Author: CeceD

Cece DuBois is a modern day Polymath. She is a writer of prose, verse, and song. She paints portraits, builds furniture, sings, laughs, and prays. She's a designer -- of homes, and wardrobes, and ideas. She's known a life of being locked in a cage so small that her wings were stunted. But through the past few years she's broken free, traversed the shattered familial ties, and soared to the higher ground of a healing Spirit. In high school, Sister Edith told her to "choose one" of her many creative talents and discard the rest. Instead, Cece became determined to breathe life into every one, as long as she herself drew breath. Cece lives in Middle Tennessee, but has the heart of a gypsy, and loves the richness that adventures of the creative mind provide. She sees each day as a blessing, and all things as happening for good.

::The Space Between::

Empty Space

I’ve heard there’s a way to live that is without pressure, or obligation. A way to avoid the mundane requirements of life; electric bill, rolling trash bins to the curb, changing batteries in the smoke alarms. I’m not real clear about how one achieves that no-pressure life without ending up under a bridge somewhere. I do feel pretty certain that there’s a way to find balance along the nothing/everything continuum.      

                   
I was watching Hoarders the other day. In fact I was watching Hoarders back to back. I was sort of hoarding the Hoarders series. I keep thinking about those people and wondering, what was their trigger? What was the last straw that caused that interior designer to pile her historic home so full of crap that she ended up living in the driveway, in her dilapidated van with her dogs? That when the cleanup people were climbing over the piles inside the home, she was cheerily bragging on it being her design studio? In her mind and eyes, there was no problem.

HoardingShe literally hoarded herself out of her home. She crowded herself out of her life with stuff. And though she declared the high value of it all, much of it was … nothing but garbage.

Another woman’s home was over run with  cottage cheese cartons, rubber bands – which she had huge piles of, and wouldn’t let the cleanup people touch – plastic bags. Anything. Everything. It appears that too much everything flips over and you get nothing.

I’m thinking balance. It’s a great term, most of us use it, and most of us think that, in some way, we have some sort of balance in our lives.

Those hoarders think they have balance too. Like the woman whose house was so filled with crap she was living in the makeshift aviary with her cats. She couldn’t live in her house. She cried. She didn’t want to let anything go, but at the same time knew she had a problem.

Not sure why I’m writing about this. What I’m sure of is, I need to hire a couple of teenagers to help me clean out my garage.

You never know when that last straw’s gonna show up.

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::LAST DAY::

Police and Ballet

Locker clean out: check

Firearm, badge, and uniform turned in: check

Ten years of my life gone: check

Experiences that no one should ever have to go through, and some that no one should ever miss: Check check

If anyone had told me when I was five years old that I’d spend ten years of adulting doing this, I’d have run crying to my Mama. I was planning to be a ballerina. Or a veterinarian. But when Robert was gunned down in a drive by two days after my seventeenth birthday, I couldn’t find any other choice. My big brother was gone, a hole the size of the world was left in his wake, and I had to make sure that never happened to anybody again. Ever.

Applying to the academy was difficult. Admissions were grueling. I failed twice. But once in, it was even worse. I stuck it out, graduated, and for a decade I did what I could to keep good people alive. Even if it met traffic stops, stakeouts drinking bad coffee, or desk work when I was pulled off the force while an investigation took place over a cracked out kid I shot. You never want to kill them. You just want them to stop. Sadly, sometimes killing is the only way to make that happen. Luckily, the boy I shot survived … but was later shot and killed in a drug buy gone bad. He was on a dark path and just couldn’t get turned around.

I’m tired. And ten years wiser than I was when I set out on this crusade. I realize now that I can’t force people to be good, or to make the right choice. And nothing I could do – no matter what – was gonna fill that hole, or bring my brother back.

So today I officially disengage from law enforcement, and head into the world as a full blown civilian. I wonder if there’s a ballet class for thirty eight year old ex cops.

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::THREADS::

Tapestry

Things tend to make sense in ways we don’t expect. Sometimes situations or events go what we’d normally call out of control … all we can see is the chaos. But a step back reveals the wider net, the bigger picture. The choreography, the symmetry of all things.

