Four of us are living in a one bedroom apartment: Bob, Lori, Larry, and myself.
But on the night of December 27th, it was just me and Lori. Bob was with his sister. Larry had not yet moved in.
The Sound of Music was released in 1965. I have watched it on TV so many times in the forty some years since then.
This year, on December 27th, Sunday, we were sitting in front of the TV, Lori and I, and it came on again.
I cried and cried.
Why did I cry so much?
I have an explanation, below the fold.
A special welcome to anyone who is new to The Grieving Room. We meet every Monday evening. Whether your loss is recent or many years ago, whether you have lost a person or a pet, or even if the person you are "mourning" is still alive ("pre-grief" can be a lonely and confusing time) you can come to this diary and process your grieving in whatever way works for you. Share whatever you need to share. We can't solve each other's problems, but we can be a sounding board and a place of connection.
Link to all previous Grieving Room Diaries.
I am listening to a music cd that Pam picked out while her brain was not functioning very well. It was Christmas time, December, of 2003. I had been told in June of 2003 that Pam was dying. She had been sent home to die, with a hospice nurse coming around.
But Pam had a feeding tube in her stomach, and we put nutrition in it, one can at a time, I forget how many cans per day. And we kept the bi-pap machine on her.
And she gradually got better.
When she became well enough to be able to speak to us again, she asked, "Why am I in a hospital bed in the living room?" So she was moved to our king size bed in the bedroom.
Some weeks later, while in that king size bed in our bedroom, side by side, we were watching an ad on TV for Time Life Music Christmas cds. Pam wanted to buy it. I called the number, and the four cds were delivered, the first or second week in January. I did not care if we got them in January of 2004, and I do not care that I am listening to them in January of 2010.
That was a painful time, a time of fear, for me. I was glad Pam was alive, and getting better. However, I did not know at that time how well her brain function would recover. I feared that she would be confused and not very coherent, for the rest of her life.
At that time, Pam and I often listened to a radio personality called Delilah. She was, at that time, taking personal stories from listeners, including holiday stories, about overcoming troubles, and having a good holiday season, because of finding a happy ending to the challenges. I considered calling Delilah. However, I felt she would not use the story on the air, because of the involvement of Carrie, and because Pam was not fully recovered. In fact, Pam could never fully recover. She was gradually dying of her muscular dystrophy.
As I said, that was a challenging Christmas for me. Pam was back from the dead, so to speak, but it was no Christmas miracle, not a cause for boundless joy.
I am now listening to Canon, by Pachalbel. That is my favorite song on the set.
To give you an example of Pam not having the full function of her brain, she imagined people at the door, or people coming in the bedroom from the ceiling. Like ceiling cat. One day, as we were waiting at the dentist office, she kept saying that they were calling me to go back to see the dentist. She kept saying it, over and over.
She did get back to her old self, by the way. She was normal and not in the hospital for nearly all of 2007, if I recall correctly.
Then she died in March of 2008, as you know.
I have been under so much stress at Walmart, where I work, that I feel I need this relaxing Christmas season, after the Walmart Christmas season. I was a Roman Catholic for twenty years. The Catholic Church liturgical season of Advent is roughly the entire month of December, ending on Christmas eve. The Christmas season starts on Christmas day. So, I am in tune with the Catholic church, feeling the Christmas season now. Even though I am a firm non-believer.
Did you know that certain ignorant people think I cannot possibly enjoy and participate in the Christmas season, since I am a non-believer? Very odd, it seems to me. I simply understand the True Meaning of Christmas.
Here is a link to the song, Canon.
Canon
This link is not the version on my cd, but you get the idea.
It was snowing today, and I told my co-workers I should sing to them, Let it Snow!
My theme is when the song is right, it is right. If a song has been used near Christmas, so what. I can still listen to it or sing it in January.
