Compost Studios

Dark clouds roll over the Potomac River cliffs

The end was within sight. I was unpacking my last boxes, making my final trips to Goodwill, tucking stray items into closets and cabinets, hanging my artwork, and anticipating buying a loveseat for our bedroom and a lamp for the foyer.

I finally felt fully and happily in my house in Virginia, ready to move back into the mainstream of life, cultivate friendships, resume working.

And then the dark clouds rolled in.

We went camping last weekend and managed to miss the rain, but when it finally arrived Sunday afternoon, it came with a vengeance. FIVE inches of rain fell overnight.

Monday morning a trip to the storage room in the basement to grab a suitcase led to a horrifying discovery--wet carpet and walls and no sign the water had come in through the windows.

Hours later, with the carpet pulled back and paneling removed from the studs, we saw a big crack in our foundation wall. My daughter's room was so wet we had to move her out of it.

A foundation repair expert arrived, looked at the damage and let us know we were looking at a repair job that would cost tens of thousands of dollars. A structural engineer is coming by tomorrow to give his assessment. Another specialist is due later this week.

Happiness at Chez V has been squashed and smothered.

These beautiful plants in my front yard, photographed last week? We'll lose them all when they excavate the foundation.

The massive oak tree in this photo that I posted two weeks ago? It died as a result of last summer's drought. Its enormous branches, overhanging our roof, were a threat and so the tree was removed at a cost of nearly $2,000.

In the process of removing the tree, our front porch rail was smashed and broken:

And did I mention my heating and cooling system isn't working? 

If we're forced to replace it, it will cost several thousand dollars.

Those of you who have been following my story in the last year know it has been full of ups and downs, that I've been bullied, that I've struggled to keep faith in the institutions I used to believe in, that my family structure has been rattled and shaken, that we endured a tremendous amount of stress during this move, and that I've had moments when I wondered just what would be left of my life when the dust settled and I was finally in Virginia.

Initially, it seemed to be a smooth transition, there were lots of joyous moments, and I was finally beginning to exhale.

But now, the house that I have lived in less than two months and love is draining our financial and emotional resources.

 The dream that our toughest challenges were behind us has dissipated.

The fragile peace I was cobbling together is falling apart.

Somehow the jagged, muddy crack undermining our foundation is more than a little symbolic.

But today on the phone I told Peter in Antwerp that maybe I shouldn't have the crack repaired. Maybe I'll pretend I'm back in Belgium where the fractured stone walls are transformed into something beautiful by the hardy plants that tenaciously hang onto whatever they can, grow even when they seem to lack what they need to thrive, and bloom in spite of everything, among the stones. 

Peter and I, we're looking at our broken homes and trying to see a garden. What else can we do?

May 13, 2008

Memories of the road I walked as an expat in Belgium

By the end of the month when the last cardboard box disappears, the garage is empty of items to send to Goodwill, the closets are neatly organized, the art is hung and the last random piles littering the floor are resolved, I will finally have a sense that my expat experience has ended and the next phase of my life has begun. There's been so much to sort out. Being an expat isn't just about location, it's tied to your state of mind.

In many ways, my expat experience didn't begin the day I landed in Belgium to live, but the hot July day I first seriously considered leaving America behind and starting a new life in a foreign country. I stepped out in faith, knowing little about what would lie ahead but believing I could handle it, that it would be good for me even if it was hard.

And it was hard. And it was good for me.

It was  a journey that expanded my world, created a whole new interior and exterior geography, and altered my ways of seeing and being. Just as the title of this blog suggests, life grows, breaks down, is rearranged, and generates something new. 

While the preparation and physical act of moving dominated at least six months of our lives, the psychological effects and lessons will be with me always.  As my post over the last few months have indicated, unpacking and settling into my native country again hasn't just been about dealing with boxes and closets. It's about unwrapping the feelings and ideas that were buried during the process, recognizing what they are, examining them from all sides, confronting what I'm uncomfortable with, working toward a larger understanding, and ultimately, processing my experiences--not stuffing them away.

As I've written before, the greatest truths are often revealed in the questions we ask ourselves. The questions define what it is we want to know, what it is that Matters. Questioning is a constant for me--the foundation of my life. As for answers? They evolve, are fluid, and will always reflect change.

