grief

BTW: I Didn’t Get Arrested

Deb Zuroski, , , , , 3 Comments

When I visited my not-my-Aunt G last week, she asked me if there were any sexy bits in the book I’m writing. Not-my-Aunt G is (was?) my mom’s best friend. They worked together as accounting clerks about a million years ago when they were 20ish and remained very close for the rest of my mom’s life. In fact, not-my-Aunt G married my father’s best friend. Their little group was tight. 

Anyway, not-my-Aunt G used to add scare quotes around the word aunt when she sent me birthday cards, possibly because we aren’t related but, in my opinion, more likely because she was terrifying. 

She’s still terrifying at almost 89 years old but also funny in a way I didn’t notice when I was a child. I laughed when she asked about the sexy bits but she really wanted to know so we talked about what I was writing. In case you are interested, the bits aren’t as sexy as she was hoping. And I can’t decide if I feel insulted but I probably should.

She’s been a widow for 25 years. Her husband died about 3 weeks before my mother. Can you imagine – though who would want to – the grief she must have felt losing her husband and her best friend within a month’s time? 

After my husband died, I asked her for advice on how to keep going but she didn’t really have any to offer. Apparently, in her mind, it wasn’t a feat to survive for more than two decades alone. Somehow, she just did it and didn’t seem to think it was worth remarking on. 

That was actually more helpful than she probably realized. When Ken first died, I felt like a newborn, not in a Star Trek III: The Search for Spock way. More like an “oh my god, I have no idea how to even feed myself” kind of way. Not-my-Aunt G just acted like it would all sort of work out if I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. And as with many other things, she was right. She did it. Probably, I could too.

So, anyway, when we got done talking about my novel writing, she asked me if I thought I’d ever marry again. I told her what I usually say to people who ask that. Well, actually, I usually just laugh and ignore them because … you know, people should mind their own damn business. 

But one doesn’t ignore one’s not-my-aunt. So I told her that I probably won’t ever marry again. And she nodded. “You find out, after a while, that you don’t actually need men for anything.” AND THEN SHE SMILED. You know what I’m talking about. It’s the smile that says “Yes, I do know what I just suggested to you and yes, I meant to suggest that.” Seriously, she might as well have winked lasciviously. 

My sister was there. She can attest to the truth of this. 

It made me laugh. Honestly, I’m still laughing about it. When I told one of my kids, he was horrified and told me to stop speaking immediately. And after I got done laughing again, I began to wonder what else not-my-Aunt G has said over the years that I just missed or blocked out because I was too young to appreciate it. 

I wonder too what my mom would have said if she’d been with us for the conversation. Mom was very … reserved is probably the best description. I believe she and I only talked about sex once, when she mentioned that my father was … hmmm. Well, let’s just say that it wasn’t a flattering comment and that I flatlined immediately after she said it so I don’t remember much of the conversation. 

But I’ve always loved the idea of “happily ever afters,” even though I didn’t have one. Right now, I’m reading an ARC about a woman who didn’t realize her college crush was also crushing on her. I’m having a hard time relating. Honestly I didn’t really have time to date in college. I had a work-study job (at the counseling center) and a full-time job (server at a country club), plus school, all of which pretty much consumed my time.

So, I didn’t really have college crushes. However, I did, weirdly, have a guy 20 years my senior proposition me on the day we graduated. We had lots of classes together – same major, you know – but I barely knew him. His offer, in my mind anyway, came out of nowhere. His last words to me, which I still remember all these years later:  “Does this mean we’ll never see each other again?” 

So far, the answer to his question has remained, “Correct.” And I hope it stays that way. I really, really hope I don’t ever see him again. In fact, Mike, if you’re reading this blog and wondering if we should reconnect:  No. We shouldn’t. We didn’t know each other in college and nothing has changed. Regardless of age difference, one should not proposition people.

That doesn’t mean, though, that I will discount the possibility that OTHER people HAD and missed out on connecting with college crushes. I’m assuming that the trope of college romance revitalization is based on real life. 

Obviously, it was not based on MY life. My strongest memory of college is actually the terrifying stress dreams I occasionally still have – you know, the dreams in which I miss the entire semester of class but go to the final exam. (Shouldn’t I just skip the final too? I mean, there’s no hope of passing, right? In these dreams, I apparently never even buy the textbook. But that’s the horrifying drama of dreams for you.)

Every time I visit not-my-Aunt G, she reminds me how terrible it is to be old and alone. Although she and not-my-Uncle George never had children, they were blessed with a large extended family who take remarkable care of not-my-Aunt G, visiting regularly, taking her to church and to the grocery store. Nonetheless, she’s gone to bed alone for more than 25 years now. And though she might not want me to remarry, she doesn’t want either of us to be alone. 

I don’t think there’s a readily available solution to alone-ness when I become elderly. Therefore, I have made the decision to move in with each of my children for a third of the year. They don’t know this yet so let’s make the agreement to keep it a secret until I show up at one of their houses.

