First Loss of Innocence

Standing on a Hill in Harvard, Looking West over the Nashua River Basin, Known as the Nashoba Valley, Toward Shakerton, Massachusetts, Where Author JessieMay Kessler Spent Her Childhood

Those of you who have purchased my second book Bitzy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Silence, from Amazon.com or ordered it from Barnes and Noble, and read it, have heard about one of my childhood Christmases. The one in which I was very sick.

This event takes place the year after the Christmas in Bitzy’s Story. Christmas Day was always the big celebration in my childhood home. My older sister PollyAnne, my older brother, Owen, and I would get up as soon as the sun crossed the horizon, lighting the surfaces of the windows. We’d tip-toe down the stairs to the living room. Our five stockings hung over the fireplace that didn’t ever hold a fire. (Coppy, my baby brother, hadn’t yet joined the family.) Those stockings were stuffed with things, and as the others got older, there were gifts on the mantel and floor. We’d gather up our loot and head back upstairs to wake my parents, who were wide awake by now. All three of us crowded onto the bed with Mom and Dad, who were still in their jammies, but sitting up, waiting for the fun.

This particular Christmas, I was sitting close to my mother’s feet but facing her so she could see my reactions. I tore into one gift and was happy with what I got. (I don’t remember now what was in the wrapping paper.) We handed my mother the large pieces of paper to smooth and fold for wrapping any gifts in another year. By the third package, I stopped unwrapping and turned the gift over in its hiding place. Then I stopped altogether and just sat looking at the paper.

“What is it, Honey?” Mother asked. “Why did you stop opening your presents?”

“The wrapping paper! It’s the same as the paper on a big package under the tree. How did the paper on that package from you and Dad get on my stocking gift from Santa at the North Pole?” No one in the room took a breath. (Remember, PollyAnne was ten years older than I and Owen, nine years.) They had been sitting on this secret for a long time.

My mother, always the one to explain, said, “Well, you know Santa Claus is the spirit of Christmas giving. And it is much more fun to have him seem like a real person, living in a real place, doing a real job to make this a happy time. His behavior of giving is why I sometimes say to you, think about what you are giving to your sister, not what you will get.”

“So this is why we give away gifts instead of keeping them for ourselves.” I summarized what I’d heard. “If I should have a younger brother or sister, I’d have to keep the secret, too?”

“Yes, you would.” My siblings were breathing again by now, and my father smiling silently.

Mother finished her explanation with, “This is the day we set aside in the Christian tradition to mark the birth of Jesus Christ, but it is also the day we spend doing what he taught us to do;  give away what we have to others who might not have so much. So we choose to show our love for one another with thoughtful gifts.”

I sat somewhat stunned.

“Are you old enough to handle a Christmas with this meaning?” Mother asked.

“I guess, but I’ll miss my old Santa Claus and The Night before Christmas.

“You don’t have to give up the story. Just remember for what it stands.” my mother ended.

And it is a good thing she told me that because almost every Christmas Eve, my husband, Sy, and I would recite from memory The Night before Christmas to our children, he recites the first half, and I finish the story. Once in a while, in the present time, one girl or the other will say, “I wish Dad were still here to recite The Night Before Christmas with you. I’ll respond, “I can do the whole thing!”

 And with a sheepish grin, they will say, “It’s not the same.”

Happy Christmas to all of you, and peace to humankind!

Backwards Expert

The Nashua River basin, Known as the Nashoba Valley, Looking West from the Harvard Hills Toward Shakerton, Massachusetts, where Author JessieMay Kessler was Born and Raised.

My Second Book: Bitzy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Silence

When we start out to write an article or a book, most of us writers look to other writers as to where to start and what to do. As a bestselling author, my Uncle Ralph always said, “Write about what you know, not about what you think you know.” So that is when I decided I would write my life—a memoir. Once we are marketing our books, the other prompt is to become an expert in some area. Well, writing about my life puts me back into home and family. And being an expert at something? I was not particularly eager to babysit when I was a teen. I wanted kids to mind me on the spot. Little children want to be entertained, and once you read Bitzy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Silence, you’ll know I didn’t have much practice playing in a group or entertaining someone else.

