The Daily Cure

Years ago, I lived through the death of someone dear to me largely by cleaning house and arranging things in a pleasing way.  I wanted to cast my eye about and see loveliness—everywhere. The therapist I was seeing off and on at the time (y’know, maintenance) remarked that I coped by “weaving the threads of my anxiety and sadness into something beautiful.” For years, I put the emphasis on the word “beauty,” because it is true: I do love beauty and give myself over to its sway willingly.

I’m not talking about perfect beauty so much as I am referring to an inherent quality in things, events, ephemera and people that speaks directly to the soul and is hard to pin down in the final analysis. Beauty that breaks your heart and puts it back together again. Beauty that gives reason where it seems to be lacking. Beauty that, on sight, makes us feel balanced and is if things are right with the world after all. Beauty that grows out of imperfection. Flawed beauty. Accidental beauty. Spontaneous beauty. Simple beauty. It’s hard to put this into words, of course, because it really defies description even though you all know what I’m talking about.

So, yes, beauty is important to me. But I’ve realized after many years, that the more significant part of the therapist’s statement wasn’t the beauty bit. It was the part about “weaving”—doing something, making something out of something else—taking all those feelings that are so hard to hold inside yourself, and transforming them through almost any creative act whatsoever into something else. A vase of cut flowers. A quilt. A typographic solution. A crocheted bag. A beautifully clean closet. A new business idea. A blog post. A handwritten letter. A nourishing meal.

Making things, or at least trying to, is my drug. It lifts me up when all else will fail. The entire contents of a pharmacy are zero to me compared to creating something where, before, there was nothing. Even if that something is just an idea. A scribble. A plan. I’m good at starting things, but not always good at finishing them.

(I don’t think I’m alone in this. So many of you write beautiful blogs and take stunning pictures. And I know you’re not in it for the self-promotion. There’s something about just doing those two things—isn’t there?—writing and photographing—that helps set us straight. And so many of you make so much else besides…beautiful homes, delicious dishes, chicken houses, gardens, new business plans, mini-empires. Some of you make mockery of disease in the most stunning act of creativity and daring of all!)

I suppose this is why, in the end, I chose advertising as a way to make a living. I didn’t relish the poverty of being an artist, but I knew that I needed to be called upon to make things. To realize something that sprang from a creative inspiration. It’s why, too, I tried to do it differently, injecting beauty when and where I could, and it’s the reason I was lucky to land in a place that conducted (and still does) this unwieldy and often ugly business with great finesse and relative enlightenment. It helped that there were deadlines, and people standing by to make me meet them. It helped that when one project finished, there were always three more.

For years now, my husband and I have both freelanced—his projects arriving from all corners of the globe. So our work comes and goes, riding the waves of geopolitical events, constant technological changes and economic crises. This is not a good time. It’s a challenging time. But I’m not complaining. When we’re not making things for pay, we have time to dream up and make other things. Who knows what will grow out of it. Who knows what the sleepless nights, as full of wonder as they are of worry, will weave themselves into.

A new career? A knitted sock? A story to tell you? I don’t know yet. But I will, and when I do, you’ll be among the first to know. Have a lovely day, OK?

This week, my mother is moving to an assisted living facility in Atlanta, Georgia to live closer to my brother. She’s going with an open mind and a good, healthy sense of adventure. She knows that my brother and I would like her closer, and she knows, too, that maybe it’s a good time for her, also, to be closer to us. There have been some health scares, which are luckily resolved. And there’s that pesky memory-stuff, that can’t be denied. She’s leaving New York City, which has fed her heart, body and soul for many years. I know she’ll miss it. I will miss going there to be with her, and it will always be “her City” as far as I’m concerned.

But I also know that if anyone has the capacity for happiness inside four walls, or out of them, it’s my mother. She’s intellectually curious. She’s open. She’s observant. And best of all, she’s rarely—I believe I can say “almost never” here without lying—scared. In a world that’s full of stuff to be feared, she doesn’t. She approaches newness as an adventure, and you can include in that gaping category the big unknown, Death. She’s not scared of it. She’s philosophical about it. And because she is, we talk about it openly and honestly. I hope her courage will one day rub off on me. It would serve me well.

“Courage, hard work, self mastery and intelligent effort are all essential to a successful life. Character in the long run is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike.” —Theorore Roosevelt

You don’t participate in the moving of a parent without going through a lot of thinking, worrying and sleepless nights. Is it right for them? Is the timing what it should be? Is it the right place? Am I treating this person with love? You go around and around…and in my case, you do it while spending a great deal of time talking, laughing, crying and querying with the very person involved. We talk almost every day, she and I, and while I’m aware of the challenges of aging that are upon her, I’m most often aware of what her body and her mind continue to do really well. When she’s having good days, she’s brilliantly observant, critical (in the best sense of the word), funny. And while I’m being myself and she’s being herself…our ages slip away and disappear, and we snuggle into the comfortable slippers of biological and age-indifferent roles, mother and daughter. I may do a lot for her administratively, but she is still the one who gives hope. Her maternal supremacy reigns on, whether she knows it or not.

Take away the hierarchy implied by familial relationship (i.e., she is older by nature of being the parent), and you have two people who are still the people they were a long time ago in many senses. She still “plays well by herself” (a comment made by one of her elementary school teachers). I still have difficulty finishing projects I’ve started. She still wields a vast and accurate vocabulary. I still love illustrated children’s books. She still gets dressed every morning with a singular and somewhat dramatic sense of style. I still throw my hair thoughtlessly into a clip and say, “Let’s go!” I think we both look in the mirrors and feel slightly disconnected from what we see, our inner voices and selves not matching up perfectly with the ever new arrangement of flesh. We just feel like ourselves. She tells me how young and beautiful I look, and I tell her the same, and our mutual, unspoken inner response to that statement is: “Well, that’s because you love me.”

Age falls away—means little—does nothing but get in the way of the critical business of living the instant. Of listening, sharing, laughing, witnessing, attending, participating…giving comfort where you can.

So when I think about how old I am, the question falls dumb on even dumber ears. I am what I am. I am the daughter of my mother. I am advancing in years as we all are. I am a product of my times, past and present. I feel changed in some ways, and essentially immutable and untouched in others. My spirit shines next to hers, as it does next to my husband’s and my daughters’. I will one day be dust, just like my father and my grandfathers, and unbelievably the offspring of my offspring. But, so what? Now is now. And here we are. And we were all lucky enough to meet and spend this amazing time together.