When one child gets tired of my shenanigans, I’ll move in with the next one. We can rotate year around and the kids will bond over how horrible it is to house mom for 4 months of the year. I’ll promise to behave but at this point, I don’t see much likelihood of changing my core personality so I will probably still whistle off-key, sing (repeatedly) sections of song lyrics, adopt more animals than I should, and promise to clean without following through. 

The good news is that they all love me at least half as much as I love them (which is an infinite amount). And that’s close to how much I love my not-my-Aunt G, even when she’s in a grumpy mood and tells me to leave the butterfly cookie I brought her from Prantl’s Bakery on her stoop and hit the road because she’s not in the mood and isn’t opening the door.

Here’s to you, not-my-Aunt G, for teaching me that it is possible, probable, and entirely necessary to keep putting one foot in front of the other, even when you don’t want your butterfly cookie. (She did open the door for the homemade strawberry-rhubarb pie.)

Much love.

BTW: I Didn’t Get Arrested

In Case I Get Arrested

Deb Zuroski, , , , , 1 Comment

You’ll never believe what happened to me today so I’m just going to tell you. I mean, if you want, you can try to guess before you read the rest of this paragraph. In fact, I got you. This paragraph will not include what happened to me. 

This one doesn’t either. 

Okay, now, I’m going to tell you what happened. Let’s see how close your guess is:  

We have to get into the wayback machine. Are you settled? Seat belt on? Cool. Cool. Let’s get going …. About two years before my husband died, we started noticing some problems with our front steps. They were beginning to crack a little, not bad but you know these things don’t fix themselves. They’re just going to get more cracked and more cracked – a little like me, actually – until finally, it’s time to give up some of that lovely, lovely cash to take on the repairs. 

We might have been able to repair early for less cash but once sickness entered the house, other things left, including motivation and money for early repairs. Anyway, over a year ago, I finally called three companies for estimates. I had a cost in my head and was anxious to see how over or under the estimates came in. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Since the only solution for the steps was a total demolition and re-build, and the cost was A LOT, I put off the work for another year. Yeah, I know. Shut up. Don’t remind me that, with the recession and supply shortages, all I really did was shoot myself in the foot because this year, I couldn’t put it off any longer and the price for supplies went up. 

The most important part of the re-build was that the end product had to be identical to the original steps, regardless of cost implications. Why, you ask? Well, I live in a house designated as a historic landmark, in a historic district. It’s a big deal. In fact, it’s a little like living in Colonial Williamsburg. Except colder. 

And now, let’s step out of the wayback machine, back to today. With the demolition behind us, and the brick walls up and in beautiful shape, it’s time to pour the concrete. My crew is out front with an absolute monster of a cement mixer. The day is cool and overcast but there’s no threat of rain. It’s perfect. Or so you’d think.

Work has been underway since 7AM. The guys are joking now and again. Every once in a while I hear, “More water.” Everything is going as planned. Then, I hear louder voices outside, voices other than my very Jersey-sounding contractor, that is. I assume (wrongly, it turns out) that it’s my elderly neighbor. (He’s a retired architect – a little curmudgeon-y but still lovely – who likes to be involved in every project so he often stops by to kibitz with the workers.) 

Suddenly, there’s a loud knocking at the door. Just a heads up here: A knock at your front door is not normal when your front steps are missing or, you know, filled with very wet concrete. 

I actually ran to the door, concerned obviously, and found my contractor, we’ll call him Nick (because his name is Nick), calf-deep in the wet concrete (this part IS normal) on the top step and he’s FIRED UP. 

Now, a little side note about Nick:  He’s older than I am, shorter than I am, and much nicer than I am. Seeing him fired up was astonishing because he is kind to the workers, polite to the nosy neighbors, and an absolute treat to me. 

Turns out that one of those neighbors told our historical society that I am making changes to my house without permission. I know all my neighbors – at least, I know their pets – and I can’t figure out who wouldn’t just ask me what I’m doing and whether I filed for permission, etc.

And that makes me think that my other next door neighbor – not the elderly architect – is the one who turned me in. She’s been mad at me since one of our other neighbors (and yes, I do know which one but I’m not telling, ever) called the police one day to do a welfare check on her because her dogs had been barking for hours. 

I know what you are thinking and you’re right. We are, in fact, a microcosm of the NextDoor app. Most of the time, everything is fine but every once in a while, someone’s kid pulls the petals of someone else’s tulips and all hell breaks loose. 

So now, even though I am literally paying extra to make sure that my steps stay the same, I’m still going to have to go before the historical society board to prove that I didn’t make any changes. You know what happens if they don’t like what you’ve done? You guessed it, didn’t you? They make you undo and redo to their satisfaction. And that’s why Nick was absolutely RIGID with anger this morning. 

He told me that the board “would be calling me.” Since he’s got that Jersey accent, it sounded a little like he was saying that I should watch for a horse’s head in my bed. But since it came from a guy who looks a little like my grandfather, I’m not sure if I should be worried or if I should expect to receive a tin of Grandpa’s favorite butter mints. 

So, how close was your guess? Did you think I was going to tell you that I won the lottery? I don’t play so if I ever tell you that I won the lottery, I was either hacked or kidnapped. 

