my alternative? Do I give in and give up? "Accept reality"? Or do I just remain me--ever hopeful on some days; sobbing on others because I'm afraid I'm stuck. I prefer the hopeful idiot, and so I pack, rent trucks, buy airline tickets, look for huge storage places in Iowa. Mary's looking for a small house to rent in Canton for one semester. Maybe I'll be here as well, but I hope not. Oh, by the way, looking for a job is b-r-u-t-a-l. Wow! This is a painful but great experience for me. My professional life, in this sense, has been, as Grandma would say: "a flowery bed of ease." Time for me to know intimately what others go through, and hey, not a word about a PhD please. Worthless outside of the academy--just worthless (in the humanities at least). The best it gets you is a lot of quizzical looks and crazy questions about why you want a job. I shoulda been a nurse or something in medicine or perhaps even an IT person. Not an English teacher with a PhD. Nope. Nada.

I've had my first dreams about my mother since she died two years ago. I remember them vividly. I think it's her way of weighing in on this moving business. In the middle of the last dream, I went back to that brief time when she was here. July 16-September 16, 2008. I saw the face of every, single person who stood by me during that time. That core group that kept the vigil toward the end--read scripture, sang her favorite hymns, did whatever they could to comfort me. And then there were those who dropped by. Some cried; one person lotioned her dry, dying skin and spoke softly to her. There was a steady stream of people during those last days and final hours. I see some of them from time to time, but not often anymore. I don't spend much time on campus. But I hold all of them in my heart--every, single one. Funny, there are a couple with whom I had quite a professional disagreement last year. I suspect they would say that I didn't love them or that we are no longer friends. So not true. Well, maybe half not true. We may not be friends, but I'll love you always for what you did for me during that time. My vision of my friend sitting alone in Gunnison in his suit observing my hand in Mary's replays over and over. I carry mental snapshots of special people at an extraordinary moment in my lifetime--the most extraordinary moment in my lifetime. Sometimes I hear the words they spoke to me; other times I feel the touch. So I got mad love, big love, deep love and forever love for them all, and that love has nothing to do with anything in our professional lives. It's personal--as personal and intimate as any experience can be. Nothing trumps that. Just sayin'.

Okay, so now I'm going back to my mad woman self--packing my stuff to move to my no home in Iowa that I'll pay for with my no job. And guess what? It's all gonna be just fine.