John

 

John in a fez and with a nail through his head.

 

I don't have enough words to write about my Uncle John.

Ones that come to mind easily are: Funny, generous, smart, joyful, loving, curious, enthusiastic, and kind. 

The only negative words that cross my mind would be: Occasionally inappropriate. Some jokes didn't land. Some attitudes took time to evolve, but they eventually did. Because John was a true lifelong learner who never stopped reading and wanting to know more in order to be better and more compassionate.

My Uncle John was the youngest of his three siblings, and from his earliest days provided some of the all-time most enjoyed family stories. He was often compared to the Eddie Haskall character from TV as always a source for a bit of trouble.

As a baby in an old version of a wheelie saucer, he once got into the kitchen garbage and rubbed coffee grounds into his hair right before Grandma had company arriving and she'd spent all day cleaning everything. She said it was a terrible mess and he just grinned and laughed.

My grandma used to talk about how my mom and Joe would be contentedly playing a game on the floor, only to have John toddle over and sit on the board.

Once as a small child John didn't get his way and his parents heard him yell and stomp loudly up every single stair in protest. At the top there was a pause as he listened for a reaction, and finally said out loud to himself, "Well, that didn't work."

John once got separated from Grandma in a department store, and after a frantic search she located him sitting on the floor of a shop reading a comic book. He looked up and said, "Where have you been?" 

When John was a teenager learning to drive, my grandpa used to describe a harrowing trip around the block where he tried to direct John away from various obstacles such as garbage cans and curbs and parked cars. In Grandma's telling of the story, it always ended with Grandpa simply walking silently into the house afterward and putting himself into a room behind a closed door for a long time. Supposedly John called after him, "How did I do?"

Possibly my favorite story of John as a kid is how he used to ask his dad for an advance on his allowance, and then still collect his full allowance at the end of the week. His siblings were annoyed, but didn't protest until the day Grandpa reached into his pocket and didn't have enough for a full allowance for everyone, and started to reduce equally what each person was given. My mom and Joe cried foul, pointing out John regularly got more than they did due to his frequent advances. My grandfather was an accountant for Sears.

John's college stories always seemed heavily edited for young ears, but we did hear he hung around with a frat-mate named Bubble, and it was implied much beer was consumed and much fun was had. Most famously it was described how little he studied, but how infuriatingly well he did anyway. John used to regale us with how diligently his wife Charlotte studied, and how he decided to crack open a book only the night before exams. He startled everyone by graduating magna cum laude, and then turned to his parents and said if only he'd studied an additional day he "could have been summa cum laude!" 

He was overwhelmingly well-liked in his town of Marysville, despite being an outspoken Democrat in a bright red sea of Republicans. My favorite testament to his abilities as a lawyer came in the form of a condolence message to my cousin Tony a day or so after John's passing. The guy said John was the nicest person who ever prosecuted him, and even though he disagreed with the verdict, he admired John's professionalism. Then he added a P.S. saying, "I was totally guilty. Lol! That man did a professional job."

John's relationship with his mom after my grandpa died was really funny. Grandma was organized and practical and punctual. John less so, much to her exasperation. 

He used to do Grandma's taxes for her (mine too, when I was a student at OSU) and the only payment he charged family was that he got to check the box for a donation to the Presidential Election Campaign Fund. But as a lawyer he did a lot of taxes, and he treated the April 15th deadline for mailing it all in as a holiday. I think Gram went with him once to the post office which had extended hours and a band playing, and she said he celebrated with the postal employees as he turned everything in at the last possible minute. This always made my grandma anxious to have something important happen right up against a deadline, but that was John.

John also used to happily announce if we were all out to dinner that the check should "go to Mom." He paid for many things and made sure she was always comfortable and cared for, so she could certainly manage to pay for dinner, but I think he just liked the look on the waitstaff's faces when they'd start to hand him the bill at the end of the meal and he would loudly make sure we all knew Grandma was paying. She always smiled and shook her head and pulled out her wallet.

He made sure Grandma had a really comfortable chair up at the cottage that she could nap in. He's been the one tending her grave since she died.

I had the opportunity to live in my Uncle John's house for a summer when I was in college. I needed to live somewhere in Ohio before the start of my sophomore year in order to qualify for in-state tuition, and John found me a job with the Department of Transportation in Marysville. I mostly worked as a flagger on a road crew, standing in jeans and boots and a reflective vest and hardhat in hundred degree heat. I think John also intended to make me appreciate the value of a college degree after a summer of lower skilled work. There was a time where there was a produce truck on fire that necessitated all the cargo be discarded, and all the DOT workers got to help ourselves to as many singed vegetables as we could carry. John laughed when I walked in with all that food saying I was finally pulling my weight in the house. The wildest day was when a box fell off a truck (that according to local news was either going to, or coming from, somewhere) and they had to call a hazmat team to investigate. The call went out to any truck in town with lights on it to go to the scene. I was in a truck with a couple of guys, and we chose to park under an overpass where it was shady. It was pointless for us to be there, so we may as well have been pointless in a cooler spot. After a little while, some official stuck his head in our truck to tell us to "EVACUATE MARYSVILLE!" How? To where? John absolutely loved that story.

Living in John's house was really fun. My youngest cousin, Mary, is ten years younger than I am, so she was nine and I was nineteen. We were roommates who somehow shared clothes despite the age difference, and she could sleep through anything so I would play music in our room in the morning as I got dressed. I loved time with cousin Tony and Aunt Char. Nobody was ever on time to anything. Meals were erratic but good. Friends and relatives came and went because everyone was always welcome.

That was always a given. If you showed up at John and Charlotte's house, you were welcome. If they weren't there, they'd tell you where the key was (under the flat rock at the top of the basement steps) and you could help yourself to whatever you needed. They provided a space that was a safety net for many. One of my kids once told me in a fit of worry about her future that she was afraid of failure and ending up homeless. I said to her, "Do you really think John and Charlotte would ever let that happen?" Because of course she knew we would be there for her always, and her grandma, and any number of family and friends who would not hesitate to help if she needed it, but the sheer bedrock of love and stability that was John and Charlotte was the most reassuring foundation I could conjure, and it helped.

John and Charlotte hosted many a Christmas Eve dinner. Possibly the best Christmas event was when we all left John alone to decorate the tree--which he insisted he could do--only to come home to the big reveal of the tree in the stand still bundled tightly in its net, a string of lights wound around it, and a giant bow slapped on the front. We laughed about it the whole night, and enjoyed a Christmas Rockin' Eve exchanging presents as we danced. I've seen many trees, but none as memorable as that one.

They'd have us for Easter if we were around. They held baby showers and birthdays and general cookout events in their home. They hosted the reception for my brother Arno's wedding to Deepanjana. 

John was the judge who married Arno and Deepanjana in the courthouse in Marysville. Arno's not particularly interested in common traditions, and was somewhat unprepared for ceremony details. We'd gone down to High Street in Columbus trying to find rings for them the day of the wedding, and the only things we could find were in this funky shop with incense and tie-dye shirts, and they found silver rings with lizards. Arno's had lizards all around. Deepanjana's was a slender ring with a single lizard on top. When John led them through the ceremony and got to the exchange of rings, we listened as he gently gave instructions to Arno, "Left hand. Next finger. Lizard up."

John loved travel. John loved history. John loved to read and his library was always one of my favorite rooms to spend time in. John loved the Boy Scouts and Detroit Coney Island Hot Dogs and his cats. 

More than anything, John loved his family. He adored his wife in a way no one could question. He used to call her "the Bunny" and he liked to say sweetly, "The Bunny makes my life a living hell" which always made her laugh and say, "Oh, John!" There were many things that made Charlotte say, "Oh, John!"

He loved his son and his daughter and his brother and his sister and his mom and his dad, and if you ever met him you got the sense there was love enough for you, too. He made love feel both special and commonplace. It was in abundant supply. 

He made meaningful contributions to his community without any desire for acknowledgement. He was generous in a way that should put wealthier people to shame, because in all ways that matter he was far richer than any billionaire could hope to be. 

John was a wonderful uncle. He was the kind of uncle who wanted to make you laugh and spoil you with all the stuff he knew parents wouldn't indulge. He gave big bear hugs.

He specialized in a sliding severed finger gag that never failed to amuse. The ultimate time for the finger trick was once in church after the pastor mentioned the many miracles of Jesus, and Tony said his dad caught his eye and flashed the finger slide as if to say "You want to see a miracle?" Tony said it was very hard not to laugh.

He would give us noisy presents like a Mr Microphone (which only a sibling would give another sibling's kids) and was quick to hand out treats. Even in recent years where I was now a middle-aged adult, he would give me cash as we were passing through on our way to New York so I could spend it on something fun there. John helped move heavy furniture into my first apartment in college. He drove me to Toledo several times to transfer me to my mom's car so she could take me home to Detroit on school breaks. All of his nieces and nephews knew he was proud of them. He loved us.

And John loved my kids, so he was not only a great uncle, he was a great Great Uncle. He was delighted to have my kids around, and regularly offered to take them if Ian and I ever wanted to travel alone. I also enjoy my kids, so never found a time where I would want to be apart from them on a trip, but I was always touched by the offer to watch them for us. Maybe I should have done that. I'm sure they would have had a blast. He took us to see Indian Mounds, and the topiary garden downtown, and bookstores. He read to my kids from "My Father's Dragon."