Hope your tomorrow is less eventful than mine will be …. What do you think will happen if I just don’t answer the phone when they call? Can they put me in irons? I wonder if they have a dungeon for disobedient homeowners. 

Stay safe.  

In Case I Get Arrested

The Bookworm

Deb Zuroski, , , , , 2 Comments

Yesterday evening, after a terrible, no-good, very bad day, I watched Summerland and if that wasn’t emotional enough, I followed it up with the final episode of The Good Place. Chidi describing a wave … friends, I sobbed. And swore off Netflix for the rest of the night.

Tonight, two of my kids are at the Greek food festival with their friends and I’m watching The Lake House while I have dinner. Great movie – so much pining. But I should probably watch something light after this, like Toy Story 3 or Up.  

Anyway, today, I have a story to tell. A friend posted a meme on Facebook about shopping for books with a bookworm and it reminded me of a shopping trip with my MIL.

Many years ago, during the 90s era of the book desert, a Borders moved into the South Hills of Pittsburgh. The store was a new concept for us – a cafe, big comfy chairs, two stories! It was magnificent and we loved it. 

Ken – who was a bookworm’s bookworm – convinced his mom to go there with us. He knew how much she loved books and thought she’d really enjoy the luxury of a bookworm’s bookstore.

She did not. 

We were at least an hour into this particular visit, each of us lost in our pile of books, when she found me and said, “I’m ready to leave.” Now, it’s important to note that my MIL and I got along very well but … nonetheless … this was my MIL talking. So, of course, I said we’d wrap it up and get going. 

I hadn’t counted on Ken, though, when I promised we’d leave. I’m not sure how long he would have been there, ultimately, but after ANOTHER 45 minutes, Margaret said that she was going to the car, the locked car. And she did. She stood at the locked car, waiting, while I dragged Ken to the exit. 

When we finally got to the car, I expected fireworks, a battle scene out of Lord of the Rings. Nothing like that happened. Ken unlocked the car. Margaret got in. That was that. 

But there was no question who had won.

He didn’t take her to any more bookstores but over time he and I spent so many hours at various bookstores throughout the city. Nowadays, you are just as likely to find me and the kids in used bookstores. We seek them out on vacations too, especially the hole-in-the-wall kind. 

One time, on a trip to Kentucky, we spent most of a rainy afternoon at a dusty old bookstore that was full of lovely out-of-print treasures. The owner snoozed in a big comfy chair while we wandered through the store. And then when we took our books to the front, we had to wake him and he made us pay in cash because he couldn’t get the credit card machine to work. Since we were the only customers, I don’t think he tried very hard. And we didn’t mind.

The Bookworm

Coffee Shop Life

Deb Zuroski, , , 7 Comments

I’m at the coffee shop again, working. (Am I really working if I’m writing a blog post?) There are two friends sitting in front of me and they are giggling like 5 year olds. Their hair is fully gray, their cheeks patterned like wrinkled tissue paper. And they’re talking like they’ve known each other their whole lives. 

That’s one of my favorite things about the coffee shop, one of the things I missed the most when these places had no tables and we were all sitting at home, hoping to wait-out the pandemic. It’s a weird stranger connection, that feeling that you don’t know anyone and yet you know them all.

And just now, a woman shopping for an aluminum coffee mug knocked one over with a loud clang and the domino effect happened, three or four falling, though it sounded like thirty. 

She looked up to see if any of us had noticed. Yep. We all had. But I pretended like I hadn’t. Because who hasn’t experienced that (completely unnecessary) feeling of mortification?! 

Whoops. She just dropped a ceramic mug which, surprisingly, did not break. I wouldn’t give it a second drop though, just to test it. And I think she should probably stop touching things for a bit. Third time’s a charm, you know. 

A woman with a baby stroller is at the register with her entire family, husband, young child, new baby, and the grandparents. She looks tired but is wearing the best dress, striped pink, orange, blue, green, and white. Just looking at that dress makes me a little happier. And I’ll bet it makes her feel a little less tired. 

The giggling ladies have left, replaced by an older woman in a woolen shawl and a beautiful Gibson Girl hairstyle. Oh my gosh. She’s the mom of striped-dress woman. I did not see that coming but her fabulous style was definitely handed down, mom to daughter. 

Sometimes I eavesdrop on conversations but today I’m wearing headphones. Lizzo, right now, but it’s a playlist. The chair dancing will likely be replaced by something weepy in 5, 4, 3, 2, … 

Ha. I was wrong. It’s Devil Devil by MILCK. Dark but not weepy. 

The rush has slowed for the moment, a perfect time for aluminum-mug lady to come out and dust. Yes, she works here. I didn’t realize that initially, though it makes sense since she was doing a lot of stuff-touching. 

This is the coffee shop with the garage door that is opened when the weather is warm. The door is all glass so I can people/puppy-watch even when it’s chilly, like today. 

Every time I’m here I see a man who wears a big, very bright, knit cap over his locs. I’ve never seen him without the cap but I’ll bet his hair is long because the cap sits straight up on his head, ala The Cat in the Hat. 

