The Little Things

This morning when I woke up, I picked up my iPhone and held it about 1.327 inches from my face so I could see the time. It was 8:32 EST. Meh. Too early on a Saturday to get up. Too late — more to the point, too awake — to go back to sleep. I picked up my glasses so my astigmatic eyes could focus a reasonable number of inches from the bridge of my nose. As is the case most mornings, there are those familiar red dots on both my e-mail and Facebook icons.


I click my e-mail to see if there's a message from the bank that all my money is gone. Or from my mortgage company to say they're foreclosing on my home. Or from my investment firm to say that my little egg has cracked and rotted all over its equally little nest. It's important that I point out — and quickly, given that right about now, every member of my immediate family has a racing heart and thinking "What the fuck?" (Yes. Even my mother is thinking "WTF." In fact, my mother is thinking it the loudest.) — I have no reason to be worried about any of those catastrophic scenarios. It's just that I've never had reason to worry about it. Mr. J did. I never even knew how much money I had in my account. I just knew there was enough. I didn't get degrees in Journalism and English to reconcile a checkbook. I got them so that one day I could do, well, this.


The daily deep breath of unreasonably paranoid poverty averted, I was ready to move on to the red dot hovering over the familiar lowercase "f" icon. I scrolled down my news feed and The State (South Carolina's largest newspaper and the one that I marketed for six years. You know, back in the days when newspapers had marketing departments. Or newsrooms, for that matter.) had posted a story of a man catching a catfish. Not just any catfish. A 136-pound catfish. That's a big ass fish. In fact, that's what the photo caption said: "Man catches big ass fish." (Not really. The newspaper industry hasn't gone that far south. Yet.) This is an eminently shareable story, though. It just cries out for a "Holy crap! Check out the big ass fish this guy caught." Doesn't it?


So I looked around. There's no one there to hear my "Holy crap!" I knew there wasn't. There hasn't been for more than a year. And it never gets easier to wake up and realize that all over again every morning. We'll see how tomorrow, day number 400-something, goes. I don't expect it will be any easier than today, yesterday or last week to awaken to this new reality. (Please notice I did not use the trite "new normal." I despise that term. There is nothing normal. I accept that it's not the reality I chose, but the one that I have; however, I will never acknowledge that anything about it is normal.) It becomes more bearable. Less crushing. Tolerable. But not easy. Every day I make a choice to be here. To be present. To strive to live the life I know I'm capable of living. The life he wanted me to live. 


At this point, it's 8:43 a.m. I scrolled to my contacts, knowing that it's about a 70-30 chance I'll hear a groggy hello as I awaken the person I'm calling. I hoped for the 30 percent odds that would deliver an alert, coffee-already-consumed "Hey. How are you doing?"


And it did. When I heard it, I asked my father, "Hey, you ever fish in Lake Moultrie?"


"No. Why?"


"'Cause some guy caught a big ass catfish."


"How big?"


"Guess."


"Oh ... about 110 pounds." (Which brought a fresh "holy crap!" to mind. Who knew?)


"Nope. One hundred and eighty-six pounds," I said, drawing it out for effect. (And now is where I admit that fact-checking lowers my declaration by 50 pounds. You can take the girl out of the newspaper ...)


We continued talking, Dad pointing out that such big catfish are known to inhabit that lake. I pointed out that it wasn't your standard fish picture with human hand in icky fish mouth. The big ass fish was, in fact, on the ground in front of the angler looking like a seal. And a big ass seal, at that.


Then Dad says, "Hey, is there an award they give for Off-Broadway plays? You know like the Tonys? But not?"


"Hm. Yeah. Yeah they do. The Obies. O-B for Off-Broadway."


"O-B-I-E-S? That fits."


"Huh?"


"Crossword."


"Ah. Yeah, that's it. The Obies. Okay. I just wanted to tell someone about this big ass catfish. I'll talk to you later."


"OK."


"I love you, Daddy."


"I love you, too, honey."


A choice. Every day I make a choice to be here. And I did today. I will tomorrow. And it's not really my bills or my bank balance that challenge me. (Even though I have to do math. Damn it — I really thought I'd figured a way out of that.) It's the little things. Like having no one next to me to ask why I'm saying "Holy crap!" first thing on a Saturday morning.


