I proposed to Kim on Saturday.

I want the world to love her like I do. My best tools are these words--even when they fall short.

So how can I tell you about Kim? Where are my best words?

I hold three of my stories very close to my heart. They were autobiographical in a way (as most good fiction can be). Real events, locations, and people inspired them. I won no awards for these stories (one was nominated and made a very short list), although each has garnered a fair share of attention.

The Battered Suitcase published "Reciprocity"  way back in September 2008. Yes, it's my big fish story, and yes, there might be spoilers. It's a story of struggling to fit in, a story of understanding who you are and trying to find a way for that you to fit with the rest of the world. It's a story which could have been tragic, but ends with a flash of gold.

I remember the idea for "The World in Rubber, Soft and Malleable" (published first at A Fly in Amber in September 2009 and later, in a slightly revised version, in Triangulation: End of the Rainbow and my collection, The Saints are Dead) coming to me while I shuttled the family to and from church one Sunday. I think we forgot our donated Christmas gift that morning and I had to run back to the house to grab it.The extra doorways and disappearing townsfolk became one of my favorites. The protagonist makes a hard decision in the end--choosing what may appear a rockier path to remain true to himself. It might be a rockier path, but it leaves the protagonist, Andy, an entire town to cover with spray-painted murals. "The World in Rubber" was a finalist for the Million Writers Award and a story which moves me each time I read it.

And finally, one of my most personal tales, "Wanting It" from Shock Totem #3 (2011). This little tale took several revisions and gallons of blood/ink. I'm proud of the way it reads, the feelings it evokes, and the lasting impression in the final lines. It's a story about losing something you hold dear--and how that loss colors the rest of the world. Like "The World in Rubber," I wrote it in first person. It's autobiographical, even if fiction. Ellen Datlow was kind enough to include "Wanting It" as an honorable mention in The Best Horror of the Year  (even mentioning my name in the introduction... me=humbled).

These stories are my children born from some of the hardest years of my life. They each tell truths about love and loss, grief and hope. They're special to me. They're a part of me.

So who's Kim?

She's the magic goldfish from "Reciprocity"; she's every mural Andy paints in "The World in Rubber, Soft and Malleable"; she's the ghost who comes after the end of "Wanting It" and tells the narrator his dreams are true. She leans close and whispers in his ear.

Who's Kim? Read the stories when you have time and you'll understand.

Who's Kim? She's seen all my scars and called me beautiful.  Everyone on the planet should be so blessed.

And by the way--she said yes.

Display Comments Add a Comment

 Me at Fern Lake in 2007...

Me at Fern Lake in 2012... Funny how the world tilted a little, but I'm looking for the same thing in the sky.

Guess which one is the more hopeful me. Go on, guess.

Display Comments Add a Comment

On my last day of high school, a group of senior parents hosted a picnic. The idea was to keep us sober for a few hours, I suppose. I stayed away from booze in high school--read Monday's post and you might understand why--so the picnic didn't make much difference to me. It was just time to socialize. Act stupid. Learn a few more lessons about life before graduation.

Some classmates started a game of two-hand touch football. A tackle happened when someone on the other team touched two hands to the back of the ball carrier. No one got hurt this way, right? The quarterback had a "five apple" count to get rid of the ball before he could be rushed. At some point, while I was playing quarterback, a kid on the other team (let's call him Bob) quickly growled his count, charged forward, and threw me to the ground before I could ditch the ball.

Bob--a classmate since 8th grade--had suffered a lot of insults during high school. He'd been the brunt of too many jokes. I wasn't innocent, but I wasn't the ring leader, either. Regardless, Bob chose me to be the lightning rod for his rage. Nearly twenty years later, I still remember the look of anger on Bob's face when he tackled me--as if he took all the pent-up frustration from the last four years and clobbered me with it.

I haven't thought of that moment in years, but as I sit here, trying to say what needs to be said, it is the moment which comes to me. Two lessons came alive in that moment, two vital lessons I understand now.

The first lesson is fairly obvious and somewhat overplayed: some people will not like me. Bob sure didn't. Maybe he burned through all his anger in that one, fiery moment because we've had cordial conversations since. Maybe he, like me, grew up and now understands high school students do stupid things. Mean things. Reckless, thoughtless things. And while we certainly felt like adults at the time, decision-making wasn't our chief skill. I gave Bob plenty of reasons to be angry. I made fun of him. I'm not proud. But--and this is perhaps the most important part of the lesson--I wasn't the only one to say hurtful things. He simply chose me and that moment. I didn't "earn" it any more than anyone else.

As I've grown older and a touch wiser (I hope), I know it's not just the Bobs of the world who will find reasons to dislike me. We all want to be liked--maybe it's some primal, evolutionary tic--but seeking universal acceptance is a lost cause. It's something I've fought most of my life. I've hurt myself in the pursuit of "likeability". And poor Bob never asked for all the abuse we hurled at him. He never did anything to earn our "dislike" but be who he was.

