9/14/10

a spot for garden musings...

You can find me here, writing about my garden, my chickens, and my rambling thoughts.

5/18/10

Taking a break

I love this blog. It saved my sanity at a time when I had a LOT to work out. It connected me with strangers who became my friends, it made friends out of my acquaintances, and it even brought me closer to my closer set of friends and family members. I could never have dreamed up the advantages that blogging provided me with during my chemo year (and beyond).

However, when I set up this blog as a way to talk about my breast cancer and disseminate information, I chose to have the title be my name. I couldn't think up anything snappy (still can't), but also saw the value in making it simple. If people wanted to know what was going on with our family in the middle of the cancer year, they could look it up pretty easily. Try a few variations of Pam Lucken and blogger, and you could find me! It was a great tool for me when I was sharing information that was good to share.

Happily, my life isn't really about my own breast cancer story anymore. I don't have news to share with a bunch of people at one time. Unhappily, though...I feel like I have some bigger issues than my Stage I Invasive Ductal Carcinoma (not to encourage it to come back bigger and more deadly...I'm hoping it will stay a non-issue!). I'm doing just fine...but the cancers that have affected my life that are NOT my own have been harder for me to deal with than my own was. It's hard currently for me to think about my breast cancer year without guilt and sadness. My dad's pancreatic cancer struggle and my mother-in-law's lung cancer have really put things into perspective for me.

I hope I will keep writing, or that if I stop, that I will one day start again. Thanks for reading
and let's hope for good days ahead!

4/22/10

P.S.

I love having chickens. I never expected them to be so affectionate, so funny, have so much personality. Best $3.50 I ever spent.

They are a bit of work...but there are some big payoffs - like the way they snuggle and fall asleep in my lap, or the sight of them waddling over to me in the garden.

Also, Bill is making the most outstanding chicken coop. I'm so proud of him.

Busy busy days

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4/5/10

Easter Sunday with family living and deceased

The Lucken children were spoiled this Easter! They were included in an Easter Egg hunt in my sister's neighborhood, which was fun. The Easter Bunny left them baskets and a multi-step scavenger hunt leading to a few extra presents. (The Easter bunny is a gifted poet! Her iambic pentameter is flawless!) Grandma Sybil, Aunt Julie, and Aunt Perry brought over the cutest things, and now our house is trashed with Easter presents, candy wrappers, and plastic eggs.

In my first attempt at (co) hosting Easter, we had two Easter Egg hunts - one for big kids and one for small kids. Total number of hidden eggs = 160

Today, I definitely feel like I overdid Easter, but I think that is understandable. It was both our first Easter without my Dad, and our first Easter with the Gibbs in town. Added to the crazy Easter festivities was Katie's family birthday party on Friday night, and I am tired! I went all out for my little family - I can't imagine how the Easter Bunny must feel!

--------
All 5 of us went to Mass on Easter Sunday. More than anything, following family traditions like egg hunts and Easter Sunday Mass made me feel like my parents were right there with me, celebrating Easter with my family.

My Catholic upbringing gives me a soundtrack for these holy days, and I loved that the opening song was one that I had been serenading my kids with as we looked over our Easter Baskets earlier that morning. The kids looked at me like I was magic when they heard it in church. The offertory hymn was "Morning Has Broken" - the hymn I chose as the opening hymn for my Dad's funeral. Emma remembered it, and was sad, but I explained that it's meaning was perfect for my Dad then, the way it was perfect for Jesus now - the suffering was over, it was a new and beautiful day.

I looked at my little family, and the tears rolled down my face as I whispered to them - "I am sad your grandparents are missing this [being with my kids as they grow up], but I am so happy because I feel like they are HERE."

3/30/10

A very good life

I'm reflecting on something my husband said yesterday. He said that we are doing everything we can to surround ourselves with life, and it's true. We have a very alive Red Dog; we have an enormously fluffy and playful black kitten; we have 8 baby-adolescent chicks. I'm growing about 100 plants in my house because it is too cold to put any of them out in the garden. Everywhere we look, it is life, Life, LIFE!