Back to chair dancing: the song is 35 by Rob Ruha. Yes, people look when I chair-dance but I figure they’re people-watching, too. Might as well give them something to look at, right?

A young woman just entered and I am absolutely certain I know her. She’s probably my daughter’s friend but I’m damned if I know what her name is. She hasn’t noticed me or else she’s playing the long game, texting Haley to ask if I’m here. That has happened before but my darling girl always gives me a head’s up so I don’t accidentally ignore someone. She’ll even text me a picture so I can find them and say hello (like I’m cool or something). 

Last week, a young man was interviewing for a job at a table near me. He was so sweetly earnest and excited to show off his portfolio. It seemed to be going well but like all coffee shop interactions, I’ll have to write my own ending since I won’t know what really happened. In my story, he definitely got the job. Maybe even now he’s writing a social media post that I’ll interact with later on Twitter. 

Sad song time. You Were Meant For Me by Jewel just started. I know all the words because I used to sing it to Tristan when he was little. I remember singing, holding him in the dark in the middle of the night, the week after my mom died. “Hearts are broken every day.” I don’t think it will ever not be a hard song for me to hear.

But we are a tapestry, each of us, made up of all the threads of our experiences, right? That’s what people say. There are some threads I’d like to pull but that’s not the way our tapestries work. Thus, I listen to Jewel and think of my mom and how much she wanted to still be here with me and my sister, even as she hoped and occasionally tried to die. Life is confusing. 

There’s a big line all of a sudden. The waves of coffee-buyers are unpredictable. I looked up from my screen and watched the line develop. Then an older man walked in, got into line, looked at his watch, made a surprised face, and ran out the door. 

What’s his story? Forgot to pick someone up? Parking meter expired? Late for an appointment? Had a sudden urgent need to buy a sticky bun at the bakery across the street? (Yes, there’s a bakery directly across the street and yes they have delicious sticky buns – at least, so I’ve heard. I only look at sticky buns. I never eat them. Of course. Because that’s exactly what one is supposed to do when one encounters a sticky bun in the wild.)

Two young people just left – a very pretty girl who is majorly crushing on a hot-as-fire young man. Phew. There are still flames on the floor where he walked. I think she might come back in to touch them as they spark and expire. He looked at her as she turned away for a second and I’m pretty sure the feeling is mutual. It’s really obvious that they’re not currently together. I hope one of them says something. Life is too short to miss these opportunities.

Power and Purpose by Joseph Trapanese just started playing. I love how it builds to a crescendo. A little too powerful for a coffee shop afternoon though. I should be striding through the woods like Mary Oliver, scribbling words into my notebook with my number two pencil. She said that she could really only write if her body was in motion. Of course, she had a horrific childhood so the woods were also a true safe space for her. The coffee shop is safe enough for me, at least at the moment. 

Line out the door right now. I love the vibrancy of this community. There’s a young girl sitting at a table playing with a little feathered chick – the kind that hop when you wind them up. She’s so proud of it, holding it in her cupped hands as she sits there. Then, gently, she puts it on the table and it hops around, making a quiet clicking sound. (The sound was temporarily obscured by Macy Gray belting out I Try. But now I can hear it again.)

There’s a man on crutches waiting for his coffee. I’m watching discreetly to see how he’ll handle the coffee and the crutches. It doesn’t seem like a viable combination, at least from my crutch experiences. Then again, I have been known to nearly fall over while crutching along and overbalancing so I’m probably not the best judge of coffee-crutch skills. 

Bob Dylan is singing his portion of End of the Line by Traveling Wilburys. I don’t love Dylan but I do love him on this song. Tom Petty is my favorite of the group but honestly the whole collaboration is genius. How could it not be?

Well, crutch-coffee man nailed it. He put both crutches under his left armpit, coffee in his right hand, and slow-walked his booted-foot self to a table. Should I have offered to help? Maybe. But I was busy admiring his balancing skills. I would probably have knocked over my unlidded iced tea if I’d tried to help him. And honestly, he’s got boss-level skills

There’s a woman sitting by the garage door right now. She has red hair that is absolutely gleaming gold in the light and I suspect she doesn’t have any idea how glorious that mane looks. I’ll never understand people who don’t see the beauty of red hair, with its golds and russets and oranges and variegated reds. 

On the other end of the color spectrum (is it really though?), the young woman next to me has blue hair. Sometimes I think about dying my hair or getting a tattoo. Hair dye is a lot less painful so that might be the way to go. But I’d kind of like to get a tattoo to represent the WHO I’ve become as I’ve worked my way through enough trauma for the lifetimes of a few people. 

It’s nothing like the trauma of watching an army attempt to destroy your home but we don’t measure our traumas against other people. Trauma is trauma. It doesn’t need a scale to validate it. 

I’ve been singing a phrase for weeks now. After finally getting really annoyed because I don’t have any idea where I picked it up, I asked Ms Google for an assist. Turns out it’s from Fly Me to the Moon. I don’t listen to Frank Sinatra and I’ve never seen Squid Game … so why in the world am I singing that phrase (“in other words, hold my hand”) over and over again? I have concluded that the problem is – my brain no work right anymore. 