As the baby of his family, I think John had a special affinity for my youngest child. We didn't often have sugared cereal in our home, but when we came to visit in Ohio, John wanted to provide all the treats. He once handed Quinn a box of some sort of sugar bombs and said it was all for her and it wasn't for anyone else to eat. She demurred, because maybe that seemed like too much, but John insisted, and all that cereal was only Quinn's. Every subsequent visit over many years, John always provided Quinn with her own personal bottle of Hershey's chocolate syrup. He knew being the baby meant always getting the hand-me-downs, and always having to share. John made it clear the chocolate syrup was for Quinn alone. 

John proudly displayed art my kids made. (To be fair, they make unusually good art.) He had hoped to visit Aden's college and have her give him a tour. He offered out of the blue to find Mona a job down in Ohio and let her live in one of their spare rooms when she was uncertain about what to do after high school. (She didn't feel that was the right direction for her at the time, but the fact that the option existed was incredibly reassuring at a time of many unknowns.) John was easily one of their favorite people in the world. This loss is hard on them.

Any average day with John was a good day. Aden described how her favorite was a time he was in Milwaukee, and the two of them drove around on errands, stopping for gas (where John chatted with the cashier about how he loved the city), and picking up pastries. The Canfora Bakery near the park had changed ownership, and the new pastries weren't as good as the old ones. The two of them started out excited about their cheese danishes, then slowly agreed the quality had declined. Aden said it felt nice to be included in a more grownup conversation, where her opinion was treated as equally valid. John didn't talk down to people. John was genuinely interested in what children had to say.

John passed away in his sleep after a birthday celebration in a restaurant for his daughter. He got to enjoy time with people he loved and hold court as he did at a table with good food. He was in his home next to his wife with no thought he wouldn't see the morning. In many ways he went exactly as many of us would wish to. Maybe it's better to have some warning. Maybe it's not. John had a wonderful and full life. I think he might have been painfully aware of how much more he wanted to do and how much he was leaving behind if he had known ahead he was about to die, so in John's case it was maybe best to go while content and looking forward to the next day.

News in small towns spreads quickly. Before the sun was up, people were already contacting my cousin saying how sorry they were, and food began arriving. The number of people coming forward to say, "John was my best friend" is moving. I can't believe how many plates of cookies keep coming to the house.

Funerals are strange things. There's grief side by side with joy. There are moments to worry the joy feels disrespectful, and other times when we know it's how we survive. There are people gathered we haven't seen in a long time. Having Domino along was not convenient, but she makes everyone smile, not just me. 

The sheer number of people who wanted to pay respects required a full day of viewings at the funeral home, in addition to the scheduled viewing prior to the funeral the next day. The open casket was hard for me, but it was very John. He was in his scoutmaster uniform, holding a favorite book (The Frontiersman by Allan W. Eckert). The room was filled with flowers and photos and a small shrine to beloved dog Smokey Joe. The music piped in included The Beatles, Paul Simon, and the soundtrack to Hamilton.

The receiving line in the morning was out the door and an hour-long wait. People drove from miles away. I don't know how my aunt and cousins had the strength to continue to greet so many people so graciously for such a stretch. 

The weather has been beautiful. The young cousins are enjoying each other's company. We somehow ended the viewing day feeling good, despite the terrible loss, which is how John would have wanted it. He would have enjoyed this gathering so much. I hope I play well for the funeral service later today.

John was a big personality with one of the biggest hearts I've ever known. John was funny, but when he was with his brother Joe the two of them were next level hilarious. At Joe's funeral only four months ago, John spoke of his brother going ahead of him into the afterlife to scout things out.

I thought we had longer with my Uncle John. I'm trying to remember to be grateful to have had him as long as we did, but it's hard not to be greedy and want more. I loved him dearly. I wish he weren't gone. 


ADDENDUM April 4, 2026:

The funeral was touching and funny. Mary read a poem by John from a book my mom recently made about his library. She finished with a poem John often quoted:

"You can look at a book and better still read it.

A book is a friend when you happen to need it.

And when you are through you can still think about it.

So hooray for books! Don't say it but shout it."

Those of us in attendance who knew the poem recited it along with her. 

Tony then proceeded to give the best eulogy I've ever heard. It was funny and sweet and moving and John would have loved it. The friend's eulogy that followed included the impromptu story of when Charlotte was very pregnant and someone asked if John was excited, and he replied, "I would be if I knew for sure I was the father." (I'm sure that got another "Oh, John!")

I played solo viola for about 45 minutes during the visitation. I used a viola I built for a friend in Ohio rather than the one I built for myself almost twenty years ago because I think the more recent one sounded warmer and more balanced. (I'm glad to see my work has improved over time.) As part of the service I played Simple Gifts. I'm glad I can offer music in a time when it's hard to know what will be meaningful to people as they are grieving. I think John would have enjoyed my playing.

Unfortunately my name was listed in the program as Kolby Klein. The minister apologized several times, and I told him I don't know if I have any programs from any funeral I've played with my name spelled correctly, so not to worry about it. Although "Kolby" is new. I've never met a Kolby, so that seems like an odd name to throw out there. On the plus side, I think he was so embarrassed that he did not do more than cast a sidelong glance at Domino sitting in the front pew. She was much appreciated emotional support for me, nestled by my side when I was seated, and contentedly watching me play when I was working.

The burial this morning was just family. There were military honors. Included in the casket were the ashes of both John's beloved cat Norman, and little dog Smokey Joe.

A representative (and family friend) from the funeral home that ran everything with such care this week read this poem, which I thought was lovely.

...Death is nothing at all. It does not count. I have only slipped away into the next room. Nothing has happened. Everything remains exactly as it was. I am I, and you are you, and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged. Whatever we were to each other, that we are still. Call me by the old familiar name. Speak of me in the easy way which you always used. Put no difference in your tone. Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow. Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together. Play, smile, think of me, pray for me. Let my name be ever the household word it always was. Let it be spoken without effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it. Life means all that it ever meant. It is the same as it ever was. There is absolute and unbroken continuity. What is this death but a negligible accident? Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight? I am but waiting for you, for an interval, somewhere very near, just around the corner. All is well.

— Rosamunde Pilcher, September

There were hugs. There was crying. We took turns laying hands on the casket. (I let Domino rest one of her paws on it because I know that would have made John smile.)

We went back to the house for food and a little more time together before we started the long drive home.

I think the image that will stay with me most from the funeral was looking up at one point and seeing all three of my kids comforting each other by the casket. It was just the three of them under the tent, arms around each other, heads bent. I cannot express how much it means to me that my children love each other, and find support in each other in hard times. That is what family should be. That is the thing I love most in this world. 

 

 

Dear Dad, 2024

Dear Dad,

This is the ninth Father's Day without you. Did I remember to call you on the last one in 2015? I hope so. I don't remember.

I was just glancing through pictures from back then, and it's odd to see how young Quinn was in particular. She was only eight when you died. There is such a world of difference between eight and seventeen. How much of you does she remember? So many of those memories must include your being sick or needing a walker. That's so unfair. I wish she had more experiences like mine, where you shared information about history and the world at the dinner table, surprised us with poems, dashed around city streets going from one gallery or bookstore to the next, always greeting me with a smile, and tucking a twenty dollar bill in my palm at every visit claiming it was overdue allowance. 

We never really got an allowance growing up, did we. There was a week where I remember I got a dime, and my brothers each got a nickel, and then there was a stretch where you had a stack of comic books you drew from once a week to mostly the boys because after my first couple of copies of Magnus the Robot Fighter, I lost interest. Then randomly in high school you thought twenty a month or a week was deserved for no reason I can think of. We had paper routes, so we didn't need it, but I liked the extra record money. I guess my approach to allowance with my kids has been the same. I'm happy to just get them what they need when they ask, or hand them money if they are going somewhere they might need it, but they seldom ask for anything. They have what they need. They don't feel entitled to more. I feel like my brothers and I grew up with that same sense. When I hear people say if you don't pay kids for chores they won't appreciate the value of money, I never buy it. I think it depends on the kids and the circumstances and the examples they see around them. The example I got was to make good choices, and books and art were among those.

So, let me think what I would update you on if I could call you this year.

I guess first is to let you know that Mom is okay. She had a scary fall down the front steps on her birthday back in October, and that was a mess. She broke her heel and had to be off her foot for months. It still hurts, and she's moving a little slow, but she's healed up remarkably well. Arno and Barrett and I took turns going out to help. She had lots of support from friends. Physical therapy made a difference, and she's back to her regular life as far as I can see. She's making beautiful work, including finishing up the project with the small cabinets to house books based on different trees. You'd be amazed. I know she still misses having you there to help her determine when a piece she's working on is officially done. All the current work is stunning. 

Mom actually told us a really funny story about you recently. We were in Pleasant Ridge for an unplanned evening (after touring U of M we were supposed to go straight to the cottage, but decided to visit Mom and stay there a night and she put together a meal so much more elegant and tasty than anything I could have done if given a week to think about it) and we started telling Dad stories. And she described how the first time she tried to cook for you in your apartment she opened the oven to find the smallest skillet she'd ever seen, and your response was, "Oh! I lost that six months ago!" She also said your cabinets were filled with empty boxes you found attractive, and things like a chipped teapot that couldn't be used but were all aesthetically pleasing. We may have a gathering later this year just to record everyone's stories about you (so they aren't lost like a tiny skillet in an oven).

