You’ve heard mention of the MHR before, when Valentines Day 2012, Pop got really sick and I came home from Uruguay to be with him. I’ll skip the whaa-whaa-whaa-victim--victim--victim recap of how I was booted from the very home in which I was raised, in a snow storm, without a coat, on a Sunday and ended up on the front porch of my cousins’ house (a.k.a MHR), down the road a piece, shaking and hysterical...whaa-whaa-wha-ya-da-ya-da-ya-da-get-over-it. You can (re)read about it if you want ( http://geesplat.wordpress.com/?s=Rehab ), or not.
Anyway, my cousins
Rule #1:
My cousin openly owns her OCD, which makes it quite easy to live with. It's true that she rarely gets sick and will probably live to be 100, which will be a blessing to humanity because she is one of the kindest, most generous and most joyful people I know. Know why? Because she accepts and loves herself and others exactly as they are...no matter their peculiarities.
In defense of my frequent forgetfulness to close the lid, I must interject that I rarely get sick either, despite using wanna-be "bathrooms" that don't even have a commode to sit on, much less a lid to mess with. They don't have running water to wash your hands either. Furthermore, I've stored my toothbrush in the same ziplock bag for two years, in seven countries and have used it in dozens of bathrooms with lidless johns and my gums are pink as a piglet and my teeth all originals. So, since I've suffered not from leaving the lid a-jack, it's hard for me to remember to put it down. I think that kind of thing has in be ingrained during potty-training, like with little boys raising the seat.
Rule # 3: Pick off your ticks and drown the bloody bastards before you come in the house.
(We live in the deep woods and the ticks are thick this year!)
Rule # 3: Remember your place in the pecking order.
Rule #4: If you are going to be out after the dogs' bedtime (9:15p.m.), find yourself another place to sleep for the night and we'll see you in the morning.
Abide by those rules and the chocolate bowl stays full.
Most of my time here is
spent trying to sort out, emotionally and practically, the inheritance we’ve
put off dealing with since Pop's death last June. I’ve arrived in the month that marks the one year
anniversary, which has cranked up the sensitivity around issues. I wish Pop were here to guide us through the mess
of an estate he left us, though, honestly, I don’t know that he would be of much help other
than provide a scapegoat for the turmoil.
Any time there was a disagreement
about it before he died, he’d get mad and say, “If ya’ll can’t get along, I’ll
just rip up the will and leave the whole damn thing to the church!”
“Whatever you want to
do, Pop, is fine by me,” I’d say. “Just because I was born the daughter of Samuel Earl
“Squirrel” Austin, I don’t feel that gives me a right to anything. You do what
you feel in your heart and I’ll love you all the same.” And I meant it.
One time he was so
bent out of shape that he said he would burn the f---in’ house down, if it was
going to cause a ruckus. I personally saw no reason for a ruckus over asking
the simple question, how are we going to keep the place maintained?, especially
since it was already showing signs of decline. The "ruckus" that ensued the innocent inquiry could have made us millionaires on one of these reality t.v. shows. The drama lasted
about fifteen minutes; there was a pause and then, as if we had just finished up a lovely cup of tea, the three of us marched single file into the basement to address one of the issues cited in the ruckus: the bare wires that had been hanging out of the breaker box for years
and were either going to electrocute someone or save Pop the trouble of
striking a match. We worked with the emotional sterility of an ambulance crew. My brothers called for a tool, I handed it to them from the toolbox and in ten minutes we fixed a repair that had been an
accident waiting to happen for three years. All is well that ends well...until things aren't well anymore.
That’s pretty much how settling
affairs have gone this trip—explosion, triage, truce, peace-pact, explosion, triage, truce, peace-pact...you know,
totally normal dysfunctional family protocol.
To medicate the inner disturbance such
turbulence causes me, daily, shortly after dawn, I go lopping down the bunny
trails on our 60 acre property, clipping and snipping all that impedes my way. It’s taken me a week to clear the old logging roads to the delta of Ginny Hollow,the magical paradise,
where I read, write and listen for inner wisdom. “Lop therapy” I call it. Each brier clipped,
each sapling snipped, each weed whacked, I imagine, metaphorically, is one less
pain-in-the-ass cause of suffering I have to deal with.
A concluding thought on family matters: One of my wise elders from the Vision Quest wrote to me in a text
message: “The higher road is always the means to inner peace.” I'm a higher road kinda gal, but it ain't easy. Amen, anyway.
A P.S. concluding thought: If you are a parent, for the sake of your children, try to heal family wounds in the bud. They are never included in the Will, but they unavoidably show up in the inheritance.
O.K. There you have it, another brutally honest 'logue of what's going on. I don't know how else to be. I promise we will back track to the Vision Quest, which many have asked about. For the next 11 days I will be at some other cousins', just as kind, on the VA coast and should have time to write.
Much love, G