We are at the college level, and I have switched to Home Economics, so I’ve learned a good bit about domestic life. Right out of college, I married a minister in a small country Connecticut parish. We were, by definition, in the spotlight and in the midst of family life and living. If that wasn’t enough, we took in a foster daughter and didn’t know it at the time, but she had bipolar disorder. These children are some of the hardest to parent because they don’t care about you; they are oppositional and defiant with very strong tempers.

The Parsonage Where Rev. Lesser Wanted to Close All the Windows

I didn’t know it then, but the good minister, Rev. Harvard Lesser, was also similar to a bipolar by temperament. So, some of our fights were pretty loud. I remember him trying to control the volume and saying, “If you don’t stop yelling, I’m going to have to go around and close down all the windows in this parsonage.” By then, we had two biological daughters, and I had, by default, become the “bad cop.” Harvard’s father was abusive, so Harvard wanted nothing to do with discipline or setting boundaries. Much of my discipline came from frustration and anger about his non-support.

Once, when my two biological daughters were grown and riding with me in the car, I pulled into a parking lot, and we witnessed a mother screaming at her young child, swatting and punching him on the back, pushing him towards the back seat. It was horrible to watch. As I slid the car into my parking space, I looked into the rearview mirror and said, “I’m so glad I wasn’t that kind of a mother!” There was that heavy pause, and my bravest daughter said, “Oh, but you were!” Her sister nodded and mumbled, “But, Mom, you were.” What a wake-up call!

So now, thirty years later, I’m writing about communication–see my new logo–and what children need psychologically. My book Bitzy’s Story is about confinement, loneliness, restriction, and childhood trauma. Was I an abuser because of the marital relationship or the silence and frustration I brought forward from my confinement as a five-year-old? I’m not sure you or I will ever have the answer. But you can see how I’ve become a Backwards Expert. In my early life, I did much of it backward out of ignorance. After studying, reading, watching, and listening to family trauma, I’ve learned what is better for a strong, emotionally healthy family.

Bitzy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Silence is available on Amazon.com. I would greatly appreciate it if you would buy a copy and write me a review. The sooner these reviews are posted on Amazon, the higher their rating. I still have one more book to finish. I need your help. And I hope you have some fun as you choose to work with me. Thanks in advance, JessieMay.

PS. There should be a Television interview with me and my reading bits from Bitzy’s Story on Channel 24 Sunday evening, October 30, at 7:30 p.m. It will be under Stories Worth Telling, hosted by my good friend Cate Steele.

To Fib or not to Fib

Nashua River Nashoba Valley Looking from the Hills of Harvard, West toward Shakerton, Massachusetts, where the author, JessieMay Kessler, was Born and Raised

The only pre-publication picture I have of my second book, mentioned below: Bitzy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Silence

When I was a little girl, about five years old, the age of the heroine in my new book “Bitzy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Silence,” I was sitting beside my mother in church on Easter Sunday morning. Back then, all the women wore extra fancy hats to church on Easter as the monarchy of England does today for formal occasions. Four pews in front of us sat Mrs. Anderson with a purple hat adorned with birds and a small bird cage. I looked up at my mother, and she placed a finger up to her lips. Then leaning into me, she whispered, “When all the people file out of church today, they will stop and tell Mrs. Anderson what a lovely hat she is wearing.” Confused, I whispered, “But what if they think it’s stupid?” “No matter! This moment is one of the few times in life when you are allowed to lie—tell a fib to spare Mrs. Anderson’s feelings.” I slid back into my pew to mull over this new information. It wasn’t right as far as I could see.

Later, as I was beginning to be of childbearing age along with my cousins, my cousin Emily came to show us her new baby. My mother asked, “Do you know the story about your grandmother, Mary Emma, when she was a child? Her mother, your great-grandmother Hannah, had become the town’s visiting nurse, and she was taking your grandmother and her sister, your Auntie Grace, to see the newest baby in town. Great grandmother Hannah said, ‘Now when you see the new baby, you try to say something nice.’ Your grandmother, about age six, peered into the baby blankets and said, smiling at the lady, ‘Well, it is a nice long baby.'” So this fibbing has been going on in our society for some time.

It’s a Nice Long Baby!

Another place where this question of honesty or fibbing comes up is when we have lost a job. My girls would come home all dejected, having just been let go from their work, and I’d suggest, “In a few days, go back and ask your employer why he let you go.” “Mom, you know what he’s going to say; something that keeps him from getting sued. He isn’t going to tell me why he let me go.”

