December 9th of 2013 is when our worlds were turned around. I remember coming home from tutoring to my parents' and Mom had made the chicken thigh recipe Selena made for us that we all liked so much, but nobody wanted to eat it after the news of Aunt Kay's diagnosis. I came in the house in my usual tornado of complaints about insignificant things but was stopped short. You can always see that look on people you love. Something was wrong. I started crying instantly.
Last Christmas we hung on to each other in shell-shocked something, I don't want to say despair, because as a family we always seem to rally. This Christmas we looked back on a year I think we're amazed at for many reasons: because it happened and we celebrated it, and in the end we triumphed in it. Love always wins. Isn't that in a Brandi Carlile song? No no. Love will find a way. One thing I know for sure is love will find a way.
January, February, March, they seem like a blur. I started this blog but didn't really keep up with it too well. I wrote in too many different areas, journals, random Word documents, to keep track of anything this year. We commemorated Joni's one-year-adoption-aniversary. Karen's baby shower in Tucson. My mom spending half of each month in Arizona. Everything getting harder. Went to Ski Cooper in Leadville. Great snow. My dad's 80-year-old father skiing with me, Grandpop, complaining that I had slightly more stamina. My parents' 29th wedding anniversary. April, of course, what a month. Spring "break" (do I really need a break from my part-time work?) in Tucson for the first week, hoping and praying I would get to meet Baby Hazelton. He arrived a week after I left. I ran out of the bedroom at the apartment when I got the text from Aunt Kay. "Ryder's arrived!" Tim immediately started strumming on his guitar and singing, "Ryder's arrived, Ryder's gonna ride, Ryder's arrived, Ryder's gonna ride...get ready to ride!" We loved him for it. Adam filmed it.
In May Erik saw Priscilla Ahn and got the tank top and album for me, and also realized that his chances of marrying her had "reached absolute 0." At the end of the month, all of us together again in Tucson for Aunt Kay's 57th birthday. The binder full of stories. 57 people wrote hilarious heart wrenching inappropriate hysterical loving too-much-fun-having incredible memories and there they all were for her to read. It was the best present ever. I have the best aunt ever.
June, Adam's 24th birthday. We did the Boulder Sunrise Triathlon. He got a medal even though he thinks he is slow and fat. I love him so much. I wish he could run now, but his knee acts up, fluid or something behind it the bone doctor says. I'm just proud of myself for going ahead and pulling on the wet suit and getting in the cold reservoir so early in the morning. The rest of a triathlon is purely enjoyable. The next weekend, Aunt Kay and Karen and Ryder come to visit, those bundles of love! Aunt Dana's 50th birthday party, rainy in the park. Lindsey came and was subjected to Aunt Kay's try-to-make-you-squirm humor. "So Lindsey, when are you and Erik going to start a family?" She faired better than poor Chelsea who had to run away blushing and squealing in that way that just comes out of us when we are embarrassed. Father's Day beers with my dad at Left Hand. I posted the picture and got 28 "Likes," showed him, "That's pretty good, Dad, 28 likes." "Jesus Christ, Beth. That's so stupid." "Dad, the people like us!"
Then everyone went to Maui, and I watched from Facebook. The beautiful silhouette of Karen holding Ryder up in the air like Simba, except looking at his smiley face, her prize, her beautiful son, the treasure we all can't get enough of. Adam and I rode our bikes to Berthoud to drink beers and hold Harley the one-eyed chihuahua, Lindsey met us there, of course, supported mill dog rescues. June was a good month. Aunt Kay got to swim in the ocean. My mom by her side. Adam and I got to run. Together. With him just a little farther ahead. Ryder got to see Maui before most 2-month-olds do. Sometimes tragic circumstances present opportunities for unforgettable memories.
In July I went to see my brother for the 4th. There was a terrible forecast in Boston so they rescheduled fireworks for July 3rd. We crowded in with the sweaty people and watched the show, said, "Wow, we think the show is better in Pana by A.D.F Fireworks. What did that stand for? Alcohol Dave and Fireworks? Yes, with fireworks twice. Ha ha!" Then we wanted ice cream. We always want ice cream. Emack and Bolio's turned in to a refuge instead of a treat when we had to stay there for cover in the midst of a frightfully quick development: a torrential downpour. "What should we do? Want to make a run for it?" We did. Have a picture of or drenched, wet-dog smelling selves waiting for the train on one of our slider phones that everyone makes fun of. Of course, the trip wasn't all silly revelry. The too-many-Benedryls and paramedic visit. Recovery. Delicious plum-raspberry and strawberry-rhubarb tarts. J.F.K House. Tennis and walks around the reservoir, the water museum. Interesting but I think over our heads, or at least definitely mine. Roger Federer's heartbreaking 5-set loss to Novak in the finals of Wimbledon. Then me sitting on the plane for 4 hours before it took off because of tornado warnings. At least I got a free Corona. I am going to miss trips to Boston to visit my brother. I have this feeling he might be back. In the meantime, I am glad to have him moving back "home," wherever home may be for him.
