October 19

Carole, we awoke together his morning at 6 AM, as if a clock mattered. You were helping me straighten the tablecloth, a cranberry-rust color. All the leaves to Nana’s table were in, a long rectangle as if getting ready for a party, our family, who else? You sat under the repro Matisse painting, in that spot of the room, and had a dark short sleeve top on, probably with shorts along with that beatific smile of yours. I’d pitched some bagel pieces along with an old bag of bread rolls from the fridge and was setting fresh ones, a dozen or two I’d just bought, hard crust rolls sprinkled with poppy seeds. It was so joyous ordinary and at first I was happy then thought, of course you'd come today — it is your yahrzeit — 8 years since you died, and I cried and cried. It is stupendous that you came today, if only the tears would stop.

Carole Connection

Rosh Hashana Weds. September 8, 2010
Written upon awakening.

The workman drilled holes through walls, smack dab in the middle of them, not the bottom or top as might be expected, holes for a cable wire although I didn't know what they'd connect to, the roof from a hole in the middle of the wall? the men supposedly working in my home because a new ordinance said I had to raise the roof for a new building code. They were noisy but nice and they kept showing me their business cards with phone numbers to call the boss, Nautilus, to take up the issue of their being in my house, making a ruckus, drilling through the walls, the center of the gypsum boards. In the dream my house more like your former one on 64 Street, In my dream, the phone line was always busy. During one of my attempts to reach Nautilus, I heard a conversation with a another guy, crossed wires, he leaving a message, not vile or angry but saying he was trying to reach the owner too … I handed to phone to one of the workers at my house … then Nautilus called me, saying everything was all right, he’d take care of things, not to worry. Nautilus from the sea, telling me he’d take care of things, reassuring, Nautilus from the sea the same sea we’d scattered your ashes into, Nautilus, a species surviving relatively unchanged for millions of years.

After a while you called, but there was so much noise, two little girls running around me, and the counter where the phone was, two daughters of the workers, who were using loud tools. I wanted your phone number, told you I’d had been trying to reach you for days, telling you I’d up been cooking until 3. You started to give it to me but I couldn’t read my own writing, and the paper I was writing on, the one in front of me, was loaded with doodads, and the pen was near dry, barely inked. I said hold on, when I came back you fudged with the phone number, gave me a few false starts, one beginning with a 500, like the 800 free calls … then said you couldn’t make it over, asking who would pick up Daniel, Agustin? You didn’t want to see Agustin, no way — I said Josh would get him, and you said OK, you’d come since Josh would pick up Danny in his car and bring him to my house.

You were frightened, hesitant, didn’t want to be seen.

Our older sister had been over earlier and I demanded that she leave even as she had looked innocuous, like her 30 year old self. Mom’s presence was a distant hint in the yonder.

Mostly I’d wanted you and your phone number you finally gave it to me, it began with a 271—had a 6 in it, maybe your former number that I no longer remember? Then you said you’d come…you were still mulling it over, I could tell, still thinking but so close to yes even as the background between us on the phone was obtrusive and distracting.

Then in real time I awoke to the sounds of lawn mowing outside and I was in tears, and in real time, Madeline called minutes later, unusual for her to phone that time of the morning. She was the ONLY person I could talk to just then, in real life, synchronicity, our friend Madeleine the real time connector who’d truly understand … and I told her about Nautilus from the sea, telling me he’d take care of things, the same sea home to your scattered ashes, that freeing sea.

Happy Birthday, Craggie

Hello Carole and Craig!

Craiggie, I am trying to post the 'youtube' account set up for you but am having trouble. Hope to add:

Happy Birthday dear friend, and to your daughter who shares the day, I have the poem your father wrote, penned on a box after my sister died. A toast to you, Craiggie, and to those here, and here not.

Carole in Red

Carole I dreamed about you again last night, an 8-year-old sitter was watching your boys, just for minutes, while you looked for another but that wasn’t the significance of the eight. It was eight years ago that you left Miami and moved to Key West - and in another few months you’d be dead. In my dream you were wearing a red shirtwaist dress with yellow and blue circles, not quite polka dots, I remember the design, red with a few small yellow and blue circles, like bubbles, maybe the sky and sun with a red background for bleeding because you didn’t want to leave your young adult boys, they just starting college, you thinking families should be weaned by consent rather than poverty. Yet you found love with Craig, so maybe the red was for love. A few months after moving to Key West you’d die, officially of a heart attack, but I knew otherwise, we all did, especially Craig, whose love and warmth cradled you even as our father sharpened his knife.

Today is Curt's birthday and our 20 anniversary, both together, how practical of us. How sad to be without you.

Carole, Keep Channeling!

Hey Carole,

Keep coming at me .... we still have work to do.

“It was a dream,” Carolee emphasized. “But the dream was important. Because in another lifetime our sisterhood was cut short. And now we are sisters again. And there is something we must do. Something wasn’t finished, remains incomplete.”

Carolee related that dream years ago, and I remember it as if yesterday when the air between us vibrated with life. I cannot remember when she first mentioned the dream, only that it emerged into our world with the same certainty as the years we shared. Although I could not recall our dying together, I never doubted the experience, simply accepting that Carolee had retained our past. We both knew, too, that Carolee’s vision wasn’t a dream. She was the keeper of our history, a past that would again become our future. We will be sisters forever, and in the intermittent space between us, I now carry our story forward.
more later.

Love, Hope

With You

Hi Carole, your boys will be here soon, Passover and my birthday ... am so missing you. Have an upcoming meeting with a literary agent about our book ... you'd be proud.

Bermuda Shorts

You were wearing them, tailored Bermuda shorts, beige, with a pleat down the front and a wide leather belt, your hair shoulder length, maybe with a hair band. We together, in a hallway with pictures, maybe mother was there, too .... but you and I for sure, so natural, talking, walking.

January 3

Your birthday, you age 60, me 61 ... when again.