Summer's pause

when my foot 
pauses
between rocks
in the creek
arms flail and
i plunge --
exhilarated
by the cool depth 
of Nature's tears
like the Natives whose feet
kissed the path along this creek
their courageous connection
no bothersome breeze 
just unbounded, blessed glee
in the valley within the valley

Along The Sound

When you can come off a week-long stay with cousins, their spouses and kids, elders and your own family all under one roof for the first time in 11 years, that is courage, grace and love all at once. As our parents are in their golden years, it becomes even more apparent that living middle aged means making sure that we create more moments for connection and recreate the childhood memories our parents worked so hard to ensure that our family knew we

were fiercely loved. So when we get together, it means reinvigorating our familial love -- even with the family dramedy and dynamics that are sure to surface. Just like the movie The Family Stone, we love and accept our family members for who they are, flaws and all, to grow stronger and more meaningful relationships, all the while with a deep sense of care and support for each other, with family central to strength and resilience. And that, folks, was my New London (CT) reconnection.

be still and listen

to the voices that belong

to our past, present and future,

to the voices that belong
to the sea wall
along The Sound

find our earnest wishes
on the sands under our feet

Human condition

What a week it's been as we recover from my father-in-law's funeral and a long haul of supporting my mother-in-law in her 57 years of caregiving to her husband in their marriage. Our family would undoubtedly agree that she is a saint given her unwavering dedication to her husband in sickness and in health, mostly in sickness the last three years. 

Obituaries always share the best of someone, and they can differ immensely from the complicated components that others experience of a person. Three children in a family can have three completely different relationships with the same father. A grandchild can sense the deep tension between Grandpa and each of his kids.

Marrying into a family can be met either with a warm welcome or a lukewarm undertone, depending on expectations. Still, we can choose to make the best of it and struggle to understand that all parents, even when they are not our own, are human too. Through the years, my father-in-law and I engaged in our own banter, and I distinctly remember him firmly stating that he disliked Hillary Clinton as a presidential candidate because she was 'too strong' (code for 'she's a woman') as we sat in the family waiting room for A. to come through his open heart surgery. 

As we waited for my father-in-law to die, I could not help but reflect on my Dad's cancer journey and his death. Grateful that I did not have sibling dynamics to work through and analyze. What a challenge it is to sit with all the lovely images everyone else has of my father-in-law and reconcile the images I have of him as a hard, most demanding man, especially of his wife and in the years his health declined, along with the experiences that his oldest son, my husband, has shared with me. 

Such is the human condition, and we meet it with compassion and grace. 

prayer
is the heartache's
grieving everything
you would have liked to say
(to those who are dead)
and prayer
is the heavy heartedness's
mourning everything
you would like to say
(to those who live)

Grateful that my father-in-law and mother-in-law raised a son of deepest integrity and discipline. In memory of my father-in-law, Rosendo Torres, b. 3.1.1939 - d. 04.30.2025