Okay, now we are down to friends. We can feel the relationship is “going south,” and we ask why the atmosphere has gradually or suddenly changed. They come up with some fuzzy logic, and we begin the job internally of naming all of our relational shortcomings. That is a painful task and can go on for weeks, years, and without resolution. I always thought that if the friendship was truly a friendship–the kind that lasts for years–it may wobble a bit, but always rights itself–was one in which the friends shared the truth of their feelings–hopefully with some compassion—but with honesty.

I wonder if this fibbing has become so rampant with our advertising, television, and politics that we no longer know when it is fibbing to spare someone’s feelings and when it is just business as usual. I think I would rather have my friend tell me the real reason for the downturn and hope they can do it with thoughtfulness, trusting in the strength of the relationship.

Now We are Down to Friends

What we do about the fibbing or downright lies that our leaders and world leaders are spinning is a bigger can of worms. National lies are causing many, many people to lose their lives. Now it is not fibbing! I would love to hear your thoughts on this subject and possible solutions, especially at the global level. Contact me here or through my personal email at my2litle25bird78@gmail.com. Please include the title of this blog: To Fib or Not to Fib–so I know you are one of my followers.

Watch for my new logo with its slogan: “It’s All in the Communication.”

Call a Friend

The Nashoba Valley Looking West from the Hills of Harvard, Toward Shakerton, Massachusetts, Home of the Author, JessieMay Kessler

During this pandemic, I believe we all have learned the value of friends. For those of you who have lost loved ones through Covid-19 (I lost a daughter, Lynn May, from cancer), the support you gained from those friends you could reach through the computer or the telephone has helped keep you from falling apart completely. Through this terrible period in our history, we have learned how much we need to value our friends and hold them close.

Grandson Andrew dressed for Junior High School Graduation

Several years ago, my grandson Andrew was struggling with the social relationships of junior high school. We were having a conversation on this topic, and his opening statement was, “Gramma, I don’t have any friends. Nobody likes me. I don’t know why!”

“Well, Andrew, you only need one or two really good friends, the ones you can say anything to, who won’t laugh at you or try to change you,” I said in response to his confession.

He looked at me quizzically, so I went on. “You know kids invite their friends over to their house to play a game on the computer or play catch with a ball or just to talk to each other.”

By now, I’m feeling uncertain. Then Andrew blurts out his first thought, “You don’t have any friends, Gramma, because nobody ever comes over here to play with you.”

His comment took me by surprise. “Andrew, I have lots of good friends, but you don’t see them because many of them are from my college days, and they all live way far away from here. My friends and I talk back and forth on the telephone, through letters, and presently on the computer through email and Facebook.”

It wasn’t too long after this conversation that Andrew invited a new friend over to swim in our backyard swimming pool. At one point, I looked out to see the two boys were jumping off the top of the stairs into the pool. The friend would go first, and then Andrew would follow him. As Andrew surfaced, the friend would put his hand on Andrew’s head and hold him down. My heart dropped as I watched. And after some thrashing, Andrew would surface, gasping for air.

The Backyard Pool at the Hopi Street House Where Jake Held Down Andrew

I waited a couple of days, and then when the opportunity presented itself, I said to Andrew, “I noticed when you and your friend, Jake were in the swimming pool, Jake kept holding you under the water. Do you think he is truly a good friend?”

Andrew looked confused by my question and responded, “Well, Grams, I invited him over to my house, and we were playing in the pool like you said.” I didn’t know how to take that conversation much farther, so I said, “I would look at a friend that does something that hurts me and ask if they were truly a good friend.” Andrew’s struggle with Jake’s friendship lasted for several years. It ended when Andrew got into trouble because of Jake’s behavior. For some of us, friendship is so important, but it indeed has a learning curve. If you have read my first book, A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir, you have already met my grandson, Andrew.

