My life these days is chiseled into four facets:
1. MY DESIGN WORK: which has been exacerbated by my business e-mail going haywire. None of the ad proofs sent out in the last few weeks ever got through. While technical support is unraveling this, I'm using a temporary Gmail account. Luckily, although no e-mails go out of my website address, I do receive anything sent in, so I won't miss delivered items.
2. DEALING WITH "THE SWITCHOVER": which ultimately will eradicate Steve's existence and place his worldly obligations squarely on my shoulders: House. Utilities. Insurance. Social Security. Medical Bills. IRAs. Lots of forms and death certificates and submissions and reviews and people who never knew Steve being sorry for my loss. And the weeks between things happening.
3. KEEPING MYSELF RELATIVELY SANE: Taking Care of Mark. Making Mark Happy. Keeping Mark Engaged and Content. Unfortunately, not much can occur on this front without the labyrinth of postmortem minutiae of Item No. 2 above having been surmounted. Item No. 1 is a split-stimulus source: I really enjoy the design work but I really hate dealing with the technical crap and stressing on the deadline. I do think about taking time off and traveling to visit people I haven't seen in years. I need time and room to successfully wrap my head around what has occurred in this last year. But it won't happen just yet.
I spent six years in my Hollywood apartment, deliberately single and celibate, learning to live by myself and feel complete and content. (For the moment, we won't discuss my agoraphobic period during that time.) In 2005, I started dating again because I didn't need someone in, but wanted someone in my life. When we met, Steve had been through a similar period, and I think that's one of the reasons we melded so well. I can truly say he was the love of my life.
3a. DECIDING WHAT COMES NEXT: This is not really a separate thing yet. I seriously can't think about it in detail until Item No. 2 is fully resolved. But some imagination time has to be handed over to this subfunction, feeding some hopeful, forward-looking thoughts into the major function of this third facet.
4. EXTRICATING THE MATERIAL REMNANTS OF STEVE: It has taken me a month to clear the bedroom closet and the dresser. Clothes are the most intimate of possessions, and folding them with care and inventorying them took a lot of energy out of me. And I still have to contend with three more closets and the garage. At this rate, the physical removal of Steve's effects will coincide with the completion of Item No. 2.
Item No. 1 does have a deadline of Dec. 9. It will come together nicely, I'm sure, but getting there might be a little on the insane side. I know it was last year. Luckily, all my other clients are fine with holding off on their projects during the holiday season. I know it's upon us (it starts Oct. 31 now; let's just face it), and I'm not even sure I want to acknowledge it this year. My Christmas present will be getting the chamber directory completed and to the printer.
A bit of sad news: I lost Steve's wedding ring. I was wearing it as a pinkie ring and it slipped off (somewhere in the house, I believe) and I didn't even notice it. It wasn't in the garbage disposal, or on the patio, so it must be tucked just under something. After I clear out Steve's stuff, I'm going to have the cleaning ladies come in and go over the place; I'm hoping the ring will show up then.
So these days, I'm not just doing No. 1 or No. 2, but also No. 3 and No. 4. I focus on one until I'm frustrated or worn out, then I turn to another and work on it for a while. After a couple of hours, I just have to stop and relax. Sometimes my eyes glaze over and I have to lie down for a 45-minute nap. Then I pop awake, ready to dive into the next-most-obvious list of chores.
Without Steve here, I find watching TV a very weak distraction. I realized that when my sister came down to visit this last weekend (she was alone because her husband had to work Saturday). With someone else to watch with, TV is enjoyable, except that most of the shows tend to put me to sleep. We did get to watch the DVD of the second half of "Angels in America" (Peristroika). When she and Dave were down two weeks ago, we watched the first half (Millennium Approaches).
Even though it is the most unpleasant time of my life, I am glad to be a legally recognized widower who stayed by his husband's side until death came. And now, in mourning, the world is treating me like a person who has lost a spouse. I find a secret pleasure in being treated like everyone else because, beyond acknowledging my loss, they are also acknowledging my equality.
That's something I have worked for and waited for my entire life. Steve died knowing we are citizens.
Monday, November 18, 2013
Friday, November 8, 2013
I'm Ready For My Breakdown,
Mr. DeMille
Shitty days. You know; really shitty days. You wake up just enough to realize you're waking up, and all you want to do is not wake up. You dread what reality has in store for you, and there's more that you can't even imagine about to explode like a burning bag of mysterious contents sitting on your front porch. If you wake up, you're gonna hafta stamp out that fire.
This is not depression in the classical sense, because there are big piles of shit I have to deal with; not so smelly, but very unhappy things. But (perhaps luckily; I don' t know), each of these bureaucratic things takes days or weeks to take place, so the process feels viscous and remedial. I keep thinking that these people that I'm talking to deal with this stuff every day. But they don't need to possess the death like the survivors do, it is merely there to be processed from papers into computers.
