Category Archives: personal

Autumn, Mourning, and Community Chorus

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Autumnal morning mist over Lake Champlain rises and becomes clouds

Dear Reader has probably gotten used to the fact that it is no longer summer. We fought its departure for a good while, having enjoyed such a glorious August here in Vermont. We did not want it to end. But: time marches on.

The low autumnal sun blinding us both outside the post office, an acquaintance mentions how weird it got once both her parents had died. October is weird for me. My parents died a few years apart, a few days apart, in October. I don’t mourn them together, I do it separately.

I mourn not having shown my mother enough gratitude over my lifetime. The woman was not thanked enough. I understand that this is not uncommon, but it’s also not okay. A mother said to me, “Oh, we don’t expect a lot of thanks!” But hell if most don’t deserve it … the diapers alone, which to this day I believe fall mostly into the hands (so to speak) of the mothers. I wish I could sit down with Mommy and thank her for every single thing. It would take hours.

I mourn my father’s loss of eyesight years before his death. He was so brave, walking blind to choir rehearsals at night. Once he told me, regarding my politics, that I was “just not that smart.” Well, Fathah, you were just not that smart walking around blind with no indication that you were blind, in a town with elderly motorists with not-great vision of their own! The man gardened and cleaned gutters on ladders, blind. The neighbors thought we were “letting” him do this. He was unstoppable. I’d find an old family photo to mail him and remember suddenly: Wait, he can’t see. Heartbreaking.

Admittedly, I’ve never been good at dates. I tested terribly in Social Studies when it came to dates of battles or peace accords or presidential terms. My own life is a mystery to me in terms of what years I lived where and did what. Parents have it easier, I say, because they can carbon date events based on their kids. (“Tobias was a toddler, so it must have been the early 2000s…”). I don’t even try to remember my life dates any more. I check my resume for that.

But this year at least, perhaps like Dear Reader, I have my parents’ dates of death (“the other DOD”) down cold. I’m going to honor each in some way, on their days. Maybe I’ll read to Fathah from my humble book, which he was so damn proud of though he couldn’t see it, despite a nuclear orange cover. And I’ll make a long list of Mommy’s many talents, presents, and services she provided for decades — undemanding of accolades and improperly compensated for same. I will thank her. It will take hours.

And then I will move on, knowing that if I’m alive in a year I’ll do it again. I endeavor, generally, to be cheery; I feel it’s our duty not to drag others down. I’ll do things that make me happy, and hopefully others. Sing and dance and laugh and goof off. Poke the stick at the tiger. Be fey and surprising and mischievous. Do pranks. Distract others from global unrest, from the miseries of their own lives. Let others do these things for me. Why not? Life is for the living. Those of us that are still here can and must exchange good energy.

To that end: if you’ve been thinking of joining a community chorus, it’s not too late, even if they’ve had 10 rehearsals. Community choruses are very forgiving; there’s always someone who will help you catch up. No auditions!

What I love about a community chorus is it’s like a train pulling out of the station. You’re not positive you really want to do it, so you’re jogging alongside of the train as it pulls out, just in case you decide you want to get on. It starts picking up speed. You have to trot faster as you ponder the pros and cons. You’ve invested a bit of energy and time now, and you’re leaning more towards Yes – just as it’s gaining real velocity and the pressure is mounting (from the other altos, or the person who collects the money). So you decide, ah hell, I might as well see where this thing is going, and you scramble aboard the moving train. You commit.

You meet experienced travelers, along with hacks like yourself. You realize there is no way you are going to pull off 14 songs, the way rehearsal is going. You dump this metaphor.

Rehearsal gets longer. You attend additional, desperate section rehearsals in an effort to pull it together. The director culls the songs you’re really destroying as a group. There’s still some doozies, in Latin or gibberish or a capella or with crazy-weird notes. At the eleventh hour you’re scrambling to learn your parts, which means rote memorization via some quality time with YouTube. You’re practicing in the car, the bathtub, the emergency room, the Port Authority bus terminal.

On the eve of the performance, chorus members are soiling their finery in abject terror at what might go wrong – it’s show time! Then somehow … your beloved, underdog community chorus … knocks it out of the park. You switch metaphors.

