Category Archives: Culture

Grief: no negotiations, no pardons.

Poem By Gwen Flowers

Phew! It’s an unwanted colonizer that takes over and sets up house inside you, follows you everywhere, seeming to sometimes relent but always returning, unbidden and often surprisingly.
A deep and ugly scar that never stops throbbing, and won’t be ignored. You live with it: the phantom limb of loss. You talk your way through the daily tasks because the body goes on, seemingly soulless, rudderless, all purpose and desires gone. The things that anchored your life vanish, leaving you not merely adrift, but blood-soaked chum in shark infested waters.
Is this still “life”? More a Purgatory that you cannot pray or repent your way out of. And some days, it is just pure Hell.

You try to keep it to yourself, but also know that there’s something entirely wrong with a society that doesn’t mourn deeply and skirts around feelings. Where many relationships are investments: all form, no substance.

I want a Greek or African type period of wailing: rending of clothes, ashes on my forehead, women keening all around me. Full throttled acknowledgement of the loss of the Beloved, who deserves and rates the stopping of clocks and covering of mirrors, all the actions of loss that spill outside the lines of daily life and boil over in messy clumps of grief not readily wiped away. I feel a bond with all those who have loved deeply and lost, no matter what the relationship. We are veterans of a horrid war, trapped in post trauma, clutching at bits of life and not knowing why.

Grief is a true connection to our humanity and the only surety that comes with birth. It is the terrible and murderous price of love, and perhaps the reason society denies all depths and pain, refuses to allow shared grief in full, and waxes prettily about ways of “moving on/going forward, and worst of all, “getting over it.” Love becomes another disposable item, replaced with people or things, but never plumbed, never allowed to annihilate our “was” to see what’s left or might emerge on its own like a tiny green shoot after a forest fire. Never risking the real, searing pain and suffering that comes from the loss of a life completely entwined with someone who is quite simply you. We are instead zombified: spent debris hoping to be up-cycled, perhaps practical, but never again achieving the singular and fluorescent beauty that being loved produced.

1,085 days I’ve cried out in pain, sometimes softly, often loudly, as though my cries might move some nonexistent being to divinely intervene, send my love back to me, make these years a terrible dream that alters our lives, forever chastened and appreciative. I want a story with an ending I can live with: the hero’s journey completed and survived, now coming home to a hard won and deeply felt peace.

I wake up confused every single day, not understanding how I continue to exist without him, how we can possibly exist on different planes, how he can have ceased to be. It makes no sense, and every single day, my mind and body reject any reality in which we are not together, squabbling, laughing, dancing, making food and music, and loving each other with a complete trust that surprised and confused me for thirty seven years. That I could love someone as deeply as my own blood and bone was amazing to me as has been three years of anguished grief. I never thought I could feel so much except for my child, nor did I understand that love grows deeper, wider, stronger, beyond every boundary of the mind or senses, beyond the pretty words in any song or poetry, a powerful thing that alters your being in every possible way and lifts what you didn’t even know wasn’t there. You felt complete, but love grows an entirely new you that cannot have existed without such love. A seed? A song unwritten? A depth of self undiveable without the oxygen of Love.

And feeling such a well and wealth of love, how is it possible that we can be separated? How horrible and great the force required to separate two such magnets, united in passion and love. How evil and cruel that force must be. It cannot possibly be neutral and wreak such damage: we can only hope that reincarnation exists and that the crime committed in some other life can be absolved and balance restored. But three years later, despair wrangles with acceptance, science, and intellect, none convincing to my heart.

Bereft, bothered, and bewildered, I grieve.

Anole Tales Continue


Opening the curtains in the sunroom on Thursday, I noticed an anole near the door. It didn’t move as I got closer and I feared that it was dead. As I sadly prepared to remove it, he moved, but lethargically. Realizing that it was probably sluggish due to the overnight temperature drop, I reassured him and turned on the little heater I keep there, then left the room.
Returning an hour later, no anole! Scanning quickly and hoping that he was safely ensconced in a planter or huddling with his family, as I walked into the room, I felt a presence. Looking down, I saw that my missing friend was in fact luxuriating in my chair, like some tiny king on his bed-throne!
Laughing, and appreciating his good taste in seating, I asked only that he clean up after himself, then I left dear Freeman to enjoy his rest.

