He was always going to make an appearance in my book. At first, the text was largely about him. But, people change over the years. With all the water under the bridge; by the time I had scribbled my way through hundreds of pages, I had grown as thinker and writer. He had morphed from hero to villain. And She was still alone.
(Inspired in part by the writer button: Careful, or you’ll end up in my novel)
Unlike my short story posted on the tab above, this is truth.
I had a wonderful time at the symphony Tuesday night. Like a three-year-old, I cannot resist asking, “why?” Why did the evening play out so charmingly? Was it the book I was reading, dinner, the weather, the setting, musical selections, the clothes I was wearing, the evoked memories, the people? Or did I finally step outside my introverted self and slay my fears?
The book I held in my left hand during dinner was “Persuasion“, by Jane Austen. My evening had not much in common with the plot other than the habit of taking a long look back. For the book, eight years. For me, at least 30; at times 40 years. Dinner itself was left-overs. The weather was mild to cold. The setting was the 1600 seat auditorium at GJHS.
A newcomer to both the Western Slope and the symphony asked, “Have you ever been up on that stage?” He was curious about the portable band shell, was it rigid? What material was it made of? “What else would you like to know,” I thought, “the location of the light cage? Whose names are inscribed on the bricks in the wings? The smell of that hardwood floor after an astounding performance? The gentle clink of the curtain as it closes for the final time? Is that too much information? Do you also want to know that I have spent more time on that stage and back stage than I have spent in these seats, excepting study hall?”
The lights dimmed, the concert master arrived and was applauded. He is younger. Not a part of my memories. The maestro entered. He is my age, but has only been here 25 years. He too has no place in my memories. Some old friends remain. I single out a face from junior high band; and a violinist I met on the school bus in grade school. Prominent is the now white-haired concert master emeritus who was all-schools orchestra director in my youth. Many of the faces are familiar. I am used to seeing them in other hats; school band directors, choral directors, private teachers, university profs.
The concert began. Brahms’ “Tragic Overture“; played with a passion and overall finesse unexpected from a local orchestra. My mind and heart snapped to attention and immediately fell through the wormhole of memory. When was the last time I heard music like this from the GJSO? Easy. That would be “Pictures at an Exhibition,” circa 1984. There I applauded until my palms turned to pulp and my arm muscles gave out. Still feeling I had not done enough, I wrote a rave review by way of a thank you note to the Symphony. With some members of the orchestra, that earned me the nickname, Sweaty Palms. But tonight, I have no crush on the conductor, only the remembered feelings of being thirty and single.
If it is true that clothes make the man, perhaps my most important decision last Tuesday evening was in what to wear. The little black dress, of course. When one has made the conscious decision to live as though given only 365 days, one wears the little black dress as often as possible. I have two. I donned my favorite. Continuing with William Borden’s fine guidelines: no reserves, no retreats, no regrets; I opted for the most stunning earrings and necklace, black tights, and my heeled hybrid wellington / cowboy boots. I made a conscious decision to be outgoing and friendly, to pursue conversation, so I joked with the strangers sitting in my row.
At intermission I enjoyed excellent conversation with my band director from seventh grade. We go back. His wife was my first trumpet teacher. He was the man who made our 8th and 9th grade band the first junior high band ever to perform at CMEA convention. We were also a marching band. We were good. Sometimes, I need to remember that I was good once. In the intervening years, all I have done on my trumpet is raise the flag on Fridays at elementary schools, teach a handful of beginning players a C scale, and demo brass instruments to wide-eyed kindergartners. He went on to the university and saw years as head of the music department.
Our intermission chat was punctuated by greetings of passers by. It was here that my past collided with my present and my very private writer’s life. There are many whom I know well by name and not by face. Former state representative and senator, Tillie Bishop is one such person. Mr. Schneider made our introduction whereupon I blurted, “Did your wife teach at Central High School?” I am talking to a man who served 24 years in the state assembly, administered at the local university and serves on the University of Colorado Board of Regents, and I ask if his wife taught at Central High School? I just as well have asked if his son shared my school bus – which he did. Such a conversationalist! Sure, knowledge and education are often forefront in my mind, especially when paired with music; yet Mrs. Bishop is firmly lodged in my memory for another reason. She makes an appearance in my short story, “Eight Months and Five Men Well.” Mr. Bishop kindly responded with the logical question, “Oh, were you a student of hers?”
To avoid frivolously taking up the time of two important men, I answered as succinctly and truthfully as possible. “No,” I said quickly, “I met her at a faculty reception – on a blind date with John Elliot.”
The men chuckled and continued their conversation. To not recognize the name Elliot would be not to have attended Grand Junction High School in the 70s, Central High School in the 80s, and never to have played tennis.