It's the little things. Which really aren't little at all.

Thank You, Betty Kirby

I stood up against censorship when I was 17 to my high school principal over the content of a fictional story written for Belles Lettres, our annual literary publication.


My voice — internally and externally — was shaking, and I didn't think my fellow editors and I even thought we'd be able to include our response statement, even though we had the full support of our adviser.


Our little fuck-you statement, was in retrospect, much — much — milder than that hypenated adjective I just used to describe it. (Well of course it was. We couldn't go getting our censorship response censored.) It simply said, at the top of an otherwise blank page:

"The Belle Lettres staff 

would like to say everything good 

there is to say about censorship:"

In fact, just a few years later, once I'd entered The Grady School of Journalism at the University of Georgia, I found myself embarrassed for its mildness. My 20-year-old self was full of I'm-gonna-change-the-world arrogance, and rightfully so. My 17-year-old self had spent a lifetime as an Army brat, 12 years in the DoD education system and was just grateful to be finally doing something against the rules that would bring her praise and not punishment. And rightfully so.


It wouldn't have surprised either version of the younger me that at 43, I'd still be proud of my instincts and responsiveness. Nor that I would have the freedom that I do to express myself in myriad public ways. Whether it turned out to be a column in The Chicago Tribune, or my own little nation that I've staked out on the Internet is irrelevant. This is America. My father fought to ensure we'd all have that freedom.


It would have shocked the hell out both of them, however, that at 43, I'd still be faced with censorship.


And it should shock you, too. Please check out the facts, and please vote.


Thank you. From every single one of me.

Saturday the 14th. Still Here.

Um. Yeah. That counts as a victory 'round these parts.


In fact it counts as a big ol' "WOO-FREAKIN'-HOO!"


We take our triumphs where we find them these days.


And now Percy and I are going to settle in for a long (painless) winter's (it actually is cold) nap (yeah — snooze, sleep and snore — the whole shebang).


Carry on. 


Wait. What? Yes. Yes, of course with your bad selves. Is there any other way?

Friday the 13th

So far, so good.


All necessary business done for the day. Clean, soft, smell-good outfit (READ: PAJAMAS) on. Any knocks on the door shall go unanswered. Any unknown phone numbers will be siphoned to voice mail.


If you really need me — you really know how to find me.


It's not that we're that superstitious (Really. Well, kinda sorta maybe not ...); it's just that odd, unusual, unexpected, unwelcome and what the hell, we'll just say it: Really. Fucked. Up. Things have somehow found their way to Halfglassistan over the course of the last 13+ months, and a random message from one of said things (READ: THE LITTLE BITCHES THAT PASS AS OVARIES — WHOOPS! — OVARY SINGULAR. ONE WENT BYE-BYE LAST SUMMER. HER TWIN HAS DECIDED TO DO A LITTLE CHA-CHA DOWN BY MY HOO-HAH THIS PAST MONTH.) was interpreted this a.m. A distraction that was most unwelcome, as we have plenty of other ... well ... really fucked up things to deal with already.


And now, the girl who looooooves alliteration is taunted by the two words, when used in tandem, she despises the most.


Watchful. Waiting.


Considering everything is on the inside and not on some nifty balcony below my bellybutton, I find the term "Watchful" especially taunting. I'd be much more relaxed for the "Waiting" if I had a little closed circuit TV down in my business so I could actually watch it. As it is, it's really just Waiting Waiting, which I typically despise in most any context.


(insert indignant snort of derision HERE)


It's 4:10 p.m. EST. I'm going to park my ass in bed, with Nurse Tilly, a good book, remote controls and magazines for at least the next eight hours. At least. To be on the safe side, I'm thinking ass-parking may be done the majority of the weekend. Especially since our buddy Percy is here to soothe the savage beast bitch doing a polka in my pelvis. And, being as controlled as he is, he does a rather good job of keeping me in one place.


Come midnight, and it's Saturday the 14th, I have a pretty strong feeling that Percy will have set the tone for weekend. It's the other twenty-odd days that follow.


My prediction for Halfglassistan: People will be Watching us as we put our fingers in our ears, close our eyes, sing la-la-la-la and continue Waiting.