As I come to the end of my first (but hopefully not last) expat experience, I give you The Big Questions I've wrestled with and continue to explore:

• Where is home?
• What does it look like?
• How does it feel?
• Who do I share it with?
• How do I share it?
• What is my community?
• How will I participate in it?
• What material possessions do I need to function happily?
• Why?
• If something isn't useful now but may be useful later, is it really worth saving?
• Does it really matter how much I spent on an item if I don't love it anymore?
• What does money have to do with value?
• Does it matter how much I've invested in a relationship if it's not working anymore?
• What does time invested have to do with value?
• How does proximity create, shape, and end relationships? 
• What items remain personal symbols and what ones have ceased to resonate?
• Why?
• Can I let go of who I was and acknowledge who I am now?
• How do I discard the past without discarding its lessons?
• How do I release old sorrows and embrace the day's joy?
• How do I let go of the hurt and truly forgive others?
• How do I hold myself accountable and yet forgive myself?
• Is all this soul searching leading to understanding and compassion--or narcissm and selfishness?

What are YOUR big questions?

May 12, 2008

Without understanding, there cannot be true love, and without love there cannot be true understanding.

--Thich Nhat Hanh

In 1972, my sister Louise was planning a big adventure. A 24-year-old secretary, she had saved up a sizable amount of her modest income so that she could travel Europe for a month with her best friend. In the spring, she bought a set of Samsonsite luggage, and it came with a bonus gift, a little sprig of a miniature orange tree.

My sister Louise gave the orange tree to my mother Louise, who had a knack with houseplants. It grew from a six inch stick to several feet in height under my mother’s loving care. Much to our delight, it burst forth with sweet-smelling white flowers followed by oranges the size of walnuts. It seemed a bit magical, this tree, producing baby citrus fruit in our house.

When my parents moved from New York to Virginia, my mother managed to move the orange tree too, and it kept blooming in its new location in my mother Louise’s sunny kitchen. It was ten years old and thriving there in 1982 when my sister Louise died after a long battle with cancer.

It was twenty years old when my mother Louise died of cancer ten years later, in 1992. Still in the kitchen, it was a bittersweet reminder of the two Louises.

My husband, an avid gardener who shared a special bond with my mother, loaded the tree (and most of my mother’s other houseplants) up in his pickup and transported them to our home in Virginia, about 180 miles away. He pruned the little tree, occasionally fertilized it, treated it to a special citrus tree “cocktail” once or twice a year, and treasured the way its blossoms perfumed the air in the winter. When our children came along, they too delighted in the novelty of miniature oranges being produced at their house.

When the time came for us to move to Belgium, we gave away most of our houseplants, but we couldn’t possibly give away the tree that reminded us of the two Louises. The orange tree in its enormous white pot was driven 180 miles to western Virginia and put in the care of my big brother.

It was 2005, and the tree was now 33 years old.

Maybe in a stroke of what Buddhists refer to as “interbeing,” the tree remembered that my sister Louise had only been given 33 years on the planet.

Maybe it missed my mother.

Maybe it missed us.

Whatever the cause, despite my brother’s diligent care, the tree started dropping leaves and losing its vitality after we moved.

E-mails were exchanged between my husband, the master gardener in Belgium, and my brother, keeper of the family tree,  in Virginia. The Virginia Tech extension office was consulted for advice. My husband shared the recipe for the special "cocktail" my mother had fed the tree with. All sorts of actions were taken, and my brother and his wife were more than a little dismayed when they had to tell us that despite all their efforts, the tree had just died.

All that remained...

They moved the dead tree outdoors, under the watchful eyes of the statue of St. Francis, and my brother, who had saved some of the seeds from the last harvest of oranges, planted them in small pots and watched them sprout and grow. It was my family’s way of remembering my sister and my mother, of keeping them alive in our hearts.

The baby orange tree, grown from seed 

Maybe it was that act of faith.

Maybe it was a manifestation of our hope of one day seeing the two Louises again.

Maybe it was further evidence of “interbeing” and mystical connection between ancestors and future generations.

Whatever the cause, my brother and his wife witnessed a miracle on their front porch: the “dead” orange tree, now 36 years old, came back to life.

Somehow, out of all the dry brown wood and a long season of nothingness came new green leaves.

 A bit scraggly, but alive

Today the orange tree is once again under my husband’s TLC.

And the baby orange tree? My kids consider it their own.

See, not all family heirlooms are silver and gold--some are green and leafy and offer lessons in resilience.

I'm keeping faith that the tree, like our family, will bloom again and bear fruit.

May 9, 2008

The heads of the roses begin to droop.

The bee who has been hauling his gold

all day finds a hexagon in which to rest.

In the sky, traces of clouds,

the last few darting birds,

watercolors on the horizon.

The white cat sits facing a wall.