I directed much of this blog toward myself, unconsciously. I have been so busy trying to get the last bits together for my second book, Bitzy’s Story: Healing from Long Term Childhood Illness, that I have neglected dear friends. Hunting for a self-help publisher with an excellent reputation, which will not cost excessive money, has kept me from reaching out to these friends. So far, I have had offers to spend $30,000.00 and $18,000.00 to publish my book. These are the costs of doing business with a vanity press, and they are too rich for my blood. I was hoping you could help me by signing up for my new mailing list. The number of people on this list shows a publisher that I have enough followers for them to offer me their best publishing deal for Bitzy’s Story. You can add your name to my mailing list by contacting me through my website at www.jessiemaykessler.com and clicking on the CONTACT button. Then fill out the information requested and get it back to me. I will only use this list to send announcements of events, my next book launch, or brief articles which I think would interest you. Having my mailing list gives me control, rather than having a social media mogul in charge. I promise not to sell your information or fill your inbox with nonsense. Thank you so much for any help you can give me in this way.

Bubbles—the Magic of a Circle

The Nashua River Basin and Nashoba Valley looking west from the hills in Harvard, toward Shakerton, Massachusetts, where author, JessieMay Kessler was born and raised.

Blaze Looking at Bubbles from Bubble Machine which don’t Show Up in the Picture while Scarlet is Behind Him

What is it about a bubble that sets our hearts to beat faster and our minds to fill with images of happiness when we see bubbles floating in the air? You don’t have to tell a dog that soap bubbles or any other orb-shaped object is something special. A dog will chase a ball for hours, hoping to conquer the target somehow. My daughter Annie’s dog, Scarlet, is likely to sniff at the bubble and bark in sheer glee while my dog, Blaze, lunges at the bubble or chases it. Both dogs are full of happiness and a sense of play.

Last week in my blog, I wrote about the final hours of my daughter Lynn May’s life. I had such sadness and regret about what I couldn’t give her in her growing up years that might have steered her away from such a painful death. As I searched in my mind for solace of some kind, I saw Annie on the back porch running the bubble machine for the dogs and their absolute joy at chasing the bubbles. The sun shining on the colored ethereal orbs lifted my heart, for the circle symbolizes continuation. Life doesn’t end when we no longer breathe; it simply goes on in a different format.

The bubble or circle tells us that there is no end to our lives; there is only transformation to a different form. We are told that beyond the rainbow is another kind of existence, and I choose to believe that it is as exquisite as the soap bubble, filled with rainbow colors and the clarity and joyfulness that people have forgotten in this life. Some of us have turned this earthly life into drudgery instead of using our moments to find magic and inspiration.

A Bird and the Dragon: A Love Story for Adults

When I wrote A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir, I was trying to capture the essence of my departed husband Sy, while breathing life into memories that would console me and teach my descendants about life with a loving father figure. I’m not sure I have managed to do that for strangers reading my book, but I have certainly done that for those who knew and loved him, especially his children and grandchildren. Sy’s early life was not particularly happy, nor was his first marriage, but I believe together we created bubbles of emotional comfort and sometimes glee. And like the bubble, life in our marriage format had to come to an end. Although Sy’s physicality has ebbed away, his spirit still pervades our household, much as the bubble creates excitement for the dogs.  In one form, it creates happiness, but as the bubbles break or disperse, the remembered circles still carry the delight of the chase and the joy of the experience.

If you Look Closely you can See the Bubbles — So it is in Life

I do hope that as you face complex and painful experiences, you can turn from that to see the magic of the circle, the iridescence of the soap bubble, the promise of a better tomorrow. And if you are inclined to share an event like this, I’d love to hear your story. Please contact me here or on my website jessiemaykessler.com by hitting the CONTACT button and writing me a note.

As always, may you ultimately experience your Lucky Dreams.

Mountain Top or Balance

In my counseling office, I talk to clients a lot about finding the balance between masculine and feminine energy. In actuality, the psychological definition of masculine and feminine follows our physical bodies. Masculine energy is out in front, pushing forward, often controlling, many times doing things by force. Feminine energy is more held in, following, waiting for the moment, softer, and perhaps more patient. We, as human beings, carry both types of energy inside us, and in my counseling room, it is a matter of learning when to use which strengths in whatever situation you find before you.

My second book, Sissy’s Story: Healing the Emotional Pain of Long Term Childhood Illness, deals with a five-year-old girl being shut away and sick for a long time. This isolation sets up emotional pain and withdrawal in the child. At this developmental stage, children are learning both masculine and feminine energies through regular socialization. This second book is quite different from the first book, A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir. In this book, Sissy tells her experience of everyday events, while there is a commentary at the end of each chapter: observations about the family dynamics written by the adult Sissy, psychotherapist and author, JessieMay Kessler.