Adventures in “Petty”

As an adult, I have never made New Year’s resolutions. I have a couple of traditional rituals, but they don’t involve promises of any type. I also don’t consider January 1 to be the start of the year and chalk off continuing or new annoyances to be the final dregs of the year until the Lunar New Year begins.

However, in an attempt to at least shift a bit and move past the grueling and unbearable level of anguish I’ve been in since my husband died, I made a personal resolve to try to be more present in my life and accept the reality in which I continue to reside. To live and not merely exist.

I also decided that I will indulge in “I told you so” and acts of petty revenge whenever possible. To whit, my first act of “Petty” in 2024:

I was minding my business, checking the information for a past order on Amazon, when their bot asked me to review past purchases. I ignored it and it asked again, this time stating that if I wrote five reviews it would tell me a joke. My reviews come cheap and I’m a sucker for a joke. Today marked 1,000 days since my beloved died, so for the sake of a laugh, I started writing.

With each one, there was an encouraging Bot note counting down the number to completion. But when I finished the five, BOT had booked! No joke, no thank you, nada.

This didn’t sit well with me, so I decided to contact Customer Service. The service bot couldn’t cope with the fact that I had a problem not directly related to a specific purchase, so I was soon directed to a human by phone.

To the poor woman who called, I patiently explained the problem, acknowledging that it was unlikely that she could help. Following my explanation, she was, as expected, confused. She then contacted someone else who was also stumped. I asked if there was an IT person who could send the joke or change the program so that people weren’t being promised items they couldn’t deliver on. Of course, they were helpless and remained befuddled, despite my obvious amusement. (As a friend noted, they might simply have told a joke over the phone, but I don’t think their English or job description covered this situation.)

After hanging up, I decided to email Amazon, explaining the problem and demanding compensatory jokes as well as the originally promised joke. I said that I knew they carried them, because Amazon Echo’s got jokes! Terrible jokes, but jokes, so I knew that they warehoused them somewhere, perhaps in Bezos mind.

I now await my jokes. I won’t give up and will contact them daily if necessary. A promise is a promise. The BOT specifically said “I’ll tell you a joke” not play a joke on me. As a worker and union member, when I complete a job, I expect payment. I’m retired, have time, and a weird sense of humor. This can become part of my daily sadhanna/spiritual practice. 🧘🏾‍♀️Like the Blues Brothers, I’m on a mission from god. (Not that God, the one “karens”are always entreating. Yeesh, people!)

The Force of Pettiness is strong within me this year, and I will not be denied. Beats crying every day, and I have a lot of anger that my husband died. Might as well use some of it creatively. Excelsior!

Another Sad Christmas Song

Holidays are brutal because Rayo loved them and was like a kid around Christmas. He was the antidote to my Grinchiness via his patience, perseverance, and passion. The cleaning, cooking, baking, and anxiety were relieved by his silly faces, kisses on my neck, and that outstretched hand, inviting me to dance.
I am easily annoyed, quick tempered, and seldom forgiving, but I could never stay angry at Raymond. I knew he had no malice in him and never intentionally hurt anyone he loved, despite his failings. And once we started dancing, it was inevitable that I would laugh, and he would be forgiven, even when I was annoyed that I couldn’t stay angry.
He was, is, and always will be, embedded in my heart. And as is my determined and serious way, I will not forgive him for leaving me here without his comfort and cheer, in a state where my heart remains imprisoned in grief. He will not be forgiven.

At least not until I see his loving hand reach out for me and we dance together again.

Re: Toxic Positivity/Shallow Words

Not every bad experience enlightens or strengthens us. Some are just bad, plain and simple, and we reduce our humanity and disrespect ourselves when we whitewash our own lived experiences and realities. You don’t lessen anyone’s fear or pain by glossing over it, not even your own.

It’s hard to watch people you care about (or anyone!) suffer and it’s hard to live with your own discomfort. Maybe it’s natural to want to “cheer them up” or try to “fix” things. And maybe sometimes that’s appropriate and works, depending on the nature of their suffering.

But all too often it’s a gloss and a way of avoiding your own feelings of guilt, helplessness, and yes, fear of “contamination”-that their bad luck will rub off on us somehow. (Hey, I didn’t make our species, I just participate and observe.🤷🏽‍♀️)

A friend of mine said it this way: “In the face of enormity, people feel like they have to say something meaningful, but they’ve never had any deep feelings or thoughts, so it sounds trite.”