Now, at 37, I know we all have to be who we are regardless of how others receive us. Polonius might have been a bearded blow hard, but his advice to Laertes is as sound today as when Shakespeare penned it: to thine own self be true. At least when you are true to yourself those who like you--and love you--will do so for you. One must be honest with him/herself before sharing with the world. It's an old lesson, not one I invented, but a good one. If you're honest with yourself and the world still tries to hold you back... that's about them--not you. Keep moving forward past the sea of doubters. You don't have to be like Bob and knock one to the ground, but keep moving forward.

The second lesson which Bob taught me, the most important lesson, is simple, but it's a rare human who can take it to heart. When you want something, really want it, you have to throw yourself at it body, heart, mind, and soul. You have to go for it, dive, hope, and if you land in the dirt, bloodied knees and bruised shins, at least you've lived.

Look, Bob took plenty of abuse before he knocked me down. Life kicked him around enough before that afternoon in May of '93. If he missed the tackle, what was one more trip to the dirt, one more bruise when his ego had taken a beating? But he didn't miss. He hit me, hard. And the look of satisfaction on his face... priceless. Priceless enough that I can close my eyes now, twenty years later, and still see it. Bob was really alive at that moment, really living.

I'm living, too. I'm throwing myself into the tackle, going for it all or nothing, throwing my mind, body, heart, and soul into it. And yes, it's about more than me; it always is. I want my boys to understand how precious life is and not cower from it when bad shit happens. I want resilient kids who can love and laugh and live through all the hard stuff. I want them to grow up with minds that hope, hearts that love, and bodies that wear enough scars to tell good stories. In the process, I suspect each one of them will earn a beautiful soul.

I want them to know that when someone amazing comes along, you love her as hard as you can and you move forward with no attention to those who would hold you back.You throw yourself into the tackle whether you make it or not, all or nothing. Life is too precious not to.

Yes, there's more. There's always more.

Soon.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Hello again, blog.

The beauty of the internet (and the inherent danger, some may say) is the words put out here can last for a long time. I've heard people use words like "forever" but forever is a long time. That EMP coming from a giant comet will probably take care of the internet some day.

I digress.

This is about my mom. I'm writing it understanding these words might last a long time. They may reach far. They may not. But I'm writing it all the same.

I need the world to know a few things about my mom, especially why I respect her as much as anyone on the planet--even when we disagree. I need to world to know because Mom has been there and helped shape how I approach life.

My father had an "episode" in 1980, near the beginning of the school year. Paramedics rushed him to Clay County Memorial Hospital, and then on to Topeka for tests at a larger hospital. He had a brain tumor, malignant, and the cancer/treatment would slowly eat him away over the next nine years. He died in November, 1989. I was a freshmen in high school.

Mom filled those nine years with patience and caring. She took care of an ailing man--a man who was often out of touch with reality, a man who accused her of many awful, untrue things. A man who made all of us feel just a little unsafe from time to time. We made sometimes bi-weekly trips to Topeka so he could see specialists at the Menninger Clinic. She fought a legal battle, went to graduate school to increase her earning potential as the only salary in the house, and coached three sports to add a few dollars to each paycheck. I rode more buses than I care to count with the middle school girls' basketball team as an elementary student. Still, she rose early on Saturday mornings and made doughnuts for me to munch as I watched cartoons. I always had clean clothes, a full belly, and a warm home. She did all this while the man she married slipped into a grey shadow of who he was.

This is how I knew my mother and father.

She taught me about resiliency and toughness. She taught me how to put your head down and continue on when life hurled unimaginable horror at you. She taught me how to take care of your kids when things were eating away at you. She taught me about love.

She's helping me with the boys, now. She takes care of them when I am busy with my job, when I'm not able to be there, and when I need to be gone for me. She gives me breaks she never received. I've joked that she's my au pair. My nanny. 

We don't always see eye to eye--we don't share the same outlook on life, but she's been there. Always stubborn. Always loving.

My mother never remarried--not yet, anyway. In fact, even though Dad died in '89 and I didn't graduate until May of 1993, she didn't go on a date until I was out of the house.

Mom and I are different people. We've made some similar choices and some very different ones when confronted with harsh realities. We are different people, but I will always hold the utmost respect for her.

I've been blessed to have her in my life. I wouldn't be where I am now without her.

I've been blessed in many ways.

Stay tuned.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Hey Blog, it's me. Aaron.

We haven't spoken in a while. It's nothing personal--really. It's just, well, I don't need to talk to you as much as I did in the past. I really needed you then. We had so much to say to each other. Some of it was nonsense. Some of it was blood drawn from our veins. Sometimes, I performed open heart self-surgery for the world. I don't regret a moment we've spent together, Blog. I know our time has helped others know me better. I can't hide the words we've shared and I'd never want to...

Please understand this isn't you, Blog. It's me. It's where I'm at in life. When I started you, I was coping with some pretty heavy stuff. We've traveled miles together. We cried together. We shouted at the big, dark night together. We held each other when things were really, really bad.

