Blessed & Grateful: Something About Blue

Posted on by Lisa Duchene

We sparked with Blue’s sweet face and story at the humane society. Then we learned just how strong he is.

Blue, our big red-brown rescue dog with loving eyes, has become another sweet, tough member of our family.

I’ve been sleeping with a great guy who is not my husband. My husband understands, since Blue is his dog.

Our Blue is a big, curious and anxious 70-pound rescue dog with a rich chestnut coat, sweet eyes, a huge head, a body as long as a piano bench and a tail that curls up like a comma when he’s happy.

Blue has had a rough few weeks.

He’s recovering from minor surgery, as we have been renovating the house. Plaster, paneling, old pipes and an entire wall have come down.

My younger stepson’s beagle mix, Echo, doesn’t mind the noise.

But to Blue, this shake-the-house banging and power-sawing has been terrifying.

An anxious, post-op dog with stitches at the same time as a house renovation is crazy-making.

We would have never planned it this way. But Blue’s lump had to come out, and the best contractor could squeeze us in before Thanksgiving and the cold weather.

Sparking with that Sweet Face

On a May Saturday at the humane society, I lingered at Blue’s picture taped to the wall. Eighteen months before, we’d lost our beloved yellow lab mix, Duffy, who had carried us all through a lot of heartache. It was time to welcome a new dog to our family.

Something about that face was so earnest and endearing.

“How about Blue?” I thought, just as my husband said, “What about Blue?”

I believe in signs like that.

The shelter volunteer told us what she knew. He’d been a stray, and there for several months. Twice he’d been adopted and twice he’d turned up back at the shelter.

The paperwork said he’d shown some aggression, but when we heard the details we were cautiously optimistic that he’d been put in no-win situations, and that our family could be a good fit.

He needs an active family and calm house. We are an active, outdoorsy family and our house is typically pretty quiet. We don’t have little kids. We believe well-exercised dogs are well-behaved dogs, so we walk a lot.

“Let’s give this guy a chance,” I said. My husband nodded.

Our Bobblehead

Blue was a lanky stretch of bones and angles. So skinny we could count his ribs and his hind end was maybe three inches. At most.

He is sweet and gentle, and snuggled into our hands. He hugs by leaning his broad body up against your legs, just like our Duff did. Maybe that’s a lab thing. We fostered for several weeks to assure the shelter folks that this time things would work out for Blue, then adopted him.

“He looks like a bobblehead,” said our vet, Dr. Kristi the first time she met him and smiled. His head was so big and his body was so skinny. She is kind and bubbly. We fully trust her and her colleagues with these family members.

Now, Blue is broad and muscled. He’s gained about 10 pounds. On Blue’s first afternoon home, my husband walked him four miles in the woods to an old oak tree that’s become a family landmark. They’ve walked together nearly every morning since then — until Blue’s surgery.

Take Me With You

Our big, red-brown mixed breed rescue dog, Blue, takes his co-pilot job very seriously on road trips.
Our big, red-brown mixed breed rescue dog, Blue, takes his co-pilot job very seriously on road trips.

Blue’s theme song would be Prince’s “Take Me With U.” He doesn’t care where we’re going, what we do or how long the ride is, he just wants to go along. He loves to sit tall and at full attention behind the driver, and takes his co-pilot job very seriously.

He loves to be outside, chasing his ball as I work in the garden, and loves to play in the creek.

Blue can be anxious. Sometimes he flinches. We wonder what he’s been through in his three years. He has some baggage.

Don’t we all?

These past several months, I’ve read up on dog behavior as Blue and I bonded and built trust. We’ve sat together and snuggled. When he’s nervous, I tell him: I know, babe. I get anxious, too. I have abandonment issues, too, honey.

He knows I would never hurt him. I know he would never hurt me or any of us on purpose.

He’s settled beautifully into our home and routine.

Every morning at about 4:30, my husband walks Blue and Echo. By the time I come down to the kitchen at about 5:30, following the scent of coffee and looking like Bill the Cat from the old Bloom County comic strip, they are back from their walk, invigorated and wide awake.

A Scary, Walnut-Sized Lump

“He’s been through enough,” I pled to Dr. Kristi two days after Blue’s surgery. She agreed.

Dr. Kristi had removed a walnut-sized lump on Blue’s chest, plus 3 cm all the way around it, and sent it to the lab to be tested. We were so relieved a few days later when the lab report came back and said it was nothing.

But Blue was already nervously licking at his stitches, and I didn’t know how to make him stop. His slurping woke me up the first night and I’d slept on the couch by his crate the next night. For two weeks after surgery, he was supposed to stay quiet and could only take really short walks out to the backyard. We were giving him sedatives, yet still he licked.

I was worried. I knew the risk of infection.

We tried a cone. He shook it off and attacked it. OK, no cone.

We tried a t-shirt, but Blue just rubbed at his stitches through his shirt.

The more he picked, the more worried I became. The more anxious I got, the more anxious he got. Deep breaths.

Plus — in those first few days, our house was full of chaos and noise, as we started pulling down all the old layers of paneling and plaster in our living room.

After a weekend of hard work and keeping our Blue as quiet as we could — but not very quiet — we were ready for our contractor.

On Monday morning, I realized Blue’s wound was bleeding. Soon after the crew arrived, I zipped him off to the vet.

He would soon be on valium. I resisted the urge to take one.

Shell-shocked

I secured the dogs in my home office, as our contractor and I worked on decisions — zipping up and down the stairs to check on Blue. He seemed OK.

That night, even with special food, and all the medicine, he was anxious. He shook. He licked at his stitches. From what I could see of the incision, it looked red and angry.

I sat on the floor with him against the couch in our temporary living room. Eventually he laid down against my leg. Every time I moved, he’d lick at his stitches.

He was shell-shocked. “We got this, buddy,” I said to calm us both as I stroked his fur. I felt guilty and panicked, tried to stay calm and still. That was our night.