Some pains and losses are never fully healed. Yes, life goes on and there may even be joy and laughter, and a scar might cover and protect the wound, but it’s there. You don’t “get over” the loss of a child or beloved spouse. You certainly don’t simply “heal” from acts of genocide, enslavement, and other mass cruelties. It’ll be 2024, and we continue to search for relatives who were taken and disappeared. It may have an end, but not through denial or superficialities of land acknowledgment without lands or wealth returned. I still want my 40 acres and the mule.

Sometimes silence is best, especially when accompanied by an open heart willing to sit in empathetic compassion. Sometimes only right action will do.

Maybe not immediately, but before long, you can ask the hurt/bereaved what’s best for them and they’ll generally tell you once they know. Sometimes what was lost cannot be replaced, but it’s for the bereaved to say, not you to project or decide. This can be a very difficult concept for many to grasp, especially if you’ve never experienced it or have even indirectly benefited.

But humanity is a shared condition and empathy is real, if you’re willing to understand others as equal to you and deserving of exactly the level of respect and care you believe is right for you and those for whom you care.
Allow for human complexities and always err on the side of kindness. Life can be very simple and very good in that way.

Muchas Gracias

Thanksgiving can be complicated for any number of reasons: being of indigenous descent and knowing what really happened, having a difficult or even an abusive family, or no family or friends, etc.
I’m descended from people who celebrated multiple days of thanksgiving, not only the fall harvest, and I grew up with a Southern mother from a “mixed” family, who spent a great amount of time and energy preparing wonderful food to be shared with loved ones, even while ensuring that we didn’t buy into the story spread by the colonizers.
Any day you are fortunate enough to be surrounded by loved ones and have food to share is a day to give thanks. If you also have health and music, you are a person of great wealth. All of this plus a roof over your heads and no bombs going off? You hit the Lottery of Life!

Appreciate that and take a moment to acknowledge that a too large percentage of people to whom we are all connected are not as lucky. And make no mistake about this: it is luck! Misfortune knows no boundaries. We know this innately, but instead of creating a fear of the unfortunate, let us reach out in compassion. If you pray, include them, if you have money or time, make a donation.
Because at the heart of all thanksgivings is connection, compassion, and sharing. It’s about community.
Thanks to my beloved son and his family who’ve taken care of me through two very recent surgeries and the past 2+ horrific years of grief. And thanks to my extended family, both kin and kith, for the laughs, kindnesses, and understanding.

And I’ll now say something most have never heard me say:
May you all be blessed: bendiciones, mis amigx.
Oh, and please eat something yummy in my name 💕😉💕

I’m Not In New York Anymore

Last summer, I moved to South Carolina to be closer to my family following my husband’s sudden death, and found a little house within walking distance of my son and his family. Cute house, albeit in a dreaded HOA, and part of the overdevelopment of this area of the country. But lovely neighbors, fewer problems associated with previous older houses, an adorable little downtown, and best of all, my grandchild and her parents. All good.

It’s obviously been hard without my beloved, in so many ways, both expected and unexpected. So when I started hearing what sounded like gentle snoring at night, I first assumed that it was my grief stricken imagination. Friends immediately suggested that it was my beloved’s spirit trying to comfort me with the familiar sound of his snoring, letting me know that he was there.

While I do believe our Ancestors exist within and outside of us, I was also taught by my mother to eliminate the corporeal/physical and mundane before assuming the supernatural, so I went through some basic mental checks: animal bedding down in the sunroom? Animal in the vents, etc. Armed with my trusty machete, I quietly creeped out to the sunroom half expecting to surprise and be surprised by a bear, but no, the room was empty.

Listening closely on different nights, it sometimes sounded as though coming from the vents, almost like a bellows, so perhaps the air conditioning? There’d been no problems during servicing, but it seemed the most likely source. I held my own breath to listen carefully, as the sounds could be heard at different levels on different nights, fairly convinced that there’d be a mechanical answer for its regularity.

The sounds continued, and eventually became just background noise. Whenever anything was moved around the house, or we couldn’t explain it, my husband and I would joke about having a wee Poltergeist, so I found myself smiling and thinking, “I guess the Poltergeist followed me from NY” and shrugged the whole thing off.

I hadn’t realized until it started up again this spring that it had been quiet during the short winter. Determined to trace the sound, in the wee hours one night several weeks ago, I got up and again followed the sound from vent to sunroom, and surrounded by this “breathing” sound, and despite my fear of being mauled by mosquitoes, I walked out into the warm, humid night.

And it was under the always beautiful night skies and against the wooded area’s dark silhouette that loomed behind my house that I realized that what I was hearing vibrating throughout my bedroom was the glorious sound of a million various tree frogs! Not bears, or pumas, nor Ancestors, but “Coquis without a song” asserting their healthy presence in the trees and marshlands of their Ancestors. Listening to the force of their combined woodland voices, I stood in awe of their symphonic volume for a few moments, again amazed by the natural world around me.

I thanked them for their presence, said a prayer for their protection, and returned to the cool of my room, content to have one small mystery of life solved.

Photo by Anjana Mebane-Cruz, 2022

Send Help Now!

Ok, I know y’all might be tired of my ish, (I know I certainly am in a way) but some of my besties need to come fetch me, right now!

I came home yesterday, exhausted and hurting. I’ve not been sleeping well and the radio frequency ablation I had for my back has worn off. I was returning from a two hour drive to and from my dentist, and not happy with the prognosis. Hurting, grumpy, and resenting entropy and the capitalist system that profits from it, I wanted very much to walk into my house, freshen up, and get in bed.

But as I approached the door, to my surprise, there was very large box blocking the entry. I wasn’t expecting anything, so I thought it might have been delivered to the wrong house and my annoyance grew at the prospect of either finding the owner or arranging a return. Either way, I was going to have to haul it into the house, so I put my purse inside, metaphysically girded my loins and went back to take a look. It was indeed addressed to me, so I proceeded to tote it in. With Mothers Day approaching, I wondered if it could be a surprise present from family or friends.

Upon inspection I saw it was from Goodwill in Washington State, so now I was confused and curious, thinking that one of my gardening buds must have seen something I’d like or needed. I know no one in Washington, so my mind filled in the blanks.

I’m befuddled, but as it’s more awkward than heavy, I bring it in to an area where I can cut it open, sat down with my trusty razor to find what appeared to be a suitcase- an old, weird suitcase.

I was intrigued, but also nervous, quickly running through possible murderous enemies from my past who might have access to products used in chemical warfare and a hatred long term and deep enough to have found my address, and packaged it. Happily, I could think of no enemies, and certainly none with backgrounds in chemistry, espionage, or murder. At this point I will admit to having read too many mysteries and watched too many procedurals in my lifetime, as well as possessing a ridiculous imagination that often causes me to laugh at its determinedly intricate plots. I do crack myself up most days.

Reassured, my curiosity got the better of me and with a bit of difficulty, I opened the case to find: an autoharp!!!!!!!!

At first totally bemused and bewildered-wondering who would have sent this strange instrument- I then remembered that middle of the night some weeks ago when I found myself pricing autoharps online. I’d been thinking about things I enjoyed before my marriage that I might want to try again, and yes, it seemed like a great idea to buy an instrument I haven’t played in more than a generation and with which I was never especially proficient, so that when my friends and I all gather in Charlottesville or one of their farms, we can porch-sit and sing, and I’ll have a portable instrument! 😳

I want to disavow any knowledge of the aspect of self that visualized that scene, but I can’t. I recognize the desire to be with my dearest friends and recreate a version of our Christmas sing alongs, the always hilarious versions of Broadway shows that helped us blow off steam during graduate school, or the many songs we’d spontaneously sing, often to highlight parts of a conversation. The autoharp was under $100, so if it’s in good shape, that’s a bargain, but do I actually see myself playing it regularly? Who knows.

I don’t know who I’m becoming as a recent widow in a new state. Almost every part of my body hurts, I’ve come to pretty much hate the species of which I am part as the world is increasingly frightening and made unlivable via human greed and stupidity. Yet, apparently some part of me thinks an autoharp will help, and you know what? That’s fine. I don’t smoke, rarely drink, and have no friends anywhere nearby. My husband is dead and my body aches: if an autoharp affords any comfort or allows me to concentrate on music, this is a good thing. This was my first middle of the night purchase, and I intend for it to be the last, but now I do have a portable instrument, so there’s that. Move over, Dolly Parton!