The U of M tour was fun. We've taken four official college tours with Quinn so far: Beloit, Lawrence, U of I Chicago, and U of M. So that's two small schools in small towns, one small school in a big city, and a very big school. My inclination is to have Quinn not too far away so she still has access to things like home and the doctor she likes etc., and in a small enough environment that she doesn't fall through the cracks if she's not assertive. But big schools have advantages, too, I just worry. I just want her to have a good college experience. She doesn't know what she wants to study, but she's good at all subjects and loves to learn.

Quinn's a lot like you in many ways. She's quiet and serious and smart, but with a really wry sense of humor that takes people by surprise. She's particularly good at Spanish and art and writing, and of course geography still. She joined the debate club and the National Honor Society this past school year, and she also had a paid internship with some sort of sustainability company. She has nice friends, her grades are good.... The only thing I can think of to improve upon would be for her to practice piano regularly. I ask her every semester if she wants to continue lessons, because I know it's frustrating for both her and her teacher that she's not putting in the work, but she insists she wants to keep going. If she wants lessons she can have lessons, I just don't know what's happening from her point of view. Anyway, Quinn is lovely. It's easy to imagine how much you would enjoy going with us on college tours.

Mona's doing great. I wish you could see her art. I know you called her out as a genius many years ago, but her aunt recently said the same thing when we were in New York recently. I'm not entirely sure what's happening in her apprenticeship because she's very private about her life, but I know she loves the things she's learning and appreciates her teacher. There is so much more interesting stuff to know about tattooing than I ever realized, and she loves learning it all. I really think this path is a good fit. Plus she loves having her own apartment above the store, and she regularly pops in on us at home to hang out, especially now that Aden's home for the summer. I love seeing all the siblings together.

Aden's taking the slow path in college, which is fine by me. UW Stout is affordable, and she loves it, and she's still grappling with managing ADHD and anxiety and performing well in her classes. She's very good at what she's doing, and has won several awards so far, but turning in regular assignments, etc., is still a struggle. She's made some beautiful art, some of which I've had framed to hang in the house. Her current obsession is sea monkeys. Aden continues to be a delight, and I'm glad she wants to take advantage of being in  There are lots of classes she still wants to take, and I don't have any timeline she needs to fit into. 

How many years were you in school? Hamilton College, Univ of Geneva, Columbia, Wayne State.... I think I'm missing something. I have it in my head that you were at Teacher's College for a bit, but Mom disagrees. I know I wrote all of it down (your entire school and work history) on my laptop years ago where you gave us a hilarious blow by blow of many things, but that was one of the items lost when my computer crashed. I figure if anyone could see the value of taking your time to enjoy being in a learning environment while you can, it's you. So I tell Aden her grandpa would have approved, and to take whatever classes make her happy.

All three kids are so sweet and funny and kind. I worry about them and love spending time with them and wish you could visit with them. You would find each as fascinating as I do. 

Your other granddaughter loves college (of course) and is studying art history and anthropology. I hope I get to see her this summer, maybe at the cottage if we're lucky. Your grandson is bright, creative, funny, and surprising. He had his first cello lesson the other day, and if it sticks, I may wind up building one more cello after all. I really thought I was in the clear and would never need my cello form and templates again! But we'll see. He's one of the few people on Earth I would actually make a cello for.

Oh, and speaking of building, I was just in New York where a couple of my violins were part of a show of women luthiers! It was the second leg of a touring exhibit of instruments, and the showroom was just down the street from Carnegie Hall. You would have loved this trip SO MUCH. I wish you could have been at the makers' brunch with me and Mom and Arno, and I was on a panel talk that I think you would have enjoyed, and the concert that evening (all woman quartet playing music by women composers on instruments in the show) was amazing and you would have loved everything. It's impossible to walk around that city and not think of you with every step. We even walked all the way to the Cloisters on our last afternoon in town (which on my wonky knee was quite a feat). You made it to the Cloisters finally, didn't you? Wasn't that a running joke for a while that you kept meaning to get there, but somehow never did? The whole trip was wonderful, Arno's new office is great, their renovated apartment is incredible.... You should have been there. I wish you could have been.

Ian's good. He spent part of this Father's Day at the violin store running the rental charges. I've been really happy to see him use more of his retired-from-the-Army time to get involved in projects he's interested in, like his Wisconsin Association of Railroad Passengers group, and more Linux things. The other apartment above the violin store freed up, so we made it an office where he can set up the 3D printer, etc. I still need his help running the business, but I want him doing more of what he wants to as he can. Oh, and we're finally in the process of selling his childhood home. It's been two years since his mom passed away, and he agreed it wasn't good for the house or the neighborhood for it to just be sitting. Emotionally that's all still a lot, so I handled as much of that as I could. Losing a parent is awful, so I understood. I wish I didn't understand so well.

I'm trying to get myself unstuck with my writing projects. It's weird that for me being stuck has nothing to do with actual writing. I don't have any trouble writing and have never suffered with any kind of writer's block, but I have a need to finish a project before committing to the next, and the wedding novel has been stalled for years at this point, simply because I don't know what to do with it. I finally decided to send it to an editor and get professional advice. We'll see. She's had it for a couple weeks, which means in my head I feel like the whole book is garbage. Few things are worse than handing someone a book you wrote and then having to wait for them to read it. But it's a start, I hope! I just want to be unstuck and start playing with more of my projects.

Health wise, this year has been annoying. I feel like I was fine, and then I turned 55 and fell to bits. My right knee got all swollen and I couldn't walk for a few weeks. Physical therapy is helping, but yuck. I was kind of relieved when I found out the mandolin orchestra wasn't going to Spain this summer, because I don't think I could handle airports, etc. I'm on a CPAP machine now, which is stupid looking but I like sleeping through the night. I'm wearing aligners again because something was off with my bite. I had another biopsy, which was uncomfortable to say the least, but the results were benign. I have a thyroid check coming up, I need meds for my blood pressure, and I have another colonoscopy scheduled in about a month. I figure since colon cancer took both you and my grandpa, that's not something I can afford to ignore. That's too many things! I don't like going to the doctor. I have thoughts for when the last child is out of the house for getting both Ian and myself in a better eating and exercise routine, so maybe that will help with some of it.

I'm sure there was more I wanted to say, but I'm getting tired and I have a lot of work waiting for me tomorrow. I do miss our Monday chats. I don't reach for the phone anymore when I think of something to tell you, but I still think of things I would say all the time.

I miss you. I miss you so very much and it still hurts. Is there an age that's too old to just want your dad? If there is, I'm not near it yet.

Ha, the dog just came in to nudge me into petting her, and I make that same funny wgshkk! wgshkk! sound to her that you used to do to our cat and dog. Domino is such a cutie. She'd have let you pet her!

I love you, Dad.

Kory

Dear Dad (2023)

Dear Dad,

So much to tell you about this year!

First, some general updates on the kids, which is the thing I most miss being able to talk to you about. 

I can't believe when you died they were only 13, 11, and 8. That was half Quinn's life ago at this point. There is such a world of difference between those ages, and 21, 19, and 16. I mean, could you have imagined Mona with a driver's license? She's still the only kid who has one, although Quinn is doing a good job in driver's ed and should have no trouble passing her test when she's ready. We need to bug Aden about finally taking her test again, even though she's not keen on driving. Mona seems to like it, and Quinn is getting more comfortable behind the wheel. 

Anyway, Aden loves her college, but she's been struggling. I think we missed catching that she likely had ADHD and anxiety issues when she was growing up, and now there are bigger complications with that at a college level. It's so hard to know sometimes what things are typical kid problems, and what things run deeper. All kids have bouts of laziness and bad time management, but how are you supposed to tell that from something parenting alone can't correct? We're working on some things with a therapist over summer to see if we can get her to a more confident place come fall. Aden is so talented and kind and lovely... It hurts to watch her not be able to do the things she wants to do. Regardless, she's managed to grow up quite a bit in her couple of years away at school. 

I'm glad Aden's home this summer. Although she's living in the downstairs nook, since Mona has kind of taken over their whole room. I know for Aden that home does not feel the same as it used to. That's such an odd transition, isn't it? When I visit Detroit, the house is still home, but there's really nothing there that's mine now. And yet, when I lie in the guest bed in my old space, I still recognize the patterns on the wooden door and the way the light shifts in the room. Somehow that's enough to feel like I belong.

Aden's been doing some nice print work. A lot of art schools have apparently abandoned print making, but not Stout. She does some adorable animation. The best news recently was that apparently one of the big video game design studios is now in Madison, which would be nicer for an eventual job than maybe all the way out in California. (At least for her mom.) She's hoping to spend time with friends up at the cottage before going back to school. Her new housing assignment will include a real kitchen and a private room, and she's looking forward to cooking again, and more privacy. She's playing a lot of a game called Tears of the Kingdom. She still has the bluest eyes you've ever seen.

