Checking in (Part 2)

 Here's the problem with the checking in exercise: 

I don't even have to do anything about what I learn when I check in. I don't have to change or fix anything. There's a good chance there's not even anything to fix. I can just be feeling what I'm feeling.

I wrote that last week like it's a good thing(?), and today it doesn't feel good at all. Because I woke up, took a couple of deep breaths, and started crying. Today, I'm feeling many of the feelings in a much feel-ier way than is comfortable for me. 

In the famous words of Chris Evans's nephew, "I don't wike it..." [Scroll down for video.]

I learned at a very young age not to let the sun go down on my anger. Moreover, I learned that even feeling angry--or sad, or fearful, or disgusted, or generally bad--wasn't good. Which is really weird because I learned this as part of a Christian tradition, and Jesus himself exhibits all the above-mentioned "negative" emotions in the Gospels. I guess the religion of my childhood took from the sacred texts of Star Wars as much the sacred texts of our faith.

I was also taught that the secret to true J.O.Y. was putting Jesus first, then Others, and then Yourself. Yourself always came last. (Seriously, I made a J.O.Y. wall hanging at camp one summer that stayed on the wall of my room until I graduated high school.) And as a good girl / oldest daughter / evangelical / people-pleaser / Honors student / well-raised Southerner / Enneagram 3, I knew I always had to be joyful--or at least keep up the appearance of being joyful--so that no one could ever accuse me of not putting Jesus first.*

Ummm... Did you know there were
this many feelings? Because I didn't.

This means I allowed myself only two of the seven colors on the feelings wheel--happy (orange) and surprised (green). Actually, it's more like 1 ½ if you don't think you should acknowledge the confused, disillusioned, and dismayed side of green, which I didn't. If anything from the wrong 5 ½ colors started to creep into my mind, heart, or gut, I denied it. Just stuffed those suckers way on down, and instead busied myself with deeds, actions, and achievements that could prove how good I was, how strong, and how on the right side of right. 

I leaned hard on the busy-ness--my crutch to help distract from (at best) and suppress (at worst) the feelings I didn't want because I didn't think I should have them. And that busy-ness, that productivity, eventually came to define me and my sense of worth.

This may have something to do with why I bawled my eyes out watching Inside Out 2. (Five stars highly recommend)

So, yeah, even after a lot of unlearning (and a lot of meditating on what it means to "Be still"), I'm still more comfortable doing rather than feeling. I like keeping my brain occupied with others' voices so that there's less obligation (or even opportunity) to listen to my own. Which is why the checking in exercise is sometimes problematic and always necessary. The urgency of the assignment lies in the fact that, after five decades of this kind of behavior, my crutches just aren't doing it for me anymore. I think I've leaned on them so heavily that they are starting to break.

I will admit to being lucky in that my crutches are socially acceptable and don't get me labeled as having a problem, even though I use them in the same way that any "functioning" addict uses their crutches of choice:

• work
• travel and travel planning**
• my daily regimen of online NYT games (Wordle, Connections, Strands, Spelling Bee, Crossword--in that order every day except for Sundays when I do the Crossword first, on paper, and in ink) 
• audiobooks and podcasts
• self-help books about how to be better at feeling my feelings
• Instagram, including feeds about how to be better at feeling my feelings
• Netflix, Hulu, PrimeVideo, Max, AppleTV+, Disney+, and "Friends" re-runs on Nick@Night

And sometimes, for good measure, 1-2 glasses of wine "to unwind" [nay! to numb!] at the end of the day.

The goal in acknowledging these choices is to move toward [oops! almost wrote "to achieve"!] emotional sobriety--to learn to live with, regulate, and free myself from the least comfy feelings, not just today but over the long haul, without misusing these or more damaging crutches.

So here I am, audiobook paused, checking in instead of scrolling Instagram, still sniffling and super squeamish about how I feel. Per the wheel, I'm a little in the blues, a little in the pinks, a little in the purples, and definitely on the wrong side of the greens. [Cue Kermit.]

I will admit, however, that a couple of other things are happening. First, as I name the feelings, I find a couple of oranges mixed in with the other colors. Alongside my feelings of isolation from living in a city where I don't know a lot of people lives thankfulness and love for the five friends who will shortly be traveling here to spend a weekend with me. Alongside worry about the Thespian finding his way in college lives a sense of awe that he's attending his dream school. 

Second, I am giving myself tacit permission to have these feelings, which is the key to taking from them what I need and letting the rest go. [Cue Elsa.]

Maybe Yoda was right all along, as long as we read him through more of a Buddhist and less of a Southern Baptist lens. It's not the having but the holding onto that puts us on the path to the dark side. We cannot banish emotions without first being conscious of them, and that requires a calm mind.

