Two Segues and a Funeral

It was about four years ago that Jenn and I moved in together in McMinnville, Oregon.  At 45, I felt I had finally reached the age where I was willing to make the leap. It wasn't love or lust or even a pragmatic financial decision that prompted the impetus to move in together. It was, in fact, turkey hot dogs.

At the time, I was living with a vegetarian yoga teacher/massage therapist, renting the rear portion of her house while I got acclimated to my new town. I had my own entrance, my own toi-toi, and became good friends with both she and her 1/4 wolf 3/4 German Shepard mix named,  Timber.

"Tom," my landlord said one night as we hung out in the kitchen. "Could you please not cook those things anymore?" Referring to my turkey dogs. "Or if you do, leave the back door open. The smell is making me nauseous."

I said sure, but was caught off guard by the request, and it took me all of five minutes to work up a good head of steam: Who the fuck does she think she is, telling me what i can or can't eat? Man I hate living with people, especially when ...


I made turkey dogs once or twice during the next week (with the door open), and decided I was too old for this shit. I called Jenn.

"I was wondering ... that is, how would you feel about ... do you want to move in together?"

She sounded surprised at this sudden turn, but also game. "Okay when?"

It was mid- March. "I dunno, how about ... May 1st?"

We moved in six weeks later, and got married a little over two years after that. In a sense, Zinnia might not be here if it weren't for turkey hot dogs.

(Okay, here it comes, one big flying leap into an oncoming segue ...)

A similar turn of events recently lead me to give notice at my 28 hour a week job with university. The steady paycheck has been wonderful, the team I worked with outstanding, my supervisor couldn't have been better. In this case, however, the proverbial turkey dog was the prodigious amount of required paperwork.

Every place I've ever worked has had a one page treatment plan that a clinician can kick out in 10 minutes and never think about again. My current place of employment has a six to eight to occasionally ten page beast that the client's are required to update every 90 days. The treatment plan also has to be frequently referenced during therapy sessions and then documented in a progress note to make sure that the objectives on the plan have been completed by the appointed time.

I tried to buy in, I wanted to buy in, I yearned to buy in, I just couldnt'. Since my arrival there, it  has taken me a minimum of two 50 minute sessions to complete one of these plans--sometimes more--and I've reached the point where I find myself apologizing to my clients for spending so much time on a document that neither one of us believes in or cares about.

Is it possible to complete one in a single session? Absolutely! Many (if not most) of my colleagues do it on a regular basis. But I have grown to detest these things that I see as a symbol of everything wrong with agency mental health. The system has been so overrun by bureaucrats and auditors justifying their jobs with ever increasing amounts of paperwork, that actual, you know, treatment, has taken a back seat to what one person referred to as "treating to the chart."*

One sure fire sign that it's time for me to move on is a marked spike in my bitching. For example, when Jenn and I and baby-to-be first moved back to New Mexico, I would return home from my first agency complaining almost daily about the "work conditions.** With my current (and soon to be former) place of employment, my complaining is trending in a similar fashion, but for very different reasons. I love the my coworkers, love my boss, love my clients, but hate the bureaucracy and cover Your Ass-ness of it all. Inevitably, my tone has begun to take on an unfortunate whiny quality while I relay various complaints to Jenn:

... so I'm on my third session trying to get this treatment plan done, but I have to make sure I include tobacco use on the plan. It's like, 'I know you're addicted to crack and have lost custody of your three kids and were just fired from your job and are living out of your car, but lets focus on that nasty nicotine habit.

I'm not justifying my reaction. In fact, it reeks a little of tantrum and makes me cringe to even put into words. But my visceral resistance has become so strong that, in the immortal words of REO Speedwagon, it has become quite clear that It's time for me to fly.***

But what next, Tom? We knowest from whence thou came, but where goest thou anon?

We goest--Jenn and Zinnia and I--into private practice and are currently looking for an office upon which to rent-eth. I will be hanging my shingle by October 1st.

"Good lord!" the astute reader might exclaim. "In this economy? Have you gone mad?"

Well, er, no ... or maybe a little. I fully understand that the above quote from the fictitious "astute reader" is merely my own projected fear; I further understand that my current job offers me the security of being part of a solid, fun-loving team while guaranteeing a steady paycheck into perpetuity; furthermore, I get that if I slowed down enough to truly feel my feelings around leaping and hoping/praying/screaming for the net to appear, I would ...