John makes an appearance in the short story, as does the resident symphony conductor of 1985, and a past president of the Grand Junction Symphony Guild.
The story, as told, is not gospel truth – it is fiction. The names and details have been changed to protect the innocent – mostly, to protect me.
It is hard, so hard, for me to trot out the memories of the past, even in fiction. I shrink in embarrassment that someone might find out who I really am. But those memories? They will come out. They refuse to remain unwritten. I crossed a milestone Tuesday night. I learned to speak directly. To speak instead of remaining silent for fear of saying the wrong thing. Besides, I have resolved to confront the future and the memories as though I have only 365 days to live. No reserves, No retreats, No regrets. This is truth.
“Eight Months and Five Men Well,” was fiction.
Take heart, folks. Things are not as bad as they seem. The heart attack warning signs you feel gripping your chest? Are just your lungs and heart responding to sub-zero January temperatures as you struggle to breathe. Feeling faint all the time, depressed, light-headed? Your New Year’s resolution to loose 10 pounds must still be effective. Does your workplace feel like a prison where you never see the light of day?
It’s January!
If you can just hold on a few more weeks, the weather will right itself. You’ll be pleased with your new body. The sun will be back and you can take regular outdoor excursions before and after work. In the meantime, give a little extra grace to those around you. I trust they will do the same for you.
Be good to yourself. Read your email by the light of a full spectrum bulb or sit on the sunny side of the house. Fill the bathtub to capacity and give yourself the luxury of a long soak (candles and bubbles if you are female). Plan some mid-day outdoor time on weekends – even if you have to skip lunch to do it.
And hold on! It’s going to be a glorious spring!
There are many times I have been in need of a confessor. Someone to whom I can spill out my guilt. One who will not be shocked; who will not tell me that if I just leave off sinning and do it the right way everything will right itself. Ah, you will protest, “We no longer need a high priest. You can go straight to Jesus.”
But that is precisely who I cannot touch.
So, instead, I will step inside the confessional, the inner closet of my heart; draw the curtain and in the quiet I will weep and rage. Finally, blubbering, I will whisper,
“Father, I am troubled.”
“Speak what is on your mind, my child.”
“What would you do if your boyfriend said to you,
‘You will marry me or I will make your life miserable’?”
“My daughter, nowadays we know to run fast from this type of man. He is the type of man who will also make your life miserable if you do marry him.”
“Well, what if your family says,
‘Don’t you love your mother? Don’t you love your grandma? Your Mom and Grandma are going to be in agony for the rest of their lives unless you marry him’?”
“Child, you cannot be held responsible for the feelings of your mother and grandmother.”
“But, my mind and heart are such a morass of guilt, shame and confusion.”
“Why are you so troubled, daughter. Have you already given yourself to this man?”
“Yes, yes I did once. It was a long time ago. They told me he would send me to hell if I did not accept a relationship with him.”
“Gasp, but did they say nothing of love?”
“Yes, they told me I had to love him with my whole heart or be lost.”
“But did they say nothing of his love for you?”
“Oh, yes, they said I was not worthy of that kind of love.”
“But child, God is love.”
“They told me I couldn’t get to God unless I loved the man first.”
“But you believe in God anyway?”
“Yes, but I still struggle with the son.”
“Did they not tell you that the father and the son are one? You have been told that to get to the father you come through the son. Does not it follow that when you come to the father, you are coming to the son?”
“But that’s not what they said!”
“It doesn’t matter what they said, daughter, it matters what you know. Do you know God?”
“Oh yes, as creator, the essence of which everything is made. The spirit by which everything is held together.”
“And how have you found God to be?”
“God is love.”
“Have you ever considered that really love is all you need?”
“I would like to believe that, but sometimes I can’t feel love at all.”
“It’s not something you have to do at all, child. It is something I do. My love is big enough. My love is all you need.”
The bunny at my house lives free and uncaged, hippity hopping at will over an acre or more of desert terrain. He is a common cottontail – born in the wild in one of the warrens underneath the juniper cedars in my front yard. I see him every morning in the half-light before dawn and every evening at dusk as he scavenges in the flat sandy areas of my small adobe house front, or sniffing his way around the carried stones of the meditation maze in back. He nibbles with delight at the occasional tossed apple core, yet never turns up his nose at the winter starved rabbit brush, scanty saltbrush, or shadscale.
Today, in the fresh scouring of snow, he ventured completely up on the flagstone porch, whiffling in the cold powder. What did he find there? Some unknown nutrient blown in with the snow?