But gentle readers, aside from a couple of folk era tunes I might remember, autoharp doesn’t really lend itself to the songs we generally sing, although it could be a creative addition to South Pacific. I can honestly connect to my mother’s “country girl” roots and her familiarity with the autoharp and Southern Appalachian music through the workers and their kids who came down to Fayetteville for work when she was young. She respected Pete Seeger and other folkies who’d supported her idol, Paul Robeson, and had none of the disdain for white folk music that was prevalent in our communities. She knew the history and connections between spirituals, blues, indigenous African and American music, folk, and rock. “All music is made by folks, all music is folk music” she would say. We watched Tennessee Earnie Ford and Patsy Cline as well as Nat King Cole on our console tv. My sentimental father sang plaintive Hank Williams songs as well as playing Fats Waller’s stride piano tunes. Steeped in the jazz of Sidney Bechet, Ella and Louie, we also listened to ancient 75s and 33s of Caruso and Martinelli, and Mahalia, and we all knew the words to every song in My Fair Lady. Music was music, and if we, or they liked it, my parents had it in the house.

So while there’s room in my psyche and life for an autoharp (I really wonder why I didn’t get the cello!?!) most importantly, and my reason for concern about that late night vision and the source of my plea for help is simple, silly, but to my randomly ridiculous mind, quite crucial:

I DON’T HAVE A PORCH!!!

Seriously: come get yo’ sista, now!

Robert D. Raines, Remembered

I’m sorry to again be writing because of Death, but I guess I’m of an age where it shows up more regularly. And the fact is, between disease, war, and murders, it’s the unwelcome guest at all our houses. But this isn’t about death, it’s about one of the most unique characters I’ve ever known and who I wish had shared himself with many more people. He was a pure delight and merits this moment.

He was funny, subtle, generally on a quiet high even when he wasn’t actually so. I knew his fears and limits, and I think that I was as good a friend to him as he was to me.

Robert Raines was one of my dearest friends. He was my family’s paperboy for a brief time when we were about 11, and we learned our Catechism together, although only one of us was actually Catholic. But we really became besties in high school, sharing trips to the Village and our love of music. He was always avant garde in his reading and music, and it was he who turned me on to Hendrix, long before he was known in the States. Robert was quietly brilliant- the first person I knew to discuss the importance and underlying problems of belief systems. It was he who introduced me to yoga and changed my life. He hosted what can only be called a salon in his basement while we were in high school, built his own speakers, and later studied engineering at RCA. Our friends would gather to smoke and listen to the early greats, and the night he debuted Jesus Christ Superstar, I think we all felt like participants in something monumental. We went to rock concerts and art shows, and discussed everything from politics to physics. He was an actual boyfriend for a period, an intermittent lover, and always the faithful friend who encouraged me to take risks and go beyond what was the norm for young Black kids in Jersey City at the time. When I hesitated to take a particular journey in life, he did something to give me a sense of security and let me know that I’d always have a safe place to land. That allowed me to leave my first unhappy marriage and later, go to UVA rather than stay at Rutgers

It is deeply painful to have had my inner knowledge confirmed recently. I knew that he had to be dead or completely incapacitated when my last letter was returned and I didn’t hear from him. We were never out of touch for too long and everyone who knows me well was aware of him even if they never met my most reclusive bud. My husband knew that he was family even though they met only once. Occasionally he would ask if I’d heard from him and he shared my concern when the letter came back that year. He helped me do the fruitless online search. As long as his house remained in his name, I had hopes that perhaps he’d met someone special and was somewhere in Hawaii, living his best life. But this past Sunday, another high school friend confirmed for me that he had died the year that the mail was returned, and I am again, bereft. Grateful that I had such a brilliant and abiding friend, sad that I won’t hear his distinctive voice and jokes. Sorry that I never got to introduce him to Dr. Roy Wagner at UVA- they would have understood each other perfectly and “tripped out” in conversations I can only imagine. Sorry that I didn’t get to honor his life and pay my respects. Saddened that I wasn’t there, but buoyed knowing that he would tell me in his sometimes whispery voice to find the next path and follow my light, and to listen for the laughter along with the music. He would simply say, “Well…you know, Anjana…” then laugh and take on a stern and parent-like voice, and repeat, “Anjana! You KNOW what you need to do!! Get to it and fix your soundtrack- the pop is overriding your own sound. Get back to the groove.” He’d end it with one of the childhood names we had for each other and I’d know that despite my numerous doubts and fears, that in fact, all will be well.

My dear friend- presente.