... still feel completely solid about the decision. I have my wife's support, all three of us have our possies (aka--our Spirit Guides), and I feel guided in a way that I have only experienced a handful of times in my life. They were, in no particular order:

While writing
When I participated in shamanic ceremonies (both here and in Peru)
Hiking in various parts of the world
When, as a wee lad (or is that Wheeee!!! lad) I discovered the wonders of the semenless-climax.
And when I was able to support my parents as they went through their deathing process.

This brings us to segue  #2:

When I realized I was unwilling to stay at my job--a fairly agonizing decision--Jenn and I talked. My plan had been to continue to work my 28 hours a week, while squeezing in as many clients as I could during off hours, both Saturdays and Sundays. Essentially, I would work my ass off for two months, save enough money to support us while I grew my practice, and then make the leap.

Then my mother died.

After Barb became sick and started taking regular falls in her apartment, one of the reasons she offered for not wanting to move into the Jewish Independent Living place in Milwaukee (aside, of course, from the fact that she would be giving up her car and leaving her home of 20+ years to move into a place with a bunch of aging Jews), was the fact that she wanted to have money left over to leave her kids, i.e. myself and my three siblings (or rather two siblings, which was bumped up to three every time my oldest sister gave our mother a call).

When my father passed, he left this: His love of golf, his passion for the Green Bay Packers, and his enamored, heartbroken wife. Here's what he didn't leave: A red hot cent for his kids. This was unsurprising and as it should be. While there has been the occasional lamentation at the fortunes my father didn't make and the poker hands he left un-raked in, the way he went out was consistent with how he lived his live--spending freely, saving nothing, and leaving his kids to fend for themselves.

My mother, too, left the planet the way she lived--in chaos, fear, and generosity. The money she had in savings, IRA's, and investments was a remnant of the money she made from the sale of our childhood house, some stocks and bonds, and I believe, my father's social security money.

It was one of those situations where even while she was in the hospital, I was doing my best not to feel what I detected  to be a glimmer of daylight--lets call it relief--simmering just below the surface. It didn't wortk. With my mother's tragic and untimely demise, the inheritance--whatever it may be--will support my family and myself, and help us purchase a new/used car for Jenn and Zinnie-binnie without my having to put in grueling 60-70 hour work weeks.

With my mother's help and, I would like to think, her blessing, I will now be able to launch my private practice not from a place of sheer exhaustion and missing any number of Baby Ba-Zinnia's milestones, but from a place of faith and gratitude.

Thank you, mom. Even if you struggled to be happy while you walked the earth, I know you would feel good knowing your grandchild is being well taken care of in the air conditioned cab of a sparkling teal Toyota.

Here are some potential names for my practice:

Prickly Pear Counseling
Living Gratitude Counseling
Man, Do You Need Help Counseling
Bendersky Unlimited
Cheerful Meat Counseling (found in one of Jenn's cookbooks. Made us laugh for obvious reasons)
The Counseling Station (all aboard!!!)

Needless to say, I am open to suggestions. Please email me with your votes or ideas.


* Very much like our wise ex-president's "No Child Left Behind" initiative, a system where teachers are not so much teaching kids how to learn and be independent thinkers as they are instructing them on how to pass a standardized test. This law from a man who was recently quoted as saying, “Eight years was awesome and I was famous and I was powerful,” Bush told the Hoover Institute’s Peter Robinson. “But I have no desire for fame and power anymore. … I crawled out of the swamp and I’m not crawling back in.” A bit of a cry from "Ask not what your country can do for you ..." speech, but point taken. Being president for eight years is an awesome thing to do.

**A euphemism for "Did that just fucking happen?" 

***Gotta love aging rockers. They want to prove they still got what it takes. Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o51baQWH5Ec&feature=related 



   

Z. Turns a Year

Zinnia's first birthday was a smashing success! Her mother looked marvelous in a pair of Old Navy designer jeans and a Calvin Klein, robin egg, short sleeve blouse ($125 at Sack's), while her father exhibited his usual stylish flair with cotton dockers and a wife beater tee, both courtesy of Good Will (total ensemble--$3.75 plus tax). The guest of honor wore her usual, Cookie Monster disposable diaper, roughly 27 cents per.

