And Along Came Me…

Susan at the age of 4 with cousin Sherry

A note to my readers:  I am so grateful for this opportunity and your desire to know more about my most fortunate life.  I know the form is somewhat strange...no punctuation or caps.  Some chapters very long like this one.  Jumping around in time.  Thank you for your patience and support and friendship.  Some of you are so thoroughly woven through these stories and they are especially for you.  Please let me know your feedback.
Love, Susan


i was just born
a startled woman awoke 
to find a little girl in her hospital gown
eye to eye
at her bedside declaring 
i was just born
i turned to go
my gown flapping open over my naked backside
out the door and down the hall 
to my room and bed at st olafs 
i dont have this memory directly
but from the story the nurses told me 
the next day 
about my midnight sleep walking ramble
through the hospital 

recovery from ether anesthesia 
was never easy  
hallucinations, nausea, vomiting, disorientation
sleepwalking…

i have one old friend 
who also experienced ether as a child and 
had a similar recurrent hallucination while under  
counting backwards from 10 
then black
then millions of teeny tiny dots 
swirling in a ever expanding spiral
ala twilight zone
tiny tiny tiny tiny to humongous humongous humongous,
back and forth over and over again
mountain out of a molehill to the extreme
hard to even write about it without 
summoning a single grain of salt ballooning up into
a planetary sized salt crystal 
then back to teeny tiny again
ad nauseam literally.

i am wondering now
if my early experiences with this hallucinogen  
had long term effects

as a child from the age of 3 to 13
i had recurring bladder and kidney infections
painful  scary
for me and 
for my parents and family

as a doctor my dad knew
the worst case scenario
if the infection spread to my kidneys
i could die
yes scary
susie has a cold
it’s raining
so no hula hoop contest for you
get her to the hospital 
whenever I got any kind of bug
hospital for exploratory with ether
stays long enough for me to require a tutor for school
painful lonely
antibiotics daily for years
screws with metabolism
made me throw up
regular visits to the urologist for pelvic examinations
scary painful
could kind of screw one up, eh?

yet at the same time
i was singing
every day

sang along with mitch on the hifi
with my brothers 
michael 	john 	  
sister jody 	
dad 
all standing around mom 
pedaling away on the pump organ

sunday school choir in the presbyterian basement
singing “for the beauty of the earth”
joyce funk our director 
gave me private lessons
next to her at the piano 

sing from the heart 
susan
sing from the heart 

several hospital stays

campfire songs
under the stars at ymca camp olson 
northern minnesota 
home of bunyan and babe the blue ox
little boy lake 

emulating our revered camp counselors
500 miles and michael row your boat
under the big oak tree 
on the knoll behind banfield elementary
having been given a gorgeous 1956 gibson dreadnaught
my hero judy collins
hootenanny with my pals

show tunes with
pal susan ruth
we wrote our first song together 
in 6th grade at the age of 12

 Love Haunt Me No Longer 

Love haunt me no longer, I have felt your sting
Take your sweet hope and your false promises
And your sorrow and tears
And then maybe someday, some how, some way
I may learn to love again.

12 years old, what did we know
quite a lot

another hospital stay or two

music music music	the transformer
violin 
eventually string bass 
orchestra 5 days a week

hospital life 
gave me idle time 
gettin’ crafty
bending colorful pipe cleaners into 
whole zoos of critters and their cages
learning origami from a Japanese nurse 
paper cranes 
from gum wrappers and napkins

that was my last hospitalization as a child

it wasn’t til a few decades later 
when i visited hiroshima
and ground zero
50 years after 
for the first time and came upon
the statue and 
the story of the child sadako
surrounded by mounds of colorful folded paper cranes 
by children from all over the world 
enfolding
their prayers for peace

sadako a child in hiroshima city center
when ironically named little boy was dropped
she survived but
suffered the effects of radiation

tradition held that
if you folded 1000 paper cranes
you would be healed
sadako died 
just before 
she reached 1000

i practiced 
tracing my father’s beautiful script 
on the blackboard in the hallway
ironic for a doctor
to have a beautiful signature

i had no idea then that 
these skills and more
would carry me 
through life to this day
a love of paper and ink 
handcrafting metal wire
hints given and 
habits formed 
along the way.