To that I'll add my own: Being busy will only block things out for so long. And sometimes there has to be crying in baseball.***

“Remember, Sadness, wherever I go, you go too.” -Joy

*At this point, I would like to apologize to everyone in my world to whom I proselytized positivity. You never asked for Pollyanna as a friend or family member, and I'm sorry I showed up as her. If you want to give me a chance to show up better and are going through something hard, I promise to shut up and sit with you in it while you share. No matter what you are feeling.

**Note that when travel includes visits to or time with friends--especially the truth-telling types of friends mentioned in Checking in (Part 1)--then there may be a chance of some de-stuffing of the feelings. For example, last year I spent a weekend in the mountains of Colorado with Margaret (she of the "sweet pea" in my previous post) and Heather. It was two weeks before my birthday, and they surprised me by baking cupcakes. When they pulled them out of the oven and started to sing, I promptly burst into unstoppable tears. Not because I was sad about the birthday but because I was overwhelmed with gratitude for these women who have supported me along the roughest parts of my road. Apparently that kind of crying is a good thing(?). Yet another reason why I love my realest friends.

***If you don't know this about me yet, I love movie references and have no qualms about mixing and matching them.

Checking in

 I love catching up with Justine.

It doesn't happen that often--not nearly often enough--as she lives in Brooklyn and works in finance for an international arts organization, and I live in St. Louis and work in communications for an international professional services organization. We both have two children in varying stages of late teenagerdom / early adulthood, dogs, husbands who were also college classmates, siblings, nieces, and mostly non-overlapping friend groups. But when we do have an opportunity to talk, I relish every minute. 

The first funny hat that
I ever saw Justine wear

Justine and I have known each other since we were 18 and assigned to live together in a first-year quad at our alma mater. We found out after moving in that, by square footage, ours was the smallest quad in our residential college. She was a polyglot from Toronto with one of the best senses of humor I had ever encountered. I was a debutante from South Carolina with evangelical tendencies. She befriended me anyway. We bonded over Strange Brew and convinced a classmate from Dallas that she had gone to high school every day on a dog sled, which was difficult because dogs are color blind and could not tell whether the traffic lights were red or green. She taught me about the Barenaked Ladies, and I taught her about grits. Her first experience tasting them went something like this:

"It doesn't really taste like anything."
"Crumble some bacon in it and try again."
"Oh, OK. Now it tastes like... bacon."

I think it's her honesty that I appreciate the most. 

Justine knew me before I learned I could give myself permission to be someone other than who I was taught to be my parents, teachers, church, geography, and gender norms. More than thirty years later, while my sense of self has changed, my appreciation for our friendship has not. This morning she called to chat about some volunteer work for our upcoming college reunion. The obligatory part of the conversation took about 10 minutes, and then we stayed on the phone for another 45, during which we both began multiple sentences with phrases like "I wouldn't tell a lot of people this..." and "Just between you and me..." She is a person I trust completely with the whole truth of me. Or at least as much of it as I know thus far.

Now when we get together,
we wear lots of orange
and new funny hats

I have been fortunate in my life to have several friends, like Justine, to whom I can turn when I need to exhale, lower all my defenses, or not put on any kind of show. These friendships are sealed in moments of authenticity. We've let each other vent, cry, and ask taboo questions. We've sat in silence and doubled over in laughter. We've held each others' hair and rubbed each others' backs--both when drunk and when painfully sober. We've watched relationships come and go. We've moved around the country and around the world. We've struggled through kids, from non-sleeping, puking infants to non-sleeping, puking young adults. We've burned brightly and burned out. 

Thanks to these friends, I have found relief from always feeling like I have to keep up appearances, read the room, meet or exceed others' expectations, and derive my sense of worth from (a very American, capitalist understanding of) productivity and achievement. While I feel obligated to show much of the world how many items I can check off my to-do list, these friends show incredible patience, support, and love as I continue to figure out what's on my to-be list.

I recently started a practice, recommended by my therapist, of trying to check in with myself in the same way that I would check in with my friends or they would check in with me. This means that at certain moments during the day--yes, I set an alarm--I pause, take a few deep breaths, and ask, "How are you feeling?" Feeling, in this sense, could mean physical (shallow breathing, tight shoulders, butterflies) or emotional (nervous, tired, content). My friend Margaret even encouraged me to take it a step further by putting a hand over my heart and adding a term of endearment: "How are you feeling today, sweet pea?"

The goal is to get into the habit of actually noticing and acknowledging when there is a change in how I am feeling without the alarm. I guess this is why they call it a practice. 

