Housebound

On Monday I had my second total knee replacement (left) - my right one was done in January and I told the doctor that if he could do the same thing with my left knee that he did with my right, I would be a happy customer.

It's only been four days, but I think things are looking pretty good.  The doctor called me a "star" patient and the nurses and PT people at the hospital were amazed at how easily I breezed through everything. It definitely helped going through this once and knowing what was coming.

Now I get to spend the next few weeks vegging out at home doing some light exercises and healing before I have to start the hard job of physical therapy.

It's just so unusual for me to sit here and not feel like I have to jump up and do laundry, cook something, tidy something, etc. etc. But I'm on a break from all that for a while.

Last time I couldn't get my brain clear enough to do much writing or reading - but I did do some sewing and wrote in my journal. I've got a quilting project prepared that I may start tomorrow and I just downloaded a new book onto my Nook. I haven't gotten bored yet.

Food is kind of an issue because I'm here alone all day and have to fend for myself for breakfast and lunch and my husband is doing some simple cooking when he gets home.  Luckily, my appetite hasn't returned yet. I've included this picture of peach pie because this is something I hope to snag while I'm here sitting around. It's certainly one of my favorite kinds of pie and a local grocery store makes good pie.

Father's Day

The kids: Max, Sloan, Caleb during Sloan's college graduation weekend.

Each Father's Day I like to give a little tribute to my husband, Tom.
This year marks 32 years spent as a father  and  2-1/2 years as a grandfather.

We're at an odd time in our lives now when all the kids are adults and we're standing on the sidelines watching them making their life decisions.

Some of those decisions are NOT the ones we would make. And sometimes I find myself telling Tom, "it's not our business."

But he finds it nearly impossible to really let them go. I think he will always feel the need to throw a protective umbrella over them. Perhaps that stems from the fact that his own father died young when Tom was only a teenager.

Tom has hung in there a lot longer. He has shepherded his children to adulthood and now, like it or not, we stand in the dust as they head off into pastures of their own making.

This afternoon we babysat for our little pre-school grandson. Before he could come over, Tom had to buy some special toys, a DVD and some candy. I try to warn Tom that we can't spoil him and we have to back off a little - but the truth is that neither one of us really feels that way. It's a different role for him - the grandparent instead of the parent - but he enjoys it and, characteristically, he's doing a good job with it.

Happy Father's Day, Tom. And many more!

Can not not write

Earlier this week I just pretty much gave it up.

For years I've been telling myself that I'm a writer, but to be one you actually have to WRITE and I just haven't been doing that. I journal, I write about writing, I read about writing, I organize programs to help other people write - but sitting down and creating new, original work is something I just haven't been able to make myself do.

It's not for lack of ideas. I have at least five projects going right now, two of which I'm determined to finish before the end of the year - and they are both book length.

But each time I sit down to write, I think about all the other commitments I've made that need my time and attention and all have deadlines that haunt me like ghouls!

I know better. I know a writer needs to set a time and keep that sacred like you would a doctor's appointment. But I have trouble settling my mind when other obligations are weighing on me. And I'm in big-time procrastination mode!

Finally, on Tuesday I just decided to give it all up.  Who would notice? I'm just a middle-aged (teetering on the edge of old) woman scribbling away at things that nobody is likely to read or care about. I'm tired of being persistent - I've had 40 years of persistence!

Then, yesterday I got a notion about an essay I'm working on for a larger collection. This morning I think I'm going to sit on the deck looking out over my quiet back yard, and work it all out.

I suppose in the end it doesn't matter if what I write never sees the light of day. I do it for me. I do it to quiet a too busy mind. I do it for when I'm gone - to cry out into the darkness that I was here and this is the way I thought. 

And all of that is enough. For now.


Quilt Success

My quilt, "Early Morning in Grand Teton National Park" made it into the Michiana Annual Art Competition and won an "honorable mention" in the fiber arts category.

It's always a little nerve wracking to enter contests, but I'm glad I pushed myself to design and sew this quilt.

Now if I can just push myself to finish the writing project that does with it!

Nolan's Spring Training

As each of our three children hit 5-years old we would sign them up for the tee-ball league, often volunteering to coach one of the teams ourselves, then spend a season of agony! Most of the kids (not ours of course!) had no concept of how to play the most basic game of baseball. Most of the kids couldn't hit a ball off a tee to save their lives - heck most of the kids couldn't even keep their hats on or stand in the outfield without sitting down to pick dandelions!

But our little Nolan doesn't seem to be heading down that path at all. We bought him this little baseball tee set and he can already whack that ball a fair distance. And although he does occasionally hit the tee - he's only 2-1/2 years old - just imagine what he'll be like when he turns five! He carries the name of a pretty famous baseball player, but it's a name our daughter-in-law chose - I'm not sure she even knew the baseball connection. But I can see the drive in Nolan. He's so much like his father: our son who never met a sport he didn't like.