But, dear Blog, I've grown. I'm not the same man who posted for the first time on December 9, 2007, almost five years ago. I've grown, but you're still here. You'll always be here. You'll be here when I need you again--should I need you again. I hope I won't. I don't want to need you in the same way I had before.

Is this goodbye?

No. Not really.

It's just... time for me to acknowledge my heart is somewhere else. My words are somewhere else. And it's good, Blog. It's so very good. When my words were with you, they had no where else to go. They were homeless and cold and frightened--and that, dearest Blog, is no way for words to live. Now, they have a home. A good, warm home where they can grow and play without fear, without loneliness, without terrible thoughts driving them into dark corners.

So long, Blog, for now. You'll always be right *here*.

Add a Comment

I've always wanted people to like me. 

It's been my greatest weakness and one which I share with plenty of the world's population. After all, humans are social creatures, right? Of course we are. But trying to live a life so others will "like" you leads down a steep, rocky slope to the badlands. It leads to anxiety, suffering, and unhappiness. I have no desire to wallow in that mire ever again.

Yesterday, our school's band director shared a nugget of wisdom he learned as an undergrad: when you take your first job, disband the booster club.

What? Throw away all the support? All the fundraising? All the advice?

His explanation: even though you might step on a few toes, it leaves you free to direct your band and run your own program without being beholden to a sea of sometimes disparate and not-so-reasonable voices. I live in a world of metaphor and didn't lose the correlation with my life. After Aimee died, I received support from scores of people and silent encouragement from even more. She touched many lives in Lawrence, undergraduate school at the University of Columbia, and all the way back to her childhood in St. Louis. Plenty of people wanted to give back. I get that. I respect it, too, and I'm grateful for those who care. I will always be grateful for those who care and share their love.

But I must make decisions for my life and the lives of my kids on my own. I continually feel pressure from those who would have me "be" Aimee--at least live my life as they assume it would be should she still be alive--but I'm not Aimee. Never was. Never will be. My life changed irrevocably with her death. I'm the director of this band and must do what is right for me and the boys--us. It might not be what someone else would choose. Likely, it won't be. I'll listen to advice, weigh its merits, but chose the path based on what we need.

Will I make mistakes? Sure. Will I take risks? Absolutely. Will there be hard days? Of course. Will there be joy and love and goodness? Of course--I know there will be plenty of love and goodness. The trail up the mountain is just as rocky as the way down--but I hear the lakes are clear and beautiful and the view breathtaking--much better than the swampland at the bottom of the hill.

Add a Comment

"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown." 

H.P. Lovecraft, right? Fear sounds like a great topic for a horror writer's blog, especially during October. Just don't tell anyone I haven't finished a story since March, okay? Besides, I'm a human being before I'm a horror writer. And this human being has faced a lot of fear in his life. Note the past tense: faced.

Last night, someone very dear to me asked if I was "scared" of the future. I took a minute to feel the the question, weigh it a little, and try to understand my feelings before I responded.

No. Not scared. I don't fear the future anymore. While I wrestle a bit with the unknown, it's a much healthier relationship than fear. Fear paralyzes and leads to poor judgement. Fear kills dreams and clogs the pathways to achieving goals. Maybe a better word than fear is anticipation, that heightened sense of reality when expecting something important, something big. Something challenging but wholly good. 

And the future is good. Life is good, even when it is a struggle. Even when awful tragedy happens, I still have the choice to focus on hope and goodness and the gifts I've been given. Yes, it may be impossible to feel hope and goodness in the midst of the tragic event. I know--I've been there. But the lesson looks different seven months later. None of us make it through life without scars, but scars become stories, and stories remind us of the preciousness of each day. Besides--when "bad things" happen, they will do so whether I allow fear to eat away my life or not. An abundance of fear makes no one safer. That is the lie that fear whispers to us. 

Wasted energy, if you ask me. I'd rather save my energy for the road ahead.

So how do I feel about the future? Hopeful. Filled with a healthy level of anticipation. Ready to roll up my sleeves and go to work. It's good.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Communication is hard. It's the most difficult activity in which we humans engage. And while other animals "communicate," humans are the only creatures on the planet to use language. Feel free to use your uniquely human ability to use language and argue that one in the comments below.

When I started teaching, one of the courses on my load was titled "Applied Communications." It was nothing but a "dumbed-down" speech class built around modules published in the late 1980s. I first taught the class in 1999-2000. So much had changed in just over a decade... The modules were oh-so out-of-date.

But this hadn't changed: communication is hard.

I can send what I feel is a very clear message to someone, but that message passes through filters and noise before being received and interpreted. The message, truly, is in the ears (or eyes) of the beholder. Language is infinitely complicated and communicating tainted with all sorts of external and internal "stuff" before decoded and understood. It's frightening, really, to try and make someone understand your message as you want it understood. Sometimes it requires persistence and repetition. Sometimes it requires dogged stubbornness. Sometimes it requires all the patience love can muster to make the message heard.