By the way, my diaries may not hit the rec list, but the rescue rangers love me. Another of my overpopulation alarm diaries got rescued:
Ghost Towns in Paradise
A few good comments, calling the diary very good. And I did not put that much into it. I just keep preaching the same thing, but this time I tried giving a vision of what could be, rather than the mass starvation of billions that I suppose will happen.
Back to music. There is a song by Ozzy that I like so much I wrote a diary about it:
Dreamer
I suggest you listen to that song more than once. I suggest you print the diary, as I did, so you can take the words with you, and sing to yourself, any time.
Now, to answer the question from the introduction, why did I cry so much while watching
The Sound of Music?
The most obvious reason is that the story is of a man, Captain Von Trapp, who is a widower. His wife has died, and he is having trouble dealing with his emotions. He is using his military training and applying it to the task of raising his children. That way, he can just give them orders, and have them march around his estate, and he does not need to hold them in his arms, and think of their mother, and cry. Those words are not in the script, but I am reasonably sure that PapaChach could tell the tale better than I about the connection that must exist, emotionally, between a man, his children, and his deceased wife, and her memory. The scene in the movie where Maria confronts the Captain about his ways of avoiding affection is a great scene. She says, if I recall correctly,
They just want you to love them.
Something to that effect. And, when she asks the children why they played such tricks on the other governesses before her, they ask her,
How else can we get Father's attention?
The children craved their father's attention so much, they would rather have it as anger than not have it at all.
Now you see why the movie made me cry. The story is about a strong man, a handsome man, a man who was the focus of his children, his wealthy girlfriend, and Maria. They all adored him, but only Maria had the balls, one could say, to get his attention focused on the fact that his children needed direct affection, hugs, not marching orders.
I see from that story that a man can be the focus of a great deal of adoration. I have the adoration of Bev, for sure. She makes me feel as if I am as handsome and powerful and wealthy as Captain Von Trapp.
For those who do not know, Bev is my next door neighbor and number one girlfriend, someone you might call a common law wife to me. We have been a couple since August of 2008.
So, in short, I am a widower, and the Captain was a widower. That is the big connection.
Now for the explanation of the set of dishes Pam would like, mentioned in the title of the diary.
A few days ago, a few days after Christmas, at the Walmart where I work, I saw a set of dishes, Better Homes and Gardens Holiday 2009 Limited Edition dishes. The decoration on the dishes is poinsettia art work. I opened the box and took a bowl out, and examined it carefully with my reading glasses on. I could see that the art work was below the glaze. I am not an expert on dinnerware, but I took a ceramics class, Pam and I did, may years ago, in Hays. From that class, I know that you always want your art under the glaze. That is the whole point of ceramics, it seems to me.
Years ago, Pam picked out a set of dishes that had a red and white checkerboard pattern, a black and white checkerboard pattern, and the Coca-Cola script lettering we all know so well. But the art work, the red squares and the black squares, and the Coca-Cola script letters, are in the form of decals on top of the glaze. I still have one bowl from the set. I am looking at it now, to make this diary accurate. And the decals have many deep scratches. To defend the makers of the Coke dishes, the only scratches are where the glaze is scratched anyway, so they are very durable decals. By the way, the date on the bottom of the Coke bowl is 1996, so that tells me we bought the dishes most likely during the ten years we lived in Houston, 1989 to 1999.
Pam never drank Coke, only Pepsi, but she liked the art on the dishes. I did, too.
This relates to PapaChach, and his Lauren. PapaChach said his wife was so easy to buy for, because he knew what she liked. Likewise, with Pam and I, we enjoyed shopping together for clothing for her, because we agreed so well on what would look good on her, what would fit her personality, her style.
And, one of the first things I did when Pam died, to reach out and give myself hope for companionship in my future, I bought an outfit, shorts and a top, for Carrie. And I have bought her clothing since then, as well. The last time we were together, last October, when Bob and I travelled to Hays to attend the funeral of Pam's younger brother, Jeff, (He had the same genetic muscular dystrophy as Pam. Now the only one of the three alive is Pam's older brother, David.) Carrie said that is one of the things she likes about me, I know her taste, her style, in clothing. I knew Pam's style in clothing, as well.