The next morning, Blue’s wound looked awful. We zipped back to the vet.

Dr. Nikki sat on the floor in the exam room, let Blue lick her face, and listened.

“I can’t manage this,” I pled. “Even when I am holding his head with both hands, and with him constantly, I can’t keep him away from those stitches.”

I was nearly in tears. “He is a beautiful, sweet, healthy 3-year-old dog,” I said. “I am not going to lose this dog.”

From her spot on the floor, Dr. Nikki said, full of confidence: “You’re not going to lose this dog.”

She had a plan. As I waited, I realized this had all stirred up my own baggage and painful memories of spending November fighting for life.

This is Blue, I reminded myself while I sat in the waiting room.

Not Duffy. Not Dad.

My November Baggage

Nine years ago, I spent the first two weeks of November by my Dad’s hospital bed, as he slept in a medical coma and fought a life-threatening infection. He cheated death then, woke up a few days before Thanksgiving, and we were all lucky to have another few years with him.

Two years ago, for weeks Dr. Kristi and I fought the good fight to save Duffy, our yellow lab. She ran tests and we tried different medicines and I made special meals of boiled chicken and sausages until the Tuesday when Duffy laid down outside by our neighbor’s fence and would not move. The scans would not show the blood cancer that made him so sick.

Duffy had seen my husband and stepsons through some pretty painful days when their family had broken.

Duff had welcomed me into the family, shown me a dog’s unconditional love, and walked beside me on a ridge trail through the woods day after day in 2013 after I lost my dad to pancreatic cancer. When I started to write about my dad, Duff would walk over and lay his head on my lap.

Duff taught me that every part of our daily life is better with a dog. He’d left us all heartbroken.

And then we healed. So many wonderful animals need a good home, and we had an empty spot in ours.

Super-strength

Dr. Nikki packed Blue’s wound with honey and wrapped him in a bandage that covered his chest, shoulders and upper part of his belly. She prescribed one more medicine to make him drowsy.

For awhile, we were at the vet’s daily for a check and bandage change and our Blue was a walking medicine chest: two antibiotics to treat the raging infection, two sedatives and a painkiller to make him drowsy.

He still fought sleep, but eventually succumbed, and konked out across the backseat of the car. As the contractors worked, I drove a drowsy, sleeping Blue around — with the beagle buttoned up in her crate — to spare the dogs the stress of the noisy house. I postponed anything that could not be done with him, and am grateful for my flexible life.

Date Night

That week, I crossed over to “kooky dog lady.” By Saturday, the house was quiet and we were all exhausted. The dogs and I burrowed under quilts and blankets on the couch — temporarily in the kitchen.

“Let’s go out to dinner,” my husband said when he came home from a day in the woods.

“I don’t know if I can leave Blue,” I said, and realized I’d been with him for nine days.

“He’ll be fine, hon,” said my husband, pointing out that Blue was soundly sleeping and we’d be gone about two hours.

We went to the adorable Italian place with the twinkle lights, chianti and homemade meatballs. Ahhh…

Blue was fine. Still sleeping when we returned.

Blue’s Will

Now, every day is better. Blue’s wound is healing and closing up. Right now, he’s sleeping soundly on my office floor beside Echo as the guys work downstairs.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, that big, beloved celebration of gratitude.

I am thankful. Today, tomorrow, and every day.

Even for Blue’s fight to stay awake. Even for the toughness that’s made him a high-maintenance, expensive handful these last few weeks.

Behind Blue’s sweet face is Blue’s will and it helped him survive, until we could get to him and bring him home.

Pupdate: Blue tolerates a fancy new pillow around his neck so he can’t reach the last part of his wound that needs air to heal. (I tell him he still looks tough.) No more bandages. The house has been quiet for a few days in a row. We have the vet’s green light for normal walks. This morning, as the wind whipped snow into our faces, we leaned in and walked a couple of brisk miles. A refreshing step toward the normal routine.

Related posts:

  1. About Blessed & Grateful
  2. Blessed & Grateful: Rule #1 is Come Home Safe
  3. Blessed & Grateful: With Love, We Can Do Hard Things
  4. Blessed & Grateful: Meeting My Superhero
  5. Blessed & Grateful: Coming Home

Blessed & Grateful: With Love, We Can Do Hard Things

Posted on by Lisa Duchene
With Love from our Angels, We Can Do the Hardest Things

My grandmother’s singing soothed and loved me through childhood, through the loss of her — and has helped me face every hard thing in life so far. When my beautiful friend faced her own death, I did the little I could, and leaned on the love, strength and singing of my angels.

 

When I was little, my grandmother held and snuggled me in her lap and rocked me as she sang this silly song about a mama fish and her baby fish swimming over a dam.

When I grew too big to sit on her lap, I watched as she rocked and sang to my younger cousins from her chair on the big front porch of her white bungalow house.

She did this with all 10 of her grandchildren. I was often at my grandparents’ house, and walked there after school most days. My mom and I lived nearby, and my aunt and uncle and cousins lived down the street.

I remember our post-war suburb outside Cleveland as a lovely place to be a child: Mature maple trees so big and lush their branches overlapped, making a green tunnel above Anthony Street. All the neighbors knew each other and as they walked by there was a constant-back-and-forth between the porch and the sidewalk of “hellos” and “how-about-this-weather?” and “how’s such-and-such doing?”

When the tough times come, I reach for these memories, as they are among my most cherished. I reach for the comfort of my grandmother’s love and strength, the sound of her singing.

Phoning Home

My first job out of journalism school was as a small town news reporter at a local newspaper on the Maine coast. Newsrooms — even in quaint coastal towns — tend to be chaotic, loud and crowded places.

Every day, from their corner of the newsroom the two sports guys delivered a lively variety show of silly jokes and songs that grew increasingly whacky and louder as our deadline approached. Dave and George covered, wrote and edited all the sports stories in at least two dozen towns and four school districts.