This I believe: words are not cheap. As a human, I know they are my most complicated tool. I've spent my life trying to understand their nuance, but still fall short sometimes. And while I can't argue against the old adage "actions speak louder than words" I believe in the power of words written or said well to send the right message. Sometimes words are all I have. Sometimes the message doesn't break through the noise and emotional stuff the first time.

This is why I keep talking. This is why I continue to send the message. This is why I won't quit.

I saw Pink Floyd on this tour. Amazing show. Keep talking.

Display Comments Add a Comment

I took a walk this afternoon. A park sits just to the west of the school stadium, and a nature trail winds through the woods of the park. Years ago, when I taught Emerson and Thoreau, I would walk my English classes to the park and have them sit and experience "nature," journaling about their experience.

I hadn't been on that path for years. It had changed a little. A few taller trees, a little less water in the pond thanks to our summer drought. A felt a moment of nostalgia, but the moment passed.

Earlier this week, I took another walk. The top 10% from our senior class were honored at KU's Memorial Union, and after the ceremony I strolled around the campus. I have very few memories of the campus from my years as a graduate student. I was also a new father and full-time teacher, so most of my memories are blurry at best--not to mention 75% of my classes met in Kansas City at a satellite campus. Most of my memories stem from other times, some distant and some very recent... some slightly bittersweet and some strong and good.

Here's what I've learned about place and memory: time passed isn't as much a factor to how I experience a place as the time in my life when I revisit it. The lenses I'm wearing now shape how I tell the stories of my memories, and memories without stories attached are just vague things without much form or shape.Like ghosts of feelings which, like other ghosts, can haunt.

Visiting those places often exorcises the ghosts and leaves the story. I want the story. The ghosts can stay behind.

For years, I used to feel sad when we left my mom's place in Clay Center. It was a deep, chest-squeezing sadness. I grew up in that house. My formative memories hold it at their core. Earlier this fall, as we drove away from the house for the last time, no sadness came. I was done with that part of my life--I knew it, and this part, where I am now, has no need for that old house. The lack of feeling almost surprised me, but it also reminded me that this is how it should be.The ghosts don't need to haunt us.

I have countless stories from my childhood--countless stories built from memories of that house, my neighbors, and the small town which raised me, but I don't carry sadness anymore. Stories are good, wholesome things. Human things. And I count myself lucky to be able to tell them.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Six months ago today, a pounding on my front door woke me. Two sheriff's deputies and a parish priest were on the front stoop to tell me Aimee was dead, killed when a southbound coal train struck our Honda Civic just north of Lawrence.

Six months. Half a year.

Nearly 2/3 of Elliot's life. He was 3 1/2 months old and is now 9 1/2.

I remember being the Aaron of six months ago. I remember feeling the awful, empty pain in my stomach and chest.

A week or so after she died, I remember telling myself I would feel differently in a month, in three months, in six months. I remember focusing on the magic of time to heal wounds torn open on that April day. I remember well how I knew I could not make "it" happen any faster than it needed to on its own.

Time, the only truly precious resource, had to sweep forward. I couldn't stop time had I wanted to.

And time has brought many changes, some more wonderful than I could have hoped. It has brought grief, healing, and insight beyond what Aaron from six months ago would have imagined. It has brought a new zest for living, a new focus on life, a new perspective on the importance love and understanding and patience play in my life and will continue to play in my life. It has encouraged me to live harder than I thought possible--and I don't mean the "hard" life, but the life lived to "eleven" (with a nod to Spinal Tap).

I sit here, Aaron of October 2012, and dream six months down the road. What will that Aaron be able to say of the one now? What new measurements can he take of his life?

I plan to live and experience and grow every day until I pause again to reflect.

It's a gift for which I am so thankful.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Has it been seventeen days since I last posted?

Radio silence here doesn't mean silence everywhere. In fact, I'm learning to be a better communicator than I have most of my adult life. I'm learning to say what needs to be said to those who need to hear, but doing so in ways which can deliver the message without malice or self-loathing or fear or worry or vindictiveness. I'm trying to be the best communicator I can, trying to cut away the noise and deliver the essence of the message.

It's hard.

Damn hard sometimes because words don't always do what you want them to. Words can't always translate emotions so others can feel you. Words are just words, simple tools, and sometimes fit like a broad-bladed screwdriver when a tiny one would do. Words can soothe a little but not take away the pain of losing a loved one, learning of tragedy, or facing your own mortality. Words are just words.

But I will take them.

Sometimes they are all I have.

The older boys and I have begun a daily ritual of taking "five minutes" one-on-one with Dad (me). I listen while they talk. Sometimes I share, too. Max, being six and a half, has his own super self-focused perspective on the days events. Once in a while he will surprise me, throwing in a big picture perspective that stretches well past his developmental age. Mostly, we talk about PE class or making a plaid pattern in art or what happened at recess. Owen has started really opening up to some "big talks" about life and our future. He surprises me a little, but then I realize he's my kid. I've never really done life halfway and don't want them to live that way either.

