pegkerr: (Default)
2025-06-21 02:24 pm

2025 52 Card Project: Week 24: Granddaughter

A new generation has arrived!

There will be a sparsity of details in accordance with her parents' wishes, but for now, let's call her 'M.'

Image description: Top: Peg holds her granddaughter at their first meeting, with Fiona smiling by her side. Lower right corner: baby! Lower left corner: Delia holds baby!

Granddaughter

24 Granddaughter

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2025-05-23 12:50 pm

2025 52 Card Project: Week 20: First Time

This past weekend was a lot of fun. I had significant events on both Friday and Saturday, and I was rather torn over which should be the subject of my collage. I decided to not decide, because both events had a common theme (if you squint): they were both first-time events.

On Friday, I had my first big event for my Year of Adventure: my friends Dăna and Scott took me turkey hunting! Here is Dăna's report:
Peg accomplished her first Birthday adventure with Scott and me today - at her request, we took her wild turkey hunting! 🦃 We met her at the Cannon Falls exit around 4:30 am, and she followed us to our friend Keith’s farm and to just inside the edge of the woods to our parking spot.

Peg donned the camouflage clothing we brought for her and off we went, hiking across the bottomlands fields and up to the top of the bluff, with gear in hand. We climbed into Keith’s turkey blind and Scott set up our Tom and Hen decoys about 25 yards into the corn field. It was too warm for gobbles unfortunately and no turkeys showed up. The winds were ridiculous (sustained winds of 26 mph with gusts up to 46 mph!!) and blew our Tom over a couple times so we put him away and left just our hen out. A beautiful coyote cut across the field and disappeared into the woods on the other side - that was super fun! Our highlight came when Peg pointed out a Peregrine Falcon that stooped on our hen decoy, pulling up just inches away!! We wonder what would have happened if it carried our and decoy off with it. We do not know anyone who has had an experience like that! A once in several lifetime experience! Strong winds had torn a roof section out of Keith's nylon blind last night so we had a skylight to watch that falcon through. Perfect! The barred owls were calling boisterously. A red-tailed hawk flew overhead. But no turkeys. We moved down to the bottomlands again mid-morning. The songbirds calls were beautiful and some wildflowers and ferns were blooming and were magnificent! We showed Peg a new bird ID app called Merlin (Cornell Lab of Ornithology - it's free and very fun - check it out!) Peg was delighted with it!

We moved back up top and sat under a big cedar tree next to Keith's wildlife food plot. Unfortunately we spooked a turkey while getting in there, but at least Peg saw a wild turkey, albeit running away!!

At 10 am it was time for Peg to go and prep food for tomorrow's baby shower for Fiona and Alona.

We had a fun morning even though the turkeys didn't cooperate! Peg was a trooper and was interested in everything. She even tried her hand at using a slate turkey call to call to the turkeys!!

What a fun way to celebrate Peg's birthday! We all had a great time! And Peg tried something totally new! Great job!
As Dăna said, I had to leave the hunt early because of the other big weekend event: a baby shower for Fiona and Alona's baby (my first grandchild). Alona's dad and stepmom hosted, and her mom and stepdad were there, too. Alona's sister Mary is also pregnant, and so it was a double shower, with many beautiful gifts for both couples. The sweater that Alona is holding in the collage was handmade by her mother Nancy. There was also a gorgeous handmade quilt (a bookcase with a cat) and several beautifully crocheted blankets. We served brunch for everyone, and I think a wonderful time was had by all.

Image description: The collage is divided into two triangular portions. On the left side, a woman (Peg) smiles at the camera, dressed in camo in the dawn light. A pair of binoculars is slung around her neck. Overlaid over her is a peregrine falcon making a dive, talons outstretched. Lower right corner: a Tom turkey decoy. On the right side, two women (Alona, seated, and Fiona standing behind her) smile at the camera. Alona is holding a hand-knit red baby sweater with intricate cabling detail.

First Time

20 First Time

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pegkerr: (Default)
2025-04-04 01:15 pm

2025 52 Card Project: Week 13: Coffee

I like coffee. No, I love it.

I was thinking this week that not only do I drink it every day, but it is also a common element in almost all of my most important social interactions. I get together regularly to walk with a couple of friends each week, and we always follow our walk by buying coffee together (lately, I've been adding a half shot of lavender syrup to mine). I get together regularly with my mom and sisters for coffee and scones. Every Friday, I get together remotely with several writing friends--we originally met in a coffee shop until the pandemic. Eric and I usually meet on Saturday mornings at my house for coffee and pastries. (He uses the Brontë mug and I use the Jane Austen mug). I have taught him all about the delight of adding molasses to enrich the flavor.

I didn't drink coffee until I was in my thirties, but teaching writing composition at the University to hungover freshman at 8:00 am made it eventually seem necessary.

Oddly enough, neither Delia nor Fiona ever developed a taste for it. I would love to go out for coffee with them, but we have to console ourselves with brunch instead.

