Rosa: It's Later Than You Think

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

It's Later Than You Think

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Originally uploaded by Tokyorosa

I was supposed to take Ellen to her therapist appointment today, but when I arrived at 2:00 to pick her up, she was laying in bed, filled to the gills with painkillers, at the outermost edge of consciousness. I greeted her and then went to say hello to Ruth. Ruth said, "I guess you didn't get my message."

I talked with Ruth for a few minutes. I thought before that Ellen might have a few weeks left, but that assessment was far, far too optimistic. Now Ruth is hoping that Ellen will hold on until Saturday, when her sister is coming from Washington. Ellen's father will be here tomorrow. Ruth says she doesn't want him in the house when Ellen dies, but I didn't ask why. Nor did I ask about Ellen's mother.

Instead I went and sat at Ellen's side for awhile. She was just barely conscious when I came in and I told her that she didn't have to entertain me, that I would just entertain myself by jumping on the bed. She managed a doped-up grin. I held her hand. One of the cats settled on my lap. And we just sat.

2 comments:

Gina said...: This is so sad. I'm so sorry. She sounds like an amazing lady.

I'm really horrible with knowing what to say in times like these. Always afraid of saying the wrong thing. Then often not saying anything and find that's worse then anything. : (

Sigh, why do good people have to die too soon and the horrible old evil ones walk this earth to age 150 it seems.

Anyway, I just wanted to say, I am so sorry. And you have been a good friend by visiting her and stuff, a good good friend. You are loyal. I see that.; Wednesday, February 18, 2009 8:11:00 PM
Rosa said...: Thanks, Gina. I really appreciate that. I think you're right about how soon good people disappear from our lives.

Ugh. I'm all choked up now and can't think of what to say. Just that I'm going to miss my friend. I guess I miss her already.; Thursday, February 19, 2009 5:15:00 AM

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Why You Might Be a Witch
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The banana split is very dear to the heart of British diners of a certain age. It evokes memories of 70s and 80s childhood largesse. It should, by unwritten culinary law, involve a banana, cream and ice-cream, yes, but more than this: sprinkles, and drizzled sauces in raspberry and chocolate flavours. I will accept a glacé cherry. If you have a sparkler, I want that sparkler lit. I don’t care if Aunty Sheila loses an eyebrow: this is about me. The Bodean’s banana split is a passive-aggressive act. It’s what you give a bad child on their birthday if they have recently drop-kicked a guinea pig. It’s just a banana covered with squirty cream. While Instagram rocks with freakshakes and bespoke cronut-duffins catering to a Bake-Off showstopper-spoiled audience, over at Bodeans they’ve created the perfect post-Brexit banana split. It’s 1944 again and we should just be excited to see a real-life banana.--grace dent, restaurant reviewer

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Before you wake up
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To be safe up here with you.
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anger first, then never-ending sadness--Samantha Sparks

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I work very hard and I never - never! get people to understand what I mean.

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WAIT

Wait, for now.
Distrust everything, if you have to.
But trust the hours. Haven’t they
carried you everywhere, up to now?
Personal events will become interesting again.
Hair will become interesting.
Pain will become interesting.
Buds that open out of season will become lovely again.
Second-hand gloves will become lovely again,
their memories are what give them
the need for other hands. And the desolation
of lovers is the same: that enormous emptiness
carved out of such tiny beings as we are
asks to be filled; the need
for the new love is faithfulness to the old.

Wait.
Don’t go too early.
You’re tired. But everyone’s tired.
But no one is tired enough.
Only wait a while and listen.
Music of hair,
Music of pain,
music of looms weaving all our loves again.
Be there to hear it, it will be the only time,
most of all to hear,
the flute of your whole existence,
rehearsed by the sorrows, play itself into total exhaustion.

Galway Kinnell (February 1, 1927–October 28, 2014)

"You know what would be so cool? To get to the end of my personality and just, like, lay in the sun.”--Carrie Fisher

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"What we’ve been seeing in my lab, over and over again, is that people have an inability to predict what will make us happy — or unhappy. If you can’t tell which futures are better than others, it’s hard to find happiness. The truth is, bad things don’t affect us as profoundly as we expect them to. That’s true of good things, too. We adapt very quickly to either.

So the good news is that going blind is not going to make you as unhappy as you think it will. The bad news is that winning the lottery will not make you as happy as you expect."--Daniel Gilbert

I have no enemies. But my friends don't like me. ~ Philip Larkin

“We’re not protecting kids when we keep them from stories that shine a light in the darker corners of their lives. We’re just leaving them alone in the dark.”--Kate Messner

There is no one thing that's true. It's all true. --Hemingway

"The real things haven't changed. It is still best to be honest and truthful; to make the most of what we have; to be happy with simple pleasures; and to have courage when things go wrong."--Laura Ingalls Wilder

There’s a long road of suffering ahead of you. But don’t lose courage. You’ve already escaped the gravest danger: selection. So now, muster your strength, and don’t lose heart. We shall all see the day of liberation. Have faith in life. Above all else, have faith. Drive out despair, and you will keep death away from yourselves. Hell is not for eternity. And now, a prayer - or rather, a piece of advice: let there be comradeship among you. We are all brothers, and we are all suffering the same fate. The same smoke floats over all our heads. Help one another. It is the only way to survive.--Elie Wiesel

What are the words you do not yet have? What do you need to say? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence?
--Audre Lorde

