Month: July 2017

Art came to the Mansion a month ago to be near his brother, a resident there. Art was assigned a room upstairs, his brother was on the first floor. Both rooms are warm in the summer, the upstairs one is especially uncomfortable. Because of the windows and wiring, the upstairs rooms can only be cooled by window air conditioners.

The lower floor rooms need portable air conditioning units, they are more expensive. Two months ago, we bought a portable unit for Connie, it has worked well for her, and enabled her to start her knitting again (when her back heals up.) Two weeks ago, Art’s brother John died.

Art is moving downstairs into his room. I was going to get a window  unit for Art, have switched that plan and am purchasing a portable unit from Amazon, the unit is arriving on Wednesday.  It is an LG 8,000 BTU unit. I’ve asked the Mansion to conduct a room by room survey of the facility to see if anyone else needs or wants an air conditioning unit for their rooms.

One or two rooms simply cannot be wired up for them.

We haven’t checked with all of the residents, but I think  there are two more possibilities for room conditioners. I have enough money for Art’s unit and for one more, if it’s a window unit it will be much less than the portable. My goal by the end of the summer is to have air conditioners for all of the residents who want one and need one.

Last week, we bought a 10,000 BTU unit for the Activity Room, it will be installed this week. And thanks.

I’ve learned a lot about many things working with the Mansion residents, including air conditioning and toiletries, one of them asked if I would be the building super. I passed.

Other good news. I sent off the Mansion stories to the artist and book designer  Abrah Griggs who is assembling these evocative stories in book form. I’ve decided against an e-book format, we’re going with print books only, including 10 of my photographs. The books will be printed by Create Space, and I’m ordering 150 to start.

The Book will be called “Stories From The Mansion.”

They will be distributed free of charge to the Mansion residents and their families.  Connie Brooks of Battenkill Books has agreed to sell them at her bookstore for those of you who might want to purchase one. We have not yet set a price, but it will not be high.

Any revenue from the books will be evenly distributed to the writers. I hope to expand this project. (The Mansion residents are coming to the October House, so is the RISSE soccer team.) They are practicing their songs.

This is such an important thing for the residents, their stories are important, and they need to be told. Thanks again for the books and soap and shampoo. We are good.

A good chunk of money is going out of the fund this week, if you wish to donate in any amount, you can do so by sending payments to P.O. Box 2015, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816, and also via Paypal, Friends and Family, [email protected]. Please mark it Mansion or Refugee so I can instantly keep track of it, thanks.

Letters are precious to the residents, many say they feel connected to the world again. Here is a list of the residents who wish to receive your letters, photos and messages, they can be sent to The Mansion, 11 S. Union Avenue, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816.

-Jean, Ellen, Mary, Gerry, Sylvie, Jane, Diane, Alice, Jean, Madeline, Joan, Allan, William, John K., Helen, Connie, Robert, Shirley, Alanna, Charlotte, Barbara, Peggie,  Dorothy, Peter, Arthur, Brenda, John R., Bruce, John Z.

Thanks again.

Albert Camus wrote that there is no love of life without despair of life. Like life and death, and light and darkness, and sickness and health, I can either embrace the human condition or drawn in fear and self-pity. Life is a mess, wrote Joseph Campbell, life has always been a mess.

We find our own hope and promise, or we choke in a sea of regret and self-pity. This week, someone write me a lengthy piece on the illness of her dog, she sad it was unbearable for her, and she hoped I could counsel her or offer words of encouragement to help her get through it. She spentds every night weeping, she said, she barely has the strength to get to work or spend time with her children.

What could I tell her to help her get through this time?

I told her to read the story of Devota, an African women who spent a year walking barefoot across Central African to get to America. The skin burned off of her feet and she was raped four times and stole food from farms to keep her and her daughter alive.

I urged her to read that story before feeling sorry for her self because her dog was sick. Was that cold of me? Heartless? Judgmental?

Perhaps, but it was what I felt and what I feel is my whole identity as a writer. Dogs are nothing but a gift to me, a source of joy and connection, I will never make them into a misery because, they, like us, will inevitably get sick and die. That is what life is about. What did she think would happen?

Sorry for your loss, sorry for your loss. A Facebook chant.

Perspective is a great gift given us humans.

I wish I had said the same thing to the woman who posted a message on Facebook commemorating the death of her dog more than a decade ago. She promised her dog in the message that she would never get over her death. But this is precisely what she needs to do, what we are all called upon to do. What Devota does without anybody’s help.

I love my dogs dearly and intensely, I hope I never ask for pity because they get sick or die. That seems so indulgent of me, especially in our world. The sickness and death of animals is a part of our lives, those of us who love animals, like breathing and walking, and I will never speak poorly of my life or let myself forget what binds all of us together – we live and we love and we die.

Suffering is not a shock or surprise to me. It is part of the human experience, and I am grateful for life, every day.

This week will be an important week for me, I am permitting comments on the blog for the first time. They will be moderated, and no hostile or personal attacks will be permitted. It will be a safe place to share thoughts and ideas and comments. My life is not an argument, neither will your ideas be an argument on my site. No hostility permitted.  Look for this on Tuesday and Wednesday. People can continue to post comments on Facebook.

Today, I am sending a check for $900 to RISSE to buy new uniforms and equipment for the soccer team, composed entirely of refugees and immigrants, new to America. They have decided, over my objections, to call the team “The Bedlam Farm Warriors,” and what an ironic thing that is for a nerd boy like me, to have a sports team named for my farm. Can’t get my head around it.

