Intentions

 

 

So, it happens gradually, but no one escapes it, no one can turn back the clocks, we have so many heartbeats and then we are done.  Sounds morbid, if we have not decided and made intentions to follow along so we still have a sense of purpose.  I spent years listening to my aging mother say, “Why don’t I just go…what is fair about that young person dying…why can’t I just die… I sit here day after day…” and then she moved into forgetting and she said it no more, but, as her life became more and more isolated and hr dementia moved in, she no longer complained. 

Then, it became, “What’s happening?  Where am I?  Bryce (my brother who worked a night job and then spent every morning with her) has not been here for a long long time…Bryce is coming to take me out ( no, she could no longer go out).  I walked in and found hr readying herself for “a party” she was NOT going to, with one leg of pantyhose on one leg and another pantyhose leg on her other.  She forgot.  She forgot us all.  Her Teddybear became her baby that she clucked to, tsk’d at, warned people not to sit on ‘the baby’.  She forgot where she was, why she was still here, and where she had been and where she was going.  It no longer mattered; any of that.  It became mere survival for a few months.  We watched her fade away and wondered at her purpose then.  Perhaps her purpose was us.  She gave me gift after gift:  my brother would put her on the hone every Sunday and every Sunday he said, “Geez, I am here every morning and she does not know who I am and you phone and she hears your voice and she starts patting air! And smiling” She remembered me and her love came through the line.  What was the purpose of her hanging on when her spirit had begun leaving her body? 

I spent that Christmas Eve, in her hospital room, laying next to her, cuddling her, and talking to her through the night.    It was one of the most sacred things I have ever done.  Was this her purpose?  To allow me those stolen ours to speak to her spirit and know that love?  What is purpose?  If we are here for a purpose, what on earth could it be that dementia comes on and steals any active purpose there is?  Was it to teach me to pass on that kind of sacred love to those who are near and dear to me.  Since then, I have set the intentions of doing such with my children and grandchildren.

I intend to live life full as possibly can be lived.  I intend to have adventures (re:  joining the lapidary club and rock hounding in the mountains) .  I intend to make memories with my children and grandchildren, every time we are together.  Layer upon layer, I intend to tell my truths to them.  I am not a goal-setter, I am an intention-setter.  Goals can be heavy to carry.  Intentions allow for serendipity and miracles and no sense of foreboding about not reaching them.  With goals it is make them or break them, like New Year’s Resolutions.  With intentions, there is possibility for finding new ways to reach new things.  Life can get in the way, or illnesses, or death, and goals fall crumpled to the wayside of I wish, I should, I could...I didn’t...”  With intentions, the success is in the intention not necessarily the end results. 

I have some intentions right now.  I am going to find the fun, the joy, the peace, in every single day, be it only for a few moments of a long day.  I intend to do art every single day, in some form.  I intend to try new arts and crafting and have collected the materials to do so; moose hair for moose hair tufting; pine needles for making baskets; jewellery-making supplies to make jewelry of my beautiful found gems and stones.  I intend to meet new and old friends for coffee and a chat rather than stay homebound.  I intend to have a house-cleaner come in once a month to do the heavy deep cleaning and refuse to give myself the limited physical work I now find myself able to o without pain.  I intend to go to the library or to theatres, or to dance recitals, or live shows, or art shows, or mystic offerings, perhaps even joining in on some lectures, often enough to feed my inspiration and soothe my soul.  I intend to start calling all my siblings and my children and grandchildren at least once a month to make stronger connections.  I intend to find ways to enrich my senior years. 

Intentions!  I think it is important that we define intentions and goals to self and choose intentions.  I think that intentions will bring out the best in me, where goals would leave me feeling a failure.  I intend to do so because I need to be compassionate with self and still find ways to be inspired, to feel necessary, to know that my Self stirs the ether in good ways.  As well, it is more realistic and I am more likely to succeed.

©Carol Desjarlais 4.10.20