Now, what does this have to do with my title? I’m looking forward from this present-day pandemic and the confinement that it has brought to all of us and wonder about our future. This morning as I’m washing my face, I asked the question, “Will the United States change?” And I got back: “Of course it will change. You are learning through this pandemic that your country is large enough that no one person can know what is best for all parts of your country. As you come out of this shut-down, your governors will begin to push for regionalization because not every part of your country will be ready for “normalcy” at the same time. You will become The Federation of United States.” And of course, when “they,” whoever “they” are,  talk to me, I ask more questions. “So will we still have a president?” “Yes, but his powers will be very different, and he will be used when it is necessary to deal with other countries by presenting a united front such as going to war, signing commercial agreements, and peace treaties.”

You can bet I was surprised by this internal conversation because I was thinking about will “normalcy” take us back to “mountain climbing.” By mountain climbing, I’m talking about that good old American masculine value of fighting and struggling until we reach the top of the mountain with the corner office, title of president, the money that goes with that, and of course, the big shiny car. I think I may have done a blog on this before, but in this rendition, I ask a friend to shut her eyes and pretend she is climbing a mountain. (This was an uptight and stressed out girlfriend that had just lost the promotion that would take her closer to that corner office.)

I ask her to shut her eyes and start climbing up a mountain. “What do you see at your first rest stop?” I ask.

“Lush trees and bushes. Some flowers and a small brook.”

“Sounds lovely,” I say. “Now, climb higher and tell me what you see.”

Part of what my friend saw on her way up the mountain

“I’m in a high meadow, and there are some animals grazing. Peaceful.”

“That’s fine, now climb even higher.”

“The trees are smaller and beginning to thin out. There is more rock,” she reports.

“Okay,” I say. “Can you make it to the top from there?”

“Yes, but it’s going to take a few minutes.”

“That’s fine,” I respond. “I’ll wait.”

Finally, she says, “I’m at the top. Now what?”

“Look all around and tell me what you see.”

“There’s not much up here,” she reports.

“Are there any people?”

“No, I left them behind, way behind down in the valley?”

“So tell me, my friend, why do you want to be at the top of the mountain? All of your loved ones are down below.”

My friend’s eyes pop open, and she says, “That never occurred to me.”

Now, I’m not sharing this story because I want us all to stop being industrious, but I think we may need to rethink the struggle to gain more than we need for ourselves. Could this pandemic teach us new ways of thinking and being in this world?

A More Balanced Federation of United States

We have lived under male dominance for at least the last 2,000 years. If we look, we can see that the pendulum has started to swing; women are gaining more power, while men are doing more observing. Will we women be foolish enough to try to be the dominant sex? When we are mature enough as a people that we recognize dominance from either sex takes us nowhere. When we understand that each sex has talents to give society, gifts within the home, and the world of business, there will be a balance and hopefully success as a people and a planet. So here’s to a thoughtful Federation of United States!!

Here’s to an Earth Mother

Proposed Cover for Sissy’s Story

I haven’t been posting my blog much this summer and fall because I’ve been working on four other fronts: 1. An adult, returning, bipolar daughter struggling with medication changes, 2. Trying to get my second book Sissy’s Story: Healing the Pain of Long Term Childhood Illness ready for its first three readers, 3. Fighting a stress-related autoimmune skin condition labeled eczema, and 4. Beginning the long job of planning a move from a stand-alone dream house to a one-room apartment which means selling off furniture, packing the boxes, and tweaking this beloved house for sale.

But what does all of this have to do with my blog title this week? As if things weren’t in enough turmoil, my only, and older sister by ten years, passed away on November 1, 2019. You have met her before, here in my blogs and in my first book, A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir as PollyAnne. She came to my wedding with Sy and you will see much more of her in this second book about our growing-up years. Now that she has passed away I can reveal that she was born as Pauline Moody Sanderson, and she lived her most recent days Tennessee. So that I don’t confuse you anymore than I have, I will continue to call her PollyAnne.

For me, the best part of any good funeral service is the stories that the attendees tell about the deceased. In a sense this blog is a funeral service for my sister, so here come the stories.