Time for more chair dancing. Everybody Everybody by Black Box. A banger. Even corpses in the ground tap their toes to this one. 

In case you think I’m still not working, I beg to differ. I have opened my scrivener app and stared at the screen for more than two hours now, occasionally changing a word or typing and deleting a sentence. #WritingLife #Progress

Okay, now I have six hundred, thirty-nine words. HA. And my battery isn’t quite dead yet. 

Someone is missing their vanilla iced coffee. Did you order and then accidentally leave without it? Please, go get it because they’re convinced that shouting louder will cause the coffee to get picked up. And it doesn’t seem to be happening.

I’m listening to Disturbed’s version of Sound of Silence. It’s pretty great. Better than the original and I was almost alive when the original came out, proof that I am not suffering from OG contamination.

And as I’m watching the shop fill up again, Sober by Lucy Spraggan starts playing. 

It’s gray outside now and the dynamic in the shop has changed. The customers, mostly women, are working on computers. One is on a zoom call. I see three close-up faces on her screen. This is why I don’t like zoom calls. When I’m sitting with someone physically, they are nowhere near as close as their face on a zoom call. 

There’s a quiet spell at the counter. The three employees are looking at someone’s phone – pictures of hairstyles, I think – and they’re giggling as one of them tries to describe something, maybe a haircut they want? Corporate office would probably disapprove but I love that they’re smiling. 

Welp, the chat is over. I swear a soccer team just walked in. Okay, slight exaggeration, it’s just a big friend group – they aren’t loud but they’re young. You know how that is – vibrant, almost buoyant, with the promise of life. 

The battery has just reminded me that it will be dead to me (pun intended) in about 15 minutes. That’s good timing. I’ve reached my writing goal for the day, plus this blog entry. And I have some research to do. Time to walk the hill home. It’s a daunting prospect but very satisfying to reach the top. Is that a metaphor? Maybe. It’s also just a walk. 

Much love.

Coffee Shop Life

Five Years

Deb Zuroski, , , , , , 2 Comments

It’s five years last Sunday. Five. Every year, as the anniversary of Ken’s death approaches, I vow to have a normal day. If success is measured by survival, every year I have succeeded but if it’s measured in tears? Well, that’s a different story, isn’t it?

BUT … a couple months ago, I saw a billboard announcing that Colin Hay would be doing a show in Pittsburgh on March 30th and something about that just felt right. So, I bought myself a single – five rows back from the stage! – and went to see him last night. 

The show was at the famous Carnegie Music Hall in Homestead. It only seats about 1,000 people and the acoustics are wonderful. Maybe 8 years ago, Ken and I went there with friends to see Joe Jackson – probably the last performance Ken saw live actually. And Joe was wonderful, of course. Older than I expected but then again so am I.

The same is true of Colin Hay. If you look closely, you can see the 80s music icon in the grizzled older man. He’s funny and surprisingly Scottish for a man who has spent more years away from his birthplace than in it. 

According to Colin, most of the world is unfamiliar with his music post-Men At Work. When he mentioned a particular album and the audience cheered, he joked to us that everyone who had bought the album was apparently in the audience last night. Personally, I think his newer stuff is better than his last Men At Work album, more thoughtful, less glory-seeking.

I wasn’t expecting him to talk about grief and loss but discovered last night that most of his music is rooted in his childhood and his grieving. Dour Scot, right?! But it resonated with an audience of mostly graying fans. He told a story about carrying the ashes of his parents and his sister around with him for years and as someone who has two sets of ashes in my house right now, I totally feel that. 

And eventually he sang “I Just Don’t Think I’ll Ever Get Over You” – a song I happen to know very well – and I cried and missed Ken so much. Why couldn’t I be seated next to him instead of the overly chatty stranger (poor man just didn’t know what to do about the grieving woman next to him). Awkward but it was dark and I’ll never see him again.  

I am equally glad that I won’t see the very amorous couple who was seated to my left. Talk about inappropriately Barry White-ing a performance … though it does make me wonder if Barry White ever had any problems with his audience. If only I’d gotten my concert neighbors’ names.

Colin Hay got a standing ovation at the end – after he finished his callback song. It was lovely. He kept bowing and putting his hand on his heart and smiling so wide, even though it was obvious how tired he was. Finally he gestured that he was leaving, but the audience kept applauding until the venue brought up the house lights. 

Much love.

Five Years

Hooray and Up She Rises

Deb Zuroski, , , , 1 Comment
Tristan gives our pooped doxy a lift. Shadow loved riding in the sling pack.

Have you seen Fisherman’s Friends on Netflix? It’s fantastic, charming, corny, eccentric, entertaining, everything a good movie should be. In brief, it’s a story about Cornish fishermen who sing sea shanties as they work. 

It just so happens that one shanty in the film is a personal family favorite. I sing it frequently – badly and incorrectly – while I’m driving, cleaning, cooking, annoying my teenager … you know. It was also one of Ken’s favorites. 

About a million years ago, in 2013, we took a family vacation to the Finger Lakes. The trip itself was relatively unremarkable but it had some brilliant moments. The five of us were packed into our 17-year-old Subaru Legacy wagon, with all of our camping gear and our 13-year-old dachshund, Shadow. 