oh and did I mention tv? 
dad brought home our first bulky
small screened machine 
ensconced it in our roughly finished basement 

i was 6 and 
had only heard about disneys weekly show

even though viewed on a tiny screen
in grainy black and white
it was pure magic
next best thing to actually
going there
a world we had only ever dreamed of
in austin minnesota 
home of spam


our storybooks come to life
the world seen through that box 
became a big part of my life
my entertainment distraction pain reliever therapist companion
big window to the world
inside and out 


although I have spent 
big chunks of my life 
without a TV
i return again and again 
to rely upon the interactions 
between what is projected and my projections 
for insight about my own life
so far it’s been a very effective facilitator 
of my “personal growth” and 
at the same time
ok 
a kind of addiction
and sedative

back at the ranch
in the 50s and early 60s
we were leaving 
leave it to beaver land 
far behind
along with the rest of america
suppressed grief after wwII and 
it’s horrible losses were 
belatedly taking their toll
on our family 
on the american psyche
socially obligatory cocktail parties
medicating and dulling 
alcoholism and mental illness 
were seeping into our bloodlines
through the generations
wreaking havoc

of course like everything else
life was not all black and white
humor music and love were 
life boats
as we rafted the rapids 
together as a family.  

we were a funny bunch
with quirky senses of humor
a survival tactic born of 
difficult times 
we pranked
especially the king of pranks my brother john

example one day 
he was sitting at the bar with his friend dale 
in the rec room basement 
playing with a weird silvery liquid
when I asked what this magical stuff was
he sent me on a snipe hunt

get a jar and a spoon
climb that poplar tree  
scrape the sliver stuff off 
the back of the leaves
carefully into the jar
i spent an hour in the back yard 
trying to get a leg up 
before I remembered just who had 
led me into this folly
of course
the silvery stuff was 
mercury 
the contents of a broken thermometer
 
i loved to walk with my dad 
searching for interesting stones 
on the road or on the beach
agates fossils rocks 
that were dull and grey 
when wetted became jewels
we loved the discovery the hunt
 
we loved singing together
dad with his shimmering tenor
extremely shy 
he reluctantly shared in public
but with me we became 
nelson eddy and janette mcdonald 
i am calling you who-who-who 
across the living room 
we sang to each other

we watched
thunder storms and tornados 
roll in over our little town on 
sultry summer afternoons
while everyone headed to 
the sw corner of the basement
we headed out to the yard 
thrilled 
we scanned the darkening sky with binoculars

dad annually flooded the backyard 

at the first sign of a freeze
making a rink to skate on
mounting flood lights for winter neighborhood fun
day and night 

during the week and when on call weekends
dad was stitching up digits
treating back injuries
listening more than medicating
the common infirmities of folks who worked
at the plant
hormel meats medical department

all the while my mother 
maintained our home
cooking and cleaning for 6
refereeing
volunteering at the hospital 
a pink lady
delivering magazines books and 
a listening ear to patients

mom and dad were both good listeners

as I grew older
my friendship grew with my mother as
her responsibilities lessened 
and i matured
we shared our love 
of reading  sewing 
antiques and 
erma bombeck
who wrote broad and sometimes eloquent humor
chronicling the life of an ordinary 
midwestern suburban housewife
inspiring my mom to also write 
what she could about her life
at her little desk in the laundry room 
beneath the stairs
and her photo of 
cary grant


while singing his heart out 
in choir one sunday morning at the age of 36
dad had the first of 
three major heart attacks

alcoholism and and bi-polar disease
took their toll and 
remained undiagnosed for many years
untreated 
both afflictions grow worse
with age

because we were a doctor’s family 
in a small town, there were many secrets to keep
even now i feel cautious about
revealing what we were dealing with 
as a family back then

but I also know now
that we were far from being alone 
in our challenges

i had my first period at 13
my mother wept when i told her
they thought my illness 
would have precluded that
but for some reason 
it didn’t


much later
i could see how my hospital stays were 
a refuge
an escape from 
the sometimes subtle
sometimes not
chaos at home
even though mostly alone in the hospital
i received all the attention and love 
i craved 

we were fortunate that
my parents knew enough 
to get help
couples therapy
12 step work
lithium a miracle when discovered for manic depression
self help books showing up on the kitchen table
all eventually facilitated a 
healthier equilibrium
at home

i credit my parents 
commitment to their marriage and 
our family’s well being
their courage 	hard work   love    faith
for taking all the steps they did 
to grow and learn and heal 
leaving a path to healing 
for us kids to follow
to this day

meanwhile 
i had good pals 
music 
camp in the summer
just wait til I tell you about camp 
big adventure

childhood was 
boot camp 
for life

there were big waves building and
i was learning to ride… 


Bridges
Milton Nasciamento
Journey Live in the Cathedral St John the Divine
Phil Markowitz/ piano and arrangement
Download for free at susanosbornsings.com