We're coming into the last weeks of work on the chamber directory, and nothing has gelled, although it looks as though it will come together nicely. At this point, I usually start to wish that some process had happened in a different order, but this year, the fact that it happened at all is fortuitous. I really hate working on getting all the advertisers to send in their ads, but I've finally got a layout that will be cohesive in about a week. Just getting all the elements into a 96-page book is time-consuming. The one thing I have to say, it gives me something to look forward to, as does work on the poet's website. That job is on hold, as she is dealing with family crisis at the moment, as well.
But I'm not about to crumble. It's a wimpy alternative, but the world has become too cruel to rely on the kindness of corporate entities to understand your plight: if you don't do the paperwork, you perish. Happily, just enough of it is doable online, that it almost makes it like a video game.
In the real world, I am getting things done slowly, but that is how they like it. On Monday, I got together with a probate attorney to file a petition to waive probate, since there was no will, yet there are no relatives alive to contest my inheritance as his spouse. It's a simple procedure, so it should only take four to eight weeks and $2,000.
Also, I called Social Security and got the voice maze machine; you know, the one that has you speak all your replies and then says, "I'm sorry, would you repeat that?" On the first try, after answering all the questions quite clearly, speaking in clipped, crisp tones, he told me the waiting queue was full, and I should call back later.
This is a technique I use, which works about half the time: I called back immediately and the call slipped through. Even better, once you've escaped the maze, you can give them your phone number, and they will call you back when you get to the front of the line. It took about an hour, but finally Connie called. We set up an appointment at my local office for three weeks from now (the earliest available) to deal with the Social Security and Medicare issues.
The medical bills. The tiny ones are $200-$500. The big ones are $2,000-$4,000. They're from labs and ambulance services and emergency room doctors and anesthesiologists, and the two hospitals. And it doesn't help that we're in the choose-your-Medicare-provider season, as many of those ads masquerade in official-looking envelopes with things like "your immediate attention" and "urgent notice" stamped on them: you know it's a come-on, but you've got to check to make sure it's junk, just in case: everything has the potential these days of being not what it seems.
So I'm putting the medical bills on hold, unless I know they've already charged Medicare and my obligation is a copay.
After a short break from going through Steve's stuff, I have the goal of getting the bedroom cleared out. The closet and the dresser are both done, but there are still a couple boxes I haven't gone through, and a lot of books I want to dump (his mom must have been a fan of those Reader's Digest condensed classics with cheap leather binding and foil-stamped details, because they're everywhere.)
Since I've sold my car to friend Doug, I'm slowly moving everything down into the now-roomy garage (well, not moving slowly, but doing it bits at a time) and will stage the final dispensation of Steve's material artifacts from there. In the end, I shall have a bit more space inside.
I've been going out to dinner with Jessie on Thursday evenings, and that helps a lot. Conversation and getting out of the house. Now's the time to find a job, so I have somewhere to go and people to deal with on a daily basis. Working at home can give you cabin fever, as I am well aware.
Kittie and David will be coming down a week from today to spend another weekend, and I will be going up to Grover Beach for the Thanksgiving weekend. I still haven't decided how I'm going to deal with Christmas this year. Last year we left in in the boxes because we spent the week in Eureka. God, that seems like a decade ago.
Einstein was right: time and space are relative.
 |
| "Who's there? Is that burning poo I smell?" |
We're coming into the last weeks of work on the chamber directory, and nothing has gelled, although it looks as though it will come together nicely. At this point, I usually start to wish that some process had happened in a different order, but this year, the fact that it happened at all is fortuitous. I really hate working on getting all the advertisers to send in their ads, but I've finally got a layout that will be cohesive in about a week. Just getting all the elements into a 96-page book is time-consuming. The one thing I have to say, it gives me something to look forward to, as does work on the poet's website. That job is on hold, as she is dealing with family crisis at the moment, as well.
But I'm not about to crumble. It's a wimpy alternative, but the world has become too cruel to rely on the kindness of corporate entities to understand your plight: if you don't do the paperwork, you perish. Happily, just enough of it is doable online, that it almost makes it like a video game.
In the real world, I am getting things done slowly, but that is how they like it. On Monday, I got together with a probate attorney to file a petition to waive probate, since there was no will, yet there are no relatives alive to contest my inheritance as his spouse. It's a simple procedure, so it should only take four to eight weeks and $2,000.
Also, I called Social Security and got the voice maze machine; you know, the one that has you speak all your replies and then says, "I'm sorry, would you repeat that?" On the first try, after answering all the questions quite clearly, speaking in clipped, crisp tones, he told me the waiting queue was full, and I should call back later.
This is a technique I use, which works about half the time: I called back immediately and the call slipped through. Even better, once you've escaped the maze, you can give them your phone number, and they will call you back when you get to the front of the line. It took about an hour, but finally Connie called. We set up an appointment at my local office for three weeks from now (the earliest available) to deal with the Social Security and Medicare issues.