They sang that silly song about the baby fish that my grandmother sang to all of us. They butchered it, singing all the wrong words, and I could never remember all the right words.

So I would call my grandmother, ask her to sing it, write down the words and hand them over to Dave and George — who didn’t really care about the right words and continued to sing about the fishes with their words in their way, only louder.

The Message

On a hot Saturday afternoon in July, hearing my uncle say over the phone that she had died felt like a cannon had plunged a lead ball through my gut, leaving a hole that sucked all the air from me. I could not breathe. I doubled over.

Early the next morning, I flew back to Cleveland, anxious to reach my mom and the rest of my family, and tried hard to hold it together on that first flight.

But between flights, in the “privacy” of a bathroom stall in the Cincinnati airport, the sobs shook me. I could not stop weeping, leaned against the locked door and whispered to my grandmother, into the emptiness.

Are you OK? I just need to know you are OK.

She was no longer on the front porch, or in her chair in the living room, cooking dinner in the kitchen or at the other end of the telephone line. I didn’t know where she was now, and that was terrifying.

A moment later, she sang to me. I swear to you: That silly song in her voice was the only thing I could hear — and I had not thought of it in a long while until then.

Clear as a bell, her voice filled my head, singing that goofy little fishy song with all the right words I could never remember. She sang about the three little fishes and the mama fishy too, all swimming in a pool until the mama tells her babies to “SWIM!” said the mama. “Swim as fast as you can! And they swam and they swam all over the dam.”

An Extra Push

You may recall the chorus?

“Boom, boom, diddum datum whaddum SHOO!

Boom, boom diddum datum whaddum SHOO!

Boom, boom diddum datum whaddum SHOO!

And they swam and they swam all over the dam.”

She would always give us an extra squeeze on the SHOO!

In that moment, I was certain she was singing to me from her new life beyond her death, telling me she was absolutely AOK and not to worry one bit.

Swim!

That whole next week, our family gathered and did the hardest things together. We hovered over my grandfather — knowing the arteries of his heart were so blocked it was a ticking time bomb — kneeled at our matriarch’s casket to pray, visited with extended family and friends, wrote a eulogy and carried her to a cradle above a deep hole in the ground.

All week that goofy song propelled me through one hard thing after another. It was, after all, about a mama urging her babies forward over a hurdle. If I was alone in the car driving to and from the funeral home, I sang that silly song as loud as I could.

“SWIM!” said the mama. “Swim as fast as you can!”

I felt her rocking me, remembered that sensation of being loved and cherished, let that comfort me and felt her sing and push me forward.

Our Angels — Seen & Unseen — Love us Through It

When my thoughts and worries buzz like hornets around my mind in the darkness, I hear my grandmother singing and I can feel her rocking me and her cool hand on my forehead. I can breathe deeply again. I can rest.

Especially over these last few weeks, my grandmother is singing for I have called for her and her comfort. She is one way I feel God’s unconditional love and presence. Her singing voice affirms my faith that there is something more, and something wonderful beyond this world.

I believe in angels. Those we can see in this life who are our family by both blood and choice, and those we can no longer see who have gone onto the life beyond, whatever that is. They are still with us, somehow, some way. When the hard times come, we can ask all our angels for help and strength and lean heavily upon them.

They get us through. We stand upon their shoulders and can do hard things — the absolutely hardest, thorniest, scariest and most painful things we must face in our lives — whatever they may be for each of us.

In these last several weeks, I have called in my angels, both seen and unseen, for myself and my friend Wilda, who faced one of the hardest things any of us ever will.

My Beautiful Friend

My beautiful friend knew she was dying.

She has been my mentor, inspiration and a badass role model.

She is a wife and mother, and a warrior. A fellow believer and sister champion of the importance of stitching and building community fabric by digging in the soil and planting flowers and vegetables. She fiercely protected our special gardens because of what they mean and what they give to our community.

She and her husband led a project to plant 111,000 daffodil bulbs that bloom all over this small central Pennsylvania town every spring. She helped start the Sept. 11 Memorial Garden in honor of a native son lost at the Pentagon.

She has been instrumental on nearly every public garden project in that town: a pollinator garden, a gorgeous garden of all edibles, the plantings downtown and in the park.

When we visited recently, I asked her to count the community garden projects she worked on.

Nine.

I wanted her to know this town would not be nearly so beautiful without her.

One of those gardens is especially near and dear to my heart. She fiercely protected it.

Every spring, second-graders plant lettuce, spinach and radishes in small plots of their very own within our community children’s garden. This April, the total over nine years topped 400.

Wilda didn’t do any of it by herself. She worked side by side with people, one task at a time and led by example. With grace and diplomacy in a way that was quiet, selfless and effective.

She is a warrior who cuts through the nonsense.

And she fought off cancer for 20 years. But not this time. 

Nothing would stop the tumors this time.

She fought the good fight, endured unimaginable pain, needles, tests, treatments, tubes.

The Hardest Thing

A little more than five weeks ago, my beautiful friend and her husband and doctors decided it was time to stop treatment. She has been at home in the constant care of her husband, with help from hospice.

Honored, I sat with Wilda soon after her decision. We talked about what’s next. Because we don’t really know what happens. That’s the whole point — the beautiful, excruciating mystery.

My faith makes it easier for me to face that. Yet, whatever people believe is intensely personal and private and they have every right to it.

Her husband and sons face life without her. Nothing can spare them this pain.

She had made some decisions about her funeral service. She was starting to draft her obituary. Maybe she would ask people to plant daffodils in town in her memory. She gave me a short list of things to do.

I was struck by her calm and dignity, as she sat in a wing chair in her bedroom, looking out the front window toward the bare maple in front of her house.

She said she didn’t really have much choice.

She hoped the medicine would let her just drift away. That was the plan.