All of that life and liveliness starts to get to a person, and you just can't help feel the enthusiasm. Hope romps around the yard for hours like that old green toy is the best thing she's ever seen. Our black kitten writhes with affectionlike she never believed she could be so happy! And the chicks - they are always stretching their little necks to see "what's that? where are we?"

How fun it is to do geometry with Emma...we are finally doing some problem solving and teaching at home that doesn't put a mommy to sleep. She got a bigger bike, and now she looks little again. Katie turns 8 on Friday, and we are starting a new adventure together in girl scouts. And, Nathan! In about 1 day, he learned how to ride Emma's now-outgrown bike. I didn't even have time to teach him, to get sore running around the neighborhood hunched over and holding a bike, time to cajole him into trying again...I "helped" him once and I couldn't even keep up! He was going around the circle into the driveway, off into the street, riding like he was born doing it.

It is very liberating to do whatever you need to do to surround yourself with life, love, and your hobbies. Sometimes I feel so non-traditional, but what a very good life.

Overheard from Nathan

"I call that Dark Guy? The guy with the dark hair, dark clothes, dark everything? I call him Dark Vader."

3/24/10

My room smells like breast cancer, and...joy?

On Monday morning, after my family members were all off pursuing their various educations and professions, I walked into my room and I was taken aback with a huge sense of deja vu. It was quiet. It was clean. Bill had left on the air purifier. Most importantly, the light was just exactly the same as it would have been two years ago when I was in that same room, recovering from my mastectomy (daylight savings time, still no leaves on the trees, sunny but with no snow on the ground to make it shocking...). I was taken right back to those early days of my breast cancer.

It was almost a nice familiar smell and scene - the peace of knowing I was on an upswing (in one way - the cancer was cut out, and I only had one way to go - up and out of everything) mixed with the fear that I still had some hard things in front of me. I think remembering that upswing - feeling it, in that instant - gave me some hope.

Sometimes I feel like grieving is a cop-out. How can missing a person, missing being a daughter, and the pain of hard memories actually cause a person to be as "off" as I feel like I often am?  I have a hard time feeling like it is OK to be "off", and I have a hard time believing that I'm not always going to be a little wrecked from all of this. I have not really been so certain that I could be on an upswing, any time soon.

Then I walk into my breast cancer bedroom - that quiet, clean-smelling scene - and FEEL something again...or then, yesterday, for just an instant, while I was running on my treadmill, I felt one flash of my joy. Both sensations were so quickly gone that I can barely believe I felt them - but I am so grateful for those flashes.

I think they mean that the girl that I am when I am at my best might still be here, somehow. Could I manage to catch that upswing?

3/23/10

Our Irish Setter

She is so exuberant.


Though she has a whole acre to explore, she prefers to play right next to these kids.


3/22/10

A great day with Nathan

Just a few pics of a great excursion with my Bear...

Exciting bedtimes in the Lucken house


Someday in the future, I want to remember how I was putting Emma to bed last night... it was exactly like this, which I saw the other day - playful singing with a big exciting surprise included. She kept asking me to do it again...and again...and again. At the end, I said, "Now, have you been put to bed with the respect you deserve, having been my daughter for 10 years, 3 months, and 19 days?"

She smiled sweetly and said, "No. Only after you do this 10 more times." Meanwhile, my dog looked at me with a look that said, "Are you DONE yet?" and Katie came storming upstairs to demand the same mistreatment (which she got, of course). I love these moments with my kids!

In other news, we've started a new hobby, and here's a sneak peak. Exciting times ahead.



3/21/10

My personal training tool

Wii Sports has become my new personal training tool. Nathan has never been so happy for me to run on the treadmill as he is now. The key is to make it sound like a treat - "Do you want to play Wii Sports while I exercise?"