It’s a grand slam. The tenors, by God, they’ve learned their part and they’re belting it out, all six of them! The announcer bellows, FREE HOT DOGS FOR THE ENTIRE STADIUM. Your audience goes berserk over the hardest piece, the one the whole chorus never dreamed it could pull off, wondering why the heck the director wouldn’t cut it. The apple comes out. The fans go wild.*

Aren’t you glad you got on that train, Slugger? Good autumn, good mourning, good music making, and good day.

*Only knowers of Shea Stadium will get this reference.

Ann Aikens hosts a radio show, “Mostly Useless Advice,” on WFVR at royaltonradio.org. Her useful book of advice, A Young Woman’s Guide to Life: A Cautionary Tale, is available online and in Vermont shops, the audiobook on Amazon. She has written her Upper Valley Girl column since 1996. Find more of her writing at uppervalleygirl.com; speaking events at annaikens.com.

🎧 Replay of Local Writerly Radio Show 🎧

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Here is a replay of a local Writerly radio show I guested on ~ expires at either midnight tomorrow or Tuesday. You’d think I know. Or posted this sooner.

Starts at the 5-minute mark, after musical intro:

https://royaltonradio.dreamhosters.com/podcasts/Wordstream/stream.mp3

RADIO is so much FUN, man. A good interviewer keeps you from going off the rails entirely. Thank you, Rose Terami.

Spring, Spring, Spring, Spring, SPRING

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Holy Moly, that was one punishing winter. Shoveling, scraping, bitter cold, biting winds, falls on ice, moods swinging like a metronome, fuel costs rising like an intercontinental ballistic missile … crazy-making. Mother Nature – and other unnamed powers – dealt us a one-way ticket to Nutterville.

Normally I feel a nostalgic sorrow at the passing of both summer and winter, for some reason. It’s as if, “I’ve become accustomed to her face.” And it will be a long while before she rolls around again.

This time I feel nothing but anticipation. Here comes spring, baby. Bulbs emerging. Skunks resurfacing. Birds romping. We’re still in a wacked-out limbo as temps vacillate as the sap runs, and we gradually adjust to the next drastically different season. That’s why a friend said she lives in New England. For the “drastic changes of season.” 

Being bounced around inspires fear: is spring really coming, or is this some elaborate ruse by forces outside our control designed to drive us insane with sheer wanting? There certainly seem to be many forces outside our control right now, and I for one don’t like it a bit. I’m taking to the streets, by the Jesus (an old Vermonty expression, that).

Speaking of whom, my pagan inclinations aside, Lent became something oddly sacred when I moved back to Vermont 20 years ago and found a great church. (I realize Dear Reader may find the latter an oxymoronic pairing of words, but I proceed.) I learned that Lent is not supposed to be about self-flagellation or self-denial, but self-reflection and a putting away, perhaps, of thoughts or behaviors that no longer serve us or others. A self-freeing. I super enjoy quiet contemplation as the last snows fly during this odd period of waiting.Importantly, the Filet-O-Fish always goes on sale now. Because of St. Pat’s (O’Fish!) or Lent (fish!), who knows, but the thing is six bucks ordinarily, so have it. 

I make lists at summer’s end, the new year, and now. This March I invented a new list, good for the older set: make a list of the high points in your life. It puts things in perspective, and keeps your bean from lingering on topics dreary, which currently abound. Try it?

Please don’t think your High Points need to be formulaic. You know, “my (1st, 2nd or 3rd…) wedding; the birth of my children; my bat mitzvah.” I had none of those, so ran with:

Being zipped into a snowsuit as a child; Grandmas teaching me things; Troop mothers panicking on the beach as we girl scouts rocketed gleefully upwards in giant surf on Fire Island; Childhood friends playing flashlight tag; high school friends administering “treatments” to each other (this when you put high-quality headphones on your friend and play them an incredible song, with no advance spoiler, e.g., “Tom Sawyer”; “Won’t Get Fooled Again; “Comfortably Numb”); flying dreams; NYC at night with various boyfriends, the city our oyster; smoking horses through the woods in Woodstock; achieving the Pacific Ocean, having driven solo across the US; blow drying my hair in a convertible on the PCH; my friend onstage winning an Oscar, mouthing thanks to his deceased mother; skinny dipping while kayaking in Vermont; my first New World Festival (Randolph); laughing so hard with nieces, nephew, or friends that we couldn’t stop, to the annoyance of All; a high school reunion that went on and on until 3 am; a college reunion that went on and on until 3 am; plunging into a fjord; pounding beezers on the porch with Mommy in all weather; being bedside when Fathah left this earth; post-funeral dancing to Fathha’s favorite, “Eagle’s Greatest Hits,” with nieces; the Eclipse (you forgot about that, right?).