Against a semi-transparent background of coffee beans, a smiling woman (Peg) holds a cup of coffee. Bottom: two coffee mugs (Jane Austen mug and Brontë mug), with a sprig of lavender. Lower left: a jar of molasses. Upper left corner: a latte with latte art in the foam and a scone with jam and clotted cream.

Coffee

13 Coffee

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2025-01-31 12:47 pm

2025 52 Card Project: Week 4: Baby

I've been doing these collages for several years, and somehow I've focused on the same subject during this week each year. January 26 is the anniversary of Rob's death in 2018.

This year, I really wanted to do a different subject. I mean, the grief is still there (and will always be there) but I can talk about other things, I promise.

And this week, I definitely have something different to speak of, something that makes me very happy! And yet, oddly enough, it has prodded my grief a bit, so I will end up speaking about Rob after all.

Alona and Fiona have given me permission to share some news publicly that I have been sitting on for several months: They are expecting a baby, who will be born in June. (Alona is the person who is carrying the baby.) They have done genetic testing, and the baby is just fine and entirely healthy. (Alona, alas, has been having a difficult time with nausea and other unpleasant symptoms, and we would appreciate it if that settled down. Thank you.)

I am delighted with this news. But of course, there is that underlying twinge of sadness for Rob, again, that he will never see or hold his grandchildren. He would have loved the experience, just as I will.

That's the thing about grief and widowhood: the losses keep playing out, even years later.

This collage includes a picture of him holding Fiona on the day that she was born. Here is another one:

Fiona and Rob

Image description: An ultrasound of a fetus. Lower left corner: a man (Rob) looks down with an expression of wonder at a bundled baby in his lap. Lower right: a hand cups a pair of infant feet

Baby

4 Baby

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pegkerr: (A light in dark places LOTR)
2025-01-24 01:59 pm

2025 52 Card Project: Week 3: Inauguration

This is not a happy, fluffy collage this week. You have been warned.

I did not watch the inauguration and I haven't read much news. But I have picked up bits and pieces on social media about the flurry of activity/executive orders that the returning President has launched since resuming office.

Look. I freely admit that I have a side picked in this fight, and I'm not going to apologize for it. This week's collage, I trust, makes my point of view clear. Don't bother telling me, as Rob did on election night the first time he was elected, that it won't be that bad and that I'm overreacting.

They also told us that Roe v. Wade would never be overturned, and look what happened.

Nor do I find it easy to be sanguine about this. I just cannot. I have two daughters of reproductive age, one of whom is gay. I have trans friends. I believe strongly in racial reconciliation, environmental protection, strong public health, equal rights for women, assistance to the needy, fiscal responsibility, ethical government, and welcoming immigrants--all things that I think it is safe to say this administration opposes.

From what I can tell from his initial orders this first week, the current head of the executive branch wants people to be afraid. The flurry of executive orders that have emerged from the White House are DESIGNED to enrage and terrify people like me. It is a known propaganda policy of fascist governments: overwhelm with shock and awe so there is no resistance to the strong arm of the state. So how does one respond?

I thought about the sign over the gates of Hell in Dante's Inferno: "Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here." That, of course, is exactly what Trump wants: for people like me to feel hopeless and helpless and afraid.

Yet, even knowing how grim the next four years will be, I need to resist that demand for hopelessness, both for my own sanity and as an ethical stance. I saw a portion of the sermon that the Right Rev. Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde preached in the National Cathedral to Trump and his cronies, appealing to him to show mercy to those who were afraid. She worried in advance whether she should do it—did she really dare? But in the end, she stood up and told truth to power.

Trump, of course, rejected this appeal and has demanded that the bishop apologize for preaching the gospel. I have read that since preaching her sermon, she has enduring scolding from Trump's fans, and even death threats. But she said that even expecting a backlash (although it turned out to be much worse that she expected) she decided that she absolutely had to speak up. And she has been heartened by everyone who thanked her for doing so.

What can be gained if people freeze in fear, and refuse to act or speak up?

And so I created a collage of a woman facing the gates of hell, with the ominous inscription over the portal, but she carries a lantern as she prepares to enter.

She will do all she can to keep that lantern from going out.

(As I said, I do admit my bias. Compare my Inauguration collage from four years ago.)

Image description: A gloomy view of a stone path leading to an arched doorway. Above the doorway a carved stone lintel reads 'Abandon all hope ye who enter here.' Through the dim doorway can be seen dark hell fires and vague shapes of people in torment. Standing before the doorway is the silhouette of a woman holding a lantern in her hand. The lantern emits a faint yellow glow.

Inauguration

3 Inauguration

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pegkerr: (Default)
2025-01-17 02:08 pm

2025 52 Card Project: Week 2: Blessing

I attended an ordination last weekend, and the pastor explained during the announcement portion of the services that out in the narthex, there was a table containing bags with sticks of chalk and a piece of paper explaining the tradition of doing a house blessing at Epiphany. We were all encouraged to take them home. I was intrigued, as I had never heard of this custom before, and I took home the bag with the chalk and read the paper.

