The Fairy Godmother

     

I never dressed up like a Disney princess.
I never even pictured myself a princess.

However, as I think back over my life, I realize that, like Cinderella, I had a fairy godmother.
Daley Love didn’t look anything like the fairy godmother in Disney’s Cinderella movie.

However, she did care for me and my sister as if we were her own children, and she loved my children as her own.  

And she would have turned a pumpkin into a coach for me if she could have.
She would have provided birds as companions to remind me I was loved.

After all, anyone named Daley Love has to be a special person,
Someone whose name exemplifies her.

Daley Love was a fairy godmother of sorts—
She had a magical touch.
She could make a house a home,
a picnic meal a feast,
or an ordinary event a memory to remember long after.

Much as the fairy godmother turned the pumpkin into a magical coach drawn by
mice-turned horses,
Any space in which Daley Love lived in or inhabited became something special—-

A fireplace became a hearth,
A playroom became a magical land of imagination,
A group of children who didn’t sing well became a heavenly choir she directed,
A Caravan camping trip became glamping,
And even a trip to Adventure Island in the pouring rain with roaches pouring out of the shelter we huddled beneath became a memory to forever remember.

Her hospitality,
Her warmth,
Her love . . .

Through my childhood,
Through the awkward teen years,
Through young motherhood, as she greeted each of my children with all the joy a biological mother would,
Through marriage and divorce and remarriage,
Through the deaths of my grandparents, my mother, my father,
Daley Love stood witness and supported me.
Cards would arrive in the mail with love sprinkled inside the envelope.

As one of my mother’s closest friends,
She was the reference book of all things people,
And when Mom could not remember someone’s name or something pertinent,
Daley Love was on speed dial.
For her, people mattered.
People deserved to be seen and deserved to be cared for.

Quietly working weekly at the church counting money,
Doing the books for Freight Sales, supporting her husband,
Cooking food for others,
Volunteering at the church,
Daley Love exemplified love.

How fortunate I am to have memories of times with her
Sledding down snow-covered hills,
Riding in the back of the Freight Sales mattress-filled semi-truck with Lori, Joey, and Kelly,
Singing in the choir she and Carol Mihlfeld led with Psalty the Songbook (AKA Dad) beside me,
Singing beside her in Jim Lacy’s choir when I became older,
Seeing her smile as I married a second time,
Seeing her rocking my youngest in a rocking chair in Texas,
And providing me the warmest welcome when I was able to come back home to Florida.

I will miss knowing that she is only a phone call away,
Or a trip away.
I will miss her tender ability to create that magical sense of love.

I have to believe that she would agree with the Fairy Godmother who says to Cinderella,
“If you’d lost all your faith, I couldn’t be here. And here I am!”

And with just a bit of faith, I think she would want to tell me
She is here.  Still with me.  Just a memory away,
Turning the ordinary into love-touched memories.
Telling me that the ugliness of the world and of evil "stepsisters" can be something of the past.
Reminding me that I am more than some ash-covered unseen being.

With just a bit of faith, she is here telling me that I am more than that.
I am loved.
And my challenge now is to go out and share this truth with others.  

My challenge is to exemplify daily love for
Daley Love.

The Accompanist

 

It is much easier to be the loud voice,
The one who voices an opinion and others follow,
The one who is allowed to be a diva with all the volatile roller-coaster emotions attached.

It is much easier to be the soloist,
The one who gets to lead the music,
The one who decides the speed, and
The one who gets the appreciation.

It is much harder to be the accompanist.
It is much harder to let the soloist lead,
To slow down when the soloist does, to match the rhythms,
To be heard—-but not be heard too much.

It takes so much effort to support the melody,
To fit in and squeeze around the main attention,
To be beside and around and under the voice that is heard.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Elaine Brock was The Accompanist.

As early as I remember, she was a literal accompanist,
Playing organ and piano in church,
Accompanying both my dad and me when we sang solos in church.
She sat patiently beside Kelly and me as we learned to play all the basic notes on the piano.
She took her seat in the alto section of the choir, harmonizing and supporting the melody.

She was much more than a musical accompanist.
She was a figurative accompanist to the lives of many.
She was the silent work partner to my dad for several decades, his silent Accompanist.
She supported his larger-than-life personality and actions,
Quietly moving in the shadows,
But ALWAYS supporting, harmonizing, noticing the gaps, and filling in as needed.

She was The Accompanist to my mother as well.
She was a friend who listened, a friend who had raised her children and was willing to support a young mother with two young girls.
She was tickled with these two girls who played at her house with her antique stamps and with the Billy Goat Gruff bridge over the little creek,
She altered their clothing,
She listened to their stories,
And she loved.

She became a fixture in my life, my godmother just in case my parents died early.

I probably have a hundred pictures with the Brocks amongst my family—-at garage sales, in the VW van going to Daytona Beach, picnicking beside the interstate on the way to North Carolina eating sloppy joes with Joe (oh how funny my sister and I found this!), cleaning nasty refrigerators in rental houses, eating Biltmore ice cream, swinging on the swing at Lake Junaluska, and even putting up with my mom’s crazy idea to sled down the road in the snow.
She helped with canning, pickling peaches, fixing the trout for dinner, and puzzling over the pieces on the dining room table.