You will read in my new book Sissy’s Story about how my mother tried to keep my two older siblings away from me during the time I was fighting rheumatic fever and during the long months of recovery. She was concerned that I was not overly stimulated or frustrated, which might damage a healing heart condition, so most of my stories start after the age of six. PollyAnne had decided that Dad seemed to be too busy this year to go and get the usual pussy willow bouquet for my mother so it was now our job. It was mid-

PollyAnne’s High School Picture

March and cold, but we were bundled up and started out walking down the road beside our house to the area where they would later be building the new East/West Route 2. After some walking, we came to a dip in the road where a brook ran underneath the road. PollyAnne pointed off to our right, “There, see? There are pussy willows ready, we just have to climb through the brush to get to them,” she said. So we climbed over the guardrail fence, down an incline, and close to the brook. I was too small to cut the branches so she cut and handed the bounty to me. When she was finished cutting, she turned to me and said, “Now be careful: we have to turn around and fight our way out of here. I don’t want you falling in the brook. Mom will kill us.” She started out. I turned where I was standing; stepped back one step and landed flat on my back in the brook, winter clothes and all. You have never seen a puppy in its first bath be more indignant or protest more than I did. And to add to my misery PollyAnne stood there and just laughed at me. It was really only a moment before she reached out a hand to pull me out, but it felt like an eternity. My heavy clothes soaked with water made it hard for me to right myself and her laughter only enraged me more. I can tell you that the walk home was one miserable wet journey. Of course, Mom didn’t kill us; she just got me into dry clothes fast. I don’t even think she scolded PollyAnne. I’m not sure now, but I hope I managed to hold onto the pussy willows.

This next story is a family story and takes place before I entered the family. PollyAnne and our brother Owen were only about three and four years old. PollyAnne

If my Siblings Got this Far in their Sales Journey They were Passing my Parents First House in Shakerton. It is Much Updated in this Picture

had apparently heard my mother complaining about the lack of money in the household so Polly got their equivalent to the little red wagon out, filled it with onions and potatoes, and holding her brother by the hand they started walking towards the village trying to sell the onions and potatoes to raise money for my mother. PollyAnne’s sales pitch ran something like this: “Would you like to buy some onions? We are gathering money so that we can buy Mother some panties because God knows she needs them.” Fortunately, a neighbor came upon the children before they had gotten to the main part of town and he convinced them that they could ride back to their house with him. His comment to my mother when he returned my sister and brother was: “Do you know these children? I picked them up on the road while they were trying to sell onions to raise money for your new underwear.” I can only imagine the look on my mother’s face as she received my siblings and their wares!

This is a Stand-in Picture for What I Saw

When I was about fourteen PollyAnne and her husband, Bud, were living on a farm as the hired help. PollyAnne had experience as a cook, so she had gotten a job at a near-by restaurant cooking three meals a day for the establishment. Since her first daughter was only six months old, she needed someone to come live-in and run her household and cook for her husband. And it was here that I learned how to cook, and clean, and change a baby. I slept upstairs in a tiny room that contained the baby’s crib and one rocking chair. My sister nursed her children. One night I was sound asleep when I heard a stirring in the room and then silence. I opened one eye to see the full moon shining its light in through the window. It fell upon my sister sitting naked in the rocking chair; diaper tucked over one shoulder, suckling her baby daughter. The way the moonlight fell upon them was like a spotlight; the light you see in Christmas cards falling on the Madonna, and it is one of the most beautiful pictures I carry with me for all of my lifetime.

Lewis Hall at the University Of Massachusetts, Amherst My Home Away from Home for Four Years

My last story takes place when I was going to the University of Massachusetts. By this time PollyAnne and Bud had gathered enough money to buy a small farm and it was not too distant from the college. She would call me when she could and say, “Would you like to come to spend the weekend with us?” Those of you who have spent weekends on college campuses know that it can be a very lonely place if you are not in a relationship or a part of a sorority or club. I was an Independent so I had none of these perks. “Yes, please come and get me,” was my reply.