Things for Mona have begun to turn in a good direction! She's been frustrated with her unfruitful job searches and was feeling stuck, but she's now on track to apprentice with the new tattoo shop opening across the street from the violin store soon. She had a great interview, they loved her work, and she's prepared to put in the hours and effort to learn those new skills. Mona will also be moving into the Airbnb space above the shop, so that will be a short commute. I think it's a good fit. She'll get to create art that's personal to people that they literally carry around with them everywhere, and make a good enough living to still pursue other avenues with her art as she likes. I'm excited for her.

The biggest adjustment to her moving out may be less of not having her around (since I'm sure she'll still come to the house and hang out from time to time), but more of the bird being gone! I can't picture that corner of the dining room without Keiko. He's so loud! And present. And lately he's been hanging out in a tinier cage next to the TV so as we watch things, he watches us. (And tells us that he's an adorable Keiko bird.) You never got to meet Keiko, but you'd have liked him. I wonder if seeing him would have reminded you of stories of your own birds that maybe you hadn't told us before.

Mona's sewing some beautiful things lately. Things far more intricate and professional looking than I ever came up with. We got her a really nice straight stitch machine. Apparently the better the machine, the fewer things it does, and this one does straight stitching really fast and well. I think what sold her on it was the extra arm that you can use to lift the sewing foot with either your elbow or your knee, so you can keep your hands on your work by the needle to spin it, etc. Saves Mona a ton of time. She's got an Etsy shop, and she works diligently to fill orders. You'd be as proud as I am of how hard she works. I'm already looking forward to updating you next year on how it all goes.

Quinn is good! She is SO relaxed and happy compared to a year ago. Remember how reserved she was, even back at 8? Like, not so much shy (which she is), but like she had her guard up a little all the time. Now that she is able to be herself in the world, she still spends a lot of time in her room and she'll never be an extrovert, but she moves differently, with a grace that wasn't there before. It's like she can breathe. I love it.

It's a scary time for trans-people right now, particularly kids, but so far Quinn's had nothing but support. I have friends in states that aren't so lucky. I'm grateful for her school and her doctor, and that even the people at the social security office who helped get her gender marker changed were happy to help.

She's doing well in all her classes (particularly Spanish), she continues with piano in a sluggish way but insists she doesn't want to quit, and she wishes she weren't so tall but otherwise is just quietly being Quinn. She's in charge of having dinner on the table at 6:00 when I get home from work four nights a week (which she does with the aid of a Hello Fresh box).

My favorite thing with Quinn is that during the school year, I get to straighten her hair every Sunday night. She has lovely waves in her hair, so of course she wants them gone. I miss the physical contact you have with smaller children that evaporates when you have teens. Getting to put on a movie and play with Quinn's hair for about 90 minutes while we watch something together is something I look forward to each week.

Speaking of missing smaller children, we got ourselves a baby-sized dog! I needed her. I really craved having something to scoop up who was excited to see me in a way that doesn't happen when your children are bigger. Ian was a holdout on the idea of a new dog after Chipper died, and periodically I'd ask him if I could start looking, and he wasn't ready. But then Quinn said she wanted a dog, and of course Ian relented. Now we have our little Chihuahua-rat terrier mix, Domino. You would love her. Everyone loves Domino. And this dog would have happily let you pet her all you wanted. Mona and I even flew with her to New York where we stayed with Arno and Deepanjana, and by the end of the trip she was doing the subways like a local dog. I got some nice pictures of her by the Nick Cave mosaics in one of the stations. (You'd have liked those, along with the Chuck Close ones.)

Arno and Deepanjana are doing the best I've ever seen them. Their lives are more than I can adequately describe, but they are thriving. And Ellora got into her dream school! She loves Berkeley, and is currently doing work in Madagascar. The newly expanded apartment is honestly the nicest place in New York as far as I'm concerned. Crazy that after Ellora moved away that they finally have extra space and a second bathroom.

Barrett and Dosha are doing great, too. Barrett's soon-to-be-published book is so good! It's filled with Mom's drawings, and he even found a way to include a picture of my viola. I don't know if that's the instrument I would have wanted to represent me in a published book, but that instrument has cochineal in the varnish which is what he needed. (I just remind myself that people interested in cultural entomology are not going to be scrutinizing my lutherie skills the way violin makers would, so it will be fine. But that's the viola I made for myself when Ian was deployed, and the only time I had to carve was after midnight and between newborn feedings so its claim to fame is that it exists at all.)

Rivyn is amazing. It just hit me that he's the age now that Quinn was when you died. That's kind of mind boggling. That little baby you got to hold briefly in those last few days at home has grown up to be imaginative and funny and is such a delight. He cycles among several interests and is better read at this point than most of the adults I know. I wonder how much of Barrett you'd see in him and what elements would be completely new.

Ian is well, but he's still adjusting to the passing of his mom. It's been a year. He's still undecided about what to do with the house out in Portland. I get it. After grandma died, I realized I couldn't drive by her old house without feeling a lot of pain. There's something deeply awful about being severed from a place that was once a close part of you and your story. I don't know if once Ian lets go of his childhood home if that's the last we'll see of it. I don't know if when someday we have to let the house in Pleasant Ridge go if I'll ever see it again, or if that whole neighborhood will just be gone from my life. It's a jarring, unpleasant thought. I don't know if there's a way for Ian to resolve any of that in his situation that doesn't hurt, so in the meantime it just gets postponed. Grief is hard. Grief is persistent. 

Mom's done a lot of traveling this year. She spent a few weeks in India and had an incredibly nice time, then she and I got to travel to Austria! What an amazing trip. She got to hear my mandolin orchestra perform in Graz, and in Salzburg. I made her watch The Sound of Music before we left because we were in some of the places that appeared in the movie. Somehow Mom had gotten to this point in life and not seen it before. I feel like you must have watched that movie, right? I saw it as a kid, so someone must have been there. (I guess this goes on the list of questions that it's too late to ask.) Mom's amazing. Her work is more beautiful than ever, she's busy. She misses you, of course, but is doing okay. Still the best cook ever. Every time she serves us a meal I think about asking you in that book of questions what your favorite food was, and you wrote "anything Karen makes."

I'm doing okay. I'm frustrated (as usual) with my lack of progress on book stuff, but will make time soon (I hope) to sort it out. The store is really busy, and I need to make time to work on the commissioned instruments on my bench. My health is fine, which I don't take for granted, and we have what we need.

I miss calling you on Mondays. I miss curling up with you to try and help with your crossword puzzles. (I know I was never any help, but occasionally there was a Star Trek clue that made me feel useful.)

Hey, I'm not crying this year as I type this. Is that some kind of progress? I don't know. It's probably good that I can think of you in a similar way to how I think of people who are still here, and not focus almost solely on your being gone. But I really really miss you. What I wouldn't give for one more hug from my dad this Father's Day. You gave great hugs.

I love you, Dad.

Kory

Dear Dad, 2022

Dear Dad,

Wow, what a year. We’re in this weird phase of moving out of the pandemic, while the pandemic is also still here. The beauty of being vaccinated, though, is hospitalization and death seem off the table. Long Covid is still a concern (I know too many people suffering with that to take it lightly), but the fear has lifted. Now it’s just an annoyance. I’m tired of masks. I’m tired of takeout rather than eating in restaurants. I’m tired of the social stress of people behaving without care for others and the divisions it causes. (Someone actually stuck a flyer on the door of the violin shop by the sign saying we require masks condemning our “virtue signaling.” That was just cowardly and rude.)

But the exciting thing about life getting back to something closer to normal is we get to do stuff again! There are concerts to play, and people to see.

The event where I thought about you most was when Mom and I went to Venice. Dad, we went back to Venice! But this time I got to play a concert there with my mandolin orchestra. I wish you could have heard us. You’d have loved it. We played against a backdrop of Tintoretto paintings. It was wonderful to have a chance to travel with just Mom for a week in Italy like that, but you would have loved it so much. The food, the canals, the gelato, the art, the endless places to wander. . .  You wouldn’t have kayaked with us, though. Mom and I would have waved to you as we paddled and you stayed in your suit and tie on a nice civilized path alongside the water. But oh, Dad, you would have loved all of it.

The garden back in Detroit is looking amazing. I don’t know how Mom does it. Our yard is such mess! Literally, right now, because we had a new deck put in, and the old pile of deck garbage is still here. The new fence doesn’t go up for another week or so. But it’s so nice to be in the backyard! I’m sitting on the new deck right now in the shade of the beech tree, perfect temperature, nice breeze, no fear of rotting boards giving way underneath me and sending me to my doom. We even strung some lights from the garage to the terrace above the new deck the way I always meant to and never did. We might repaint the mural on the garage wall from a dozen years ago. Quinn in particular feels it's time to paint something much better. Mona has ideas.

I got to do the varnish workshop again, finally. I still had those three instruments in the white I bought to use in 2020 before the pandemic shut everything down. And I had three instruments of my own to varnish, so that was fun. (I don’t think I’ll build three instruments at the same time anymore. Two is plenty. Three gets overwhelming.) I built a violin for Mona that she doesn’t want, but I’m glad I did it anyway. The little bird Aden drew on the back of the scroll came out cute. The violin sounds nice! I still need to make one with simpler wood for mom to paint. That’s one of the many projects that never quite seems to happen, but I do want to make a violin in the white for mom to decorate. That would be cool. I wish I could have done that with you, too! I’m trying to picture how fast you would get that done. It would be funny, because my part, building the instrument would take months, and then you would paint something amazing in under ten minutes and that would be the only thing anyone would comment on or praise. (And that would have been fine.)