Checking in is not a new, difficult, or even particularly deep idea, but it is radical for someone like me who prefers to stay busy, let her thoughts dominate her choices, and--to co-opt a phrase from another southern debutante--feel about that tomorrow. And here's the kicker... I don't even have to do anything about what I learn when I check in. I don't have to change or fix anything. There's a good chance there's not even anything to fix. I can just be feeling what I'm feeling. It's a moment to discern what I'm tasting and accept it--the bare naked, inside out, true grits of me. No bacon required.

Inertia

 I have a complicated relationship with St. Louis.

The city is nice enough. A great parks system. Museums. A top tier university. Decent food. A better-than-expected performing arts scene. Fun sports and faithful fans. Oddly loyal high school graduates. 

And an enormous inferiority complex. Which is weird since people from here who leave always seem to want to move back. I have now lived here for four years, and every time I tell someone we moved from Denver, the response is exactly the same.

"Why?"

C'mon, St. Louisans. Don't you know I need you to affirm my life choices?

I will say that my son's academic and extra-curricular experiences in our St. Louis County school district were probably better than they would have been at his Denver school. The parents and teachers here were warm and welcoming, and we'll forever be a grateful Greyhound family for the way our local high school helped guide his class through the later months of the COVID-19 pandemic in a safe, emotionally supportive, and college preparatory way. (See? Oddly loyal high school graduates. Very St. Louisan.)

And still... I cannot help but notice the number of families who choose private school (Jon Hamm's and others') over public. And the stark, disturbing difference in resources between St. Louis City and St. Louis County public school. Not to mention the philosophical and political variance among the 23 County school districts when it comes to things like masking, book bans, and bathrooms. Ideas about what it means to keep children safe change as you move further away from the city limits.

There's a lot of complexity and violence in St. Louis's racial, economic, and cultural history that endures and impacts the city as it exists today. I wish I could say that since arriving here I've worked hard to make a positive difference in my community, but the fact is that my contributions have been minimal: a STL (Save Trans Lives) yard sign, donations to local organizations that help immigrant families transition or help women upskill and find employment, and several strongly worded emails to Jay Ashcroft and Josh Hawley in defense of public libraries, LGBTQ+ healthcare, and women's bodily autonomy.

Unfortunately, since arriving here in August 2020, I've mostly found myself succumbing to the law of inertia.

If I can get my body into motion, it tends to stay in motion. Last fall, I celebrated a somewhat significant birthday by traveling all over the country with / to see friends and family. I was away from St. Louis for 11 out of 14 weekends between mid-August and Thanksgiving, and the 3 weekends I spent in town were taken up by a local music festival, hosting out-of-town friends, and suffering through my first Covid diagnosis. When I'm not in St. Louis, I find myself energized, engaged, and fully enjoying life's busy-ness.

When I'm home, I often find myself exhausted, enervated, and uninterested in much beyond work, family, dog, and Netflix. There are days when I wake up in St. Louis and find it hard to get out of bed. 

This happened today. After weeks of continuous travel to move both kids onto their respective out-of-state college campuses and then grab some beach time over Labor Day, I slept in my bed in St. Louis for the first time in nearly a month. And when my alarm went off at 6am, as it always does, I made the decision (and I do recognize that it was a decision, albeit a passive one) to stay in bed. I forwent any chance of a morning walk, a shower, starting my suitcase laundry, or reviewing work emails to help set the day's priorities. Instead, I chose multiple snooze buttons and scrolling Instagram for longer than I care to admit.

It's hard to say whether my location is giving causation or correlation.

#thebestpartofwakingup

Maybe it's not St. Louis per se. It could just as easily be part of my post-Covid reality, perimenopause, or the culmination of two decades of really intense parenting. It could be that I, as a body, am so desperate for rest that I tend to remain at rest until acted on by an outside force... like the dog needing breakfast, being 5 minutes out from my first Zoom of the day, or my saintly husband making coffee and delivering a mugful into my hands. I will go vertical for coffee.

My dream is to be compelled to change my state by the action of an internal force, to be motivated by what I want for me and who I want to be in my community.

I just need to stop / start moving enough to figure out what (and where) that is.

On the third day, it got unapologetically political

 It happened again.

Yesterday, a 14-year-old boy with an AR-15-style rifle opened fire inside Apalachee High School in Winder, GA, north of Atlanta. He killed two students, Mason Schererhorn and Christian Angulo, and two teachers, Richard Aspinwall and Christina Irimie. 

Mason Schererhorn's parents will never get this text from their son:

The Washington Post reports that more than 382,000 students have been impacted by gun violence at school since Columbine. 