Suddenly your whole life story seems like one of richness, rather than of trials. Send me your list if your like. (It will be graded, but technically this is open book.) The patterns will remind you of, say, “Right. I like water. Need water.” Or: “Music. Play more music.” Crack the code.

Tips to launch your keister into SPRING, Hell-bent for leather:

Play Royalton Free Radio WFVR ~ 96.5. Too many good shows to suggest just one (stream or replay).

Maple, maple, maple.

Do what feels good besides a handle of bourbon, though the industry could certainly use your “support” with Canada shutting down consumption due to tariff insanity. Try a Brocklebank stout? Killer.

Read a book as the last snow falls to Gabriel Fauret’s “Requiem.”

Go to Dandelion Acres, movies at the Playhouse, dance in your skivvies under the moon.

Good launch and day.

Ann Aikens is an author, columnist, speaker, and blogger. Her darkly comical book of advice, A Young Woman’s Guide to Life: A Cautionary Tale, was published in 2023, her Upper Valley Girl column since 1996. Find events and bookshops at annaikens.com; her blog at uppervalleygirl.com.

The Other Frankentree

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The original Frankentree is a fruit tree with grafted limbs that produces multiple varieties within a species of fruit — say, pears, apples, plums, or cherries. It is colorful, comme resultat. It can be gorgeous.

The not-gorgeous Frankentree is the cell-phone-tower-disguised-as-a-tree tree. Few people have access to this creepy monster.

I recently got up close to one. It gave me the willies. The “needles” on a “branch” that had fallen off had a revolting texture, like that of a fake Christmas tree made out of recycled toxins. Plus, I was probably getting irradiated by the cell tower itself. I fled.

A Fun Thing to Start in a New Year

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Last year I had some lucky breaks, despite seemingly increasing Earthly mayhem. So every day, more or less, I thought of one thing that had made me feel lucky — or just happy — that day. I wrote it down on a scrap of paper and put it in this vase.

Now I get to read them all, have my mind blown, burn them, and start anew. Won’t you join me?

When Your Parents Die

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Some years back, a wise Vermont friend told me, “When both of your parents are gone, it’s as if a roof over your head has suddenly disappeared that you never even knew existed.” I wondered what that would feel like.

When my old Fathah recently died (he loved being called “Fathah” with a Boston accent), I found out. Even though we had been taking care of him, not he of us, he’d remained always somehow … in charge. Now I’m adrift. Untethered. When my mother died six years ago, I became an easy crier. So when people offer me condolences with those pained eyes, I lose it. Which makes me want to avoid people. No roof. I feel for people whose parents died young. Their roof was more evident, and necessary.

I was fortunate to be in the room when he went. It was painful, and beautiful, and profound. And painful. I had raced to be there in a rental car in the dark and somehow made it. Maybe he’d waited. 

Just as I got there, 21 members of his choir arrived to him in his bed. I’ll never forget it. They did parts of “Peace like a River” and “Amazing Grace,” a song I never cared for untilI learned its history just this year. He opened his eyes and smiled. Someone made a crack about football and he smiled wider. My father was nearly deaf. Yet he heard them. 

He couldn’t speak, so I “watered” him with straw-fuls of water, and said a lot, which flooded out of me as I wept. I sang into his “good” ear a gospel song he loved, “Down To The River.” And a bit of the Eagles. I was lucky because so many people camp out for days or weeks and the second they go for coffee, their parent takes off. I am certain that at one point he could see me. My father was blind.

He stopped breathing. Then his heart slowed. The nurse got a stethoscope. She said softly, “He’s going.” Pause. “He’s going.” And then my Fathah left the earth. 

