Author: chaskemp

One year

On our front porch

It’s been a year. Oh, Leslie. I miss you. I’ve loved you all my life – since we were 16 – for 55 years. I can’t believe how lucky I am. My heart is full – full of love, full of gratitude, full of grief. I adore you. You are the best thing that ever happened to me. Oh, what a life we had. It’s hard to believe how good it was – how full of love, how true – nothing was undone, nothing unsaid, nothing unfulfilled. 

Our happy little family. You, me, David. Talk about love! Through deeply magical times, through everyday times, through hard times, you loved him and are loved by him in full measure. With a year of your life left, he gave you (and me) a whole city – San Francisco, the best city in the world. And now, he’s taking good care of me. You taught me everything I know about being a parent – a good father, thanks to you. Sweet Leslie, we have a Son for the ages.

How we wish, how we wish you were here.

With David in Beautiful Hue – our favorite place


I was thinking a few weeks ago that you probably thought adoration was your due. When the roses were in bloom, I would scatter rose petals where I knew you would walk when you got home, on the sidewalk, up the steps, across the porch and to the front door, and I think you were like, that’s about right – and so it was. 

I can’t say who – the announcement isn’t mine to make – but someone you loved is pregnant. It’s a girl(!) and her name will be Leslie. Someone you helped in elementary school is graduating from Jesuit and has scholarship offers (>$40,000/year) from St. Edwards and Baylor. I’m in touch with your friends and they are all doing well. Your Son and his husband are well. Your husband is doing better – after all these years I love you as much as I ever did. 

January 2015


It’s probably against the rules, so I’m not actually saying that we’re scattering your ashes in the beautiful National AIDS Memorial Grove, and on Haight Street where so many people were so kind to you, and at the magical 37 bus stop, and in the Castro – places that you loved and where you were welcomed. And of course among the roses and perennials at our home. 

About 10 hours before you passed away.
Edematous, but look at you – Hi Leslie!


We had a beautiful life together. And then, in the past few years, it got even better. There were times in those last few months when it got hard between us (I didn’t understand what was happening). Then, somehow, we both surrendered and love came down like a shimmering fall of beauty and truth. Real. And then, as our time ran out, we were pure – ahhh, Leslie, how we loved.

You died as you lived, loving and loved.

A new Leslie!


The pain is unbearable. Stabbed to death every day – and still grateful, still loving, still adoring. 











National AIDS Memorial Grove – in the meadow, on the hillside, among the redwoods. Leslie!


.

Keo

January – ceremony in Keo and Chouen’s bedroom

(Notes from my blog and what was written for the funeral.) Keo was born in Cambodia in the Khmer Rouge years. As a baby, she didn’t have enough to eat, no medicine, no home, so she was often sick. Her father was taken away by the Khmer Rouge not long after she was born. Through the miracle of her mother’s love, she lived through the terrible Khmer Rouge regime. Her mother, Roeuth and her grandmother, Lon carried her from Cambodia to Thailand. From there, they were sent to Utah, and from there to Dallas. 

Keo and Chouen were married in 1994. At first, she and Chouen lived with her mother and grandmother. Later, she and Chouen lived separately from her mother and grandmother, but still very close. Keo worked in several different jobs and everywhere she went, she made good friends, some of whom are here today. Keo and Chouen traveled to their homeland, Cambodia in 2005. Although there have been hard times in her life, she has lived a good life. She has loved and been loved.
Many people have helped and the family extends their deep gratitude. I want to also say the names of three other people who were long-time friends and with Keo until the end: Suasaday and her husband, Jimmie, and Suasaday’s Mom, Keo Thorn.


I made some notes over the past 6 weeks when Keo was so sick from the cancer. I hope these will speak to the question of who she was and what kind of person she was.

December 2015. Keo began talking… sometimes whispering, sometimes a little stronger. She talked a long time about her life as a poor refugee child – what it was like for her learning a new language and customs, going to school, helping her grandmother take care of neighbor children, struggles in school, and her hopes and dreams. 
Altar set up immediately after she passed away

She graduated from high school and passed the TASS. She went to work in a factory, where, being so young, she was given a hard time by older workers and had to fend off unwanted advances by other workers and supervisors. There were gangs in some of the places she worked and there were many problems.

These were gripping stories. She would start a new one and I would be kind of holding my breath, hoping that she wouldn’t be hurt and every time, she made the right decision. 

She also talked about visions she had – being baptized in the clear water by Jesus; being protected; making the decision to leave the gold behind. She said, “I was born this way.”