Some evenings, the bunny arrives while I am playing the piano and he pauses, twitches his ears and looks straight at me through the window glass. I fancy he likes the vibrations stroking his ears. Frequently, the rabbit is a complete distraction to students sitting at my dining room table for tutoring. While a rabbit might lend to research and discussion of mammals, rodents, or the differences between cottontails and jackrabbits; one rabbit does not facilitate a math lesson for nine-year-olds.
There are actually three that I know of. Occasionally, I see two of them sparring over food or territory in the small clearing. One time a third, and smaller, bunny huddled demurely in a clump of ricegrass, intently observing the contenders.
As dusk fell last week, a nine-year-old piano student looked up sharply from the keyboard, “There’s a rabbit!” she exclaimed.
“Yes, that’s my bunny.”
“Can you hold him and pet him?”
“No but I see him every morning and night and sometimes he stops to listen to me play the piano.”
“Can you put him in a cage and bring him inside?”
“Why would I want to do that?”
“To keep him warm. It is cold out there.”
“He has a fur coat and long underground tunnels were he keeps warm. He wants to be out right now.”
When I ponder the bunny in my front yard, some questions cross my mind:
Why would I want to take natural responsibility from the rabbit and smother it with artificial care and provision?
Why do I feel like something or someone belongs to me only if I can control them?
When I cannot control significant people, why do I feel they are no longer mine?
Why is it we want to catch and tame?
Can we not all live free and independent?
In truth, I see this bunny more often than I ever saw bunnies kept in a hutch. This bunny chooses to hop into my field of vision, forage on my doorstep. Bunnies in a cage are often forgotten but for chore time.
This year, I want to know more who I am each day; to pursue heartily the person I am created to be, though it may take me a few degrees outside my angle of comfort.
Happy New Year! I am only a few days late, so I’ll make it simple. My goal this year is the same as last: To live as though I have been given 365 days to live. Why reinvent the wheel? Some who have gone before have said it much better:
“The purpose of life, after all, is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experiences (Eleanor Roosevelt).”
“No Reserves. No Retreats. No Regrets (William Borden).”
Promptly with the new year, a new book crossed my path and was subsequently loaned me by a good friend. 20,000 Days and Counting (Robert D. Smith), is a slim manuscript, in which I found the words of William Borden quoted above. From the author himself, I enjoyed these nuggets which apply directly to 365 days to live:
“Live each day as if it were your last – imminent death inspires clarity of purpose.”
“There is no thought that will purge your priorities of worthless and worldly tastes like that of your impending death.”
For me, there are still many places to go and people to see. The year past was not one of travel and travel is on my bucket list. I still want to see the wonders of all 50 States and some foreign places as well. I want to talk deep and laugh with my children.
There were things I experienced this year that had not made it to my bucket list, yet made for richer life. I hiked most of the trails in Colorado National Monument; many in solitude, most in sunshine, and once in moonlight with my brother and sister-in-law. I plunged into the Colorado and Gunnison Rivers in a borrowed kayak with no reserves, no retreat, and certainly no regrets. I reclaimed my right to share my musical gift by singing in a quartet and tickling the ivories at retirement centers. My spirit has been too full of fear and reticence for over 50 years. May I remember, “I am always divinely guided…I will always take the right turn in the road…God will make a way where there is no way (Norman Vincent Peale).”
It’s all about relationships
In December of 2011, I glibly typed, “People who have only a year to live spend lots more time with family. They renew old friendships and polish up their relationships… I want to invest in life-long friendships and loving and tending of family.” So far, so good. I spent time with grandkids, my son, my DIL, my parents. It would have been nice to see my two younger children as often as I saw my two old friends.
Then I wrote, “There is no time to waste on pursuing or flirting with new relationships.”
Someone should have asked me: Please explain how you can play gigs at retirement centers, present singing valentines with a quartet, provide private piano lessons and elementary tutoring, be employed as a cashier; without embarking on new relationships?
What I meant was; I will not go chasing men or searching for new best friends.
Actually, a couple friends did question me. They were aghast that I did not feel I needed a man in my life. I knew better. I know that my singleness is the outcome of two failed marriages. Ultimately, the culprit in both cases was probably my dependence on the affirmation of a man.
But, what happened was; I found the perfect seasonal job where – gasp – I made new friends. Now this should not have taken me by surprise. I have a degree in Organizational Management. Over and over in classes such as Praxis of Organizational Health and Growth, I heard: no matter what your field, nor how difficult the labor; it is the people you work with who make it a good job or a bad job.
My summer and autumn months were full of sunshine, enjoyable work, professional relationships, endearing students. And yes, each I had to hold loosely, to stay until it was time for me to go. Mid-winter approaches. Enough of looking back. Time to move courageously into the next 365 days.