I wish we all (meaning everyone on the planet) had less fear when it came to communicating with one another. Maybe the fear stems from the insufficiency of language. Maybe the fear grows when we realize there really is no way to make someone we love know, really know what that love feels like inside of us.

I don't know. I will probably never have the answer, but I can live with it.

Communication breakdown?

No. Not at all.  

Add a Comment

If you live long enough, you'll come face to face with some genuine horrors. Death of loved ones, long illnesses, dishonesty and betrayal, heartache (and not the pleasant kind--because yes, I now believe ache can be pleasant)...

If you live long enough, you'll earn a few scars.

I was digging up Mom's peonies at her old house this past weekend when our neighbor sidled to me and said, "If you find any bones, we're not going to call the police."

What?

She laughed. Bones. Memories. Scars we've tried to bury in our own dirt. Painful experiences we've tried to shove down so deep and cover so completely we think--just maybe--no one will ever see them again. We don't have to show our weak moments. We can pretend those hurtful things never happened. We can live life free of the weight of history. No one has to see our scars if we cover them with enough hearty black soil.

But it never works, does it? You spend your life shoveling and shoveling and hoping it will be enough to hide the scars and the bones and memories, but your shoulders stiffen and your hands callous and crack and bleed... And the bones still come to the surface.

All of that energy wasted... for what?

The boys' principal said something wise this morning--kids are much better than adults at being open and honest about their thoughts and feelings if we give them a chance. Adults spend so much energy trying to suppress their feelings. Trying.

So much energy wasted... for what?

If the best of my short stories were about anything, they were about living in the face of pain and disappointment and horror. I've always felt hopeful about them, despite how hideous my progeny might look to a reader. I've always thought they were little stories of hope.

I'm living out loud the best I can. I'll save my energy for love and hope and gratitude. It is a conscious choice--a choice I can make as well as anyone. I'll dig up the peonies, but won't worry about the bones I find. They aren't mine, and I never buried them there.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Purging the basement, I found several artifacts of my life. Each one could sprout several stories:

Display Comments Add a Comment

In Act I, scene 3 of Hamlet, Polonius tells his daughter Ophelia, "Best safety lies in fear." He's speaking to his daughter about her relationship with Hamlet. Spoiler alert: fear or no, things weren't all that safe for Ophelia. Fear didn't protect anyone in that play.

The desire for safety breeds fear, and fear is the dream killer. Follow me down a path. The woods are darkening, but not dark yet. Noises haunt these woods: the clack of bone-dry branches knocked together by ragged breeze, the scrape of our feet over the brittle leaves on the path, the distant moan of some animal you hope is only an owl or other night bird. Scary? Maybe. But do not be mistaken; the most dangerous thing you might find here came with you.

A desire to be safe.

It's supposed to be a comfortable word, a good, warm word. Safe. But the desire to be safe often leads to fear. Living in fear leads to a life of chances not taken, dreams unfulfilled because an army of "what-ifs" march to our threshold and hold us back. Will we fall on the path at times? Yes. Will we scrape our knees? Hell yes. There will be bruises, too, and hard times, and days of slogging through mud. But there will be wholesome fulfillment and love and wonder because we took chances at which safety balked. Safety never climbed Mount Everest. Safety never crossed an ocean. Safety never landed on the moon. Safety never fell in love and stayed in love through hardship and heartache. Safety never made me send my first short story submission into the wild. All "safety" ever brought was a heaping dose of fear. All fear ever brought was extra sour to my lemonade. God knows I like a good, sweet lemonade.

There is a certain freedom which comes when fear is put in its proper place. I remember the night I gave up. Max's birthday this year--just a month after Aimee's death. It was a raw night. The boys finally hit their beds after a long evening of cake and presents. I spent an extra hour building a Lego something which lasted about three days. I was exhausted, emotionally and physically. Mom reminded me we needed milk. She stayed with the boys while I ran to the store. Walking into the grocery store, it hit me. After Aimee's death, after her illness, after Max's stint at Children's Mercy, after all the home improvement nonsense and the running and running and running... I was done. Spent. Stripped bare. What did I have left to fear?

It was a turning point. A glimpse of blue sky through the black web of branches on this path. What did I have left to fear? Fear never kept anyone I loved safe. It never protected my mother, my brother or sister, my kids, Aimee... myself. Fear never kept anyone safe no matter what it promised.

So fear? Safety?

Forget you. Forget you straight to Hades.* I'll choose to live instead.

*Did you like how I went all "PG"? Well played, Aaron. Well played.

Add a Comment

I've had several brushes with Aimee's ghost in the last few weeks.

Let me rephrase: I've had several people at different places in their relationship with Aimee's death speak with me in the past few weeks. One person asked permission to make a tribute; one simply greeted me like it was April 2nd and not nearly five months later with no sense of the journey I've taken in those five months.Another, a parent of former students, simply gave me a hug. There were others, but these are salient and representative.