January 2016. Three weeks into seeing Keo as life slowly slips away from her body. Three weeks since she first said, “I’m ready to go.” 

I thought about Jesus’ agony in the garden of Gethsemane right before he was crucified. “Remain here… watch with me,” he said to his disciples. They didn’t do it. 

February 2016. Keo continues to waste away. A couple of days ago, I said to her husband, When I first started coming here, I think I was very helpful. Now… I’m seeing something beautiful (and so sad).

  • Something beautiful like with only a couple of exceptions, every time I come in, her husband is sitting or lying on the bed with her, massaging her legs, cradling her, wiping her lips, loving her. Her mother is there, too.
  • Something beautiful like seeing Chouen sitting against some pillows and Keo (she couldn’t weigh more than about 65 pounds now) propped up and leaning into his embrace.
  • Something beautiful like it’s all so clean, no smells, no tv, the altar moved from place to place depending on which way she’s lying (oh, so small now) on the bed… this is sacred space.
  • Something beautiful like love and faithfulness as real and palpable as the walls of this room we’re in right now.
  • Something beautiful like her husband and her mother touching her in ways I know are to memorize the feel of her.
March 2016 – ceremony in living room
She was born in hell – and her mother kept her alive through the Khmer Rouge years and across the border and across America and 39 years later here they both are on this bed in a room overlooking a playground.
————–
Keo passed from this life in March 2015. And in the end, the sum of her life is integrity. A lovely, sweet person, who loved and was loved.
Her husband and her mother were with her, holding her in her last moments – just as they did throughout her illness. 
Matthew 25:23 (the parable of the talents) speaks directly to what Chouen and Roeuth did: “His master said, ‘Well done, good and faithful servants!'” Chouen and Roeuth, In the most difficult times, you never gave up, you never quit, you never faltered. You were the embodiment of love and faithfulness.

Things I love, at the corner, dreaming, something beautiful, the Old Golden Land, I’m on the way, Beanie!

At the corner of Market and Church
Once again, some of the photos will have nothing to do with the text. I was thinking, what photos would I like to look at in a year or five years?
————-
I love (or like a lot)… babies, puppies, flowers (especially fragrant ones), parents being sweet to their child, pretty women, baking bread, San Francisco… At first I thought I would make an inclusive list, but stopped at what is here. Of course there are people, but I already write about them a lot (Leslie, David, John, Jeff, others). I love each one of you, named here or not.
————–
There was a woman on the cold January downtown corner near First Presbyterian. She had that skinny, jittery look of methamphetamine, complete with gurning around an unlit cigarette hanging out of her mouth. A man walked to the corner. He had tardive dyskinesia with tongue thrusting and grimacing (surely from too much Prolixin or Stelazine or whatever drug). I saw him give the woman a light with all the smoothness of a man in a tuxedo in some kind of old-time upscale night club.
————– 
Sourdough with currants, pecans, cinnamon

Yesterday I was listening to Neil Young singing about a dream his wife had – “It’s a dream, only a dream, and it’s fading now…” and I felt my own meaning to the words and was so so sad to think that maybe all this with Leslie was a dream. Now I think, if it was all a dream, what a dream! 
————–
My friend continues to waste away. A couple of days ago, I said to her husband, When I first started coming here, I think I was very helpful. Now… I’m seeing something beautiful(and so sad).
Something beautiful like with only a couple of exceptions, every time I come in, her husband is lying on the bed with her, massaging her legs, cradling her, wiping her lips, loving her.
Something beautiful like seeing him sitting against some pillows and her (she couldn’t weigh more than about 60 pounds now) propped up and leaning into his embrace.
Something beautiful like it’s all so clean, no smells, no tv, the altar moved from place to place depending on which way she’s lying (oh, so small now) on the bed… this is sacred space.
Something beautiful like love and faithfulness as real and palpable as the walls of this room I’m writing in right now.
Something beautiful like her husband and her mother touching her in ways I know are to memorize the feel of her.
She was born in hell (Cambodia 1975) – and her mother kept her alive through the Khmer Rouge years and across the border and across America and 39 years later here they both are on this bed in a room overlooking a playground.
————–
Speaking of vision quests, I recited/sang this to her yesterday:
Keep on walking where the angel showed
(All will be One, all will be One)
Traveling where the angels trod
Over in the old golden land
In the golden book of the golden game
The golden angel wrote my name
When the deal goes down I’ll put on my crown
Over in the old golden land
I won’t need to kiss you when we’re there
(All will be One, all will be One)
I won’t need to miss you when we’re there
Over in the old golden land
We’ll understand it better in the sweet bye and bye
(All will be One, all will be One)
You won’t need to worry and you won’t have to cry
Over in the old golden land.
(Robin Williamson)
—————-
Sourdough with currants, pecans, cinnamon

