Planning for a good death

I spent the past several days talking about dying and how to care for our own dead at home. If that sounds gruesome to you, just hang on a minute.

Death's got a bad rap it doesn't deserve. We're all going to die; maybe that's the hard part. But when we give just a little thought and consideration as to how we'll deal with this reality, death can remind us of all the wonderful parts of being alive, connected to people we love, and how to not sweat the small stuff.

I just returned from the National Home Funeral Alliance conference in Raleigh, North Carolina. We had a number of inspiring speakers, and a room full of talented, experienced home funeral educators and guides who are helping to grow the movement of home funerals across the country.

Did you know you can bring your loved one home and have a funeral for them in the comfort and ease of your own home?You can clear a spot and make it beautiful. Your friends and family can come and sing and light candles and bring flowers and eat together and decorate the room. I've been a part of this work for the past several years now and I have seen beautiful, touching, and profound home funerals. The families have felt supported, the community has been enriched. Home funerals may not be for everyone, but helping people understand the option is critical.

Caring for the dead, just like caring for the new mother and the newborn, is community work. When we don't take up that work and we pay someone else to do it, we lose our ties to our community. We don't know how to wash and dress a body. How to dig a hole. How to gather our family and friends around us to help us grieve.

But it wasn't so long ago that we all knew how to do these things. We all used to do it this way before embalming became the norm. Embalming is the primary factor that drives the way funerals are done today. Because here's the fact that so many people don't know: You don't have to embalm dead bodies. Really. There is no state in the country that says you have to, expect in some oddball cases. We don't have to embalm for safety or sanitary reasons.

The idea of a home funeral may seem new and uncomfortable. But as more people understand and experience home funerals, the movement is growing across the country. And well it should. It was only ten or fifteen years ago that people didn't know or understand what hospice care was. Today, every major medical institution has a hospice unit. It makes sense to help people be comfortable while they're dying. Many people chose hospice in their home: where they are most comfortable.

Here is my hope: that in another ten or fifteen years, we'll all know what a home funeral is. That we'll understand our options and be clear that taking our loved one home, or keeping them home if he died there, is something we know we can do.

A good death, one that is properly respected and cared for, can show us a lot about good living. It's time to give death its due.

Four secrets of the good life

The other day a woman I scarcely know stumbled across my work here at Tending the Fire Within. Next time she saw me, she said, “Did you come up with this stuff yourself? What’s your secret?”

She was asking particularly about the upcoming communication series, “Say what you’ve gotta say: compassionate and effective communication.” I’m running the three-part series October 24, November 7 and 21 at my home and I’m also offering a two-day session November 23 and 24 at the Calliope Center that will delve deep into these practices. I hope you join us; it’s a great bit of work that can help you become a more confident and successful communicator. And then who knows what you can do in your life?

But the question of how I came up with the content for this work is a good one. I’ve been walking around this planet now for 45 years, but what in that time has particularly prepared me to help other people learn anything about how to walk through it a bit more happily?

I’ve written some in the past about the challenges and choices of my youth, particularly this piece about how I overcame my drunkenness and the dark days that accompanied it.  And the ways that I learned to live more healthily and happily back 28 years ago still play out today and every day. There is so much more that I’ve learned along the way, but I always feel pretty certain that I wouldn’t have learned much if I haven’t been sober and clean for all this time.

Once I had this spiritual awakening as a young woman, I understood that what I really want in this life is deep, true connection. I’ve spent much of the past three decades committed to that idea and I love the way it shows up in my life. I’m not telling you my life is perfect, but I have created a great life for myself and my kids. I think that I’m contributing good stuff into the world. I can do this because of the boatloads of self-development work over that I’ve done over the years. I’m a graduate of The Hoffman Process and I’m an initiate in the Wheel of Initiation. I have ongoing groups that I work with and have been a part of for years.  

The Tending the Fire Within work is an amalgamation of all this work and living and experience and consideration. Facing every day and every situation without altering my perception with drugs or alcohol, and continuing my own practices of well-being has taught me to stay open, stay honest, stay responsible for creating my life, and to stay with the work.