3/19/10

Goals

Goals for spring
  1. Go for a daily run - even if you would rather spend the time working in the yard.
  2. Try not to get injured while working in the yard.
  3. Quality time with children. I could spend all day saying "sure, in a minute". Do a better job planning meals and quality fun activities to do together. And again, get out of the yard.
  4. Take more pictures.
  5. Do a better job with my garden journal. Though this seems counterintuitive to my other plans.

3/10/10

Emma's Jump Rope for Heart Thank You

Thank You all so much!! I managed to raise $300! It means a lot to me that I got to help with saving other people lives. Now I know that I helped to make sure no one goes through what my Mom and Aunts had to go through. Thank You.
Emma

3/9/10

a note from Emma

This is Emma Lucken writing to say I am doing Jump Rope for Heart. I know that most of you donated to my sister (rats I never get to Jump first ). You don't have to donate but every little bit counts. I am jumping for my mom's mom who as you know died when my mom was a kid, and I have always wanted to meet her. I am jumping because I don't want anybody to have to go through what my mom and her sisters went through. So if you want to donate click on this link: Jump Rope for Heart Thanks!
Emma

Dear Dad





Dear Dad,

It's hard to believe that this was us just a year ago: trying to have a good time in Roatan despite the terrible diagnosis...but still together.

It's harder to believe that this is my life now - with no you. I hate to whine about it...but it seems so unfair to me that our historian, our photographer, my father, is gone. I don't see my children smile as widely anymore as I saw them smile in pictures you took...and I know that I feel different, ungrounded. I'm having a really hard time taking things seriously, with this feeling that life is so fleeting.

I'm never far from the memories or the pain.  December: "A year ago was my last Christmas being someone's child." January: "A year ago, Dad was diagnosed." February: "A year ago we were with Dad in Bayfield." March: "A year ago we were on our last trip together." I'm getting farther and farther from those though.

And even the good stuff causes me twinges because you won't see them - Noah's first haircut, Natalie looking so big and happy in her new backyard, Matthew's 2nd birthday party, Katie will be making her first communion this year. We're doing it all without our photographer, and without our biggest smiles.

But I know that life isn't fair, I know that I was gifted with a pretty good life, and I know that I am tough enough to handle this loss - MOST days.

So anyway, my progress report: I am not the all-A student you raised when it comes to grief management, but I am at least passing this class. I started running again (and I would guess you can run again, too, now that your legs are not all ruined). I'm starting a Brownie troop for Katie tomorrow. I'm hoping for a whole new wholesome adventure and more special time my precious middle child. I'm trying to make my life to go on. I'm trying pretty hard to engage, even though sometimes I wonder if any of it is worth it. Losing you still hurts an awful lot...so much that my other roles aren't quite filling up that spot. Maybe these new adventures will help me pass the time and one day I will look up and not feel that hurt quite so much.

Anyway, Dad, I'm sorry for the times that I didn't appreciate you as I probably should have. I should have probably worked less hard on my mother role over the past 10 years and worked harder on the daughter role - because it seems I wasn't ready to be done with that role yet! (And everyone knows, you can always mother harder...it is a neverending spectrum, motherhood.) Hopefully you know my intentions though, and know how much I loved you, even when we didn't always understand each other.
With love,
your daughter,
Pam

3/8/10

I can't believe...

  • I can't really believe that I am a breast cancer survivor.
  • It seems so weird that such a womanly disease was written into my DNA...I feel like I am the least womanly person around.
  • I think it is funny that now I have so few girl parts (no real breasts, no ovaries, no periods to deal with, etc.) I guess I fit better now with who I always thought I was.
  • I can't believe I had chemotherapy for breast cancer, and that I'm lucky enough to not be having it now!
  • I can't believe I found a lump, and that I was lucky enough to find it in stage 1.
  • I can't believe this will be my 4th 3-day, or that we have 29 team members!
  • I can't believe I have no living biological parents.
  • I can't believe I am a parent myself.
  • I can't believe spring is really coming...