I had an awful time leaving his body behind. What if he was still in the room? My sister said by phone, “No way he’s still there. He hated it there. He’s back at the house!” I drove to his house, rolled in my luggage, turned on all the lights inside and out, cranked his beloved Eagles, surrounded by 1,000 photos my parents had framed, and keened.

I’m not a fan of the simple “Sorry for your loss,” or (to vets), “Thank you for your service.”  Each feels a little pat. I’ll say instead, “I’m just so sorry,” or “Thank you for what you’ve done for our country.” I know vets who have given so damned much. I liked it when one person wrote me, “I’m sorry for the loss,” and another: “Well, that sucks.”

The Gifts of the People 
When someone I haven’t seen in a while asks, “How’s it going?”, I sometimes exclaim, “My father died!” It’s all I need to say. Now their expectations of me are lowered, and the window opens for their wisdoms, which have been legion. A sampling:

A brilliant comedy writer friend who’s lost many people texted, “You never get over it. But you get used to not getting over it.”

A tennis pal wrote, “Death is such a part of life … natural, normal, and PAINFUL. We are all holding you up!” Later: “Think about jotting down some favorite memories. Stuff that doesn’t make the obit. It might be an ongoing list you can reflect on just for you. It’s a giant swing of emotions when it’s a parent.”

A library friend emailed, “I think of my parents as the wings that keep me going. I’m made of their DNA, so they’re always with me.”

Someone else said: “I never realized what a big deal it is when your parents die. Then mine did.”

A cashier said, “When you don’t have a good relationship with a parent and they die, you never get a chance to repair it.” A few people said this. My internal reaction was, “Well, it’s really the parent’s job to repair it.” But a healer I know recounted how he, as a young child, initiated the repairing. His father even mentioned it to him upon his deathbed.

The officiant at Fathah’s service has been a minister for decades. I asked how he keeps doing it. He said, “I do it. Then, I move onto the next person to help.” I have found that, indeed, helping others is a massive balm. Traumatized people agree.

A lovely local minister I’ve never met offered a phone call. He said many things that helped. “Everyone is surprised at their emotions when someone dies … it is a matrix of circumstances and personalities. You’re not in control of their death, or your feelings or thoughts. It is beyond your ability. Unless the feelings are intrusive, ongoing, embrace them.” 

He went on. If you had a difficult relationship: “Examine in your heart why you are having these feelings. You cannot get to the bottom of it, but it can help to get inside their head. Ask God why they said or did the things they did.” It was odd he said this, because I’d recently had an epiphany where I “got” that my father’s criticisms were sometimes about his concern for me. He thought I was making the wrong decisions or on the wrong side of politics. He feared for me.

A dear contemporary whose husband died a 2 years ago wrote, “I feel like I’m in Stage 15, not that I have numbered them. Lots of examining stuff in a new light, as if I’ve moved onto higher ground and am looking back and down. Still pain, but a softer ache. Regret and acceptance.”

Ah, regret. That has been terrible. Not just the second parent to go, but the one I had a less easy relationship with. Also, he went so quickly. I thought we’d have weeks together, not one hour. When I find the clippings I was to read to him, the earbuds for him to hear my audiobook — or music — a memory of Christmases past, a post-it of cheery news about Barnard and Vermont … I bawl with a burning regret. I never got the chance. People say, “Read it to him now!” Oh friends, it’s so not the same. And much as I grieve for myself, and his wish to live longer, I’m relieved he’s out of pain.

Recently, an old friend and I were talking about the loss of certain houses in our lives. When I brought it up, I thought she’d think me petty, but she was totally on board, regaling me with stories of her grandparent’s magical house (replete with a non-working carousel and working miniature trains big enough to ride). Others agreed. 

You can picture every inch of the house. The old appliances and countertops, the cabinets, lighting, the bed you slept in so soundly. If they die, you go through every inch of the place deciding what to keep. Your parents’ entire lives are chronicled in the house. But you’d need a museum to keep it all. Then someone buys it and utterly destroys its character. White cabinetry? A tear-down? When the house goes, all the memories that were inside … vanish. They are now only in your head. And as others pass on, there is ultimately only one Keeper of the Memories. Which is the strangest thing.

What I have mostly found is this: no matter what shape they were in when they died, you always wanted more time with them. Even just five minutes. You don’t want them to suffer, at all, but at least when you had to take care of them, they were still in the room. You could still be loving, even if it was only going in just one direction. You don’t want them to go.

I have heard this sometimes happens even when the parent was declining with memory loss. Initially, they’re on the phone trying to figure out whom they’re speaking with (their own child), or rooting for the wrong team in sports — some of it tragic in the moment and later comical, or vice versa. Then it gets worse. Much worse. But children do not always feel relief when that parent dies. They don’t want them to go.

There is no way I’m going to grieve this time as long as I did for my mother (3 years?). Fathah had a great life and knew it. I’m going to grief counseling, the gym, the woods, acupuncture. I’ll call those who offered to talk. Including Hospice personnel, God love them.

Take Dictation
One last piece of advice. As trips to Fathah 1,000 miles away became increasingly undoable, I’d take “dictation” from him by phone about his life. He loved talking — and having a secretary again, I think. All of his gems informed the obit, and gave me things to tell my family and his sister that we never knew. It also explained some things.

I leave you with a laugh. My dad had a great big sense of humor, and would be thrilled I ended with this. It’s the funniest, yet loving, obit:

https://www.fayobserver.com/obituaries/m0028451/

Goodby, Fathah. I love you so. Thank you for everything. Good night.

Ann Aikens is an author, columnist, speaker, and blogger. Her darkly comical book of advice, A Young Woman’s Guide to Life: A Cautionary Tale, was published in 2023, her Upper Valley Girl column since 1996. Find events and bookshops at annaikens.com; her blog is uppervalleygirl.com. Her father was delighted by her humble scribblings.

A Better Mousetrap

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I guess mouse trap is a misnomer. It’s more like mouse electric chair. And you know, much as I love Havahart traps, there’s just way too many mice to keep doing catch and release.

I cannot get a cat. And the poisons are so cruel. Glue traps the worst possible. The old- fashioned mouse traps gave me the willies every time I saw the grimaces on mices’ dead faces ~ seemed an awful way to go, and it didn’t always kill the critter. With this one, it’s pretty much guaranteed, and I don’t have to look at my victims.

So, a great mouse trap? No. But better. Have I put the batteries in yet? No, I have not.

Free eBook NOW thru Tuesday (midnight Pacific time) AND Audiobook coming soon!

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Free downloads at the Amazon. Use the free $0.00 eBook at upper right, not the Kindle download. Sign up for my e-list at www.annaikens.com and win a Prize! And my undying LERV. Note square cover created for eBook, by a goddess.

Halloween, Pagans, and Religion in General

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I know some readers ran from the building upon seeing the word religion, above. And I know it should not be discussed in polite company. But I further know that many readers – and nutters I call friends – would not consider themselves polite company. 

Ah, Halloween! A magical holiday where I grew up, a place then not as rural as Vermont, yet not the overdeveloped bastion of privilege that it sadly became. Back then, it was a lot of houses made by dads and uncles moving their families to “the country” from the Bronx and such. A lot of woods. And a heck of a lot of childhood mischief, especially on Halloween.

I recall like yesterday the thrill as we crunched through (mostly oak?) leaves in inventive costumes, dragging wands, too-long skirts, broomsticks and giant satchels, delighting in autumnal smells. The real excitement began once we were old enough to go out without parental supervision. It was invigorating as hell. Our antennae (lit. and fig.) were on high alert. We had minimal street lighting. No halogens. Dark! There was a palpable sense of danger in the air. Little to do with honoring the dead or saints on All Hallows’ Eve, or the possibly pagan roots thereof.

Melissa Kirsch suggested in the NYT that we all try not knowing everything in advance. Not spending hours comparing products before buying. Not researching the heck out of each place before going there.  Letting an adventure unfold, and inspire wonder. Doing an unscheduled, impromptu, playful thing. 

This holiday was that. We had no master plan for maximum treatage. We weren’t greedy. We were just roaming in the dark, tittering, wondering what was around every bush, house, and corner. The older kids were generally menacing on any given day. What might they do to us on this day? Attack? Plunder our treat haul? Anything but that!  

Raised Episcopalian, to my Catholic grandmother’s dismay, I later became a bit of a pagan in the original sense (not as in the polytheistic belief in multiple gods, but as in the Latin pagani: people who lived rurally, thus considered ignorant). I’m happily, rurally ignorant. Due to unexplainable events and crazy coincidences I experienced, over time I came to believe in energies and nature spirits, certainly ghosts, and in celebrating the change of seasons. Which might make me Wiccan. A modern pagan.