And if there were any “secrets” to living happily, I would say that list of four are right up there at the top. When we understand that we are the ones making our lives, when we commit to fully taking on every bit that we create, when we stay honest with ourselves and others about these things, and when we just keep in the game of paying attention, our lives get better. We can have what we want.

Those are big ideas. Big ideas are great, but they don’t often help people by themselves. What we really need are specific, clear, and effective practices for changing the way we do things. The ways we think. The ways we interact with others. The ways that we choose what comes out of our mouths. What we choose to do with our anger, our penchant for sarcasm, our habit of beating ourselves up when we don’t live up to our expectations, however impossible.

A Tending the Fire Within workshop gives participants specific practices that can change the way they think, the way they behave, and the way they live. These practices aren’t rocket science. But when we apply them to our lives they can rocket us into new and beautiful places. The upcoming communication series is part of that work. We’ll learn how to start being honest and clear, with ourselves and with others. Good communication is a foundational skill. Good communication helps us get what we need, to hear and see other people, to set clear boundaries, and to think good thoughts.

It’s good, good stuff. I hope that you join us for it. To register, email me at anneoconnor@tendingthefirewithin.com or call me at 608-606-4808.

Why I live in the middle of nowhere

Ten years ago, I moved to this part of the world from the Twin Cities. Born in Chicago I’d spend my whole life in cities before finding my way to Viroqua. A decade in, I’ve come to understand the ways that I love this tiny town of 5079 in rural Southwest Wisconsin.

You can’t believe this place. I’ll tell you about it, but I suspect you still won’t believe it. Viroqua is a small-town that draws people with some force that I can’t quite define. I’ve stopped trying. What I know is that people who drive through often stop, find people they love, and marvel. That if your car breaks down in town, you may end up moving here. That if you visit, you may visit for years while you figure out how to get here and stay here. And if you have a need for deep, true connection this place will call to you.

So today, in celebration, a list of reasons I call Viroqua my home.

The Viroqua Food Coop: crown jewel of the food system here in a place with all kinds of ways to get good food. photo Anne O'Connor

1.      The foodscape. This may seem ironic since you can count the total number of restaurants in my town on one hand. The good ones will take fewer fingers still. Here, you have to think differently about food. You have to remember where food comes from. You have to consider the amazing potlucks that regularly have vegetarian, gluten-free, and raw options. And the dinner parties. And the picnics. We are in the heart of some of the best growing land in the world. We are home to Organic Valley, the largest organic cooperative in the world and people here love good, clean, organic food. We have more organic farmers here—density wise—than anywhere else in the country. My egg farmer delivers fresh, organic eggs to my door every Saturday.

Fresh, organic eggs delivered to my door. photo by Anne O'Connor

 I can get organic milk from several farmers I know. Same with meat. There’s this Portlandia spoof "ordering the chicken", but it’s funny because there's some truth in there. Most nights, I know the farmers who are providing the Driftless Café with food. I grow shiitake mushrooms on a log in my backyard. A friend of mine makes the only pop I've ever really liked at Wisco Pop Soda. The roadside stands offer everything in season: strawberries and peas and corn and tomatoes and melons and grapes fresh out of the rich soil. I love these informal networks of food; they are a vital and sustainable way to feed my family. A little more formal are the abundant CSAs and the farmers’ market—a festive party downtown every Saturday.We have a local grocery store, Village Market, that is owned by a real family for more than 20 years. And the Viroqua Food Coop is the crown jewel where food and people meet, a community as much as a grocery store.  People come from all around the country, many from cities with up to 50,000 people, to study how our tiny town has such a kick-ass coop. It’s hard to imagine any other place that has a more vibrant, thriving, and healthy food system.

We have just a few restaurants, but the ones we have are great. Like The Rooted Spoon: yum! photo courtesy of Tony Macasaet

2.       The collaboration. When my kids were younger, I was part of a mamas group that met every week with the kids. We’d pick one mama’s home and while one of us hung out with the kids, the rest of us would work. This is kind of the norm around here. We are home to the coop. We have coops for everything: food, animal feed, electricity, mental health (yep), home-funeral services (really), housing cooperatives, a bank, and the Viroqua Healing Arts Center. These are just the formal cooperatives. There are so many informal networks of people gathered together to take on fantastic projects. We work together to make this a great place to live, to have a new running track and get parks and a community arena built, to restore a grand old theater, and a new library constructed.

Our new library is going to be an wonderful place. Drawings courtesy of the library board.

3.      The caring. We also take care of one another. When a family is expecting a baby, or someone is ill or injured, or someone dies, friends step forward and make meals and cut grass and sweep floors and care for children. When I recently moved to a new house, more than 50 people showed up for the moving party. Yes: 50. It was a true party. We aren’t alone unless we chose to be alone. Many people are in long-term women’s groups or men’s groups: we help each other live better lives. But this caring is reflected outside of organized groups. We prepare mothers for birth with days of love and rose petals and massage and words of encouragement and listening. We stand together when our loved ones die and hold one another up. We work to maintain our love and respect for one another even when we don’t like what someone does. It’s not utopia: we are humans still. And there is a varied experience. Maybe there is a tone that permeates much of life here—we accept that you’re flawed and love you anyway. Or at least recognize that as another human being on the planet, you have a right to respect and dignity and—yes—care.

4.      The creativity. This place fosters and supports creative endeavors. Artists and writers and musicians and philosophers and dancers find their way here. We are a small place and life happens on a small scale. But there are many nights when there are too many options. Good options. World-class musicians playing jazz or a Beckett show at the Underground, the town’s alternative theater? Alternative so as not to be confused with the Viroqua Community Theatre that just put on a fantastic Wizard of Oz. Oh, and there’s the Women’s Theater Project. People take up work here and make interesting things happen. We are about to have our fourth annual Viroqua Harvest Festival and Parade, an extraordinary community event. The Driftless Folk School teaches lost arts. Tons of art and writing and performance work happens at The Ark, a community arts center. And WDRT is a community radio station. VIVA, an artists’ cooperative (naturally) on Main Street, is a showcase for local work that has turned First Thursdays downtown into a fun and go-to event. You can browse for books at Driftless Books or on Main Street's Bramble Books. Viroqua Public Market is forever interesting. And there are the private groups of musicians on a porch or writers in a living room or fantastic cooks around a full table or the knitters’ circle, or the group canning together or the people making sausage together. There’s the ladies’ bike rides (no one left behind) and the power rides on our great hills and all that Bluedog Cycles has brought. There’s the group that canoes and kayaks on the Mississippi and the Wisconsin. There’s horseback riding. There’s the wild flower group at the Kickapoo Valley Reserve and the birders. There is so much that happens here, so much to learn and to discover about what makes life full and rich and varied.

The Viroqua Harvest Parade demonstrates the creativity of the place. photo courtesy of Tony Macasaet

5.      The landscape. This area is called the Driftless region—no glacial drift has flattened out the landscape like it did all the rest of the Midwest. The drift went around us. So instead of flat, we have gorgeous rocks standing up out of the land. Viroqua is the heart and hub of the Kickapoo Valley, the land of rolling hills, luscious valleys, wind-swept ridges and rock outcroppings of limestone around and along one of the country’s most winding rivers—the Kickapoo. There are ancient plant and animal species not found anywhere else. You can literally dig a rock out of the earth and you will almost surely find something craggy and full of crystals and beauty. I almost don’t want to tell you about the reserve, because once people realize what we have hidden in plain sight here, well, I imagine my favorite trail will occasionally have people on it.

The Three Chimneys rocks are impressive, but just one part of the stunning landscape of the Driftelss region. photo courtesy of Tony Macasaet.

6.      The schools. There are excellent school options in this small place. The public schools, the alternative schools, a thriving home-school community, and religious schools. My kids attend incredible schools. Pleasant Ridge Waldorf School and the Youth Initiative High School (YIHS) work to teach kids a holistic approach to life: “an education for head, hands, and heart.” This commitment plays out in very real ways for my kids, my family, and my entire community. The schools teach kids about any particular subject by giving them such a wonderful context for life and knowing and learning. They expect the children to develop and be full, open, free, and participating people. What I mean is that they draw the best from my kids. And from me. These schools call people from around the world to this place. This year alone, nine of the 50 students at YIHS are international boarding students. My daughter has her own little international community every time she goes to high school. It’s like that here.