The car was so jammed with stuff that my husband, who hated to drive, insisted on driving for the entire 6-hour trip. There was no way he was going to stuff himself into the back with the dog, two bickering children and a case of potato chip snack bags that some jokester had dumped all over the back seat of the car. 

Anyway, at some point on our trip, Tristan and his dad, both sitting in the front, started singing sea shanties. If you know Ken, you probably heard him sing – he sang frequently – but you might not know that he and Tristan could harmonize perfectly together. 

Whenever I hear the song, I travel back in time to that vacation, sitting in the Subaru on a sunny summer day, listening to Ken and Tristan singing ‘hooray and up she rises’ so beautifully it still sends a shiver down my spine. 

Anyway, go watch Fisherman’s Friends. And maybe raise a glass to Ken when they sing “The Drunken Sailor.”

Much love. 

Hooray and Up She Rises

Sweet and Salty Girl

Deb Zuroski, , , , , 2 Comments
Salty sits in judgment on her favorite window seat.

My beloved Salty – queen of cats – has, at the age of 19(ish), crossed the rainbow bridge. This post is an homage to the best and most difficult cat I have ever known. 

Salty was a striking Abyssinian, with the characteristic long legs, small face, and big ears. Christened Jessica and later given a name that better suited her personality, she was a gift from my husband to his mom; but honestly, cat and human struggled to find balance. My MIL was a cat lover but Abys are a difficult breed. They make aloof cats seem like your best friend. They make angry cats seem neighborly. They make smart cats seem like doddards. It’s impossible to keep up with their deviousness.

Even in sleep, those claws are ready.

Mom-in-law used to complain that Salty would wake her up (in a non-snuggly way), knock over her treasures, and steal her food. All of these complaints are true. I have both witnessed and experienced Salty’s diabolical pleasure in disruption, destruction, and theft.

One of her favorite activities – until we finally grew wise(r) to her antics – was to steal our socks, gloves, yarn projects (and other items as we started learning to hide things). She would chew on these items until she had damaged them just enough to make them unusable. For example, Salty would chew a hole in one finger of a single glove or bite through the elastic at the top of a sock. 

Usually, she struck in the middle of the night and would leave the evidence for me to find as my day started. Sometimes, she’d leave her sock or glove “kill” in the shared cat food bowl. If you know anything about cats, you know how remarkably finicky they are. A sock in the food bowl is an absolute cat-astrophy. (Couldn’t help myself. Sorry! Or am I?) Our other two cats would stare at the food bowl and meow for assistance, refusing to eat until the carcass had been removed. 

Salty was well-known throughout the neighborhood. Although she was ultimately an indoor cat, when she and my MIL first moved in with us, she worked deviously at finding ways to leave the house and once free would return only on her terms. She had a chip and collar but never got lost (until her recent walkabout). Usually, she’d visit the nearby college campus and scam food from lonely freshmen. 

How, you ask, do I know that she scammed food from college students? Well, Salty had a … quirk. She was our security cat. Whenever we went for a walk, usually daily during nice weather, she would follow us, walking about 10 or 12 feet behind us. We knew she was there. She knew that we knew she was there. This was all deliberate. She intentionally went with us on our walks. 

When we walked on campus, students would point out that there was a cat following us and would say things like “hey, that’s the cat I gave chicken to yesterday.” And we’d explain that Salty was our security detail. Everyone thought it was super funny and our sweet girl stayed slim and healthy so we never told the students to stop giving her snacks. It wouldn’t have worked anyway. Salty could scam anyone out of chicken.

Eight or nine years ago, she stopped leaving home. Instead of regularly slipping out the front door or leaping over the 7-foot fence, she started preferring to sit in the sun in our backyard. Eventually, she even got pretty snuggly, though never in a polite way. 

As with everything else, she’d put herself where she wanted to be. If she wanted to be on my lap, my choices were to accept gracefully or continually put her on the floor until one of us gave up. (It was usually me. She could wear down a diamond.) 

I hope that I’ve learned a few things from her: persistence, assertiveness, defiance of convention, how to relax on a summer day. I hope too that wherever my sweet and Salty girl has gone, that there’s a spot of sun on a warm wooden deck where she can snooze. 

Good-bye, little Salty. I will miss you forever.  

Sweet and Salty Girl

Palentine, Galentine, Valentine?

Deb Zuroski, , , Leave a comment

Happy Galentine’s, Palentine’s and Valentine’s Day!

My husband was renowned for giving perfect, thoughtful presents, sometimes funny, always purposeful. As I’ve mentioned before, he really disliked events that compelled gift-giving but that didn’t reduce his gift-giving game at all. He was at his best when he could give gifts for no particular reason and in my opinion, those “I was thinking of you” gifts are the absolute best gifts to get. My favorites of all of those are a poem he emailed me and a candy necklace he dropped on my desk, still in a little brown bag.

