It’s a Mystery

/ Ann Coleman / 88 Comments

When our children grew up and moved out of our house, my husband and I officially became “empty-nesters.”  I remember having mixed feelings about it, both proud of the adults my son and daughter had grown into, yet also feeling the loss of the children they had been.  But for the first time in years, I had empty closets, dresser drawers, and even empty storage containers on our basement shelves.  It was a strange and wonderful thing.

I remember standing in my son’s old bedroom in front of an empty dresser and wondering, “What am I going to put in it?”  Usually my problem was finding a place to store our stuff, not finding stuff to fill our storage space.  Eventually, I put my collection of antique post cards, our heating pad and extra throw blankets in that dresser, deliberately leaving one drawer empty so houseguests could use it to unpack and settle in properly.

That was approximately ten years ago, and sadly, finding stuff to put in empty storage space in our house is no longer a problem.  Somehow or other, we’ve filled every one of those closets, storage bins, and dressers.  The house that used to comfortably hold a family of four is now full to bursting, even though there are just two of us living there now.  And I have absolutely no idea how that happened.

I’m not a person who shops a lot, or who is comfortable having a lot of stuff.  I cull my wardrobe regularly, and make frequent trips to local donation centers with bags full of clothes and household items.   With the exception of my photo albums and my books, I’m not, and never have been, a “saver.”  If anything, my motto is “less is more.”  So how did I end up with a full house?

I can blame some of it on the grandchildren.  My grandmother kept a bedroom in her small bungalow reserved for grandchildren, and it always made me feel so welcome.  I wanted that for my own grandkids, so they have a dedicated room in our house, complete with toys, books, and a crib.  I also acquired a few things when my mom moved to a retirement community, which explains the large drum table wedged into our third bedroom.  My husband sometimes complains about it, but I grew up with that table and can’t seem to let it go.

Still, that doesn’t account for the overflowing storage shelves, the packed-to-capacity closets, the boxes underneath the pool table in the basement family room, etc.  We do a big clear out every couple of years, congratulating ourselves on successfully downsizing our stuff, but it’s always just a matter of time before those closets and shelves fill right back up.  I don’t understand it and I don’t like it, but it still happens.

I guess I just need to accept that this is one of life’s mysteries, like how we can put two matching socks in the washing machine and only one sock comes back out.  Or how we can diet for two weeks and lose one pound, but eat one piece of cheesecake and gain three.  Maybe some things just weren’t meant for us to know….

No Choice

/ Ann Coleman / 125 Comments

As anyone who spends time with young children knows, choice is important.  For instance, you don’t tell a child it’s time to put on her pajamas, you hold out two pairs of pajamas and ask which pair she would like to wear tonight.  Ditto with eating vegetables.  You don’t announce,  “You’re having vegetables with your dinner!”  You ask, “Would you like carrots or green beans with your dinner?”  That may not guarantee success, but it does improve the odds of actual vegetable consumption.

I haven’t been a child for decades, but I have kept some of my childlike ways.  And one of them is that I, too, like to be offered choices.  When I book a room at a hotel, I study the types and prices of rooms on offer and select the one I like best.   If I need a dress for an upcoming wedding, I try on several before choosing the one that is the most flattering and comfortable.  (If I have to choose between flattering and comfortable, I go with comfortable, because I’ve reached the age when flattering is a relative concept.)  In short, having the ability to make choices is just as important to me now as it was when I was a toddler myself.

Which explains why I’m having such a hard time dealing with situations in which my choices are being taken away.  I prefer to cook on a gas stove, because it’s so much easier to control the temperature.  As someone who routinely sets off the smoke alarm when I’m preparing a meal, I truly need all the help I can get in the kitchen.  But I’ve heard that gas stoves are becoming increasingly expensive and will soon be phased out entirely, so I’ll have to struggle with an electric one.  Similarly, I don’t like online banking, but banks are slowly but surely pushing customers into it by cutting branch hours and raising checking fees.  Soon online banking will be the only “choice.”

One of my favorite ways to spend time is browsing through a bookstore, picking up any book that looks interesting and skimming through it to see if I like the writing style.  But all across the nation, bookstores are closing.  Clothing stores are also being slowly replaced with online shops, but how can I tell if a pair of pants, or worse, a swim suit, will fit simply by looking at a tiny photo?  A photo also doesn’t show the quality of the fabric or the true color.  Face it, as brick and mortar stores keep closing at a record pace, soon everything will have to be purchased online.  And we’d be fools to believe that free shipping is going to be offered once the online stores have a monopoly on the market.

