I met Rosalie about 15 years ago, when she put me up for my dad's second wedding. I fell in love with her on sight, when she threw open the door and bathed me and my brothers in such warmth and delight that even awkward, dorky I felt completely welcome in her life.
I stayed in the little den next to her bedroom, overlooking the pool. Her house was built in the 50s, when her neighborhood was inexpensive and remote. It has an endless view across the whole valley of Los Angeles.
She was a spring chicken, only 83 years old. She had already had two back surgeries to fuse vertebrae, and scooted around – with characteristic energy – in the distinctive crow-backed shuffle of post-fixation chronic back pain.
About five years later, my CRPS journey started. Rosalie was my first model of how to handle increasing pain and disability with a degree of grace and poise. Whenever I came to visit my stepmom or her mother, I'd see if Rosalie's and my schedules would allow a visit. In all those years, I don't think she failed to raise a smile more than once or twice, despite some brutal trials.
She had several more surgeries, implanted devices, physical therapy, and she swam laps in her pool whenever she could possibly manage it, inviting whoever came over to swim with her to have a glass of wine and tonic water (or gin instead of wine, for my stepmom) afterwards.
She kept love in focus: for her offspring and her dear friends, she had a seemingly bottomless well of love and regard, regardless of the vicissitudes of life and relationships.
She was always herself: whatever her opinion, and whether or not you agreed with it, she would let you know. No energy and no words were wasted on making things seem nicer than they were. You never had to wonder what her agenda was. And she managed that without ever being pissy or the least bit mean. Conservation of energy, including emotional energy, is a big issue for pain conditions, because pain is so exhausting; she didn't waste a drop.
Yet she was famous for the radiancy of her outlook, not to mention of her smile. As soon as she had answered the question, "How are you?" with customary honesty, she visibly put that aside, turned her bright eyes on her visitors, and got them talking about more interesting things. She kept her focus where it belonged: on the rest of life.
As I said at her memorial service yesterday, she always looked for the nuggets of gold, whatever else was going on. She always looked for a way forward, whatever held her back.
If you've read this blog for any length of time, you know that I hardly ever write about anything until I've found the nugget of gold. You know that I always look for a way forward, whatever holds me back.
I can find this in myself, in large part because Rosalie gave me a living, breathing, occasionally querulous but never unfair, always loving, always real example of how to do it. I need those living models. I can learn only so much in theory.
This is real life. And sooner or later, it ends. I'm slightly bowled over by this intensely personal realization that the true radiance of a life can outlast the grave. Rosalie's radiance is with me still, reflected off these nuggets of gold.
I stayed in the little den next to her bedroom, overlooking the pool. Her house was built in the 50s, when her neighborhood was inexpensive and remote. It has an endless view across the whole valley of Los Angeles.
She was a spring chicken, only 83 years old. She had already had two back surgeries to fuse vertebrae, and scooted around – with characteristic energy – in the distinctive crow-backed shuffle of post-fixation chronic back pain.
About five years later, my CRPS journey started. Rosalie was my first model of how to handle increasing pain and disability with a degree of grace and poise. Whenever I came to visit my stepmom or her mother, I'd see if Rosalie's and my schedules would allow a visit. In all those years, I don't think she failed to raise a smile more than once or twice, despite some brutal trials.
She had several more surgeries, implanted devices, physical therapy, and she swam laps in her pool whenever she could possibly manage it, inviting whoever came over to swim with her to have a glass of wine and tonic water (or gin instead of wine, for my stepmom) afterwards.
She kept love in focus: for her offspring and her dear friends, she had a seemingly bottomless well of love and regard, regardless of the vicissitudes of life and relationships.
She was always herself: whatever her opinion, and whether or not you agreed with it, she would let you know. No energy and no words were wasted on making things seem nicer than they were. You never had to wonder what her agenda was. And she managed that without ever being pissy or the least bit mean. Conservation of energy, including emotional energy, is a big issue for pain conditions, because pain is so exhausting; she didn't waste a drop.
Yet she was famous for the radiancy of her outlook, not to mention of her smile. As soon as she had answered the question, "How are you?" with customary honesty, she visibly put that aside, turned her bright eyes on her visitors, and got them talking about more interesting things. She kept her focus where it belonged: on the rest of life.
As I said at her memorial service yesterday, she always looked for the nuggets of gold, whatever else was going on. She always looked for a way forward, whatever held her back.
If you've read this blog for any length of time, you know that I hardly ever write about anything until I've found the nugget of gold. You know that I always look for a way forward, whatever holds me back.
I can find this in myself, in large part because Rosalie gave me a living, breathing, occasionally querulous but never unfair, always loving, always real example of how to do it. I need those living models. I can learn only so much in theory.
This is real life. And sooner or later, it ends. I'm slightly bowled over by this intensely personal realization that the true radiance of a life can outlast the grave. Rosalie's radiance is with me still, reflected off these nuggets of gold.
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... and the fact that you look for the nugget of gold is really what makes this blog so readable.
ReplyDeleteIt's what makes it possible to write, too.
DeleteUnrelieved awfulness puts people off. It's also a truly dreadful bore for the one going through it. Hence, the mental panning I sometime have to do in order to write, does me good.
I can now admit that I go back and re-read my own old posts to remind myself that there's more to this life. In short, I occasionally inspire myself. That's peculiarly rewarding. I'm deeply, and re-iteratively, grateful to have learned to dig out the gold.