It said:
For centuries, Christians have celebrated the season of Epiphany by chalking their outside front door with a blessing. You are invited to try it at your home.

The Traditional Chalk Blessing:

20 † C † M † B † 25


Surrounding the blessing is the date of the new year (2025). The crosses between the letters symbolize Christ.

CMB has two meanings. It signifies the traditional names of the three magi who visited Jesus (Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar), and it stands for the Latin phrase "Christus mansionem benedictat," meaning "May Christ bless this house."
Reading about this tradition got me thinking about my house.

Rob and I moved into this house in December 1992. I realized, counting back, that I am almost at the exact point where I have lived half my life in this house.

I thought of a song I've loved for years by one of my favorite artists, Peter Mayer, "Houses of Winter," which imagines homes as almost sentient entities, watching over the people in their keeping. The Houses of Winter )



When we moved into this house, I was seven months pregnant with Fiona (convenient, because I wasn't expected to lift anything heavier than a waste basket on moving day). I brought my babies home to this house and raised them here. Rob and I loved each other here, and it was my anchor when he died.

This home has sheltered a family. Now it is just me.

I have often wished I come up with a proper name for the house, as some of my friends have for their own homes, but nothing ever quite seemed to fit. Yet it has a personality. It was built in 1916 and has beautiful bones, but it is whimsical and sometimes temperamental, too. The furnace in the basement is original to the house, an octopus monstrosity that crouches in the darkness, tentacles reaching in all directions, hemmed in by asbestos, greedy as hell for natural gas, yet as reliable as could be desired. The electrical system is barely adequate. The floors slope toward the midline, the tile floor in the bathroom is cold, and the light switch in the bedroom says 'NO' instead of 'ON' because it was installed upside down. The less said about the paneling installed in the hallway and two of the bedrooms, the better.

The house regularly demands tribute in expensive repairs: a new roof. Drain tile in the basement. Regular repainting. The walls are threaded through with cracks in the plaster.

I have tried to make my home more my own as I have been slowly cleaning out Rob's stuff. I have never had a pet while living here (allergies make it impossible). It is just me. And the house.

I've eaten tomatoes and Swiss chard grown in the backyard and cooked thousands of meals in the kitchen. I've probably cried in just about every room in the house. The walls have soaked up so much laughter, the yells from so many fights, the joy of so many celebrations (perhaps that's why they are cracking so much).

It feels almost like...like it's the two of us now, the house and me. It is almost anthropomorphic, in other words, as in the Peter Mayer song. This house has watched over and sheltered my family, been my comfort and haven in times of struggle and grief. Now it watches over me. It seems more personal. Just as it has been a blessing to me, it seems only fitting to bless and thank the house in return.

Background: a dark wooden front door, overlaid at the top with a stitched sampler reading 'Bless This House." The top of the door has an inscription in white letters "20 † C † B † M † 25." Lower center: a mesh bag containing a piece of chalk hovers over three porcelain figurines of the three wise men. A pair of hands reaches up from the bottom, cupping the sampler in blessing.

Blessing

2 Blessing

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pegkerr: (You think the dead we have loved ever tr)
2024-11-08 02:06 pm

2024 52 Card Project: Week 44: Hands

I had some trouble settling on an idea for this week. Again, I was preoccupied by my mom's care (we moved her into her assisted living apartment this past week). In addition, I was coping with a great deal of arthritis pain in my left hand. Finally, it was Halloween and as I usually do this time of year, I watched the movie Coco again.

I have already done collages about all of these topics before. I thought about what might be a common thread tying all these things together, and I started thinking about hands.

Caregiving as my sisters and I had done in the past week was very hands-on: fastening and unfastening the brace, combing Mom's hair, handing her coffee and water cups, holding onto her waist as she took walks, and holding her hand.

Yet I couldn't help much with the tasks of moving Mom from one apartment to the other as my left hand was so dreadfully painful. I thought of the x-ray taken of my hand last April, how it revealed how the cartilage was disappearing, and the way the delicate edges of bones were grinding painfully against each other.

In the movie Coco, as I've previously explained, the story focuses on the bonds of love and loss that tie generations together: children, their parents, aging grandparents, and finally, the dead. One of the first signs that Miguel is in danger of never escaping the Land of the Dead into which he blundered is that his body starts to gradually disappear, revealing the skeleton underneath, beginning with one of his hands.

I mulled over the movie's story this week, thinking about the slow turn of generations my siblings and I are sensing. Babies are born and their parents care for them. They grow older and their own babies come. And then the parents are gone, leaving only memories behind--and the aches in their own bones that tell them that their own time is also coming.

I thought of one of those vivid mental snapshots I made of a moment when I was a child. We were at my Nana's house, doing something together--perhaps putting a puzzle together or playing a card game. I looked at my Nana's hands, wrinkled and shrunken and age-spotted. And I looked at my mom's hands, strong and finely boned and slim. And I looked at mine, a soft child's hand.

