NROOGD Eleusinian Mysteries

Saturday, Oct. 3, 2009. Kirby Cove

At sites 2 & 3 at noon and at 10 am for the picnic area.

 Ritual will start just at dusk with people arriving during daylight.

 shuttle will be available

What to bring: Bring flashlights, water and food for the potluck.  

Definitely bring water.

 Firewood for fire after ritual potluck-

 Camping gear if you plan to stay overnight. 

Sites not raccoon proof, so

tight coolers recommended. 

Donation of $10 - $20 requested.

 No one will be turned away for lack of funds.

Campers in particular should plan

to pitch in on the fees.

There is only parking available for 10 cars,

so plan to use the shuttle service or walk down to the camping site.

 Parking passes for cars for sites 2&3

 Walking down stairs and along the beach may be challenging

for the less mobile. There is an easy route.

Site 3 under the pine trees with 4 leveled tent areas & fire circle may be the easiest site to navigate.

 NO POTABLE WATER

& only 1 faucet w/ no handle in case of fire.

For more information, contact Glenn at

glenn@ancientways.com

Last night in a schedule format as it should be: 
9 pm: go to bed
Sleep, sleep, sleep until 6 am to go to work.

Last night as it was:
9:30 pm - in bed
10:30 pm call from friend. She running away from husband and needs to stay with me.
11:30 pm - I get call that she can't find her way up. I go down the hill to get her
12 am: She gets to the house
12:01 am:  I notice that she is drunk as a skunk. I'm amazed she didn't drive down the side of the hill.
12:30 am:  She falls asleep on the toilett, when I go to get her she doesn't recgnize me, thinks that I'm a burglar and starts hitting me in "self defense"
1 am:  I and her son get her calmed down and she falls asleep on the floor of my room. The whole room stinks like alcohol I'm sick to my stomach and may have to make a meeting today.
All Night:  I can't sleep - I'm worried. I don't know how much she has consumed. She could throw up on the floor or she could have alcohol poisoning. I am starting to crave.
5 am: I'm getting up. I'm sick to my stomach. I'm in more pain than usual - no sleep will do that.  She has crawled from the floor into my bed and is sleeping there. I can't have that breath in my face. I don't wanna start drinking, too.

shit!  I hope this day goes over fast.

So much going on:
This past week has been exciting and frustrating, happy and sad.  It's a long ass tale, but I'll give ya the highlights and lowlights. Neither makes sense without the other.
My nuclear family was not accepted by either side of the extended family.  This is an idea with which I have grown up. This is an idea that has formed me, my personality and my way of thinking. This has formed the way I live in denial.

I was always told that my father's side of the family wanted nothing to do with us because they saw us as illegitimate children. You see, they were/are all Catholics and my father was married in the Catholic Church to his first wife. He married another woman in 1946, and divorced his 1st wife in 1948.  Yup!  Dear ol' Papa. He had two sons in his first marriage. From his second wife he had a daughter, Heidi. She was painted as this horrible person by my mother. Later on in life she ended up being my beloved sister, whom I trusted beyond all. The he married my mother and the story starts on that end.

On my mother's side of the story, it goes that that side of the family was rich. They wanted nothing to do with the humble beginnings of my father and always looked down on his and my mother's marriage. So, this is what my mother told us.

In their many fights I often heard very unflattering things said about each side of the family.

So, over the years, I learned a bit about myself and about child psychology, especially that of abused children. I learned that these children often take the point of view of the abuser. This is a survival mechanism and actually to me it seems quite rational and a good survival technique.  I understood it intellectually, but never made an emotional connection.  That is until last weekend.

Last weekend I talked to my aunt Ina. When she answered the phone it was like a ton of bricks fell on me. She has my mother's voice, dialect and inflections - mostly. The spell was broken when she uttered a few Bavarian words, which my mother detested.  But until then the tears were flowing. My mother had died in December and there was her voice coming back at me in May. It is so hard to describe the emotions that came up with that.

I am already quite afraid of returning home. I missed my mother's funeral. I missed my father's funeral. I missed all the chances at saying Good Bye that one gets. My father died in 1986. Each time I go back to his grave it is as if his death is a new thing. Each time I'm in my home town, it's as if for me only a few days have gone by.  And now I shall have the same feeling of that sort with my mother. I have not been home since here death. I have not seen the grave. I have not been able to put it all to rest. I am afraid of going home.

The other aspect of my conversation with Tante Ina was her validation of my childhood memories. Her validation of the stories that my oldest sister told me. Her presence in my life or the lack thereof had a great deal to do with my mother. And in our conversation that came out - loud and clear. She told me of her anger towards my mother for her abusive behavior toward us children and my sister in particular. She told me of her anger about the many lies and deceptions my mother told. She told me that my mother had always been that way as long as she can remember back.