Oxnard beach reunion later that month. Oh, how we love to travel. Oh, how the beach calms us. It was a little too rocky-rough-cold to swim much in this ocean, unless you asked Adam when he wanted to try surfing the first day (it didn't go well.) The hole-digging, the photos, little Rose and Ryder crawling around on the quilt sewn by Aunt Lee. Henry at 3 eyeing "pretty girls." Reading A Prayer for Owen Meany and Mrs. Bridge, that was me, falling completely in love with them both. "Heads Up" and Korean barbecue. Spundnuts Donuts. Lying in bed with Karen late at night hearing the ocean waves crash and Ryder's sweet little cries, not irritating to me but adorable and helpless. I love that baby boy. Going to CrossFit with Karen and Uncle Rob and Adam, rubbing our butt cracks raw on the ab mats, no one believed I could hurt myself that badly. There is still a scar. Perhaps I should stick to running. Surf Brewing and Anacapa Brewing and beer beer beer. I am my father's daughter.
August was the Folks Festival, Josh Ritter and Brandi Carlile and Adam and me, and of course Tim couldn't miss that, growing his beard and being one with the other hipster songwriters. This was after what my mom gives the euphemism of "my derailment." I wrote about what happened in August at that school in another document. I'll paste here:
Shame: 8/20/14
One week ago today I had an English
classroom. It was at an alternative high school across the street from a shabby Mexican restaurant and
out east too far to see the mountains and down the road from some churches and
some well-manicured lawns of tiny houses my mom would say had “pride of
ownership.” It is a school with character. My students would have all been
Mexican and would have all suffered hardships I have not known and likely will
never know. But I never met them.
Two
weeks ago today I was attending Therapeutic Crisis Intervention training for my
job as a behavior coach at a school for kids with emotional and behavioral disorders. I liked my job there. I didn’t
have to stretch myself. I have never been flexible in any sense of the word. We
were learning how to de-escalate students before a potentially violent
situation became dangerous. We were a room full of people wanting to work with
emotionally troubled children and teenagers, for whatever reasons each of us
carried in our hearts. I don’t think they want me to come back. I’ve never been
one to think I am valued. I’ve never really valued myself.
Last
Thursday I saw a professional counselor and told her I’ve had anxiety for my
entire life. I told her I am tired of it.
“What would you like to get out of
our sessions together?”
I want to feel better. I want to be able to do
things. I want to like myself a little more. I want to stop asking for help all
the time. I don’t believe you can help me. But here’s 70 dollars. She was a
very nice woman with a golden suntan and yellow hair and expensive shoes. I
wonder what she has gone though that makes her think she can help people like
me. I wonder if she is doing it because it probably makes people say, “Oh, how
wonderful,” when they ask her what she does for a living and she says she is a
professional counselor. Or I wonder if she really wants to help me. I wonder if
she’s needed this kind of help before, too. I’ve never been able to fully trust
people to have pure motives. I know mine are hardly ever pure. It’s nothing
against humanity.
Last Wednesday I wandered out of a
meeting about updating my e-portfolio and reviewing observations of my teaching
performance online and updating my professional goals on a weekly basis and
documenting it for the district to see and make sure they
are hiring effective teachers who reflect and grow and cite all of the
standards from the curriculum guides in their lesson plans. Before I left I
couldn’t breathe. My eyes twitched all around the room. The ex-Marine, although
Trish warned me to never call him that because once-a-Marine-always-a-Marine,
came and asked, “Hey, are you registered for the union? Because you really
ought to think about doing that. It’s for you. For your safety. As a teacher.”
I looked at him like what else but a deer in headlights. Nick laughed and told him, “I think she has
other things on her mind.”
My classroom had a desk by a window.
