Not Meant To Be

I have been an admirer of Clyde Butcher's photography (http://www.clydebutcher.com/) since I first saw his photos of the ghost orchid and the Facahatchee Swamp in the Florida Everglades at the Cleveland Botannical Garden's annual orchid show years ago. At that time, his haunting photographs were expensive but not entirely out of reach, but I just could not allow myself to indulge in one. Too frivolous. And, since that time, I have followed his work, ordered his yearly calendars and kicked myself for not purchasing a work. His photos have only gone up in value. He is considered the Ansel Adams of this century. I read The Orchid Thief by Susan Orleans and eventually ended up living in Clyde's backyard, so to speak. All signs were pointing to me to own one of his works.

So I put a "search" on eBay and for the past maybe five years, have looked at every Clyde Butcher item that has come up for auction. Finally, an early work of his which is color (which he did before his son was killed in an auto accident) came up and I took the leap and bid and won the auction.

I waited excitedly for the UPS delivery truck to arrive and toted the awkward and heavy box upstairs. After carefully cutting the box open and laying the bubble wrap enclosed print on the dining room table, I unwrapped to view my prize.

What! The glass had broken in shipment. The print, which is #10 of 25o, had a huge scratch across the middle. I couldn't believe it. I contacted the seller immediately and he was terribly upset, even to the point of offering me works from his private collection to purchase at a discount. But I wanted that particular print. Now I await the UPS claims agent and will apparently have my money refunded and a piece of history is gone. It was not meant to be. I feel bad about it. If you want to see what I was going to own, go to Clyde's website and look up Estero Island. But I was going to own a pre-1985 rare color version. Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. I will have to keep searching.

Shame and Embarrassment

Harry and I are involved in a lawsuit over work that we did for another couple who promised us a percentage of ownership of a motel they were purchasing. The benefit for the other couple was that in order for them to obtain financing, they needed someone to be involved who had hotel experience and Harry, indeed, found them the loan. In addition, we helped them get a business up and running and were supposed to work on an ongoing basis to get the property up to snuff. But, as I have written in a previous blog, once we had done the work, they reneged on the deal.

This lawsuit has taken over a year and a half and is starting to get close to being brought to trial. I have already been deposed, and the remaining three depositions will occur this week.

In addition, the other couple's attorney is starting to prod and pry into our business affairs and sought court permission to look over our motel loan and how we have been paying it. Is it on time, late, in default, etc. The court approved a part of their request and I was immediately overwhelmed with a sense of, what? Embarrassment, shame, guilt? I wasn't sure. I worried whether I had been late on a payment. Would the jury think I was trying to squeeze money out of this couple to manage my own finances. When I presented my ire at their request, Harry scoffed and said, who cares? Let them dig as much as they want. They are just wasting time on their attorney's fees.

The defendants' attorneys also asked the court to force me to answer questions that I would not answer at the deposition and that my attorney intervened on in my behalf. I did not want to mention names of persons who had commented on how difficult and dishonest these people were in the business world. I felt I would jeopardize the persons who had made the comments. And I felt anxious, distressed and ashamed. I questioned whether I was doing the right thing by bringing on this suit.

I actually had to force myself to remember how infuriated, and angry I had been over how shabbily this couple had treated us. I could not understand why I would not feel that I deserved what they had verbally promised and why I would hesitate in any way to demand reimbursement for my efforts. I needed to picture their website depicting their motel rooms with the very same furniture I had used originally in our property. I had to recount how many vendors and how much privileged information I had shared on how to make their property successful. I had to review the hours of work and emails and contacts I had made on behalf of this couple. Why would I feel embarrassed that they could see what my loan was and my payment history? Would a jury see that this couple had more money than us and judge that we were trying to milk them?

When their attorney asked me to define my skills and why I felt I was worth what I was demanding in the lawsuit, I again, felt flustered and doubted what my skills were worth. He picked apart my experience and my education. Later, I had to remind myself that I had more accumulative education than he did, so why was he intimidating me? That I had learned to successfully operate a motel which was consistently rated highly on travel review sites and that this couple had not succeeded in that way. Why did I need to defer in my thinking to Harry being the commanding force in this equation when indeed, I had actually spend more time on preparing for their property to open under their management.