And then a day came thirty years later when I was doing something with my mom and Fiona, and I realized that it was my hand that was now strong and finely boned and slim. And it was my mom's hands that were starting to get shrunken and age-spotted. And there was Fiona's hand, soft and baby-smooth.

And my Nana was gone.

Right there, right then, I saw the earlier picture of my memory superimposed on our hands, and I felt the wheel of time make another turn.

Image description: Background: semi-transparent black and white photo of marigolds, the flower traditionally used to decorate ofrendas in Mexican Dia de Los Muertos celebrations. Lower center: a marigold blossom held in a pair of cupped hands. Superimposed over it: a pair of semi-transparent hands in x-ray view. Upper center: a pair of clasped hands (my mom's hand clasped by a friend's).

Hands

44 Hands

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pegkerr: (Fealty with love valour with honour oath)
2024-06-17 02:56 pm
Entry tags:

Plumber’s oath

Fiona took the oath as an apprentice with her union last week.

I thought I would spotlight the ending of this oath, which is just awesome:

“…I do further promise and swear that I am not a member of any organization advocating the overthrow by force and violence of the Government of the United States or of Canada.

I take this obligation voluntarily, without any mental reservation, and bind myself until death under the penalty of scorn due to moral perjury and violated honor as one unworthy of trust or assistance.”
pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2024-05-31 12:06 pm

2024 52 Card Project: Week 21: History Plays

Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.

Because my daughters and my daughter-in-law are the BEST, they gave me tickets to the Guthrie's 3-play run of Shakespeare's history plays for my birthday. Fiona went with me, and it was HUGELY enjoyable. I went to the cycle in 1990, and comparing the two production runs was extremely interesting. I was so glad to share the experience with Fiona and so very grateful!

Image description: Three kings in Shakespeare's history plays, each holding a crown: left to right: Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V. Lower half: the entire Guthrie cast of the history plays, looking forward: Lower center: the crown sits on the floor, spotlit from above.'

History Plays

21 History Plays

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2024-05-24 12:34 pm

2024 52 Card Project: Week 20: Graduation

I drove to Eau Claire on Saturday and joined Fiona, Alona, Chris (Delia's boyfriend), and Lisa (Chris's mom) in the roasting gymnasium (the air conditioner was broken) to watch Delia's college commencement. Of course, I cried when the announcement was made that all the students should switch their tassels to the other side because they had officially graduated. It was bittersweet, because Rob had wanted so badly to live long enough to see his little girl walk at her commencement. But there was a lot of joy, too.

I stayed overnight at Chris's family home, and we had a leisurely breakfast and then set up a taco bar for the graduation party that we held for Delia and Chris (who graduated last December).

taco bar


It was a wonderful weekend. Delia's aunts (Rob's sisters) came in from Seattle and Phoenix to join us for the party, and her uncle (Rob's brother) and his wife, both professors at Eau Claire, were there, too, to celebrate.

Image description: Three women (from left to right: Fiona, Delia, and Peg) stand under a tree and smile at the camera. The center woman (Delia) is wearing an academic mortarboard and graduation gown, draped with a multi-colored feather boa. lower center: smiling woman (Delia) holds up a mortarboard that reads 'IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME: I'm done with this BS.' Upper center: Lettering reads "Congratulations" with a mortarboard and diploma.

Graduation

20 Graduation

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pegkerr: (The worthies of Bree will be discussing)
2024-05-01 03:14 pm

2024 52 Card Project: Week 17: Birthday

Again, I'm doing this card a little early, as I will be away for a three-day work event this weekend.

One of the sentences that came up in my Scottish Gaelic practice in Duolingo this week was the sentence: 'S e mo cha-là-breith a th' ann!' (which means 'It's my birthday')

This was entirely apropos because it was, in fact, my 64th birthday. And it was an entirely lovely one.

I wore one of my favorite necklaces to note the occasion and met Fiona for brunch. Afterward, we went to browse around the newly open Tropes & Trifles bookstore. Later in the afternoon, I met my mom and sisters for coffee.

I was quite delighted with the gifts my family gave me. Fiona, Alona, and Delia gave me a lovely floaty wisp of a thing printed with irises, and the promise of tickets to the Guthrie's Shakespeare history play cycle: Richard II, Henry IV, and Henry V. My sisters gave me a couple of new plants for my collection and a loaf of Betsy's homemade sourdough bread. I can assure you that it is entirely delicious.

Thanks to everyone who helped to make my birthday an entirely delightful day.

Frame: a multistrand glass bead necklace. Upper center: a cartoon bear with a thought bubble that reads 'S e mo cha-là-breith a th' ann!' (Scottish Gaelic for 'It's my birthday'). Over the thought bubble are superimposed the words "Richard II," "Henry IV," and "Henry V." Center: a cup with a coffee latte with a currant scone. Lower right corner: two plants and a package wrapped in a dishtowel. Lower left: several semi-transparent figures of a woman (Peg) with a non-transparent picture of Peg on top, wearing a floaty scarf poncho, printed with irises.