Jenn and I invited people from all walks ... several walks of life to celebrate the fact that we kept our daughter alive for an entire year. Really. One year. Elizabeth and Carrie were there, Charlene and Dan, Martin, Jerri, and their miracle baby, Kiko; Chris and Shara attended with Gracie-kins and Evie-kins, Marc, Susan, and their lovely Guatemalan Princess, Sofia, attended as well, as did Jenn's mom, Margaret and her Bill ( I asked him what I should call him (e.g. Margaret's husband, Jenn's step dad, etc--and he said, "Bill.") Lynda "Who Refers to Herself As" Leonard graced us with her presence, Kathleen, Mark, and their one year and change Madeleine (who Jenn's mom caught on video wacking Zinnia on the shoulder for looking a little too longingly at her own mother), and last but not least, the guest of honor, she whom I call Baby Ba-Zinnia.

I have attended parties for three one-year-old's in my life, and every single one of these kids was at Zinnia's bash. Sofia, the first baby I ever held for over a minute (and it took me a good year for me to work up to it); Madeleine, who turned a year four months ago; and Z-Rain. I have no memory of Sofia's party, but spoke to Susan, and we are both relatively confident I attended; Madeleine's I found ... a little odd. The party was divided between people who knew her and babies in general well and childless friends who hugged the wall, drank, and made small talk.

From a father's bird's eye perspective, I now notice things that I never had before. For example, we recently took Zinnia to a gathering at Dick and Elizabeth (whom the Hollywood tabloids have dubbed Dicklebeth). A dear friend and Long Dance brother, John H., was their from out of town. When he sat on the floor to get a better look at Zinnia, he smiled at her and said, "Watch this. Babies are afraid of me."

No sooner had the words come from his lips than Zinnia recoiled as if a potential molester of adult and children alike had just joined the party. Over the course of the evening, it was clear John was simultaneously enamored with our child and a little clumsy around her, as if he didn't know quite how to interact with babe-age or what to say. He made several jokes that were ... they were okay, but just a tad askew; the kind of jokes that are more likely to cause parents to smile politely while cringing a little on the inside.

I know this one well, for I used to be the ... Thomas Bender, P.B. (Perpetual Bachelor.) For years, I didn't know or want to know how to hold  a baby. When I did, as soon as the thing (and things is how i thought of them) began to move, I would hold him/her out with stiff arms and say, "Uh, here. I'm done." Additionally, I just assumed that most of my parent/friends actually related to my graceless attempts at humor because, hell, didn't every parent secretly resent their kids?*

And speaking of my mother, she has been gone for approaching two months now. I told the partial story of her death to Chris yesterday at Z's party. While doing so, I looked, I searched, I scanned the entire neighborhood for my grief. I finally found it, but it was only a speed bump of heartache. Where the hell did my well of sadness and pain go? For a while, i thought I was in denial, then thought it was perhaps because I didn't like my mother terribly so, then I realized it was because I did much of my grieving while sitting bedside vigil at the hospital.

But back to John: Zinnia had reached the end of her rope and was this close from breaking into a full wailed cry  (she saved it for the car ride home). John--Big Hearted John who once fell to his knees in tearful gratitude at a Long dance check-out, paused for a moment, began to speak, stumbled a little over what he wanted to say, then spoke.

"I envy you your life." He looked for something to add to it or elaborate, but couldn't. "That's all I have to say," he said, near tears.

I let it in. I love my life. Jenn and Zinnia, the cats, our cookie cutter house and our proximity to the health food store, and my '95 pick-up.  I love the New Mexican heat and the occasional cools down. I love God and how blessed Jenn and I have been since moving to the desert. And I find it almost unbearably poignant and cute that every time a car drives by, Zinnia waves in her clumsy whole-arm wave until either the driver waves back or they are somehow able to resist Z's charms and go on by. Sometimes she waves to nothing at all, and tt's those times that I imagine she is waving to her guardian angels whom I often bid good morning after we wake up.   

Prior to Jenn's and my arrival. a friend reminded us that we didn't have to worry, that Zinnia was already calling in all the resources she needed to make our stay in New Mexico a success. It took me a while to wrap my brain around that one, to not to mistake the small, baby-sized package of our daughter for the enormity of the soul.


*The dearly departed, Barbara "You're Just Doing This to Spite Me" Bender did (to name one), which is why I grew up thinking this was true of all parents.