The medical bills. The tiny ones are $200-$500. The big ones are $2,000-$4,000. They're from labs and ambulance services and emergency room doctors and anesthesiologists, and the two hospitals. And it doesn't help that we're in the choose-your-Medicare-provider season, as many of those ads masquerade in official-looking envelopes with things like "your immediate attention" and "urgent notice" stamped on them: you know it's a come-on, but you've got to check to make sure it's junk, just in case: everything has the potential these days of being not what it seems.
So I'm putting the medical bills on hold, unless I know they've already charged Medicare and my obligation is a copay.
After a short break from going through Steve's stuff, I have the goal of getting the bedroom cleared out. The closet and the dresser are both done, but there are still a couple boxes I haven't gone through, and a lot of books I want to dump (his mom must have been a fan of those Reader's Digest condensed classics with cheap leather binding and foil-stamped details, because they're everywhere.)
Since I've sold my car to friend Doug, I'm slowly moving everything down into the now-roomy garage (well, not moving slowly, but doing it bits at a time) and will stage the final dispensation of Steve's material artifacts from there. In the end, I shall have a bit more space inside.
I've been going out to dinner with Jessie on Thursday evenings, and that helps a lot. Conversation and getting out of the house. Now's the time to find a job, so I have somewhere to go and people to deal with on a daily basis. Working at home can give you cabin fever, as I am well aware.
Kittie and David will be coming down a week from today to spend another weekend, and I will be going up to Grover Beach for the Thanksgiving weekend. I still haven't decided how I'm going to deal with Christmas this year. Last year we left in in the boxes because we spent the week in Eureka. God, that seems like a decade ago.
Einstein was right: time and space are relative.
Sunday, November 3, 2013
If You Pick It, It Will Fall Apart
 |
| Little Boxes on the Platform |
I'm in a kind of haze. I do my design work, which consists mostly of file maintenance right now; try to get both projects moving forward at an adequate pace. Then there are the Death Papers. Everyone who had business with Steve when he died has to be notified, documentation processed, and procedure followed to the letter. So I hop between deadlines and death, and try to make progress on things around the house in between. I shut down easily, though, and most days I take a short nap in the afternoon to change gears between these three very different chores.
The day after the last blog entry, I went down to the bank to make sure his credit card was flagged and the mortgage and equity account payments were made on time. When I got home, the Neptune Society (over Toluca Lake way in the San Fernando Valley) called to say the death certificates had arrived, Steve's cremains to go were ready, and I could drop by and pick them up, if I wanted.
So the next afternoon, I picked him up. I knew just where he was going to go; I'd known it for months: sitting at the center of the platform, a photo of him and me from an Oscar party last year at Steve and Roberto's home. He had wanted me to don a rainbow afro wig for the picture, but I felt a white feather boa was quite enough fabulousness for me, thank you very much.
A lot of my time is taken up with folding, bagging and making an inventory of his things, since I plan to donate most stuff to the Rescue Mission and Out of the Closet. So a fond memory is touched with each shirt I fold, each pair of shoes I match up and carefully tie together: walking through the old-growth redwoods in Eureka, strolling through the Louvre in Paris.
The strangest thing so far, though, has been pulling out boxes that I have never seen open since I moved to Pasadena nearly nine years ago. Most of the stuff is from his tour of duty in Viet Nam (like a monstrous scrapbook with every letter he wrote his mother while on deployment. His Purple Heart and its certificate. High school yearbooks, letters, notes and cards. What to keep, what to donate, what to toss?
And, lastly, an odd side effect of this process is that I'm going through my things and seeing what's there that I can cull out and release. I'm not being reckless about it, but all the closets in the house are filled with things that I haven't looked at or used, some for more than a decade. And don't even get me thinking about tackling the CD collection: hundreds to go through.
Kittie and David came down again this weekend. Kittie cooked, went through the paperwork we have left to pull all the documents the attorney will need for the probate petition, and helped me clear out and pack Steve's things in the dresser. David untangled an ivy plant from its holder on the patio and helped me build a moss cage in the holder, transplanting the ivy from its small pot into the moss-lined holder.
And it was time with family. It was time with company. It was people filling up the solitude. I know, at some point, the house will fit me and feel like home with just me here, but for now I still suppose I hear Steve upstairs, when it's the cats knocking something over. They're on edge, too, because they know something's going on, and they know they haven't seen Steve for nearly two months.
I keep pointing out the very nice box on the platform in the living room, but I don't think the cats get that what's left of Steve is sitting up with Shakespeare and the Oxford Dictionary.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Emotional Dilatation & Curettage
It's been over a week since Steve died. It hasn't really sunk in yet. The only times we've been apart for more than a day were when I visited my brother Steve and his family in Wisconsin while my Steve stayed at home and held down the fort.
I took my sister Kittie's advice and tried not to be alone. On Sunday, the 13th, I had dinner with Jessie at Panda Inn. She brought a falafal and salad stuff with her, so I had snacks beyond the stuff already in the fridge. She helped me pull out all the expired food and haul it out to the dumpster before we left for dinner.
