Tipping Point

It is dusk.
I sit on my parents’ bed and gaze out the window.
A rare treat.
I see a beloved grove of aspen surrounded by their darker pinon-mates,
in a previously oft-visited arroyo.
I do believe I could walk that arroyo blind-folded by heart, if only.
The aspen stand tall and golden in the lingering sun,
bright enough I cannot yet tell if they are still clothed
in their fall yellows or are naked for winter.

A couple of mornings ago, at dawn,

I hobbled up here seeking comfort to find my parents on the spot I now inhabit;

they were sound asleep curled toward each other,
foreheads touching, arms draped tenderly around each other;
they didn’t even awaken when I curled up in a vacant corner of the bed.
During waking hours they suffer greatly,
but they have this shining deep-sleep-comfort;
you can plainly see the over 50 years of unconscious body attunement.

They awaken to this view,

but I don’t get to look outside much—
I have to catch the tipping point of the day—
neither too bright, nor too dark; 
I’m the outdoors type so this is serious deprivation.

Now as the sun lowers,

I discern that the aspen are a mixture of still-clinging leaves and bare branches;
how can I be this out of touch with the basics of this tipping season?

This poem set out to be about the tipping point of my health.

Shall I move toward greater life or death?
Gasp, I have now written That Word.
A recent practitioner described the precariousness of my present condition this way.
It resonated with a gong of truth
I did not want to hear, but cannot deny.
Oh death, whatever you are, do not take me yet.
I cling to this bed, this view.

I want to tip back into life.

My blessed parents have rested in this spot year after year

to restart each day sacrificing long and hard

to help me tip back into life;

one that we may enjoy more fully together;
and so that they might tip away one day, before I do—
a prospect I have long dreaded, but
the “natural order” we all took for granted.

Don’t speak to me of equanimity, not now, not yet.

I am too scrambled to metabolize what is happening.

So, back to the window:

Now pink clouds appear over the mellowing aspen.

I heard in some indigenous culture it is believed
the soul dies if you can’t see the horizon. 
Mine suffers from this loss;
it is rare I can visit this vantage point at the right time.

Now dark, heavier stark clouds streak the sky above—

Oh, please no thunder, no sound of rain!
My being can’t take that.
It unwillingly contracts in response to that which it once embraced.
It barely tolerates the sound of the felt tip marker on the page.

I confess I long to see Papa walk up the driveway this window faces.

I feel safer when he is here, as if he can protect me from my invisible demons.
I am glad he’s getting exercise, though.

Now the light New Mexico is so famous for is fading,
calling for an appreciation of the subtle browns and greens.

I must put down pen and paper soon; the writing isn’t good for me.

Here is Papa now!
I wish his gait were steadier,
and he walked a straighter line.

Deep breath.

I can’t afford to start crying over that now.

He looks down as he walks.

I hope it is to be careful with his footing,
but it appears more like his habitual preoccupation.
He’s not the nature lover I am;
doesn’t relish what every sense can take in as I would.

He enters the house, and believe it or not, I am annoyed. 

More sound.

How do you solve a problem like Molly?

Now it grows dim outside, and my vision is blurry.
And I believe I have committed one of my more recent errors:
My scribble is so messy and small I may not be able to decipher it later.
Aggravating when trying to compose communiques to docs
and I have no idea what I jotted down that I thought was important to convey.

I must get up and face the rest of the tasks of trudging on.

But still, it seems I cannot approach the subject of death.

I naively thought this poem might help us make peace,
even ease me away from IT.

What a lot to load on to a little poem.

All that has arisen is a poem defeated.

At least it used the scary word, and that’s a start.

Ok, now it’s pretty much dark, and though I still appreciate the shadowiness,

I know I am avoiding the suffering that lies ahead,
amplifying it even. 

I don’t want to abandon my perch.

But I will.  I will be careful.  Mindful as I navigate. 
Sit and eat my waiting dinner. 
And then who knows what to get through the evening.
 
Oh world, hold me, keep me, tip me back toward you;
reach for me tenderly or fiercely.  Yank, if you will.

Afterlife, be beautiful, but wait;
push me away for now, out of this limbo.  Push me hard.
But if you must come now, please be kind and swift.

Now, the coyote are making their crazy calls.

Have you heard that sound?
The mind knows that it is an earth-sound,
but it is so eerily incomprehensible it seems from another world.
Some say animals remember the other side.
Is that the language you are speaking now, coyote friends?
Because, oddly, in this moment, it is the only sound that doesn’t rattle my being,
as if it echoes the wail I cannot make.

--Molly Hunt   October 26, 2013

WHEN YOU ARE LOST

Know there is a stranger in a foreign country who wants to love you for no reason;
there is a sapling that would like your company;
and there is a rock that has always known you.
The earth has been hugging you to it,
and gently turning so you may know dawn and dusk;
and there is a star that sent its message for you tonight
millions of years ago.
There is a small mammal that would like your comfort,
and a large one that is genuinely interested in you.           
Even you who are in prison,
or are being ruthlessly tortured;
you who have lived a timid life,
or have turned against your gifts;
you who let your true love get away,
or who feel cursed;
you who have betrayed loved ones,
committed or been victim of heinous acts:
You don’t have to be strong;
you don’t have to be grateful;
you can be bitter.
Still, there is a rabbit with a fist;
a stone circle with a secret;
someone who believes in unicorns.
There is a ghost town with the cross of a long-passed individual who would have adored you.
There is an artisan devoted to crafting clay ducks
who would like you to have one,
and a seagull that would like to play with you.
Someone somewhere is composing just the music you need to hear.
There is a tree branch just so, for you to sit comfortably upon;
a plant that awaits your deep remembrance that it has the right medicine for you;
and another that wants to feel your touch.
There is a lion that is shy,
and a mouse that is brazen.
Even if you are as lonesome as the very last member of a dying species,
there are sea tortoises that know your birth song,
otters that know your secret name,
and an undiscovered fish fossil that is your ancestor, and longed for your birth.

I came across a coiled snake once on a back country road.
It must have just been run over.
I sat with it, crushed, while its life drained away.
It lives with me still.

--Molly Hunt, October 2013

Cougar, by Molly Hunt

COUGAR

For decades we tracked each other,
allies, prayer-mates and honored opponents.
We each had paid our respects to the other in a variety of ways.
I won't share how this secret relationship began.
There were dreams you took me on Technicolor adventures.
In others were you were a calm strong companion by my side.
And in some you roared at me.
I would awaken with a fright.

Then we met at the top of a mountain pass at 4 AM,
you hissing threateningly, eyes glowing red in the dimness.
That time you introduced me to my primal animal nature.
I grew large, bared my teeth and displayed my fingernails turned into claws.
I heard my own fierce growl – a new emanation from my throat –
echo off the valleys on both sides.
Every cell in my slender body believed without doubt
that I could and would rip you to shreds should you attack.
You backed down from our face-off.
Thank you for bringing out my killer instinct,
the proper use of my own sword.

But now, cougar, I have a new kind of predator;
they have taken up residence within the body that faced down yours.
Micro-organisms are tricky adversaries.
They have been wrestling with me for my now-mangled sword.
I have not been able to wield it successfully.
Infiltrating my being,
they have even confused me as to who I am.
loved ones are sustaining injuries in the battle.
These microscopic attackers aren't like you,
they torture me in a long drawn-out process.

When you confronted me,
there was a simplicity about it. No animosity.
an age-old agreement between species.
I knew you were defending your young, or hungry.
I defended myself.
The way of this world.

But what motivates these tiny beings?
They won't face me squarely.
Their insidious methods are cruel.
Perhaps they are a bit lost and confused, like humans can be?
But I sense no interspecies connection, here.

Is there anything you can teach me now, my cougar mate?
Any of your relaxed strength you can transmit to me?
I am in great need.

Or do I need a new teacher now?
I saw a slow-motion film once
of you beating out your prey in the chase.
That rabbit knew when its time was up.
It turned belly up at the last moment,
offering itself to you, to the intrinsic order of things.
What beauty in that!
Has that time arrived for me?
Is it a rabbit teacher I need now?
If so, I'd like to surrender with such grace.
Then, will we all lie down together,
lion, lamb, rabbit and pathogens?
I always vaguely thought that sounded nice.
Now I'm not so sure.
And I still resist.

--Molly Hunt, August 2013

DONKEY

DONKEY

I stumbled upon a timeless communion with an aged donkey.

Already compromised by illness,
I sat on my wobbly three-legged camping stool.

We met eye to eye, transfixed and still.

Who knows how long we dwelled together

before I was obliged to pull myself away

and resume ordinary life.

 

Perhaps we are still there now.

 

How can I tell you what I beheld in the depthless black eye

of that white-haired fellow-being?

 

I found something more captivating than the night sky

in the deep wilderness

brilliantly dense with stars.

But it was so unassuming it could have easily been over-looked.

 

Imagine a fullness so complete

that it was larger than the universe itself,

All that ever was and will be,

burbling yet blissfully peaceful.

My life, yours

all the struggles and striving of us two-leggeds were at home.

 

Had that animal existed forever?

Witnessed everything?

Before the big bang,

before and after God?

 

I sometimes wonder what her unwavering eye saw in mine.

 

That elder donkey was approaching her immanent threshold

as naturally as she was shedding her coat for a season she would never know.

 

My illness seemingly progressing, I contemplate my own threshold.

I recall that episode,

so seamless and simple at the time.

 

But now I won't let it alone.

I grab for it.

I want it back.

I want to swim into that eye.

Or to be that absolute totality on four sturdy legs,

unconcerned about the future, the past,

without the desire for answers, without regrets.

 

Somehow the juicy eternity in that now-dimmed eye must be reachable,

though the eye itself no longer shines.

Can I find my way there?

Will it claim me?
 

--Molly Hunt, July 2013

This is a painting that my friend Charlotte Price painted in response to the poem above.  It is entitled, "Unburdened Beast."  Thank you Charlotte.  I love this companion dearly.  Anyone interested in learning more about Charlotte's artwork is welcome to email me.

Molly says, as in the old song,

"May the circle be unbroken."

A favorite poem of Molly's

This reflects something of my longing. It expresses something I'm not able to finds my own words for right now. There's so much I wish could be said and shared with all of you.
Love always, Molly
LAKE AND MAPLE
by Jane Hirshfield

I want to give myself
utterly
as this maple
that burned and burned
for three days without stinting
and then in two more dropped off every leaf;
as this lake that,
no matter what comes
to its green-blue depths,
both takes and returns it.
In the still heart,
that refuses nothing,
the world is twice-born–
two earths wheeling,
two heavens,
two egrets reaching down into subtraction;
even the fish
for an instant double,
before it is gone.
I want the fish.
I want the losing it all
when it rains and I want
the returning transparence.
I want the place
by the edge-flowers where
the shallow sand is deceptive,
where whatever
steps in must plunge,
and I want that plunging.
I want the ones
who come in secret to drink
only in early darkness,
and I want the ones
who are swallowed.
I want the way
this water sees without eyes,
hears without ears,
shivers without will or fear
at the gentlest touch.
I want the way it
accepts the cold moonlight
and lets it pass,
the way it lets
all of it pass
without judgement or comment.
There is a lake,
Lalla Ded sang, no larger
than one seed of mustard,
that all things return to.
O heart, if you
will not, cannot, give me the lake,
then give me the song.

July 18, 2011 From Molly's cousin Stuart Hunt, who is in Santa Fe working hard for Molly's health (excerpt):

By most outward appearances Molly is far from death. Although her major organs are under great strain, none of them appears to be shutting down. She is not likely to "slip away" anytime soon. However, she does suffer. She is in a great deal of pain, utterly exhausted, afraid for her sanity, barely mobile, unable to sleep and barely able to keep food down. She clings to life but she does so as almost an act of pure will. She is running on nervous / mental energy alone. This, in itself, puts a huge demand on her physical resources and yet she has already overdrawn her account in the "physical resources" department. Consequently, she descends to an evermore tenuous and fragile and vulnerable state of being. It is very hard on her.

April 2011

Flowering forsythia brought from her yard
and first cherry blossoms
tears in her dark room
"you've brought me spring"

Marilyn

Jan. 30, 2011

We’re sorry we haven’t been keeping you up to date on Molly’s welfare. Every hour is occupied with caring for her and looking for solutions. Her illness, which first manifested as Lyme disease, then progressed to include environmental illness with multiple sensitivities (as it often does in advanced cases of Lyme). It’s further complicated by sensory sensitivities (to light, sound, motion, fragrance etc.), mercury, mold and other neurotoxin poisoning, and genetic anomalies impairing her ability to eliminate toxins. Most treatments have become impossible for her to tolerate, and often produce adverse reactions. Her core vital force apparently remains strong, and she has gained some weight back. The main recommendation of the doctors right now, while some new medical approaches are being worked out, is for distance energy healers, who often sound a more hopeful note. But we are pleased to say that both hormone treatments and a protocol to address her many sensitivities are coming up in the near future. We hope she can tolerate them, and they will work!

This is a good time for us to put in a renewed request for your prayers, meditation or whatever you choose, such as holding Molly in your hearts or playing the protective Mantra CD that Molly burned. Please concentrate especially on our finding the right help for her!

We’re so thankful for your presence in her/our lives. If you’re so moved, Molly would love to hear what you’re doing and what’s alive for you, and perhaps to hear one true thing from the heart on any subject or something that made you laugh heartily recently.

Responding is difficult for her, though, because she is too weak for writing or dictating. She is now sensitive to electro-magnetic fields from telephones, computers etc. But you can be sure that she is deeply appreciative. “I’m holding you in my heart and feeling grateful for all the ways you’ve touched me,” she says. “I also can’t express enough gratitude for the loving care and devotion of my parents.”

New symptoms include a central nervous system that simply will not rest and cognitive problems, all of which the doctors say are part of the neurological aspects of Lyme. She is also weakening (in spite of her strong vital force), and experiencing ever more pain and sensitivities. Every day and night is challenging for her just to get through. She feels under continual siege from these internal and external stressors. As a result of the crazy constellation of her symptoms she has become increasing isolated and confined. She wants so much to get her life back, but is weary of soldiering on. She makes herself eat in spite of nausea. Her spirit and wit shine through, even though she is unable to talk for long at a time (and when she does she pays for it in serious wear and tear on the body and mind).

Her neurological problems make it extra hard for her to process what’s happening. She says, “I am in disbelief. I cannot believe this is my destiny.  I still feel so ALIVE!"

We all send great love to you,
Marilyn, Molly and Frank(lin)

March 2010

Sorry we haven’t been giving frequent reports on Molly’s condition, but we’ve been vigorously pursuing various avenues, some promising but none magic bullets. In the meantime, her condition on the whole gets worse. She has to stay in a darkened room at our house because of the rawness of her senses (hyperacusis)–she is still very sensitive to light, sound, scent, motion and commotion. She remains weak and subject to physical and mental torment every day, but at least she continues to eat well. Her doctors work hard. Cousin Catherine was a big boost for everyone while she was in Santa Fe, staying at Molly’s house. Thank you, Catherine!

Molly sends vast love and hugs to everyone. She asked me to convey that one of the most challenging aspects of her illness at the moment is her inability to be in more direct and individual contact with her loved ones she misses terribly. She is unable to write or converse or even dictate except for small amounts, which even then are very taxing. If you can believe it, even the presence of others in her room triggers a great many symptoms. She felt enormously supported by Catherine’s coming out, but heart-broken not to be able to enjoy her beloved cousin’s delightful company more often.

It’s especially difficult not to be able to express in a way she would like her gratitude for the e-mails, art work, inspiring messages and book excerpts, photographs, gifts, voice mail messages, prayers, Reiki, blog entries, letters, cards and loving thoughts, and those who sit with her in meditation or prayer. It is also hard not to be able to express support during loved ones’ own difficult times and to share in celebrations of joyful times. She says, Please know that even though I am silent at the moment, I am sending love and best wishes through the ether.

As you can see, Molly’s symptoms have made her very very isolated, and I know your contact and supportive thoughts are very meaningful to her. Blog comments are fun for her too. I know she is grateful for your concern, as are Frank and I.

Love,
Marilyn, Molly and Frank

P.S. Molly asks me to add our gratitude for research, expertise, practical support and other contributions she can't even begin to list!

Molly, Frank and I cherish your support for Molly. We’re sorry we haven’t been better at giving updates on her situation. As you know, she isn’t able to write or talk without exhausting herself and bringing on more symptoms. We haven’t had clear news to convey because her body has had such intolerance for many medications, antibiotics and supplements. That has also kept us hopping, looking for solutions.