When someone dies, we each own our own grief. We have to. Mine is not the same as Aimee's mother, her father, her sister, or any of the boys, just as my relationship with Aimee wasn't the same as it was with any of those people. My relationship with her death is as different from anyone's as my relationship with her while she was alive. To call it anything else would be untruth.

What I want--I need--the world to know is that I don't own Aimee's memory. I am not the gatekeeper for anyone else's grief journey. I don't have answers for her family or the boys, former students or her co-workers. Anyone. I've only been able to find answers for myself, answers which have been painful, but real. No matter how painful, no matter how broken, we can still strive for beauty in life. We can still love. We can still live every day as though it is a precious, precious gift.

Because life is a precious gift. Every. Damn. Day.

I stood next to Aimee's body for three hours the night of the visitation. I shook hands, hugged, laughed, and cried with hundreds of people. I knew some of them; others were strangers to me. I was the conduit, the lightning rod for so much raw, barbaric emotion. The well is deep. Bottomless at times. That night, I was there as a stand in for her.

Now, I can't be her stand in any more. Aimee would have rejected the idea of me owning her memory, being the sole keeper of her legacy, just as much as she would have rejected such obscene inequality when she was alive. I never owned her. She was her own person, at times beautiful and full of life but as fragile as any of us. She had countless relationships, too, and each was precious and unique in its own way.

I lay this burden down not out of malice or ill will or exhaustion, but because it is not mine. If you had a relationship with Aimee, it is yours. Take care of it. Show it to loved ones. Tell stories and remember good times. Set her ghost free. Cling to it if you need to. Rage with it. Build an altar and let her smoke rise up forever if that is what you need. Love her memory like you loved her.

Display Comments Add a Comment

I recently started my new job as guidance counselor at McLouth Middle/High School. No, it has nothing to do with the latest Triangulation anthology, but I'll get to that. Trust me.

Enrollment took place last Thursday night and Friday morning. I saw what felt like hundreds of parents and students in a small amount of time (it was probably only a few dozen, but the feeling was there). I changed schedules, enrolled new kiddos, and was just there for a few to vent.

I don't remember if I've ever blogged about "the well" before, but as I'm nearing 1,000 posts, I don't remember a lot I've blogged about. The well, the deep place inside a person in which they can feel emotion, has been my greatest ally in the last eight months.

When I coached forensics, I talked to my team about the emotional battery inside all of us--the well--and how they could draw from that to make their performances work. I guess I was teaching method acting; it's just the language which spoke to me. This year, one senior placed 5th at state in serious solo acting, the highest placement in years. His piece, "Griefstruck" by J.J. Jonas, involved a tragic car accident which wiped out a young man's entire family. The morning of the performance, I looked at my student and asked, "Do you need any motivation?"

We went there. He knew. I knew. State forensics came only a month after Aimee's death.

My biggest ally in healing--and not only healing from Aimee's suicide, but her illness and struggles over the past eight years--has been the well. Mine's pretty deep, and I don't mind drawing from it. It helps me hear other people in hurt. It helps me work with teenagers. In helps me be there for my own kids, even when I'm exhausted and stretched too thin. It helps me enjoy life, too. It helps me love.

Yes. The well is deep.

Triangulation: Morning After is now available. It's the fourth Triangulation book in which I've managed to land a story, and I thank Stephen Ramey and the whole crew. "Scar Tissue Wings" is as much about Max's stint in Children's Mercy last December as it is about a man who cannot die in a world which already has. The well helps me go there. Triangulation has always been about telling the truth even with a strange spin. Some of my favorite stories have been graced to find themselves in its pages: "Dancing Lessons," "The Good Daughter," "The World in Rubber, Soft and Malleable," and now "Scar Tissue Wings." This may be the last year for the anthology because the price of producing it has stretched limited resources too far. Please buy a copy so future writers can find a venue for their truths.

Add a Comment

I try to practice "being in the moment" especially when the moments are good. It's all too easy to keep thinking about the next moment, and the next, and next week, and going back to work, etc. instead of really attending to Now. Focusing on the present helps enhance special moments and builds intense memories. Focusing on the present helps make life good.

And it's been a good week--wonderful moments of cheek-aching smiles, laughter, lazy river rides, and getting lost only blocks from a destination.

Aimee was the first to bring "being in the moment" or "being in the now" to my attention--from Eckhart Tolle's seminal book, The Power of Now. She talked about "the moment" but struggled with it. Life pulls us in so many directions, little stressors yank and tug until our minds are splintered.

In fifteen minutes, I'll be riding the lazy river again... floating on an inner tube with the boys... laughing. While I'm there, I'll be there, truly there. Yes, I have to go back to work this week. Yes, there will be laundry to do at home. Yes, little things will pull away my attention as time passes. But there are moments of precious peace and presence. I'm going to enjoy every one of them and build memories.