Dear Reader may find that nuts, but what sissy writes about religion without stating where she stands? I’m not too worried what people think of me. I go to a great church. I also believe that trees have a kind of consciousness (which has been scientifically examined), as does everything in nature. We should honor nature. We should cheer it on. I feel it would respond in kind. More oxygen. Cooling temps. Fewer storms. 

Is this paganism? Wicca? A heretical blending of “true” religion with fanciful notions? Does it matter what it’s called? I just call it energetic. Have you never nursed something or someone back to health by your own seeming sheer force of will, with or without prayer mixed in? Thoughts and desires carry energy.

As for the earth’s widely accepted Abrahamic religions, and any other I’ve read about, I find some of it silly – including in my own Christianity, which I very much enjoy right along with my less conventional beliefs. Still, I think the world would be a lot happier if more people regularly practiced some form of religion (spirituality?) without judging the others. It has been proven that people who live in groups are happiest. And I can tell you for sure that people who gather in groups to give thanks, to commune, to do good works, and sing maybe, and pray for each other and our planet, and to celebrate together, absolutely get a happiness and a peace from it. I doubt most people attend services these days because they’re afraid of eternal damnation. They go because they feel good there. Hopeful. Valued. Useful.

I’ve been in mosques, Russian Orthodox churches, JW meetings, Jewish temples and Chabad Houses, weddings of all stripes, Buddhist funerals, a Catholic Easter in Rome … and honestly, they all felt spiritual, holy, life-affirming. I’m not keen on those run solely by men (still?!?), but no one forced me to attend.

Many don’t believe in any God at all, regarding earthly suffering as proof that no loving being is In Charge. I’ve waivered myself, and understand. I don’t believe in predestination or fate; I do believe in free will and in luck — including bad luck. I don’t believe in a punishment/reward-based karma, but did when younger, and I do believe in multiple lifetimes. Is there truly no divine being of any kind? The universe is too magnificent, with too many synchronicities, for there not to be something larger than ourselves at play, way I see it.

I get your God, if it’s love-based. What I don’t get, as perhaps Dear Reader does not, is why so many consider their religion superior — in fact, the only valid one. If that were the case, you’d have to be born in a certain place to certain parents to be lucky enough not to burn in the fires of Hell (or whatever) for eternity (or whatever). To wit: all the poor slobs who weren’t born like you were just born damned. And should be punished or enslaved, in life or in death? I’m not buying it. 

Surely all religions, when not misinterpreted by maniacs with agendas, basically lead to the same place. Be kind. Stand for what’s right. Make amends. Help others, including strangers. Respect however our planet’s beauty was created; steward its health. Do good works. Spread love.

Ideas
• Try taking time off weekly, a secular sabbath of sorts, to appreciate things. I’m awed when something nice, even a cloud formation, is delivered unto me. I thank the Forces almost daily for something, however small, because my belief is that there’s no way this whole show is running itself. I think we’re co-running it with some benevolent spirit or spirits, and if we’d just quit screwing things up on our end, everything would get a lot nicer real fast. 

• If you can’t do, CHEER ON. Can’t run or perform? Go see a footrace or a play or a concert. Participants are boosted like a rocket when spectators are rooting for them! Feel the energy travel around the participants and spectators. It’s magical. My niece said that a dog got so excited as she ardently cheered on 5K runners that he “piddled.” Feel the love. Good day.

Ann Aikens is an author, columnist, speaker, and blogger. Her darkly comical book of advice, A Young Woman’s Guide to Life: A Cautionary Tale, was published in 2023, her Upper Valley Girl column since 1996. Find bookshops at annaikens.com; blog:  uppervalleygirl.com.

Free eBook thru Tuesday midnight Pacific time

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Free downloads at the Amazon start tonight at midnight. Use the free $0.00 eBook at upper right, not the Kindle download. Sign up for my e-list at www.annaikens.com and win a Prize! And my undying LERV. PS Don’t think that I think I look good here! Authors often don’t. We’re not a fancy lot. We’re more concerned with thots than our hair?