7.      The people. When I leave my town and go to bigger places, I remember how much people know me here. Know my children. How I can forget my checkbook but the store will still let me “buy” something because they know I’ll be back tomorrow with the money. There is great comfort in being known, being seen, being part of a whole. Of course this can feel like being scrutinized, being judged, or being unable to escape, but I guess it all depends on your perspective. Small towns—and especially this small town, push us towards one another. We have so many chances to figure out more of ourselves, who we are in the world and how we want to live our lives. We are all here in Viroqua and there’s some recognition that we have to be kind because we are in it for the long haul. You can’t shake your fist in anger at someone on the highway and expect to never see them again. Likely, they’ll be sitting next to you at your kid’s track meet. Living in close proximity to people is challenging. And immensely rewarding. I’ve been living with and learning from these people for the past ten years. I can’t wait to see what they’ve got for me in the next decade.

I was skeptical when I moved here. I've lived in big cities my whole life and, for the most part, really loved that. But there's something tremendously grounding for me about being surrounded by natural beauty each day. It is, for me, undeniably nurturing. And all these human-made endeavors help to make this place part of a genuine community.Whatever its call, I'm not alone. This land and the people it calls has been working its magic for a long time.One thing I've realized is that where there people, there is life. And even in "the middle of nowhere," we get to make the kind of life we want.  What a luxury! What a life!

Why do you live where you live? How do you make it work for you? What are you building? Tell me about it in the comments, or drop me a line.

I won't lament the weather

     My friend says it aloud but she might as well say it directly to me.

“Lamenting the weather is like lamenting the existence of prime numbers.”

I want to resist what she says. Prime numbers don’t numb my nose and fingers. They don’t turn my muscles into tight little wads of shiver. Prime numbers don’t make me slow and plodding and careful, taking to steps and sidewalks like minefields.

You could call it mid-April now and for the past two days I’ve awoken to a layer of ice on everything. This morning, there is snow on the ground and on the trees. It is still snowing.

I long for seventy-five degrees. I long for warm spring showers and the subsequent May flowers.

But I’ve longed and lamented enough in this life to know that longing and lamenting don’t do a whole lot of good for me or for anyone else.

So I won’t lament the weather.

Instead, I’ll notice how gently the flakes fall outside my window, and how different that looks in the April light.

I’ll remember how much I love my soft wool socks and how happy my feet are when they are tucked in my winter boots, dry and cozy with two pairs of warmth that allow me to be outside comfortably.

I won’t lament the weather.

I’ll appreciate my Cuddl Duds—long underwear that I put on sometime around September and don’t take them off until it’s warm. It may be June this year. I may be walking around looking a bit like that Michelin Man tire guy, full of big layers. But I’m warm.

I’ll notice that the robins are back and that the juncos are still here. The juncos fly south to my home for the winter. They hang out here until it gets too warm and then they fly back to their colder climate for summer. It’s mid-April and those classy white-breasted, charcoal grey-backed, yellow-beaked little guys are still out at my feeder.

I won’t lament the weather.

I will instead be grateful for how warm my house is, the rich and steady warmth of the radiators keeping the place toasty and perfect for snuggling up to read a book to my kid.

Every night in the winter, I take a hot bath, settling into the steamy room, the hot (hot!) water and letting every bit of chill from the day wash away. I come out floppy, entirely relaxed and go right to sleep. This is one of my favorite things about winter.

That and having a child come and sit on my lap, her head on my chest. Snuggling under blankets together is surely something we don’t do in July. We do it in this weather.  

This weather, which is the weather that we’ve got today. I’m going to love it and appreciate it and know that when it changes, there will be other things to be happy about—as long as I remember to look for them. 

Don't ignore this one critical thing in your life

I’m going to hot tub with a bunch of my women friends tonight under the full moon. It’s part of my on-going birthday week celebration. Last night was Indian dinner with one group of friends and tonight I’ll join my women in the hot tub and we’ll marvel at the moon and the life that brings us together.

My kids and I will have a different kind of celebration this weekend together: it’s always important to my youngest that we actually sing Happy Birthday.

One of the things that I’m so grateful for in my growing up is that my mother taught me how to make days count. Especially important days.

I remember her and my aunt Cheryl transforming our basement into a haunted house for Halloween, complete with smoke from dry ice and peeled grapes for the dead guy’s eyes. Once, we all dressed in period costumes, blindfolded my sister, and brought her to an alcove overlooking a gorgeous fountain in one of St. Paul’s most beautiful places, Como Park. We had an elaborate brunch waiting. Another time, I remember a detailed, across-town treasure hunt that my mom sent the kids on, hunting for treasure.

Creating a ritual around a day or an event impresses that event in our minds and hearts and becomes part of the story of our lives. And although we are the writers of our own life stories, sometimes we don’t know how to devise great story lines.

 This telling of a great story…a living of a great life, is part and parcel of Tending the Fire Within. I love to plan a party or an event and I love to tell the story. They go hand in hand.

So what does it take to make a great life? A great story? A few things seem clear.

Our people. I’m not saying we have to have a gazillion friends. For some people, their “tribe” is their best friend. Or their family. Everyone does this her own way. I love so many people I just can’t keep up with them all. But however we do it, we gotta have our people and they have to have us. We need each other.

Time together. I know that quality time is important is key (I’m talking about some quality time right here, right?) but we really need the quantity, too. We have to make the time to have these things happen in our lives.

But the biggest thing that we’re losing our historical cultural memory on and more people find tricky?

Ritual. We need some way to mark important moments, some way to mark our community’s connection, so way to say: Hey, I belong to you and you belong to me and isn’t that the coolest thing?

Ritual is the linchpin of a great life. Think about it: going to the lake cabin every summer, eating that nasty lutefisk every single Christmas Eve, flying a kite on the first days of spring, hunting for Easter eggs. Our stories become our lives and our lives become our stories.

We’d best make sure we’re telling good stories.  

Tending the Fire Within lives and breathes for this kind of thing. We’re damn good at it, if we do say so ourselves. If you’re finding that your group needs a little cohesive action and you don’t know how to find it, I hope you give us a call and let us help.

And keep an eye open. Because I’m about to launch some online offerings that will bring some of these ideas right to you. Right there, with you. Just where I like to be.

               

Let me know what kinds of things that you do with your people to make life hum along. I’d love to hear your ideas.  Just leave a note in the comments below. I’ll think about you in the hot tub tonight. 

An open letter to my daughter.

Dear darling girl,

Funny how sometimes a mother has to write a bunch of strangers rather than to write directly to her girl. Maybe, someday, when you’re not fourteen-years-old and pissed-off at me about half the time, you’ll be able to hear this from me.

No matter. I still have to say it. It’s one of the things that I’ve learned and I hope you learn too: Say it anyway. Even when you can’t say it to the right person. Say it out loud and clearly and then…move on.

So you’ve got this solo violin concert tomorrow: your first. And you’re scared to death. New things have never been easy for you, but standing in front of a group of strangers and playing a fairly complicated piece? Yeah, that’s got to be getting your knees shaking a bit.

The thing is I know you’re going to be great. I also know that my opinion on this doesn’t count for much right now. You were pretty clear last night when I asked you if you wanted to hear what I think: “Mom, no offense, but you don’t know anything about music.”

It’s a lovely thing for me that you consider me someone who doesn’t know anything about music. What it means to me is that your standard is high. Not because I do know, especially, anything about music. I don’t know how frustrating it is to switch to third position when you thought the piece was played in first position. The circle of fifths makes my head hurt and I haven’t been practicing the guitar enough to build even the smallest of calluses on my fingertips. I almost always have to have you sing the harmony because it’s easier for me to hold than to harmonize. I am one of the least musically-talented adults in your world.

I get it. Little do you know, though, that I sing in so many places with so many groups. One time, my women’s group was at a restaurant and we were singing happy birthday to Kristina. We sang in three-part harmonies and we sounded great! (I held the melody, of course.) When we were finished singing, the whole restaurant clapped. And then two other tables, who were also celebrating birthdays, asked us to come and sing for them. You would have been mortified.

Once, I led a national gathering of women in song after song. Yep, me, your musically deficient mother.

So, you’re right that I don’t know the technical details of your playing. If you use an up-bow and it should be down, I’ll almost certainly miss it. But I’ve been listening to you play for six years. I’m surrounded by musicians and music and it’s a huge part of my world.  And here’s what I do know.