I hope you find some of your own.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Monday shook me awake before three this morning, slapped me hard, and asked, "What now?"

Yes, what now?

The funny thing about 3 AM wake ups... sometimes that's when the ideas happen. I haven't sought a story idea in over four months, and last night, a plot unwound in front of me as I searched for sleep. Look for one thing, receive another, I suppose.

But ideas don't just happen, do they?

I watched American Movie with a buddy of mine last week. I'd never heard of the film--a documentary about a low budget filmmaker in Wisconsin with all sorts of personal issues. But the movie isn't really about making a movie--it's about following dreams and making something happen, even if you lack the ability or resources to fully realize your dream, to fully make it come to life as it should. I've been there all too often with writing: the idea is there, but the words won't cooperate. Lately--at least until last night--the ideas weren't even cooperating.

I didn't look for inspiration in the dysfunction, economic turmoil, and alcoholism rampant in American Movie. I found inspiration in one man's (perhaps misguided) quest to make a movie, to realize a dream. As with many things in life, the final product did not do the journey justice. Is is the journey which matters, always. 

The inspiration came when I realized it's time to keep moving, keep writing, keep living. There are miles to go, and the forest is dark ahead, but I imagine mountain vistas, too, and the special dignity of blisters on my quite metaphoric road-weary feet.

Let's go.

Display Comments Add a Comment

I feel another "significant" post brewing, but it will wait for another day. Today, I bring pictures from our recent trip to Rocky Mountain National Park and one of my favorite stories about Aimee.

National Parks were/are an obsession of ours--I still have our map of all National Parks hanging in the basement (with color-coded pins indicated which family member has been where). In 2000, Aimee and I took a road trip to Yellowstone and Grand Teton. We camped for five nights--four of them in Yellowstone--and enjoyed all the sights. The view of the Tetons from Jackson Lake... spectacular. We rented a boat, a small craft with an outboard motor, and headed onto the lake. The boat's owner gave us a bit of advice which caused contention:

Stay within a mile of shore.

Of course, Aimee (being the adventurous type she was), aimed the boat for the mountains and gave it the gun. My knuckles whitened as I clutched the gunnels.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Staying a mile away from shore like he said," she said.

"No. No. No." I glanced over my shoulder at the swelling waves. The tiny boat would easily capsize in the middle of Jackson Lake. "He said within a mile of shore."

She didn't agree, of course, but the look of sheer-animal-panic on my face convinced her to turn our ship around. Aimee and I weren't able to share enough National Park adventures before her death (could there ever be enough National Park adventures?), but the boys and I will keep going...

I hiked to Fern Lake early on Saturday morning, the date which would have been our 11th wedding anniversary. Aimee and I made the same hike on our 6th wedding anniversary (June 16, 2007), just over a year after Max was born. I was early enough to miss the crowd (it's a tough hike, but a popular one) and have some alone time with the lake, the trees, the mountains, and my thoughts.



Elliot was not impressed by the lack of oxygen above tree line.



Max, Owen, and I on top of the world. Okay, at least on top of a granite formation on Trail Ridge Road. 


Max and Owen showed me how to scramble on the rocks near a waterfall. Going down was easier than up.

Display Comments Add a Comment

There comes a time during every vacation when I decide I'm ready to go home. Vacation is great--new adventures are great--but home... It's just home. Home brings comfort and routine; I spend less energy at home and can focus on other things. Damn I love those mountains, but until I buy my cabin, home is in Lawrence.

On Sunday night in Estes Park, while packing for home, I sank into a recliner in our rented cabin. A heavy weight pressed against me--it wasn't exactly the "grief landmine" feeling, but something close. I suddenly understood the easy comparison between losing my spouse and homesickness.

The only problem--when your partner dies, you can't go "home" again. Not to the same home.

Aimee has been gone for nearly three months now; an eternity in some ways (half of Elliot's life), but a blink in others. The first few weeks of April were muddy and slow and painful. Part of May vanished beneath "endings" (school, soccer, etc., etc., etc.). June has clipped along with my deck building project, Colorado, camps, art classes, and trips to the swimming pool. Day by day, the new normal takes root. It digs deeper. But this isn't quite home. It's a new place. A move without moving.

Baby steps...

Yes, this is why you learned the Pythagorean Theorem in high school: so you could build a deck. It's also handy for laying tile. I'm well beyond this point (attached the joists today), but I thought my students need to know that math is real. Look--I'm doing math.  Math is helping me guarantee a square corner. Yay, math!

(Somebody tell me to bend at the knees next time. My lower back is killing me.)

Display Comments Add a Comment

The new front porch/deck is "done." Done as in: you can walk on it, sit on the new furniture, jump up and down, and even lean on the railing. I still need to add railing near the front door (on the opposite side of the deck) and do a little landscape work, but right now it's too damn hot.