Which reminds me, I did an internet search not long ago for your ties. I think often about all those ties you painted in that sweatshop in Brooklyn and there have to be some of those still out there in the world. I feel certain I would recognize your work if I saw one, but who knows? Mona and I went through a portfolio of Mom’s old prints from early in your marriage and before, and it’s fascinating to see what elements of her style have persisted, and what things are hard to recognize as her hand. Maybe those ties of yours don’t resemble what I think of as your work. Maybe I’ve passed one on the street and didn’t know.

Writing is weirdly stalled. I need to buckle down for one more edit on my latest novel, and figure out what I’m doing. I feel if I play the numbers game, I have a shot at a traditional publisher. But maybe I’d like the control better of staying indie and just investing in real marketing for a change. Or maybe creative control but with some support from a hybrid publisher is the way to go. I don’t know. All the non-writing bits of writing gets really discouraging and frustrating. But I like the new book. It’s fun. (And wouldn’t make you weep like the first one did!)

I think the oddest thing at the moment that I wish I had you here to talk about is the transition away from having kids in the house. We spent so many years where everything was centered around the needs of our kids, and scheduling things based on school calendars, or having to base so many meals adjusted to boring palates. . . And now they are essentially all grown up and it’s wonderful in new ways, but very different. Ian and I actually have to figure out what we want to do. We’ve spent a long time tag teaming to get things done, but now we can do things together again. So there are good things which are exciting, but it’s also a bit sad. I’m looking back on all their childhoods and wondering if it was okay. I don’t get a do-over. Maybe it wasn’t enough. I tried, though. I really did try.

I keep thinking there will be some relief at least in not being responsible for all of them in front of me all the time, but then I think about that lunch at your house where Alit was over. She’d just had her first child, and she said she had been experiencing nightmares where she was scared for the baby or didn’t know where she was and was panicked, and you looked at her sadly and said, “That never goes away.” So I’ve thought ever since that I should be prepared for that to be the case.

Luckily, though, at the moment it doesn’t seem to be. Aden finally got to leave for her first year of college, and when I don't hear from her, it means she's happy and busy. At the moment, Aden’s off being a camp counselor to six and seven-year-olds. She loves it. She found the job herself, and she’s teaching little kids art, and seems to be really enjoying everything. She loved her first year of college. There were a couple of complications, but you know what? She handled it all herself and did fine. She loves UW Stout. She’s made good friends. She’s adorable and sweet and making beautiful things. Aden’s even in a print club where they did some giant woodcut pieces that they printed on fabric using a steamroller! How fun is that? Anyway, she’s amazing. She’s still magical. All blue eyes and happy laughs and funny and kind. Just like the tiny girl you remember, only taller. I really miss her. I was supposed to have a week with her between college and camp, but then Ian’s mother died, and she agreed to go with her dad to Portland to help him sort out the house and the estate stuff. I don’t know if she was helpful in a practical sense, but the emotional support she gave Ian was invaluable. With a little luck she’ll be home for a week or two at the end of the summer, but that seems like a long time away. We have lots of Star Trek to binge together whenever she gets back.

Speaking of Ian, he’s doing okay. I think he’s still in a bit of shock after losing his mother so unexpectedly. The stress of managing the house in probate, etc., is a bit much. I’m trying to help where I can. But I know what it’s like to lose a parent, and there’s really only so much anyone can do. That’s just a hole in your life that never gets filled. You learn to walk around the hole or face away from it sometimes, but it’s always there. I feel like the yard that is my life has a few big holes at this point, and maybe when there’s nowhere left to walk that’s how you know it’s time to go.

I wish you were here to talk with Mona. She finished high school a semester early, and graduated 6th in her class! You’d have been so proud, but you wouldn’t have had a ceremony to watch. She tried a semester of college online through UWM, however it was awful and turned her off of college entirely. I keep telling her that that wasn’t college, that was sitting at our dining room table watching assigned YouTube videos, and she should do a real semester of art school somewhere in person before she makes up her mind if that’s of any value or not. I feel like she might have listened to you. She did apply to Pratt based on the idea that you thought she should go there when she was only 11. You loved college so much (14 years of it? Am I remembering that right?) and you would have had lots to tell her about why she should give it a go. She’s not really listening to me, so nothing I say gets through. If you were still around, I would find a way to send the two of you off to Paris for a bit, and you could give her the tour you once gave the St Paul School boys, and you could draw together and see all the museums, and I would be satisfied that that was enough of an education if she still didn’t want to do school. She is focusing in on jobs and putting together a resume. The most enticing plan of the moment is to set her up in Nancy’s house in Portland and let her get a fresh start in a new state, but with housing and transportation covered so there is a cushion while being far from home. We’ll see. I know she will be fine. It’s just hard to see her so anxious while she’s living in a time of unknowns. But damn I wish you could see her work. She’s so good. She won the Racine Art Museum Peep contest this year with her Peepzilla, so her sculpture abilities are as strong as ever, but her ink drawings are mind blowing. I would give anything for you could see.

Quinn came out as trans recently. She surprised us with a cake that was the trans-pride flag inside. Not that the news was a surprise, just the cake. Remember all those conversations we had when she was only two and insisted she was a girl? Changed her name and everything for a couple of years? I know you thought I was being overindulgent and not helping her in the world by going along with it at the time. But now I’m wishing I’d advocated more for her earlier. It’s so hard to know. She needed to come into herself in her own way and her own time, so maybe an official coming out did have to wait until now. I don’t know. But I’m really proud of her for being so courageous. This country is so cruel to trans-people, and the rhetoric is so nasty, that I’m already fearful about places she can’t go and be safe. As if anyone has anything to fear from someone as sweet as Quinn! I wonder how you would have handled her coming out? I suspect it might have taken some adjustment (heck, I will be stumbling over pronouns for a while out of habit), but I also picture you doing some amazing drawing full of rainbows and weird birds to send her in celebration. I know your love would never have wavered. There’s nothing not to love about Quinn. I’m hoping the fact that her entire family is in her corner will help what will likely be a complicated path. I’m going to smooth it as best I’m able.

Well, the lights above the new deck have switched on in the dusk, and the bugs are far too interested in my laptop screen. Time to wrap this up.

I love you, Dad. That never changes. I hate that you didn’t get to go with Ellora on her tour of colleges (I can’t imagine anything that could have made you happier!), or that we can’t really tell you she got into Berkeley. I hate that you don’t get to see how little Rivyn (not so little now at seven!) is a bundle of creative energy like his father and such a pure delight. You would be amazed at the beautiful work Mom is doing lately. She told me she misses how she always counted on you to look at a piece and be able to tell her when it was done. It feels unfair that life goes on and you’re missing some wonderful things. But life isn’t fair.

I love you. Happy Father’s Day. I will try to make you proud even though you can’t see.

Love, Kory

Dear Dad, 2020

Hey Dad.

I can't believe it's been almost five years since I've heard your voice or made you laugh. The words "I miss you" are inadequate to how I feel. But they are all I have, so... I miss you.

This year has felt like a decade. I'm not even sure where to begin to catch you up, and I'm not sure what articles you would even clip, because everything is insane. The news moves so fast, and it's all either ridiculous or dire (or both), and there's no way you could have even hoped to keep up. (Although I'd have bought you fresh scissors for Christmas so you could try.)

Last summer we didn't do any big trips. We did a couple of really nice family events at the cottage, and Arno and Barrett got us kayaks we can use there. (I wonder if we could have ever talked you into a kayak? I doubt it, but it's hard to know. You did tell us about your traveling in Europe on a Vespa, and I can't picture that either. Your moments of unpredictability remain some of the best family lore.) I'm wishing we had done some real travel, because all of our hopes for that this summer were dashed. Quinn was supposed to do a class trip to NYC and Boston, but when we talked about it early in the school year, he admitted it would be more fun with his family, so I told him we'd use that money instead toward all of us doing a big East Coast trip together. We had plans to hit lots of small states, and go as far north as Maine to visit Ian's sister Ursula and her husband. But no.

Because a pandemic hit this year, and the world ground to a halt right around my birthday. (Which is in March, so I'm a Pisces. Every time I see a horoscope, I think about you reading mom hers from the paper, and when I'd request mine you'd ask, "When were you born?" every time!)

Mom's doing okay. She's got a ton of interesting art projects, and she's been in the garden a lot, but I know she's tired of feeling isolated. I wish she had you at this time. I think you'd have been perfectly happy to ride out Covid-19 at home, clipping articles in the library and not having to share Mom with guests.

For the rest of us, though, it's been strange. Everything got canceled, Dad! My concerts, my varnish workshop, my book signing at Boswell's (wouldn't that have been fun?), Ian's Army retirement ceremony, Aden's high school graduation.... Just, everything.

And being trapped in the house with a lot of unexpected free time was not as useful as it might sound. All of us felt a creative drain. I think because even though on the surface it may have looked like a vacation, it was really a crisis. Being in survival mode makes it hard to focus during waking hours, and even though we were sleeping more it wasn't very sound. But I think we've leveled out. Aden is drawing and painting again, and making small things out of clay lately. Mona is drawing on the computer and started constructing something today out of feathers and wire. I've been finally getting into my home shop, and today I worked on a cribbage board with Quinn of our own design. We're starting to feel like ourselves again.