Birthday

17 Birthday

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2024-03-01 02:52 pm
Entry tags:

2024 52 Card Project: Week 8: Wedding

I am sure there is no suspense whatsoever about what this week's collage would be about.

The wedding, as I said in my last post, was lovely and touching. Although they hadn't coordinated it at all, Fiona and Alona both mentioned the same point when exchanging their vows. Each had experienced heartache in the past from partners who had refused to put them first. That was why this was such a joyful day because both knew that they would always be first in the eyes and the heart of one another.

There was an interesting variation in the promises made when they exchanged rings. They had purchased beautiful rings for one another, but in the lines of the service, each promised to wear the rings 'on my hand or over my heart.' It wasn't until a couple of days later that I figured it out: Fiona is going to enter a career as a plumber. For reasons of safety, she is not allowed to wear any rings on her hand while she is on the job. I can only presume that she will wear the ring, when it is not on her hand, strung on a necklace around her neck.

Unfortunately, one picture I failed to capture during the day was of their handfasting ribbons, so I went out looking for photographs of handfasting ribbons in blue, green, and brown. I found the photo used in this collage, but the ribbons were blue, green, and purple. I learn something every time I make one of these collages--I feel rather smug that I figured out how to change the purple ribbon to brown.

I also took care with the Hebrew translation of 'I choose you' (Alona is Jewish). I checked with a friend who confirmed the construction of the sentence as it would be spoken to a woman, rather than the text that Google Translate gave me, which would be spoken to a man. I'm glad I took the trouble to double-check.

Image description: Two women (Alona and Fiona) stand smiling on their wedding day with an officiant (Jory). their hands clasped in front of a fireplace decked with flowers. At the top center of the collage in English and bottom center in Hebrew are the words "I choose you." The Hebrew words overlay an arrangement of handfasting ribbons in blue, green, and brown.

Wedding

8 Wedding

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pegkerr: (Default)
2024-02-25 09:05 pm

Fiona’s wedding day

When I came downstairs this morning, this was the picture that was on display in the digital frame that Fiona and Alona gave me for Christmas. Seeing it gave me a great deal of comfort, as if it were a sign that Rob was sending his love.



I was pretty pleased with my appearance. I think I polished up pretty well.





The wedding was in a lovely private club in Summit Avenue in St. Paul. Delia was Fiona’s attendant and in fact walked with her down the aisle.



I didn’t take very many pictures during the ceremony because I was using my phone to record the ceremony. Fiona and Alona wrote their own very moving vows. They incorporated a hand fasting braided cord (blue, green, and brown), and seven meditations on love from various writers. At the end, they both stomped on a cloth-covered glass and we all cried ‘Mazel Tov!’



There were hors d'oeuvres and cake and champagne, music and conversation and dancing. There was a lot of joy. Alona’s sister Mary and Delia gave moving speeches.

It was a wonderful day. I am delighted with my new daughter-in-law and overjoyed by this new addition to our family.





Edited to add: Check out the mood icon. For once, this line from Pride and Prejudice is absolutely perfect.
pegkerr: (Default)
2024-02-25 07:34 am
Entry tags:

Fiona’s wedding day — without Rob

Okay, this tore my heart out a little.

Today is Fiona’s wedding day. And this is the picture that was displaying in the digital frame when I came downstairs this morning.

Rob sends his love.

pegkerr: (All was well)
2024-02-22 03:25 pm
Entry tags:

Getting ready for the wedding

Somehow I never imagined I would be going out a few days before my daughter’s wedding to help her pick out matching neckties for her and her bride, but it was fun! (Even if Fiona was uber stressed OMG.)
pegkerr: (You think the dead we have loved ever tr)
2024-02-02 10:23 am

52 Card Project 2024: Week 4: Shipwreck

*Sigh*

This is the fourth year I've been doing these digital collages, and every year on the fourth week of the year, the collage has been about the same subject. I am not sure it always will be. But after all, I select the subject for the collage on whatever I've been thinking about that week.

This week included the sixth anniversary of Rob's death.

There is a diffidence, a shyness about grief that you sometimes see in widows in our culture. An embarrassed self-consciousness. As time extends further and further out from our loss, we face a certain amount of judgment, even (and yes, we widows can be oversensitive, but I have felt it) a very faint tinge of...contempt. Yes, of course we know that you loved and miss the person you lost. But life goes on. Shouldn't you as well? There's an unspoken but blunt sense of get over it already.

Well, I assure you I am continuing to live my life. I am not frozen in time. I have cleaned much of Rob's stuff out of the house. I continue to go out and have new experiences. I have even fallen in love again.

But I know Rob will never hear me speak Scottish Gaelic. He will never see his daughters marry. He will never hold his grandchildren. I may dream about him, but I'll never hear his spoken words or feel his touch again.

And it still hurts.

When I was considering seriously the question Am I really going to do another collage about this? I remembered a post I've seen floating around Facebook that hit me with the ring of truth. Here it is:
I'm middle aged. What that means is that I've survived (so far) and a lot of people I've known and loved did not.