I know that the power of music is in the playing. The technical skill is nothing more than how you get to playing a piece like it matters: the technical skill isn’t enough. When a player has her soul come through her instrument, through her fingers, that’s when music hits in the heart.

I know that I am starting to hear your soul in your playing. I hear your passion, your solidness, your feistiness. Yes, it helps that you can do a strong vibrato and longer bows and that you’re steadier on your feet. But what I hear coming through is the power of Irene O’Connor’s fire in the pit of her belly. When you dash your music to the ground and scream that you can’t possibly do it, that you won’t go and that I and no one else can make you…I know you’ll be more than fine.

Here’s the thing—I don’t know what will happen tomorrow. I suspect that you won’t dare disappoint your teachers; that’s so unlike you. And I hope you go. Because when you have to push up against these hard things, you see what you’re really made of. You’re made of some pretty good grit. If you don’t have to force yourself to get up and do something sometimes, my guess is you won’t do much. And that’s not you at all.

Tomorrow at this time, it will all be over. You’ll have done it. And you will—almost certainly—be glad you did.

So, cast me out of your mini-rehearsal. Yell and fuss and agonize. Then take all that passion and feeling and depth that I so love about you, and let it come through the music. Try not to think too much about the notes: they’ll come. Just remember to say your piece in your playing. It’s beautiful, just like you. Everyone will feel that, even if they don’t know a thing about music. 

            P.S. Thanks for reading this before I published it and giving me your okay. Mama.

If I can keep a shamrock alive, anything is possible

There was a time when I'd say I couldn’t cook. When I was eighteen-years-old and living on my own, I ate white rice with butter and salt every night for months. Now, anyone who knows me will know that, while I still consider popcorn a major food group, I can throw down in the kitchen with some respectability. People change; they do it all the time.

There was also a time when I would say I couldn’t have kids because I couldn’t even keep a plant alive. 

The best demonstration of that was my St. Patrick Day’s shamrock.

First, I have to tell you about my mother. I’ve been lucky to live near my mother for most of my adult life, and she has always been a major piece of the undergirding for me. While her lessons and support are often profound, she is subtle, because she doesn’t talk much (unlike….me.)  

Many years ago, my mother gave me a beautiful, blooming shamrock on St. Patrick’s Day. My mother is not from Irish descendants. She has Swedish ancestors, mostly. But she married a guy whose parents had come over on the boat. She was the one who upheld the strong traditions of that side of the family. We learned to love Irish Soda Bread, we learned that the Irish have strong traditions of writing and poetry and music. That storytelling was an art. One St. Paddy’s, she made us kids green eggs and ham. Brilliant, if gross, hey?

The shamrock she gave me was healthy and full and had delicate white flowers. I was thrilled. I kept it alive for months. But it was with a sad and somewhat heavy heart that I handed the pot back to my mother: the flowers non-existent, the plant dead.

It was in the fall when I first gave it back to her.

The very next St. Patrick’s Day, the beautiful shamrock again appeared on my table—full, alive, and thriving. She hadn’t gotten a new one; she had nursed the same plant back to life, back to beauty. And she handed that beauty back to me.

Whew...okay. “I can do this,” I remember thinking. 

But I didn’t. Again, by the fall, I would kill the thing. And again, I would hand it back to my mother.

When St. Patrick’s Day rolled around again, she gave me another chance.

And I killed it again!

I just didn’t take the time and energy to pay attention to the thing. I’d forget to water it, or water it too much or just generally neglect it.

But once again, the shamrock was sitting on my table on St. Patrick’s Day.

Maybe the third time is a charm. Maybe I just grew up. Maybe I decided, once and for all, that I can keep a plant alive. Sometimes, it’s in the deciding, isn’t it?

Today, many St. Patrick’s Days have come and gone and I’ve figured out how to keep the plant alive, thriving and beautiful. The little white flowers are wonderful. A couple years ago, I thought I killed it again: there may have been too many people watering it. I knew what to do. I cut the greens back, set it in the sun, and was patient. It came back. I can, officially, take care of my own shamrock.

Happy St. Patrick's Day, Mom. And thanks.