"Doing Dishes"

          When we first moved to San Antonio in the 1960s, the biggest draw of excitement for the new house came from the dishwasher. The luxury of simply rinsing the dishes, pots and pans and then placing them into a machine that washed them seemed decadent to us. I don’t remember anyone complaining about doing the dishes during those first years that we had a machine.

         This little dishwasher toiled away for ten years before its motor burned out. My father’s comment when he realized the expense for replacement? “I have three dishwashers in this house. We don’t need another.”

Resentfully, the women in the household took over the machine’s duties. My sister usually cleared the table, putting any leftovers into neat Tupperware containers and stacking the dishes in a manageable pile. I manned the sink of hot sudsy water. As Paula brought dishes to me, I’d quickly submerge them, scour them clean, and dip them into the second sink filled with rinse water. I didn’t mind this chore, but I often wished the scenery I viewed wasn’t the dining room table. I swore that if I even owned a home, I’d have a kitchen sink with a window that overlooked the yard. No one listened to my grumbles as I scrubbed. My mother just calmly dried each plate and restacked them neatly so my sister could put them away. I may have complained a little more when it came to doing the pots and pans, but with my SOS Brillo pad in hand no job proved insurmountable.

Me and my window!

When I left home for college and my first apartment, I thrilled in having a dishwasher again. Only I barely used it at first because I lived alone. If I didn’t want ants or roaches invading my place, I couldn’t leave dirty dishes in the sink. If I had to rinse the dishes enough to keep the insects away, then I figured I should just wash them by hand. I didn’t begin to rely upon a dishwasher until I roomed with three other women. We constructed a simple rule. If you cooked, you didn’t clean. Three of us cooked on a rotation. One roommate never touched the stove, so she always did some kind of clean-up, but she never complained.

Eventually, my apartment living gave way to home ownership. When David and I bought our house, which was built in 1966, it had a portable dishwasher. The little butcher block model sat on one wall across from the sink. You had to roll it over to the sink and attach a hose to the faucet. Needless to say, it leaked. We rarely used it, but it didn’t matter.

The sink in this kitchen overlooks a huge back yard filled with trees. I could finally stand on the inside, hands submerged in heat and suds, and watch butterflies and hummingbirds. We lived in our current home seven years before we remodeled the kitchen and added a dishwasher. I didn’t shift back to automation as easily as you’d think. By this time, I had several sets of dishes and glasses that I didn’t want to run through a machine. I still preferred to clean pots and pans by hand. When this machine eventually died, we didn’t rush for a replacement. Eventually, the pace of our daily routine converted dishes into another dreaded chore, and my complaints lead my husband and son to search for a perfect replacement.

Every day, though, I still stand at the sink and gaze out into my gardens. I’ll load most of the dishes into the machine, but hand wash a set of plastic tumblers I bought at Target for under $2.00 a piece! These smoky goblets bore the instructions—hand wash to keep glass appearance. As they look so much like glass that you don’t believe they’re plastic unless you touch them, I figure I’ll spend a little time each day with hands submerged and eyes gazing into the backyard.  

Puppy Koi "helping" with the dishes

 Copyright 2012 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

"Inspiration"

Writing, most days, comes easily to me. I sit with pen and spiral notebook and jot ideas, or I face the almighty blank screen of my laptop and wait for my muse to guide my words. One thought may snag my attention, and I’ll obsess over the concept until I create something. Not every piece I produce meets my inner critic’s standards of “quality,” but I ignore that negatively nagging voice and push through until I have something on the page.    

If I pen about a memory, then I become a medium who channels the past into the present. Recounting a recollection proves the easiest type of writing for me. I spent most of my years as I writing teacher modeling for my students the layers of personal narratives. I’d have my students stretch out on the floor and do a visualization activity where they’d revisit an experience. Classroom darkened to reduce visual input, relaxation music playing in the background, and my own voice barely above a whisper, I’d coach my students into their selected memories. I’d take them through all of the senses one-by-one, asking them to take note of specific images within their memory. When I’d let them open their eyes, they would scribble their remembrances as quickly as possible.   

“Get the skeleton of the event down on paper,” I’d preach. “We’ll go back later and add the other layers. I’ll give you the tools you need.”

       And I’d teach them about simile, metaphor, personification and imagery. I’d model my own paper on the board or overhead (and later through my laptop and projector,) fleshing out my skeletal first draft until eventually I finished my narrative. Sometimes, I’d show my students how to take the prose narrative and convert it into a poem by lifting out those special words and phrases that brought life to the piece and utilizing them in a different way.

Some days, writing becomes a laborious endeavor, like today. I flit from idea to idea so quickly that nothing makes it to the page. My brainstormed list bores me, and fatigue prevents me from tapping into my childhood. The current news either depresses me or angers me, and either way I can’t muster the momentum to tackle politics. (Perry will have to wait for another day.) Poetry takes even more energy and focus, so I know it’s a long shot that I’ll suddenly whip out a snazzy rhyme or thought provoking verse.

After a million false starts, I decided to let my mind meander to find its own revelations, but stumbled upon no wonderful Inspiration. Instead, I typed in several possible titles, rejected a few beginnings, and finally decided I’d record the silence of my muse, for she hasn’t whispered a single word to me as I sit and write.

        Do you hear the silence?

Copyright 2011 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

"Journey of Grief"

Dad joking with this shot!

          Life punched me in my stomach. A fierce blow delivered by a massive fist that pummeled me mercilessly. Bile burned my throat, and I tried to swallow back the pain, but an altered consciousness enveloped me, held me down against my will.

My dad died.

A few minutes of time changed my life forever. The path I walked so confidently heaved, buckled, and then tore away. The earth shifted and tilted. The wind whipped me off my feet and flung me into an angry ocean of grief.