For Easter Nolan got a tiny leather baseball mitt and the other day when he came over he brought it with him.  He shuffled through the stack of our old mitts that Tom had unearthed from the closet and found one he thought would work for me - then out we went to play catch. To be perfectly honest, I never once played catch with any of my own kids, but now that I'm a grandma, here I stand in the yard giving catching hints to a preschooler. "Keep your mitt down, keep your eye on the ball!"

He's losing any traces of the baby that he used to be such a short time ago. But that's okay, because I'm enjoying each step of him along the way. It won't be long before we're in the bleachers again!

Sloan's graduation

Earlier this month our whole family went up to East Lansing to see our daughter, Sloan, graduate from Michigan State University.  It was a fun time together - something we don't always get to do too often - and of course we were so proud of Sloan's accomplishment.

About a hundred years ago, when I was in high school and considering the almost unthinkable thing in my family - going to college - Michigan State University was where I wanted to go.  For some reason they never shared with me, my parents told me I had to stay home and start at our local community college. I don't know if they couldn't afford it, if they thought I was too immature to go away to school, or they didn't think I was smart enough to succeed - or a combination of all three.

All I know is that I went to community college and did very well there, but when it was time to transfer to a 4-year university, I bypassed Michigan State and chose a smaller state university instead because it wasn't so overwhelming.  Despite doing well at my chosen school, I have regretted my decision ever since.

Part of it was that my best friend from high school, Janice, went to Michigan State as a freshman and I thought she had a snooty attitude about it while I was tolling away in the "rinky-dink" community college - working and trying to save as much as I could and proving to my parents that I was worthy of making the jump to a university.

But a big part of it was that I really was afraid to go to that big school where I thought everyone else in my class would have had a two-year head start on me. I regret that I wasn't braver and far more confident.

So, I was very proud when our daughter decided that she could manage Michigan State from the start and probably over the last four years I have taken a bit too much pride in telling just about everyone I ran across that our daughter was at Michigan State.  But it is something to be proud of! She did very well. She's going to be a special education teacher.

She's never going to "bleed green and white" as so many MSU graduates seem to do for the rest of their lives - and I probably wouldn't have done that either. But it was thrilling to see her in her graduation gown and that graduation weekend will be a time I'll never forget.

Step by Painful Step

Sloan, Me and Tom somewhere in Utah
Here is the epilogue  essay from my National Park Project

I have a secret about my travels West.

The trips I write about in my National Park collection took place over a 23-year period of time, but there was a ten-year gap between our first trip and our second, and four more between the second and the next. It was with this third trip in 2003 that we started travelling to the West in earnest, trying not to let more than 18 months go by between excursions and sometimes managing two trips within a year.

It was also the start of the physical difficulties for me as my arthritic knees became increasingly painful until they got to the point where I was barely functioning at all. And that’s my secret. For nearly a decade I tried to enjoy the magnificence of these vast national parks, while mostly sitting on my butt!

The pain crept into many of the essays in this collection and I would refer to my knees as “creaky” or “tricky,” but those were just euphemisms. The truth was – they just hurt! Every single step felt like grinding. I was already making quite a few concessions – Tom would mostly go on hikes alone, or with our daughter, Sloan, if she was along. I would sit in the car, or on a bench, or on a rock and try to enjoy the scenery all around me – but it wasn’t the same as walking into those far off vistas. I spent time in the hotel room or in the lobby, writing or sewing – certainly enjoying myself – but not out in the park, not fully embracing what it had to offer.

On a trip to Santa Fe we visited El Santuario de Chimayo, described as the “Lourdes of America.” We entered the dim sanctuary and sat quietly, praying a bit for a miracle, before going into the room with a small pit holding rust-colored sand. I rubbed it on my knees and hoped for the best, but not even the Saints would help me out and there wasn’t any improvement to be had.

We put off scheduling trips to the west coast, to see all that California, Oregon and Washington had to offer, because the idea just seemed too exhausting to me. Even navigating airports was horrible. Airports are painful places for people with walking issues, especially when they are too proud to admit they really should use a wheelchair! I got to the point where I wondered if I could manage to go on many more of these trips we loved so much.

Finally my doctor asked me a simple question. Did I want to live in pain for several more years before I admitted that I needed knee replacement surgery? Or would I like to live those years without that pain? Put like that, the answer was obvious.

As I write this I have already had one knee done and will have surgery on the next in a few months. And the pain in my right knee, by far the worst one, is gone. Just simply gone! Already I feel so much better and I’m beginning to realize how much that pain colored and controlled my whole life, not just my travels.

We are taking this year off from traveling in the West to give me a chance to build up my strength, but after that we have ambitious plans, including a rafting trip through the Grand Canyon, and those postponed trips to Yosemite and the Redwoods.

So, this is a good place to end this collection of work. I have produced the last piece of writing shadowed by my pain and limitations and look forward to truly being part of the experience of our National Parks.

More to come!


Denise Kalin Tackett

April 10, 2012