It takes every bit of will power and positive thinking I can manage to visit the nursing home - it's a dismal and cheerless place where the poor are warehoused and neglected - thrown together like wounded animals and slowly dying from loneliness and fear and abandonment. This is a place where the poor receive marginal care at best, a landfill for the people we throw away, a shadowy and forgotten place for the disabled and the helpless. My friend Henry lives here - his hair is so long it almost reaches his shoulders, his fingernails are ragged and dirty, he needs a shower very badly, a change of clothes, a decent meal and a little hope. His paralyzed leg has atrophied and is now several inches shorter than his good one and the good one is swollen to twice it's normal size - keeping it elevated would help but there are no extra pillows so the nurses say with sullen indifference - as if he'd asked for magic waters or a miracle. His breath makes me flinch, his vision is failing, and his mind, once tack sharp and so quick I couldn't keep up, is now clouded and fuzzy. He's easily distracted and disoriented and it takes enormous effort to maintain his focus - he rambles and wanders, not always clear or coherent, often losing track of a simple sentence and forgetting his thought, then coming back with a sense of surprise. His only links to the outside world are an old and sometimes unreliable cell phone and a tired laptop with a monitor he can barely read - he doesn't always remember how either works and I wonder if the day might come when he won't know me. Everything about visiting him makes me angry, impatient, uncomfortable and guilty. He cries when I get up to leave and the part of me that loves him cringes but the rest of me runs down the dim hallways and past the blank faced residents parked in their wheelchairs, desperate to be outside in the clean air and away from this sad and hopeless place with its raw sounds and smells of sickness, amputated limbs, dementia and loneliness.
I've been harsh with him this visit, refusing to let him deflect with jokes and other foolishness, not letting him be evasive or change the subject. Through all the haze I thought I might have glimpsed a man about to take his first step into a new reality - and I pressed him. Talking about divorce isn't the same as getting one I'd told him flat out. Promising to call the therapist isn't the same as actually picking up the phone and making the call. Losing a daughter and granddaughter might be a consequence. And finally, don't start something you can't finish - I'll be by your side with every step if you decide to stand and fight, I'd told him, I'll help you up if you fall, but don't look for me to take the lead or do your fighting for you.
And these terrible phone calls have to stop, I warn him, a very unveiled reference to the dozens of calls he makes to me and the messages he leaves - hysterical and crying, begging and pleading for help I can't give and sometimes threatening suicide.
I'm sorry, he mumbles, Won't happen again.
But within a week the calls resume and with a heavy but hardened heart, I arrange to change the number of my cell. His case worker tells me I need to cut the ties and let him reach bottom - the stark truth of this old and familiar phrase strikes me like a hammer blow. I pack up my feelings, especially the guilt, put them in a box, wrap and tie it securely, add a tag that reads Obligation Met and lock it up in my mind.
Sometimes, I remember reading somewhere, You have to walk away from people, not because you don't care, but because they don't.
Centreville - aptly named for it's location, equidistant between the two end points of Long Island and with a population of 6 families and 8 working stills - was not sufficiently known to earn a place on any map. Its one claim to fame was the woman who lived in the only house at the end of Wits End Lane. For reasons no one ever asked about and she never explained, she had painted a street sign and nailed it to a tree at the nearly hidden intersection of Route 217 and a large number "27" made from small tree limbs was attached above her door. It was the only true cottage on the whole island - not a cabin or a shack or a farmhouse, but a true fairy tale cottage with a thatched roof, stone chimney, window boxes of herbs, a spectacular ocean view and several dozen cats. It sat at the very end of the dirt road, closely framed with large trees, their overhanging leaves nearly blotting out the sky. It was a place of shadows and magic and we would never have been completely surprised to have met an elf or even a troll as we made our way down the dirt road.
There were, of course, colorful rumors of second sight, communing with the dead, curses and spells and all manner of sorcery - Miss Glenda didn't encourage this kind of talk but on the other hand, she did nothing at all to contradict it. Her visitors, mostly children who were more fascinated than afraid, willingly carried tales of strange brews and hypnotic black cats, of disembodied voices and spectral lights, of cackling witchery. We loved the fanciful tiny cottage with its sounds and smells of chanting and spices. Miss Glenda told us frightful ghost stories and read us Edgar Allen Poe and Washington Irving - she kept a shelf of glass jars filled with powders and oils and dried leaves and if we were very, very good, might even tell us our fortunes with a deck of tarot cards. My agitated mother, angered and appalled at these goings on, set her foot down.
Superstitious claptrap! she snapped, You're not allowed there anymore!
She's harmless, Jan, my grandmother said mildly, Eccentric and lonely is all.
Never being a child to know when silence was the best course, I crossed my arms and stamped my feet defiantly. She'll turn you to stone if I ask her! I yelled back, Just you wait and see! It earned me a trip to the woodshed and no supper but Nana brought me biscuits with jam later - she put a finger to her lips and shushed me as she slipped through the door.
Nobody's turning anybody to stone, child, she said quietly and you'd do well to learn to hold your tongue.
A toad then, I said stubbornly, with warts.
Stop this nonsense and go to sleep this minute! my grandmother warned, I never heard such notions in all my born days!
Moonlight shone through the window by my bed and if I listened very hard I thought I could hear the tide washing up on the rocks, the night breeze rustling through the tall grass, the muffled sound of what might've been my grandmother laughing softly. I dreamed of toads and stone statues, whirlpools and witches and woke to a perfect day.
