On the Divinity of Second Chances (8 page)

BOOK: On the Divinity of Second Chances
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“A) Cut that umbilical cord. The kids are grown-ups. Just because one resumes living here doesn’t mean you have to resume being a mother. B) What are you talking about—this new era of your life? Your life is a continuum.” I have just shown her the illusionary nature of her problems.
“A),” she mocks me, “My motherhood is a continuum. I wish it weren’t. I wish it was something I could retire from. You wouldn’t know anything about this kind of parenthood because you spent about a total of twenty minutes with the kids the entire time they were growing up.” She is too angry to regret this comment yet. “B) You also don’t know anything about menopause, or womanhood in general, so don’t presume you do. Don’t patronize me with your male approach to life. It doesn’t work for me.”
I stare at her angry face and listen to the clock tick fifteen times. Fifteen seconds seem like fifteen hours. I’m shocked by her insults directed at my well-intended attempts at problem solving. She stares right back, cold. What did I do to deserve this kind of hatred? Will someone please tell me? It’s got to be some misunderstanding that can surely be cleared up. I try to explain myself. “I wasn’t patronizing you. I was just trying to show you the illusionary nature of your problems.” Her eyes widen with disbelief and fury.
“Oh? Menopause is an illusion? I’m just dreaming this up? Go to hell, Phil.”
She storms out the kitchen doorway, and in a couple seconds, the front door slams. What just happened? I cannot come up with an action plan until I truly understand what the problem is, and I clearly do not truly understand what the problem is. I do not know that my marriage would survive another mitigation of the problem. Maybe it would be better just to not say anything for a while so that I can evaluate without making things worse. Maybe it’s just a phase that will pass on its own.
I take out my pocket calendar where I’ve been charting her menopausal symptoms. On today’s date, I write “anger” and “unreasonableness.” Yes, if I can only find the pattern, maybe I can predict the best times to talk to her. Yes, when I can organize her physiological chaos, I’ll be able to cope with her much better. I study the calendar and examine the last three months. No pattern yet. Not encouraging.
Anna on Cottonwoods
(May 31)
Since I don’t want to talk to Phil, I walk to the river with a bottle of Chardonnay and a glass. There, I find a place to sit, pour my wine, and breathe. I am in the natural world now. In the natural world, everything gets old, and if you study it, you find beauty in it. Here, among the ancient cottonwood trees that line the river, I find some peace. The tree feels motherly to me, sheltering me from the sun with her new leaves and providing me with a strong trunk to lean against. The humus of last year’s dead leaves creates a soft place for me to sit, like a grandmother’s lap. I lean back against the cottonwood grandmother, and wish this culture had elders who would explain to me this new era of my life. I feel overwhelmed.
I study the trees of all ages from the painter’s point of view. The young ones have little shape or form. They are not complex or particularly interesting. I would not choose to paint them. That one—that one over there is the one I would choose to paint. It has exquisite form. It’s gnarled, with swollen, knobby joints in its branches. With or without leaves, it would be a captivating subject. Is it only painters, black-and-white photographers, and wine tasters who can appreciate the beautiful complexity of aged beings?
I start my second glass of wine and wait for it to take some effect.
Olive on Packing
(June 1)
Michelle pours herself a cup of coffee in the employee lounge. “How was your weekend?” I ask as I pass by, find my coffee cup, remember I shouldn’t drink coffee, and put my cup back. Michelle always has a funny story, and I could use one.
“Oh, you know, it was a Twin Falls weekend.” Yes, I know. She’s explained it to me before. Twice a month now, she has to drive her baby down to Twin Falls and give her baby to a neutral party, who then gives him to her baby’s father for a few hours. Why the third party? Because she has a restraining order against him. After they broke up, he showed up at her house one night and tried to break in. I’d be damned if I’d hand my baby over to him. I’d leave the country first.
Somehow, Michelle’s story isn’t that funny this time. I try to distract myself with work, but the entire day, my mind keeps drifting back to Michelle and the position she’s in now with her baby and the baby’s father. By the end of the day, I have a splitting headache.
On my way out of the bank, I survey all the pictures of kids on people’s desks again. Probably thirty kids in all—all those kids in day care . . . all those kids being raised by someone else. What would it feel like to miss my child’s first steps? The questions keep ricocheting through my mind, intensifying my headache.
I walk through the revolving doors, glance back, and wonder what I’m dedicating my life to. This is my only life. I’m about to be a mother. Is this really how I want to spend it?