Monday I was scheduled to spend at Robin and Evan's place, but somehow I just felt like being alone in the house, watching a movie, and so I did. Tuesday Jeff and Chuck descended and scooped me off for dinner at Green Street (one of our favorite restaurants). And Wednesday morning, Kittie arrived.
My greatest dread, beyond the paperwork needed to inherit the house and transfer the bank accounts, mortgage, etc., was going through his two file drawers crammed with papers. Also, the medical bills, the household expenses, HOA fees, insurance; the list goes on.
So Wednesday, Thursday and Friday (when her husband David joined us via Amtrak and the Gold Line) were pretty much given up to digging through the files, shredding pages with signatures or personal information (like the Social Security number), and tossing the rest. It goes back to 1991.
We also organized the medical bills, and Kittie put together a pile of calls to make and things to do in logical, sequenced priority.
Saturday the shredding started in earnest, moving everything downstairs so we could watch TV while we destroyed documents from two decades ago. In the evening, we went over to Robin and Evan's, and were joined by Jessie for a lovely dinner and evening.
Sunday was low-keyed. We continued the shredding (it's still not finished) and Kittie and David slowly packed up and left around 5 o'clock.
Monday I concentrated on building the InDesign file for the Directory from the master template. I didn't really look at my to-do list, and I know I didn't want to call anyone.
In the afternoon, a package arrived from my sister-in-law Carla. I had suggested she send chocolates to Steve, since they're easy to eat. When she got my e-mail about Steve's death, she e-mailed back, "Is there anything I can do?" I sent a reply: "Send the chocolates." And she had, along with a jar of my brother Jim's strawberry jam. Joyous!'
Today I sat down and wrote out a painful sum of checks corresponding to the medical bills received so far. The money's all there, but after having gone through this month of pain and death with Steve, to have to pay these amounts seems outrageous. Still, when Medicare and the VA coverage turn a $122,000 hospital bill into a $1,200 co-pay, I don't mind paying.
I also called the Neptune Society to make sure things were going smoothly. My contact there was on another line, so I left her a message (no voice mail?) why I was calling and my phone number. I'm assuming she got the stuff when I sent it last Thursday (something else Kittie helped with).
And that was it. That was all I could do. I have to call the bank tomorrow about the equity line of credit and the mortgage, since I want to pay both of those on time. There's still about a dozen calls to make, but I just can't make them today.
I figure one or two morbid tasks a day and one or two studio tasks a day, and things will be on their way by the end of the month. I sure wish they'd ship back Steve In The Box, 'cause I really miss him.
I took my sister Kittie's advice and tried not to be alone. On Sunday, the 13th, I had dinner with Jessie at Panda Inn. She brought a falafal and salad stuff with her, so I had snacks beyond the stuff already in the fridge. She helped me pull out all the expired food and haul it out to the dumpster before we left for dinner.
Monday I was scheduled to spend at Robin and Evan's place, but somehow I just felt like being alone in the house, watching a movie, and so I did. Tuesday Jeff and Chuck descended and scooped me off for dinner at Green Street (one of our favorite restaurants). And Wednesday morning, Kittie arrived.
My greatest dread, beyond the paperwork needed to inherit the house and transfer the bank accounts, mortgage, etc., was going through his two file drawers crammed with papers. Also, the medical bills, the household expenses, HOA fees, insurance; the list goes on.
So Wednesday, Thursday and Friday (when her husband David joined us via Amtrak and the Gold Line) were pretty much given up to digging through the files, shredding pages with signatures or personal information (like the Social Security number), and tossing the rest. It goes back to 1991.
We also organized the medical bills, and Kittie put together a pile of calls to make and things to do in logical, sequenced priority.
Saturday the shredding started in earnest, moving everything downstairs so we could watch TV while we destroyed documents from two decades ago. In the evening, we went over to Robin and Evan's, and were joined by Jessie for a lovely dinner and evening.
Sunday was low-keyed. We continued the shredding (it's still not finished) and Kittie and David slowly packed up and left around 5 o'clock.
Monday I concentrated on building the InDesign file for the Directory from the master template. I didn't really look at my to-do list, and I know I didn't want to call anyone.
In the afternoon, a package arrived from my sister-in-law Carla. I had suggested she send chocolates to Steve, since they're easy to eat. When she got my e-mail about Steve's death, she e-mailed back, "Is there anything I can do?" I sent a reply: "Send the chocolates." And she had, along with a jar of my brother Jim's strawberry jam. Joyous!'
Today I sat down and wrote out a painful sum of checks corresponding to the medical bills received so far. The money's all there, but after having gone through this month of pain and death with Steve, to have to pay these amounts seems outrageous. Still, when Medicare and the VA coverage turn a $122,000 hospital bill into a $1,200 co-pay, I don't mind paying.