Strength in the Silence

Weeks later, that did not happen. She was restless. She was in pain. It seemed as if she was between worlds — no longer really here with us and yet still alive.

I tried hard to say the right thing to them both. I pointed out the beauty of the maple outside her window, now covered in red buds.

I thought that maybe my job was to gently urge her to let go, to tell her she’d taken care of everything on her list, to remind her of all the incredible good she’d done in this world. Because she has.

So I did.

But who was I to say and to tell her the time had come? She had plenty more she wanted to do in this life, and she was entitled if she was furious that she would not get to do it.

I realized I don’t get to decide the timing just because it so hurts to see her pain.

When I left with the luxury of returning to my so-called normal life, I wished I had said something different. Or better yet, maybe nothing.

I wished I could cradle my friend and gently rock her until all the comfort and peace of my memories seeped into her bones.

But that too would be for me, not for her.

I shouted for her angels, and hoped they had already filled the room and were singing the music that sounds the sweetest to her, and in her own time and way would lead her to peace.

Gratefully, she was not alone. Her husband was with her round-the-clock, loving her and managing — and being pushed beyond exhaustion.

There are no right words. This business of dying is awful and ugly. The anguish of it filled the house.

The day after my visit, Wilda’s best friend since seventh grade arrived from Seattle.

We Will Remain What We Were to Each Other

I cannot imagine what that next week was like. I choose instead to focus on what must have been the brightest spots: the final time with her husband of nearly 50 years and her very best friend of even longer, and her bravest visitors.

Wilda died eight days after I last saw her, last Sunday morning.

On the day of her local celebration-of-life service, the daffodils were in full bloom and children laughed and danced like worms as they learned about beneficial bugs and played bug BINGO in our community children’s garden. Just a small part of her beautiful legacy.

At her service, a friend read a poem she had selected, Death Is Nothing At All (Death of the King of Terrors) by Henry Scott-Holland.

The truth of this lovely line struck me:

“…the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.

Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.”

In this life she was an angel, bringing soup to my door when I was under the weather, listening with endless patience and kindness to my troubles, opening her kitchen and home to me for comfort in my hardest times.

And now, I believe that if it is at all possible, she will find a way to soothe and comfort her sons, and husband and family as they go on without her. I believe her soul is like that of my grandmother’s, an unseen angel, and that love lasts beyond death.

Nudged by the Love of Unseen Wings

Our angels in the life beyond death are not fixers. They can’t spare us the pain. Remembering the ones who have crossed is not the same as having them here with us. No way.

Yet, they can give us a little reminder of love and faith, a little nudge to dig deeper and find the strength to get through.

To help ourselves. To go on. To swim forward over the dam, whatever it is.

To take the next best step — toward life.

 

Related posts:

  1. Blessed & Grateful: Rule #1 is Come Home Safe
  2. About Blessed & Grateful
  3. Blessed & Grateful: Meeting My Superhero
  4. BLOG: Can you be Blessed, Grateful — and a Badass?
  5. Blessed & Grateful: Something About Blue

Blessed & Grateful: Meeting My Superhero

Posted on by Lisa Duchene
Blessed & Grateful: When Wishes Come True

One October Friday afternoon, I returned to my home office, checked email and read a message about me — but not intended for me to see.  A friend of mine traded messages with a friend of hers about their plans to introduce me to some guy named Mike at an upcoming Halloween party.

I saw the message by mistake. An accidental “reply all,” went to 200-some people on the e-mail list for a happy hour group.

My face flushed hot with embarrassment.

Why Orange? Because I Can

Too soon. Some legal paperwork was all that remained of the marriage that had brought me here to the middle of Pennsylvania, full of mountain ridges, valleys, forests and farm fields.

A year, I’d promised myself. One year before I decided whether to stay or go. By then, I had cried my tears, reflected on mistakes, done a lot of healing, and still had a lot to go.

Too soon to think about dating.

I leaned heavily on my best friend and her husband. They’d helped move furniture in and out of my house and shared their New Year’s Eve and Fourth of July holidays with me. Three is kind of a crowd.

That autumn, I settled into single life — and enjoying it.

I tore out old carpets of my 1900 petite, folk Victorian house to find original hardwood floors and painted my office a deep, rich, earthy violet. Soon, the living room would be a brilliant fire orange with crisp white trim and dark hardwood floors.

Why orange? Because I could. There was no one else to please and I really didn’t believe there ever would be. I dug deeper into the garden and studied to be a certified master gardener.

By Friday evenings, between a week of writing and editing work in my new purple office and a weekend of working on the house, I needed to get out for awhile.

So I’d joined a social “happy hour” group of adults of all ages, both singles and couples, who met for drinks after work on Fridays.

The Wish List

The embarrassment faded. I wanted to be a good sport. I thought of Rodney and his wife’s wish list.

My newly re-discovered single, creative life would not be disturbed for just anyone.

So I made a wish list, then told the fixer-uppers that since they were out there looking, thankyou-very-much, they may as well have my wish list — oh, and by the way you are sharing your private email exchange with everyone. 

“Wish list,” I scrawled in blue ink atop a half-sheet of torn notebook paper I still keep in my desk.

Then: GOOD PERSON. Responsible. Strong moral fiber. Generous of spirit (but not a doormat). Honorable.
Smart. Healthy. Active. Attractive. Outdoorsy ~ the more nature-oriented, the better (but no dirty, smelly hippies).
Good Listener.

Can I Borrow a Boa?

On the night of the Halloween party, the couch and its comfort looked oh-so-good. Way better than figuring out a costume.

The day had brought some blues and an early snowfall of several inches that stuck to the dry leaves still on the trees and weighed the boughs in an awkward way. This was the record-setting 2011 Halloween Nor’Easter known as “Snowtober.”

He’s probably a dud, I figured, still un-decided as daylight faded.

My friend called, wondering if I was going. I hemmed and hawed.