I've lost friends, best friends, acquaintances, co-workers, grandparents, father, relatives, teachers, mentors, students, pets, neighbors, and a host of other folks. Gratefully I have not lost a child but I know people who have (too many), and I can't imagine the pain it must be to lose a child. But here's my two cents...

I wish I could say you get used to people dying. But I never have and I don't want to. It tears a hole through me whenever somebody I love dies, no matter the circumstances. But I don't want it to "not matter". I don't want it to be something that just passes. My scars are a testament to the love and the relationship that I had for and with that person. And if the scar is deep, so was the love. So be it.

Scars are a testament to life. Scars are a testament that I can love deeply and live deeply and be cut, or even gouged, and that I can heal and continue to live and continue to love. And the scar tissue is stronger than the original flesh ever was. Scars are a testament to life. Scars are only ugly to people who can't see. As for grief, you’ll find it comes in waves.

When the ship is first wrecked, you’re drowning, with wreckage all around you. Everything floating around you reminds you of the beauty and the magnificence of the ship that was, and is no more. And all you can do is float. You find some piece of the wreckage and you hang on for a while. Maybe it’s some physical thing. Maybe it’s a happy memory or a photograph. Maybe it’s a person who is also floating. For a while, all you can do is float. Stay alive. In the beginning, the waves are 100 feet tall and crash over you without mercy. They come 10 seconds apart and don’t even give you time to catch your breath. All you can do is hang on and float. After a while, maybe weeks, maybe months, you’ll find the waves are still 100 feet tall, but they come further apart. When they come, they still crash all over you and wipe you out. But in between, you can breathe, you can function. You never know what’s going to trigger the grief. It might be a song, a picture, a street intersection, the smell of a cup of coffee. It can be just about anything…and the wave comes crashing. But in between waves, there is life.

Somewhere down the line, and it’s different for everybody, you find that the waves are only 80 feet tall. Or 50 feet tall. And while they still come, they come further apart. You can see them coming. An anniversary, a birthday, or Christmas, or landing at O’Hare. You can see it coming, for the most part, and prepare yourself. And when it washes over you, you know that somehow you will, again, come out the other side. Soaking wet, sputtering, still hanging on to some tiny piece of the wreckage, but you’ll come out.

Take it from an old guy. The waves never stop coming, and somehow you don’t really want them to. But you learn that you’ll survive them. And other waves will come. And you’ll survive them too. If you’re lucky, you’ll have lots of scars from lots of loves. And lots of shipwrecks.”
That is what the grief has been like this week, perhaps. The anniversary of his death have brought back memories that are like fifty-foot waves, instead of one hundred-foot ones.

There is much in my life that has gone on without him that makes me happy.

Yet I love him. I still miss him.

And this week, I grieved him.

Image description: Background is a stormy sea (a portion of Thomas Moran's painting "Moonlight Shipwreck at Sea.") A remnant of a wrecked ship is tossed by the sea in lower center. A semi-transparent of a woman dressed in white floats in the center of the painting. One extended hand hovers over the wrecked ship. The other stretches toward a white lily flower (a symbol of grief in the language of the flowers) in the upper right.

Shipwreck

4 Shipwreck

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2024-01-26 12:40 pm

2024 52 Card Project: Week 3: Passages

Two things happened this week that struck me as particularly significant, signs of life passage for me as a parent.

I gave the instructions to the Minnesota 529 College Savings plan to send the last payment to Delia's university and then to close the account. We started making these payments in, what, 2011, when Fiona started college. And it has taken eight years for Delia to get through, but she will be graduating this May.

Secondly, I ordered my mother-of-the-bride dress for Fiona's wedding, which will be taking place next month (it's pictured in the collage below).

I wish that Rob was here to celebrate with me, but nevertheless, I am so, so happy to have arrived at this point.

I like this card, and I think that I have really improved in making these collages over the past three years. I have used some layering techniques in this one (like the one that gives the interior of the room a glow) that I think elevate this card above the ordinary.

An open door shows a room interior with another open door showing beyond. Inside the room, just inside the door, stands a woman's figure wearing a navy blue long gown with a beaded yoke. Superimposed over the woman's head are a pair of hands holding a heart shape from which a bright light emerges that illuminates the room. Toward the top of the doorway are the words "MN Saves Minnesota 529 College Savings Plan.” Superimposed over the woman's feet are the words "University of Wisconsin Eau Claire." 2024 52 Card Project: Week 3: Passages

Passages

3 Passages

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pegkerr: (All we have to decide is what to do with)
2024-01-19 01:19 pm

2024 52 Card Project: Week 2: Change and Acceptance

I wrote in my holiday letter at the end of last year that I know that 2024 will include a lot of changes.

Fiona will be starting her plumber's apprenticeship program and getting married.

Delia will be graduating from college and moving from Wisconsin to find a job in Minnesota.