Meh. It could be worse. It could always — always — be worse.*


*Holy crap. 
Anyone else catch that flashback to the early days of Halfglassistan? 
Where the hell did that come from?! 
I. Don't. Know. But I like it. I like it a lot.

Surreality Bites

You know those dreams that are so real, you find yourself convincing your conscious mind that your brain essentially just Punk'd you?

Yeah. They suck. Worse yet, they stick with you.

Carry on. I'm gonna go scrub my cerebellum with Clorox.

Smack My Ass & Call Me Sassy

I? Am feeling cheeky. And feeling hair that's a lot less brunette around my sizable cheeks.


Something spontaneous in me (uh ... CatCon) decided we needed an adventure. Posted above is not the best photographic evidence, but I was, well, feeling spontaneous (impatient) and snapped it in the parking lot while there was still available sunlight.


There aren't many pictures of me here in Halfglassistan, which is in direct correlation to the reason I'm starting Weight Watchers next week. Yeah. Haven't been happy with the way I've looked and felt for a while. However, the ones that do exist show my natural chestnut brown haircolor. I have experimented — poorly — with peroxide in the past (An almost-platinum streak down one side in high school. In the eighties. Oh. And at my sister's wedding. Niiiiccce.), but never told a professional to go for it.


Until today. 


I love it. It's a blend of caramel and honey and a little creamy milk chocolate. I didn't want anything to clash with my brown Irish eyes, and my stylist didn't let me down.


The only downside? I came home and Mr. J wasn't here to say, "Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Turn around. I like it. She did a good job. Wait. Come here. Yeaaahh. I really like it. You look great." Insert kiss here.


That's just one typical male stereotype Mr. J didn't fall into. He never missed something new. That might have something to do with the fact that I made sure he knew something new was coming (I never understood girls getting pissed off because their significant other didn't notice that they just had an quarter-inch trimmed off their hair. Turn the tables. You wouldn't notice either.). Or it just might have something to do with why I love him. And miss him beyond description.


I'm going to be writing more about that. I'm going to be writing more, period. Those of you who are still out there reading — I'm hoping there are still folks reading — know that I've not chronicled much of life in Halfglassistan for the past year.


The reason is simple. Since Mr J's death, I've spent an awful lot of time in the other half of the glass. It's something he wouldn't have wanted. But — and this is up at the top of the list of "Reasons I Love Jamie Wedding" — he would have understood.


So I'm going to show up around here a lot more, regardless of in which half of the kingdom I'm residing. And I hope you will, too.


I need you.


And don't think that mention of Weight Watchers was inadvertent. No. A fab new 'do can only take me so far. I'll be posting WW progress here as well. (Aw hell. I've really gotta do it now.) 


Hopefully, as time passes, my cheekiness will be more attitude, and less assitude.


Keep coming back. (See three paragraphs up. Really.)

Well. Thank You, Captain Obvious.

Above is a Christmas gift from my sisters.

In case you can't clearly read below "Middle Sister" (Yes. Me.), here's a closer look:

Yes. Yes it does say "drama queen." (Yes. Also me.)

However, you also must have noticed the disparity in fashion:

Yes. Yes, also me.
In fact, I am currently watching bowl games while sporting a chic little trench (um, grey yoga pants and black t-shirt), a classic black handbag (er, my iPhone in my pocket) and my hair in a chic twist on top of my head (uh, a ponytail contained by a Goody(TM) elastic) and pumps and Jackie O. sunglasses (no, really; that's the truth ... it's tres fetch).

I'm also holding a glass of the clever California vintage above. Oh, yes. And sipping it. Today's still officially a holiday, so daydrinking isn't quite as risque. But still ... there's a little thrill. 

So Happy New Year's and chin-chin, my friends. May the coming year bring us all much more laughter, fewer tears and more love than you can possibly imagine.


Oh -- and plenty of high heels, comfy clothes, ponytails and tiaras, relaxing beverages and a diva attitude. All at once. Whenever you want.


Why the hell not?


Cheers, my dears.


(BTW, as far as accuracy in labeling goes, yes, my little sister does have bigger boobs than my older sister. Just in case you were wondering.)