25 years

416 shootings

382,000 kids

The youngest of those kids -- the Sandy Hook survivors -- saw the deadliest of school shootings in 2012. The shooter was in their first grade classroom. This year they graduated high school.

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Twenty children from Sandy Hook didn't live to finish high school. Neither did Mason Schererhorn and Christian Angulo. Nor any of the children who lost their lives due to gun violence between 1999 and today. They will never do what my son and his classmates did yesterday and stroll a college club fair during the second week of classes, signing up for activities and organizations that will help them create fun memories and meaningful experiences, like visiting elementary schools to teach and tutor kids. 

Elementary schools that could be the site of a future shooting. Just like his college campus could be. Just like my daughter's college campus could be. Just like an elementary school five miles from my daughter's campus was less than 18 months ago.

WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. F*<%?

I have a lot of thoughts and very few coherent words. What on earth can I write that hasn't already been said or written? How can any of us justify not working for -- not screaming and shouting and busting our asses and donating and voting for -- evidence-based solutions to gun violence that will save lives?

• Background checks on on all firearms sales and mandatory waiting periods -- Those tin cans you claim to have fun shooting in your backyard will still be there in 48-72 hours
• Laws that ban guns from schools, campuses, and other sensitive areas; permits and strong standards for carrying concealed weapons in public; mandatory owner education and secure storage -- I'm a First Amendment absolutist, and even I believe in content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions. Get on board, Second Amendment disciples
• Gun dealer reform, no immunity for gun manufacturers, broad gun trace data requirements and accessibility, silencer regulation, and prohibitions on automatic weapons/bump stocks/rapid-fire devices/high capacity magazines/downloadable guns -- Big tobacco. Purdue Pharma. Asbestos. Silicone implants. GM's exploding gas tanks. Manufacturers, distributors, and dealers with irresponsible, negligent, and most of all reckless practices should be held accountable

Some people call this common-sense gun control. I'm not convinced Americans have much in common in the way we sense these tragedies.

Some people say that guns don't kill people -- people kill people. Yes. But the person holding the gun and pulling the trigger is the LAST in a long line of those who bear responsiblity. I cannot claim to understand what could possibly motivate the shooter. I fully understand what motivates the rest. Greed. Power. Belief in their own superiority. An uncanny ability to value their own comfort, pride, and satisfaction over the lives and safety of others.

That's pretty much all I have this morning. Grief. Tears. Anger. And, for now, my children.

CLICK HERE TO TAKE ACTION OR DONATE TO EVERYTOWN FOR GUN SAFETY / MOMS DEMAND ACTION

Let's talk about SLEEP, baby

 The Good Place. Euphoria. We Were the Lucky Ones. The Bear. 

If we were playing NYT Connections, you might click on these four tiles and assume the thread binding them together is "Titles of TV Shows." In the game of my life -- and I know I'm not alone in this -- these words and phrases mean something completely different:

Bed. Sleep. Life before perimenopause. Me in the mornings before coffee.

It used to drive Nick crazy that my head could hit the pillow and within minutes I'd be out. It used to terrify me when our children were small and cribbed that I would sleep through a call in the night or, worse yet, the house catching on fire. Although I never lost sleep over it.

I will often still fall asleep within minutes of my head hitting the pillow -- after I've taken 480mg of magnesium, 100mg of progesterone, 60mg of Qulipta, 365mg of Omega 7s, and two Gaia "Sleep Thru" capsules, finished all my daily NYT games (IYKYK), taken off my glasses, put one over-ear Beat earphone in my non-sleeping-side left ear, turned off the lamp, lay on my back and breathed through a Headspace Sleepcast, then turned onto my right side with a podcast on 30-minute "sleep." After that, I'm usually out for at least a couple of hours.

Until my bladder, my sweat glands, or my brain decides otherwise.

@momsbehavingbadly

None of this is unique to me. Women have written about it, memed about it, blogged about it, cried about it... But something happened this morning that was slightly different.

When I woke up, the clock didn't start with a 1, 2, 3, or 4.

The clock showed 5:59. 5:59!

And I wasn't thinking about all the work I didn't get done yesterday, or the really hard conversation I need to have with my parents this afternoon, or the fact that they are going to leave me with four storage units full of antiques they cannot bear to part with and WHAT. THE. F*<% am I going to do with those?, or whether my son received the package that was supposed to have been delivered yesterday, or even knows how to get packages delivered to the mail room at his college, or what time I need to leave on Friday to arrive at my daughter's campus for the Family Weekend events, or whether I need to do laundry between now and then, or where is my rain slicker in case it pours on us at the football game like it did two years ago, or whether the boundaries I've set in my life are appropriate or selfish, or why I was raised to think that doing anything to protect myself actually is selfish, or about the time I told Beth T. in 8th grade that I didn't want to be her friend anymore and then saw her 20 years later at the Soda Shoppe and still didn't have the guts to apologize in person... 