Once again, as I look at these pictures, 

The Accompanist cannot be seen in the forefront of the pictures,
But she is always there,
Moving amongst the melody,
Harmonizing, supporting, and lifting the melody to new heights.

As I grew older, and my life took unexpected twists,
I always knew that this woman would support me no matter what.
She may not have always understood my situation,
But when no one else seemed to be in my corner, she stood in a parking lot beside I-35 in Waco, Texas, and hugged me as I cried.
She arranged her spring vacation to witness my second chance at marriage—

And for decades, she has quietly changed out the flowers at my dad’s burial site—-and then again, at my mother’s.  She has spent more time at the cemetery quietly accompanying my family than I have been able to since 1993.

Although I did not know The Accompanist early in her life, I know she served as a
Beautiful accompaniment to her husband,
Supporting, listening, and being a part of his pursuits,
Whether it was stamping books at Bartow High, visiting people in the hospitals, listening to his Sunday School lessons, and playing hymns for the services.

* * * * * * * * * * *

I will miss her.
I will miss her accompaniment to my life’s journey.

She so effortlessly supported my melody,
She fit in and squeezed around,
She was beside me, around me, and lifted me up when I could not hear my own melody.

Beautiful Accompanist, your harmonies will forever be in my heart.
I long to accompany those I love the way you did to those around you.

Boo Radley meets Casper the Friendly Ghost

   

“A house is made of walls and beams; a home is built with love and dreams.” — Unknown

Once upon a time architect pens hovered over floorplans,
Electricians strung the wires between the studs,
The roofers hammered the shingles,
And every last paint color and brick shade was selected.

Anticipation and promise and the possibilities of the future hung in the air,
Calendar days were counted for the completion of the construction.
Title papers were signed,
The key was handed over,
And a new life began.

The new owners had an idea of what their lives would be like,
The dreams of connectedness,
The hopes of happiness and joy,
The thoughts of future years planned out.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Something happened.
I don’t know what.
All I know is that when I moved into this neighborhood seventeen years ago,
The dream for life in that house  had died,
This hope was abandoned.

As far as I remember, this house has always been abandoned.
Seventeen years of echoes within the rooms.
Seventeen years of neglect and abandonment,
Seventeen years on display for all who pass by to see.

I may not live in Maycomb, Alabama, but I think Harper Lee would agree that this house has the feel of the Radley home—
The decay,
The mystery,
The sadness of lives not lived as anticipated.

Thanks to a lack of housing restrictions in the country,
This home has fallen
And fallen
And fallen into disrepair and neglect.

That house has haunted me for years.
I don’t think an evil spirit or even Casper the Friendly Ghost  hovers.
However, there is a sense of grief and loss associated with this house each time I drive by.
Lost now—-
All the love and attention,
All the time and energy,
All the anticipation and hopes  and passion—-

And now the weeds hide the front of the house,
The front door that once hosted a wreath for Christmas
 is now hidden from view.
The tree that may have hosted the play of children among its limbs
Now stands with dead branches, drooping and falling on the once-shingled roof,
The yard that once was green and new
Is now strewn with weeds and dead grass.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

How can a building have such a loud voice?
How can it speak to my heart of the disappointments in life,
To the desperation silently felt by so many?

It seems to  stand as a monument to the many shattered dreams and
The grief of lost possibilities.

Grief is not just a loss of a physical presence.
It is the loss of future dreams and future possibilities.

This house speaks to me of the choices available to me at this time of change in my life—
When my husband no longer is beside me,
And when my children are physically or emotionally distant.

This house speaks to me of the individuals who have given up,
Those whose massive potential screamed to the world,
And yet those same individuals whose self-view became so distorted that giving up and giving in were the only options.
This house speaks to me of those whose mental illnesses have warped the possibilities,
Those whose grief, depression, and anxieties have grown up to shut out the sunshine.
Those whose dark secrets have blocked the entrance or exit from their inner self-imposed exile.


This house haunts me with questions:
Will I be the house I currently live in?
Willing to undergo a new vision, a new remodeling, a new purpose?

Or will I silently give in to time,
Watching it pass me by as the bushes cover the front windows, back windows, and doors,
As the glass darkens,
As the exits to the house are blocked?


* * * * * * * * * *
This house haunts me in its sadness.
The possibilities dreamed of are now dead.
There is no hope for these four walls other than demolition.

I am not ready for this.
I am destined for more than demolition or self-immolation.

It is hard to see the beauty of this new life with its changed possibilities.

However, it is a good thing that this woman who has undergone several traumas in life
is good with yard work and hard work.

I am picking up the pruners to trim back the bushes,
Kneeling, weeding my beds,
Standing with my hose, watering my plants,
Searching for bees feeding from the blossoms.
I am picking up my window cleaner, making sure that the vision from my windows is clear.
Day by day, step by step, inch by inch,
I am clearing out the mental and emotional debris,
Determined to make my physical and symbolic house
a testament,
a monument of
resiliency, of strength, and of hope.

Maybe if I can make my “house” that sort of testament
Others with no hope will perhaps dare to speak to me,
Dare to perhaps clean their own windows and let me help them with their yard work.