I need to say something important about being back in Texas…something righteous, to the bone. Instead, I just feel numb. I’m thinking that I don’t really know where I’m supposed to be. Although for several months I’ve separated myself physically from the world here in Texas that changed dramatically and with such finality when our mother died on February 1 of this year, I didn’t escape in northern New Mexico, and being back in Texas, especially as we finish out this year, I feel the bruises that have marked me, it feels like forever.
I’ve returned to this place I have called home for the last several years. It is a complicated reminder of some of the missteps I’ve made since 1999. Not to beat myself up, at which I am the master, but I have to face some things, make an accounting…pay the piper. What I’ve tried unsuccessfully to keep out of my heart and mind for most of this year is finally staring me in the face, yes, even clawing my face.
Where do I begin digging myself out of this hole? I’ve come home to the winter image of a garden that grew huge as shovel by shovel I turned over the earth for eight years. In a way, digging became my savior during the long, lonely years we focused our attention on Mother’s declining health. Shovel by shovel, I turned over the dirt, exchanging my frustration for the fragrance of the earth. Stone after stone I transferred from palette to wheelbarrow to ground as I redefined what had been pasture into a landscape.
As gardens are wont to be, this one requires attention, nurturing, maintenance, even though I am quick to say, “I have a native garden”. Weeds still grow…like weeds…roses must be pruned…and not just on Valentine’s Day…and with winter comes the severe grooming that follows a year of growth. Before I started my journey west in early summer, I had given the garden all that it craves in early spring, including 14 yards—yes, that’s a dump truck load—of mulch. The early summer brought much rain, but once we hit mid-July, the water stopped, the sun shone with Texas intensity, and there was no relief through mid-October. I was trying to run away, returning to Texas only to ply my antiques trade for a month. The garden got the slam-bam with what little time I had to give it while I was home, and as I left for the return to northern New Mexico, I wished the garden well and prayed for rain. As we are about to enter the New Year, I am again married to a bucket of yard tools, shovel and rake my mates, and a wheelbarrow my pack mule.
If I could count the loads of gravel and crushed granite that completed the paths through the garden, the yards of mulch spread around plants year after year to conserve moisture, I’d really have to say, “How did I do that?” A better question in hindsight is “why did I do that?” I know the answer. It’s how I deal with frustration. It’s why I tackled a two-story barn, making it into a house—a house that will never be completed and that most people just “don’t get”, although they politely say, “interesting”. Flying by the seat of my pants, I’ve spent my money, gone into debt, mostly because I had no plan, just some sense of urgency. Technically, my house is paid for—technically. House and barn-still-not-house are filled to overflowing with treasure, the product of the perpetual hunt. Someone told me a few years ago, “Harold, just because you like something doesn’t mean that you have to own it.” It doesn’t? Explain that to the ranks of card-carrying junkers, the addicted seekers of the golden egg.
I have been away. The fall in northern New Mexico was a gift. It was my first opportunity to live a season where the weather truly changes from warm to cool, the trees follow nature’s directions, and ah-ha moments are waiting outside, along the rivers and just a short drive up the mountains, where at virtually every bend in the road, you just have to say, “oh, my God”. At least, that’s what I say as I witness such beauty. The weather changed, of course, and winter announced itself, well in advance of its official start. On the day of the Winter Solstice, we had several snows behind us. Scraping ice from the windshield of my truck before heading out to coffee each morning was second nature. Friends came from Texas to visit, some for Thanksgiving, others for Christmas. My daily ritual has been journaling, reading, and sometimes roaming along the Pecos River, driving into the mountains, walking, walking, walking, my camera always at hand.
Ah, but lives change, things end, and we try to figure out how to move forward. That’s where I am these days. That’s where we are, those left behind, the heirs, the owners of an undivided interest in property, trying to do the right thing, disagreeing and conceding, distrusting and suspecting, trying to remember the love we felt for one another as our Mother and Daddy’s children, and trying to claim and honor our rights as God’s children. My great escape is arrested. I have come back to what used to be home, where this property and my house are for sale. The road before me, well, it might as well be a mountain. I have come back to pay the piper.
Returning to Texas 2007—Normangee, Texas (December 30, 2007)
R. Harold Hollis
I’ve returned to this place I have called home for the last several years. It is a complicated reminder of some of the missteps I’ve made since 1999. Not to beat myself up, at which I am the master, but I have to face some things, make an accounting…pay the piper. What I’ve tried unsuccessfully to keep out of my heart and mind for most of this year is finally staring me in the face, yes, even clawing my face.
Where do I begin digging myself out of this hole? I’ve come home to the winter image of a garden that grew huge as shovel by shovel I turned over the earth for eight years. In a way, digging became my savior during the long, lonely years we focused our attention on Mother’s declining health. Shovel by shovel, I turned over the dirt, exchanging my frustration for the fragrance of the earth. Stone after stone I transferred from palette to wheelbarrow to ground as I redefined what had been pasture into a landscape.