Relationships. Blood, love, hate, passion. The binding thread that brings them all together is fiery red. But in it … when we’re in it … it feels like drowning, or flying, or crashing. No color at all. Just the grit and grind and focus of getting through it, or holding on to it, or getting rid of it, or expressing it. That is the experience of the thread itself. We are that thread.

Blue. Of Jazz, pain, loss, rain, regret. The thread of blue awakens quickly with each event. Fluid and flexible or vulcanized and unyielding … this strand goes from silk to steel in an instant, its transformation governed by the emotional dictates of experience.

And yet, when we lay our heads down in the dark, all threads come together; as we sleep through the night they work in concert, weaving another length in the tapestry of our lives.

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::Binding By Heart::

Connections. They’re so interestheart-stringsing. Commitments. Promises.

All my life, I thought those things meant the same to everyone else as they did to me. The ties of attachment are strong, invincible, able to weather any storm. Right?

I guess the only way that holds true is when the heart is an intrinsic part of the threads that weave together. When it defines the bindings that pull us in, hold us close. That compels us to dig in, to see things through.

There are some people who make commitments, make promises, but they don’t seal them with the heart. The ties they bind with are paper thin, easily broken. Often by design.

I don’t know, but it seems like they leave that crucial thread out as a way to – eventually – turn away. To break. To run. They were never fully ‘there’ in the first place.

For the heart-driven, it often looks in retrospect like a fool’s journey. Were we played? Were we taken for a ride? Probably so. But for our part of the experience the love, the promise, the commitment was there … even if it only came from us.

This world is full of two types of people: Dreamers, and Cynics. The Dreamers are heart-binders. The Cynics are … not. I know this because, as a Dreamer myself, I have a history of binding-by-heart to Cynics who bind-until-the-going-gets-rough. I’m not complaining, just observing from a place of weary wisdom. From a place where, by now, I know to pause, to observe, to wait … as long as it takes for someone to show their true selves. Sometimes that means waiting a lifetime.

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::LOVE LETTER::

double-umbrella

Hey you –

Well, here we are. Damn. Long road. You’re scaring hell out of the “golden years,” and still coming from the place of,  “if I can just get this started …”

You lost sight of your dreams for awhile. A long while. That period between the kids leaving home and you deciding you couldn’t glue the pieces of your marriage back together one more time … yeah, that part. You were in the deep water, kiddo; as a non-swimmer that’s a tough place to be. But hey … you made it. Now, you’ve got just enough time left for the really important stuff. So here are a few tips from the heart of me, to the heart of you:

  • You aren’t your past. Stop looking back there. Look to the future
  • Don’t waste time with regret
  • Get rid of pride. It will separate you from those you love the most
  • Say “I’m sorry” when you are
  • Say, “I love you” every chance you get
  • Eat healthy, but don’t make yourself miserable
  • If you end up face to face with a guy who seems like a potential “last part of your life partner” material, don’t call him your boyfriend. Just don’t
  • Paint. Paintpaintpaint
  • Write. Writewritewrite
  • Write prose, write music, write your story. Even if only your children end up reading about your life, give them that chance. They deserve to know who you are
  • Keep following your dreams
  • Failure is just another word for one way that didn’t work. Find another way
  • Get rid of the bullshit. In your relationships, in your possessions, in your way of thinking. Drop it. You don’t have time for it
  • Be as generous as you can with as many as possible. Start with yourself. An empty bucket can fill no others
  • Relax. This is not a contest. You’ve already won just by waking up this morning
  • Find the humor, always
  • Laugh big, loud, and long, every day
  • That kid inside? Give her free reign on a regular basis. She’ll keep you young. And authentic
  • The relationship you have with God defines everything. Go to Him first, stay with Him through it, and be with Him last
  • A peaceful sleep, a beautiful sunrise, and a great idea are all gifts created just for you. Enjoy them so much they bring you to tears
  • Never forget to say Thank you. A grateful heart is always tender. And a tender heart is always grateful
  • You are loved

Signed – Me

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::Two Way Mirror::

cece-and-tim-hog-posterized

These days we’re like a two way mirror.

