The Circle of the Sun

Aunt Amy Bridget Vander Zanden Twadell
Born into this world December 2, 1953
Born into Eternity October 7th, 2008

There was a song that my godmother Aunt Amy would sing to me when I was little. She would sit with her legs crossed on the ground and I would sit in her lap. "Put your arms around me like the circle of the sun, you know I love you baby when my easy ridin's done..." I didn't really understand what the lyrics meant then, but liked the tune a lot and loved hearing her sing it as she hugged me and rocked me back and forth. When I was a kid I thought she made it up herself. Everyone in the family thought of it as "Amy's song."

A child of a very large Catholic family, Amy Vander Zanden was raised in a strict but very loving household. Speaking with a giddy cheerfulness when recounting childhood stories, she told of the seven children using an assembly line after dinner to clear, wash, dry, and put away all the dirtied dishes. If you'd ever seen my grandmother cook you would understand the challenge that would have awaited them. The table would have looked as if it were set for a State dinner at the White House; the kitchen would have looked like Hiroshima after the bomb. The seven kids celebrated when their assembly line technique helped them achieve their all-time best record of seven minutes. My Aunt Amy laughed when she told stories of playing loud music with her siblings and holding rolled up paper between their lips when their parents were away to arouse the suspicion and ire of the nosey old lady across the street. She rolled her eyes when telling about her fancy sister buying expensive shoes and paying her little brother (who wore the same size at the time) to break them in for her very sensitive feet.

My Aunt Amy didn't tell many stories of her adolescent and teenaged years. There were whispers of a cousin's sexual abuse and my aunt's subsequent troubled times. She went to college in the early seventies and fully embraced the age of drugs, artists, and rock and roll. My mom described her during those years as soft-spoken, kind, and "a little unsure of herself." She met a long haired, warmhearted lover of art and music and fell in love. Shortly after my Aunt became engaged, my grandfather was diagnosed with cancer and was given a very short time left to live. The family mobilized and put together the most charming, heartfelt wedding in two weeks time. Wearing a simple, vintage garden dress and adorned with a crown of flowers, my Aunt Amy married Kenny Twadell in a simple church ceremony and a reception at home among a very small circle of friends and family. For my Aunt Amy, this wedding was absolutely perfect. My Uncle Kenny and she moved to a farm in Darlington, Wisconsin shortly after. My aunt talked about that house as her favorite place of residence, a place of peace and simplicity. Eventually they moved to Chicago and my aunt became a social worker, helping children from the city's south side and surrounding suburbs cope with lives broken by abuse and neglect. Never having had children of her own, she poured her mothering instinct into loving her nieces and nephews and caring for the troubled children who sat in her office each day. My aunt became a straight-talking, strong woman while working as a therapist. She excelled in this role and helped dozens of children overcome their own troubled times, but the sadness and brokenness of these children's lives was a heavy burden. She battled alcoholism much of her adult life. I remember asking her once when she was braiding my hair why her hands always shook so much. It wasn't until I was in college that she finally started on the path to sobriety. With the help of AA, she got better and helped dozens of others on the path to sobriety. She made deep, soulful friendships with her AA friends. She began to radiate a confidence and peace like never before. Embracing her artistic and spiritual side in this new life, my Aunt Amy started making gorgeous scarves and shawls on her loom with her now steady hands. Many friends and family are blessed to have a few of Aunt Amy's creations.

My favorite memories with my aunt were at Point Comfort, a cozy little cottage which sat right on the water about twenty minutes away from the town of Green Bay. It was there that I would sit in her lap and avoid the tip of her lit cigarette while watching the sky explode into shades of orange, purple, and red as the sun plunged into the water's horizon. I know she was as happy here as she was as a child or on the farm in Darlington. There, all troubles would disappear and the calm waters and golden sun would hold her in a constant state of peace. Out on the beach in front of the cottage I would happily sit in her embrace as she sang me the song that I now know is an old 20's folk song remade by the Grateful Dead, Arlo Guthrie, and others during the early 70's. The lyrics now aren't so unintelligible to me as an adult. I think somehow when that artistic spirit entered the original writer of this song, it had my aunt in mind all along. Eight years before she was diagnosed with a cancer that would prove to be too much to fight against, she sang this beautiful song to me at my wedding. Now, I sing it back to her.

Put your arms around me like the circle of the sun.
You know I love you baby when my easy ridin's done.
Would you believe I love you? Look at the shape that I'm in!
Would you believe I'm sinking? Look at the hole that I'm in!
Stealing, stealing...nobody's got a hold on me.
Cuz' I'm stealing back to my same old used to be.

My dearest Auntie Amy, rest well in the Circle of God's Sun.

The Bitch vs. The Angel

I am missing blogging. Someone described blogging to me once (when I hadn't yet admitted to her that I blogged) as a sort of "verbal masturbation." I'm sorry, Mom. And I agreed. It is. Blogs are full of "I thinks" and "me" and stories that attempt to show what a smart writer, cute storyteller, and interesting person the blogger is. But blogging is fun, it's compelling sometimes, and it's a wonderful release to be able to put something down on paper that has been swirling around in the brain. When you tell someone your thoughts, it feels better. In the old fashioned method of calling a friend up and talking about your thoughts, or sitting in a cafe somewhere to chit-chat, you're also tailoring your stories to that one person. If you're like most people, you change slightly depending on who you're talking to. You don't tell dirty jokes to your grandma, you don't talk baby talk with your coworkers, and you soften and lighten your verbage on political views with someone you know does not share your opinions. This last example you might disagree with.

With a blog, you can more easily be yourself. And for this reason, it's sometimes an even greater release of tension to be able to put onto paper in a somewhat coherent manner one's feelings, opinions, and happenings in life. It's like telling a friend, but that friend is the combination of all friends and relatives in the audience. You can't possibly tailor your speaking points in a blog. You have no choice but to be yourself. And for a woman who is accustomed to trying to please many people, it's nice to be able to be yourself. It's nice to practice how that feels, because maybe, just maybe, we should try that a little bit more in real life too.

When I was reading the Betty Friedan book last year, "The Feminine Mystique," the book that essentially got the ball rolling on the women's movement, I remember reading a quote from her ex-husband as he talked about Betty's personality and how it helped lead to the downfall of the marriage: "She changed the course of history almost singlehandedly. It took a driven, super aggressive, egocentric, almost lunatic dynamo to rock the world the way she did. Unfortunately, she was that same person at home, where that kind of conduct doesn't work. She simply never understood this." I feel that if we behave like the woman who speaks her mind and doesn't sugar-coat our words, our home life and social life suffers. As the eloquent Tina Fey put it in an SNL skit when talking about Hillary Clinton, "Yeah, she's a bitch...but bitches get stuff done."

Sometimes when blogging, our own questions can be answered for us. Like this: we love to categorize in black and white, yes and no terms when the world is full of grey maybes. Do we have to be either Bitch or Angel, or can we be a very direct but very sympathetic friend?

There. I feel better already. What a release!