And as she talked, I felt both lighter and sadder at the same time. Lighter, because there was a validation that I have not received at any time of my life. Sadder, because now I once again had to deal with the house of cards that I had built.  You see, over the years, as I told some friends the stories of my childhood, inwardly, I always thought/hoped that I was exagerating all of it. I was making more than there was. This way I was the awful person and not my mother and father. This way I had modicum of control, because I was in charge of changing me.   And as my aunt was talking, this house of denial came crashing down again. I finally had to look at me and how I kept it all going by not looking at the reality of it all. And to be honest, I don't know just yet, why this tore my apart for a little while, but it did.

The act of starting to rethink relationships with my father's side of the family seems to have opened the floodgates. That same Sunday, a few cousins of mine contacted me on a German website, which I joined to find old school mates.  All of a sudden, there are parts of my father's family that want to know me. And just as sudden, I hear this voice in me speaking: “They just want to get to know you so they can come to the States and have a free place to stay."  That voice and the voice of reason battle back and forth.  "Give them a chance"  "Be careful not to open up!"  and on and on and on....

On Monday, Hubby had to go in for surgery. He had some hemorrhoids that had to be removed. While I thought that it was going to be an easy thing, it turned out to be very painful for him and exhausting for me. He is in constant pain when It comes to WC time. Wednesday evening I came home from work, and he's lying on the couch near tears, he was hurting so much. And the pills aren't making it any easier. They add to constipation.  So, my days consist of working 10 hours and driving two. Coming home, cooking and cleaning a bit and then falling into bed with exhaustion.  But this one shall pass, and he should be back to old self soon. The doctor said that recovery would be about one month.

Beyond that, I am enjoying my new client. She is 5 months old and a sheer delight. Today she rolled over for the first time. She was quite surprised by her bold act and ready for a nap from the hard work.

The money doesn't hurt, either. Hopefully I will play this smart and put some aside for a change. That has been a lifelong struggle for me. Saving money isn’t easy, but I am determined to save some.

Having hotter than Hades weather certainly pays off - sometimes.  It did for us today. 

Our house has a flat tar and gravel roof, and with that no insulation to speak of.  This means that our house gets very hot very fast.  By the time 2:30pm came around today, we were being baked and just couldn't take it anymore.  Off to the beach we headed.

I wanted to go to Limantour Beach, but changed my mind at the last minute. Instead, I headed straight through Inverness to  Abbotts Lagoon.  Gee, what a good idea that turned out to be. The place was quiet and cool. The walk out to the lagoon was about 2 miles one way. On the way there is so much to see. Stinkbugs (J says that's what they're called), all kinds of plant life, rabbits oh so cute, quails, great blue heron, red winged blackbird,birds, birds and birds again. It's a magical place. Once we got near the actual lagoon, there was this huge dune across the water. At this point, I couldn't yet see the land bridge that was to come, but I had never seen a dune of that size in CA. The beauty of it instantly transported my fantasy life into the realms of Lawrence of Arabia.

I was dreading that there would be no way over to the dune for me.  I saw a few footprints, but not too many, which lead my fantasy once again into the realms of - you guessed it: movie land. This time though into an obscure German film about the island of Sylt. I never made it to Sylt, though maybe one of these days I should; but heck, who needs Sylt, when ya can have Abbotts Lagoon. The solitude, the peace.

This is was worth the 2 hour drive. This I will repeat again - next time with my camera along.

 

Today is the first Mother’s Day I will be celebrating without my mother. She passed on late last year. She and I had a difficult relationship, so the grief isn’t quite the consuming grief that one would expect. But, it is there, non the less.

Over the years, I have struggled to build a cohesive picture of my mother in my mind. It is still a struggle. I imagine that it’s so because she was a very complex woman who rarely showed anything deep about herself. Only since she died have I heard a few things about her that make her more understandable and yet so much more of a puzzle.
Last November, my youngest sister and her family moved to the USA. At the airport, when asked by my other sister how she felt, my mother said: “I’ll cry! I always cry at home when I’m alone!” This is a side of my mother I never knew. When left Germany 35 years ago, she didn’t cry. And I didn’t have it in me to ask, ever, how she felt about me. I always assumed, that she just didn’t love me.

Last year, she asked me over and over if I was planning to come again to see her soon. She never told me that she was afraid to die before she had a chance to see me. But she did give me a gift that I NEVER expected: In her own way, she told me that she loved me. She said: “Jutta, I have never forgiven your father for signing the papers to let you go. Not even since he died.” For the first time in 34 years here in the US and 54 years of my own life I had a glimpse into her. For the first time in my life I felt like I actually mattered to her.
So now, here I sit, trying to reexamine my life as a daughter to my mother. Have I missed some clues that would have spared me considerable heart ache? According to my sisters I have. Leave it up to my mother to affect me like that even after she’s passed on. But I love this journey.