Once again, it’s been longer than I planned. I would ask, where does the time go? But I know it passes quickly, and seems even faster when I’m avoiding a task (like writing a blog post.) As I try to summarize most of a year, again I am disappointed in myself for not doing this more often. Part of me always wonders why anybody would care what I write here, but I always come back, because Karen specifically asked that this blog not die with her. So, it’s not dead, but it’s certainly not thriving like it would be if she were still alive. Ugh. Last summer at Camp Sunrise, it was a beautiful day to spend with the kids. If it's not obvious from the pictures, the day's theme was the 80's, thus, the boombox, Pac-man, and Tetris. They are still a bit low on attendance, and there was one fewer cabin than we expected, so there was extra cake. After the usual taco dinner (it’s always tacos on Castle Cake day, because that was Karen’s favorite dinner, and the caterer really liked Karen!) the Arts and Crafts staff was looking for dessert. Of course I offered the leftover cake… and then they wondered if they could do a castle cake of their own. They had a blast! It makes me happy to make other people happy. Even with the extra “cabin” there was still leftover cake, so Susie made Rapunzel in her tower, complete with a prince coming to the rescue. We went to New Hampshire in October, now that we can vacation any time we want to. The fall colors were a little bit past their peak, but it was still beautiful. We met up with some friends for a hike, and then went out to eat with them afterwards. Sometimes it seems like a pain to make sure you connect with friends when you’re near them like that, but it’s definitely worth it! After a week of hiking, I went to Virginia with my sisters. No hiking on that trip! Well, there was a short walk at an arboretum, and a walk by myself around the resort, but all of the short hike possibilities at Shenandoah National Park (hikelets, really) were rejected. I got over it. We found other ways to occupy our time! We found a glassblowing studio where we could participate in the project, and also a glass slumping studio, which was a whole new experience. It turns out that these kinds of places are more common than we thought, so now we will be looking for them on all of our trips. We did two escape rooms, always a challenge, and there was also shopping, which is rarely a thing (other than groceries) when we take a family trip. Thanksgiving was in Pennsylvania, next best thing to hosting. Not too much drama, and a delicious meal with some of my favorite people! Karen loved spending time with family, and I always miss her even more when we’re all together. We got the Christmas tree early this year, at the first farm we tried! It was taller than it has been in recent years, and didn’t really need the platform we’ve been using, but we used it anyway. I’m pretty sure every employee at the tree farm commented on how fat the tree was. They should have seen the shrub from a few years ago. In December, I went to Maine with my sister for Christmas Craft Day. It’s an all day event that my other sister hosts, where she has every craft supply known to man, and beautiful things are created. It was an action-packed weekend – in addition to the craft day, we went out to dinner twice, went to a craft show, a tree festival, and made a Christmas present for Susie. Who would have expected to find University of Maryland fleece at a discount store in Maine? Steve and the kids went skiing in Vermont just before Christmas. They enjoyed (maybe that’s the wrong word) some flooding, and then some skiing. I enjoyed not driving to and from Vermont. They got home in time to decorate the Christmas cookies, and then celebrate with family like we usually do. I’m thankful every year that the kids are able and willing to spend time with the extended family. There was the usual ski trip to PA, where we were actually able to ski this year. Snow the night we arrive is always a good thing, especially if we arrive before the snow. There was even enough snow for sledding on the hill where we stay. On the way home, the kids went downhill skiing and Steve and I did some more cross country skiing on some trails that were partly on a golf course. It was nice that there was enough snow for that! We went to Colorado and Utah for a spring trip. Arches and Canyonlands, and Colorado National Monument, among other things. One of our last trips with Karen was to Colorado, so that part was hard for me, but Steve kept us busy, so I was too tired to think about it too much. One day we went on a Jeep tour in Canyonlands, and I was VERY thankful that we had a guide who had driven on the road (and that’s a questionable term for some of where we were driving) many times before. She knew exactly where she needed to drive backwards and where she could go forward, and which rocks were the road, and which ones weren’t. We were back in time for Easter, and of course we dyed some eggs. I am so thankful that the kids still enjoy these traditions and still make them a priority. They seem to enjoy letting their creativity shine for a few hours around these holidays. And then I struggle to decide which cookies and eggs I should eat first, because they all look so amazing! And finally, there was the eclipse… The last eclipse was less than 2 weeks after Karen died, and I was a mess. The kids really wanted to go to see it, so we did, and it was amazing. This time, I thought about going somewhere to see totality, but Steve didn’t seem particularly interested, so I didn’t mention it. We could have gone to my nephew’s house in Syracuse, or to visit friends in Rochester, but neither are particularly close, so we stayed home. I watched almost the whole thing from the deck, and it was very cool, and I wasn’t terribly disappointed to be here instead of in a totality location. I will always associate an eclipse with Karen, because of that first one, even though she didn’t get to see it with us. Of course, I can find a way to associate a lot of things with Karen, so maybe that doesn’t mean very much. As I’ve mentioned before, I play a game at lunchtime where people submit puzzles, and I almost always do the ones that say that Karen made them. I like to look at where they’re from, and I tell myself that that’s where MY Karen is, on that day. Silly, I know, but it makes me smile, and that’s a good thing. Smiling is so much better than crying. I still send my daily quotes, even though the original recipient has passed away. I think of Amy when I’m sending them, and when I’m reading news articles that we would have shared with each other, which is pretty often. There are more than 20 people who get them every day. One recently asked me to add a friend of hers to the list – that’s a lot of pressure, sending it to somebody I don’t even know! I think Karen would have approved of this use of my time. I want to thank Amanda for giving me a push to write this, without even knowing she was doing it. She texted me the other day to say she had recently read the blog, and that she enjoyed seeing what we were up to. I need all the encouragement I can get, to sit here and type. And then, as I sat down to write this today, I got distracted (hard to imagine, I’m sure) by Karen’s email. There are a lot of “blog comment” emails, which are actually just spam that I don’t know how to delete. (not the emails, but the comments) Today, there was an email that was different, though. It was a “contact” email, with a message from somebody who knew Karen in high school, and hadn’t realized that she had died. As always, it made me happy to hear from somebody with good memories of Karen, and it gave me a little more motivation to sit and write this! Give blood, and spread kindness! The world needs more of both of those.
2 Comments
4/22/2024 02:48:52 pm
You maaay think my name's funny...
Reply
4/22/2024 02:51:53 pm
Apologies accepted •if• you didn't ever
Reply
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorI’m Karen. I was originally diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) in August 2004 when I was 10 years old. When I was working on my college and scholarship application essays two years ago, I wrote about my journey. Although it was a rough few years, it became such an influential part of my life that I can’t, and wouldn’t want to, imagine my life without having had cancer. I called it the worst best thing that ever happened to me. Archives
April 2022
Categories |