30 Lessons About Living From A Wise Woman

It’s Sunday, and usually Sunday is my day to spend with my mother. I take her swimming at the pool or lake and then back to my house for lunch in my kitchen, a visit with her grandchildren and a few ball-throws with my dog, Lucy. It’s been a tradition for the past three years, since my mom moved out here to Seattle from her home in New Jersey after living alone for 35 years.

Today, I am writing about my mom instead in being with her in person. Yesterday, she passed away peacefully at our local hospice center, ten days after suffering a massive stroke. Within a few days of her stroke, she had lost the ability to talk, open her eyes much, or move her limbs or her body. She had not eaten or drunk anything since being admitted to the hospital. She was diagnosed a little over a year ago with congestive heart failure, and she had a number of other ailments common to 81-year-olds (arthritis, memory loss). With three hospitalizations in 18 months, we had all seen this coming for a while.

Maria at the LakeMy mom had been very clear over the years with me and my sister that she was horrified by the idea of having to live in a nursing home, unable to walk. Certainly the idea of being unable to eat by herself, move much at all, unable to communicate with others, was the stuff of my mother’s nightmares. She was a woman who swam laps in the gym pool four days before her stroke. She had been a long time supporter of the group Compassion and Choices, and was thrilled when our state passed the Death With Dignity act in 2008, just before she moved out here. So her passing relatively quickly was both a sorrow and a relief.

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The Instrument of Creation

This essay is about coincidences, relationships, love, death, expression, creativity, and the profound role that music can play in our lives.

I’ve been through the wringer this week. I don’t quite know what to do with it all, so I am going to write about it here. This post has nothing to do with social media or marketing, but everything to do with music.

On Tuesday, I found out that someone I had once loved deeply, Kyril Faenov, had suddenly died. Wednesday, I attended his memorial, burial and reception. Twelve years after we ended our romantic relationship, I was embraced again by his family and close friends. As I write this, it is Saturday, and I have been struck bolt awake every morning since, the knife edge of sudden, painful realization again in my chest. People around me are mystified by my devastation. How could I be so profoundly affected by a relationship long ago resolved and, so I thought, put to rest?

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