The World Moves, with Force

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I joined the US Army in July 1979. I left the Minnesota National Guard behind me, a series of positive and negative growth opportunity. I believed at the time that a person owed a time of service to their country, and I was the only one in my family who prepared to follow my father’s footsteps. I was a musician in a world that had no way to find opportunities in music, if you didn’t have someone to point you in the right direction. I had no one pointing careers out to me. The Army would give me a few musical opportunities, a few contacts. No mention was made about the bad things that I would learn.

I thought my dad would support my move. He had served during Korea, had played jazz, marched and made the voice of the tuba, baritone, french horn, and string bass ring across two countries. He was a genius in the art of music who was lost to the profession by a lack of contacts, a young wife, four hungry, reading children. He needed a job to take care of us, often holding two jobs until the time that would always arise when his sense of honor was affronted and he would quit. I was sure he would support my move. I was wrong.

It was my mother who glued the family together as we grew; working at jobs, creating works of art, making sure that we would never lose our home, or go too hungry. She was my friend and supporter, but she also understood that I needed the canvas to create who I was and what I stood for in my life. There was the quote, “Oh, Ann” that would follow mistakes I made. That quote follows me to now.

My father told me he would never speak to me again. He did though, calling the Commander of the Naval School of Music and letting him know of our argument. My Commander set me straight about fathers.

My mother stood strong and let me do as I believed I needed to do. None of us knew that music in Minneapolis/St. Paul was about to explode in ways that shouldn’t have been possible. I missed every single one. If only there had been an internet for me, the outcome very likely would have been different.

I went off to the Army. I packed an iron, jeans, a concert dress, a cowboy hat and a faux leather coat that would eventually crack and show it was plastic, “pleather” was the term. What I found was, some of the military are honorable men and women. Some are abusive. This shouldn’t surprise anyone, it’s been this way since the beginning of history. What surprised me was that a peacetime army would have so many heroes, and so many predators, when no one was required to be there. I wanted to serve my family, country, and the goddess music with all of  my heart.

The heroes aren’t seen on lists of heroes. I can name some. Lt. Colonel Tony Cason and his wife. They were honest hardworking people concerned for the lives of those under their command. Wherever they ended up, their standards followed them. Music under this man was a living entity. He also allowed me to believe in a love that was only beginning. He handed me to my new husband with a smile. When Lt. Colonel Cason was promoted, life changed for me.

I, like my father, found myself somewhere I didn’t think I would end up. I was married with a husband who was stationed 3000 miles away. When the harassment and the coverup of the behavior of a second commander happened, all I could think of was to find a band on the east coast. So the Army sent me to Maryland, firstly to get me out of the hair of a band that no longer wanted me to be a member. Secondly, because I was loudly protective of the women I served with, even though there was one who was an old boy herself. I ended up in a band that could have been the most cohesive band I had been in yet, but they had a problem communicating between top and bottom ranks. Shortly after I arrived, several members where prosecuted for possession of illegal substances. The commander of the band decided that because I was nice to these members, as I was nice to everyone, that I must have been a drug dealer. He called me into his office to let me know how miserable he was going to make my life, destroy my reputation, and destroy my marriage to one of Fort Myer’s Charlie Company’s enlisted. I had enough. I laughed. Yes, I laughed. I told the commander he had no power over me. I had just found out that I was pregnant with my first child. I was willing to take any blood test needed. I had base housing, bring it on. And, after all that, I was leaving. I walked down to the Admin building and filed for a discharge. It was granted and I was given time to serve in the inactive reserve. My sense of honor had been affronted, so I did what my dad did, I walked.

I’m sorry I lost my chance of music as a career. It hurts to this day. What I gained was a family with two children, now well grown and establishing their own worlds, who also possess a sense of honor, and the most gracious man in the world. He’s handsome, supportive, caring, intelligent and the hardest working man I’ve had the honor to know. He’s been tolerant of all of my harebrained adventures and given me his smile to bless them. For 35 1/2 years, he’s been here for me.

Eric is a force of nature in a very confused world that seems to be repeating itself. He’s saved my life at least three times. He’s sacrificed his career possibilities to make sure my healthcare is safe because of my MS. He gave me the ability to be myself, although I am rather shy of sharing where I came from  and my experiences. You might not understand that from this post, but my words are stronger because of him.