By the way, Bev, my number one girlfriend, makes most of her own clothing herself. That leaves me out of the picture of buying clothing for Bev. She recently got new shoes. She recently bought herself a new coat. She makes bracelets as a hobby. I bought her a watch a year ago. As a Christmas gift this year, I gave Bev the kind of thing she enjoys all year, any time she has a few dollars to spare. I gave her Kansas Lottery scratch off tickets, $12 worth.
When I have about $200 to spare, I may buy Bev a diamond ring. No, not an engagement ring. Bev likes to have rings she can pawn at the pawn shop. So, if I buy a ring at the pawn shop, then the same pawn shop will give her half the money I paid on a pawn, as I understand. Bev likes that, so that is what I will do, someday. Maybe, if I get a big income tax refund this year, I will do that then.
Anyway, Pam and I had similar taste in dishes. And, ten days before she died, she bought a set of blue glass dishes form the Walmart where I work. In fact, she bought two sets.
After she died, I returned one of the sets.
Anyway, after I looked carefully at the poinsettia dishes a few days ago, I checked the price, supposing they were marked down to a clearance price. The price was $6.25. Six dollars and twenty five cents for a set of four dinner plates, four salad plates, and four bowls.
And as I started to say before I interrupted myself, this set of dishes has the poinsettia art below the glaze, so that it cannot be scratched off. The set of Coke dishes that Pam picked out years ago, had the art on top of the glaze, in the form of decals, as best I could tell. The art work got scratched off over the years, little nicks and scratches in the black squares.
Looking at the Christmas dishes in the Walmart made me cry. For the first time since Pam died, I felt a desire to buy something for Pam. I decided to buy the set of dishes for Pam, because I knew she would like them. I knew that, because I know what she likes. What she did like, when she was alive. It is as simple as that.
Now you know why I put the dishes in the title of the diary.
I will close with a quote from the Ozzy song, Dreamer:
Your higher power may be god or jesus christ.
It doesn't really matter much to me.
Without each other's help there ain't no hope for us.
Like living in a dream or fantasy.
Update:
I bought a mattress for Lori to sleep on, for $100. She is sleeping peacefully on it as I type this. I had a good paycheck, because I worked 40 hours both Christmas week and New Years week, and got paid holidays. So, I got her the twin mattress, new; low quality, but new.
So, now, Larry and I sleep on my king size bed in the bedroom, Bob sleeps on the floor of the living room, and Lori sleeps on a new mattress on the floor of the living room.
By the way, roommates always have moments when they feel they cannot stand each other, but in general, we are getting along very well. Bob and Larry are close to the same age, mid twenties, so they watch movies all evening on Bob's big laptop computer. They are watching a movie as I type this. They have two headsets plugged in to Bob's computer, so the noise does not annoy me. That is the key to roommates getting along, headsets. Only half joking.
Of course you know what I do every evening. I am here at Daily Kos, writing comments, writing diaries, and educating myself.
By the way, Larry is part Native American, and he is very intense about the topic of Native Americans who have been constantly harmed by the USA government and the apathy of the rest of America. I need to read up on the topic, and ask him a few questions.
By the way, I just read exmearden's front page diary. We have a lot of grief diaries lately, besides this TGR series. At the Christmas season both myself and PapaChach wrote grief diaries, and exme, too, outside TGR. Peer support, peer counseling, helps so many.
Anyway, I hope this diary can bring together all of the above, exme, PapaChach, and all their loyal admirers, as well as our usual sprinkling of those who write:
I just found this diary, this diary series. What a great time to find it, because my (fill in the brother, friend, mother, dog) just (died, was diagnosed terminal). This is a great place to find, to read the love, to feel the love. Thank you.
Dontcha love those newbies?