Tree's Thoughts
Finally!
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Finally!
It's a new year; 2010 is here!
There's an old adage (are there any new adages?) that says bad things happen in threes. If that's true, then 2010 promises to be a great year, because the last three have really sucked.
It started with the death of my brother, Terry, in 2007. I hadn't finished grieving for him when Mom died in 2008. I was still grieving for them in 2009 when I lost my sister-in-law, Cheryl, my niece Christa and my cousin Louie. It's going to take a little time yet to get back to "normal", but at least now there is hope that there might be a light at the end of this tunnel.
In search of this fabled light, I've been throwing myself back into my music. I couldn't touch my guitar or piano for nearly a year after mom was gone. I was kind of forced back into it by my younger brother, Eric.
Thank You Eric!!!!!
When he learned that I wasn't playing anymore, he came to my house with his guitar and brought my nephew, Amzy and they asked me to play along with them. (They both know I can refuse them nothing!) I did, and they have been coming back every week since then.
The second week, we were joined by my brother Amzy and soon others joined in as well. (Darren, Tammy, Dustin, Jim, Debbie, Brenda, Carl, Corey, Larry). We started going to other houses to play, and the Traveling Wannabees Band was born!
Some have dropped out, some appear from time to time, sometimes there is someone new and we never know from week to week, who is going to be there. That's just part of the fun because all are always welcome.
We even have 1 loyal groupie!!!!!! My niece and Goddaughter Gabrielle, even though she does not play or sing, rarely misses a week to come and listen. Thanks to you too, my Angel!
Now I need to get back into my writing. Perhaps writing songs along with the poetry. The best place to go for inspiration that I know of is the Poetry in Color Forum.
I've been a member at JPic for 4 years now. I've watched it grow from 30 members to over 900. It has got to be the friendliest writing site on the Net!
The admin/owner, Ms. Jacquii Cooke, subscribes to the belief that uncensored writing does NOT mean that rudeness will be tolerated.
Wrtiting and artwork posted there is simply for sharing. Not for being torn apart with rude comments. If you want pointers on how to make it better, you can post in the Critique Salon section.
Unfortunately, JPic is not accepting any new free members at this time, but if you really want to join, you can still buy a membership with a donation of $20.00 or more.
We desperately need funding for private hosting since the site has grown so large that the current host cannot provide adequately for such a large number of users.
Many members have donated and we have almost reached our goal of $750.00. When we do, JPic will once again be a FREE site to join. If you can help - PLEASE do!!!!!!!!! Just click the link and then click the "DONATE" button.
So that just about covers my plans for 2010; music and writing. The only other thing I have planned is joining T.O.P.S. (Take Off Pounds Sensibly). I'll let you know how that goes next month!
May you all have a safe and happy 2010!
Yet Another One
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I had the strangest dream last night.
Perhaps not so strange though, considering the real world outcome.
I was in that twilight time between sleeping and waking when my mom and Terry came into my room. Terry sat weightless at the foot of the bed while mom lay down beside me and hugged me.
I felt so happy to see them. I knew I was dreaming but it felt real and I didn't want it to end.
Mom told me that she would always be around whenever I wanted her. While I basked in her hugs I asked her if it hurt to die and she laughed and said it hurt more to live.
I asked her what it was like on the other side. She told me there was work to be done for anyone who wanted to do it.
I looked at my brother, who had not spoken a word and asked mom why he looked so sad. She told me not to worry and that it would be OK.
I felt myself starting to wake up and struggled to stay in the dream. I asked her if she had seen my Grandma but before she could answer, the daylight pulled me into wakefulness.
Dang light.
I woke up, got myself a cup of tea and noticed that my message light was flashing. It was my sister Charlene. I called her back and found out that my niece, Christa (Terry's daughter), had died last night. She'd had a heart attack. The same thing that took Terry. She was only 35 years old.
The Tenth Day Feast Ceremony
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Yesterday we held my mom's Tenth Day Feast Ceremony.
This is done for people to have closure on the tenth day after a loved one has died. It is torture for neat freaks. It is usually done at the place where that person has passed on. For my mom it was in her home.
First we went out to the sacred fire where we again burned the ceremonial tobacco and invited Mom's spirit to join in the feast with us.
Before entering the house, the children were marked either on the hand or the forehead with ashes from burnt hickory. Children are considered to have pure spirits. When a person passes over, their spirits also become pure. The marking was done to differentiate their spirits from that of Mom's so that when Mom's guide came for her, the spirits of the children would not be taken too. The mark on them would ground them to this world.
After entering the house the doors were locked and no one would be allowed to enter or to leave until the end of the feast. Then everyone got out their feast baskets. These are just baskets that contain a dinner plate, a bread plate, a bowl, a cup, cutlery and a napkin. A place was set at the table for Mom and her chair drawn up to it.