Andy Williams, Elvis Presley and Neil Diamond crooned, “Then I’ll stay, until it’s time for you to go (Buffy Sainte-Marie).” Though I am a tenaciously loyal soul, this has been my chosen motto and mission this year.
It is one thing to commit, in marriage, for life. Quite another to commit wholeheartedly when you don’t know how long the life of a project, activity or job may be. I am learning, ever so slowly, to hold things loosely, not to base my dreams, goals, or life on any one particular outcome, event or circumstance; not to control the response of another.
I am learning that you cannot force the outcome with relationships; job, social, spiritual, even love.
“The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image (Thomas Merton)”
One of the ways I let those I love – including me (because how can you love your neighbor as yourself if you don’t love yourself well enough?) – be perfectly themselves; one of the ways I remember to hold jobs and opportunities loosely; is to go about humming quietly:
“Don’t ask why,
Don’t ask how
Don’t ask forever…
I’ll stay until it’s time for me to go.”
Elvis, Neil Diamond, Andy Williams; they sang so convincingly. Now, the task is to convince myself.
If you have ever been on the care-taker side of codependent; continuously putting the needs of others above your own, you need to see this movie.
The message of “27 Dresses” was one I sorely needed to hear. It was about loyalty and persevering in service to others-to a fault. It was about a journalist who intuitively pointed out the flaw of the caretaker and, deft as a counselor, kept his focus on the issue and the cure. It was about a best friend who admits her own moral compass does not always point due north, but still cares enough to hold Jane accountable.
In the movie “27 Dresses” Jane finally learns to speak up for herself. The things she says are truths that need to be spoken. But, she does it all wrong. Her friend Casey points out that she unleashed 20 years of hurt in a cruel way. Instead of just going straight to the person and speaking the truth, Jane waited until she was completely angry and then exposed her sister publicly. People suffered. Jane suffered. Some important relationships were nearly lost.
I have been there before; both on the job and in the home. It is a place where you perform a small intervention (as it was termed in communications class), but something goes wrong. Either you do it horribly wrong or it is received in the worst possible way. The result is a complete and absolute end of the relationship. Talking has no result. Apologies go unheeded. Reconciliation and restoration are out of the question.
Why is it so hard for a people pleaser – someone who really does care about others- to speak directly? How is it we think that covert hints are better than direct confrontation; clever exposures more valid than courageously speaking our own needs? Is it wise to keep stuffing our own wants until we explode in overkill? As a result of covert, clever overkill; I have been accused of being mean and controlling for exposing the weaknesses and deceit of others, when I most want to be known as a loving and accommodating person.
“27 Dresses” is also a story about second chances. It turned out alright. Jane was contrite about doing it wrong and she immediately acted on doing things right to the favor of her future. Her sister took the chance to hear and be heard and it benefitted her future behavior as well. Both were better people for truth spoken and heeded.
Some things I covet from 27 Dresses:
1) friends who stick with you and hold you accountable until you do the right thing the right way; family who loves unconditionally, and the chance to keep practicing until you get it right.
2) to be like Jane, tirelessly doing unto others what I would have them do for me.
3) to be so true to myself that it raises the bar of loving my neighbor as I love myself.
Pretty strong messages for a chick-flick, don’t you think?
I have heard psychologists recommend it as important to get closure before the death of a significant other; to confront the father who abandoned, the mother who neglected or the parent who exacted too violent a punishment, however just. I know healthy adults who had these conversations with aging parents with happy result. Sin was acknowledged, forgiveness was offered and accepted – sometimes even begged.
When death comes unexpectedly soon and we are left with question after question and no closure; what then?
Many years ago, when I was a fresh divorcée; raw from every attempt to keep a husband who wanted freedom, I heard a panel of young widows on Focus on the Family. They were discussing with Dr. Dobson the pain of their loss. One said the most painful time was when she saw a man checking out at the store. From behind, he looked like her husband. She resisted the urge to run throw her arms about him and was devastated when he turned and the illusion was broken.
I knew something of that experience, and longed to give my response. Though the finality of divorce is a bit stickier than the finality of death; in a small town, the chances of actually meeting my estranged husband at the store were real. So too, the possibility of seeing him with another woman. Restraint was essential, denial useless.
Over time, I came to see that denial might have been faced with healthy result much earlier in the relationship. I endeavored to write a novel about it-to help others with my experience. That book and two others remain works in progress.
Enter psychologist turned author Bonnie Grove whose book “Talking to the Dead,” deals with similar issues of love and loss, appeasement and denial – and closure. Only this is closure with the already dead.
What do you think? What would you want? Is it better to unmask denial or betrayal and find closure with the living; or to discover, after death, those things you never wanted to know?