By the time I am 25, I carry a feeling in my blood that something is very wrong; something has been done to me, but the words never seem to find my consciousness. All I have as confirmation is a deep, dark terror I try to slough off, but can never quite shake it.--Oriana Koren

Pride is a sense of worth derived from something that is not part of us, while self-esteem derives from the potentialities and achievements of self. We are proud when we identify ourselves with an imaginary self, a leader, a holy cause, a collective body of possessions. There is fear and intolerance in pride; it is insensitive and uncompromising. The less promise and potency in the self, the more imperative is the need for pride. The core of pride is self-rejection.--Bruce Lee

Do you know what they are? Deluded. People who are living under the delusion that their work is separate from their identity and experience are generally people who are benefiting from enormous amounts of structural privilege.--Grace Dunham

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When one does what Buddhas do, one is a Buddha.
When one does what Bodhisattvas do, one is a Bodhisattva.
When one does what Arhats do, one is an Arhat.
When one does what ghosts do, one is a ghost.
These are all natural phenomena.
There are no shortcuts in cultivation.

--Master Hsuan Hua

A poem by James Tate:

Goodtime Jesus

Jesus got up one day a little later than usual. He had been dreaming so deep there was nothing left in his head. What was it? A nightmare, dead bodies walking all around him, eyes rolled back, skin falling off. But he wasn't afraid of that. It was a beautiful day. How 'bout some coffee? Don't mind if I do. Take a little ride on my donkey. I love that donkey. Hell, I love everybody.

I asked Evgeny to help me with this sad job. We covered him with snow and rocks [...] This last respect was for a man I feel was the best and brightest expression of the American persona. I think often of his brilliant smile and positive manner. I am a difficult man and I hope to remember him always by living a little more by his example. --Anatoli Boukreev

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"I am not a mystic and I do not lead a holy life. Not that I can claim any interesting or pleasurable sins (my sense of the devil is strong) but I know all about the garden variety, pride, gluttony, envy and sloth, and what is more to the point, my virtues are as timid as my vices. I think sin occasionally brings one closer to God, but not habitual sin and not this petty kind that blocks every small good. A working knowledge of the devil can be very well had from resisting him."--Flannery O'Connor

There is a German proverb: “Der Teufel scheisst immer auf den grössten Haufen” [“The Devil always shits on the biggest heap”]... Prepare yourself: there is never a day without a sucker punch. At the same time, be pragmatic and learn how to develop an understanding of when to abandon an idea. Follow your dreams no matter what, but reconsider if they can’t be realized in certain situations. A project can become a cul-de-sac and your life might slip through your fingers in pursuit of something that can never be realized. Know when to walk away.--Werner Herzog

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--Gabourey Sidibe

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"That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong."

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

"I often hear voices...If you believe, as I do, that the mind wants to heal itself, and the psyche seeks coherence not disintegration, then it isn't hard to conclude that the mind will manifest whatever is necessary to work on the job...Going mad is the beginning of the process. It is not supposed to be the end result."

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"This can be anything you want." --Louis C.K.

Happiness is itself a kind of gratitude.--Joseph Wood Krutch

"I did the right thing and I am not going to apologize for it." --Grace and Frankie

The weather was warm, I was in a car with a piece of pizza and a little to-go cup of wine, and Mariah Carey’s Christmas album was playing. It was beautiful. I don’t know if I’ve ever been happier.
--Jenna Wortham

Go where the search takes you.

Original: 子曰：“吾十有五而志于学，三十而立，四十而不惑，五十而知天命，六十而耳顺，七十而从心所欲，不逾矩。”

English: Confucius said:”When I was fifteen, I aspired to learn. At thirty, I could be independent. At forty, I am not deluded. At fifty, I knew my destiny. At sixty, I knew truth in all I heard. At seventy, I could follow my heart’s desire without overstepping the line.”

There's a point when you go with what you've got. Or you don't go.--Joan Didion

"I am not an American. I am the American."

--Mark Twain

"There's a lot of ego, greed, stupidity, and insanity. And that's a really bad combination." --Matt Groening

“Whenever the devil harasses you, seek the company of men or drink more, or joke and talk nonsense, or do some other merry thing. Sometimes we must drink more, sport, recreate ourselves, and even sin a little to spite the devil, so that we leave him no place for troubling our consciences with trifles. We are conquered if we try too conscientiously not to sin at all. So when the devil says to you: do not drink, answer him: I will drink, and right freely, just because you tell me not to.”
— Martin Luther

Love casts out fear.

Fail. Fail again. Fail better. --Samuel Beckett

"...so I chose to tell myself a different story from the one women are told. I decided I was safe. I was strong. I was brave." --Cheryl Strayed

"As much as anything, I miss being insulted every now and then, which is probably the Virginian in me."--Richard E. Byrd

"Form is a straitjacket in the way that a straitjacket was a straitjacket for Houdini."--Paul Muldoon

"Art is the only way I know to heal from the inside, to see the world for what it really is, beautiful and bright."--Danny Gregory

"Love is bigger than being satiated by happiness. --Derek Cianfrance

"You can change your circumstances by changing your attitude."
--Eleanor Roosevelt

"Art does not reproduce what we see. It makes us see." --Paul Klee

"I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

--Michael Jordan

“When a woman tells the truth she is creating the possibility for more truth around her.”

--Adrienne Rich

“If you’re not sure you could love your children, please don’t have them, because they might grow up and kill us.”--John Waters

'There is no such thing as paranoia. Your worst fears can come true at any time."--Hunter S. Thompson