Here is a piece of news, however, that we hope will turn out to be significant. It could make sense of the variety of frustrations we’ve met with. A Lyme doctor who has noted Molly’s low tolerance and sensitization to antibiotics and other medications, and her history of toxin exposures, points out that she may have a genetic predisposition against recovering from such exposures (especially to Lyme toxins and molds). She may be lacking an enzyme necessary to break down the toxins. She should receive the HLA test (Human Leukocyte Antigen test) to determine which pathway for detox is blocked, and also a test for methylation defect. Then measures could be taken to counteract any such problem. (The doctor has 5 patients who had the same trouble, were tested and are improving.) This sounds promising! Fingers crossed!

Note: Molly has been suffering with increasing neurological symptoms. Everything seems to move at a stately pace in the medical world, but on Monday, Dec. 14th, we are expecting to get the tests--10 of them!--done for missing enzymes etc. . Then we wait for the results, and see what to do about them...

A new adventure, from Molly

I have received some comments that have spurred me to indulge in what is perhaps the most dangerous use of a blog: the sharing of dubious artistic efforts. I will share some of the poems I’ve written recently. I have chosen haiku as a form, because it’s a length I can deal with, with my enfeebled mind and weak arms.

First, disclaimers. I’m no poet, and I’ve had no chance to study haiku form. Mom googled some of the barest guidelines for me–English haiku can be one to three lines totaling 17 syllables or less, with direct observation of nature, often two images with a meaningful implied contrast.

Maybe others will be inspired to add their own poems!

my cottonwood struck by lightning
no “why this?” or
“oh shit, what now?”

unable to go there myself
the mountains came to me
on the evening wind

glee at saving a spider from drowning
moments later, crushed to have rolled over a lace-winged insect.

pinons against moon-lit clouds
longing for the nights of
outdoor adventures

(From Marilyn on those trees:
stars peer through pinons
christmas in September.)

awakened by mouse on my bed
mournful hope for the springing
of Pop’s traps

four fresh
roadside crosses
wash of Milky Way shimmering

two tiny vases
of fresh cut wildflowers
mama loves me

This next and last pertains to Nature magazine’s cover story about a marmoset monkey that had successfully received a foreign gene. It was my first haiku effort and Pop sent it in for publication as a “letter to the editor”–but no luck!

biomedical supermodel
“hisui”
sad lost eyes

Papa, please post the ballad you have started for me upon my request at a particularly sad moment. Maybe others will be inspired to add verses.

September 20, 2009 from Molly

Apologies. We have received a lot of email from loved ones saying they were unable to post their comments to the blog. We too had trouble (i.e. Mom!). We had to give precedence to numerous doctor consults, etc., but we've solved the blog problem now, and have posted some comments we have in hand. (They aren't in the order they were received.)

Please do try new posts with some confidence!

August update

Dear friends and family,

We've been so busy we haven't posted updates for quite a while. Plus, I was shy about figuring out how to do posts! Now there are three new ones all at once that we’d started over a period of time.

Much of what was in the last posting, for July, is still valid, sorry to say. But we were very fortunate to arrange an early August face-to-face meeting between Molly a  Lyme expert and consultant from out of state.

Consequently he and our local doctor who we have consulted in the past, have put together a new plan for treatment, which we are beginning to carry out in an orderly manner as befits Molly’s sensitive state--frustrating though it is, not to implement everything at once!

Love to all, and thank you so much for your support,
Marilyn

P.S. from Molly: As I say below, I haven’t been able to retrieve e-mails sent to my address since mid-June, and I miss those communications. Please do send future e-mails to the address you find on the e-mail notification about the new entries. I look forward to hearing from you, and to your comments on the blog (just say if you would like us to post your e-mails on the blog for you).

Update on Molly, July

Dear family and friends,

I wish I had better news to report. Molly is having a very difficult time, because of deterioration in her physical vigor and increase in her neurological symptoms, especially sensitivities of all kinds. It is very tricky treating Lyme disease, although she is able to take many supplements meant to counteract various aspects of her troubles, as well as attacking the spirochetes themselves.