After I left their apartment yesterday afternoon, I went on to Baylor emergency for the abdominal pain that’s bothered me for about a week. Trying for a couple of days to decide if I should go. Then I asked myself, what would I say to someone in my situation? It’s a no-brainer: Go. I went. I have acute pancreatitis. Haha, I’m glad I went! Liquid diet for a few days, then small, low fat meals, no alcohol (no prob – I quit that 40+ years ago), those kinds of things. Way better than cancer of the pancreas!
Actually, I didn’t completely give alcohol up. A few years ago walking along a street in Saigon, Leslie saw a sign saying, Beer – 10,000 dong (about $.50). Let’s go in, she said. From then on, that became an evening ritual for us… in Saigon, Hanoi, Hue, Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Hong Kong, San Francisco, Dallas. Good times. 
Lying in the room, waiting for sonogram results, thinking, it was just a day ago that I was thinking about pancreatic cancer. And that now there is some chance I may have it (and relief that I didn’t). Sometimes Leslie and I would call one another Beanie or Cecil. Lying in the ED room, looking into the distance, looking toward the Old Golden Land, and I’m smiling and thinking, “I’m on the way, Beanie!”
In the garden

I may be a one-woman man.
————-

“I’ll try to be around and about. But if I’m not, then you know that I’m behind your eyelids, and I’ll meet you there.” 
(Terence McKenna)

I want to be like Mary Magdalene

I was coming twice daily as life slowly slipped away from her wracked and wasted body. Three weeks since she first said, “I’m ready to go” and now she’s whispering, “I want to die…” and “Why can’t I die?” Her suffering is infinitely sad and unnecessary. That’s the way suffering seems to go so often. I notice that despite the sadness I don’t seem to completely connect with it. I wonder if I’ve lost so much I don’t have that much connection left.
I remember in Vietnam when I became impervious to the horror, I thought…
It was dark by the time I got into the perimeter of a Marine battalion on an operation at the DMZ. I reported to the commanding officer, who told me to stay with the command group. Some of them were asleep by then, so I lay down beside them and slept the night through.
In the morning I discovered that I was sleeping next to some dead men wrapped in ponchos and laid out next to the command group. Their gear was lying piled nearby and I found a C-ration can of cinnamon roll (my favorite) in one man’s pack. I had started to eat it when some Marines asked for help lifting bodies onto the back of a quad 20 tracked/armored vehicle. There were two men on top of the vehicle and two of us below and I was holding the cinnamon roll in my teeth as we lifted the first man up. His body was tilted up and I was below and a dark liquid ran out of the poncho and down my upraised arm and I couldn’t let go or the body would have gone to the ground and the liquid slid down my arm, down my side.

It was the heart of darkness. The horror. So much for impervious.

Photo of photos of condemned children
S21/Tuol Sleng in Phnom Penh

 

Later it got worse, when the bodies and ponchos started to cook on top of the engine vents as we fought through the morning.

When I first started seeing my friend after she had become so sick, she would ask me to stay and I would. When she went home from the hospital I committed to coming twice daily to her apartment and I did. At first it was a lot of time and a lot to do. Later, there was less to do, but I’m still coming because I said I would. Now I’m only a witness to her suffering.

I thought about Jesus’ agony in the garden of Gethsemane right before he was murdered. “Remain here… watch with me,” he said to his disciples. They didn’t do it. I deeply don’t want to let my friend down like the disciples let Jesus down. I want to be like Mary Magdalene, the one who didn’t give up, the one who watched with Jesus through the awful suffering and through the end, who was witness to the suffering, the one who stayed. (And I get it that three weeks isn’t very long.)