A Thousand Words — And Then Some

It's not our intention to only post on holidays, despite the fact that the merry-merry header went up today, and we haven't been heard from since 'round Halloween.

Really.

No. It's simply that we've been speechless. 

Really. 

There is much truth to the the cliche "a picture's worth a thousand words," because I have been trying to come up with the proper ones to accompany the following images since November 1. Yes, All Saints Day, another day of observation, and from 2010 on here in Halfglassistan, Mr. J. Celebration Day, as well.

The images that follow are posted in no particular order, have not been edited, altered or enhanced in any way, and are all ©2011 caryn bowen/halfglassistan. The only common denominator, to me, is that they make my heart swell every time I look at them. But every time — every time — I see something different and different words and ideas come to mind. And none of them seem worthy of what my eyes see and my heart feels.

So I'm just going to stay out of the conversation and let them speak to you, too.

I hope as many — or more— words came to you, too.

Up, Up and Away ...

"This one's for you, Uncle Jamie ..." - Caryn Conley Bowen
©2010 cliff bowen/halfglassistan

Sometimes truth just happens. It just happens and can be a beautiful accident. And it just sucks at the same time.


This unprompted photo of my nephew J.C. was taken last year on Halloween night in Atlanta. His mama, my baby sister Caryn, was 300-something miles away in South Carolina, fielding phone calls, fetching fast food, giving Nurse Tilly much needed breaks and — along with my big sister, Chrisie — basically making sure whatever was happening around me just happened. If without my knowing, at least without my worrying about it. Because in less than 24 hours, Mr. J would be — I choose to think — in the heavens where the above almost-two-years-old John Conley Bowen is looking. And, it must be noted, saluting with a Tootsie Pop, my favorite simile for describing Mr. J's personality. Hard outside. Soft inside. Meltable parts always much closer to the surface than he'd ever have you believe.


Caryn didn't caption this photo until a week later, November 8, what would have been Mr. J's 48th birthday. Mr. J did not like to celebrate his birthday, but as he was reminded every year, " ... you knew what you were getting into when you married me. Birthdays are not ignored in my world ..." Last year, it was celebrated on Facebook, where still-stunned friends and family posted simple messages.


Mr. J's death was surrounded by what I am choosing to call — instead of cruel coincidences or circumstance — beautiful accidents of truth. He died two days after our 11th wedding anniversary. He died the day after Halloween (Trust me, there's a story here and it's coming, too. Soonish.). He died on his father's birthday. He died on All Saint's Day. (I would have gone to light a candle for him for the rest of my days regardless. Way to go, baby, dying on a Holy Day. Now every year, you're gonna get that full-blown ritual of Mass that you dug so much.) He died a week before his own birthday. I choose — I very definitively choose — to see poetry rather than pity in these coincidences.


Except the truth that just sucks. My brilliant, beautiful nephew J.C. will only know his brilliant and beautiful Uncle Jamie through stories and pictures — as will so many of our Munchkins. And the eerie poetic quality of this undeniable circumstance of suckitude? When I had just turned three, my Aunt Betty Ann died of cancer. She was, as my beloved Uncle Ray has so often expressed without anyone contradicting him, "The best of them all," meaning my mother's siblings. That phrase repeated itself a year ago when my beloved brother-in-law Rob said many times of Mr. J, "He was the best of all of us," meaning his siblings.


I'm not equipped to pass judgment on either declaration. But I am all too familiar with the pangs of loving — deeply and desperately — someone you never knew. The blessing in Betty Ann's death ... Wait. What's that you say? Yes. Yes, more coincidences. ... Betty Ann left behind a teenaged daughter, Lynn. Who just happens to be my godmother. And as a too-early-widowed woman herself, she is also a guide, a comfort and everything I've needed a second mother to be. Lynn is also the mother of the mothers of many of my oft-mentioned Munchkin tribe who has given me so much joy over the past year — Mommies and Munchkins alike. And finally, no coincidence at all, her latest grandchild's name, James. Whose two-month birthday does just happen to be today.


So. I've decided that every year, the November chapter of The Ballad of Uncle Jamie will be about happiness. About love. And I will think to myself about the way all of these independently unconnected dates and details are pressed into a imperfectly perfect tale.