Or through a glass, darkly.

At the grade school on Grandparents’ Day, if he shows up he is brittle and distant. He wears a starched smile, the kind that never reaches the eyes. When he looks at me, he doesn’t. Perhaps he can’t bear the reflection of himself that he sees there. Or perhaps I’m making too much of it, and he’s forgotten who I am. Like that time at the Film Festival when I saw him and called out to him. He looked at me, quizzically, then moved toward me, head shaking slowly, hand extended, with the words,

“I’m sorry, you’re going to have to help me.”

I did not take his hand. I looked at him in disbelief, and said,

“Cece.” He was embarrassed that he didn’t know who I was that day. But I realize now that he never really did.

Looking back at the years we were together, I recognize the holes he crawled through to go from our life together into his other life. I couldn’t see it at the time. The camouflage of home and family clouded my vision. But distance brings clarity. And friends who were there then have come to me from time to time since; as an act of confession? To clear their conscience as accomplices? I can’t honestly say.

While I don’t know every detail about what was going on then, I know more than I ever wanted to. Sometimes information serves no good purpose. Except, you know … it helps me realize that I was in a completely different relationship than he was. And it’s confirmed for me that he had no clue of the goodness that was present and waiting for him there. Loving him there. Knowing this is a different kind of heartbreak all by itself.

When someone becomes addicted to dancing with the dark, the light is just an irritation.

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::MYSTERIES OF MAMA::

Mama, Close Up

This picture was taken when we lived on South Madison. In it Mama is her beautiful, comical, musical self. Back then she would strike a pose, then collapse in laughter. She had flair, a free spirit,  she was my personal movie star, even before I knew what movie stars were.

I’ve gone back and looked through as many events as I can remember, trying to piece things together.

I’m searching for the turning point. To find when things changed. When the sun stopped shining, and the world went from bright colors to shades of grey.

I remember we had moved to the little house on North Marion. The one with the crayon blue linoleum floor. I remember a pivotal darkness, but nothing will speak to me from there. I try to go inside that space, but it’s always …. like the memories in it are right on the tip of my brain. I can almost see them. But not enough to grab hold, and to understand.

The things I know are that they had friends back then. At night they would get dressed up and go out together, and leave me with Ma Welp. But what else was happening?
I remember kitchen cabinets, with the doors open. Mama’s friend was rearranging. I remember Mama crying, and putting things back in the right places after the friend left. It was during that time that she stopped laughing.

I remember the priest coming. I remember feeling confused, and then it fades to black.
After whatever happened, that friend who was changing Mama’s kitchen never came over anymore.

Years later, when she was into her cups and in the mood to offer sage advice, she would say that you should never let anyone into your life because they’ll just walk in like they own the place and take over everything. Never get too close to anyone, she said. That’s the only way you can be safe, she said.

I’ve always wondered if that was the philosophy she used through the years to stay so far away from me. We’re closer now than ever before because, at 92, she has no clue who I am. It is a brokenhearted comfort that she always says she’d “love to get to know you.” I’d like to get to know you too, Mama. Or at least to understand what happened that kept us separate. But whatever it was, I loved you so; I choose to know that you loved me.I’m reminded of Birdie’s mother saying,

“All mothers love their daughters, even if they show it poorly.”

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::THE GANG’S ALL HERE::

Celia and her buddies

If three year olds can be gang members, I was one. We had a pack of kids in our neighborhood on North Marion Street. Each morning, as early as any parent would allow, a youngster  drifted out the front door of his little clapboard house, and stood in the yard wearing nothing but a pair of rumpled camp shorts. Maybe he’d wander the length of  the driveway, bend down, pick up a rock, survey the street for signs of life, and head back to sit on his porch stoop. And wait.

Almost immediately, sets of young eyes threw quick glances out picture windows. Front doors opened, and small, tan feet ran or skipped or sauntered to assemble where the child was planted.

