Time In A Pocket, Judy T. Lloyd [i can read with my eyes shut txt] 📗

In that dream there were snippets of the present. My mother had died this time. Of course I think that I went back to the day that she did die. I felt alone,betrayed,isolated by my own cancer. Because of that I believe that is why I dreamed that I was left alone on a road. I had told the lawyer that I wanted to have a say in the funeral arrangements. My daughter had with a friend of mama's taken the arrangements over. Needless to say my siblings were left out of the arrangements. Or rather it was my sister and I. I do not know why that is but then you would have to know how my mother could be at times.

There were times that she seemed to be very loving,kind,patient as well as intelligent. There were other times when she was lost in her own world of retribution,punishment,anger not to mention cold heartedness. I write this because this is a factor many others denied. The truth is mama could be very mean. Little did I know the reasons why until much later. Yes I guess that I have anger issues of my own. I wish that the doctors had not been so constipated in their giving out information to her children. I resent that to this day, because if we had known in time that mama had two malignant brain tumors we could have dealt with that. Instead they let us feed on the doubt and fear that we perhaps were not as loved as other siblings.

So it became obvious that it was time to excise the ghosts. It was time to start dealing with certain truths. I would have liked more time to allow my mother to excise her own ghosts. However when the end came, I did what I had to and that was to love her. I guess for that reason it was enough time, only I wish there had been more. My mother did not have a childhood so to speak. Her mother died when she was very young. Yet she spoke of her growing up days affectionately. Sometimes we just have to go with what we got and be glad that time is what we chose to remember.

So am I done with the ghosts? Probably not because there are other memories that need to come forth. They are the memories that helps us to understand the nature of disease that could consume us. Cancer is just one of those diseases. It was during the period of having cancer cells running amouk through my body that I encountered those that enabled me. When I say enabled me, I mean that I could gain control again over what path I would take. I chose to start writing because it would set me free finally to be who I was meant to be.

Writing open doors and lines of communication that were not possible before. It also put roadblocks up too. Mama,my siblings as well as close associates apparently disaproved. One reason is because of the ghosts. Ghosts that they felt surely would come out. The secrets in a family that no one wanted to admit too. What they never understood is that it was the only way they could be free. When you grow up in a family that feels the adults are the only ones that can take part in a conversation, you are stifled. You become that girl left out in the rain on a long road back to a place you did not want to visit. Yet you have to in order to make sense of everything. You have to in order to let the dead remain where they are. You have to let the living find a measure of peace. You can not just keep that time in a pocket.

The truth is always going to be there. Whether the truth is running behind you or running before you. The truth is inescapable. What you can escape is all the guilt and fault finding that you dug a hole for. So the dreams become that truth that you dared not speak to anyone. So I wonder too if the others had the same dreams or were able to finally deal with them. I sure hope so. We all have our demons and our angels. Somewhere along the way we can find the time to be what we were meant to be.
I believe that in an effort to keep the truth out of the picture,both my mother and myself clung to our emotions as a crutch. That crutch built by both of us kept us at odds with each other. I wish that it had not been so. Nevertheless it was because now I know I could have put that time to better use.


Water Under The Bridge


Every drop of water that flows beneath a bridge can not flow that way again.
While fish remain almost in the same spot.
People are like the water and the fish.
Sand and pebbles flow with the water.

Currents come and they go,
yet the water flows the same.
Time erodes away the rocks of our guilt.
Settling down as sand.

We can reach in and take the sand,
putting it in an hourglass.
Twisting the hourglass upside down.
The sand flows the same way.

If we flood the sand out.
Washing it with our tears.
Does the sand return to the stream?
Only to flow completely away?

I think that if I had to turn back the pages on those days that were so hard to deal with.
I would have taken more time to understand who my mother was so that she could understand who I was. Still all in all that time which can not be turned back, made me all the stronger. I suppose that is how it is with the hourglass, that no matter how you shake it you come back to the same conclusion. So I must contend myself to be satisfied that I did the time to figure it all out myself. Neither my mother or I did too badly. For I am the reflection in the mirror of my mother. That is what I have to be happy with at last.


The story does not end here,rather it continues. I origionally wrote Your Time is My Time for Vandal Holman. A true friend,counselor,mentor as well as cancer survivor. Vandal is a unique person in that she was a school teacher,became a pastor,was ordained a minister. She became a Bishop after getting her doctorate in religion. Vandal also joined the Red Cross where she has traveled across the United States performing her duties. I believe that I learned more from her than any other single person in my adult life.
I had a jewelry business in which I would either make jewelry or buy it online. My husband and I bought fifty pounds of jewelry from a vendor in Florida.

We sorted through the jewelry where I found a jewel encrusted watch. On the watch was printed the words. Your time is my time. I thought that was neat since both Vandal and I spent a lot of time working with cancer survivors. Vandal was always willing to share her precious time with us. Of course when it comes to Vandal I do not hesitate to offer my time to her. It is a friendship built from love. We have a relationship that is more like a mother and daughter. I am quick to point out that if you bash Vandal,you would be the subject of my wrath. The same is true with Vandal since she is my Rose in the books that I have written.

What else can be said about a person who holds you when you are vomiting your insides out. The person who comes in and gives the doctors a piece of her mind about your care. The person that lets you make the decisions of what treatment you need be yours. In the same sense she is the person that I can write a permission slip for. That permission slip read like this.
"I hereby give you permission to crawl in the bed and tell everyone else to go to hell." You have to know that there are times when the emotional overload of cancer gets to you.

We both understood the pain,fear,depression,frustration at the doctors,plus endless medical tests that tear at your emotional well being. I was the first person that she told that the biopsy showed cancer. I was the one that called her to try to make sense of how I felt. I understood what the Bible said about sending a comforter. She is that comfort,is it no wonder that my time is her time?

Today is January 14th,2010,we have returned from the Federal Courts in Richmond. Filing bankruptcy is not easy to do nor is it easy on our emotional status. However it had to be done,now maybe the dreams of flood waters covering everything will cease. I doubt it though. This is the residual of many battles with failing health on both of our parts. True we wasted time on the things that did not pan out. Yet I have to say that the doughnut hole that we have been in seems more like a sink hole. Only we are the ones sinking. Such is the fate of many others,however it does not help to know that. Approximately one year ago I lost a job mainly because I had a hernia. I got that hernia working with a woman who did not appreciate the help she got. No matter what I did for help while working for the agency that I did, she wanted more. She was unsatisfied with my work complaining to my boss. My boss kept me in a hostile environment that lead up to my injuring myself enough to cause a hernia.

Sometimes I just can not figure out some people,what do they want? I will say that mama got a lot of help from her caregiver who we all appreciated. It was because of her that I became a nursing assistant. Still I wonder if she felt unappreciated. My family would not like that if she did feel that way. So when I made this year's resolution, I vowed to help whoever I could wherever I could. It is my resolution not to hurt someone no matter what, but to try and help. I look at the television that is showing the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. Knowing that I can not go there does not mean that I cannot pray for them.

I will say that my friends,the good ones do worry about the stress on me. I find it difficult but being able to write is helpful.

I found out over the weekend that one of my cousins attempted suicide. She is in the hospital's ICU unit. You know to be sad is very hard on a person. It is equally hard on the family. Many people do not see that one can die of sadness. You may not see it that way, but let me explain.

When you get to the point that life holds no meaning for you it becomes more of a burden to live. There was a point when I was in so much pain and heartbreak that I attempted suicide. I truly believe that was the toxins from my cancer that took over my body. Taking oxycodone also did not help. This is when I decided that there