Don’t let the past surround you to the extent of losing all else. Miracles are born in hard times to good people. We work for them, tailor our lives to them, and if we are very lucky, we become the instrument of our miracle. If we work hard enough, we become a Force to be reckoned with,  as the world repeats the anger and horror of prior generations and the human History. The future isn’t known. It’s a gift that way.

Winter Warmth, Warm Dogs, Warm Hearts

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Blog #3 Learning to be Warm

This time of the year is hard on me. There are the usual reasons; family missed, short days, money, and Multiple Sclerosis. That’s my secret. I’m not alone either.  Yes, 400,000 of us try to adapt our schedules so that we can be with family, avoid viruses, and hide our secret thoughts. MS is that which causes me to write, to photograph the world, to try to remain as human and hopeful as I can and which causes me to fall off the precipice of who I was. MS is the lassitude which prohibits me in strange ways. It is the challenge I mentioned but did not clarify before. There is company, PatientsLikeMe.com is where I can go to feel normal and pass on what positives I can when others need to hear them. They made me an Ambassador this year, seeing in me something I can’t always find. What I find is that life lurks all around us. Hope is the most important link to being alive.

Hope is an astounding emotion. The wings it gives to you so that you can fly somewhere you had lost are astounding. It can lift you from the depths of despair and let you soar among the stars. I need that hope. I can find the dark moments with no trouble, but the light, that is what I find lifts me out of the house and into society again. Clouds are places to rest, marvelous palaces of cool vapor waiting for angels to sing their choruses and composers to write them down.

My dogs and silly cat keep me warm in the evenings when the alone monster comes to call. Foxy will “Yarf” at me; waiting attention, to play chase, to go outside, and to have dinner. We eat together. Tigerlily, the oldest pup at 14 1/2 carries my heart in her dancing. She doesn’t like to eat much anymore so I spoon feed her. She is so happy just to be with me, to sit on a sofa and nap. Frankenstein is a long haired tortoise shell cat who at ten pounds thinks she is the Queen of Quite A Lot . She bosses the dogs around, moving them out of their food bowls to check and see if they have something tastier than the fish in her bowl. She tells us to go out and in. The door needs no bell, it has a cat waiting. Leave your name and she will pass your message on. I can’t forget the dogs outside, because she waits at the window for them. She commands with a low growly voice and I obey. Eat, go to the bed, behave, she tells me all of these things and then drifts off into thoughts which only a cat can know. T.S.Eliot understood cats well.

I drift into my music: Barber’s Adagio, Fanfare for the Common Man, Stravinsky, Hindemith, Thomas, Bach. I find the tears on my face, the glow of harmonies, the waves of humanity and heaven filling me full. This is one of the secrets I have. My music, which should have been my life, has returned to greet me at the moment when I most wish to give up. When walking is stumbling, treasures dropped, and the company of man is gone, music fills that hollow space in my chest with memories and love. I remember my childhood, my father, uncles, grandfather, aunts. I remember my friends, mentors, and teachers. It’s okay to miss them, and even to talk to them still, as long as I have something worth saying. “A Place for Us” has begun to play. West Side Story balanced what I knew of the world and racial prejudice as a teen and resounds still in my mind. The stories of today are seen in vivid noise on the news, but I can still believe that somewhere and sometime society will fix its ills.

Now you know two of my secrets, the MS and my fear of not having done what I was born to do. Every one has regrets somewhere. Mine are no more special than anyone else’s. I have tidied my corner of the world as best I could. I have pride in having done at least that much.

The lights on the house and the Christmas tree are a gift from my children. They want me to remember when I gave them the miracle of the dark giving birth to the light. They have given the light to me this year. I want to embrace the shine, the purity of color, the smell of pine and cinnamon, and the feel of a family come together to laugh. It gathers around me, holds me, pokes me in silly places and it gives me shelter from being lonely. I am a lucky woman, many don’t have that support. The pillars are there so that I will never have to be totally alone. The lights on the tree will last me until April when growth becomes obvious.

Go and hug those who are dear to you. I can wait a bit for you to return.

Ann WJ White

Birth of the Snow Legend

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The worst of the snow,
balled together and sticking
to twisted twigs,
gave the illusion of a monster,
a snow monster.

Given life and breath
under icy skies,
it lifted its frozen eyes
to a landscape cruel and seasonal,
a tundra.

Abominable and frosty,
it thought of the eternal winter
as it hoped Spring
would not be sprung upon it.
A tender wish.

Fables would grow mentioning
a creature of delicate habits,
ferocious only when seen.
Teased, it would strike back
and stay alone.

In between the Spaces

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IMG_1233

Blog #2

I live in between the spaces on the page. Illusion has to balance with what I am trying to say without force feeding you the reader. So I blend a careful recipe of what life has shown me to be true with a way of letting the reader hear a story. Ultimately, the hope is that the reader will take home some of what I have written to think about. There is no guarantee of that, of course, because as soon as the words leave me to travel on their way, readers see what they know in between the spaces. It makes for a great deal of excitement when the two views find each other again.

I knew a beautiful woman with bright blue eyes and a smile that never deserted her. She lived in Minnesota and was a librarian for a college of women. She never ran from learning, in fact she often ran towards it with a smile that increased by the second. Rikki Tikki Tavi was her role model and I’m not sure she ever met a snake that she didn’t understand. She had a singular motto, “What can I do for you today?” She was an unusual species of woman, more concerned for others than herself. She would be an excellent model for a character. Honor, loyalty, someone we all hope to meet someday. It’s the essence of a character that appeals to most of us. When someone like her appears in a story, we know something good will have to come out of it.

Then there is an antagonist who will do everything to undermine the stability of a life. Perhaps an old boss, or an abusive husband, or someone that lives in the shadows that is unpredictable and out of focus at the beginning. It could be written as a fairy tale character, or an insect. Notice I don’t list the villains I know, that would be imprudent. But a story can’t live without a conflict, the more unusual, the better.

Then there is the protagonist, use me. I’m a mom, living with my husband, a grown child, a couple of dogs, and a cat. I’m always running to get to the next thing that needs doing, and somehow I’m always late. Somehow the keys slip to the bottom of my purse. I forget presents for people who really could use them. I’ve been young and middle-aged. I’ve been able and unable. I was Super Woman, but that didn’t work out so well for me. School was never a place to be avoided, I knew everything at one point. Well, I thought I did. So, sometimes stories are me mixed with other traits. I find it amusing to torment my poor main characters. It’s only fair. I know how to torment them best.

I like to watch people and imagine meeting them. Would they interest me, hold that interest and pull me into their lives? The good ones might. Some of them might be predictable. I’d love to meet people like Bryce Harper, Mr. Werth, and others from the Nationals. I’m a big baseball fan. I’d love to meet the grounds people at the National Zoo. If a driver on one of the Metro trains that runs through DC ever started talking to me on his or her way to work, I’d listen. You never know where your story will find you.

I did find a story. In-between the spaces of my notes, an idea started forming. I saw it in a few of the poems I’ve written. I’ve been chasing it for ten months now, and it’s almost to the very end. Just like this blog.

See you soon,

Ann WJ White

 

Finding a Voice in a World of Words

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This is my first blog. Oh, I wrote about my biography when I got a wordpress.com account and it’s all true. The problem with that is that I think all of the time. I think about the news, old friends, gone friends, long nights and short days. I write poetry to work my way through the wiggle room that we need to hide enough of our emotions from a world that might not understand them.

The news these days is full of fear mongering and hatred. Envious of Canada, France, Germany and Norway, I wish I could solve the fear. Humans turn to violence and blind devotion in the face of the unknown, but I hope our survival will show us as developing creatures of conscious. Dogs need homes with people who love them. Cats adopt us and quickly teach us their rules. They believe themselves to be the adults in the relationships and mindfully shepherd us to dinner, outside, to bed. Humans, though, find solace in company of other humans. When they don’t find sympathy and love with humans they are open to other species. We even created pet rocks.

Growth never stops for us. We try out new foods, ways to clean, ways to travel, and somehow we retain our identity in the first focused moment when we say, “I am.” This is usually followed by a listing of traits, education, important people in the world, interests and hobbies, and what we are to our families. We determine what is nice and what is cruel. Ever defining those things, those moments, we learn to say no or yes. We become confident or stumble into the shadows  looking for a cure.

The universe, while being neither cruel or kind, is interpreted as being both. Philosophy governs interpretations which inspire world leaders. Then the world brings in a sound stage and attempts to bring you to who you are. It’s uncanny the feeling of being in front of a group of people. Some will like you. Others will be baffled that although you speak the same upbringing and language, you are off your rocker. I’ve been off my rocker for years.

I thought I was a patient woman until I had to put up with myself. I could always advocate for others, but never worried about doing it for myself. That made me a target for bullying as a child. I learned that bullies are always around us, but my father told me to learn to like myself. If I could do that, I would be able to help others.

When you find yourself diagnosed with a severe, chronic or fatal disease or condition and your body decides to pull pranks on you, you had better be a person who likes themselves and is patient. That was a hefty lesson. I dropped things. I fell down. My brain became a clutter of insecurity and the harder I pushed myself, the more I couldn’t do things. You loose your edge, become fatigued. In fact, the fatigue is more a lassitude, and leads to your going through the stages of grief as if you had just died before your eyes. You don’t die, however, you become stronger. You take your time and pick up what you drop, including yourself. The small victories become huge victories, you see the little things that make up life. You pixilate yourself. I even bargained with myself about my expectations.

I tried to be normal, but that didn’t work out so well. I tried to be serious, only to find myself the butt of my own sense of humor. I fell asleep in the classroom only to find out that I do snore loudly. Doing that in front of the director of Language Arts was not the best move during my career. So now I am regressing to who and what I loved at the age of 12. I am writing. I am looking for the small bits that make me smile, and the larger realization that I am not done growing up yet. I will never be done growing up.

I’m a lucky woman. I have a family who love me, a home, a set of shibas who spend their days being my primary sense of companions. Joined by the cat I alluded to above, I’m not as isolated as I could be.

I haven’t said what is wrong with me. I don’t need to in order to let you understand me. Besides, I’d start joking about things and I’ll do that in another blog. Be aware that I am not alone. There are many of us who look healthy, but aren’t. Who look drunk or lazy, but are just having an out of body day. If it is me, I’m probably on a trip in outer space and have left a puppet to hold my place.

It’s nice to meet you, and I will be back soon. Happy Holidays and nice to meet you.

My name is Ann White.

Addiction

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Gone forever, so high the cost
That took from laughter to lies,
Your sense of home.
The referee between women,
Morphine, and cocktails, pacified,
Struggled with her lack of sobriety.
Sober as a judge, your own life.
Your leash cinched tightly.
Your words planned to
Balance on a knife’s edge.
Cruel words striking.
A life wasted, putting salt grains
In a jar with pickup sticks,
With Chopsticks.
Saki bottle,
Or gin, or rum, or morphine, her perfume.
Her pain, her lack:
Luring, alluring
Without humanity.
We lost you then, drowning, as
Tears raced upwards.

Krampus Night Lullaby

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On Krampus night,
The elder ones wake.
The dance begins
In wild, old ways.
The children quiet, and
Listen in fear, as old
Krampus draws near.
Don’t be afraid,
My darling child.
Just close your eyes
and dream of time.

Auf Krampus Nacht,
Die älteren wecken,
Der Tanz beginnt
In wilden Wege.
Die Kinder ruhig, und
Hört in Angst, wie alten
Krampus kommt in der Nähe.
Haben Sie keine Angst,
Mein liebes Kind.
Einfach die Augen schließen
und träumen von der Zeit.

On Krampus night,
Strengthen the Old.
The wild dance ends
As night grows cold.
The winds will calm.
The cries will end, as old
Krampus draws near his end.
Don’t be afraid,
But sleep, my little child.
The morning comes.
You’ll open your eyes,
For the sun will shine.

Auf Krampus Nacht,
Oh, Stärkung der Ältesten.
Die wilden Tanzenden,
Als die Nacht wird kalt.
Die Winde wird zu beruhigen.
Die Schreie enden wird, so alt
Krampus naht seinem Ende.
Haben Sie keine Angst,
Aber der Schlaf, mein süßes Kind.
Der Morgen kommt.
Du wirst deinen Augen zu öffnen,
Für die Sonne scheinen.

@2015 Ann WJ White