Also this week, I have offered to treat the soccer team to a Saturday matinée showing of “Spiderman” in a theater near Albany, drinks and popcorn included. I will continue to fund raise for Devota Nyiraneza, who walked across 2,500 miles of Africa to get to America, and who is working to pay off a $10,000 student loan for her son that she thought was a financial aid package.

I am hoping to get as close to $10,000 as possible. You can donate through my post office box, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., or Paypal Friends And Family, ID [email protected].

By Sunday, and before I even asked, I had received $1,500 for the fund. Thursday, I am meeting another refugee, Mawulidi, an African artist, a wood-carver who left his tools behind when he came to America. Someone has already messaged me to say she wishes to pay for new tools. I’ll know more this week when I meet him.

And I today, I am ordering a portable air conditioner for Art at the Mansion, his brother died there two weeks ago and he is moving into his room, which gets very  warm on summer days. The Mansion is a Medicaid facility, there is little extra money there.

Selfishly, this has been a good year for me, despite all of the anger and worry for so many others.

The election in November, disturbing to me, has been an open door, not a gate. It paved the way for the Army of Good, and selfishly, I have never felt more energized, or better about myself, or more meaningful about my life. The blog is nothing but a gift to me, and hopefully, to others. I am committed to telling the story of the Mansion residents and the refugees and immigrants, so critical a part of our national soul.

Life will always offer us setbacks and challenges, we cannot always get our way, and our dogs and friends and family members will get sick and die, but it is our choice how we wish to respond. I see my life as a series of choices. Self-pity and lament are not among them for me.

Grace is not the avoidance of trouble and suffering, but the manner in which we respond to it.

There is no love of life without despair.

Maria and i cannot believe how gentle Fate is with Gus, how she lets him climb all over her, pushes her to the ground, grabs her collar and tries to pull her around, pulls toys and treats right out of her mouth. The two seem to adore one another, and Fate has helped the feisty Gus grow confident and strong.

It is true, I see, that small dogs have no idea they are small. Boston Terriers are terriers, after all, and  ratters. Surviving Fate is great basic training for a farm dog, but here, Fate’s enduring sweetness comes out. She is too sweet to push sheep around, too  sweet to push Gus around, unless that is, he looks away from his treat or rawhide flip for a second, and Fate steals it out from under his trusting nose.

As you know, I love to take portraits of the people I like and love, this one was taken of Robin as she left, we were saying goodbye. She was tired, ready for a nap, but I do think we were each a bit sad to be saying goodbye to each other, we had a lot of fun. They say black and white photographs capture the soul, and I think this one caught a piece of Robin’s soul.

My very beautiful daughter doesn’t care much to be photographed – that has caused some tension between us at times, but my very beautiful granddaughter loves to be photographed, and the camera loves her back.

Our relationship is marked by continuous hellos and goodbyes, we are apart much more than we are together, and the good thing about that is that her growth and evolution is very visible to me, even if we are unlikely to ever know one another really well or be too great a part of the other’s lives.

I am not sad about this, but accepting. This is where I am, and I do not speak poorly of my life or pity myself for the choices I make. My time with Robin is lovely, and I know it matters. I just understand the boundaries of it, nobody is going over the top. Robin seems to know me and laugh with me, although she knows and loves a great many people. That is her nature.

I notice that we are considering one another more carefully. I see her often watching me, trying to place me, trying to figure out who I am and what I am in her life. All the other grandparents use Facetime and they have all assigned themselves names. I don’t  have a name for Robin to call me, I’m sure she’ll figure something out and it will not be anything I suggest.

I don’t know what is wrong with me, but I can hardly ever go where everybody else is.

I don’t care for Facetime, it seems forced to me, I really don’t know what to say and she can’t speak in sentences yet, yet I feel pressure to do something, so I babble and she stares back at me. I don’t quite see the value in that. A part of our relationship is trying to figure each of us out over a substantial distance and infrequent visits.

Emma is very conscientious about keeping Robin and I in touch with one another, mostly through the photos and videos and pictures she sends me. She is trying very hard to keep me involved in Robin’s life and I am trying hard also.

Robin and I do seem to reunite quickly and easily, I sense that she knows who I am, if not what I am. There is definitely something there, some chemical connection between a grandparent and child. We are, after all, blood.

I am happy to see her warm relationship with Maria, the two have much fun, playing with dogs, singing and dancing together. I must be honest, I am a bit circumscribed by age with Robin, as I am with little Gus.

I can’t move as quickly as I once did, and have to consider how I will get up before I can sit down on the floor. So our relationship will, by necessity, be more cerebral and less physical. I used to toss Emma up and down into the air and catch her, my former wife did not care for this play, but Emma loved it, although I doubt she recalls it.

I haven’t lost my gift for getting babies to eat, when I’m offering it, food zooms and weaves through the air like a buzzing bee, landing in an often open mouth.

It is heartening to see what a wonderful mother Emma is, she is intuitive, loving, patient and attentive to Robin. Robin is lucky to have a mother like that. In a month or so, I’ll take the train down to New York City and check in. Another hello, another goodbye.

I realized a few hours before  my granddaughter Robin came for a brief visit that I hadn’t bought any new toys for her (at least since the last time.) I knew the local hardware store sold some toys for young children, so I drove over there and bought a musical instrument kit that my daughter will hate me for – drums, symbols and rattles.

It was an instant hit. Se picked up the rattle and held it up like a battle flag, and I yelled back at her, “you are a warrior for joy!” She shook it all night.