She would bundle up three little girls and drive all the way to get me. Feed me supper, show me where my room would be, and I think she didn’t wake me until I stumbled out for breakfast on Sunday morning. This gave us a small time to talk, her to pack me supper, and then drive me with the girls, back to college. She never complained about my laziness, or thoughtlessness that I didn’t spend my time giving her a break from three little girls. And she only asked me once if I had gotten my homework done. This is why I call her an Earth Mother. These are the women who give their lives in touch with nature, growing healthy children, and nurturing the needs of the rest of us. PollyAnne leaves behind her husband Bud and her four adult children with all of their families.

Here’s to one of the finest Earth Mothers I have ever known.

 

 

What are Your Priorities?

This may be my last blog for the summer. In the last weeks, I have been writing about bits and pieces of my forthcoming book, Sissy’s Story: Inside a Child’s Long Term Illness. My summer plans were to work over the three versions of the book, written some time ago, and morph them into one cohesive story and then present it to a publisher. I’m not getting any younger so I feel some pressure to complete this mission.

What is the expression? “Life happens when you are on your way to the grocery store.” Well, here we are! My oldest daughter, Cora, in my published book A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir, called two weeks ago and said, “Mom, I’m in a bit of a jam. Can I come home for a few days?” If you have read my published book, you know what I would say. “Sure, Honey, come on home. You’ve never done that since you were eighteen.” (All of my five daughters are

Cora at 18 Years of Age

grown, married with children, or made the choice to be single.) Come to find out Cora is in a real mess—you don’t really need to know the details—but after a few days I began saying to myself why am I giving up my dreams of getting these last three books published to help out a well-grown woman. (She takes up a lot of emotional space.) And, again, if you’ve already read A Bird and the Dragon, you know that this daughter had a devoted father and a biological mother whose life was almost all about her. When this happens to a child, the relationship between mother and child may look loving and strong, but what actually happens is the child never has the opportunity to go through the normal stages of emotional development because the mother usurps the child’s emotional strength.

In reading that first book you also know that Cora bolted and ran from the household

The House Cora Lived in from 14 to 18 Years of Age

her father, Sy and I, created for Cora and her sisters when she was eighteen years old. Life has been a struggle for her without any sort of a degree after high school or the finer things you learned from your parents in those exploratory years as a young adult.

So, I’ve recognized that my time right now is about being available and ready to listen as she struggles with finding her way through this life dilemma. I adored her father and although he’s been gone for over five years I feel that he needs me to be present to Cora and hold hands with her as she finds her way through this tunnel, hopefully to a better, more balanced, less naive life. It is amazing the things you do for love: love for a daughter, a stepdaughter, and love for a beloved deceased husband. See you over there someday, Sy, and we will still have plenty to hash over. Love you! Love your daughter! Love My Daughter!!

Sy’s Rainbow You Can Read About it in A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir

 

Which Path to Take

A Path in the Woods

You may have noticed that I’ve been absent these last three weeks from the blog scene. I have come to a fork in the road, so to speak, and when that happens I withdraw and try to sort things out: which path to take? I’m not sick, in fact, I’ve been doing more socializing than I usually do and it has been fun. But what I’m running into is that if I do all the things I’m supposed to do, I never get to what I want to do and there is little money left to self-publish another book.

In a conversation recently with my older sister PollyAnne, she told me to get going on the second book. She seemed to feel the time now was very right for me to finish up my second book. She seemed to think that “if I write it, they will come.” I’ve told you before that my mother lost two babies between myself and my older two siblings. That caused my mother to ‘bring me up properly,” and I bought most of her rules to the place that now I can’t seem to let go of the “have to do’s” so I can get to the “want to do’s.”

I’ve pulled out the old manuscripts from years ago and find I have so many incarnations that it is going to take me some time to sort and cull out the version that I think is best and I could use some help from you, my readers. Instead of doing the regular blogs that circle around my first book, A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir I’m going to feed you bits and pieces of the next book, and I’d like to hear your thoughts and suggestions, please.

A little background on what the book is about: This book covers the years in my life between five years of age and 14. During the early part of that time, I had rheumatic fever, and the cure in the 1940s was total bedrest and sulfur drugs. Later, they put me on penicillin because they had found that it worked so well with the soldiers returning from the Second World War. I have always suffered from the emotional feelings that I had during that illness and the constant cautions from my mother afterward “that I do not do too much” on the one hand and on the other, she wanted me to be a flaming success. Hard to do!!