We’ll pick you up in 20 minutes, she decided.

Fine, I said. What the heck? Probably a dud.

Then, I realized my lack of costume.

Can you bring a boa?

At the last-minute I found a turquoise feathered mask, jammed contacts onto my eyes, put on a leopard-printed shirt atop the same hiking pants and clogs I’d worn all day and went out the door.

We WILL have a Conversation

At first, it felt like an eighth-grade dance. All couples, except for me and this tall guy dressed in dark clothing. The costumed couples stood talking in the dim lighting, watching as Mike and I were introduced.

He wore a black, netted mask and outfit. A ghilly suit, I learned later, that makes hunters and snipers blend into the shrubbery.

His teeth were really ugly. Neither of us said much and walked away.

Oh no, I thought. I passed up a good movie and comfy couch for this, buddy. Even if you are a dud, we’re going to have a freaking conversation just to be sure.

Finally, awhile later, our masks came off. His Halloween teeth, an effective part of his last-minute costume, were gone revealing his true smile.

He was pretty damn handsome, tall with dark hair and a square jaw.

But we had still not talked to each other.

I was taking stock of all of this while talking in a group of people. He chatted with a neighboring group. Then our groups merged and we were both talking to the same group about how the Texas Rangers had just lost a heart-breaker of a World Series the night before.

I asked him if he liked baseball. His face lit up and he smiled. Yes, my boys and I go to games.

In that moment, there was so much light and kindness in his handsome face, and my intuition wildly screamed: “Wow! I could LOVE this guy!”

Your boys? I asked. How old are they?

15 and 13.

And my intuition screamed again: “Oh, yipes, already teenagers, almost all grown up. That’s going to fly by. Be careful.”

I’d learned the hard way not to argue with my intuition.

We talked for a long time about baseball, hiking in the forests of central Pennsylvania, and books. He is a lifelong teacher and coach, a great father. A hunter, lover of history and the outdoors.

That moment could so easily have been false hope.

But it wasn’t.

Yelling at God

The next day, I called my mom to tell her I’d met a really nice guy, but had not heard from him.

He’s busy, she said. He has kids and a full schedule.

Me: You don’t even know his name! How are you already taking his side?

My mom: I have a good feeling about this. 

I’ve learned not to argue with my mother’s intuition.

The next day, I learned Mike had asked for my email address.

Then nothing. Crickets!

For days.

By then, I knew his e-mail address — from his web page for work. Easy! And I also knew he had to make the first move.

So I waited. As I sanded and caulked and painted and raked the leaves I yelled at God. Because I was still too wobbly to be disappointed.

Finally, I’m good again! Please do not bother me unless he’s the real deal!

Eventually, Mike e-mailed.

He had bought the book I’d mentioned about how natural gas-drilling was changing the Pennsylvania countryside, and read it in two days so we’d have something to talk about. He told me about his brother’s wedding.

His punctuation was near-perfect, and I swooned.

The next Sunday, we took a walk in the woods, had dinner and talked until the patrons at the restaurant were gone and the workers were vacuuming around us and ready to turn the lights off and go home.

By Thanksgiving, I was pretty darn sure it was a done deal.

He was worth it. Everything on my wish list and more.

A Superhero Family Guy, Teacher and Husband

Mike is a good, solid, honorable family man. He leads by example: Up early working hard, long days at hard jobs — and the boys come first. I don’t know how he does it, but he always finds a way to make time for the boys and now for me.

He is frugal and responsible with money.

He is generous with his spirit and kindness — however once someone crosses an important line or betrays his trust, look out. There is often no return. (Backbone!)

He is smart, healthy, beautiful inside and out, a good listener and unbelievably patient.

As I got to know him, I realized just how incredibly gifted of a teacher he is.

See, my journalism training and experience taught me to ask pressing questions, sometimes repeatedly, and root around for answers then quickly serve that bottom line answer up to a reader.

So as we all learned to live together, and things came up, I’d ask him for the answer.

You have to figure that out.

And I’ve heard him say the same thing about the kids.

He’s got to figure that out.

My instincts are to just tell kids the answer, and save them some trouble. It seems faster. But that doesn’t teach them anything. If they learn it themselves, they might just learn it for good.

The Faith to Fly, Together

Our courtship happened in school cafeterias and gymnasiums. When we met, he was an assistant principal at a middle school. The principal, his boss, is the wife of the other “fixer-upper,” the man who had sent the “reply-all” email.

One of our first dates was to chaperone the Winter Wonderland Dance at the middle school. That weekend, I met the boys.

Soon, all the clichés began to make sense: Love at first sight? Definitely. I believed it for the first time.

I fell hard and fast, for all three of them. It was dangerous because it was so soon. Too soon.

And because the only way it would work was if I let myself be swallowed up into the lives of these three men while the boys were still growing up — which required a not-so-little leap of faith that in time I would regain my balance.

It wasn’t always easy for my friends and family to understand. I was gone a lot. Gone or raving about these guys.

Mike and the boys this, Mike and the boys that, said a guy-friend as we walked in town. I know, Super Mike is perfect.

Well, yeah, just about, I said. I’m gushing. I’m sorry.

Lots of people deserve happily ever after and never get it. I don’t know why.

Some people find real, true, lasting love as teenagers and have five, six or even seven decades together.

Those people get really, really lucky.

Don’t Screw It Up!

Mike and I waited four decades for real love. True and lasting love. And then it was up to us to get it right, to cherish this gift and each other, our family and our home.

Or, as my mother — who still always takes his side — says: Don’t screw it up!

We made sure it was real over three years of long walks and routine and holiday family dinners, of traveling to and watching the boys’ games and sports events: basketball, football, baseball and wrestling.

Then we got married in front of a solid, old stone house at our favorite state park.

You are my dream come true, I told Mike and the boys during our ceremony. They are a package deal. We celebrated with our annual summer barbecue at a pavilion in the park.