The feast itself consists of foods prepared that day by each participant and were the foods that Mom most enjoyed during her earthly time. No salt can be used in the preparation of these foods but any other spices are acceptable. The people attending the feast must eat ALL of the food that was brought for this feast.
Once everyone had their places set, the youngest able females do the serving. This got quite hilarious as my niece, Tsikenonnewen (Butterfly), who is only 4 years old, was one of our servers. This is where the torture for the neat freaks comes in. Anything spilled is NOT to be picked up. No cleaning or work is to be done until the day after a feast. With 10 children and 17 adults trying to balance plates on their laps (not enough room at the table), the floor and carpet really took a beating!
The servers began by putting food first on Mom's plate and then going around the table again and again, serving everyone else until the dish they were serving from was empty. Then, they would return to the kitchen to bring out another dish of something or other. The servers also put food on their own plates but do not eat until they are done serving the others.
During the feasting there is talk and reminiscing. No tears, this is a joyful celebration of the life we had with Mom. Good food, good company and lots of laughter.
Our menu included: chef salad, hot green bean salad, mashed potatoes, hamburg gravy, fried pickerel, turkey, cranberries, scones, corn bread, white bread, rice pudding, strawberries, strawberry trifle and strawberry drink.
Strawberries figure prominently in our culture because it is considered to be a food, a cosmetic and a medicine and is believed to be the first plant given to us by the Creator. As a medicine, strawberry drink will cool a fever and fresh mashed strawberries has healing properties for cuts, scrapes, burns and rashes.
When everyone was done eating, Mom was told that we are at ease with her passing, that she was free of any earthly worries, that we had taken care of her earthy remains and unfinished business to the best of our ability and she was thanked for all she had done while she was here. She was told that she was now free to move on and to do whatever it was that she must now do.
Those of us with the nicotine habit were allowed to go to the smoking area (still staying within the locked area) but not until we had also left a cigarette for Mom beside her plate. Mom loved that because she was a smoker too.
After that everyone received something of Mom's as a gift and a memento of her. Once the gifts were given out, the doors were unlocked and we were done.
A Tough But Good Day.
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It's all quiet here now. Al has gone to bed and I have time to sit and collect my thoughts. Of course, all of my thoughts are about family because the one who held and shaped us, is gone. Mom passed away today, November 10, 2008 at 2:00 this afternoon.
We all knew that she was going and yesterday morning at 5:30 a.m., we began taking turns, gathering around her. Her breathing was laboured and she could not speak much. She slipped in and out of her dreams as we held her hand, talked to her and gave her sips of water.
Her grandsons went out and built the sacred fire at which her granddaughter gave the opening address in both the Mohawk and the English languages. The ceremonial tobacco was burnt and we kept that fire going all that day and all through the night. Many people came to visit, to speak and to sing in her Native language. Nothing could have been more appropriate since she was the one who brought the language back to the people after so many had forgotten, or never knew it. On our Mohawk Territory the stop signs read "tenhsa ne" instead of "stop" and mom was one of the people who made that happen. None of us will ever be able to see one of those signs without thinking of her.
At 3:00 this morning she began every once in a while, to open her eyes and laugh and mumble something that sounded as if she were greeting people that we could not see. Throughout the day she seemed to be trying to hang on and then shortly after one of her dear old friends came by, she passed on.
I think one of the people she was greeting was her sister, my aunt Nellie, who passed on eight years ago. After all, they shared the same birthday, they both had sons born on their birthdays so I suppose it was fated that the two of them should also die on the same day. Needless to say, their two families grew up always staying close, no matter how far apart we lived.
After Mom passed on, many of us gathered at the sacred fire where we again burned the ceremonial tobacco and offered our prayers and thanks to the Creator. My goddaughter again gave the closing address in both languages and when she was done, a log rolled out of the fire and the fire was done.
The women closest to mom gathered in her room to sing mom away on her journey while her body was washed and prepared for the funeral home to take. When we were done, mom's home care nurse called them to come and while they wheeled her out we followed in a procession behind her, still singing the Native Seed songs.
We all stayed at her house for a while after that, visiting and sharing our stories of her. A good friend and neighbour brought over a huge pot of stew and others brought bread, cake and in sharing this fantastic feast we were able to share the burden of grief which made it much less.
So although this has been one of the hardest days of life to get through, it has also been a good day. Of course there is grief, we love her and will miss her, but there is also lightness in knowing that she no longer suffers. She had been so very ill for such a long time and now her pain is gone and she is home with her mother and my dad and her sisters and brothers. It has also been a good day because of the support and love that was shown by (and to) each and every person who was there. Exactly as mom would want.