Days of innocence, of family secrets; being beautiful; mostly good days

Annual cover, Thomas Jefferson High School
Except for the yearbook cover and the last photo, the pictures here are from Leslie’s iPhone… the world through her eyes.
Days of innocence; days of family secrets.
Everything was perfect back then and it was of utmost importance to maintain that myth – within individuals, families, communities, cultures…
Of course there were true good parts too, sweet things, beautiful things. Leslie and I fell in love during these days – when we all really did look kind of like the photo on the annual cover. We fell in love in that environment, that consciousness.
Then along came youth culture, the consciousness revolution, the sexual revolution, civil rights, women’s liberation, the war, the peace movement, all of that – we were the first rock & roll generation. It was a decade like no other before or since in the history of the world!
Now, there are still family secrets, but now there are places to go for help. Now it is a crime for teachers, doctors, nurses, etc. to not report suspected child abuse. Now there is awareness. Now the interview with the child and the police is not a bleeding nightmare for the victim (Respect and Love to Det. Lt. Walsh and Asst. DA Karnutsis – sorry about the spelling. They made it happen in Dallas). For the times they are a’changing.
A photograph of love
—————-
Now I know what a Majestic Feeling is.
—————-
1967… I would hear someone say, “_______ is so beautiful.” I’d think, “She’s not so beautiful.” Or someone would say, “He’s a beautiful person,” and I’d think, “What! He’s a guy. A guy can’t be beautiful.” But then my mind opened and I realized she isbeautiful; he is beautiful; and most incredible of all, I am beautiful!”
When you find out who you are,
David in our Noe apartment, fall 2014
Beautiful, beyond your dreams
If someone had asked me if I ever dreamed myself as beautiful, I’d have thought they were crazy. Yet somewhere deep inside, from the beginning, deeper than consciousness, deeper than words I did dream of being beautiful. I awakened and became beautiful (you know, now and again).
At the same time, Leslie was showing me, loving me how to dobeautiful… and I was reaching out, reaching beyond my misperceptions about myself and thus my misperceptions about others.
Another factor in the awakening was war. I came out of that war wounded, sick, soul-sick, skinny, tense, with violence barely below the surface – yet in all that, committed to somehow never lose track of the war, never lose track of being alive.
For the ones who had a notion,
A notion deep inside,
That it ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive.
One of our hangouts – patio at Thorough Breads
These things worked together in the creation of who and what I might be: the war-driven drive to be fully alive, Leslie’s love and the example of her life, and the changes in my consciousness.
How could anyone ever tell you, you were anything less than beautiful.
How could anyone ever tell you, you were less than whole.
——————-
People say things. Sometimes I’m staggered at what people have endured and how some things resonate all through people’s lives. Sometimes it’s extraordinarily difficult, even impossible to “choose to be happy.” Here’s to the ones who have endured – and to those who didn’t endure. And a Curse on those who cause such pain.

On Market Street

I wrote this in 2008: I was in the Parkland Psychiatric Emergency Room, in one of the little interview rooms with a woman, her daughter, her granddaughter, and one of my students. Their story was that the grandmother had learned that her husband was molesting her granddaughter – just as he had molested her daughter. “He’s not going to get away with it again, God-damn him.” There is a curse – the real thing.  
—————-
Two hard days the past few days. Otherwise I’m doing pretty well. There have been days in the past few weeks that I’ve actually not been more than ready for the day to be over(!).
2015
Today I finished cleaning the house for Christmas. Part of the cleaning was moving everything off Leslie’s shrine so I could dust and rub the wood with oil, then put everything back. Of course everything in/on the shrine is of the greatest significance and I was sad and grateful and lonely for some hours.

I’ll be out shopping or whatever and see so many couples. It’s like that’s our natural state – in relationship.

On the street, drugs, AIDS, nine months, park party

I write different things on different days and sometimes rearrange things, so who knows what day something is really written on.
Walking along upper Market/Castro/Noe/Church…
David and Charles on Castro… all those people
  • Super pretty young woman zipping along on a Razor scooter – Wow!
  • Man alternately raving and begging.
  • The man who sells flowers two blocks from my apartment, Guy, walking up the sidewalk carrying a bouquet. “Are you doing a home delivery?” “No, I’m starting my second career, singing in the studio.”
  • Lovers walking, embracing (this is a town full of lovers).
  • Two men shouting at each other, “m-f this, m-f that, g-d m-f the other.” They weren’t upset or anything, just shouting at each other.
  • Old man wearing a black leather jacket walking an old dog. “There’s a couple of old dogs,” I said. We both laughed and the dog just stood there, glad for a rest, I’m sure.
  • Many of the people with babies carry them in a harness so the baby is facing forward, little legs kind of flopping along. Wouldn’t it be grand to be able to see the world like those babies!