And this brings me to our first Valentine’s Day as a couple. I was as broke as a church mouse, still surviving on ramen (7 for $1) and peanut butter sandwiches. So, I made him a little paper Valentine’s card. I still have it somewhere. It was red and pink and I wrote a little note – something silly or punny, not passionate or deeply emotional. 

He was horrified. I had given him a handmade card and he had nothing for me – nothing. The king of sweet and silly gifts had nothing to offer. 

I didn’t care. I swear it. I didn’t cry, make a fuss, get mad. I swear it on my mom’s grave. I really had no expectations. Seriously. We hadn’t discussed Valentine’s Day, no dinner plans, nothing like that. I just wanted to give him a little card, you know? But he was so horrified that he left my apartment without saying a word. Not in a mad way, just flustered. He was often unpredictable so I just went back to whatever I’d been doing. No big deal.

A couple hours later, he returned. He had left my place to get me a gift. Flowers? Candy? A card? Nope. Car mats, really nice car mats, maroon to match my little maroon car. 

My favorite Valentine’s gift ever. 

I missed Palentine’s lunch with friends last week. I was really looking forward to it but life intervened, as it does sometimes. Over the weekend, though, I was very lucky and got to brunch with two of my favorite Palentines. It was lovely, even though the water glasses were only slightly larger than sippy cups. 

Today and everyday, I hope you too get to share loving connections, however you define them.

Much love.

Palentine, Galentine, Valentine?

Clean Sheets & Dirty Books

Deb Zuroski, , , , , , , , Leave a comment

The clean-sheet feeling is fantastic, isn’t it? I don’t get to experience that feeling very often because cats and dogs like clean sheets too. 

Most nights I reluctantly share my bed-for-one with at least one animal. This is not of my choosing but as I’ve mentioned before, there is no door to my bedroom. Doorlessness is both invitation and mandate to cats. My husband’s Maine Coon often sleeps upstairs. He’s the loudest snorer you will ever hear, worse – by far – than Ken ever was. He’s also a blanket hog, a trait he definitely learned from Ken. 

My daughter’s rescue cat also likes to sleep on my bed. She makes bread for at least 15 minutes every night while she purrs loudly. Then, she cleans every single piece of fur on her very furry body – also loudly. After that, she circles around like a dog, making her bed, and then sleeps like the dead for hours, until, that is, I disturb her by getting up to use the bathroom.

Like the cats, the dogs are not invited guests but when they’re not kenneled, they occasionally sneak to the third floor for a snooze. The doxies can’t make it onto my bed directly; but like crows, they have mastered rudimentary tools, such as jumping to the bed from a nearby futon or footstool. The pitbull needs no assistance and is often the instigator of bed-ageddon. (In case there’s a question, the bed is the good guy in this battle.)

First, the dogs get on the bed. Then, they unmake the perfectly made but de-pillowed bed. The littlest doxy – the runt of the litter – likes to crawl between the sheets to nap. The furry doxy likes to build a blanket throne and climb up to snooze. The pitbull prefers pillows, thus my daily de-pillowing efforts.

By the time the dogs have been discovered on their illicit snuggle island, the bed is a wreck. Unmade. Dirty footprints on the blankets and sheets. Dog fur everywhere. Sometimes there’s slobber too if the pitbull has decided that one of “her puppies” needs to be cleaned. Perhaps because it is still technically standing at the end of the battle, the bed generally wins but oh the cost. 

Tonight, after I diligently foiled every effort by the dogs to sneak upstairs, I am tucked between truly clean sheets. And it is delightful. I’ll only have it to myself for a brief span. My daughter’s cat is on the futon, waiting for me to finish typing so she can jump on the bed. She abhors typing (though she loves to sit on the warm keyboard).

Today’s success against the dogs was not without its own price tag. The pitbull was so mad at me this afternoon that she refused to look at me. She sat on the sofa for over an hour, grumbling, which sounds a little like the noise an angry toddler makes while sitting in timeout. 

She knows – as do I – that tomorrow is another opportunity to sneak onto the bed. Since she regularly outsmarts me, I’m determined to appreciate the luxury of clean sheets. So, even though it is 19F outside, the windows are open and I’m pretending that a balmy spring breeze is rustling my curtains. (I don’t actually have curtains and the breeze is anything but balmy.)

I’ve been working on a blog post about the current round of book bans in schools. The anger and disappointment I feel are currently getting in the way of productive words so for now, I will just challenge you to read some of the books on the ban lists. You can be sure the people who are advocating book bans haven’t read these books. Knowledge is most threatening to the un- and ill-informed. 

The frustrating thing – as I’ve posted elsewhere – is that book bans hurt the most vulnerable children, those who don’t often see themselves in books, those who can’t buy books, those who aren’t safe at home. My kids have library cards, ready access to the public library a 10-minute walk from our house, and a parent who will buy them any book they want.

That’s privilege and that’s part of what this book ban is about.

My beloved husband would be so angry about these bans. He would have bought copies of all the banned books and driven to Tennessee or Texas or even Ohio to offer free copies to students. It’s not a viable solution for a lot of reasons, but there are advocates with reach who could make free books available to these kids, these kids who need to know that we care and that we’re not sitting by while the book bonfires are being lit. 