As for me, I know that my job will be changing. I work in the office of the Bishop of the Minneapolis Area Synod for the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America. Her second and final term will end this year and a new bishop will be elected the first weekend of May.

The bishop's staff serves at the pleasure of the bishop, and so we all have to tender our resignations and then wait to find out whether the new bishop (and at this point, we have no idea who it will be) will hire us back.

Since we work for a church-based organization, if we DON'T get hired back, we get no unemployment. I guess that the custom is that we would get three months of severance. But that's it.

What's more, the synod is struggling financially--we get the money for our budget from what people put into their offering plates in our congregations on Sunday mornings, and between the pandemic and inflation, that number has dropped substantially. I have a hunch that while the staff is being shaken up anyway, it might look like it would make the most financial sense to combine my position with one of the Assistant to the Bishop positions. So my job is looking increasingly precarious.

I have been trying to gear myself up for the changes to come. Even if I get to stay in my job, I fully expect that I will be losing my boss (the bishop) and my supervisor, someone with whom I work very well.

At the Epiphany service at my church, we followed the custom we've been doing the past couple of years: everyone was offered a sticker with a word on it, something to contemplate in the coming year.

My word was "Acceptance."

I have often joked that I am a Gryffindor but with high-security needs. Brave, when I need to be (and I have needed to be, especially since losing Rob), but change is still hard.

In fact, I did a Hard Thing in the week that this collage covers to try to get ready for that change. It didn't work out (Peg says vaguely) but I will keep trying.

Change is a-coming. And I will have to accept it when it does.

I do rather like the way this collage turned out. When thinking about 'change' and acceptance,' I was thinking about some of the principles of Zen Buddhism, about balancing stones. Stones may seem changeless and immovable, but the sea will polish them away and tumble them over, and as they grow smaller, you can pick them up and carry them around. I think the curves in the outline of the phoenix are mimicked by the shape of the stone heart, and the slant of the fiery bird is echoed in the slant of the words.

The bird, of course, is a phoenix, the mythical creature that dies and is reborn in fire.

I can feel the sparks starting to stir under my own breastbone.
I know they will get hotter.

Image description: background: semi-transparent picture of a rocks that have been smoothed by the ocean. Lower right corner: three rocks piled one atop the other, with an open bloom tucked in at the side. An old-fashioned key rests on the top one. Lower center: the word 'Acceptance' is written. Center/left: a bird made of fire (a phoenix) with wings outspread. Upper right corner: a heart shaped from smooth pebbles. The word 'Change' is overlaid over the heart.

Change and Acceptance

2 Change and Acceptance

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2023-11-24 01:03 pm

2023 52 Card Project: Week 47: Euphoria

The last two years of this collage project, I have produced cards commemorating the Thanksgiving celebrations I've had with my family. The card for this week is, in a way, a Thanksgiving card, too, only it comes at the concept from a slightly different angle.

First of all, we received word on Wednesday that Fiona has been accepted into the St. Paul plumber's apprenticeship program. She has been working faithfully in her employer's warehouse since May, pulling plumbing fittings, throughout the 100-degree heat this summer. Had she not been picked (they only accept one candidate out of three) she would have had to wait a whole more year to apply again (unless she were to try her luck with a different city's union). Now she will get a raise and begin combining classes with her job. The program will take five years for her to finish. This is wonderful news and we are all absolutely overjoyed for her.

The other wonderful happening this past Wednesday is a longer story, but trust me, it's worth it.

Rob and I got married in 1986. We picked out our wedding rings on Valentine's Day of that year. My ring had a brilliant cut diamond of modest size, about a third of a carat. I loved my ring and wore it proudly.

About fifteen or twenty years into our marriage, I happened to look down at my hand while I was in the shower, only to find that the diamond in the ring was missing. My heart plummeted. I shut off the water immediately and searched the tub, but I feared that the stone had washed down the drain. Anyway, the diamond was gone.

Now as it happened, Rob and I had been going through a rough patch. We were really strapped for money. But I didn't hesitate a moment. I had all the information on the stone and went back to the jeweler. They said that the ring was insured and for a nominal deductible, I could get the diamond replaced. So I did, getting another brilliant cut diamond of a similar grade. Rob told me later how much hope and comfort it gave him, that despite our troubles, my response was to immediately replace the diamond in my ring. It showed him my commitment to the two of us, knowledge he badly needed at the time.

About a month later, Delia came to me in great excitement. "Mom, you're not going to believe this. I found the diamond from your ring."

The girls' room was incredibly cluttered at this point in our family life. But one day as she was shifting piles of stuff from one part of the floor to the other, she spied a glint and immediately picked up the diamond.

It seemed like such a miracle. I thought hard about it, and then took both the diamond and the ring back to the jeweler and explained the situation. "If you want me to give the new diamond back, I understand. I put in the claim in all good faith, thinking it was lost."

"Nah," the jeweler said. "The claim has been processed by our insurance company, and you're clearly not trying to pull anything over on us. You paid the deductible. The new diamond is yours."