——————
Harvey Milk shrine in the Castro.
He was assassinated in 1978. 
I already knew that drugs like enalapril, omeprazole, levaquin, and so on can do wonderful things (and also can be dangerous). But it really came home to me when about 20 years ago I started prescribing them and following people over time. The first serious illness I cured was pneumonia – in a woman who wasn’t responding to treatment through a public hospital. I gave her Biaxin XL 1 gm qd for 10 days and I forget what else and she got well. I went to her apartment on Gaston several times working on getting the dosing right. Always a few gangsters around. For the rest of our time at Agape the woman would come in every few months mostly just to kind of say hello.
——————-
Yesterday evening, David, Charles, and I walked to the Castro for a farewell dinner at Eureka!, one of my favorite places. When we turned on to Castro, I realized that the sidewalks were covered in chalked names. It was World AIDS Day and the names were a memorial to the many, many thousands who died from this terrible disease. I was stunned. There were little buckets of chalk for anyone who wanted to add a name or idea. After I got home I decided to walk back to Castro and add Rueben’s name. Little known fact about Leslie: she helped take care of Rueben when he was sick.
Sidewalk memorials. Rueben.
———————
Today marked nine months since Leslie passed away. What a ride we had and what (a different kind of) a ride this grief and mourning have been. Looking back on this time – and really it’s been hard since last November when Leslie began having difficulties – I realize I’ve gone about as deep into grief as I can go (famous last words!) and I realize I’m afraid of more pain. God almighty, it’s been hard. The first 6 months I was I don’t know what I was. I was going, Leslie, oh my sweet Leslie. I was in awe of her everything. I was so sad for her, for us, our beautiful life together. I spent a lot of time being grateful, too. The next two months I was feeling sorry for myself. The last 3 weeks I’m not as sad.
It was a perfect day to get a Christmas tree. I can hardly believe I did it. It would have been easy to think never mind and not have a tree. I bet nobody would be surprised. But there it is.
———————
Hippie Hill drum circle on a Sunday afternoon.
Here comes the didgeridoo!
Saturday: Breakfast at Taco Joint with Ron. Home. Go to used stuff store looking for ceramic pie pans, thinking wouldn’t it be nice to give people pecan or apple pies in nice pans. On the way, I saw a farmers market and knew Don would be there, so stopped and hung out with Don and Tia for awhile. On to used things store but no pie pans. Got a tree. Patched a hole in the side of the house where a squirrel had chewed its way in (Thanks for telling me, Jay!). Went to Whole Foods and ran into someone I’ve known a long time and had a disturbing interaction with him. Got lights on tree. Started with decos and John came by and hung out for awhile while I put decos on. Dinner at Whole Foods. I’m sure I would never bring my own Cajun chicken grilled in John’s “Big Green Egg” and my own bread from Acme Bakery and get $.78 worth of lettuce to enjoy the sometimes convivial atmosphere of WF (saw Stephen from psytrance scene, so that was nice). The front of the house smells like a Christmas tree.

Atrium Obscurum park party. Sarah Spirals
doing the opening dance/flagging
Sunday: Park party in Fort Worth with Atrium Obscurum. Brought cookies (chocolate chip with extra chocolate and nuts). Helped with set-up. Spent the afternoon talking with people – a lot of nice people who I like a lot. Good music throughout. It was a beautiful day.

Days into days…

Days rolling into days, into nights, into days. 37 Bus to the Haight, hang out on the street for awhile, walk to Hippie Hill, nap in the sun…
Apple Pie!
After months of drought, it’s raining in San Francisco. Cold and rainy, so fine. The front door is open and it’s cold and the pumpkin pie just came out of the oven and yesterday it was a pecan pie and chocolate chip cookies – the apartment is smelling very good. Pecan pie to neighbors: ½ to Chuck and Stephanie and ½ to Sean and Emily and Leon; cookies to Tony on the third floor, to Chuck and Stephanie, to Lance and Spence, to David and Charles.
David came by yesterday evening late, on a walk with Jake. This is how it is, wonderful, having an apartment 3 blocks from David and Charles. I was thinking about their wedding rings – I gave them Leslie’s wedding ring and they had their rings made from that 18k gold layered into platinum from a goldsmith in the Castro. Perfect.