I also called the Neptune Society to make sure things were going smoothly. My contact there was on another line, so I left her a message (no voice mail?) why I was calling and my phone number. I'm assuming she got the stuff when I sent it last Thursday (something else Kittie helped with).
And that was it. That was all I could do. I have to call the bank tomorrow about the equity line of credit and the mortgage, since I want to pay both of those on time. There's still about a dozen calls to make, but I just can't make them today.
I figure one or two morbid tasks a day and one or two studio tasks a day, and things will be on their way by the end of the month. I sure wish they'd ship back Steve In The Box, 'cause I really miss him.
Sunday, October 13, 2013
It is a Puzzlement
It's coming up on the 22nd hour of day zero. It literally has been the longest day of my life. I caught a half-hour nap here and a 45-minute snooze there during the day, but no real REM sleep. Two Xanax this evening to relax me and keep me asleep.
For relief and distraction, friend Jessie came over and took me out to dinner at Panda Inn (not to be confused with the fast-food atrocity known as Panda Express, although they are owned by the same corporation; go figure). We had Crab Wonton appetizers (Steve's favorite), a mango-duck salad that was quite tasty (but not enough mango or duck), and shrimp upside-down crispy noodles.
It was wonderful to get out of the house with her and talk about the crazy times working together at the "DeeJ" (Los Angeles Daily Journal) at the turn of the millennium, traveling in general, and reminiscing about taking Steve to London and Paris; the next trip was to be to Vienna and Salzburg, near his ancestral turf.
When you think about it, any kind of planning is really just an active bucket list, like our plans to retire to Eureka and live on the cool, unpopulated coastline. It was a great idea for us, but not for me alone. Someone said, "Don't make any major decisions for at least a year," and that sounds like good advice.
My sister Kittie (pictured below) told me I shouldn't be alone for a whole day, so Monday I'm going over to Robin and Evans, Tuesday Chuck and Jeff are taking me to dinner, and Wednesday Kittie herself will arrive, with her husband David showing up a day or two after (that part's still sketchy). Anyway, my week's worth of caretakers has been arranged.
The screensaver on my Mac is a "Ken Burns" slideshow (pics slowly moving across, up or down through the frame). As I walked into the studio, two or three of Steve's pictures played in a row on the monitor.
I realized that I really didn't have a group of photos of Steve or of us together. While picking some out, I started to play and uploaded them to JigZone.com.
If you're at all into jigsaw puzzles, this is a fun little website that will waste a lot of your time. I'm linking 48-piece puzzles, so as to waste only four minutes of your time, give or take.
Click on each to solve, then use your back button to return to these pics. If you want to sign up, or if you're already a member, buddy up to see all my puzzles.
For relief and distraction, friend Jessie came over and took me out to dinner at Panda Inn (not to be confused with the fast-food atrocity known as Panda Express, although they are owned by the same corporation; go figure). We had Crab Wonton appetizers (Steve's favorite), a mango-duck salad that was quite tasty (but not enough mango or duck), and shrimp upside-down crispy noodles.
It was wonderful to get out of the house with her and talk about the crazy times working together at the "DeeJ" (Los Angeles Daily Journal) at the turn of the millennium, traveling in general, and reminiscing about taking Steve to London and Paris; the next trip was to be to Vienna and Salzburg, near his ancestral turf.
When you think about it, any kind of planning is really just an active bucket list, like our plans to retire to Eureka and live on the cool, unpopulated coastline. It was a great idea for us, but not for me alone. Someone said, "Don't make any major decisions for at least a year," and that sounds like good advice.
My sister Kittie (pictured below) told me I shouldn't be alone for a whole day, so Monday I'm going over to Robin and Evans, Tuesday Chuck and Jeff are taking me to dinner, and Wednesday Kittie herself will arrive, with her husband David showing up a day or two after (that part's still sketchy). Anyway, my week's worth of caretakers has been arranged.
The screensaver on my Mac is a "Ken Burns" slideshow (pics slowly moving across, up or down through the frame). As I walked into the studio, two or three of Steve's pictures played in a row on the monitor.
I realized that I really didn't have a group of photos of Steve or of us together. While picking some out, I started to play and uploaded them to JigZone.com.
If you're at all into jigsaw puzzles, this is a fun little website that will waste a lot of your time. I'm linking 48-piece puzzles, so as to waste only four minutes of your time, give or take.
Click on each to solve, then use your back button to return to these pics. If you want to sign up, or if you're already a member, buddy up to see all my puzzles.
I find it's a fun way to assemble all the pictures in my head of Steve, examine his visage from a new perspective, now that there's no real Steve to look at, just pictures to remind us of the clarity and playfulness and soulfulness of his eyes; how that meticulously trimmed goatee wrapped just so around his chin; a far-off gaze of sober contemplation, or just how shiny his head could get!
Thanks for all the kind words everyone has been sending and the prayers that go along with them. Steve was not a churchgoing kinda guy, and neither am I, but we shared a sense of spirituality and a deep belief in the overflowing goodness of most human beings. Church services and worship and fellowship weren't our thing, we just tried to carry that spirit in our hearts and share it with everyone, no matter how stupid, shallow, self-involved, numb-skulled and/or thick-headed they might be.