The horse in the field is asleep on its feet.

I light a candle on the wood table.

I take another sip of wine.

I pick up an onion and a knife.

And the past and the future?

Nothing but an only child with two different masks.

--Billy Collins

May 8, 2008

Everyone talks about sustainable design, but my nephew Joe Gebbia and his friend Matt Grigsby are actually doing something about it.

As I mentioned here, Joe is a product and graphic designer and an entrepreneur who launched a company while he was still a student at the Rhode Island School of Design. After graduation, he and Matt  founded an organization  called Ecolect which caters to industrial designers looking for materials to use in "green" design.  Ecolect's mission is "to be the largest freely accessible sustainable materials library in the world."

Ecolect is accessible online via an easy to use Website featuring only materials with sustainable attributes. It includes user reviews and images, case studies, and a blog and helps designers find vendors for sustainable materials to use in their products and projects.

It's a creative concept serving a creative community working toward a better future.  If you or someone you know is using or researching eco-friendly design, send them to Ecolect.

May 7, 2008

The movie sat on my desk for a long time: A Mighty Heart, the story of  Daniel Pearl. Pearl, a journalist for the Wall Street Journal, was writing a story on shoe bomber Richard Reid when he was kidnapped and murdered in Pakistan in 2oo2.

At the time of his kidnapping, I was deeply upset and disturbed. Yes, people were dying the world over, there were tragedies closer to home, but this was one that inexplicably burrowed deep into my heart. Weeks after he disappeared, when a video was released showing him having his throat slit and his head cut off, I wept.

The horror and brutality of his death at the hands of Muslim extremists was tempered by the calm and measured response of his Jewish parents and his Buddhist wife, who was pregnant with Pearl's only child when he was murdered. From the depths of their anger and grief, they managed to stay focused on who Danny was, what he stood for, and his legacy. Their message was not one of vengeance and hate but of peace. Their words not confined to their loss alone or the loss of American lives but to all who lost loved ones to terrorism. 

His French wife, Mariane, is a journalist and dared to tell his story in her memoir of her life with him, A Mighty Heart. His parents published a book of responses they received to his death and what it meant to them, to Danny, and to others to be Jewish. Most notably, they started the Daniel Pearl Foundation, an organization with a mission to "promote cross-cultural understanding through journalism, music, and innovative communications." The foundation sponsors concerts, lectures, panel discussions, and journalism awards and fellowships.

It was a miracle to see so much goodness rise from the ashes of such horror and violence and hatefulness. But this didn't make it any easier for me to watch A Mighty Heart and revisit the events of 2002. I had to wait until I felt strong enough to handle the feelings I knew the film would trigger.

Last night I was stunned by the way Angelina Jolie disappeared into Mariane Pearl. She was almost unrecognizable to me. She delivered a focused, understated performance, free of sentimentality or hysteria or any of the emotional dramatics you'd expect Hollywood to produce with a story line like this one. Indeed, the entire movie stays true to that tone. It is taut, surprisingly objective, almost journalistic as it brings those weeks of Mariane's life to the screen.

The tension is there as Mariane, Daniel's colleagues, diplomats, Pakistanis, security forces, and the FBI work nonstop to unravel the intricate plan to kidnap Pearl and to find him in a city teeming with millions of people, chaos, and unrest. The magnitude of their task, their refusal to give up, their ability to work together all makes for a riveting story. The movie is from Mariane's perspective, and so we don't see Daniel's story, except through her eyes. This was a relief for me because I'm not sure I could have watched if the camera had been on Daniel.

Even knowing how the story would end did not diminish its impact. I'm glad I plugged that DVD in last night and woke up this morning reflecting once again on Daniel Pearl's life and death and the courage of his wife and family who refused to be silenced by terror and preserved and advanced Daniel's ideals and legacy.

May 6, 2008

the prompt: what are you afraid of? really afraid of?

i'm afraid:

i will turn into a shapeless dumpling

of the day i won't be able to go out walking in the woods

the meds won't work

i will never be loved that way again

i will never love that way again

i've fallen off the pedestal he put me on years ago

i will hide behind khakis, loafers, my address, his income

i will be silenced

people will discover i'm not so smart after all

i'll stop sharing the truth of who i am

i'm a fool for sharing the truth of who i am

i'll be forgotten by people i want to remember me

i'll never again be held just for the sake of being held

i'll never be able to support myself

i've lost my faith

i will never see you again

and never get over it

i'll travel to the end of my life still hungry

with no one to hold my hand. 

What are you afraid of?

May 4, 2008