3/3/10

Lucken Family Mushers

I love this picture. We went dogsledding in Winter Park to celebrate my 2 year breast cancer anniversary:


Brownie Troop Invitations


I'm pretty excited to be starting a girl scout troop and love these invitations I made :).

The word that strikes fear in every mother's heart

SPRING!!!!!

It means mud, and more laundry, and so many school activities that it might make a person insane. Today has been an busy fundraising/team meeting planning/volunteering day. I'm going to finish up making a birthday cake and dinner for my husband, before I pick up the girls from school.

All of this marks the beginning of the uptick in activities that happens every spring ...which would be fine, except for what is happening outside. 40 degrees means I just want to be in the yard like
Laura Ingalls Wilder and Almanzo.

Oh SPRING. I love you and yet...yikes. So much to do, so little time!

2/11/10

Katie's Jump Roping for Heart!

Katie loves Jump Rope for Heart and has been asking me to help her fundraise for about a week...I told her that since this year we have a big fundraising job (fundraising for both Mom and Dad to do the 3-day), we wouldn't be pushing a big campaign.

A special anniversary changed my mind.

Coincidentally, today Emma is the exact age that my sister Amy was when our Mom died. At around 11am today, I will be breathing a huge sigh of relief that I am still alive to mother Emma...and then I will start down the countdown to the day when Katie is the exact age that Julie was when our Mom died. (8 years, 5 months, and 16 days...on September 18th of this year Katie will be that age.) I've been hoping and praying to mother my children past all of these special anniversaries, and then to go on mothering into the new frontier (what would it be like to mother, or have a mother, past the age of 12 years, 5 months, and 12 days?). I can't wait to find out!

And so...

Jump Rope for Heart! In Memory of Grandma Cathi

2/4/10

Dear Dad

Dear Dad,
A burst of sunshine came through the clouds just as I was finishing up yesterday's post - it seems like things are a little brighter than they were yesterday. It is good to have a moment to think about what I have lost, what I miss, what I wish I had.It helps me then  think of what I have, what I can work for, and what fun there still is to be had.

There is much to be thankful for - and top of the list is my family. I am so lucky to have Julie living nearby, to have such a close relationship with Amy, and to have my young ones developing wonderful relationships with my aunts. Yesterday, Aunt Perry dropped off 4 bags of canned goods  after Emma emailed the family to ask for help with a canned food drive at school. Emma was jumping around the house, squealing and saying, "I have the best aunts!"

There are relationships to cherish, and relationships to form, and cement.

I know we'll be ok, soon.

Love,
Pam

2/3/10

Dear Dad

Dear Dad,
Today I was dusting rather compulsively, albeit quickly, and I accidentally knocked down a folder on my bookshelf. Out fell cards, and pictures, and pages upon pages of memories people had shared with us over the first few days after your passing. Though I have not much time to clean the house before Nathan's friends and moms arrive, I took a few moments to read, and now, a few moments to write to you.

I was so angry immediately following your death that I didn't fully appreciate your career, or the impact you made on this region and the world during your time here on Earth. I felt that you had chosen to spend the precious time that you had with your career instead of with us. Now that I look back, I realize that you did spend time with us if we needed you. No, we did not get the chance to talk about your life, your wishes, your hopes, your prayers. We didn't get the chance for you to spend some good days out on the boat that summer, watching Emma jump off the side, watching Natalie and Noah take their first boat rides with their Bubba. It wasn't your fault, though, that we didn't get these moments - it was your stupid cancer's fault.

I remember how upset I was that you didn't want to talk, and now I am sorry that I was ever upset with you about it. I always realized that you were in pain but I couldn't understand how the emotions involved with what you were going through just wouldn't come out. I was upset that you couldn't or wouldn't talk about it.

I think I know now, Dad.

Looking back, I think you knew where we were headed, as a family...down the road of loss, and misery, and sadness, and grey days that don't end. You probably could not bear to think about it, much less talk about it. Whereas I was saying to the rest of us, "we can do this...we'll have the rest of our lives to put ourselves back together, we just have to help Dad now and worry about ourselves later"...you remembered how hard that is.