I am so sorry, Beth. You were absolutely right -- you had done nothing but try to be my friend, and it was a really bitchy thing to say.

Nope, I wasn't thinking about any of that. Instead I was thinking about coming back to this very page to write something. And because being here was the only thing I did differently last night -- that, and watch the first two episodes of FX's "English Teacher" (So far, no notes. Highly recommend.) -- I'm assuming that correlation = causation and that writing this stupid blog is good for my stupid mental health.

Because instead of lying in bed angry about not sleeping (or the myriad other things in the world that really get my blood boiling), I got up, took 2 multivitamins and a probiotic, 300mg of Wellbutrin, 100mg of CoQ10, and 15mg of L-Methylfolate, made coffee, and... well... the rest, as they say, is (browser) history.

Screw you, Emily and Amelia Nagoski. Do you have to be right all the damn time? Just kidding. I love you both so much. Don't ever stop writing or researching or singing.

Take Two

As it turns out, I wasn't a blogger.

2014 me: not a blogger

Bloggers write and publish on a regular basis. To do that you have to believe in your own writing enough to hit the publish button after writing something. Like in academia, blogging is a publish or perish life.

Which means you have to own your own imperfections, accept that not everyone will like everything you do, and be willing to learn in public. These are three things I could not yet do ~10 years ago, and the result was that my blog's behind-the-scenes dashboard holds 

15 published posts and 

20 unpublished drafts

In other words, the odds of my being unready / unwilling / unable to publish were 4:3.

So why come back here to this space? What's changed since then? 

In June 2018, nine months after I wrote my farewell post on this page, I started a new job. I had been a freelancer for six years and went in-house with one of my clients. We knew this would be a huge transition -- going from a local firm of one to a global firm of 30,000 -- and Nick agreed that it made sense for him to "coast" for a while at work while I onboarded and accelerated. 

Then, while I was in Chicago at my orientation training, a headhunter called him about a fantastic opportunity. The kind that you can't not explore for fear of asking "What if...?" for the rest of your life. I was 100% supportive, of course, and so proud. I think my exact words were "Dude, WHAT THE F*<% happened to the coasting plan?!"

He started his new role (and commuting to a new city) six months later.

In 2020, my daughter graduated from high school, and we learned that car parade graduations are so much more fun than traditional graduations. Seriously, they should make that permanent. Later that summer, our family moved from Denver to St. Louis so Nick could stop commuting and, in my son's words, "we would only ruin one kid's life." 

I don't recommend relocating cross-country in the midst of a global pandemic.

Mad props to my son, who transitioned like a champ. In 2023, he also graduated from high school. While his ceremony had fewer neighbors ringing cowbells and holding up posters in their front yards, the Superintendent did pass out 200 cups of ice cream from Clementines, a local creamery, during her speech, which is about as good as it gets when you're stuck in a robe made from shower curtain material and a weird hat sitting on folding chairs in an auditorium on a hot and humid late-May afternoon.

Both my kids took gap years between high school and college. I've become a convert and sometimes wonder about the potential Sliding Doors storylines of my own life had I spent a year at age 18 recovering from Type-A burnout and giving myself the grace and space to ask who I am outside of others' expectations for me and my path. The good news is that I eventually got there. Or am getting there. Or will get there.

In April, I asked for a demotion at work, effectively undoing the 2½ promotions I had received since 2018. (See burnout, supra). This decision was made far easier once I found out that I was still being paid within the range of my original role and that, while my title would revert, my paycheck would remain the same. Again, I found myself asking, "Dude, WHAT THE F*<%?!"

2024 me: still not a blogger

That particular question has become more of a recurring theme in my life as of late.

Now the kids are barely grown and barely flown. I just moved the Thespian (who still loves but is no longer consumed by theatre) into his dorm for his first year of college, and the Equestrian (who still loves but is no longer consumed by riding) just moved herself into an apartment for her senior year. 

There's a lot to process. A lot to confront. And I find myself called back here. 

So should this page still be The Baloney Sandwich? Indubitably, as I still find myself sandwiched between

• parenting kids and coaching/befriending young adults
• navigating my own life and that of my aging parents
• what Richard Rohr would call the outer task (building the vessel) and the inner task (filling the vessel with purpose)
• mid-life and whatever's next

Not to mention that most days I feel like Oscar Mayer processed luncheon meat as I battle through perimenopause. (The prefix peri deriving from the Greek meaning "enclosing" or "surrounding." Because we are in it, my friends.)