My husband is absolutely all of those qualities on that wish list I made, and more.

So in those quiet moments together, I never forget to tell my superhero: Thanks for being my dream come true. Thanks for going to the party.

Related posts:

  1. Blessed & Grateful: Rule #1 is Come Home Safe
  2. Blessed & Grateful: With Love, We Can Do Hard Things
  3. BLOG: Can you be Blessed, Grateful — and a Badass?
  4. Blessed & Grateful: High-Altitude Insight
  5. Blessed & Grateful: Something About Blue

Blessed & Grateful: Rule #1 is Come Home Safe

Posted on by Lisa Duchene

One chilly Saturday morning in early April, I ran into my brother-in-law at our small-town post office. He and his family live in town, just a short walk out beyond our backyard, and down the hill toward the mountain.

He asked if one of our teenage boys had been messing around in the night, with his friends, perhaps?

My mind quickly flashed to the memory of the police car that had pulled into our driveway the night before. But the officer had actually been looking for the duplex two doors down. He was checking into a complaint about noise, but I knew it couldn’t be our house.

A few kids had just arrived for a sleepover, and they weren’t loud. I was still hovering to see what they needed.

But then I’d gone to bed.

The House Rule on Peanut Butter

Why? I asked my brother-in-law.

In the morning, he had found his truck handles covered in peanut butter.

Back at home, I reported to my husband. We hatched a plan.

Later, we asked our 14-year-old if he knew why we had both organic peanut butter and less-expensive, regular peanut butter. The organic for eating and the other for — well…?

His face instantly cracked into a smile.

Busted.

It was our way to send a few important messages: People are keeping an eye on you, a little peanut butter on your uncle’s truck isn’t a big deal, and we can share a laugh about it.

So we added to our rules list: If you’re going to prank your uncle, use the cheap peanut butter.

House Rule: Don’t Burn the House Down

For the record: I am not their mom. They have a mom and she loves them very much.

And these are my kids. All these things are true.

Their dad and I had fallen head-over-heels in love in our early 40s, so I loved these kids before I met them.

When I arrived in this family, the boys were already teenagers, 15 and 13, already well-behaved young men and they knew what their dad expected of them. They lived with their dad half the time and I moved into their house.

There was no rules list, no guide-book. I tiptoed for a long time. We all had to figure it out.

One day their dad and I left to take a walk and just naturally said something like: We’ll be back in an hour. Don’t burn the house down.

And I chimed in: And don’t hurt yourself — or your brother.

Later, we added the bit about which peanut butter to use when you want to prank your uncle. Then, after ribbing about the big pocketbook I carry and the number of lost items that had turned up in it, we added to the list: If you lose anything, look in Lisa’s pocketbook.

Looking back, that rules list was kind of my way to establish my role as someone new in their lives and home. As a second adult and parental figure I could make rules.

And they could be funny ones because these kids already had a great base and, if anything, they just needed an occasional friendly, funny reminder of what was expected of them.

Your Heart Walking Around Outside Your Body

Somewhere in there, I became a parent.

They were growing up so fast and the world is so big and dangerous.

I remember telling a friend how scary it was when they went out the door, especially as they started driving.

That friend was not yet a parent. She said she’d heard it described that it’s like your heart is walking around all day outside your body.

Exactly.

I mean, driving.

I overheard a dad at a baseball game say to his son: Don’t do anything stupid, and you’re old enough by now to know what that means.

That went on the list with the not hurting anyone, or our home, the pocketbook and the peanut butter.

House Rule: Watch out for Stupid

The morning my older stepson went to college, I had about 25 different things I wanted to say to him.

I picked the most important one. I told him he had a good head on his shoulders and made good decisions. All true. And sometimes it’s really easy to get caught up in the bad decisions of other people. Also true.

So — Watch out for the stupid things other people do. Onto the rules list.

As my younger stepson began to drive, and his senior year of high school was upon him with college soon to come, we retired the rules list into one simple, number one rule.

Come home safe.

Because kids are going to take risks. Most of us can remember times when we were the ones doing stupid things, or taking so many risks at once that we somehow survived by the grace of God.

Sometimes you find yourself well beyond your limits. There was the night I accidentally drank too much and could barely walk, supporting myself against a brick building as I made my way toward Boston’s Kenmore Square. And that night in Maine when four-wheeling on the beach in the pickup truck I’d just bought seemed like a great idea. So did the idea of a friend trying to stand up in the bed of the pickup as we zipped down the road.

All, gratefully, turned out OK.

We all know those things don’t always turn out OK, that terrible, life-ending things that happen. I do not know why some people survive those dangerous moments and others do not.

I don’t know why sometimes you can do everything “right,” the best you can, everything you can think of and it’s not enough and they can’t get home.

Come Home Safe

If you find yourself in a bad situation, just focus on survival. Just get home.

If you ever get to a point where it all seems impossibly broken and you don’t know where to start.

Come home safe. Everything else can be worked out.

If ever you are worried about being shamed or judged or yelled at, don’t. Just get home. We will listen with love. No matter what, we will fall to our knees and be grateful you are alive.

Come home safe.

There is always time to make things right.

Keep Them Safe, Please

As I write in the early morning, I am far from home, in a hotel room. I’ve spent the last couple of days with a very sick family member. I’m worn out and weary.

My husband and older stepson are on their way, driving a long distance. We are here to see my younger stepson play baseball as a college freshman.

I try not to worry about all that could happen on the highway, as I try not to worry every time they drive away.

The boys are all grown up now. Fine men.

Our oldest graduates college this year and has a great job lined up.

Sure, there were probably more peanut butter incidents and other things I don’t know about. We’re not naïve.

Just because we live in a sweet little antique town, full of beauty, family and love, we know there are plenty of dangers, and lots of pain.

Life has already thrown them curve balls and there will surely be more.