November 1 marks the one-year anniversary of Mr. J's departure from this world. I'll be Atlanta for the week, receiving very much needed sister, parent, puppy and J.C. therapy. And the opening page of the story to come will be a sky filled with bright, free-flying symbols of weightless — and painless — shiny, happy messages to Mr. J.


I know, without a doubt, even though he's another place, he's with me. With all who love him. But when I think of him, when I talk to him, when I stop whatever I'm doing to just breathe, I look to the sky. So that's where the messages are headed.


With J.C.'s help, I'll be releasing 50 balloons — 49 for Mr. J's birthday that I still will never ignore — and truly one to grow on for Baby James. To them, I'll tie names, messages, anything that's light enough to float and from whomever would like them attached.


CatCon will be fielding and organizing any requests. (I know. I've already had to tell her three times: "No. Glitter.") Comment here on the blog. Click on the e-mail the author link below. Email me here. Post it on my half-glassed life's Facebook page.


As I've said before, here in Halfglassistan, we welcome all. And as we say here in South Carolina, "Y'all come." Bring on the love.

The Wonder That's Keeping The Stars Apart

Every child of the military knows where home is. Our mothers taught us that "home is wherever Daddy is."


That's been true all of my life and luckily, still is today. The SGM has been retired for decades now but just as Mom did for 30 years all over the world, she has maintained that one constant security for her children.


I've also been blessed to have the comfort and love of many others whose doors are open to me, providing not only safe haven — but also that undefinable, yet instantly recognizable essence that is home. Sisters. Cousins. Aunts. Friends. Even the familiar voices of faces I'd not seen since adolescence — one in Memphis, one in Phoenix and one in Kentucky — can reach through a cell phone and wrap me in a cloak of solace as surely as if they were tucking a blanket around me as I curled up on their couch.


But as safe — and perhaps much more importantly, loved — each of these make me feel, none has erased a singular longing.


I want to go home. My father holds me and tells me in his living room, "You are home."


I lie with my head in my big sister's lap, as she strokes my hair while I weep and long for home.


My baby sister holds me tight, both of us crying in her driveway. "You have so many homes. So many people who love you."


"No. I want my home." She holds me tighter.


I look at my godmother, who 15 years ago was also widowed in her early 40's. "I want to go home," I sob. Her shining eyes mirror mine.


And she says: " I know."


On a quiet November afternoon, in the home we had made, I peacefully held my husband in my arms as I waited for the gentlemen in the dapper suits to arrive. I calmly walked outside with them as they prepared to take him for one last ride. I kissed his beautiful face and watched as they closed the heavy black door. I turned to walk back inside, still determined and head held high. I summoned the same posture of dignity I'd tried to maintain throughout every challenge of the previous years.


I stood straight and tall until I recrossed the threshold of what was now just walls and floors, windows and doors. Just a house. Mocking me. I have no idea how many steps I took before I hit the floor. I have no idea how quickly, or how many, arms wrapped around me. How many I reached for and clutched.


In the moment, I had no idea where the grotesque sounds I heard were coming from. Sounds I'd never heard and hoped I never would again. I soon realized they were coming from me, and all too soon, realized I would hear them again. And again. And again as the months passed. Even if only in my mind as my mouth formed silent screams. It could have been at 3 p.m. and I was locked in the restroom in my office, hoping the running water would mask any gasp that escaped. More often, it was 3 a.m. and I couldn't stop long enough to catch my breath, much less think — or care — about what my neighbors might have thought if they heard. 


More days than I care to admit, at the end of the day, I'd pull my phone out as I walked to my car and punched 2 to tell Mr. J that I was on my way home.


But there was no home.


Because my best friend, my confidante, my cheerleader, my protector whose eyes and arms could erase fears in an instant and my playmate who could make me laugh and sing just as quickly was no longer there.


Over the past year, it's taken me a long time to realize that the same metaphor that marked the first twenty-odd years of my life is still true.


Now Jamie's heart equals home. And home is, was, and always will be where he is.


"... and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart. i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart.)"


And as long as I can keep sight of that wonder, I'm safe at home.


excerpt from i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart) ©1952 e.e. cummings