I wanted to build a porch/deck for two reasons:

1. Aimee always wanted a front porch.

2. This is my house now, and by God, I'll build a damn porch if I want.

Our neighborhood is relatively "porch" free. This saddens me. It's an older neighborhood (most houses built in the early '60s), but not old enough to be part of the grand American porch tradition. The lack of front porches is a sorry development in residential architecture. I'm thrilled to have one.

I remember moving into the neighborhood--how Aimee lamented not knowing the neighbors like those she did when she was a girl. Eleven years later, I know the neighbors (most of them), well. They were there when Aimee died, swooping in to clean up the house and take care of things.They've been there through many ups and downs for over a decade.

The porch/deck isn't much--but it's enough. I can listen to the rustle of leaves from my pin oak and fire maple. I can wave to the neighbors as they drive by. I can sit and remember good times with my wife and dream of good times to come.

 

Display Comments Add a Comment

Display Comments Add a Comment

I haven't written a word of fiction in more than three months. Not. One. Word.

Do I have your attention? Good.

I've used writing as therapy over the past six years. I started a year after Max was born, one of the hardest years of my life. Aimee spent two stints in the hospital that year and we struggled with balancing medication and therapy and workload and home life... When I started writing, I wasn't sure what direction it might take.

Monsters started appearing in my stories. Monsters and strange situations and Twilight Zone-esque plots. I embraced the weirdness, wrote stories about hotels with shifting rooms, doors to "other places" in the basements of a small Kansas town, a wife who morphed into a new person every morning...

Therapy.

I never called it therapy--it just became therapy. I wrote through my demons, my fears and anxieties about what had happened/was happening with my wife and family. With fiction, I controlled a little sliver of reality--the sliver I invented. I never called it therapy and I never really thought about it, either. It just was.

I haven't written a word of fiction in more than three months. I haven't wanted to--

On Sunday night, a good friend said, "You might not want to revisit those demons."

That sounds true. I hadn't thought about writing just like that--demons I hadn't wanted to revisit. My stories gave words to so many doubts and fears, and now I'm living in a different world, a world with different demons. I'm using "demon" as a metaphor--and we all have them. Doubts. Fears. I've learned different demons need a different kind of exorcism. I've always used creative pursuits to wrestle with mine. My summer screen printing and book binding classes have been very therapeutic. Once upon a time, I wanted to be an art therapist. I know why. I know why...

As for writing, I hope it's not gone, but I'm not going to seek out trouble just to stir those creative juices. Let it come as it comes.

Yes, I found this in a fortune cookie last week. Best. Fortune. Ever.

Display Comments Add a Comment

I'm making köttbullar for some friends today--or meatballs as we'd say in English. The funny thing about these is that they are meat-less because the target audience lives a mostly meat-free life. How does one make meatless meatballs? With potatoes (from our family garden), ground almonds, and love.

I've used food as an "I love you" for a long time. I suppose I learned this from my mother--what with her always available chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter brownies, and various pies. During college, I never came home to an empty pan or cookie jar.

My first gift to Aimee, was a peach pie. We'd only been dating for about a month, so I didn't want to get weird or anything. She'd mentioned liking peach pie once. I made one and "sealed the deal." (her words, not mine) I baked scores of pies over the years--peach, strawberry rhubarb, chocolate peanut butter... Aimee's birthday became an occasion for pizza, a different kind of pie. When she turned thirty, I kneaded dough and baked for hours. By her fortieth, I'd learned a few tricks, but every pizza was still a work of my two hands.

When prepping food for friends, I always like to make it from scratch, just like my potato meat(less)balls. Food is special that way--something with effort and care put in that you can actually taste and feel.

Aimee helped plant this year's potato crop, and I'm happy to share this little miracle tubers with friends.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Being a recovering high school English teacher, I tend to frame my world in metaphor. Being a writer, the metaphors often take that route.

I mentioned going through some life revisions to a friend earlier this week. But yesterday, as I found myself asking "what the hell am I doing" several times, I realize I'm not revising anything.

I'm a work in progress.

We all are, really, little works in progress. Yes, conventional psychological wisdom indicates an individual's personality is fairly crystallized by thirty or so. Yes, I'm past that age. But really, our lives--what happens to us and what we do about it--continue to develop. And that's what I'm doing, developing. Adventuring in undiscovered countries.

For the first time in a long time, I don't know what the future holds. I never really did, but when life was routine, I found myself living some sort of delusion: it has always been this way, it will always be this way--neither statement is true. Neither statement has ever been true.

In "Guided by Wire," Neko Case sings

Life is not a constant thing
It's only made of short stories

Yes, true. To a point. I'd like to think life is like a series of short stories with overlapping characters, something like Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried but without the landmines and snipers. But to think of life as one single work constantly needing revision... No. It is more like a story collection.

So "what the hell am I doing"? Living. Hollering big, barbaric yawps when I have the chance. Seeing where this manuscript heads next. I have many stories yet to write--and yes, some of them are fictional.

Display Comments Add a Comment