Maybe you are one of those advocates ….

Be safe. Be loud. 

Much love.

Clean Sheets & Dirty Books

2020 – [Take] Two

Deb Zuroski, , , , , , 4 Comments

It’s January, which means a new 30-day yoga program (Move) from Yoga With Adriene. Ken never understood it; but for me, yoga is about self-acceptance, really self-love. When I “get on the mat,” as Adriene, from Yoga with Adriene, would say, all the self-criticism, all the self-doubt is silenced for that 30 minutes or so. And if I consistently do yoga, I start hearing inside my head those words of self-acceptance, instead of the self-beratement that I learned very early in life. 

“Meet yourself where you are” is such an encouraging statement. If I can only briefly hold a pose, if I fall during crow, if I stay on my knees during plank, that’s all good because it’s where I am in that moment. That lack of judgment can feel pretty weird at first, pretty unbelievable, because we are taught that no matter how good we are, we are never enough. 

What if, in fact, you are enough … actually enough, just as you are? Something to think about.

I read something recently that has stuck with me: “I walk down memory lane because I love running into you.” It sounds lovely, doesn’t it? But of course it’s not really true. Walking down memory lane is a very bittersweet experience. 

You all have memories that run on repeat through your minds, right? And some of them are triggered by objects or pictures or even smells. I have a blanket – it turned 25 years old in early October. How do I know that, you ask? Because I remember the day Ken and I bought it. Every time I see that blanket, the event comes back to me. 

We actually bought two identical blankets on a Friday in October, 1996. We were going to a sleep concert, this sleep concert. We weren’t really prepared – I had no idea what a sleep concert was – and Ken had mistaken the day, a thing he did consistently because he never really cared what day it was. 

So, we drove there on Friday, discovered that it wasn’t until Saturday, looked at the venue (a gymnasium floor) and realized that we needed blankets and pillows. We called my MIL to make sure she’d be okay watching our son for another day (she was thrilled), found a hotel for the night, and went shopping for supplies. 

We got to the venue early and picked out our spots on the floor in front of Robert Rich. Yep, THE Robert Rich. He had a big, amazing, crazy setup and was already there testing his equipment. Ken, of course, went over to introduce himself – a thing Ken would absolutely do and I would decidedly NOT. 

Robert was gracious and thrilled to hear that Ken was a huge fan. They chatted for a long time while I fussed over our sleeping arrangement – it was really just two blankets and like 4, maybe 3, pillows tossed on the floor. (It’s a good thing I was young then. When I think about that setup now, all that runs through my mind is how incredibly uncomfortable it must have been to lie prone on a gym floor for 8 hours.) 

Of course, I couldn’t really tell you what it’s like to spend an entire night on a gymnasium floor, because I had a horrible, mucousy cold. It was the worst. I could only sort of breathe out of my mouth, when I wasn’t coughing, of course. By Saturday evening, I was a toxic waste site all on my own. 

In case you’ve never gotten the opportunity to attend a sleep concert, let me explain. It’s a very lengthy concert experience with live music, some from albums but lots of improvisation. Concertgoers attend with the intention of going to sleep. Noise at a sleep concert is beyond criminal. There’s no rustling, no snacking, no snoring, no whispering. It’s really and truly silent, except for the performance.  

Most attendees do sleep, at least for a bit of the concert, especially as the music gentles to an ambient, atmospheric, spacey sound for a portion of the night. Some people doze or go into what they describe as a trance-like state. As the next day dawns, the music becomes more vibrant to intentionally but gently wake the audience. 

Thanks to my terrible, drippy, disgusting cold, unlike the rest of the attendees, I stayed up the entire night. Initially, I would lie down for a few moments, sit up to sneeze and then lie down again, occasionally tiptoeing out of the room to blow my nose heartily before returning – very quietly – to my little sleep spot. 

Eventually, Ken furiously whispered that I needed to go away because I was disturbing the vibe  – a fair comment. It’s hard to settle in for an ambient sleep music experience when your neighbor keeps sneezing.  

So, I left the gym and sat on the hallway floor listening to the concert until Robert Rich himself invited me to share his picnic table. (There was a literal picnic table placed in the hall directly outside his performance space.)

I accepted his invitation after warning him about my putrid condition. He didn’t care and encouraged me to watch his entire concert up close. Every once in a while, he would take a break and sit at the table with me, chatting about the nothing things that strangers talk about in the middle of the night. It was ridiculously lovely. 

Ken and I attended other similar events throughout our lives together. All have great stories to go with them, of course. One of these days, I’ll dust off the story of the time I wore khakis to Projektfest (black tape for a blue girl – and absolutely nothing sleep concert-y about that experience!) at the Vic Theater in Chicago.

I think I still have the tshirt from that one, though I left my ego on the ground outside, somewhere behind one of the many groups of goths in spike collars who made fun of the only girl there in a button-down shirt and khakis.

I’m not sure if there’s a lesson here regarding memory lane – maybe it’s to be careful how long you linger, though while you’re there, you can wear whatever you want.

Happy New Year. 

2020 – [Take] Two