I was only 12 when we lost mom...and when we lost Grandpa and Grandma and Uncle Mike in those few years before her, they weren't my parents and my brother. Only you knew our road ahead - young parents, with no parents of our own to guide us, or love us, or share these memories of parenthood with us, and no time to even cry (without freaking out the children), or stay in bed for months, or go crazy and sell everything and travel the world like nomads until we find our joy again. We have other people to be responsible to now, others to love while we still carry this heavy, miserable grey load around day after day.

It is horrible, and you knew it would be. I didn't know what this would feel like - the loss, the memories, the missing parts of myself (you and Mom), and watching my children grow up without you. How much I would love to tell you about Emma! How she loves her family - your brothers, your sisters-in-law, your nephews, your niece...how she counts on them and thinks of them and they make her feel safe and proud of herself. I wish I could talk to Mom about my little middle child - the shining star who sparkles and then just as easily explodes...so much emotion and creativity and intelligence in that skinny little body. And Nathan...he is a boy you could really love - he's funny and and smart, and a joy to be around

You know the burden this is...the joy that my children loved you is now my misery that they miss you, my worries that the loss of you is too hard for them, my concern that I won't be able to keep it all together well enough so that I can raise them properly during these precious years.

And believe me, I am now probably happy that I didn't know HOW MUCH sadness was coming my way. It's a different kind of loss, and grieving, when you are 36, with no parents, with young children of your own. It's not at all fun.

So, Dad, it's ok that we didn't talk about it.

Love,
Your daughter always,
Pam

1/29/10

A big day for an introvert

This was a huge day for an introverted mother:

  • 8:45am -Take kids to school, remember "Tacky Day" for Nathan, drop off cleaned toys for preschool
  • 9:00am - 10am -clean house, including guinea pig cages (a friend came to school all allergic and so I volunteered to take her guinea pig until she found a new home for it. So I was cleaning a cage of a guinea pig that wasn't even mine...)
  • 10am - Drop off deposit for Nathan's new school next year
  • 10:10am - Return library books
  • 10:15am - 10:55am - Drive to the mall, buy gift certificate for Emma's teacher who is going on maternity leave
  • 10: 55am - 11:25am - Emma's teacher's baby shower. The teacher loved the scrapbook, with baby and big kid pictures, notes from all the kids, pieces of advice for parents, etc. that I worked on last week
  • 11:25am - Emma's off to a playdate
  • 11:40am - 11:55am - Pick up Nathan from school, 
  • 12:05pm - Pick up Katie from the bus stop (half day)
  • 12:10pm - Feed kids
  • 12: 45pm - Answer phone, it's Katie's friend. Katie's having a playdate.
  • 1pm - Collect Katie's friend
  • 1pm - 3pm - Supervise playdate, while cleaning toys for preschool and monitoring dumb dog
  • 3:10pm - Drop off Katie at Julie's house for "movie Fridays"
  • 3:20pm - 4:30pm -Pick up Emma
  • 5: 35pm - 8:05pm - Take Nathan to new friend's movie watching party
  • 8:05pm - 8:35pm - Leave, drive to pick up Katie
  • 8: 54pm - Write this
  • 9pm - Put kids to bed
I can't even believe the amount of activity and socializing for this basically antisocial girl. I must really, really, really, really, really love my kids.

1/25/10

Today by the numbers

Minutes spent driving family members: 243 minutes

Piles of dog waste picked up in the yard: 49

Kisses for a 4 year old: 100

Hugs for same 4 year old: 20

Times same 4 year old was lovingly thrown onto the bed: 12

Times I said, "OFF, HOPE!" - unable to count that high

Hours I spent working on a teacher gift today: 3

Exercise, in minutes: zero

Happy thoughts

How wonderful it is to have my sister situated so conveniently close by, here in grey old Michigan.