I’m not against change or progress, but  I don’t appreciate the steady erosion of choices that often masquerades as progress.  We never really outgrow the desire to choose what we like, and I don’t think we need to apologize for that.  Lack of choice often translates to lack of control, and it’s only natural to resent it.  More importantly, having options means the freedom to make the decisions that work best for our unique personality.  It’s a way to respect the diversity of our community.  And that is why I will always choose to have a choice.

Getting Better

/ Ann Coleman / 84 Comments

I’ve never been good at being sick.  I lay in bed, feeling immensely sorry for myself, and whine a lot. I also fret about all the things that I’m supposed to be doing, but can’t do because I’m sick.  I know when I don’t go to the animal shelter to walk the dogs, the other volunteers have to walk even more dogs than usual.   And even if I had the energy to babysit my grandkids or help my mom, I can’t risk giving them my germs.  So between the misery and the guilt, my mood is very dark when I’m under the weather.

The only thing that helps is remembering my illness won’t last forever and eventually, I’ll feel better.  It rarely happens as quickly as I wish, but so far, I’ve managed to recover each time I’ve been sick or injured.  Bearing that in mind really does help me cope when I’m lying in bed with my stomach doing flip flops and my head pounding.  “This, too, shall pass,” I tell myself, as often as I need to until I can actually believe it.

Personally, I’ve found that remembering that tough times don’t last forever is very helpful, period.  When my daughter tells me her baby kept her up most of the night, I sympathize because I remember just how sleep-deprived I was when my own children were young.  But then I try to cheer her up by reminding her the time will come when both she and her baby will routinely get a good night’s sleep.  When I’m watching my back yard wither in the dry and unrelenting heat of a drought, I remind myself that the rains will come again, as they always do.  The grief that accompanies profound loss may never disappear, but it does become more bearable with time.  Life may never be the same, and certainly not the way we want it to be, but there will be moments of joy and happiness again.  Sometimes, we just have to wait it out.

Recently, my husband and I had the chance to visit Sanibel Island, which had been devastated by Hurricane Ian last September.  We used to love the first sight of the island as we crossed the causeway, because it was beautiful and it meant our vacation had truly started.  This time, the causeway was a mess of construction, the surrounding water was a dirty brown, and much of the greenery on the island was gone.  Some buildings were intact, but others had gaping holes and others had been swept away entirely.  Piles of refuse, waiting for pick up, lined many of the roads.

I’m not going to lie, the devastation did make us a bit heart-sick, especially for the residents who had lost so much.  But we also saws unmistakable signs of recovery.  Some businesses had reopened, and some bike paths were clear.  We actually ate lunch at one of our favorite restaurants which had somehow come through unscathed.  And through the restaurant’s windows we could see palm trees still standing.  Their palms had blown off, but they were already growing new ones.  It was a timely and much-needed reminder that “this, too, shall pass…..”

Mom’s New Phone

/ Ann Coleman / 125 Comments

I have a good friend who exclaims, “Give me strength!” when she’s faced with a challenging situation.  I think that’s a very appropriate response, and lately I’ve been saying it myself.  A lot.

When my mom’s old flip phone stopped being dependable, my sisters and I decided to get her a new smart phone.  We really did think it it would be easier for her to use than her outdated flip phone, but it turns out that we were wrong. Swiping a screen was a new concept for her, and she either pressed her finger too long and hard or too lightly to be detected.  She wasn’t used to typing in a code to unlock her screen, and was completely confused by the myriad of choices that kept popping up on her screen.  She couldn’t read the fine print that said “swipe up to answer” but she was drawn to the large “edit contact” button, often pushing it before she tried to make a call.  That resulted in my contact information going from “Ann Coleman” to something like”243y Cx9L.”

It wasn’t long before we admitted defeat and got her a newer version of her old flip phone.  It’s a bit awkward, but she’s more comfortable with it because most of the buttons are similar to her old phone.  She has figured out how to make calls.  But the problem with the new phone is the ultra-sensitive volume buttons are on the side of the phone, exactly where she holds it when she uses it.  That means she keeps turning the volume off so the phone doesn’t ring when we’re trying to call her.