I left a zip-up sweatshirt on my chair so that it looked homey. Like I could
live there for most of my day and put the sweatshirt on or leave it on the
chair and still go home, because I could leave whatever I wanted in my very own
classroom. I told myself things like that to try and convince myself that it
was real. Now, it seems silly and fake and like something that I read in a bad
book. I hung up greeting cards from family members and Adam on my filing
cabinet full of materials that weren’t even mine, full of dried out dry-erase
markers and index cards and handouts of Mr. Pope’s, who taught there last year.
One greeting card had a nice quote and cartoon drawing of a young woman who had
everything together on it. It was from Granejo. My grandparents must feel so
sad for me. Or maybe just disappointed. The quote said, “And she packed up her
belongings and put on a cute pair of shoes and set out to change a few things.”
In September the weather started to get cooler, maybe I started to feel better about myself. If nothing else awful had happened this year, probably this whole breakdown of sorts I experienced in August would have been a center of attention. I am good at being the center of attention. I come by it naturally. It's not my proudest trait. The day before my 24th birthday, September 26th, 2014, I wrote another entry in that electronic journal of sorts. I wrote about walking Joni around the lake. I wrote about graduating college and feeling like I had nothing in common with the other English Education graduates. I wrote about the two principals who wanted me to teach English and how I didn't want to. I wrote about feeling self-absorbed.
I admire my mom so much. She and Mimi epitomize the complete opposite of self-absorbed, always on their feet for the sake of someone else. I asked my mom today, "Mom, do you think I will ever grow up to be as good of a person as you are?" She said, "Well, I don't know if you will ever want to help people as much as I do if you don't get paid for it." She won't like me printing that. I came back with, "Well, my husband won't make as much money as yours did," with a sideways glance at Adam playing Candy Crush on the couch. Obnoxiousness is one of our many fortes, my mom and I. I am getting side-tracked.
October. Walk to Defeat ALS. We raised so much money, Aunt Kay and Karen Mcmillin cutting the ribbon to start the walk. Karen and Ryder announcing our team. Karl and Ashley so giddy in love. Patrick wheeling Papa along the course, happy to get the exercise. Mimi and Erik overwhelmed with the amount of emotion crammed into one park. All of the people there to support my amazing Aunt Kay. Erik breaking down that night at the kitchen table. I don't have many memories of my brother breaking down.
I started my job with Sarah. It's been so inspiring, I tell people she is more help to me than I am to her. She amazes me. She makes me laugh. She makes me appreciate life in a way I never have before - And always, with a smile. We're sitting on the on-ramp in Louisville to get on Highway 36, trapped in all senses of the word. Cars overflowing off the on-ramp back into Louisville. Cars backed up for miles on the highway. I let out this big sigh, so cursing with Sarah, but at least an, "Oh, my God! We are so stuck!" She looks at me with this intoxicating grin. Laughs in a gasp of air and exclaims, "Look at ALL THOSE CARS! They're crazy!" She is the perfect companion to any candidate for potential road rage. I am literally getting paid to hang out with someone who never fails to make my day.
I started my job with Sarah. It's been so inspiring, I tell people she is more help to me than I am to her. She amazes me. She makes me laugh. She makes me appreciate life in a way I never have before - And always, with a smile. We're sitting on the on-ramp in Louisville to get on Highway 36, trapped in all senses of the word. Cars overflowing off the on-ramp back into Louisville. Cars backed up for miles on the highway. I let out this big sigh, so cursing with Sarah, but at least an, "Oh, my God! We are so stuck!" She looks at me with this intoxicating grin. Laughs in a gasp of air and exclaims, "Look at ALL THOSE CARS! They're crazy!" She is the perfect companion to any candidate for potential road rage. I am literally getting paid to hang out with someone who never fails to make my day.
The rest is fresh in all of our memories, anyway. Thanksgiving in Kansas, Colorado, Arizona. Adam and I got to feed the kangaroos, what fun. Erik landing the job in Colorado. Leaving that city he's grown to love. We just had Christmas, you were all there. It was amazing. "One of the best in my memory," Ashley said to Karl. The only place to have one for me is in Tucson. It's home for the holidays.
Picture Memories of 2014:
Picture Memories of 2014:
This year has been awful. It has sucked something out of me. But it's lit a fire, too. I want something out of this life. I have my star tattoo and it's not a stupid whim like that other one. I want things to be different, I want a real job, I want my mom to get some rest, and most of all I want there to be a cure for ALS. I don't know what's going to happen in 2015. I don't have a cheesy or conclusive way to tie this up. Here we all are. We'll bring in the new year in Tucson, like always. LOVE LOVE LOVE.