They are good and solid, well-prepared. They are absolutely the most amazing men you could ever meet.

I know, I gush.

And they never really needed my rules. All along those rules were probably just for me.

Occasionally, I will remind each one of Rule #1. I know, he’ll say.

As I stand at the window and watch them drive away, it’s my prayer. Please bring them home safe.

Then I can let go and move on with my day.

 

Related posts:

  1. Blessed & Grateful: With Love, We Can Do Hard Things
  2. Blessed & Grateful: Meeting My Superhero
  3. About Blessed & Grateful
  4. Blessed & Grateful: Something About Blue
  5. Blessed & Grateful: Coming Home

BLOG: Can you be Blessed, Grateful — and a Badass?

Posted on by Lisa Duchene

At first, the thought of combining these words was a bit frightening.

See, I’m leaping into this new Blessed & Grateful blog project and I want to get it right. That means telling stories about the richness and light I treasure in language that speaks both to my dearest friends, fine people who would not be caught dead in a church, and the lovely new people I know through our church.

I’m not promising all sweetness and vanilla, peeps. I am no polyanna. I’ve been lucky, and tough.

To arrive at this place of contentment I had to be brave and a warrior of sorts. And I know this peace can be shattered in one tragic moment.

This journey taught me. It made me.

A few weeks ago I consulted my brave and wise mother-in-law, a retired pastor. She said the Bible offered plenty of examples of flawed people and tough, kind heroes. She was fine with badass. She promised she wasn’t just being nice.

Onward. Then, I started to notice badasses everywhere.

Gracious, Fierce and Fearless

Badasses are kind, gracious, loving people who are also wicked strong, fierce and fearless.

They go for it. They protect those dear. They rise for those who can’t — but never at someone else’s expense.

They do what needs to be done—sometimes with a roar and sometimes so quietly you hardly notice them. They are brave and bold. They speak their truth.

They are not bullies, nor are they nasty.

The people who embody these qualities have a strength that inspires my own.

They are in public life, often unexpectedly — like those incredibly strong, fearless and articulate students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School who survived a horrific mass shooting and one week later stood tall and asked straightforward questions of powerful people. Amazing.

Turns out I’ve been blessed with badasses, drawn to them all along: My mother, my grandmother, my aunts and best friends, my husband and stepsons and plenty of other women and men.

Sweetie Grandma was a Total Badass

One of my favorite pictures of my grandmother is from August 18, 1945. She is wearing her Army-issued dark skirt, light long-sleeve blouse with a pointed collar, round sunglasses, hat and sensible shoes, walking between two other women dressed in identical skirt-blouse-hat-shoes down a sidewalk in Marseilles, France.

She is looking straight ahead, ignoring the camera.

“Don’t ever tell anyone that you know the center character,” she wrote on the back of this black and white snapshot.

I always wanted to know more of her story than she’d tell.

Magdalene grew up in a small railroad and coal town in Northeast Pennsylvania, wedged among the creases of two mountains. She joined the Red Cross to become a nurse, suspecting it would take her far away to war.

She served as an Army nurse in World War II, and met my grandfather. They returned, married and made their home in Cleveland, where they had five children, including one who died before birth, and my mom, then later 10 grandchildren.

As the story goes, when she inquired about joining the local VFW she was offered a membership intended for women. “She would have none of that, and reminded them that she was an officer,” reported our family historian, my uncle. “She became a regular member.”

She was a maternity nurse who worked nights, and when I was little watched me during the days. She was generous and gracious, a woman of strong Catholic faith, hard worker and the wife of a hard-working public servant and politician.

We called her “Sweetie” because she was all warmth and sweetness. Her lap and bosom was for me a place of pure comfort and refuge from whatever was scary and sad.

Now, that little town where she grew up is cute-as-a-button and a quaint haven for tourists. A century ago, however, living there was a tough life. She both loved it — and knew she needed to get away.

My uncle recently found her grandfather’s death certificate. We learned he died on the railroad, the cause of death was “cut in half.” There must have been plenty she wanted to leave behind in that place.

I’ve always loved that image of her walking down a foreign street, before she was a wife, mom and grandmother. She is cool and confident, rising to the mission, fearless, her whole life ahead of her, ready to serve, ready for an adventure.

My Badass Friend Candace

One cold night in early spring, loud shouting and stomping outside our apartment door caught my attention drawing me away from bed, where I was headed, and out into the hall. My boyfriend and I lived in an old three-story house in Maine with an apartment on each floor.

The young, estranged boyfriend of the single mom who lived upstairs was drunk and belligerent, arguing with three other people as his two-year-old daughter slept inside. The young mom’s mother was there along with the boyfriend’s father. All of their efforts to calm him had failed.

I also attempted to reason with him, and got nowhere.

My friend Candace was not there that night, but she had taught me well. I knew exactly what to do.

Calmly, I confirmed with the single mom that she wanted him to leave, and nicely asked him to leave. Once.

Then, ready to zip out of his stumbling reach if need-be, I pointed my index finger right between his eyes in a jabbing motion, looked him directly in the face, got as close as I dared and shouted at him to

GET OUT. RIGHT NOW. GET OUT. RIGHT NOW.

The language was slightly more colorful. I repeated.

He retreated, stumbling, out the front door, off the porch to the sidewalk and away.

I did not have kids. But I did have a mama-bear instinct to protect the people who lived in that house. They would soon be my tenants, as I was buying the building.

After drunk guy had gone that night, I realized I was covered neck-to-ankle with the cutest brown and black kitty-cats all over my flannel pajamas. I had not stopped to think about that, nor to be afraid. Gratefully, he did not have a gun. I knew I’d be OK.

When drunk guy returned around 2 am, I called the police from behind my locked door. As far as I know, he never came back. Soon, we installed a lock on the exterior door to the house, gave keys to our tenants and kept it locked.