So I put my wedding ring back on, and I put the original stone in a plastic bag and placed it in one of my jewelry storage trays.

When Rob passed away, I wore my wedding ring for almost a year, but eventually, when I started seeing Eric, I took it off and stored it in the jewelry trays. "I have two diamonds now," I told the girls. "Each of you can have one now if you like when you marry."

Several months later, I found a plastic bag on the floor of my bedroom. I discerned at a glance that it was empty, and I threw it away.

Fast forward to last year when Fiona announced that she was engaged. "Would you like one of the diamonds for your ring?" I asked. "Or you can put it in a ring to give to Alona." I went to my jewelry box--but the plastic bag with the diamond in it was gone. I suddenly remembered that plastic bag I had so thoughtlessly thrown away. Surely I hadn't carelessly discarded the miraculously rediscovered diamond--had I? I had thought the bag was empty! I dug through the trash basket, despite knowing that I had already taken that batch of trash out, and I combed over and over through the carpet.

I felt sick. I felt, absurdly, that I had let Rob down, losing the diamond he had given me not just once but twice. Now only one of my girls would get a diamond from me. Fiona tried to comfort me: "The ring I’ve picked out already has a diamond, and Alona doesn't even want a stone. It's okay, Mommy. Let Delia have the remaining diamond." I tried to let it go, but it just added to all the grief I felt at losing Rob.

Now we come to the events of this week. The carpets in my house looked awful--the wall-to-wall carpet upstairs is over thirty years old. So I asked my sister if I could borrow her carpet cleaner.

I spent hours Wednesday shifting stuff from the corners of the rooms and thoroughly vacuuming everything, using the attachment to get into the weird angles and along the baseboard. Then I went over everything again with the carpet cleaner. The water, when I emptied it into the toilet, was black and filthy.

Altogether, I worked at it for over four hours. Finally, exhausted, I sat down on my bed and gave a deep sigh. And then I happened to glance down at the floor.

There, glinting in reflection from the overhead light, was the diamond. Right between my feet.

I thought it had washed down the drain. Then I thought I had thrown it away. By all rights, I should have swept it up with either the vacuum cleaner or the carpet cleaner. But somehow or other, here it was again, back in my trembling hand: the diamond that had been in the ring that Rob had put on my finger on our wedding day. The bag HAD fallen out of the jewelry tray, but somehow, the diamond had fallen out of the bag and then hidden itself in the carpet until I found it again. Maybe running the vacuum cleaner and carpet cleaner over it had merely polished it up so that I could see it again.

That diamond has more damned lives than a cat.

My wish for you this Thanksgiving is that you have the moments of transcendent joy that I have had this week.

Background: a beige carpet. Center top: a carpet cleaning machine. Underneath is the logo for the St. Paul Local 34 Plumber and Gasfitters Union. A woman's hand hovers over the words "Local 34," reaching for a brilliant-cut diamond superimposed over the bottom of the logo. Underneath the diamond is a woman's gold wedding ring, set with another diamond.

Euphoria

47 Euphoria

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pegkerr: (Glory and Trumpets)
2023-09-22 12:58 pm

2023 52 Card Project: Week 38: Renaissance

Fiona and I sallied forth to the Minnesota Renaissance Festival this past Saturday and we had a marvelous time.

We were both in splendid moods, which helped, of course, and the weather was perfect--not too hot, not too cold, and there had been a little rain the previous day that kept the dust down.

We have various rituals every time we go to the Festival. There is a particular song that I play on my phone as we approach the parking area: Renaissance Faire by Blackmore's Night. I usually stop for a popover when we arrive, and we always get an apple dumpling right before leaving.

Both of us got multiple compliments on our costumes, which was fun. Fiona had received the chain mail shirt for Christmas last year, and she looked for and found a green tabard to put over it. She also bought a tiara, because she, of course, deserved it.

I'd hesitated over some pouches when I'd visited last year. I'd bought one and walked away from two others, and I regretted it all year. This year, I walked directly to the booth and bought four without hesitation. These beautiful little pouches can be clipped to a simple strap to make a purse. I also realized that clipping two back-to-back made a slightly larger purse (very convenient).

We walked around until we'd seen everything we'd wanted to see and were tired. We ate our apple dumpling and then went home, tired but entirely satisfied.

Image description: Lower center: four embroidered pouches (a tree with fruit, a Celtic cross, a rabbit, a leaf). Behind that: a sign reading 'Baked Apple Dumplings with Vanilla or Cinnamon Ice Cream.' Behind that, a human figure in an ornate unicorn mask and Renaissance tunic. To the left of the figure: a Welcome sign with the silhouette of a rearing unicorn. Center left: a woman (Peg) in Renaissance garb. Center right: a woman (Fiona) in a chain mail tunic with a neck gorget, a green tabard, and a tiara. Both are smiling. To the left of Peg: a carved wooden bear statue. To the right of Fiona: a cloth tabard that reads 'Mead.' Upper part of the card: the roof line of a number of wooden buildings.

Renaissance

38 Renaissance

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