Better late than never: I started reading the Chronicles of Narnia a few days ago. I’m a few pages away from finishing the second book in the series, The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. I surprised myself with tears when Father Christmas said… “’The time to use them is perhaps near at hand. Bear them well.’ With these words he handed Peter a shield and a sword…” And again tears at the end of the book… “But don’t go trying to use the same route twice. Indeed, don’t try to get there at all. It’ll happen when you’re not looking for it.”
David and Charles took me to Chez Panisse in Berkeley last Saturday. Chez Panisse is “ground zero” for California cuisine. Local, organic, sustainable – here is where these concepts first found voice. It’s one thing that happened out of the Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley. Thank you again, 1960s.
Wait, what is this about free speech and food? The Free Speech Movement wasn’t really about saying “fuck” – it was about freedom, freedom from mindlessness, freedom from repression, from prejudice, from the gods of corporate, from being told what to eat, drink, smoke, feel, want, desire, dream…
Chocolate chip cookies (extra chocolate and nuts) and
Pecan pie with a layer of chocolate. Alright!
Baked an apple pie from New York Times recipe. Used tart apples, a little extra sugar and cinnamon. This is the second or third apple pie I’ve baked. I’m very happy with how it turned out – or at least how it looks.
All these pies are for Thanksgiving, which, thankfully, wasn’t a deeply emotional time for our family. On the other hand, Christmas was a very special time. So far, plans are David and Charles in Texas for Christmas Eve and part of Christmas day; John for Christmas dinner.
Guy and some of his flowers
This a photograph of Guy, the man who sells flowers at the corner of Noe and 15th. He’s been selling flowers here since the bad old days of AIDS out of control. He’s a story-teller, and he has some stories about people wasting away and dying, one after another, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. So many casualties…



A Day in the Life

Monday, 11/16/2015 (A post not about grief!)
View from the UCSF Fitness Center

Coffee in the early morning – fixed the night before, so ready to go from refrigerator – home-made café sua da. Then rustic sourdough with almond butter and an apple for breakfast – apple from the Courtney’s Market up the hill, on the corner at 14thand Castro.

Caught the N Judah train for a 10 minute ride to the fitness center in UCSF Parnassus campus https://www.ucsf.edu/. I spent 25 minutes on an elliptical machine watching the hawks soar over Golden Gate Park and Golden Gate Bridge in the distance and the University of San Francisco’s white rococo spires off to the right (not in photo above). And I did resistance things for almost 10 minutes. Two guys talking in the locker room: “The secret to a long life is to marry well.” This place is overrun with scientists, doctors, and the like. I’m thinking these two are probably geneticists. I’m thinking they’re right, too.

UCSF hallway – flashback to countless
halls just like this one over the years 

N Judah back the apartment. Shower. Look at news.
I AM NOT TERRORIZED
or terrified or anything along those lines. I am more determined, hardened by the awful carnage in Paris. Paris, Beirut, Mumbai, London, Madrid, Jerusalem, Bali, New York…
Walked to the 22 Fillmore outbound stop at Duboce and Church. Rode 22 to the Mission (16th at Valencia) where David’s SF office is. I got there early, so walked to 18th to Tartine Bakery (popular enough that there is no sign), but there was a long line, so moved on. I stopped in at Faye’s Video, a nice, hippie-ish coffee house/video rental place. The coffee smelled really good, maybe at a Blue Bottle level. We’ll just have to find out how good it is. At the corner of the next block, the city smells were well-scented with cannabis. Half a block from the police station – no problem.
In the Mission. I thought of Sisyphus
It brings me pleasure to think about and name – not to mention, ride – all these MUNI routes and street names.
David and I had a nice lunch at the Little Chihuahua on Valencia in the Mission, relaxed, passing the time – a huge blessing to have these lunches so often with my son. I told David about my realization that within this mourning a series of happy thoughts is followed by unhappy thoughts, like I’ll be thinking for awhile (hours or days) about Leslie and traveling or working together and be happy that it ever happened and then the sadness that it won’t happen again… The trick, I said, is somehow to not cycle into the sadness. He was somewhat amused – you mean be happy all the time? Hmmm, well, that would be a good trick, wouldn’t it. 
Took the 22 back to Church and Market, where a woman in a motorized wheelchair was having trouble getting on the bus because the ramp was blocked by a trash receptacle. The driver wouldn’t move the bus. So I got off to see if I could help her, but couldn’t get her and the WC onto the ramp – another guy joined in and we still couldn’t do it. I kept saying to the driver, “Just move forward a little and she’ll be able to get on,” but the driver still wouldn’t move the bus 3 feet either way to accommodate her. “To hell with it,” she says and motors off to another bus stop. I say to the driver, “You really were just fucking with her, weren’t you,” and I left as well. Ha, he is the proud recipient of my first phone-in complaint to a government agency in my life. Asshole.
La Boulange – happy days
Went home for a few minutes, then caught the N Judah to Cole Street, where I’m sitting, writing, in front of La Boulange. Cole and Carl, where Leslie and I passed many happy hours. I was thinking I would walk to the Haight, but on a whim, jumped back on the N to 9th and Irving (where there are four coffee shops in one block – it’s that kind of a block).
I stopped in at a women’s clothing store called Ambiance to hopefully find the young woman, who, a month ago, when I was at the corner with someone throwing up (chemotherapy) into the gutter, ran across the street to bring two bottles of water. And there she was – the same young woman. She said, “Yes, I remember that.” I said, “We all remember. It was the sweetest thing” (especially in San Francisco where one sees all sorts of body functions, parts, eliminations, etc.). 