Again, Emily Dickinson will suffice:
Some keep the Sabbath going to Church –
I keep it, staying at Home –
With a Bobolink for a Chorister –
And an Orchard, for a Dome –
Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice –
I, just wear my Wings –
And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church,
Our little Sexton – sings.
God preaches, a noted Clergyman –
And the sermon is never long,
So instead of getting to Heaven, at last –
I’m going, all along.
(Remember: to get out of any puzzle page, click your back button.)
Thanks for all the kind words everyone has been sending and the prayers that go along with them. Steve was not a churchgoing kinda guy, and neither am I, but we shared a sense of spirituality and a deep belief in the overflowing goodness of most human beings. Church services and worship and fellowship weren't our thing, we just tried to carry that spirit in our hearts and share it with everyone, no matter how stupid, shallow, self-involved, numb-skulled and/or thick-headed they might be.
Again, Emily Dickinson will suffice:
Some keep the Sabbath going to Church –
I keep it, staying at Home –
With a Bobolink for a Chorister –
And an Orchard, for a Dome –
Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice –
I, just wear my Wings –
And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church,
Our little Sexton – sings.
God preaches, a noted Clergyman –
And the sermon is never long,
So instead of getting to Heaven, at last –
I’m going, all along.
(Remember: to get out of any puzzle page, click your back button.)
|
| The wedding photo |
|
| Steve on the patio in Pasadena |
|
| LAX to Eureka |
|
| Inside a burned-out living redwood |
|
| Steve with Mark, Mark's sister Kittie (left) and mother Paula (right) |
|
| At California Adventure with Steve and Roberto (not pictured) |
Hasta la Vista, Baby
My best friend died this morning at 1:20: also my husband, my lover, my date and the warmth in my life.
At 1:15, I got a call from The Home, saying Mr. Burtner was "in distress." The doctor and the ambulance had been called. Five minutes later, he simply stopped breathing. As he was under do not resuscitate orders, they simply called me ten minutes later and let me know what had happened.
"Stopped breathing," was the way she put it on the phone. "You mean he's dead?" I asked, sitting on the toilet, getting ready to dress and leave. "Yes." She almost sounded hesitant.
This latest bout of illness began only a few days after the last blog entry: Steve started to have trouble hearing people on the phone, but soon it was people in the room, talking loudly. On Monday, Oct. 7, he had gotten to the point of hallucinating. I had had it in my mind to have him transferred down to the Long Beach VA Medical Center that day, since all his doctors are down there, but the severity of his condition required quick diagnosis of what was going on. So he was taken to Huntington Memorial Emergency Room, two blocks from The Home.
They took a chest X-rays in the room, and I could tell by the image on the portable cart's screen that the bone cancer had really spread to all parts of his rib cage, and the main tumor was half again as large as the last chest CT scan I had seen in Long Beach. It made sense, since it had been almost two months since his last round of chemo.
A CT scan of the head revealed no cancer, so the incoherence wasn't due to that illness. All the blood cultures and tests came back negative; only a urine sample, taken as a last resort, showed a urinary tract infection by a rather virulent strain of bacteria. He was put on IV antibiotics and sent back to The Home; transferring him to Long Beach was something that wouldn't happened until he stabilized.
The next five days, Steve was not really available. Visiting, I could get him to look at me, focus and recognize who I was, but there were other, fantastical things happening in his cranium, and they obviously took his attention. It all seemed rather pleasant for him, until Friday, when he didn't speak at all during my half-hour visit.
On Saturday, exhausted, I decided to take a day off. Our friends Steve and Roberto visited him in the afternoon, and as long as he saw friendly faces, he'd know, if he could, that he was not forgotten. So, when visiting time (usually around 6:00 or 6:30) rolled around, I stayed at home and watched "Hedwig and the Angry Inch," which was a favorite of his. I puttered some on the computer, researching fonts for my latest web project, and turned in about 12:30. Forty-five minutes later, the first call came.
In a fit of premonition, I had remembered yesterday to look for the box that contained Steve's box from the Neptune Society. Directly after he had been diagnosed, he had called them and made pre-arrangements for his cremation. For some reason, we have to supply the box for the cremains, and it can't be any old cardboard box anymore. As I recall, they take care of the paperwork and the death certificate and ship back the cremains. I have the information packet somewhere around here.
The box had arrived about a week after the check cleared, just another UPS package. We had never opened it. I put it away in a closet upstairs and didn't recall exactly where, so I found it and put it on a chair in the studio. Now, just before deployment, I cut the plastic tape and opened package. The box inside is quite stunning, and I have a feeling Steve will be sticking around for sometime to come. Box in box under arm, I headed over to The Home.