Growing up, I did not have to deal with drunk people. But my friend Candace did. One October night when our annual Halloween party was winding down she didn’t like the way a drunk guy was talking to me. He had come to the second-floor of our single-family house, where our overnight guests were already sleeping in the bedrooms and Candace and I were changing out of our costumes.

When Halloween drunk guy started banging on all the doors, my answer was to reason with him. I got nowhere.

When he got more belligerent, Candace snapped. Still wearing her very scary vampire makeup, she burst from around the corner, got right in Halloween drunk guy’s face, pointed and shouted at him to GET DOWNSTAIRS RIGHT NOW.

I can still see Halloween drunk guy scampering down the steps as fast as his feet would take him, his hospital johnny costume barely covering his pasty white backside.

My friend had always been so sweet, kind and gracious. That night I learned that when provoked she could be fearless for a purpose.

Kind & Brave Folks All Around Us

My mom was a single mom who worked full-time, earned her MBA one course at a time and took care of me, making sure we went on vacations no matter how tight the money was.

My badass businesswoman aunt opened and now runs a hugely successful women’s fashion boutique with her business partner, also a smart business woman.

My husband, a school teacher and administrator, doesn’t put up with his students’ bad behavior (nor mine!) He’d never raise his voice to tell you, though, and instead sets an example. (OK, and that letter M his eyebrows make when he pinches them together in that confused look of whattheheckareyoudoing?)

My stepsons show strength, intense discipline toward their goals and compassion for others.

My friend is raising two boys with her husband, works part-time, waking up early to run and carving out time to paint.

My neighbor and friend takes care of her family and five grandchildren and is always asking if we need anything.

A wonderful friend had a baby, and is raising her daughter on her own — on purpose.

Badasses, all of them.

And the so many — too many — dear friends who have faced breast cancer, beat it and then because of lasting effects, must reach for their new normal. Life is never the same.

My friend has beat cancer multiple times, raised two fine sons with her husband, retired as a communications professional, volunteers in her community, speaks her mind and cuts through the BS.

Another dear friend beat breast cancer and is passionate about creating new, gorgeous jewelry, exquisite works of art.

A best friend since college who beat breast cancer, is raising two boys with her husband and is a hugely successful marketing professional.

Candace, too, beat breast cancer and is now re-prioritizing her life. “I am fiercely looking for the next version of myself and the creative pursuits to compliment this new/old person,” she responded (and gave her blessing to share her answer.) “Probably the scariest thing I’ve faced yet — to get out of treatment and not recognize myself anymore.”

Badasses. Incredibly inspiring.

Super-heroes for These Times

I wondered about all this one January Sunday, then settled in to watch the Golden Globe awards.

Oprah’s speech that night said it all, beautifully. These times both require great strength and are giving us great heroes.

Kesha every time she performs “Praying,” Olympic skier Lindsey Vonn who battled terrible injuries and never, ever gave up. All the Olympians with their stories of what they overcame and how they battled to reach the games, maybe even the podium.

We need these people.

Maybe badass isn’t even the right word. Not long ago, it meant to be mean and bully and was negative, a way to pop the big selfish ego of bravado.

The Guardian newspaper out of the U.K., reported at the end of 2015, that badass had become a positive descriptor for women behaving like men, taking on strength and toughness of men, that it stood for feel-good feminism, empowerment. And that its usage had peaked.

It hinted at the evolution of the word’s meaning beyond women acting like men, toward a new dimension of positive description of a woman in her own right, not defined in relationship to men or by men.

Sounds good. Let’s go. These times feel right.

And if badass falls short, let’s find a new word — or re-invent a familiar one. Super-hero?

We can be our truest, very best blessed, grateful and badass selves. Super-heroes for ourselves and each other.

We can be good and strong and fiercely committed to become our best versions, people who demand and support justice, people who protect the vulnerable, people who rise to the occasion, who tell the truth, who use all of our talents — strength, honor, intuition, finesse, communication — for a greater good.

People who serve. But are not so meek and selfless that we are doormats or silent. You gotta have backbone.

I’m ready to be extra fearless.

You?

Related posts:

  1. Blessed & Grateful: With Love, We Can Do Hard Things
  2. Blessed & Grateful: Meeting My Superhero
  3. Blessed & Grateful: Rule #1 is Come Home Safe
  4. Blessed & Grateful: Something About Blue
  5. About Blessed & Grateful

About Blessed & Grateful

Posted on by Lisa Duchene

Sounds kinda corny, doesn’t it?!

I thought so, too, when I first heard my neighbor’s response to a friendly “How are you?

He replied with quiet confidence: “Blessed and grateful.”

Not the pleasant “Good, you?” or small talk about the weather I’d been expecting.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve realized this bearded and quiet older man is right. Or has the right idea. He’s inspired this blog of stories and reflections around noticing the good stuff and pausing for a moment to be thankful for it.

Blessed & Grateful is an aspiration, a goal, a practice

It’s not a mandate, forced and fake. I won’t smash a smile over anybody’s pain. I won’t tell you what you should think or do.

My goal is to give you a story around this theme that makes you smile, or think or lifts your spirits.

And in doing so, my hope is to face darkness with light, to stay up when there is so much going on the world that can bring us down. To inspire us all to stay up — as best we can. We can’t combat darkness if we succumb to it.

This focus on what I have, or enjoyed or learned is my antidote to my blues. It is no fix for anyone’s clinical depression.

The Blessed & Grateful blog launched Dec. 22, 2017, the day following the shortest day of the year. Because the light always returns, and a small amount of light is often plenty.

I hope you enjoy.

What are you Blessed & Grateful for? I hope you’ll share.

 

Related posts:

  1. My Blogs
  2. Blessed & Grateful: With Love, We Can Do Hard Things
  3. Blessed & Grateful: Rule #1 is Come Home Safe
  4. Blessed & Grateful: Meeting My Superhero
  5. Blessed & Grateful: Something About Blue