Jug band at corner Castro and Market

I forgot that Arizmendi Bakery (my destination) is closed on Mondays, so back on N to Duboce and walk to the Castro. There is a traveling kids/hippie jug band playing at the corner of Castro and Market and a guy comes by and drops some cookies into the open guitar case. Lot of cannabis being smoked on this corner – jug band, dogs, packs, guitars, crystals strewn around. Rainbow Gathering people.
Walked back to my apartment where I ran into Sean, one of my neighbors, who says kind of out of nowhere, “Do you have any idea how lucky you are” (to be living on this street in these days). “Yes, I think about that a lot.” Walked to Whole Foods for dinner, where I shared a table with a wonderfully interactive baby and mother. Good times.
Back home, thinking that today I was in Duboce Triangle, the Mission, Upper Market, the Castro, Cole Valley, and Inner Sunset. Thinking how fortunate I am.
Copied this from a web site: Charles Baudelaire developed a derived meaning of flâneur—that of “a person who walks the city in order to experience it.” 

Duboce Park Cafe – two blocks from home

There was nothing in the world
That I ever wanted more
Than to feel you deep in my heart
There was nothing in the world
That I ever wanted more
Than to never feel the breaking apart
(Pictures of You)

All Saints ceremony, a picture of a picture of a thought, I’m functional

Country sourdough (Thom Leonard recipe)

The associate pastor at First Presbyterian sent a letter early last week inviting me to the All Saints Day service. She noted that the names of church members who had passed away in the past 12 months would be read. I went. Thank you, Wendy.

Let me stop to note that several years ago I stopped going to church (though I continued in weekly Bible study). And years before that, Leslie and I quit giving to the church because of a huge difference between us and the denomination. How did the church and clergy respond when Leslie passed away? They reached out – not unlike turning the other cheek.
Chemo

The service was an All-Saints service, oriented to people who have passed on and those who mourn, including hymns, prayer, and sermon (there was a lovely thought about the “great cloud of saints” – you know, like Leslie and all the others through time). The names of members who passed away in the past 12 months were read. People in the congregation could then call out names of others, so I called out Tom’s name – Tom, whose body I found a few weeks before Leslie passed away. And, we took communion (always, to me, the highest Christian ceremony I know of).

I don’t mean anything related to “high church” or high in the sense of high on a substance like alcohol or cannabis or whatever. I mean high as in exalted… numinous… elevated… unifying… beyond…
I don’t ordinarily associate the Presbyterian Church with high ceremony, but there it was, unmistakably so.
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Welcome lights in front of our home
A thought

On the right is a photo of a picture of a thought – the person who gave the picture to me thought of giving it to me and then made the picture of that thought and gave it to me. That’s him at the bottom and me at the top. It’s on some book shelves in the front room.

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From the rocking of the cradle
To the rolling of the hearse
The going up
Was worth the coming down
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I’ve been baking, pruning roses, going places, hanging out, putting up welcome lights, being by doing (busy hands are happy hands), and doing better. Now, at eight months (yesterday), I’m not functioning at a high level, but I’m functioning. Ha! I’m a functional mourner.
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Someone was saying that in some cultures they have shrines to people who have passed away, and that person thought it seems morbid or something like that. I showed her a photo of my shrine for/to Leslie (It’s for me, obviously.)

Shrine in front room (in left lower quadrant) 



More on grief, bereavement, war, bread, randomness

(Some of these photo are unrelated to the words. They’re just pictures I took.)
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Part of my problem is that I had it so good for so long.