All the things that happened to him during this dearth of illnesses seemed to happen on a weekend, and this was no exception: the regular folks are off and not much can happen quickly. When I got there, I went to Steve's room. He was flat in the bed, head leaning to his right. There was a woman in the room, straightening the sheets, preparing him for viewing, but I had made my entrance too soon.
She gave us some privacy but hovered outside the door like a nervous bird. I touched Steve's forehead and he was still warm, but his hand was already cool to the touch. His eyes were open slightly, so I closed them. And there it was: that waxen mask of the face in lax repose, not even death, but the empty physical aftermath. To borrow from Gertrude Stein, there is no there there. Steve's gone, and he slipped out without a trace.
I talked to him quietly, just in case he was still in the room, and went to check that the nurse had called the Neptune Society, and to give them the information needed for "the transfer." While the nurse took care of that, the nurse's aide helped me pack his things, checking against their inventory list. I chucked the bags into the trunk of the car, where they still remain, and drove home.
I got here at 2:45, sent out a group e-mail at 3:10 and tried to get to sleep. After two hours of tossing and turning, I got up, made some coffee and watched the morning news. Slightly dazed, I wrote a short e-mail to all my active clients, letting them know I would not be attending to studio business until Thursday. I need some grief time and me time and time to re-orient myself.
Right now, I'm still numb. Oh, so numb. It's been a long, rough row from back in early March until now. It's 9:30, so I've been up 24 hours with only a 45-minute nap yesterday afternoon. At some point soon, I'm going to collapse. But no need to sleep with the phone next to my bed now. The machine can take any calls that come in.
At 1:15, I got a call from The Home, saying Mr. Burtner was "in distress." The doctor and the ambulance had been called. Five minutes later, he simply stopped breathing. As he was under do not resuscitate orders, they simply called me ten minutes later and let me know what had happened.
"Stopped breathing," was the way she put it on the phone. "You mean he's dead?" I asked, sitting on the toilet, getting ready to dress and leave. "Yes." She almost sounded hesitant.
This latest bout of illness began only a few days after the last blog entry: Steve started to have trouble hearing people on the phone, but soon it was people in the room, talking loudly. On Monday, Oct. 7, he had gotten to the point of hallucinating. I had had it in my mind to have him transferred down to the Long Beach VA Medical Center that day, since all his doctors are down there, but the severity of his condition required quick diagnosis of what was going on. So he was taken to Huntington Memorial Emergency Room, two blocks from The Home.
They took a chest X-rays in the room, and I could tell by the image on the portable cart's screen that the bone cancer had really spread to all parts of his rib cage, and the main tumor was half again as large as the last chest CT scan I had seen in Long Beach. It made sense, since it had been almost two months since his last round of chemo.
A CT scan of the head revealed no cancer, so the incoherence wasn't due to that illness. All the blood cultures and tests came back negative; only a urine sample, taken as a last resort, showed a urinary tract infection by a rather virulent strain of bacteria. He was put on IV antibiotics and sent back to The Home; transferring him to Long Beach was something that wouldn't happened until he stabilized.
The next five days, Steve was not really available. Visiting, I could get him to look at me, focus and recognize who I was, but there were other, fantastical things happening in his cranium, and they obviously took his attention. It all seemed rather pleasant for him, until Friday, when he didn't speak at all during my half-hour visit.
On Saturday, exhausted, I decided to take a day off. Our friends Steve and Roberto visited him in the afternoon, and as long as he saw friendly faces, he'd know, if he could, that he was not forgotten. So, when visiting time (usually around 6:00 or 6:30) rolled around, I stayed at home and watched "Hedwig and the Angry Inch," which was a favorite of his. I puttered some on the computer, researching fonts for my latest web project, and turned in about 12:30. Forty-five minutes later, the first call came.
In a fit of premonition, I had remembered yesterday to look for the box that contained Steve's box from the Neptune Society. Directly after he had been diagnosed, he had called them and made pre-arrangements for his cremation. For some reason, we have to supply the box for the cremains, and it can't be any old cardboard box anymore. As I recall, they take care of the paperwork and the death certificate and ship back the cremains. I have the information packet somewhere around here.
The box had arrived about a week after the check cleared, just another UPS package. We had never opened it. I put it away in a closet upstairs and didn't recall exactly where, so I found it and put it on a chair in the studio. Now, just before deployment, I cut the plastic tape and opened package. The box inside is quite stunning, and I have a feeling Steve will be sticking around for sometime to come. Box in box under arm, I headed over to The Home.
All the things that happened to him during this dearth of illnesses seemed to happen on a weekend, and this was no exception: the regular folks are off and not much can happen quickly. When I got there, I went to Steve's room. He was flat in the bed, head leaning to his right. There was a woman in the room, straightening the sheets, preparing him for viewing, but I had made my entrance too soon.
She gave us some privacy but hovered outside the door like a nervous bird. I touched Steve's forehead and he was still warm, but his hand was already cool to the touch. His eyes were open slightly, so I closed them. And there it was: that waxen mask of the face in lax repose, not even death, but the empty physical aftermath. To borrow from Gertrude Stein, there is no there there. Steve's gone, and he slipped out without a trace.