But as challenging as this whole business has been, the worst part is I believe all this hassle is completely unnecessary. Yes, my mom is 92 and her days of learning complicated new things are over.  But she’s been using a phone her whole life and figuring out how to use a new phone shouldn’t be causing her (or me) this much stress.  All she wants and needs is a simple device on which to make and receive telephone calls.  She has no desire to use her phone to send emails, check the weather, or text.  She certainly doesn’t need a phone that can open a garage door (she doesn’t have a garage), pay her bills, or do any of the dozens of other things the various apps on her phone kept offering to do.  All those extras do are confuse her, and worse, make her feel old and stupid and a burden on her daughters.

I seriously doubt that my mother is the only person who would prefer to have a simple cell phone that requires no more knowledge to use than the phone number of the person you want to call.  So my question is, why is it so hard to find and purchase a phone like that?  I’m not advocating doing away with smart phones; I’m just saying they’re not for everybody.  Old age is hard enough without struggling to master a complicated new phone.   My hope is that someday, those who design new phones will come up with a model aimed at people like my mom.  But until that day arrives, all I can say is: “give me strength….”

A Fresh Start

/ Ann Coleman / 104 Comments

When the pandemic first hit, I hated hearing people say, “things will never be normal again.”  It seemed to be such a pessimistic view, and predicted a future I didn’t want to face.  I didn’t want to live the rest of my life in fear of a virus, and honestly, I resented the suggestion that I would have to do just that.  It was almost as bad as people saying they didn’t mind the lock downs because they liked staying home.  I like to stay home too, but there’s a huge difference between choosing to stay home and having to stay home.

Now I realize I probably misunderstood what people were saying.   I think they really meant that our lives would never be exactly the same as before.  And that, of course, is true.  Many people lost loved ones, others lost their livelihoods, and everyone discovered just how quickly life can change for the worse.  I don’t know that I’ll ever feel truly comfortable in a crowded room again, or trust that I can find everything I need at the store.  The past three years have changed me.  But the good news is, not all of those changes are bad.

Before the pandemic, I left my house regularly to run errands, shop, go to work, etc., and never once thought, “Is this outing worth the risk?” If I wanted or needed to go somewhere, I simply went.  But after March 2020, I began to think carefully before venturing out of my house.  Suddenly, I knew exactly what my priorities were (caring for my grandson, helping shelter dogs, shopping for necessities) and what commitments and activities I was willing to give up.  Living through the pandemic helped me better distinguish between what I need and what I want.

And when gathering with my friends and relatives became potentially dangerous, I quickly learned which relationships I was willing to put on hold and which ones were too important to live without.  My immediately family became my “social bubble,” but I was very intentional about staying in touch with friends and extended family through phones calls, texts, and e-mails.  (I never did figure out how to work Zoom.)  I may not have been able to enter my Mom’s apartment, but I dropped off provisions and later, meet her outside for a socially-distanced visit.  Nothing emphasizes how much people mean to us more than the thought of having to live without them.

In this post-vaccination world, I’m back to doing many of the things I did before Covid hit.  But the truth is, I’m really not the same person I was three years ago.  I always wondered how I’d handle a crisis, and now I know. (My husband’s cancer diagnosis in June 2020 was a part of that lesson.)  I’m more willing to try new things.  I have a better sense of my true priorities, and I think I can see both my strengths and weaknesses more clearly.  And those are all good changes.  Sometimes, “not going back to normal” isn’t such a bad thing after all….

It’s Only Fair

/ Ann Coleman / 79 Comments

I’ve always known that life isn’t fair.  I could give hundreds of examples, but I’ll stick to the one that bothers me the most: the rules for using household furniture.  Just because I’m a dog, I’m not allowed to use any of it. I’m supposed to stay on the floor at all times, and if I want to take a nap, I have to choose between my dog bed and my dog crate.  Both are quite comfortable, but the point is that our house is loaded with comfortable furniture and I’m forbidden to use any of it.

Yet the human members of my family can use whatever they want.  Mom loves to read in her favorite chair, and she sleeps in a bed upstairs that has plenty of room for me to join her and Dad if they’d let me.  (Which they do not.)  Dad falls asleep on the family room couch all the time, especially when he’s watching TV at night.  And both of them sit down to eat at a table, yet I have to stand in the kitchen, eating out of my supper dish on the floor.  There’s nothing fair about this at all!