I remember dreaming about our future lives, and telling her, 10 years ago when she was packing up to move to California, to find a good place for us to live. It was always my dream to have all of my loved ones right down the street from me...and I have been willing to make that dream a reality, as much as I could. That's why we settled here, despite my strong desire to live somewhere else. We wanted them to know their grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins.

I thought we would be relocating, me somewhere with my sister to follow, or the other way around...and then came Emma and so we settled here. At that time I never thought I would be lucky enough that Julie would move back to Michigan with her family in tow.

I love being part of their lives. I love that I have to occasionally monitor fights between Natalie and Nathan. It means that the novelty of each other's presence is gone, now they are growing up together and don't always want to share. I love impromptu family dinners.

1/23/10

New Friends

Tonight I went on the greatest walk, with a new(ish) friend...and what fun! She knows the neighborhoods even better than I do, having grown up around here, and had lots of good tips and pointers. A cut-through here, pre-school advice there, where they took their daughter skiing, etc.

I am positive that walking with friends is one of my favorite activities. The time just flies by, I learn so much, we spend so much time laughing. Now if only I could get my 3-day friends to start walking in the middle of winter like this wonderful new(ish) friend...

AND...I think I have another new friend in the making - a fellow parent emailed to see if anyone wanted to start a girl scout troop for Katie's grade. I have spent a lot of time trying to find a co-leader, and here she has been all along! Our daughters were never in the same class, so we never crossed paths the right way until this week. I've seen her around plenty, though...she's one of the handful of moms who always volunteer at grade-wide events. I can pretty safely say, with all the time we are going to be spending together, I either have a friend-in-the-making, or an enemy-in-the-making (not that I would ever mind her, she may just find me a little annoying after awhile).

1/13/10

Resolving

I'm resolving to spend less time being sad. So, I'm trying my best to catch up on some of my emails, my procrastinations, my responsibilities, and my pictures.

As such, I thought I would share a picture which is making me laugh today - Hope tried to get into the garbage, and look what happened to her (notice wagging tail):



It didn't stop her from trying to get snacks from Noah's high chair/lunch:



And now, off to my Trip of the Day: the Zoo. (Yesterday's Trip of the Day was sledding...twice! Once, with Nathan, and then again later with the girls and Nathan.)

1/3/10

A love story

My sisters and I have spent some time over the past few days reading love letters that my parents wrote to each other throughout the years of their marriage. Most of these letter were written when my dad was away for Basic Training as an Army Reservist in the early 70s. It's uncanny, because these are different people (my mom and dad), and a different time (the 70s), but the same situations that I'm living or have lived. In one letter my young mom is sorry for being unhappy on a phone call with my dad, after he had to leave things a mess to get to basic training. How many times have I apologized been in that situation, making a big fuss with Bill over something, but mostly because I missed him? In one letter, my dad is pining away for his young wife with the intensity of young love that I remember so well as a 23 or 24 year old, when a love like that was the whole world, or all I wanted from it.

It just all makes me wonder...how much of who you are is determined already by your own biology? Here are my knees, showing up in the 1940s under my grandmother's dress. Here's my hair color, and of course, though you can't see it, here's my mutation, too. Here's my mood swings, showing up in letters before I was even born. Here's the same way I love, and argue, and the things that I worry about. Though I know so much of this is probably universal...I just recognize it so much in my Dad's prose, or my Mom's.

It's been enlightening, reading their letters, and hearing them talk once again. I see my Dad's handwriting being formed, hear his signature phrases and my Mom's as well. It's kind of nice, but I'm also a little afraid to really pour myself into those boxes and those letters. It makes me miss them and makes me feel sorry for what they lost. How sad to love so hard and then to lose your young wife! And then also, how sad to miss the opportunity to spend time with these guys, the 2nd generation of your love:




I know they were lucky to have found that love at all, and to have been that happy. I know they are still with us in a way. I also know that at least one of these grandchildren would rather have those grandparents on this earth with her - and I have a feeling that the other 5 will feel that way someday, too.