It's all still baloney.

But this time I am willing to own my imperfections, risk your not liking what I write, and learn in public. This time, odds are better that I'll publish.

Saying goodbye... for now

I began this blog -- if we can even call it that anymore -- because sometimes, over the past five years, as I was in the throes of multi-generational caregiving, there were moments just too absurd to keep to myself.

And then there were moments just too sad or painful to capture in irreverent short-form writing.

The last few years, since my father-in-law moved from independent to assisted living, there have been more of the latter and fewer of the former. If you had administrative access to this blog, you would see 14 unfinished drafts. I couldn't seem to get it right, which perhaps offers a bit of psychological insight into how all caregivers of aging parents feel. We start something we hope will work -- a prescription, a therapy, a regimen, an approach -- and then, for some reason or another, have to change course and try again.

Hence the lack of logging in my blogging.

In May of this year, we said our final goodbyes to Renzo. And today I am saying goodbye to this phase of The Baloney Sandwich. It may come back again in another form -- goodness knows my life is never devoid of The B.S. -- but there are other aspects of life and love about which I feel more compelled to write at this point.

For my final post, I thought I'd share the eulogy I wrote for Renzo's funeral. Perhaps that way, anyone who comes across these sparse pages will know the fullness of his life rather than just the fraction of himself he was at the very end. We miss you, Grandpa. Every day.

*   *   *

Renzo Barto, 1932-2017

I recently finished reading a memoir entitled The Other Wes Moore. In it, the author recalls one of his commanding officers at Valley Forge Military School addressing the cadets. Colonel Murphy was a “no excuses” kind of guy. When he was diagnosed with late-stage cancer and had to leave the school to seek medical treatment, this is what he told the students on his last day:

“When it’s time for you to leave this school, leave your job, or even leave this earth, you make sure that you’ve worked hard to make sure it mattered that you were ever here.”

Renzo wasn’t a public figure. He had a quiet spirit. He was an introvert. But in everything he did, he made sure that he worked hard to make sure it mattered that he was there.

He worked hard at stickball as a boy in the Bronx. Maybe he wasn’t as natural a player as his brother, who had pro ball aspirations, but he still played hard. And my guess is that to his teammates and friends in the neighborhood, it mattered that he was there.

Renzo worked hard in school. Many traditional subjects didn’t come easy to him, but you better believe that each of his book reports had an original piece of artwork on the cover that was worthy of an A. To his classmates at the School of Industrial Arts in Manhattan and all who enjoyed his art for the rest of his life, it mattered that he was there.

He worked hard in the Army, whether peeling enough potatoes to fill up a beer keg while on KP (the one kitchen task he refused to do ever again after his discharge) or running maneuvers in the field with the 7^th Infantry. OK… maybe he chose not to work so hard when he volunteered to spend his final weeks in the army on board a ship home from Korea rather than flying back and still having 2 months left on base in NJ, but can you blame him? He returned from Korea with a United Nations Service Medal, a National Defense Service Medal, a Presidential Unit Citation, a Bronze Service Star, and a Purple Heart. Years later, when the Bergen Record ran a feature story on Renzo and his carvings, one of his old army buddies, Frank Rocco, found him and rebooted their friendship after 45 years. It mattered to our nation and to Renzo’s fellow soldiers that he was there.

Renzo worked hard at Norcross Greeting Cards… even when others in the office would gather for their cigarette break around his desk – the only non-smoker in the department – and exhale all over his drawing board. I guess that is what happens when you work in the humor department. He certainly worked hard wooing Bobbi Lewan once he met her, and thank goodness he did. It mattered so much that he was there.

He worked hard on 291 Midland Avenue, whether building the brick fireplace in the den or constructing the backyard deck. Everywhere you looked there were children’s books, comics, original artwork, wooden carvings – all details that made that house their home. To anyone who walked through the front door and was served, within seconds, a cup of coffee or tea from the Sunbeam Hot Shot hot water dispenser, it mattered that he was there.

Renzo worked hard as father. The obituary originally read, “Renzo and Bobbi had one son, Nicholas, who was the pride of their lives,” but one member of my family who shall remain nameless thought that might be over the top. It wasn’t. Renzo and Bobbi waited years for God to send just the right child and then took turns trying to keep a toddler boy contained and entertained while they worked from home. Renzo coached Little League baseball and drew the covers for the game day programs, taught his son how to use every tool in the toolbox – not to mention the wonder that is brown packing tape, accompanied Nick on football recruiting trips all over the northeast (where Renzo said a little prayer for Nick’s safety every time they encountered other recruits six inches taller and fifty pounds heavier than his son), and even put up with all the completely ridiculous girls Nick dated until that boy finally wised up and brought home the right one. In his college yearbook, Nick quoted Mark Twain: “When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.” Every time Renzo was there for his son, it mattered.