A principal obstacle to improvement is her sensory sensitivities not only to sound, but to light and motion. Most recently she is suffering from vertigo. Sound sensitivity (hyperacusis) is said to be suffered by almost half of Lyme victims to greater or lesser degree, but information about treatment is very difficult to find. It makes the herxes (symptoms resulting from the toxins released by the dying spirochetes) terrible to deal with, even though they are “only” intensifications of her usual symptoms. A related symptom is panic attacks that awaken her out of the blue and make rest difficult. What an awful disease Lyme is– you have to decide how much torment you can stand at a given time in order to treat it.

The delightful early summer evening drives we were having near Santa Fe, as described in Molly’s and my entries above, have been curtailed because of a mistake one day in going out while the sun, though low, was still bright as only sun in New Mexico can be :-). This set Molly back in her tolerance for not only light but sound and motion as well. Now she is confined to a darkened room, except for evening sits on our portal watching the sky. We fantasize that we are the deck of an ocean liner.

We hope to report on new developments in her treatments before long.

One result of Molly’s being at our house is that she doesn’t have access to a computer, since ours are on the second floor. She is also having more trouble writing--even for me to transcribe into e-mails--so she asks me to give her regrets for not being able to communicate with family and friends as much as she would like to. But please keep the blog comments and e-mails coming! You can post comments to the blog following the instructions in the right column. Or just use my e-mail address (on my e-mail notification about the new posts) since Molly isn’t able to pick up her own e-mail, and say whether or not you want your message posted.

Love from Marilyn and Frank


Molly says:
I do wish to add that I have not been receiving e-mail since mid-June. So, I’m not ignoring you, if you wrote! I was in the middle of so many delicious email conversations that I miss terribly–some loving, supportive, disclosing and honest, some deep and existential, others deliciously newsy and light, some hilariously offbeat, some more intermittent but heartful and connected. Facebook was a wonderful discovery as a way to connect with people as well. I miss you all!

Written in June, posted in August (sorry!)

Dear Molly,

I really like the name of your blog, Maple Tree Warrior. It’s fierce and peaceful at the same time. How sad that the tree you loved is physically gone. But you are carrying it forward in your heart!

Your Lyme disease has subtle ties to nature. A bad part is that it’s a symptom of changes in our world caused by global warming. As you know, with warmer winters bacteria are surviving in greater numbers than ever. Lyme disease has existed for a long time, but now it is causing real havoc to lives like never before.

Another negative tie to nature is that Lyme often causes extreme environmental sensitivities, as you know only too well. Some of your indications of trouble were, early on, severe reactions to paint, outgassing from gym mats, and more recently everything from pesticide and skin products to purportedly harmless building materials... An ongoing saga.

Some of that has brought you temporarily from your cozy house that you put so much thought, work and love into, to our house. We love having you here, but we know that it’s more difficult for you to negotiate with the tough Saltillo tile floors and highway noise in the distance. And it’s hard for you not being in close email contact with your friends and family. A good thing, though, is the hilarity we share at mealtimes on your good days, and the monk-like silent communion on your not-so-good days. Also, as I write this on the 4th of July, we seldom hear fireworks here, in contrast to your own kid-friendly neighborhood.

Another good thing about your being at our house is that it has started the three of us driving New Mexico backroads and helping you to reconnect with the countryside, using your camera as well as (as much as possible) your senses. Sadly, with the sound and light sensitivities you’ve developed, you need your ear plugs, noise-cancelling headphones and two pairs of reflective sunglasses. It’s hard to see you have to buffer yourself from the outdoors you have so long loved–bird songs, the sound of wind and rain, much less thunderstorms. And for you not to be able to enter the wilderness in the same way, except by digging your feet into the earth when we drive up the hill to watch the sunset.

But driving we’ve enjoyed geological formations and striations; the spectacular and unlikely flourishing of cactus flowers thanks to this unusually moist season; the farmer whose wife’s family has lived in the town of Stanley for 100 years showing us the mysterious old farm tools they lovingly preserved by arranging on weathered boards, and describing the lost sense of community since the old Stanley store closed. Then there is the little church whose touching cemetery holds timeless stone crosses, each a distinctive and compelling shape; the achingly fresh and lovingly tended descanso (roadside memorial) near our house for four teenagers killed by a drunk driver; and the hidden pond with the majestic, venerable oaks and cottonwoods drinking from it.