Thinking back, it gives new meaning to “the gang’s all here.” But we were.  The men in our gang wore shorts; the women, bloomers. We were brown as biscuits, the soles of our feet  well seasoned from weeks of running around bare.

We played all day, moving in a raggedy clump from one yard to another. Bill’s dad had left the hosepipe hooked up on the front spigot, so we all ran over because Shorty and Margo were thirsty. Mitchell and Bobby turned the handle, and the water spurted out. It went quickly from hot as fire to so clear and cold that suddenly we were all thirsty. Everybody got a chance. About eight or ten three year olds bending over spouting water, slurping it down their throats and bellies, all of us clamoring for more.

I don’t remember every name from back then, but I remember that water.  It started in Lake Spavinaw, and came pouring out of that front yard hose icy and sweet, flavored with a touch of rubber hose and a dash of brass metal. We all loved it, and kept drinking until Bill’s mother came out on the porch to shake the dustmop and caught us.

“You kids turn that water off and go play!” she hollered. She gave us the hard eye till Bill went over and cranked the handle.  By that time we were soaked, but we didn’t care. In fact, we liked it. It was 90 degrees in the Oklahoma shade, which there wasn’t much of.

Our gang lasted till we all started school, then life its own self took over and we drifted into our separate worlds. But if anyone ever asks me about gang membership, I can tell them, quite honestly, that I was a gang member very early on. And I’m proud of it.

1

::BROKEN HEARTS ARE RED::

GLASS HEARTWe’re living in very difficult times. We have every modern convenience,  every means of communication, yet we live lives of anguish and isolation. Our ability to communicate, and to assess the subtle nuances of truth-versus-lie is tied directly to our face to face human interaction. You’d think we’d have more of that than any generations before us. But we don’t.

Ironically, psychologists tell us that our children will have less ability than any generation in history to interact with others in healthy and meaningful ways. The reason is because they spend far more time looking at a tablet screen than they do looking into the eyes of another human being.

And I totally get that. I can’t hear someone’s vocal inflection in a text. I can’t sense their energy or see their facial expressions in an email. In my head and without realizing it  I write the story, I infuse the tone, I define the intent. That is what determines how I “hear” them. How often am I correct? How often have I gotten it wrong? I can’t know, because the moment in which it happens is gone in an instant. I’ve reacted based on “my assessment” before I even think about it.

And this, I contend, is how we have gotten so far away from each other.

Then there is the media. Do we really know what’s happening in this world? Or why? Are we given all the facts of a situation, and trusted to draw our own informed conclusions? No. There are extensive, complicated algorithms and processes that media uses to decide what we should be told, when, and how. The goal is to “drive” our opinions and conclusions; to create outrage, cause us to take sides, and define others as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ based on what we “know.” And the result is that we end up unable to debate or agree-to-disagree.

But … what is it that we really know?

I can’t say definitively. I’m honestly still searching, and I feel more confused than ever before.

But here are a few basic conclusions I’ve reached:

  • I know that things are happening at high levels over which I have no control.
  • I know that every story or event reported on is colored by the reporter’s bias – be it strong or subtle – so that I will believe I “know” something that may not be the whole truth or the whole picture.
  • I know that it takes deliberate and brutally honest energy to dig into the volume of information … to find those missing pieces of the puzzle that make the picture whole, and true.
  • I know that if I claim to be a seeker of truth, I have an obligation to the whole truth, regardless of what I might think about it.
  • I know that people need each other. The separation we feel is an illusion. We are connected to each other.
  • I know that we are more alike than we are different. Like flowers in a garden that thrive in the same dirt, drink the same water, and bloom under the same sun, we are a world of beautiful humanity, all created by the same God.
  • I know that hearts are broken every day in a variety of ways. But generally speaking, it’s always about loved ones lost, either through death or separation.
  • I know that when any person, anywhere, feels overcome with that loss, that it feels the same everywhere.
  • I know that all broken hearts are red.
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