Baked October 2015. Rustic sourdough
with pecans, currants, cinnamon (part of my therapeutic work)

——————
Let us be kind to one another, for most of us are fighting a hard battle. Ian MacLaren
——————
One of the things I taught in hospice training and courses on hospice and palliative care was that each of us goes through the processes of dying, grief, etc. in different ways, at different speeds, in different cycles – and different at different times for the same person. It’s yet another example of the truth of, “It varies.”
——————
Seven months into this bereavement I looked at some of what I’ve written in the past about grief. I haven’t looked before now because I thought it best to experience whatever/however it is, without being influenced by external things, such as my own and other people’s previous thoughts about grief.
1967, a beautiful little town in Vietnam
Overall, I seem to have done a good job writing. So far, I like most the grief and bereavement chapter in my first book (1995). How can I “like” what I’ve written about grief? Mainly I like it because it’s accurate and helpful, at least for me. There are a few things I would change in what I wrote, but overall, pretty good. Grief WORK includes the following “tasks of bereavement” – each and all to be worked through again and again and again and…
  • Telling the “death story” and recounting the story of the illness (It’s not that you want to…)
  • Expressing and accepting the sadness
  • Expressing and accepting guilt, anger, and other feelings perceived as negative
  • Reviewing the relationship with the deceased (the really good part for me, usually)
  • Exploring possibilities in life after the death
  • Understanding common processes and problems in grief
  • Being understood or accepted by others

Baby playing by Carroll Street, 1982
I like that in that chapter I wrote about the potential for grief to “precipitate great personal or spiritual growth.”
I see myself working slowly through all of these tasks, but I’m not seeing much in the way of “growth” LOL. It’s a hopeful thing to see that I’m somewhere along the road in each “task.”
I get to easier places of not so much sadness and I get a little strength and kind of take on the next thing. Like today, writing to Dr. Lichliter (first draft). This was the first time I wrote about that last night.
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Phana (age 3 or 4) and me, 1985 or 86
I was in New Mexico to see Jim and Elisabeth a few weeks ago. The day I left, Katy had us over for breakfast (Thank You!). As we left her home, she was talking about attending a ceremony in the next weeks. The last thing I remember her saying was something like “… figuring out what to do with the rest of my life.” Good question!
——————-
I’ve baked bread twice in about the past week. The second time was mainly for gifts. Both times I baked rustic sourdough – plain, with cheese, and with pecans, currants, sugar, and cinnamon.
——————-
la rue sans joie, civilian bus blown up by VC mine
In the last post I wrote about war. A little bit more now – about places. I was at the DMZ (Deckhouse/Prairie), Dodge City (Thuy Bo), Con Thien (outside the wire, but I’m counting it), Gio Linh, Highway 1 (named by the French, the Street Without Joy), Khe Sanh, Lang Vei (How about that! I have several non-violent stories about being there.), Hue (before the bad time), Quang Tri (before the bad). I also spent a total of about four weeks in the rear at Danang and Phu Bai, also a few weeks at Dong Ha in the semi-rear.
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One thing I do is get out every day – usually twice/day. My main places to go are Central

Never too young to start smoking, I guess

Market and Whole Foods. Places with people around. More days than not I spend time with a friend or John (Thank You, Everybody!). Yesterday I went to WF twice – the first time was really good – I ran into someone I think highly of (hospice and mental health social worker from San Francisco). Also a friend from the festival scene, and there was a cute baby who gave me all kinds of smiles and a ~12 year old girl who had such a sweet smile I literally laughed out loud. The second time at WF was also good. I realized today that I could hang out in the café area inside or out and read. So I read for about an hour on the patio.

At Hill Fights, 1967 – wounded waiting for medevac
Look at how dirty their shirts are – that’s not just sweat

I thought going to church today would be a nice opportunity to connect. The sermon was on the Song of Ruth, which was one of the last things I said to Leslie – wherever you go, I will go… So I connected to the grief, my grief. It was a tough one. At least we didn’t also sing In the Garden or That Old Rugged Cross. I went to Open Ring and spent some time with Dan Foster, so that was wonderful
———————
Things happen, like the Song of Ruth sermon or when I finally started on income tax, couldn’t find everything, and called Social Security re how to get papers related to Leslie and was told to bring our marriage license to the SSA office. Oh. So I’ll be going through things like birth certificates, marriage license, photos, other things from a sweet past life… 

Leslie in Yoeun’s apartment on Carroll Street


Photo: Leslie in Yoeun’s apartment on Carroll Street. Leslie went places not many people went. People would wait on her, knowing that whatever it was, Leslie would fix it.