Luckily, I’m a smart dog, and I know I actually can get up on the furniture as long as I only do it when my parents aren’t home.  I also know I’ve got it pretty good, despite the disparity in household privileges.  I have a home, after all, with parents and extended family who love me, a house, a yard, steady meals and regular walks.  And what’s most unfair of all is that so many animals don’t have what I do.

But before I was adopted, I lived in two different animal shelters, and that wasn’t an easy time. It was better than being a stray or living with people who neglected or abused me, but it still wasn’t easy.  Dogs who live in shelters spend most of their time alone in a cage, with little human interaction.  It’s very stressful, because it’s noisy during the day (stressed dogs tend to bark a lot) and we can also sense the fear of the dogs who have just arrived and aren’t yet sure they’re in a safe place.  Often people walk by our cages without even looking at us, no matter how much we try to get their attention.  Or they look at us and then simply move on, which is sort of soul-crushing.

To make matters worse, all across the country, animal shelters are both full of animals and short on the staff and volunteers needed to take care of them.  And that’s really sad, because trust me, those are the people who make living at a shelter bearable.  The staff who feed us, clean our cages and give us medical care; the volunteers who give us attention and walks, and the people who donate toys for us to play with are so important to the well being of shelter animals.  Of course, the most important people are the ones who actually adopt us.

So I’m making a simple plea for help for all the animals still living in a shelter.  If everyone just did something, whether adopting a homeless animal, volunteering at a shelter, donating money, or simply dropping off their old linens and newspapers, it would make a HUGE difference!  Life may not be fair, but by working together, we can make it better….

Love, Finn

Fresh and New

/ Ann Coleman / 111 Comments

I don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions, mostly because I can’t seem to keep them.  I used to resolve to lose a little weight, spend less time worrying about things I can’t control, take better care of myself, and eat a healthier diet.  Secretly, I’d also hope that the new year would be the one where my writing career finally took off, and I’d get a nice big contract for one of the children’s book manuscripts I was trying to get published. 

Sadly, none of those things actually happened, at least for very long.  I’d diet for week or so, and then go right back to my love affair with all things sugary or fried.  I’d still worry far too often about far too many things.  The only children’s book I ever managed to publish was sold to an educational publisher for a one-time payment of $2,100…..and the check came three months late.  (If you Google “rich and famous children’s book authors,” my name does not appear on your screen.)

Still, there is something about a new year that feels like a fresh start.  It’s not that the previous year was a bad one, because in my case, it wasn’t.  I was able to travel again, which meant visiting friends and family I haven’t seen since before the pandemic began. My husband’s scans and blood tests revealed the wonderful news that his cancer is still gone.  We finally got the floor in our back family room leveled, and my husband began his partial retirement just last month.  (Never mind the fact that so far, he seems to believe that being partially retired means working lots of overtime.)  

But whether the previous year was good, bad or a mixture of the two, starting a new year always seems like a good thing. I see my house with new eyes once the Christmas decorations are packed away, and I always recognize a few things I’d like to change.  And while I might not make major changes to my diet, once the holidays are over I do stop having Christmas cookies for dessert after every meal.  I no longer write children’s books, but I do write a blog (yes, the one you’re reading) and I’ve come to enjoy that very much.  I don’t get paid, but it is a creative outlet and it’s put me in touch with some wonderful people from all over the world.

So instead of resolutions, I’ve decided to start the new year by simply appreciating whatever gifts the previous year brought and being willing to make at least small adjustments that could result in a better year ahead.  It’s my way of trying to embrace the best of the old and carry it on into the new year, while letting go of the things that it’s time to leave behind.  Because a new year can represent a chance to look at things in a new way, without all the baggage we accumulate through the years.  I guess that’s what “seeing through the eyes of a child” means….  

Happy New Year, everyone!

The Little Things

/ Ann Coleman / 83 Comments

I tripped over my slippers a couple of weeks ago and injured my big toe.  I wasn’t sure if it was broken or merely sprained, but since the treatment for both is basically the same, I didn’t go to urgent care to find out.  I figured it wasn’t worth spending an hour or two in a waiting room surrounded by Covid, RSV and flu germs just to be told to stay off my foot, elevate it and apply ice.  Honestly, I didn’t think injuring a toe was a big deal.