On the drive home, I look at Mont Soleil carefully. Where exactly do I fit in here? Not in the boutiques. Not in the five-star restaurants. Not in the numerous art galleries. Not at JPMorgan. I park my car and walk to my apartment. Jane and Shamiel, the neighbor kids who live on the other side of the couple that shout obscenities at each other, run toward me and start barking at me. I bark back. They stop barking and start panting with their tongues out. Jane licks my arm.
“Ew! Dog germs!” I shriek, and this makes Jane laugh.
“I’m wearing a pink shirt and pink pants,” Jane tells me.
Shamiel picks up where Jane left off. “Hey, guess what? Tomorrow I’m going to wear a black shirt and black pants! Hey, guess what? You should wear a green shirt and green pants tomorrow!”
“I’ll work on that,” I tell them.
Their little brother, Malcolm, comes running out of his door toward us. He’s wearing a blue shirt and no pants.
“Hey, Malcolm, how’s the potty-training going?” I ask.
Malcolm stops and looks at me thoughtfully. “I think there are little workers in my bottom . . . and when they look down and see the water, they pull a lever and let it all go.”
Shamiel looks at Malcolm like he’s full of it, and Jane rolls her eyes.
“Wow, Malcolm, how do you feel about that?”
“I feel . . . okay.”
“Good news,” I say.
Their mother comes running out of the house screaming for Malcolm.
“Uh-oh,” he says.
“Looks like you scared your mom,” I tell him.
They all run to her. She looks so tired.
I’m seeing mirrors everywhere and I know it. It’s just sinking in that Matt isn’t coming back. Even if he did, I can’t be sure that if I told him, he would abandon the tipi idea—I can’t be sure that he wouldn’t make things worse.
I let myself into my apartment and go to the half-empty bottle of Shiraz. I want to drink it, but I throw it out. I look around the kitchen, thinking about what to have instead. Garlic. I crave garlic. I love it. In fact, now that I’m single, I’m going to eat garlic every night. That’s right, I’m going to wear cotton underwear and smell like garlic. I think garlic was rumored to keep evil away because really it kept potential mates away, and really, aren’t all potential mates pretty much evil? Yep, they just devastate your life.
I order a garlic pizza and start packing photo albums, winter clothes, books, and wine glasses. I cushion the wineglasses with all the feminine hygiene products I won’t be using. I start a pile near the door, and add my ski equipment. I pack the CDs I haven’t listened to in months, and the things in my kitchen I’m unlikely to use, like cookie cutters and my Bundt pan. I pack my surplus towels, and decorative things like candleholders.
I am not a failure,
I repeat over and over. I say it, but really, I can’t believe how badly I’ve messed up my life.
I pack my books.
I’m doing this for my child
, I remind myself.
I am going to be one more woman with a picture of her child on her desk at the bank. To what end? How, exactly, is my plan so great for my child? What is the point in having a child if I just have to turn around and farm the baby out? Are these really my only two choices? Make my child live in poverty, or hardly see my baby at all?
I sit on a box of books and wonder if my thinking is too limited. Do I have choices I just don’t know about? What would my life look like if it could be anything I wanted? That’s the million-dollar question.
Matt knocks and lets himself in, finding me there sitting on the box, looking tired, a handkerchief keeping my hair out of my face. I look up at him with great disdain.
“You’re moving?”
“Why does that surprise you?”
He doesn’t answer my question. “Where are you going?”
“I’m sure not going to a tipi.” We stare each other down for a moment. As strongly as I dislike him now, for the sake of my baby, I need a moment of truth. I say a silent prayer: Please, God, if Matt is capable and willing to be a father to this baby, please give me a sign so I don’t needlessly rob my child of a father. If he shows me he’s willing and capable, I’ll make every effort to let go of my anger, open my heart, and create a new beginning. And now, to ask for the truth, but not leave my interests unprotected, I pose these questions to him: “Matt, what if we were living in the tipi and I got unexpectedly pregnant? Would you really expect me to raise children out there? Would you really think that was adequate shelter for a baby?”
“If you got ‘unexpectedly pregnant,’ I don’t think the issue would be whether or not a tipi is adequate shelter for a baby.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“The question would be: just how ‘unexpected’ was it? I mean, come on—if you don’t want to get pregnant, then you don’t. If we’re living in our tipi and you’re telling me all the time that you don’t want to get pregnant, and then all of a sudden it just ‘happens,’ I’d have to wonder just how accidental it was.”
“Are you saying I’d get pregnant on purpose?” I feel like I’m going to throw up.