As gardens are wont to be, this one requires attention, nurturing, maintenance, even though I am quick to say, “I have a native garden”. Weeds still grow…like weeds…roses must be pruned…and not just on Valentine’s Day…and with winter comes the severe grooming that follows a year of growth. Before I started my journey west in early summer, I had given the garden all that it craves in early spring, including 14 yards—yes, that’s a dump truck load—of mulch. The early summer brought much rain, but once we hit mid-July, the water stopped, the sun shone with Texas intensity, and there was no relief through mid-October. I was trying to run away, returning to Texas only to ply my antiques trade for a month. The garden got the slam-bam with what little time I had to give it while I was home, and as I left for the return to northern New Mexico, I wished the garden well and prayed for rain. As we are about to enter the New Year, I am again married to a bucket of yard tools, shovel and rake my mates, and a wheelbarrow my pack mule.
If I could count the loads of gravel and crushed granite that completed the paths through the garden, the yards of mulch spread around plants year after year to conserve moisture, I’d really have to say, “How did I do that?” A better question in hindsight is “why did I do that?” I know the answer. It’s how I deal with frustration. It’s why I tackled a two-story barn, making it into a house—a house that will never be completed and that most people just “don’t get”, although they politely say, “interesting”. Flying by the seat of my pants, I’ve spent my money, gone into debt, mostly because I had no plan, just some sense of urgency. Technically, my house is paid for—technically. House and barn-still-not-house are filled to overflowing with treasure, the product of the perpetual hunt. Someone told me a few years ago, “Harold, just because you like something doesn’t mean that you have to own it.” It doesn’t? Explain that to the ranks of card-carrying junkers, the addicted seekers of the golden egg.
I have been away. The fall in northern New Mexico was a gift. It was my first opportunity to live a season where the weather truly changes from warm to cool, the trees follow nature’s directions, and ah-ha moments are waiting outside, along the rivers and just a short drive up the mountains, where at virtually every bend in the road, you just have to say, “oh, my God”. At least, that’s what I say as I witness such beauty. The weather changed, of course, and winter announced itself, well in advance of its official start. On the day of the Winter Solstice, we had several snows behind us. Scraping ice from the windshield of my truck before heading out to coffee each morning was second nature. Friends came from Texas to visit, some for Thanksgiving, others for Christmas. My daily ritual has been journaling, reading, and sometimes roaming along the Pecos River, driving into the mountains, walking, walking, walking, my camera always at hand.
Ah, but lives change, things end, and we try to figure out how to move forward. That’s where I am these days. That’s where we are, those left behind, the heirs, the owners of an undivided interest in property, trying to do the right thing, disagreeing and conceding, distrusting and suspecting, trying to remember the love we felt for one another as our Mother and Daddy’s children, and trying to claim and honor our rights as God’s children. My great escape is arrested. I have come back to what used to be home, where this property and my house are for sale. The road before me, well, it might as well be a mountain. I have come back to pay the piper.
Returning to Texas 2007—Normangee, Texas (December 30, 2007)
R. Harold Hollis
1 comment:
first, its good to hear from you, even though i have heard about ya from reid and her journey to new mexico. i dont know why, but i feel better knowing you're in texas, though i am happy for you that you are on this journey in santa fe.
while reading your blog, i had to be reminded of my mom's passing, 5 years ago, and how my sister and i spent thanksgiving with her in the hospital, not even realizing it was thanksgiving, turkey and dressing from the hospital cafeteria, etc.
and then the breaking up of our home, the only house i ever knew as a child, the house my dad and mom built themselves in a years
time.
knowing that someone else would call it home and that more than likely i would never see the inside again and even if i did, it wouldnt be mine.
so my thoughts are with you, harold , at this time. for me, every thing took on so much meaning, as we broke up the "old homeplace". my sister and i had very few squablles over possesions.
we both wanted the Old woody, a 60+ year old wooden station wagon that my dad built in anticipation of the children that would come. as it turned out, more than one neighborhood friend came over after mom's passing and inquired as to the future of the "old woody".
i traded mom's hope chest and its contents for it, and the rest of the objects in the house went to my sister or me without a further hitch.
but sorting through the house's contents was not easy, my sister,who lives a more feng shui life than i do,did not have a problem clearing things out. i couldnt even throw out little scraps of paper because"they had mom or dad's handwriting on them".....and one day i will dispose of them.
so while i wouldnt consider myself a great source of how to efficiently dispose of the memories of a lifetime, i do understand i think,the feelings of such a job, and i am with you in spirit as you live through this first year without your mom.
please be gentle, my friend harold with yourself, and be truly good to yourself right now. it is a time i think of gentleness and kindness, and you would and i am sure you have been kind and gentle to others who have gone down this road.
in my case, and i wonder in yours, when i would get a little too sentimental or weepy over my own self, a voice in the back of my head would announce, with such strength, "come on fran! quit weepin on yourself"
okay, mom, i can do it.
many thoughts going out your way for a wonderful new year!
love,
fran
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