Turns out, I was wrong. Although the swelling was minimal, I couldn’t comfortably wear most of my shoes or even my slippers.  And not being able to put weight on my big toe meant I couldn’t walk normally, which caused my back and other parts of my foot to hurt if I walked too much.  That meant I couldn’t do my regular volunteer shifts walking dogs at the local shelter, had to choose my outfits based on my limited footwear, and in general plan my life around what my injured toe did and did not allow me to do.  I felt guilty, annoyed and frustrated, not to mention embarrassed when I begged off commitments because “I tripped over my slippers and hurt my toe.”  I considered wrapping my ankle and claiming I’d sprained it rescuing a small child from a burning house, but I’m not that good of a good liar.

The good news is my toe is finally starting to heal, and I’m no longer limping very much.  I’m back at the shelter, but sticking to walking small dogs that don’t pull, and the list of shoes I can wear without pain is growing steadily.  I believe it won’t be too much longer before I can resume my normal life, and that gives me some much-needed hope.

I learned many things from the past two years, but one of the most important lessons was the importance of hope.  Dealing with hard times for the short-term is one thing, but when you don’t see any “light at the end of the tunnel,” it’s very, very hard to keep your spirits up.  Believing that things will eventually improve, one way or another, really is essential to our emotional heath.

I think about that when I sit in church, enjoying a Christmas concert, or dine with good friends in our favorite restaurant.  There was a time when such things weren’t possible, and yet I’m doing them again.  In the past year, I’ve visited friends and family I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic started.  Covid and other viruses aren’t going away, but we are learning to control them with vaccines and better knowledge about how they spread.  That’s progress, and that gives me hope.

My beloved Sanibel Island is still severely damaged by the hurricane that hit three months ago, but it’s also beginning to recover.  Some stores and restaurants have reopened, and the island will be open to the public for day visits after the first of the year.  That’s a huge step forward, and it also gives me hope.

The truth is, there are signs of hope all around us, hidden among the world’s many problems.  We just have to be willing to look for them, and to recognize them when we spot them.  It’s true that those signs of hope may be small and easy to dismiss, but trust me, the little things really do count….even something so small as a toe that is finally beginning to heal.

Room for Improvement

/ Ann Coleman / 73 Comments

One of the downsides of buying “fixer-upper” houses is that they require a lot of work.  Over the years my husband has become adept at hanging dry wall, replacing basic plumbing fixtures, doing light carpentry, etc.  My job is usually painting and assisting, although once I surprised him by widening a doorway with my trusty crowbar.  (Sadly, my husband wasn’t impressed.)   But some jobs require a professional, and that’s when things get a little tricky.

The problem is while I love home improvement projects once they are finished, I hate the process of actually having the work done.  It’s not fun having to live with the noise and dust of demolition, and I’m not a fan of having workers in my house, no matter how nice or professional they are.  It never fails that if I get up extra early to be showered and dressed before the crew arrives, they don’t show up until around ten in the morning.  But if I dare to venture down into the kitchen to get my early morning Diet Coke, three carpenters are sure to come in the back door, calling out a cheerful “hello” while pretending not to notice I’m still in my pajamas.  You get to know the people who work in your house, but we don’t need to know each other quite that well.

Our latest project was supposed to be tearing out the carpet in the small family room off our kitchen, leveling a small section of the floor and laying down a new laminate floor.  What it turned into was the complete demolition of the entire floor (you could see the slab the room sits on), redoing most of the joists and then laying a new sub floor, laminate floor, baseboards and thresholds.  They also repaired some hidden holes in the exterior walls (we were wondering how a chipmunk got in our house).

None of this was easy.  I know because I could hear the workers complaining as they struggled to remove wood that was rock hard and nailed in with what seemed to be a thousand nails per square foot.  And just to make things extra fun, the nails were so old that the heads often came off when they were trying to pry them out.  I thought the worst was over when they began laying the new floor, but soon discovered that involved using the loudest nail gun I’ve ever heard.  And of course the sound of it terrified our dog Finn, who promptly took refuge on our antique and recently-refinished dining room table.

The project is just about complete as I write this, and the new floor really does look good.  It’s nice to know that the chipmunk entrance is now blocked off and new insulation has been installed.  A few hours with a good vacuum and a few dozen dust cloths should clean up the last of the mess, and then we get the fun job of moving our heavy furniture back into the room and finally placing my Christmas decorations where they belong.

Right now I’m swearing we’ll never tackle another home-improvement project, but I know that isn’t true.  Time has a way of making bad memories fade away, and eventually we’ll add that dormer to our bedroom I’ve been wanting for years.  All I ask is when that day comes, please ignore my whining and complaining.  Because no one likes to be reminded they really should have known better….