Now all that remains to be done is arrange a funeral service that can accommodate over a thousand people. There are 2,500 people on this territory and I think my mom knew or was related to every single one of them! And I have no idea how many will be coming from off-rez. I just give thanks for our supportive community, our neighbours and for my family's help with this!
Frustrations and Elations 2
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When her hands are not paining too much, she can still strum a few chords. Some days she can hold a pen long enough to write a letter or two.
Yesterday we went to the doctor and since moving in with me, her blood pressure is now the lowest that it has ever been. (Mine hasn't gotten up as high as I thought it would either!)
We even got out shopping! This is the first time she has been to a store in over a year. It totally exhausted her but it was a happy exhaustion! Of course this event was full of frustrations too (trying to push a wheelchair and a shopping cart at the same time is no easy task!) but we still had a good time.
I was starting to worry there for a while because I wondered if senility was setting in. Sometimes when I asked her about something, she would give me the weirdest kind of answer and start laughing. Example:
Tree: Mom, would you like me to pick up some wings from KFC?
Mom: Whoo, whoo. Hot, hot, hot.
or:
Tree: Mom, company is coming.
Mom: No meat, no Hubert.
???
THEN I realized that she's just watching too much TV! She was responding with TV Commercials! AND they were perfectly appropriate to the situation. There isn't anything senile about Mom. A little forgetful but quite often still a step or two ahead of everyone else!
Frustrations & Elations 1
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Also filed under frustrations is when we have an early morning hospital appointment to which we must take a form that the hospital has sent her. She lets me know about this form at midnight, the night before and informs me that it is a pink page that is in a box on her windowsill at her house. Since this is a necessity, I drive over to her house (at midnight, in a snow storm) and search everywhere but there is no pink paper to be found. So I get her on the phone to ask her where else it could possibly be and she tells me - Nevermind, it's a white paper and I have it here in my purse.
I can laugh about these things now but at the time....!
Filed under elations are her good days when she is relatively pain free. She will sing along when I pick up my guitar and it really does not matter that she is singing a different song than what I am playing!
She will sit at the kitchen counter and teach me how to make different dishes.
She will talk to me about my dad and when my brothers were just small boys.
She will help me translate songs and phrases into the Mohawk language.
On her really good days she will wheel her chair around and sweep the floor and/or do the dishes. Even though I can see how this tires her out, I won't tell her not to do it. It is important to her to feel useful and for me to see the look of satisfaction, pride and accomplishment on her face when she gets it done is truly elating.
Also filed under elations are the things she does that make me laugh out loud.
I heard her one day calling, "Purple, Purple come here!" I could hear her getting frustrated and I was totally puzzled until I realized that she was talking to my old deaf dog and had forgotten that his name was Blue.
When she first came to live with me, she was a little frightened of my 4 dogs. She would yell at them to go lie down. I thought she was never going to get along with them until the day I discovered that when she thought no one was around, she was petting them and feeding them treats! As soon as I came into the room, she started muttering about "mangy mutts"! It all worked out - she now has 4 granddogs.
When it comes to mom, even the frustrations are elations. I'm just glad that she is around to be frustrating!
Hello and Welcome!
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Since this is my first blog post, I must start with a big Thank You to everyone who has encouraged and helped me along the way in this publishing journey. There have been many, too many to list here! Could I have done it without them? - probably, but they sure made it a lot easier and more fun as well! Thanks must also go to those who are still supporting me by purchasing "The Language of Poetry Forms".
During this publishing journey, I ran the gamut of emotions! From doubt and fear through frustration to hope and anticipation and finally to a sense of achievement and satisfaction. At every step there were many friends and family who were there with words of encouragement and practical help.
Special Thanks must go to Ms. Jacquii Cooke (webmistress of JPicForum.info) who got my treegood.com site up and running and is teaching me how to manage it. Since I am near computer illiterate, this lady must have the patience of a saint! I have been bombarding her with HELP emails but she has not yet lost patience. Mostly she just laughs at me and answers my questions.
For the Poetry Form of the Month, I have found a most fitting form for October's Halloween scariness! The Monotetra, with it's repeating end phrase, seemed to write itself. The poem is titled: From Carmarthen, and it is a little bit creepy because of what it doesn't say. Carmarthen is an actual place in Wales but really does not have much to do with the story line of the poem. I titled it this only because I couldn't think of a better one - so if you have any suggestions, PLEASE leave a comment!
Your comments are not only taken seriously, welcomed and appreciated, they are also NECESSARY. Anything you can suggest that would improve this site, my poetry or my writing in general is something that I NEED to know!
Coming in November and in honor of Remembrance Day, the form for the Poetry Form of the Month must be an Englyn Milwr - because it is also known as the Soldier's Englyn.
Until then, I hope that everyone has a safe and
