Internal Battle With My Late Grandmother

This past November, my grandmother died. She was the last of the Great Depression generation in my family. Only one person from the family spoke at the Catholic Mass given in her honor (and at her own request). The one person who spoke was also the one person my grandmother feared the most, my aunt. My aunt would have people believe that my grandmother's life was only dedicated solely to the Church, nullifying her ambitions, her passion for the environment, politics and so much more. However, before I get all sentimental, I should note that there is little sentimentality to be given on either account, my grandmother nor my aunt. Propped up by their own lies, it is difficult sympathize with both parties who act simultaneously as the victim and the perpetrator. I'm apt to side with my grandmother for her feebleness in the end. My aunt's brute strength and unbelievable layers of filthy lies manifest and her evil demeanor is always candied in "family" feeling.

Long before my grandmother's death, she gave into the many pitches and waves of dementia. She left my family with a bit of hope that we may steal a bit of her each visit, a bit of the past, a bit of our history. All for not. She was stuck in time - 15 years ago, right before my grandfather died. She did not recognize her grandchildren, we had all grown up.

During my Undergraduate career, I wrote a poem discussing the abuses my mother suffered when she was a child by my own grandmother's hand. It is extremely difficult to manage grief and anger at the same person without really being able to manage an outcome on either side. Pity also manages to fit into the equation. My grandfather's affairs, a conniving daughter, a schizophrenic/abusive son, and a unaccountable/socially unresponsive son could break any woman. (I have left out my mother who was a convent dropout with great ambition and my dear Uncle Phil who's dreams have led him to NASA.)

Pity, grief and anger... Where do we go from here?

Product of a Generation

She grew up during the Depression hiding all.
Food.
Money.
Feeling.
Sanity.

80 years, she has surviving that Great Fall.
The bank sends her flowers once a week
and always on holidays.

The doctors tell her she must bathe.
She swabs her underarms
with rubbing alcohol on used cotton balls.
She turns her socks inside out for another day's wear
and neglects the crone-like hair growing from her chin.

At the grocer, an overwhelming smell of putrid sweat
follows her as she tucks a cheese block up her sleeve,
and braces a Virginian ham between her thighs.
Your pen is stifled between her sagging breasts.

She hordes it all in her home.
Expiration dates from 20 years ago
title prescription bottles in her medicine cabinet.
There is fruit rotting under her bed
next to shoe boxes full of money.
Stolen meats are green and rotting in her fridge
and the ketchup turned into blackened vinegar.

The bank sends her flowers once a week
and always on holidays.

She hasn't a dime to spare for her children.
On the sixth anniversary of her daughters husbands death,
she call her,
She wants the funeral money back.

This woman who pushed her daughter
to the ground, throwing her fists
upon her little girl
biting her nose -
she has nothing to give.
This fetid woman
who made her children endure
poverty and beg
could give no maternal warmth
and has stolen all feeling.

The bank sends her flowers once a week
and always on holidays.

(c) Catherine A. Viste

Where do we go from here?

Life & Writing - Confrontation & Action

Today is the day of confrontation. Today, I confront my self induced writer's block.

I have been a fraud these past months. I have called myself a writer, without having written anything of even remote substantial quality. All creativity has been slammed into a wall of "no time," "too tired," and "I'll get to it." However, I obviously have time, I am not tired, and the self sabotage lies in: I procrastinate.

With all professions or "hobbies," one must set goals, a schedule or outline, and stick to it. The motivation, however, is often shadowed by what we call responsibilities. What we often deem as responsibilities are nothing more than excuses and self-martyrdom. What we dream of doing is sacrificed by what we estimate we need to do.

So how do we stop this self-sabotage and achieve the best of both worlds? Many gurus advise any number of "motivating" "success" steps. However, if you lack the ability to follow their prescribed guidelines, you need to develop your own, customized plan and be willing to let it change. That's the largest issue with the prescribed plans; they allow little room for deviation. And isn't that what writer's are, a bit deviant?

In the past, I employed a list. It was the "I want to do" list. However, I failed to make the "I need to do," which in turn would inspire the "How to do it" list that would later achieve the "I want to do's." This is a sad admittance because in order for me to create the latter two lists I have to admit boundaries and limitations, not to mention address all of those dusty skeletons in the closet. So, I find myself wrapped up in a disgusting amount unfinished business, unable to really achieve the "I want to do's."

Here's the plan.

1. Make the "need to do list." Creative or nuts and bolts, needs to be done list. And keep it basic and make sure that it falls into the needs instead of wants.


2. Make the "how to do it," and yes, I may need to be creative and ask for help.


3. Schedule Actions and stick to it.

A friend of mine is really into David Ramsey and his financial plan with "The Snowball Effect." This "effect" could be applied to anything, not just money. If you invest more of your time in the smaller issues first and less time on the larger issues, in theory, each issue will eventually gain momentum exponentially like a snowball. You continue to move on to the next larger issue (comparatively larger than the initial issue) until it's finished, and you keep going until there is nothing left.

Ramsey also recommends backup for emergency purposes. So, if we are applying his theory to life, what's the backup? I believe this involves networking. If you have closed yourself off for awhile, as I have, networking may begin by reigniting past friendships, getting into contact with peers/colleagues and then you can move on to new contacts. Having people around you keeps you motivated and if you are stuck, assistance.

David Orr once said:

"Hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up."

I had always considered hope to be folly, I've "hoped" for years and years. I had it all wrong. I had assigned the wrong philosophy to the word hope: the "it will fall into your lap" philosophy. Orr's philosophy involves hope as an action.

Action it is then.