Trees-- I loved Deborah Post’s comment posted on your blog, with the Tagore poem about trees’ relationship to the earth and sky; and the “rowandell” email address your imaginative cousin Pym used to have, referring to those lacy trees and the Elves’ home in Tolkien’s Middle Earth. We had a rowan tree at our place in upstate New York, too, although we called it by its other name, mountain ash. The Ents from Tolkien have worked their way into our drawings and vocabulary as allies as well.

I’ve told you about the mimosa tree in my grandmother’s yard in Oklahoma City when I was growing up. It was my magical playhouse, shelter and throne, graced with delicate pink blossoms–my “powder puff” tree. {drawing?}

Pop and I want to wish you strength from all such trees,

Worlds of love, Mom


Thank you, Mom, for this lovely entry.

It has been a great comfort to be at your house, though hard to have my own sanctuary toxic. But we have had some fun and a lot of laughs! (Not that there haven’t been tense moments too, of course. How could there not? We have grown from those too.) I have enjoyed our evening sits outside, including my first sighting of the Milky Way in longer than I care to contemplate, complete with shooting star. There have also been some family firsts, for instance the breakdown of the decades-long taboo against the use of foul language in front of one another. My father was the last to fall. My first instinct was to immediately call my sister, “Can you believe it? Papa said, ‘#*!&xs!!’”??

Another new activity has arisen from my taking to the writing of haikus (brevity having a sudden new allure, since writing is more difficult). Sometimes we compose haikus together, one person thinking up the first phrase, and all of us coming up with the second and comparing our creations.

And then there’s sitting together in meditation. Who would have thunk. All in all, we have gotten to know each other a lot more.

Thank you for writing about trees, Mom. It’s so soothing just to talk about them. They have also been a major subject of my picture taking, thanks to you and Pop driving me around. Since I can’t leave the passenger seat, we call Pop the “dolly driver,” as I issue commands to go forward or back a few feet, and Mom the technical adviser, since she is a photographer in her own right and can read the camera manual, which I cannot.

I thought of a couple of things to add about trees. I thought of a healer who once advised me during a time of stress to go into nature, commenting, “I’ve never met a tree that agreed with my neurosis.” How true!

I also thought of how many “pests” are the result of ecosystems out of balance. They have their place in a functioning ecosystem but something tips the balance and they take over. Another example of this, and devastating to all of us here in Northern New Mexico, is the decimation of the pinon trees a few years ago. Our dear tree man, Rich (who was heart-breakingly downcast during that period, despite all the business it gave him cutting down dead trees), was at my house a few weeks ago looking at my own struggling pinons, and discussing how to rid them of needle scale. He commented that he made peace with all his “pest”-killing by thinking of it as helping them end their bad karma, so they might come back as higher life forms, or, in his words, as “progressives.”

I have thought of that often with regard to all the spirocide I have been doing. That is perhaps a good segue to a little medical update, which I will mostly let you (Mom) take over. I will say this though: The cure is worse than the disease! Those spiros release nasty neurotoxins during their death throes–whoa! It has been nothing short of hellish. Maybe one day I’ll get really honest about the experience. So far I’m sorry to say the results have been subtle if any.

Since Mom and I started this entry, a lot of uncertain things have happened medically. My neurological symptoms have worsened considerably, and my treatment team is in disagreement about what to do. It’s scary to have one practitioner tell you you’re in danger if you don’t take a particular substance today and another tell you you’re endangering yourself if you do, and to really feel like you don’t have the where-with-all to decide.

Now I am truly thankful to be at Mom and Pop’s house, as I really require a monopoly of their time and attention and support right now. I struggle a lot with guilt about this, as they will testify.

I’ll let Mom take over from here and say more, but first I want to express my regret at not being able to go on and on with tributes to those who have devoted enormous heart and effort to helping me in extraordinary ways. I hope to get to this as soon as possible. I’ll just say for now it’s a wondrous display to watch the various ways that creation (human beings) express(es) love, each a different flavor of gift. I am grateful for it all, and look forward to observing that beautiful display from another standpoint and even more so as a fuller participant.

Love to you all,
Molly