Remembering my friend

Remembering, always, my dear friend Kim, who died a year ago today.

Our family had a lovely few days with her family this past summer. At one point during the visit, D. was looking through one of my favorite collections of poems, and it fell open to this one. We all shared an emotion-laden pause, and then read the poem. Ah Kim, I miss you.

Caroline

She wore

her coming death

as gracefully

as if it were a coat

she'd learned to sew.

When it grew cold enough,

she'd simply button it

and go.

Linda Pastan, from Carnival Evening

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Wearing my heart on my sleeve: An ongoing project

If you have read more than one or two posts here, you know as well as anyone in my face-to-face life this important fact about me: I wear my heart on my sleeve.

I fight it sometimes, I do. But I just can't help it. I put my whole self out there, into the world, just because I feel I have to. You'll not be surprised to learn that I do not have a poker face among my repertoire of facial expressions.

Being this way brings its complications. I'm overwhelming to some people with my puppy-like eagerness. Because I'm not good at pretending ennui, I probably lack a certain mystery; I don't do aloof. 

I love meeting new people and getting to know them. I think most people are interesting, and I love learning about new friends, getting to know the details of their life.   And equally so, I love connecting with people whom I've cared about in my past.   


For years I have been a little ashamed of this kind of enthusiasm.  But now, instead of working against it, I have decided to embrace opening my heart to people. I am wearing my heart on my sleeve, proudly.

Tomorrow I will post the first in a long series of posts I'm calling "Open Heart Letters." These are open notes to people in my life--both currently or from my past--who have made some sort of impression on me. For the people in my life now--well, I am writing these because it's so good to know that someone cares for you and thinks of you, isn't it?

And for those people I knew long ago-- I realize that many of them won't even see these "love letters" I feel compelled to write.  Regardless, I think it's a worthwhile exercise to reflect on the people I have known at formative times in my life, even those I knew for just a short while. They stay in my memory. From time to time my thoughts will land on such a person, and I am reminded how amazing the wide world is, filled with good people who make positive impressions on you just by crossing your path.

This is an ambitious project, and potentially endless--there are so many people I've admired and cared for over the years.  Some notes will be long letters, others distilled into a few lines or a poem.   I invite you to come along on the journey, and consider your own connections as we go...

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Poetry for a Winter Sunday

The outside is a-swirling with snow today, and the girls and I are cuddled up on the couch. While they play with their new puppet toys and watch tv, I'm thick into Linda Pastan's new collection of poems, Queen of a Rainy Country. My praise for her is nothing less than effusive, and if you read a few of these poems for yourself, you'll see why.

Here is one that is perfect for my mood this afternoon:

Parting the Waters

Nothing is lost.

The past surfaces

from the salted tide pool

of oblivion over

and over again,

and here it is now--

complete

with ironed sheets, old sins,

and pewter candlesticks.

My mother and aunt approach,

shaking the water from 

their freshly washed hair

like aging mermaids.

They have been here

all along, sewing

or reading a book, waiting

for the wand of memory

to touch them.

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