“I’m saying I’d have to wonder. People do it all the time— you know, find ways to manipulate their partner, force them into things when it’s not what they want. I wouldn’t fall for it, that’s all I’m saying. I know you better than that. If you didn’t want to get pregnant, you wouldn’t.”
“Are you serious?! So if I did, it would be all my fault? I’d be trying to manipulate you? You really believe that?”
“I already told you what I think, but fine, let’s just say if we’re living in a tipi and you ‘accidentally’ get pregnant, I don’t know how that would really be my problem—adequate shelter and all those things. I’m pretty sure I’d be thinking more about why I’m living with someone I can’t trust and seriously wondering if that’s the type of person I really want to spend the rest of my life with.”
Wow. Signs don’t get much clearer than that. I swallow hard and thank God for a clear answer.
“So, where are you going anyway?” he asks again.
I look at him and shake my head, defeated. “Why do you care?” I didn’t realize how much I hoped his answer would have been different. I feel like a punctured tire with all the air draining out. “Look, Matt, I can’t afford this place without you. Your decision has turned my life upside down. Forgive me if I feel no need to tell you where I’m going.”
“Oh, I see, you’re punishing me.”
“Of course you’d think that. Here’s a news flash, Matt: I need to take care of myself now. I just want to get on with my life and know that you’re not going to show up at my door unannounced after I’ve moved on.”
“Right. You don’t want me showing up when you’re with a new boyfriend.”
“Exactly,” I respond, just to needle him. “Hey, you’re the one who left, not me. Did you think I was just going to wait around for you?” I get up and begin packing my coffeemaker and coffee mugs. “Why did you come here anyway?”
Matt can’t seem to remember. He stares at the floor.
“There’s a box of your stuff behind you,” I say. And there’s nothing more to say.
He picks up the box and leaves without saying another word.
Pearl on Her Husband
(June 1)
Henry just didn’t come home one night. I knew. I knew when he didn’t come in by nine that something was wrong. I was smart enough to know that. I watched the clock with dread as it moved from 8:30 to 9:00. I promised myself that promptly at nine I would take action. I knew. I knew nothing was going to change between 8:30 and 9:00. Sure, I hoped, but deep in my heart I knew. I called Mike Halvorsen at the sheriff ’s department and told him I was going to search for my husband. I asked him to please check in on us in case I found something I wasn’t prepared to handle. I hung up the phone and went to the shelf by the back door, found the big flashlight, put on my work boots, and started walking. I decided I’d best take the old Chevy pickup in case I had to transport Henry—in case he was still alive. I confess, I felt a little detached about what was going on. I knew what was going on, but it didn’t seem quite real to me. It didn’t and it did. I knew enough about what had probably happened to entertain the idea of what my life would look like if Henry was dead. I couldn’t quite picture it, but it felt like something lifting from me.
As I drove the old road to the back forty, I remembered riding my horse out there as a girl to bring my daddy his lunch or some cold water. This farm was so deeply in my blood, in my skin, and I recalled the sense of violation I had when Henry asked my father for my hand, married me, and then took over my home. He never acknowledged that this was my home. If I had been a man, it would have stayed my home. I thought about it a lot. It burned me. Marrying Henry seemed more like a business arrangement from the word go. His father owned the farm behind ours, and with Henry marrying me, our farms would merge to become one of the largest in the county. It made good sense to him, and it made good sense to our families. No one really asked if it made good sense to me. I was coming of age and needed a place to go. My parents did not welcome the burden of a grown daughter living with them any longer, one who would bring them shame if I turned down a perfectly good suitor. I owed my parents more than that. They didn’t deserve to be shamed or burdened. I married Henry. Henry must have known what I did not feel for him. I was more an observer and less a participant in our sex. Frankly, I never liked it. I found it quite repulsive actually. I did not like his corn in my field and I did not like his semen in my body. His presence polluted my home and my body. I tried to like him. I really did. I tried to think about the nice things he did—how he would chop wood for my parents, or occasionally treat me to a new dress. Little things mean a lot. That’s how I made it so long—thinking about those little things. Dutiful . . . Henry was dutiful. He knew his duties as a man, and he did them well, and for that, I could not complain. He protected, he provided, he was good to my parents. Being on the receiving end of a man’s duties always has a price, though. Some women don’t mind paying it. Some women enjoy paying it. I did not. After a few years, I wised up and lied. I told him he snored so loudly I couldn’t sleep and I went off to sleep in another room—in the room that was mine as a child. He didn’t question it. Maybe he was just as relieved. I don’t know.
BOOK: On the Divinity of Second Chances
12.54Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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