I talked to him quietly, just in case he was still in the room, and went to check that the nurse had called the Neptune Society, and to give them the information needed for "the transfer." While the nurse took care of that, the nurse's aide helped me pack his things, checking against their inventory list. I chucked the bags into the trunk of the car, where they still remain, and drove home.
I got here at 2:45, sent out a group e-mail at 3:10 and tried to get to sleep. After two hours of tossing and turning, I got up, made some coffee and watched the morning news. Slightly dazed, I wrote a short e-mail to all my active clients, letting them know I would not be attending to studio business until Thursday. I need some grief time and me time and time to re-orient myself.
Right now, I'm still numb. Oh, so numb. It's been a long, rough row from back in early March until now. It's 9:30, so I've been up 24 hours with only a 45-minute nap yesterday afternoon. At some point soon, I'm going to collapse. But no need to sleep with the phone next to my bed now. The machine can take any calls that come in.
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
Alone in Semiprivate Land
Ed is gone. Gone gone gone. When I walked into Steve's room on Tuesday afternoon, they were making his bed and clearing out his jetsam. There were three or four people in the room, including the physical therapy assistant who was working with Steve. I made several smarmy comments about how much more pleasant the room seemed without SOABMA Ed, and everyone gave a look or a nod in complete agreement.
The sling is now off Steve's right arm, and he's actually using the hand for some things (like working the TV remote). You can tell he's still weak on that side if you hold his hand, but it's working, and he has a little gel ball to squeeze and work the muscles.
The biggest thing I'm worried about is his mental condition: after almost three weeks of laying in bed and staring at the walls, he sometimes isn't focused on what's going on, and you have to say things twice, especially if it's a double entendre or something that takes making a jump in thinking. His next doctor's appointment is Oct. 30, and when I talked to the administrator about transporting him, she said that, most likely, I'll be able to load him up in the car and drive him over.
The best thing people can do for him right now is call him on his cell phone (send me an e-mail if you don't have the number and I'll get it to you). Just to say hello. Don't expect great acuity on the other end of the line, but he's not muddle-headed, either.
A lot of the time, he's trying to hear the caller while there are announcements over the public address system, or there might be people in his room changing sheets, taking his blood pressure, etc. And there's also the chance that the cell reception's not it's best.
Cards would be nice, too. The address is:
Gary Stephen Burtner
Room 15-D
Californian-Pasadena
120 Bellefontaine St.
Pasadena, CA 91105
On the studio front, I have the chamber directory going (including all the ads), and I'm starting up a website redesign for a local poet. I've probably told you that before. Looks like Steve's not the only one who's mental acuity is suffering. In any case, I've got the base template for the directory pretty much finished, and I'm collecting the copy and artwork for the website as she sends it over.
I am so lucky to have the clients I do: they're all nice people with interesting content and a real openness to my design ideas. I only hope my good luck continues on that front.
So, no long tirade this evening, just a little update. Hopefully, in four of five weeks, Steve will be home and I won't be making the twice-daily jaunt over to see him, because he'll be downstairs.
The sling is now off Steve's right arm, and he's actually using the hand for some things (like working the TV remote). You can tell he's still weak on that side if you hold his hand, but it's working, and he has a little gel ball to squeeze and work the muscles.
The biggest thing I'm worried about is his mental condition: after almost three weeks of laying in bed and staring at the walls, he sometimes isn't focused on what's going on, and you have to say things twice, especially if it's a double entendre or something that takes making a jump in thinking. His next doctor's appointment is Oct. 30, and when I talked to the administrator about transporting him, she said that, most likely, I'll be able to load him up in the car and drive him over.
The best thing people can do for him right now is call him on his cell phone (send me an e-mail if you don't have the number and I'll get it to you). Just to say hello. Don't expect great acuity on the other end of the line, but he's not muddle-headed, either.
A lot of the time, he's trying to hear the caller while there are announcements over the public address system, or there might be people in his room changing sheets, taking his blood pressure, etc. And there's also the chance that the cell reception's not it's best.
Cards would be nice, too. The address is:
Gary Stephen Burtner
Room 15-D
Californian-Pasadena
120 Bellefontaine St.
Pasadena, CA 91105
On the studio front, I have the chamber directory going (including all the ads), and I'm starting up a website redesign for a local poet. I've probably told you that before. Looks like Steve's not the only one who's mental acuity is suffering. In any case, I've got the base template for the directory pretty much finished, and I'm collecting the copy and artwork for the website as she sends it over.
I am so lucky to have the clients I do: they're all nice people with interesting content and a real openness to my design ideas. I only hope my good luck continues on that front.
So, no long tirade this evening, just a little update. Hopefully, in four of five weeks, Steve will be home and I won't be making the twice-daily jaunt over to see him, because he'll be downstairs.
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