Proposed Cover for the Second Book Owen the Big Brother and Sissy

One of the things that I feel has held this book back is that it is written from the five-year-old’s perspective and vernacular. As a first book, publishers did not think that it would succeed. I believe that parents today need to see what happens internally to their sick child while they, the parents, are fighting for the child’s life. I think that parents today are doing a better job with their children in long-term illnesses, such as cancer, but they need to understand why the child gets hurt emotionally through the process.

So I have the option of just telling the child’s story, or writing it so that Sissy, the five-year-old, tells her story and then at the end of each chapter I make comments coming from my training as a therapist; my adult observations, so to speak. And that brings me to my first and second question for you, my readers.

Question One: What should the title be?  Three options so far are:

1. Sissy’s Story: Inside a Child’s Long-term Illness

2.  Hidden Sorrow: Healing the Pain of a Long-term Childhood Illness

     3.  Thorns in the Psyche: Healing from Childhood Trauma

Question Two:

1. Which type of book would draw your interest—the one where the child, Sissy, simply tells her experiences being in a long-term illness?

 

2.  Sissy tells her story in each chapter, and then at the end of that chapter, I the author/therapist comment on what dynamics are going on in the story and the family.

You will probably find it easier to respond by going to my web page and click the CONTACT button. Then use my email address to write to me and feed me your thoughts and suggestions. Thank you in advance for doing this for me.

Perspective is a Game Changer

Several years ago I was counseling a young woman, and we were making progress with

Rosemary and James

her issues, but she felt that I should meet her new husband. He agreed to come and on this particular evening, we got through the greetings quickly. My client, Rosemary, started to pick a fight and James did his best to explain himself. Now I’m not trained to do couples work, but here we were in the middle of things. They had come in with a mug of coffee and something to eat so I said to James, “Put your mug down on the floor between the two of you with the logo facing you.” They were seated somewhat opposite to one another, and he did as I asked. “Now, describe what you see in as much detail as you can.” He did describe the decal on the side of the mug. I turned to Rosemary and asked her to do the same. She giggled and then started into the same description, but stopped. “My side is exactly the same as his and I don’t think that is what you wanted me to see.” (Thank goodness she was as savvy as she was.) But she went on, “I get your point. We are usually looking at the same thing from two different perspectives. So we fight over what we think we see.” (I couldn’t have said it better myself.) We all three had a good laugh on me, but I think they got the point of the supposed demonstration because he began to talk in more detail and she did a better job of listening.

I went on to explain that we can only look at a situation from our viewpoint which comes with a whole lot of personal history wrapped around it. And the trick for a young married couple is to remember this and not try to correct their partner but to listen more carefully so that they can understand where the difference lies between them. When I do speaking promotionals for my book, “A Bird and the Dragon: Their Love Story: A Memoir, I use a handout of my “love star” with the qualities marked on it that I believe married or about to marry people need to cultivate to make a successful marriage. At the bottom of that star is: Talk, Listen, and Time.

So often when we get into a disagreement or argument with our spouse or our intended, we begin to take what they are saying as a criticism of us or as a flaw in them. Usually, neither is the truth. But if we would Talk, Listen and give each other Time to think and process, we would be more successful in marriage.

When I was married to my first husband, Rev. Harvard Lesser, we got into a bad fight, and I began to yell at him. This fight happened during the summertime. He told me to quiet down, or he would have to go around and close all the windows in the parsonage so that the parishioners didn’t hear us fighting. I come from a family that didn’t want you to express too many feelings out loud; shut down and internalized all that anger. There was no guidance on how to express anger or have a fight.

Cora Kessler

When I married the second time to Sy Kessler, I also gained two daughters. It was Cora, the older daughter who taught me that it was healthy to yell and get the feelings out. This is simply, another perspective coming from a different kind of history.

I think what I am trying to convey is that we need to slow down in our interpersonal relationships, especially those very close ones, and take a look at the perspective each has on whatever the topic is that is on the table for discussion. Our viewpoints are not right or wrong, they are simply what we have personally learned as points of view over the years. If we honor each other and accept each other, our marriages are going to run more smoothly.

If you want to comment on this blog either respond at the top of the blog or go to my website and click the CONTACT button. I’m always open to new ideas and topics.