This is of course, not the first time I have experienced these feelings. Harry has often commented that my biggest fear is embarrassment. That being said, why would I be attracted to, and marry, a man who has absolutely no sense of that emotion! Maybe the truth is that opposites really do attract. Maybe Harry's strong ego and sense of security about himself is what I want to emulate. Because over the past 25 years, this man's actions have definitely embarrassed me on many an occasion. Just last week he was speaking to Asian vendor at an orchid show and he said "welcome to our country." The man said, this is my country. Oops. Or when someone "looks" Hispanic, he starts speaking Spanish to them. Half of the time they don't know what he is saying because they do not speak Spanish. Oh well. Fortunately, I have learned to walk away from any potentially embarrassing situation. As for shame, well I have lived a life that has had a serious amount of turmoil in light of my own standards and shame follows me regarding that.

But why the embarrassment and the shame? Should I attribute it to my mother who had high standards for my performance and behaviour? I may be looking for excuses and wanting to heap my own deficiencies on a parent as most children eventually do. But I think as my mother was pushing me forward, it was heard as disappointment. And somehow, that disappointment gets turned into "I am not good enough and do not deserve better." And even more so, it gets turned in to a disappointment in one's own self. Which means that a parent who sets a very high example of behaviour also sets a child up to feel unable to achieve and consequently feel a lifetime of shame and embarrassment? It doesn't make sense. Who can perform that perfect balance of parenting that allows a child to feel no shame and yet encourages a child to succeed without feeling guilt when they do not.

Sea Dell Nursing Home

We have added a new service to our motel - care of the aged. Last night, the Marathon police called Harry around 2 AM looking for a room for a couple in their 90's who had apparently been found driving aimlessly around town in a confused state. They had gotten lost and driven about 4 hours from their home in Florida, and ended up down in the middle of the Keys before they got some assistance from one of our police force. They had no money, no credit cards and the cop put the room on his debit card until the couple's son could be located. This morning, the woman, who was pretty confused, asked Lacey, our manager, if she was in jail. And, she wanted to know when breakfast was served! Lacey, who is a sweetheart, ran out and got them some food and turned off their A/C as they were freezing at 78 degrees and bundled them up with extra blankets. Then she checked in on them all morning despite the fact that she was on "running" mode all morning. The son arrived and took them away and the policeman even stopped by to check on them. This is living in a small town. People really take care of one another.

I love these kinds of motel episodes. But I have to wonder about the driving capabilities of someone in his 90's who is lost and keeps driving for 4 hours looking for his home. Thank you Marathon police force who are there in seconds whenever we need you, and thank you Lacey who has a heart of gold and a smile to go with it.

Mothers Honored

The only time that I really remember wishing I were a boy, was when I was watching my brother and his friends play little league baseball during summer evenings when I was a young girl. The field was surrounded by woods, yet when I had to pee, instead of having the simplicity of nature that boys had, I had to trek to the nearest lavatories. Later, as an adult, when asked on an MMPI that I took for fun when I was a psych nurse, I answered the question asking if I had ever wished I were male with a "yes" and that put a red flag as to gender identity issues. Dumb test. Who wouldn't rather pee on a tree than over some disgusting filled up smelly latrine!

Had I been a male, I would have missed the single most amazing and breathtaking experience of my life - giving birth. Having wanted a child, and then experiencing three years of infertility accompanied by the most humiliating, uncomfortable and anxiety producing medical procedures and tests and laparoscopies and such, caused a heightened joy when I finally conceived. I remember learning I was pregnant, and calling my mother and father who were out of town on a trip. My mother's first response was to yell "praise the Lord." That evening, we went out to celebrate and I remember suddenly feeling panicky and terrified. I was not sure whether if was fear of loss or fear of hurling along on a journey that I could not stop. The fear didn't last. Pregnancy is indescribable. I wish it were not so hard to recall how it physically feels. Lying on the couch reading a book and seeing a little foot or elbow roll across your protruding belly is so amazing. Feeling a life growing inside, and moving, is a sensation unlike any other. I was struck by the baseness of it all. Procreation seems like a blip in evolution. We are not so far from our animal friends. They give birth, nurse and nurture much as humans. It makes me think how little we know about the universe and how we are just step on a hierarchy that we cannot fathom.