So the pandemic is weird, wearing masks is weird, social distancing in Target is weird, not letting people inside my store while still trying to run my business is weird.... It's all weird. And sad.

And the Black Lives Matter movement has exploded into a worldwide phenomenon after even more deeply upsetting instances of police violence caught people's attention. I'm hoping this time around will lead to real change. I've been thinking about it a lot, and compared to the first time I saw video of the police beating a black man in my lifetime (which would be Rodney King), today we can instantly follow up with research. White people are actively learning things we didn't know. We're seeing things in new ways, and a lot of people I know are willing to accept hard truths and history that is new to us. Today I read about the MOVE bombing in Philadelphia. Last week I read up on the Tulsa Massacre. I wonder if those events are in your files somewhere? I may look next time I'm back home.

I wish I could ask you about any of this. Because the other day someone posted a piece about Detroit and the "'67 Rebellion" and it stopped me in my tracks. Growing up, it was always the "'67 Race Riots." I remember you and Mom talking about watching things burn and how scary it was. But I realize now we never really talked about why it happened. Those desolate stretches of Detroit that never got restored after the fires were just a fact of life. Never occurred to me to think of it as part of a rebellion. My new homework will include rethinking my hometown.

You taught us so much about the destructiveness of discrimination in connection with your family's Jewish history, it would be fascinating to get your perspective on the struggle of minorities now. You'd have been proud of Aden for going to a march.

You'd be proud of Aden in general. She's registering for her freshman college courses tomorrow! She has to do all of it online, and we've never gotten to visit the campus in person (pandemic and all), but it's still exciting watching her prepare for college. She's nervous. She isn't sure how much of a grown up she's expected to be, or how much of a grown up she already is. But Dad, she's so lovely. She's grown into a remarkable artist and person. When she talks to you about something that excites her (video game design, anime, certain YouTubers who cook creatively...) she just lights up in a way that you can't help but be drawn in. She's sweet and kind and has such a tender heart.

Aden didn't mind too much not having a high school graduation. (She understands that was more for me.) But she was sad not to have been able to say goodbye to people in her school. They didn't know when they left for the day in March that they weren't going back. There were people she would have liked contact information for, and teachers she would have liked to have thanked. Not to mention she finally got her schedule just the way she wanted, with an interesting English class on African-American Lit and a ton of art classes. When she went back a couple of weeks ago to pick up her things, a piece she'd been making was still sitting on the pottery wheel where she'd had to abandon it. Lots of projects she was excited about were left unfinished. Everything about her senior year was left unfinished.

I wonder how odd her first year of college will be with these added complications? But she's not alone. I reminded her that everyone will be in the same boat, and the class of 2020 can bond over not having had graduations, and trying to make new friends from behind masks and at least six feet apart.

I was sad I didn't get the experience of touring colleges with her. I remember your taking me to look at Oberlin. That was a nice trip. And I'm still glad I backed out of staying in that weird dorm and just sharing your hotel room since it had an extra bed. (You told me the place missed out on calling itself the "Oberlinn.")

I'm going to try to write real letters to Aden at school. Getting mail helped me a lot my freshman year at OSU. Mom wrote letters, and you sent post-its, and I still have them all. I know if you were still around you would send Aden packets of articles and she would love them.

So Aden's doing okay. I'm feeling like I haven't prepared her well enough to go out into the world, but she can cook, and do laundry, and can write a good essay when she has to. If she can just be a little brave and find some friends I think she will do well. I hope. Was it hard when I went off to college? What advice would you have for me now as the parent, I wonder.

Mona is doing okay. I think. I can never be sure. She still gets anxious, and is already a little panicky about the idea of school starting up in the fall again. I'm not sure how to help, however she's at least willing to talk to me. I'm so proud of her, Dad. She works so hard. She's been doing online gym for summer school so she can take that out of her schedule for her junior year. Can you believe she's a junior? And she's driving. Or, at least, she supposedly knows how. She needs practice. You were always so calm with me in the car when I was learning. Ian is like that. I am not. I never expected to be as freaked out as I am trying to help my kids learn to drive, but yikes. It's really nerve-wracking.

She finished her two years of French, and did well, but I have never heard her speak it. All she would tell me is the numbers are weird.

She's working on the cover art for my new violin repair diagnostics book. She's excited by the idea, but struggling a bit to get something together for me to look at. I hope that works out, because I think that would be a cool thing to have in her portfolio when she's ready to apply to art school.

Mona's still in pain. It's been two years of this now, and I hate it. We've been to our regular doctor, two different ENTs, the pain clinic at Children's, she's had an MRI, dental x-rays, tests by vestibular rehab, and a recent trip to a neurologist. Nobody can tell us what it is. Although for the migraines that accompany the ear pain, the last doctor did recommend she go cold turkey off any pain medicine to sort of reset her system (since, ironically, at some point migraine meds start to cause migraines). We have prescriptions for more things she could try, but she said she'd rather not. I don't blame her. Thankfully, her ears in the past couple of weeks feel plugged up and there's a lot of pressure, but less pain. The orthodontist said there's a chance she'll just grow out of whatever it is. He said he sees a lot of teens with odd pains and issues that simply go away once their bodies get past this stage of rapid change and growth. I hope he's right. Mona shouldn't have to deal with chronic pain. Life is already hard enough without that.

Quinn continues to take things in stride. Dad, he's getting so tall. When he's not slouching I think he's my height. Possibly taller. And his hair is down to the middle of his back and all wavy and doesn't tangle and it makes his sisters really jealous. His voice is changing, too, but we are careful not to comment. He's very sweet, but at thirteen is easily embarrassed. He's super fast at games like Tetris. Still doing in fine in school. He's stopped playing violin but still takes piano. It got to a point where both were suffering and he needed to narrow his focus. In March, before the pandemic, he went on a school ski trip and broke his left wrist, so I got to be one of his hands for his online lessons. I miss that time with him.

And I asked him recently, since our Latin lessons got canceled in this new era of not going anywhere, if he wanted to continue that when possible, or just be done. I fully expected him to say we should let it go, since this was the perfect opportunity to do so. But he surprised me by saying when we could go back to the university and have Latin again, he wants to. On the one hand, the ablative case hurts my head, but on the other, I really liked that time with Quinn once a week. We always had a nice time on the drive, and sometimes stopped at the lake to look for beach glass on the way home. I wonder how much of wanting Latin lessons again is really that? Or is that just motherly wishful thinking?

Dad, he's so sweet. He's always willing to come out of his room if I call up the stairs and invite him to play a game. And the fun thing about playing with a smart kid is I never have to go easy on him. He hasn't beaten me at Boggle yet, but he always finds some really good word that I missed. You would have loved playing with him.

And he's funny. He has this amazing deadpan sort of delivery that is hilarious. He took some sort of aptitude test at school that recommends different professions, and his list was wacky. It included artist (which I thought was odd, since there was no way to assess talent in that area on a test like that), and cartographer (because he's still freakishly good at maps), and BARTENDER. Bartender? What kind of exam suggests that to a seventh grader? I laughed so hard! But maybe it's right, who knows. When I was talking about that with Mona, she said, "You know what I think Quinn should be? A Comedian." And at the one parent-teacher conference I got to go to for him this year, his teacher remarked that he was really funny. She said it took a while to recognize his dry humor, but that he's always making people laugh. So it was a surprising idea at first, but I can imagine it. You'd have to be really smart, and methodical, and good with language, and he already has the delivery and timing. But you also have to be comfortable in front of crowds, and right now, that's hard to picture.

Anyway, I think Quinn is coping best of all of us with the shift to a pandemic schedule. He finished the school year on Zoom, and now he's got video game goals. He seems content.

I think Ian's content, too, as much as he can be with all of his concerns about keeping us financially solvent in these strange times. I don't think he misses the Army. Probably parts of it, but not the hassle. I like having him around more. I couldn't ask for a more supportive husband. Our anniversary is tomorrow! 23 years. I should break out the poem you wrote for us as our wedding reading and share it with the kids.

I'm doing okay. That last novel of mine that you got to read the draft of years ago? Just Friends, Just War? I finally polished it up and got it out into the world. Sort of. My launch got canceled, but everyone who has read it seems to have liked it. I wish you could have read the final version. Barrett made a really nice cover for it. If Mona gets too stuck on the cover for the repair guide, I may use that instrument drawing you made for me that I have framed at the violin store. I don't think you'd have minded. (Heck, I feel like if you were still around you'd have cranked out fifty versions for me to choose from in a day!)

My health is better, so that's good to report. The mastitis thing seems to finally be gone. I hope. If it returns again I am not going to the doctor. They just exacerbate all of that mess. I stopped taking all pain medication last year after my colonoscopy showed poor side effects from them, but I don't get headaches the way I used to. Only problems are some high blood pressure that my doctor put me on pills for (so that seems under control), and my back is goofy. Eh.

Since the pool closed and I can't swim now, I broke out my old dojo notes and have started up our old stretching and blocks and strikes warm up. We do that as a family almost every evening. The kids are getting more flexible and better coordinated, so that's working out well. Plus, it's about an hour every night where we listen to music and catch up. I really like it. (It makes the dog nervous, and the bird is fascinated.)

That's been the most reassuring thing lately: enjoying being together. Because when we block out the news for a little while, and forget that the world looks like it's coming apart at the seams, our own little space with each other really couldn't be better. (Well, it could be less cluttered, but that's how we know it's real life and not a movie.) I love my little family. Despite everything, we know we are really lucky.

Arno and Barrett and their families are also doing fine. Your other two grandchildren are amazing and you'd be so proud, Dad. I do feel better about the future looking at all your beautiful grandkids and knowing they are next in line to help run the world. They'll do it with intelligence and compassion, which is sorely needed.

Well, this note ran past midnight. I should sleep. I love you. And I really really miss you.

Kory

Won't you be my neighbor?

I took my family out to see the new documentary about Mr Rogers, "Won't You Be My Neighbor?"  It's a lovely film.  I think I cried the whole way through it.  There was something good about watching it in a theater and sensing other people getting choked up as well.  My eyes hurt for hours afterward, and I found it very hard to sleep that night because there was so much going through my mind and pulling at my heart.

Mr Rogers was genuinely kind in a way that is far too rare in this world.  We may never see another like him.  There are many people I love and admire and that I have felt lucky to learn from, but Mr Rogers managed to distill the core of what humanity should be centered around more simply than anyone: That we are able to love and be loved.

Intertwined

Family is interesting because you don't get to choose.  You get what you get.

Sure, you can choose to interact or not, to be an active participant in different lives or not, but who you are and where you fit, in an objective sense, is out of your control.

When I had my first baby, I became a mom.  My husband became a dad.  Whether my brothers were interested or not, they became uncles.  My parents became grandparents regardless of whether they were ready to think of themselves that way yet.  A new life creates labels like "cousin" and "great-aunt" and "niece" automatically.  When I chose to become a parent it imposed new levels of identity up and down my family tree forever and always.

Another Two Weeks

Today was our 20th wedding anniversary.

We didn't do anything particularly special today other than share a sandwich at lunch.

Ian got up early to run, I swam.  There was an appointment with a roofer to get another estimate on the latest house project that needs to be tended to sooner rather than later.  When I left for work all the kids were nestled into spots on couches and cuddled together to do things on laptops.

I did a lot of bow work today at the store.  Ian brought me lunch and did work on his side of the store which is so different from my side.  His thing is all Quickbooks and bills and rental lists, and mine is all chisels and knives and planes.  It's a good thing we have each other because each of us is lost on the wrong side of the store.

In the afternoon he picked up this week's farm share box on the way home where he had to do an Army conference call.  I finished my last few appointments and then swung by the house to grab the kids to go volunteer at the soup kitchen downtown.  Then we stopped at Michael's and Goodwill to poke around for stuff for a project I'm doing, and then home where we were unsuccessful at coaxing the dog out from under the couch for a walk.  (Chipper currently remembers how to do stairs, but has forgotten he likes to go for walks.)

Dear Child of Mine

You are beautiful and talented and smart and amazing and funny and kind and the world is better for having you in it.

You are right when you say I think those things because I am your mom.  But it's not because I am blinded by my love or exaggerating your worth because you are mine.

My love means I see you with greater clarity, not less.  I have studied you since before you took your first breath.  I have watched you grow and change, and I remember you before you remember yourself.  I care enough to examine you to a degree of detail unmatched by anyone.  I know you, I see you, and I adore you.

I'm sorry the backlash against using the word "special" in our society has robbed you of the chance to rightly own it.  I'm sorry there have been other parents who somehow labeled their children special while equating it with entitlement, and without tempering it with the idea of humility and respect for others.  They have tainted the word and made it unfairly wrong to use earnestly.

But you are special.  And worthy.  And loved.

If I could have anything on this day, it would be for you to see yourself the way I see you.  Then you would know how right you would be to love yourself too.

One Year

Sunday morning, August 7, 2016. 

My dad died one year ago today.  A whole year has gone by.

I’m sitting in Yellowstone park.  My family is all in various stages of rest in the tent.  I got up to use the bathroom and then decided to sit by myself for a bit, here, half in/half out of the van.  It’s chilly at the moment, but should warm soon into a comfortable day.

Choosing not to Choose

I recently made a cringe-worthy awful mistake in a comment on someone's blog.  I didn't mean to upset anyone, but it left me feeling kind of sick.

Heather Spohr in her blog on Babble wrote a post about why she thinks it's fine to say she loves her children more than her husband.  Apparently this was the hot button issue of the week since we are done being shocked by the 'Are You Mom Enough' Time magazine cover (which I hope has now gone the way of Tiger Mom and Octo-Mom and any other mom-centric craziness of the moment that people want to get worked up about).

Anyway, her argument was essentially that her love for her husband was conditional (based on whether he cheated on her or molested her children) but her love for her children was not.  Personally I don't agree that love of children is unconditional, because if I had a psychopath for a child who killed others without remorse I would be sad and wounded about it forever, and probably not wildly and unreservedly in love with my kid anymore.  And what if one of your children grew up to molest your grandchildren?  This standard of whether or not to revoke love applies to spouses but not kids?  (Extreme, I know, but my head goes to extreme examples to test rules.)

I was most struck by the absurdity of wanting to quantify love to begin with.  Love for a spouse is so completely different from the love for a child that it's strange to even begin to compare the two.  It seems like asking me if I'd rather have my hands or my eyes.

So, thinking of my own children, or of me and my brothers growing up, I commented that if love was quantifiable, would you feel comfortable saying you love one child more than another?  Would you love the first more because you have more invested, or the youngest who happens to be more reciprocal with his or her love?

Well, not being a regular reader of Heather Spohr's, and somehow having missed a crucial bit on my first read through of her post, I didn't realize that her oldest child died three years ago, which she brought up in her reply.  My stomach dropped.  I hadn't meant to be insensitive.  I was using 'you' in a general 'you' kind of sense, not her specifically.  Just...ugh.  I hope she accepts my apology because it's sincere.

But it got me thinking about why on earth are we even asking such questions to begin with?  What purpose does it serve to speculate which loss would be greater or which person you love best?  Why put ourselves through the anguish of a Sophie's Choice moment when no such choice is necessary?  In a real crisis none of us knows what we would actually do anyway, so... Why?

I'm not saying that it's not an interesting exercise to examine the relationships in our lives periodically and see where things stand, but I honestly don't want to know where I stack up against my brothers or my husband or our kids or my parents.  I can only think of one instance in my own life where such a question arose and it was painful.

I was spending the evening with my grandmother in her home in Ohio.  It was a few years after college, that much I remember, but there was a timeless quality about visiting with my grandma that makes pinpointing dates fuzzy for me.  I was alone with her in the family room, she was in her favorite chair, and I was on the floor near her feet.  We were talking the way we always did about nothing and everything, and we wound our way to the topic of grandpa.

We'd talked plenty of times about how much she missed grandpa, but this was different.  This time she talked about the many things that were hard about being alone, but claimed the hardest was not being the most special person in the world to someone anymore.  She wept as she said, "I'm not number one to anybody now.  I was number one to Tony, and when I lost him, I was no longer number one."

She cried for a long time, and I hugged her, and I couldn't think of anything to say.  Because the horrible truth was she was right.  If you looked at love in that manner there was nothing but a hole in her life that would never be repaired.  I loved my grandmother dearly, but it would be wrong for me as a married woman with children to put her above all others in my life.  She wouldn't want that, even if it was something I could give.

My mind raced around to all the relationships in our family, to see if I could single someone out to whom my grandmother could be number one again, but it was as if everyone had already been chosen for teams and my wonderful grandmother was left on the sidelines, unpicked.

But she was not unloved.  Not by a long shot.  My grandmother touched many lives and made a difference in this world.  I loved my grandmother.  I hated the idea that my love, or the love of the many people in her life, could be ranked, and that any of the love we had to offer could be seen as simply insufficient because it didn't compare to the love of my grandfather.  I understood what she was saying, and she was entitled to her pain, and no, no other relationship was ever going to match the one she had with her husband.  But there is more than one kind of love.  I was her first grandchild.  I know the love we shared was special to both of us.  It was a completely different sort of relationship from the one she had with her husband.  They shouldn't be compared, and I don't think they're meant to be.

It's a destructive process that allows us to take something as precious as love and quantify it for comparison.  It leaves us diminished, not enlightened.

When I had Aden, I learned how deep love could be.  When I had Mona, I realized love could be huge.  When I had Quinn after suffering a couple of miscarriages, I knew not to take love for granted.  Love is not a commodity.  It is a gift.  We should not be reckless with something so important.

I love my kids.  I love my husband.  I love my parents and my friends and my cousins and my brothers and my niece and my uncles and my aunts and so many others including my silly dog who barks too much.  I'm not interested in ranking any of them.  I can't live on one kind of love and be a whole person.  There is a lot of love to go around without wasting time announcing who gets how much.  Let's move on to a new game.  This one serves no purpose and I'm not playing.

Life in a Case (Babble)

You can learn a lot about a musician from what he keeps in his case.  I see a lot of cases as they pass through my violin store.  You can tell if someone is neat, organized and prepared, or if he or she is the kind of stand partner who is always asking to borrow your pencil during rehearsal.  Small children keep odd treasures in the pockets like acorns and little bracelets and bits of string.  You can tell if someone has a cat.  If you rifle through their music you can figure out what they are working on, who their teacher is or was, where they play….  There are programs, scraps of information about old gigs, and there are lots of photos.  (For the record, it’s hit or miss in my viola case if I have a pencil, I should replace my rosin which is ridiculous since I own a violin store, and I have a picture from my wedding and every official portrait my kids have ever had taken.  The most complete professional photographic record of my kids from their hospital photo on is in my case.)

A lot of cases also get abandoned at my violin store, as well as instruments that no one loves.  Any violin can be repaired, but if the cost exceeds the value of the instrument and the owner has no sentimental attachment to it, more often than not people just leave it on my counter and walk away.  I have a lot of orphaned violins around that I just kind of pile in the window out of the way.

Tonight I had to work late.  I cut a new bridge for a cello today, but that particular job takes me about six hours, so even though I spent all day at work I decided to go back there after I’d had dinner and reading time with the kids.  A cello takes up my whole workbench, and I kind of wanted it done so I could make room for all the other projects I need to get to.  I got the bridge finished (which I did a mighty nice job on if I do say so myself), and even though it was almost midnight I took a minute to get my space cleaned up.  I like putting my tools in order and sweeping maple shavings off my bench.

After a little cleaning the only thing that was looking really cluttered was a stack of papers that I’d been moving around my work area since Monday.  One of my customers needed to borrow a case to transport an instrument home in, and I’d simply given her one of the abandoned old cases under my bench.  I told her she could just throw it out when she got home.  It was old and worn and not particularly safe, but it would be fine for one car trip.  I’d scooped all of the papers and odds and ends from the pockets out of it before handing it over.  Tonight I finally looked at all of that more closely.

It’s hard throwing things away that had meaning to someone else.  Some of it was easy to pitch, such as old strings and a broken bridge.  Some things made me pause and wonder what the significance was, like business cards from restaurants or a map of a nearby suburb, or information about various home improvement projects.

But the rest of it was kind of heartbreaking.  There were dozens of song lists put together for various gigs with old-fashioned sounding titles like ‘Waltz of the Bells’ and ‘Tyrolean Dreams,’ all written in the same careful hand.  There were postcards from Europe, with the same block printing exclaiming, “This was the hotel where we stayed!”  And lots of articles.  The more I read through, the clearer the picture of an entire life came into focus.

The owner of the case had apparently done some kind of work in the steel industry, but his passion was for violin.  There are articles from various local papers with pictures of “the retiree who loves to play.”  He was made an honorary member of the Musician’s Union eleven days after I was born.

And there are obituaries.  Some for other local musicians.  Most of them copies from different papers for his wife.  He continued to play and dance for years after his wife passed away, but he kept her close.  There is a letter from her that ends, “I promise to love you today, tomorrow, always forever.”

What do you do with such things?  I know for certain that whoever brought this case to me was not interested in its contents.  I’m very careful to make people look through everything before they abandon anything at my store.  The case has been sitting under my bench for a while, and I don’t remember what happened to the violin that must have come with it.  Maybe it was restored and given a new case.  Maybe it was donated and has a new life with another player who is grateful for it.  I doubt that it is one of the orphans in my window, but I don’t know.  I see so many violins.

I threw away the maps and the menus and the research on plumbing and furnaces.  I saved one gig list, a photo from what looks like a wedding reception in the late 1960’s or early 70’s, some of the articles, the obituaries, the union letter, the love note….  I don’t know this man, and yet I feel like I do.  He’s quoted in one of the articles as saying, “I will continue to play until I die, or I can’t move my fingers.”  He had a life.  It’s over.  But part of it was in his case.

I will bundle these things into an envelope and put them in a storage bin of letters I keep at work.  It won’t take up much room, and I think he would have liked these treasures that he stored with his violin living on in a corner of a violin shop.  It will matter something to me to know they are there.  Because you can tell a lot about a musician from what he keeps in his case.  Not everything, but usually the things that matter in the end.

Eulogy for Grandma (Babble)

I don’t know if I have the right words to express just how much I loved and admired my grandma.  I suspect I don’t, but I owe it to her to try to find them.  I’ve been thinking about what I want to say at her memorial service planned for early December.  If I had to give a eulogy today, this is the one I would give:


Grandma loved babies.  She told me she always had, as long as she could remember.  When I had my first baby, she came out to Milwaukee alone. It was just over a month after the comotion of the holidays when everyone had come out to see Aden right after her birth.  Grandma came out then, too, but the visit in February was special and quiet and private.  We got to spend hours just looking at the baby and admiring all the cute things new babies do.  One of those evenings, sitting in the dining room watching Aden smile and wiggle her hands in the air, we got to talking about our thoughts on life and death in general.  Grandma was always interesting to talk to, and I could talk to her about anything.  I asked her what her thoughts were on dying one day; if it scared her or if she thought there was an afterlife.  Her response was the best one I’ve ever heard on the subject.  She said, “Well, I think about all the amazing people who came before me who accomplished so many impressive things, and how they have died, and I think to myself, if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for me.”

My grandma was amazing.  When she was born women still didn’t have the right to vote, but she loved school and earned a college degree.  She had so many interesting stories about working in adoption and I used to beg her to write some of them down.  She never did, but I remember the ones she told me, and maybe I will find ways to write them down.
There isn’t a day of living in Milwaukee that I don’t think of her.  Sometimes I pass the house she was born in, on the corner of Locust and Cramer.  I live on the side of town where my grandpa grew up and I imagine myself and my children retracing his footsteps when we walk by his high school.  My grandma’s stories of her early life and meeting my grandpa take on new life for me now that I live in their old town.  One of her favorite stories was about how she got to know my grandfather because he would walk her to her bus stop after class because it was on his way home.  My husband is a map and transit connoisseur, and he told me he would never tell my grandma this, but he figured out that grandma’s bus stop was nowhere near grandpa’s way home.  He was merely going out of his way to be near her.

I know a lot of stories about grandma, how when her kids were at school sometimes she and a neighbor would occasionally wile away an entire afternoon playing Scrabble and feel they were being quite wicked.  Or about when she and her friend Florence would visit a place known only as “Lake Twelve.”  Or how she used to help her mother do the laundry which was a full two day project every week, and that in the winter they would hang the wash in the attic where it would freeze solid and they would spend the second day ironing it all dry.  I once asked her if there was any particular modern convenience she’d seen invented over her lifetime that was especially important and without hesitation she said, ‘The washer and dryer.”

There are so many interesting stories about her as a child and a student and a young married woman and mother, but my own experience with her was as a grandmother.  And she was the best grandmother possible.  When I was little we would visit my grandparents in Columbus for Christmas and Easter and it was always special.  Grandma kept a beautiful home and it was always welcoming.  She cooked us wonderful meals, and whenever there were homemade treats on the counter and we’d ask if we could have one she would always say, “That’s what they’re there for!”  She was the kind of grandma that made you feel secure and safe and loved.

But I was particularly lucky to have the chance to get to know grandma better while I was in college.  I wanted to go away to school, but I also wanted to be near home.  By going to Ohio State I was able to be out on my own, but having grandma nearby was like still having a familiar home when I needed it.  I started school nearly two years after grandpa died, and gram and I were able to be there for each other.  She would pick me up from campus nearly every Sunday.  I could do things for her like set the VCR or help with things in the yard, and she taught me how to do laundry without making the washer hop across the basement.  She looked forward to cooking me a real meal once a week and I looked forward to eating it.  She let me bring my friends.  She was the first member of my family to get to know Ian.  Grandma came to nearly every performance I gave while I was at Ohio State, and when I graduated she gave me a box of all the programs from everything I’d played in for the past five years.

When I found myself home more because of pregnancy and babies I got into a habit of calling grandma at least once a day.  She was wonderful to chat with, and was the perfect person with whom to share baby updates because she never found them boring.  She would tell me what was going on in her neighborhood or we’d talk about the news or books or movies.  And when Ian was deployed, grandma was the only person I knew who truly understood what it was like to be pregnant and caring for children in Milwaukee while fearing for a husband at war.  She would listen to me cry and say, “I know, Kor.”  And she really did.

My grandma was smart and kind and made the world better for those around her.  She was the best listener I ever knew.  And she loved me, and I never doubted that she was proud of me.  When I read her some of my earliest fiction she beamed at me and said, “Oh Kory, you are a writer–A real writer.”  And because she said it I believed it could be true.
These past few years have been so difficult.  It’s been heartbreaking to watch grandma slowly fade to a shadow of the person I knew.   There were glimpses of her now and then when I would visit, but the truth is I began mourning the loss of my grandma awhile ago.  That doesn’t make this final goodbye any easier.  There is no way to accept that my grandma is not in my world anymore and have it be anything but profoundly, crushingly sad.  But maybe grandma is finally with her husband again.  Or maybe she has simply been released from the pain of an existence she had degenerated into that I know she wouldn’t have wanted.  Either way I hope death meant relief for my grandma.  And in those moments when I contemplate my own mortality, I can think to myself, “If it was good enough for her, it’s good enough for me.”

I love you, grandma.  And I miss you.

(Last photo of me and my grandma when I visited her at the end of August)