He worked hard as a husband and caretaker, doing everything he possibly could for Bobbi during her life and her battle with cancer. He was an example of selfless love to us all. It mattered that he was there.

Renzo worked hard to make sure his grandchildren knew how much he loved them. He flew to North Carolina within weeks of both births – remember, this is the man who flew to Korea (not back) and then not again until our wedding. For these kids, he jumped on a plane as often as possible. When Barrie was 15 months old, and I was required to take a week-long course at Columbia, he took care of her, overseeing meals, diapers, naptime, and daily trips to the park. He sold his home of almost forty years to be closer to his granddaughters in North Carolina, and then, at age 80, this Italian-born, Bronx-raised guy once again packed up… this time to board a covered wagon and move across the country to Colorado. 

Do you know how great it is as a parent when one of your kids says, “Mommy, draw a hippopotamus in a tutu,” to be able to respond, “Go ask your Grandpa.”? Renzo surprised his grandchildren with chocolate bunnies on Easter, became our official jack-o-lantern designer on Halloween, always had Werther’s hard caramels on hand for treats, attended Grandparents’ Day festivities, and – when Mason had to do a report and presentation on his favorite artist – even spent a morning in 3^rd grade being interviewed in front of the entire class. It mattered so much that he was there.

He worked hard – in his own unique ways – to be a good, generous brother, uncle, friend, and human being. One friend said he could light up a room with his smile. He walked his niece down the aisle at her wedding. He made baked clams for special occasions. He drew caricatures and sent them to their subjects. He gave away countless of his incredible wood carvings, usually for no other reason than he sensed that the recipient would get joy out of having an RB original. If you needed a custom box built or a ride to a doctor appointment in the city, he was your guy. He gave presentations in the community on his life’s work. He put up with my dad’s phone calls every time the Red Sox pulled ahead in the Division… and then resisted saying “I told you so” when the Yankees would inevitably retake the lead in September. He always had the perfect Yogi Berra quote for any occasion. I guess today’s would be this: “You should always go to other people’s funerals. Otherwise they won’t come to yours.” Even when his physical and mental health were declining, he always managed a smile and usually a joke for nurses, pharmacists, and caretakers.

In Ecclesiastes, the wise Solomon tells us that “there’s an opportune time to do things, a right time for everything on the earth… A right time to cry and another to laugh, a right time to lament and another to cheer… a right time to embrace and another to part, a right time to search and another to count your losses, a right time to hold on and another to let go…” Two chapters later, he goes on to write that “we should make the most of what God gives, both the bounty and the capacity to enjoy it, accepting what’s given and delighting in the work.” He also tells us that “hard and honest work earns a good night’s sleep.”

We’re so sad that the time has come for us to let go of Renzo / Dad / Grandpa / Uncle Pretzel. But these two things I know for sure:

First, Renzo made the most of the job he had for as long as God gave him life. He earned his rest and the reunion that took place last Friday with his beloved Bobbi.

And second, I know that during the time he was with us, Renzo worked hard to make sure it mattered to all of us – and countless others whom we may never know – that he was here.

Don't Ask, Do Tell

I coach Girls on the Run. For those of you who know me, that may come as a surprise, as I am about the furthest thing there is from “a runner.” Especially compared to the crazy, fit people who populate my home state of Colorado. Case in point: I chose to play goalie for my high school field hockey team so that my area of coverage would be a semicircle 35 yards in diameter rather than a 100x60-yard rectangle. That’s about… [insert math here] fewer square yards of running.

For those of you who know Girls on the Run, however, you can see why I would haul my wheezing self through the paces with these remarkable 3^rd, 4^th, and 5^th graders.  It is a fantastic program that does so much to empower girls and help them see the best in their unique identities.

Last week the girls and I were talking about choices—specifically, choosing to respect others, our community, and ourselves. One of the affirmations I gave them to ponder while running was “I make my own choices.” My own daughter heard this, laughed, and responded, “Except when you make my choices for me, Mom.”

Mic. Drop.

As a parent, I’ve spent a good part of the past thirteen years pondering the idea of empowerment and autonomy, especially when it comes to how I teach the art of good choices.  When my kids were toddlers, I practiced presenting them with either/or questions: Do you want broccoli or peas with your dinner?