My relationship with my mother was complicated. Part of that, after years of reflection, was based on my rebelliousness and placement in the family (second child). After all, my oldest sister once told me that she was the oldest, Mary Beth was the youngest, Tom was the only boy - so I was nothing! Obviously that left me needing to make some noise to be noticed.

But, when I contemplate the job that my mother did, I realize that I was blessed with being born into a family with a mother who taught me the fundamentals to allow me to be a rational, and hopefully, a basically good mother myself. I was taught right and wrong. I was taught to be self sufficient. I was taught to be nurturing. I was taught to be responsible. So, even if my mother did not lavish constant praise and acceptance which I would have languished in (and probably have grown up petulant and narcissistic), perhaps she did provide the constancy, reliability and dependability I needed. She was there when we needed. When we walked home from school at lunchtime, she was there with a hot lunch. She attended the school functions. She was at every activity we were engaged in. She sewed clothes for us. She cooked, cleaned and provided a comfortable home to grow up in. She didn't have a car and the freedom to run that we have now. She was a 50's mom, just like Harriet Nelson and until her youngest was in school, she was at home with us and available. And, she could be fun. She would pack up a picnic at the drop of a hat and off to the park we would go. She would make us laugh. I remember her heavy with a pregnant belly with my younger sister and singing and dancing a song called "I'm a Red Hot Mama." And, she was Red Hot. She had red hair. Fantastic, auburn hair. And a twin, with red hair. And, they were a formidable duo. So, not only did I have a mom, I had an aunt who was a back up.

One of my favorite memories of my mother is so simple. Going "downtown" in Youngstown, Ohio, was wonderful as a child because it meant having my mother all to myself. I remember being dressed up, and holding my mother's hand as we navigated the streets of downtown which seemed so large and exciting. We would always have a chocolate malt in the basement of McKelvey's department store. Oh, that was a treat, served in small glasses and eaten with a little spoon. The excursion was special, because I could be alone with my mother and have all of her attention.

I remember the annual "Mother's Day" luncheons at our church. The event was special, even though, in retrospect, it was held in the church's sterile recreation hall, but dressing up and having decorations, entertainment, little favors and a luncheon and punch was special. Mother's Day meant making up cards with sentiments that matched the letter's in the title. I wonder what I wrote? M - mother, O - omnipotent, T - tender, H - heroine, E - energetic, R - red head??? Who knows. And how many of us planted some seeds in a Dixie cup at school and took home a straggly marigold? My youngest, Sam, gave me one that grew into a 3 foot flower that I treasured.

I could go on and on with memories. But the essence is simple. That being a mother is special. And having a mother is special. There is a bond and understanding that is shared by all mothers. Tomorrow I will journey north to Ft. Lauderdale to meet with one of my dearest friends, her daughter and her daughter's friend and mother for a Mother's Day luncheon somewhere on the beach. We will be basking in the glow of that bond. And I wish all of the women I know who share this bond with me, the best and most joyous Mother's Day.

You Know You are Drunk When...

I worked the desk at the Sea Dell today. One of the first people in the door was a very disheveled man who had that odor people have when they drink too much and the alcohol metabolizes right through the pores.

He threw a key on a fob on the desk and asked if it belonged to our property. It didn't. He had been driving around in a taxi trying to figure out where he had rented a room last night. He had no receipt and just knew it was "around here somewhere." Being a resort town, good luck.

He was annoyed that I wouldn't find out where it came from. I will help a guest plan excursions, find a restaurant, even call home overseas on our cell phone or mail that phone charger they left behind, but I draw the line on helping a drunk figure out where he rented a room. Well, I might have if he had been nicer but he was rude because the key didn't belong to our place. At least he wasn't driving!