For months, living weighed me down. Bricks stacked one by one upon my chest each night to where breathing became a challenge each morning. No one told me this pain would overwhelm me.

My wedding

Some people offered support and kindness for a week or two. But the attitude became “snap out of it.” Other people confided that I’d been thrown into a huge, endless sea. It will take years, they said, to reach shore. And when I do reach land, nothing will be the same. So like Odysseus, my life is at the mercy of Poseidon as I flounder on the waters of grief.

During my first weeks, I’d break the water’s surface. My hands flailed helplessly as I gasped for air. My lungs ached from the pressure of the water squeezing me, forcing me down. My vision blurred with unexpected tears. One, two, three inhalations, and down I’d go again. Massive waves towered overhead and somersaulted me head over heels—down, down, down until I hit the sandy bottom and skidded to a grinding, painful stop. The abrasive sands of sadness peeled my skin and left me bleeding and raw. Then I’d slowly drift upward, limp and damaged, and float on the surface like a piece of flotsam

Wave after wave pounded me until waking, moving, sleeping, and thinking became impossible.

And this became my journey, my trip through grief that nears the first year’s anniversary. I don’t know when the bricks stacked upon my chest eased off. Eventually, I realized that in the mornings I could breathe without restriction. I do remember a day in March when I broke through the surface of the water and another tidal wave did not wipe me out. Instead, I stayed afloat. For the first time, I could feel the sun’s warm caress stroke my skin. Spring breezes sighed softly, and bird call filled the air. The hurricane force winds disappeared. Since then, I’ve sighted land. It’s distant still. A misty outline that I swim toward. I no longer float helplessly with the current. And although waves sometimes sweep out of nowhere to pull me under, it doesn’t happen as frequently or as fiercely.

I now know that eventually I’ll touch ground again. The tears that stung my eyes won’t fight for release. Once I make landfall, I’ll smile whenever I think of Dad. His corny jokes, hearty laugh, and sharp wit will come to me and I’ll welcome them with smiles and joy.

Copyright 2002 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

My father died unexpectedly on September 10, 2001. The support system that you'd expect to receive from friends and co-workers became overshadowed by the events of the next day. At the funeral home, the news ran as we discussed plans for Dad. As he was a retired deputy sheriff, many of his friends and colleagues were on alert, making a viewing within the next couple of days impossible. Dad wanted to be interred at Ft. Sam Houston Cemetery, but that had to be delayed for another three weeks. Everything became surreal for our family.

Dad and Mom hiking at their cabin

"The Puzzle Piece"

            The puzzle pieces, dumped unceremoniously upon the dining room table, hide a magic surprise. I pick carefully through the pile, categorizing pieces by color, sliding edges to the side. Puzzles require thinking inside the box, so establishing borders comes first. Straight lines and matching designs group and regroup until I form pairs and short chains. Once the boundaries hold firm, the real work begins. My hands dance through the choreography: pick up, turn, twist, match, fit. Again and again until out of chaos emerges the picture. Gestalt.
          Then disassembly begins. Tearing down the whole back into the individual bits, I bend and separate until chaos piles again on the tabletop. Haphazardly, I swipe everything back into the box, not noticing a lone piece hiding under the edge of a book. Now the puzzle, unknown to me, loses its wholeness. The lone piece longs for reunification. When I pull another puzzle out of its box and spill it across the table, the hidden part slips into the mound, trying to belong where it no longer fits.
            The piece carries similar colors and shapes to this new picture. I don’t notice the subtle differences each time I try to find a place for it. I pick it up, scrutinizing it meticulously as I try to find a mate. Near matches frustrate me as I try to force the bit into belonging. I even resort to pounding it with my fist before casting it aside. I pick up my rhythm once the piece sits in isolation, an outcast within the group. Eventually, the picture sits in completeness upon my table. My eyes draw over to the castaway that caused me so much irritation, and in shame I realize my mistake. Picking up the stray piece, I recall the picture of the last puzzle I’d assembled. I go directly to my shelved boxes, pluck open the correct box, and return the piece to its home.

Copyright 2011 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

"New Voyages"

 

David Chapman--artist

         I never want to spend my life fretting over the words never said, or the acts never completed. The changes in our lives during this last year bring home to me the importance of giving our best to those we love. Sometimes, I get so caught up in the minutiae of a situation that I bog everyone else down. “The Big Picture” always calls for taking risks and believing with heart over head. That outlook proves difficult for my often straight column approach to life, but whenever I’ve chosen my heart, I’ve never gone in the wrong direction. Whenever I push away my heart, anxiety suffocates me. Taking a breath, eating a meal, and sleeping at night all become impossible.

My head analysis tells me the “right” decisions, the cautious choices that assure safe passage across rough seas. My head won’t even weigh anchor if the voyage looks too dangerous.  The head must have life boats in tip-top condition. It makes certain there are enough jackets available for unexpected passengers. It plots my route and stays true to my course. But no matter how carefully my head plans for every exigency, a tidal wave broadsides me, flips my vessel over, and makes life boats and life jackets useless.

         My head, you see, doesn’t calculate for the totally unpredictable event. It cannot. That’s the heart’s job. The heart latches onto dreams and nightmares. The heart foresees the tsunami and still sets sail. The heart accepts risk because life’s random. That capriciousness doesn’t dissuade the heart. The heart believes.

         In the rough seas I now traverse, my heart speaks strongly to me. Believe. Believe. Believe. And so I trust my decisions. The moment I listen to the murmuring song of my heart, the decisions I must make ring true and clear. The head will step forward eventually. It will find the means of making the dreams a reality. By singing along with the heart, the voyage will prove challenging, but not impossible.    

Copyright 2011 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman