I could put everything into words

I could just write and write, describing everything, putting my entire life experience onto the page as it's happening. I really could.

Waiting with the cable guy

I posted the previous blog "Nothing has changed" on Facebook as a note. Naturally, everyone I know loves it. There's a nice conversation thread going with people's comments and my replies. My friends have been through it, are going through it now, will always be going through it, the loss of our parents. They can relate.

As I commented on FB, I'm having a land line and wireless Internet installed at Mom's house. I got the old number (706-548-5966) that moved with her to Iris Place moved back. The phone number goes back to 1963 when we returned from Maryland after a two year experiment while Dad took a sabbatical from his professorship at the University of Georgia. The original phone number here was Liberty (LI) 61321.

Nothing has changed

The flowers on the kitchen table where we used to read the Daily Word and have breakfast are beginning to fade like old age.  Her things are everywhere, just as she left them when she moved to Iris Place.  Food is in the refrigerator, bagels, cream cheese, grapes, things I keep for my visits. The milk is still good. I choose one of three ripe red grapefruits that I didn’t buy but the sort Mom would have on hand. I cut it in halves and use the knife the way Mom did to cut all around the fruit in each half to separate it from the rind and then into sections to eat with a spoon, the type with a serrated tip for citrus fruit. Several of these spoons are still in the silverware drawer. I get up late and make coffee after jamming with Conner Tribble and the All Stars at the Office Lounge until 11pm and coming straight home. The phrase “straight home” flows from my mind to my fingers most naturally, saying to me, ‘See, Owen, this is home.’ I know it is, even though I have another home in Baton Rouge I’ve lived in since 1988. But that’s my second home. This one is my first. My friends know it, too. They don’t want me to disappear from Athens and stop coming around, stop being a presence in the Classic City, A-Town, the Mecca of Indie Music and Intergalactic Culture. I’m still a character in the cast, semi-legendary, famous long ago as one of the original Athens High hippies, a member of the Zambo Flirts and paragon of coolness. It’s odd but nothing has changed. Except Mom isn’t here.

The favorite son's funeral speech

Reverend Ed has reminded me several times my Mom asked us to make her memorial service short. She also asked me a day or two before her death to write a short obituary. I didn’t always listen to my Mom as well as I should of and a part of me is glad she’s not here to ask how much it cost to publish what I wrote about her for the newspapers. I’ll try to do better here, Mom… if the Muse will only cooperate. But Mom always underestimated her own value and to me, whatever it costs to honor her memory is worth it. My niece, Natalie, and I had breakfast at this terrific café called Mama’s Boy the other day and I smiled because I’m certainly one of those. In fact, I had the good fortune to be Mama’s only boy, so she often reminded me I was the best son she ever had. Just don’t embarrass the family… like right now some of my daughters feel I’m in the process of doing. Now, of course, saying I was her best son, Mom didn’t mean that as a slight against my sisters’ husbands or the many surrogate sons she had. I used to tell people, if you need a mother, you can borrow mine. A lot of people borrowed her in that way, for example, her long-time neighbor Al Henderson, who’s actually a lot like her. Al’s family can’t be here or else he would be embarrassed to hear me say he treated Mom as if she were his own mother for more years than either of us would care to count, for which I’m grateful, Al. Without trying, Mom managed to make you want to treat her like that, because she was by nature the good Mom you needed, that we all need, no matter how old we become, in my case 62 and a half. Mom was always here as a constant. If Dad, the mathematician, who could also be very whimsical, were here, he might compare her to Pi, that number starting with 3.1416 you need to compute the circumference and area of circles that you can’t express precisely in the decimal system but you can compute out to eternity… In any case, Mom was a reliable, reassuring presence for so many years everyone who knew her believed, in spite of common sense and the well-known adage about death and taxes, she would just go on and on, and on and on, getting a little older gradually but always having those sparkling brown eyes and that smile and that kind word immediately making you feel a little happiness, a warm connection with her right away and happily ever after. But the clock keeps ticking and it all counts, so we knew deep down it would one day strike midnight and… well, you know, so I’ll skip the part about glass slippers and carriages turning back into pumpkins etc. So, here we are saying good-bye to an unassuming country girl from Rogersville, Alabama, who somehow managed to become a shining light, an anchor for my Dad, for me, my sisters, our spouses, her grandchildren, her friends at St. James, the Candlewickers of the world, and so many people. Mom has moved on as she knew she would, as I knew she would, as she and I often talked about matter of factly like I’m talking to you now. She’s no longer here with us in the world and I still need a good mother like she always was, every single day of my life. But fortunately, the light still shines and the ship still has its anchor. Because hers and ours is the God of the living and Mom will live on in our hearts as long as each of us who knew her draws breath and in the way we will follow her example and pass it forward. Thank you.

So much for the short obituary

In the early morning of January 12, 2015 in her 99^th year Virginia Reeder Scott passed peacefully from this life surrounded by the love of family and caregivers. Virginia was gifted with a deeply caring and generous spirit. Beneath her modest and self-effacing manner and despite her frequent denials and deferrals to her husband’s educated mind, Virginia was one sharp cookie, graciously unobtrusive yet unmistakably intelligent and creative in bringing to bear the great virtue of her loving-kindness.

Virginia Scott met you with a cheerful smile and an encouraging word, often jump-starting your positive mood. No matter who you were, Virginia treated you as if you mattered. Her personality had many facets. Virginia was at once humorously playful and self-effacing, resourceful and determined, alertly curious and inquisitive. She was authentically polite, genuinely humble and unpretentious.

Perhaps most important, Virginia was unselfconsciously accepting, understanding and forgiving. To be in her close family circle was a great blessing. Like her husband, Virginia was free of prejudice, counting you as a friend regardless of race, creed or orientation, a shining virtue passed on to her children and grandchildren.

Indeed, Virginia’s moral character was unimpeachable, as solid as granite. Her actions were unwaveringly honest, responsible and unselfish. A child of the Great Depression, Virginia was reflexively frugal and simple, completely unconcerned with (if not downright distrusting of) material wealth and fashion, but relentlessly concerned with the care of her loved ones. If it’s true “the last shall be first,” Virginia is now without question at the head of the line. Spending on herself was usually her lowest priority, perhaps even a sin. Yet, Virginia gave from an unending fountain of compassion, touching the hearts of pretty much everyone she encountered with love and acceptance. Neither her children nor her grandchildren can recall her ever being mean to anyone.

Virginia Scott was on a quest. She was always a student seeking useful knowledge and practical wisdom. Simply put, Virginia desired to be the best person she could become and in this mission, she was highly successful. As a teacher, she realized we must study life and learn to become effective in realizing our ideals. Is it surprising then that Virginia R. Scott was loved and admired by so many people whose lives she touched throughout an abundance of healthy and fruitful years?

Virginia was born June 17, 1916 in the small town of Rogersville, Alabama when Europe was in the midst of World War I. She was the youngest by 10 years of four children born to W. Brown Reeder and Emma Booth Reeder. It’s said Virginia lived up to the name ‘reader,’ enjoying long hours lost in books. Her father having lost an arm in an accident, Virginia at age 14 became his driver and assistant. Throughout her life she loved to drive (a favorite being her ’58 Chevy Bel Air wagon) and only gave it up, as always by her own choice, when she was well past 90. She loved popular music, especially Dixieland and the Big Band swing of Glen Miller and Tommy Dorsey.

Upon graduation from Coffee High School in Florence, Alabama, Virginia enrolled in Montevallo College receiving a degree in Home Economics. She returned to Coffee High as Home Ec teacher where in 1940 she met a new math teacher, Mr. William Owen Nixon Scott, II, of Montgomery. Mr. Scott inquired about Miss Reeder’s status and was pleased to learn she was unattached, as he knew immediately Miss Reeder was the girl for him. And so they married June 25, 1941 and remained one over 65 happy years until Owen’s death Dec 24, 2006.

The newlyweds continued teaching at Coffee through 1941; but, plans changed Dec 7, 1941 when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. Owen believed his flat feet would preclude being drafted but Uncle Sam had other ideas. Owen became a supply officer in the Army Air Corps; and, after the couple experienced a mini-Odyssey of stateside postings, Owen served in India while Virginia returned to Florence. After the war, he pursued a graduate degree and became a professor at the University of Georgia while Virginia took on the new career of mother. Three children came along, Virginia Anne (1947) and Karen Emily (1949) born in Florence, and W. Owen N., III (1952) in Athens, GA.

Owen, II retired from UGA as Professor of Education in 1983. Virginia, however, having guided her children into adulthood, had discovered another new and exciting career as a collector, researcher and writer. Her area of expertise was Depression glass, more specifically Imperial Candlewick, a simple and elegantly lovely pattern based on hand-blown glass beads arranged aesthetically as integral elements in the design of each individual piece. Beginning with articles in collectors’ periodical publications, Virginia progressed to create, produce, publish and distribute her own homespun newsletter, the Candlewick Collector, which ran from 1976 until 2004 for a total of 126 issues. Her tag line was “a little happiness in the mail” as corresponding readers looked forward to being mentioned in each issue. In 1980, Virginia self-published The Collector’s Guide to Imperial Candlewick, the first book on the subject (with copies currently listing at $80.00 on Amazon). The one area where Virginia allowed herself to express pride was being designated “the First Lady of Candlewick.” The pinnacle of this work came on June 5, 2005 when the National Imperial Glassware Collectors Society presented Virginia with a lifetime achievement award at their annual meeting in Bellaire, Ohio.

Virginia’s life lived stretched out through the Roaring Twenties, the Great Depression, World War II, the Baby Boom, the Cold War, the Sixties and every subsequent era, passing Y2K well into the Third Millennium. Having witnessed the advent of television, jet airplanes, space travel, computers, CDs, word processing, and smart phones, she loved to relate how townspeople drove horse-drawn buggies during her early years. Virginia bought her first computer, an Apple iMac, at age 80, using it to produce her newsletter, follow news and keep in touch with family and friends. She remained faithful to Apple employing a late model desktop Mac until the end of her life. She was thrilled to speak to her son, Owen, III, on Skype once or twice a week, allowing them a virtual visit over the 600-mile distance separating their homes. Quick to help the other, Virginia was fiercely self-reliant, resisting when others tried to take care of her. After moving to assisted living, she would tell family members, “Oh, you don’t need to visit me, there’s nothing to do here.” They came anyway. It was difficult when she survived pneumonia in the summer of 2014 and had to accept the assistance of skilled aides around the clock in two 12 hours shifts daily as she slowly and laboriously recovered her strength. Fortunately, the six aides who worked with her from her return home to Iris Place until her death were all exceptional people whose dedicated care and attention, along with that of daughter, Scottie, facilitated another remarkable physical recovery. Virginia had previously bounced back from two serious hip injuries, uterine cancer, and another surgery to remove scar tissue as a result of the cancer surgery, all since turning 80. She was resilient in the face of losing her beloved husband, Owen, to cancer at the end of 2006 and her eldest child, Anne Scott Merry, to a heart condition in June 2009. Accepting full-time help went against her self-image but Virginia came to realize the benefit of caring help and to love her helpers as they came to love her. Yet, Virginia realized the inevitable declines of 98 years had stolen the joys and passions from her life, one by one. For the first time she began to wonder out loud why God kept her here when she had no more goals to achieve and was limited to so few means of engaging meaningfully with life. But, as a lifelong Christian who prayed and meditated daily and approached God faithfully through both her traditional Methodism and the health-affirming philosophy of Unity Church, Virginia accepted she was not in control and she continued to give her best to stay healthy and to give of herself to those around her.  She was still seen walking the halls of Iris Place after meals for exercise in the final month of her life. Virginia’s fear was becoming gravely impaired and lingering in a sad condition with no hope for healing. Her wish was to leave this world gently and peacefully when her time came. The specter of a painful departure loomed in front of her during the last few days, when a recurrence of pneumonia necessitated hospitalization and we learned her lungs had suffered irreversible damage. But although Virginia was unable to overcome one more insult to her astoundingly resilient body, God was once more merciful in granting her wish, allowing her to fall into a profound sleep and releasing Virginia gently from the bonds of old age and suffering. The embodiment of the good and faithful servant, her crowning achievement was always to walk in the footsteps of her shepherd, Jesus. She was preceded in death by her parents, brothers Marvin and Linden Reeder, sister Rubye Steverson, husband, Owen, and daughter Anne. She is survived by Anne’s husband, Edward Merry and wife, Brenda, by a daughter, Karen “Scottie” Jarrett, son, Owen Scott, III, their spouses Steve Jarrett and Mary Lou Kelley, a grandson, Scott Merry, and granddaughters, Natalie Merry Pathwick and husband, Andrew, Larisa Baste, and Virginia, Lauren and Maureen Scott, as well as numerous relatives through the Reeder family.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to St. James Methodist Church, where Mom was a near-charter member and her children learned about the faith.

3:45AM January 12, 2015

My Mom stopped breathing and died two and one-half hours after my last post. Melinda, myself and two nurses were present.  I haven't found time to post since then. The extra trazadone did do the trick and I fell asleep at 230am. Melinda woke me at 330 thinking Mom had died. However, Mom began breathing again a few seconds later.  But her body was winding down and the breaths were further and further apart. When Mom's physical life stopped at 345am, I believe her psyche and spirt already had  passed from this life. They were gone when I arrived the morning before. At that time, I spoke to her to attempt to awaken her and she opened her eyes very briefly and stared straight at me. There was no recognition in her expression and when she closed them a moment later, they never opened again.

That was then; this is now

Today Mom's condition went south. I arrived at the hospital around 10:30am and she was unconscious with tachycardia. The doctors were very pessimistic about her regaining awareness. Medication controlled the heart rate and her vitals are good; but, they were right about her comatose state, at least as of 1:17am the next morning (this blog is on CST, so the time stamp shows an hour earlier). I'm staying overnight in her room at St. Mary's accompanied by the kind sitter, Melinda. It's too strange with the beeping and pinging monitors and Mom's erratic breathing to fall asleep, even with 100mg trazadone. Perhaps another 50mg will do the trick.

On premature reports of death

Since I posted this morning, the outlook for Mom appears more promising. The doctor sees improvement and her vital signs have moved into a healthier range after some interventions today. So we shall wait and see while hoping for the best.

With Mom at 9AM

I made it to Athens last night and Mom is still breathing, albeit with great difficulty. We were happy to see one another. Dr. Elkabani will be in sometime this morning and I hope to get an understanding of her medical status. Frankly it doesn't appear to be good as she has eaten very little for several days and has a high heart rate and blood pressure but physical medicine is not my forte. After speaking to the doctor, I'll confer with Mary Lou and the girls about whether they should come here, too. Mom is talking specifically about her death asking me to write "a short obituary" and to look in her closet to find a pink dress she wants to be buried in.

The Mother and Child Reunion

I've always loved that song. My mother has been the anchor of my life and now her life hangs in the balance. I'm sitting in the lobby of BTR waiting for Delta 5570 to board and fly be to Atlanta. I hope I see Mom alive tonight when I arrive at St. Mary's Hospital where she's being treated for pneumonia. Mom has seen 99 Christmases and no one lives forever. But if anyone her age has a chance to pull through and live to fight again, it's her.

Following up on reorientation

I read two articles about empires:

http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/57411/milton-bearden/afghanistan-graveyard-of-empires

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/why-liberalism-means-empire/

Self Reorientation

I often find myself going through a basic orientation to reality. Lying in bed at 530am it went something like this:

The human world is a team sport. Starting in prehistory, groups of humanoids organized on a small scale and over time assembled into larger groups based on a common identity, a self-definition such as "we are the Red Feathers, the greatest of all peoples in the forest." Competition between groups who encountered one another evolved into the world political order, a huge game where all the major, powerful groups have agreed to play by one general set of rules. The groups keep one another in line by having wars if one group becomes aggressive toward others.  Particular groups have established empires by forceful domination of other groups but eventually the subjugated groups overthrow the empire in a process of checks and balances. For example, the Empire of Islam was checked by the Mongols under Genghis Khan and his successors.

The same game is played on the local, micro level with individuals and deviant groups being kept in line by those around them.

Who do I belong to? I belong to the United States of America, the Scott family, the profession of psychology, and the general world politico-economic order. I have a little niche within these nesting sets.  OK, now I'm oriented. Whether any of this is "true" in a greater sense, it helps me stay grounded as I gear up to face the day.

Dream

I was in a big legislative chamber, Keith Olbermann had the floor and he was objecting to a request from Glenn Beck to get a copy of a document, possible something classified and confidential, from a woman. Beck had written an obsequious request letter to the woman and Olbermann was sarcastically denouncing the attempt.

I Shall Be Released Revisited

Disc 4

01. I Shall Be Released

Maroon 5  

1975: The Basement Tapes

Notable covers: The Band, Music from Big Pink (1968), numerous others.

This is one of those beloved songs every artist wants to perform, so in the 44 years prior to the AI LP, it was covered by, just to name a few, the Byrds, Boxtops, Youngbloods, Flying Burrito Brothers and Hollies, Bette Middler, Miriam Makeba, Nina Simone, Joan Baez (of course), Sting, Ricky Nelson, Big Mama Thornton, and Black Oak Arkansas! Another long list I won’t get into is known to have performed the song live somewhere along the way. See, I wasn’t kidding about everyone taking a crack at it. So, why not Maroon 5, a pop group of peaking popularity at the time the compilation was created?

And Maroon 5 delivers a straightforward, tasteful, Bee Gees-esque performance. Nice job, boys.

Now, I have to check out Big Mama’s cover from Stronger Than Dirt, her 1969 comeback LP on Mercury Records. “Whoa, Lord, I want you to know!” She must have recorded this during a church service as her personal testimony. It’s completely rewritten as a blues song, I mean, it’s got a guitar solo; and, I wouldn’t have recognized it as Dylan’s tune until 3 minutes in if I hadn’t known in advance. But I’m not saying it’s not a terrific cover because it is, as full of life as Big Mama always was. “I know I’m gonna be released- I want you to listen!”

Maroon 5 is for the contemporary audience. Big Mama is for eternity.

Criticism is a matter of opinion

My opinions about the Dylan covers are not to be imposed on you. My written opinions are reference points in my life, notes to be compared with yours. So, I will say what I have to say. Bob Dylan is audacious. He is ambitious. His ambition and audacity have never ceased. In line with the admonition of his chosen namesake, Dylan isn't going to go quietly. He's still escaping on the run.