Voila! Suddenly your three-year-old is empowered to make a healthy decision. Don’t get me wrong. A strong-willed kiddo still can (and probably will) answer with a resounding “NO!” But at least you tried.

I realized that I had mastered (or perhaps overused) this technique when my parents came over one evening to watch my daughter—then still in preschool. My dad asked her what they should play together.  Without a moment’s pause, she looked him straight in the eye and said in a matter-of-fact tone, “OK, Baboo, here are your options…”

Now that I’m dealing with a tween and a teen, the questions have changed and become (perhaps unsurprisingly) more guilt-infused. “Well, you can go to the movies instead of finishing your project tonight, but is that really the best choice?”

The answer, 100% of the time, is yes. But you see my point. We let them fail.
We let them face the consequences. It’s all a part of self-determination and identity.

OK, here are your options...

What I find infinitely harder (yes! harder than toddlers or tweenagers!) is how to interact with my 83-year-old father-in-law, a man who served in the Korean War, raised a son who attended Princeton undergrad and Columbia Business School (despite having gone no further than high school himself), nursed his wife through eighteen months of Stage IV uterine cancer, and now resides in an assisted living unit where he spends a great majority of every day sitting alone in his room. He says that’s all he wants to do.

My father-in-law is a quiet man by nature. If he were someone who believed in self-help books, he might have benefited from all the current literature on introverts. But even keeping to himself as much as he does, he cannot avoid all interaction, nor can he avoid all questions.

Some questions are easy for him to answer. At the anticoagulation clinic, which we visit on a weekly basis, they go through a series of routine queries that we both have memorized. He answers easily: “Has your diet changed?” (No.) “Have you consumed any alcohol this week?” (No.) “Have you felt any numbness or tingling down one side of your body?” (No.)

But ask him an unexpected question—even the simplest yes/no—and answers prove far more difficult. Leaving the clinic, I might toss out something like “Dad, do you want to get some lunch before I take you home?”

I am met with an uncomfortable silence.

While I’m waiting, I contemplate the following:

1. He isn’t wearing his hearing aids. Perhaps he didn’t hear me.
2. Perhaps he heard me but cognitively cannot work through the question.
3.  Perhaps he heard me and understood the question, but the Parkinson’s is constricting his throat and preventing him from voicing an answer.
4. Perhaps he heard and understood the question but is too depressed to respond.
5. Perhaps he heard, understood the question, and came up with an answer, but that process took so long that he then forgot he hadn’t said it aloud (or that I asked in the first place).

After a few, very long minutes, I ask if he heard me and repeat the question, this time trying the either/or tactic: “Dad, do you want to get some lunch or would you rather go straight home and eat there?” Sometimes I get an answer.  And sometimes I don’t.

And I wonder if we have reached the point of “don’t ask, do tell.”

Autonomy and empowerment are wonderful concepts, but is there a line we all one day will cross—physical, neurological, or emotional—where we can no longer make good choices for ourselves? And when a loved one crosses that line, do we as caregivers attempt to replace autonomy with beneficence? Which is more important for “aging gracefully”?

This dilemma doesn’t only come into play with the big, scary healthcare decisions. It also matters for the day-to-day, quality-of-life ones. If it is time for me, as a caregiver, to eliminate questions altogether, then I need to practice an entirely new approach:

• “Do you want to attend exercise class?” becomes “I’m taking you to the common area for exercise class.”
• “Do you want to watch the Yankees?” becomes “I’m turning on the television. The Yankees are playing.”
• And “Do you feel up for some lunch after this appointment?” becomes “Let’s go get some lunch before I take you home.” 

Admittedly, I’m suggesting what feels right to—and for—me.

At the New York Deli News, the answer to
"Do you want a reuben?" is always yes.

Sometimes I wonder if I really know what’s best. It could be that he’s reached a point where the comfort of a dim, quiet room is enough. I don’t know. But I do know, from everything I’ve read and experienced, that preserving dignity and identity are just as important as—if not more so than—preserving autonomy. And perhaps dignity and identity may be achieved as much by compelled participation in the world outside one’s room as by the opportunity to voice opinion and/or answer questions.

And he still retains the right to refuse. I hope he will. I hope he still can.

One more thought on this. I have made the commitment never to use the dreaded SH- word with him.

No, no, no. I don’t mean that SH- word. I mean SHOULD. It’s never “You should go to exercise class.” These are my choices that I’m making for him, not his choices. The difference may be semantic, but I believe it is significant.

P.S. OK, OK, OK. If I’m being completely honest, I do sometimes use the other SH- word but only in my head. For example, “$#!+. I just don’t know what to do in this situation.” If only there were a preschooler around to give me my options.