Getting What’s Needed

The Friday after Thanksgiving was unseasonably warm here in what otherwise is known as the Icebox of Connecticut. Being on a Thanksgiving break from school, Serena could fill in for me as I took a long walk, a walk to process Thanksgiving calories, a walk to process Thanksgiving events. I used walks to process thoughts all the time before recent events; a vague feeling led me to suspect that this particular walk was long overdue.

I started the walk with an agenda for my thoughts. When the opportunity finally arises I will write memoirs about my journeys with Cindy, the Expedition Woman. As I rambled along the woods road through Barbour Woods, littered with fallen leaves, I worked out three main themes for these memoirs: Boldness, the Joy of Life and Getting What’s Needed.

Yet in the true meditative spirit of a nature walk my thoughts seamlessly shifted from what I wanted to what I needed to think about. Aside from basking in the usual warmth of Thanksgiving family there were two important events on Thanksgiving Day weighing on me. Boldness, Joy of Life and Getting What’s Needed shifted from being main themes for our long distance journeys to the role they were playing in recent events.

Cindy’s side of the family have been, at times, skeptics as to how I was providing care for Cindy. They were not in close touch with the situation, but they did not have to be in order to know that, as usual, I was following the beat of a different drum. Bucking societal expectations and skepticism requires Boldness, which could be foolish or wise, but Bold nonetheless.

Fortunately, recent feedback coming from Cindy’s family provided support for what I was doing, attempting to maximize Cindy’s quality of life, in other words her Joy of Life. On Thanksgiving morning Serena shared with me that after Cindy and I left a Thanksgiving Eve gathering with Cindy’s family one of her sister’s, indeed the one who at times was most skeptical of me, commented on how happy Cindy appeared.

That was the good news event of Thanksgiving morning; the other news received was not so good. My side of the family called to inform me that my oldest brother Pete, afflicted with Alzheimer’s, had been brought to the hospital for his final days on earth. This was the news that weighed the heavier on me as I continued with my walk, crossing from Barbour Woods to Haystack Mountain State Park and a climb up that “mountain.”

My unsettled feeling was not due precisely to the tragedy of the news. As the “mistake” in the family I long accepted that all my nuclear family members likely would pass away before me. My Dad passed away in 1986 from a brain aneurysm, my Mom in 1991 from Alzheimer’s. Almost a quarter century has passed before the next close family member is now about to pass, also from Alzheimer’s. Unfortunately, then there will be another loved one passing from Alzheimer’s all too soon.

As I crossed back over from Haystack to the Wood Creek flood control area, I found myself needing to let go a few sobs. Was I sad? Not exactly. The Joy of Life is the ticket; I felt I was embracing and providing that for Cindy and myself. These were more pensive sobs, if there is such a thing, at how life does not turn out how you want, despite how ardently you might plan or hope otherwise. They were more like “What a long, strange trip it’s been” sobs.

This pensive feeling was augmented during my approach to Davidson’s Rock. I wrote about this Rock not long ago, as it was not long ago that both Cindy and I were here together, by taking the shortest, easiest path. Now Cindy is not capable of walking there even by the shortest, easiest path. As I sat down on the rock alone, I knew that from now on alone on this rock I would be. I am not saying that is a sad or a bad thing; I’m usually alone on that rock anyways.

In our den is a National Geographic book titled: “Journeys of a Lifetime.” With journeys of many types in many places around the world, that book was to be the bucket list for our Golden Years. I doubt we would have achieved all 500 journeys listed in the book, but best to always have something left to shoot for I say. As we fall short of that bucket list of what we want; I yet understand and accept how we may be getting what’s needed.

Cindy was going to get early onset Alzheimer’s whether married to me or not. She will not experience the adventure she wanted in her Golden Years despite being married to an adventurer but, because of that marriage, she still experiences the Joy of Life. She is getting what she needs, if not what she wants; for that I am not sad.

For my part I still will experience some of those adventures. I wanted them to be with Cindy, but they will happen regardless. This at least allows me to continue with Boldness, to take risks I would not take if caring for even a healthy loved one. I am not getting what I want but, perhaps just as well, I am getting what’s needed. For that I am not sad.

Yes, my sobs that warm Friday after Thanksgiving were more pensive than sad. We cannot predict life, but if we have the Boldness to place the Joy of Life first we somehow will Get What’s Needed. That is something to be more thankful than sad about; even so, what a long strange trip life is.