Two Years Today

Miss eating and laughing with you, sister.

Anna's dreams

This Sunday marks two long years of missing Anna. This is a hard week of remembering, because the memories are the painful details of two years ago. But summer is here, and Anna was summer...we all have zillions of summer Anna memories. Here is a list of her dreams that I found in one of her journals. Summer dreams, all (well, except for snowboarding and the Knicks!)...

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Hiking on the salmon river
Oregon coast – hike in to fields sleep listen for seals
B’way shows – annie a chorus line, Oklahoma
Spend every summer on the beach
Snowboard
Do Puzzles
Have BBQs on summer evenings
Dance in summer rain
Watch for Oregon rainbows
Ride bikes – long rides too and camping
Read Charlotte’s Web together
Go see outdoor music concerts
Crafts: tie dye, batik, potato prints, make t-shirts make jewelry
Eat dinner together and talk about our days
Write/tell stories
Drive cross country
Play wiffleball
Go to a Knicks game
Go to a Mets/Yankees game

Mostly now I am worried I am not living full enough – where are my mountains, oceans, hikes, camping, ice-cold water, swims, running dogs, spicy foods, shining sun, snow boarding, organic salsa + chips + large pine trees
I crave these things
Sharing the love and joy of these experiences

I too want to live as madly as deeply as I can

Be so acutely aware of love and small pleasures – savoring the moments

Still able to be radical, and live freely, and still feel connected to the earth – the beautiful earth.

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Ruby and Dario, these are the things she did with you, and the things she wanted to spend 100 years doing with you. You are her love and joy.

The picture at the top of this post is from the forest in Oregon where a bunch of us (including Chico, Ruby, and Dario) are going camping this summer. We'll be sure to post pictures of us in this very spot looking for amphibians and rainbows!

May 25

Just thinking about Anna on this sad happy day. Here's a photo I found from high school - it's total Anna: strength, humor, joy, fight. Love you Anna. I miss you and your amazing hugs so much. Happy Birthday. Druckaaah

Four!!

Christmas '07

Last night at Christmas Eve dinner at Woo's house, Annie asked, "Who made the green bread*?" I told her, I did.
Woo made a comment about me making good green bread.
Ruby said, "My mommy made good green bread."
Woo said, "Your mommy made the best green bread!"
I said, "She was the queen of green bread!"
Earlier in the day, as I was making the green bread, I said to Woo, "Where is she? Making green bread is her job!!"
(*Green bread is a kind of garlic bread made with scallions that Woo invented, but Anna perfected.)

Merry Christmas!

From Dario

That's a big thing to write on... Umm Mommy showed flowers as a surprise!!! Dario wants more pictures just so they can know Ruby is 7.
Love Dario
P.S. Dario is sitting on my lap looking at the mommy website for the first time in months. He says if you can put more pictures here he can put more on his computer. We watched the link to the rock video three times so we could see Anna with the funny hair and flowers.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo to everybody.

Love, Fear, Grief, Anna, and Anne Lamott

When Anna and I were at the beach together in the summer of 2005, right after she'd finished chemo but before she'd started radiation, and before the deadly spread was known, she told me about how she had really enjoyed reading Anne Lamott's book "Traveling Mercies." Anne Lamott is a hippie, ex-drug-addict freak and a writer who is also a Jesus-loving Christian. Now Anna and I, while not always agreeing on everything by any stretch, hate(d) organized religion, especially of the Christian persuasion, with equal vigor. Anyway, Anna recommended the book to me, saying that even though Lamott loved Jesus, that the book was funny and interesting and that the way Lamott described loving your kids cut to the heart of that terrifying, wonderful, all-consuming love for your kids and was so moving that I should read the book, and that the way she discussed loving Jesus was interesting and funny. Of course, I got the book, but I started to read it that fall, when the cancer came back, and one of the things happening in that book is that Lamott's best friend, Pammy, was dying of advanced breast cancer. I couldn't bear it - I liked the book, but never got through it. However, recently I read her book about the first year w/her son, which also discusses Pammy's illness a bit - "Operating Instructions" - and it made me laugh and really moved me. Lamott also lost her dad to cancer, and her words about that grief have really stuck with me and have inspired me. She says:

"I don't think you can ever really get over the death of the few people who matter most to you. It's too big. Oh, you do, the badly broken leg does heal, and you walk again, but always with a limp."

Somehow, even though some might call it bleak, I find this so inspiring. Because it acknowledges that things will never be the same, but that of course they will go on. Sucks to have a limp, but better than being doomed to a life of prostrate grief. And that limp, to carry it with you, is to carry Anna with you, IMO. Maybe I'm crazy, well that's not in dispute, but my point is just that this really brought me some comfort and so I'm posting it here.

Another thing Lamott said about grief that really has me thinking is something she said about her friend Pammy's grim breast cancer prognosis:

"What are you going to do? Life has got to be bigger than death, and love has got to be bigger than fear or this is all a total bust and we are all just going tourist class."

Love being bigger than fear is something Anna lived, as much as anyone I've ever known or probably ever will know. To think about this makes me want to follow in her footsteps.