When I was a child, we had an old orange tom cat named Rusty, an overweight and laid back black and tan daschund named Fritz, and a small boned boxer named Lady. My mother cared for all three, taking on the responsibility with a resigned sigh and generally doing a better job with them than she did with her kids - they were far less demanding and rarely if ever talked back.
I've loved animals all my life, could never imagine a household without them and have never entirely trusted anyone who didn't feel the same.
With the exception of the black dog (in a moment of unparalleled weakness, the urge for a second Schipperke overcame me and I gave in and paid actual money for her), all my little ones are cast offs - found dodging city traffic or living under houses or just born unwanted. Whether they find me or I find them, they all share a common need for food, shelter, kindness and someone to love - not so very different, I think, from what we're all looking for. I suppose some overpaid shrink could find a link to my childhood here and make a case for a child being raised by a resentful and unloving mother growing up with a need for unconditional love - but for me, it's much less complicated - I didn't have to learn love of animals, it's in my DNA as surely as brown eyes or small feet. Be it a baby squirrel tumbled from its nest, a turtle at the side of the road, an orphaned bird in the backyard, or a stray cat or dog - if I had my way, I'd take the entire animal kingdom in (and there are those who would say I almost have).
No, no, no ....I told myself when I first saw Jessie, Butterbean, Zackary, Mischief, Murray, Muggs, Smudge, Maya and the Cat Who Still Lives in the Garage. Think of the expense, think of the responsibility, think of the pet hair and the fleas, think of your own mental health.
And I did.
Each time.
Right before I said yes.
Again.
You can't dispute DNA or argue with your own heart.
In any bad situation, I suspect that in our core, we know what's right and true - and while we might not tolerate it happening to someone else, we make an exception for our own selves. Honesty is one thing when you're dishing it out, quite another when you're searching for it in yourself - it's always easier to be brave for someone else.
Still, I think there's almost always a voice inside that tries to speak the truth. We cover our ears, shout it down with denial, overpower it with fear and self loathing - but it still fights to be heard. Now and then we strike an uneasy bargain - Okay, here's the deal. I'll admit it's true but then you shut up. And it stays between us. It's a bad bargain, a short term bandaid for a severed artery, but it works, it allows us the illusion that everything will be fine one of these days. At worst, we gain time to collect our wits and make a new plan to keep the secret. At best, it buys us time to think, to sort out, to examine. But all time is borrowed and it runs out.
We live in the spaces between what used to be, what is, and what might be. We live in fear of exposure, of abandonment, of failure or shame or loneliness. We live in separate rooms, sleep in separate beds, and learn to lead separate lives - but we admit it to no one. As bad as it might be, it's something we know, infinitely less frightening than something we don't. And of course there's always that nagging, persistent, other little voice - the one that likes to remind us we don't deserve anything more, certainly not a happy future.
Friends and family are mystified by us and enraged by what they perceive as stubborness, lack of self esteem,
self pity, inertia, indignation. But this I've learned - until you've lived it and breathed it, you simply can't explain it. And nobody can lead you out until you're ready to go.
Our little nurse is anything but ready to let go of life with a bad man. If you ask her, things are perfect and would be even more perfect if everyone else minded their own business. She doesn't bother to justify his actions, she simply denies them - it's all a misunderstanding, the missing money was just a loan she forgot to mention, her tears are from allergies, the witnesses are wrong. She's learned to make black just another shade of white and the rest of us can't tell the difference. Denial allows you to stand in the pouring rain and see yourself dry as a bone.
It's not so much that we're afraid of change or so in love with the old ways, but it's that place in between we fear. It's like being between trapezes. It's Linus when his blanket is in the dryer. There's nothing to hold
on to. ~ Marilyn Ferguson
For her, life with a bad man is still better than life alone. When I was in her place, no one could convince me otherwise and no one will convince her. It's the difference between giving up and moving on and it has to be learned, not taught.
Tizzie was already old and faded when I met her, her memory was unreliable and her thin, frail body was wearing out rapidly - she'd had two strokes and one heart attack but still refused to leave the little house on the lane where she'd been born and raised her sons and daughters, faithfully tended her garden and bred goats. Likely as not, she would die there, people said, but still each day she with the sunrise and worked til it set. Nana sent me to check on her several times a week and we usually stopped to pick her up and bring her home from church each Sunday - she would be waiting on her veranda in what my grandmother called her best go to meeting clothes - a plain black dress, stocky heeled hook and eye shoes, and a veiled bonnet, her Bible tucked under one arm and a basket of flowers in the other. Uncle Len had made her a cane which she carried but steadfastly refused to actually use so one of my brothers was sent to take her arm and lead her down the steps and into the old Lincoln. Another would help her out and escort her to her regular seat, always first on the aisle in the very front pew where she could see and hear James clearly, pretty much her only concession to her age and delicate health and definitely not (as I'd heard my grandmother suggest albeit not unkindly) because she still enjoyed making an entrance. She had been, I learned, an aspiring actress and model in her much younger days, had even made it to New York City for one memorable summer as an intern at The Neighborhood Playhouse - according to legend, had even studied however briefly with Martha Graham - before giving up the dream of stardom and returning home sadder but wiser, broke, cynical, a little lost and a lot pregnant. She'd been drawing water from the well when she miscarried, might've died but for Rowena's passing by. It was a tragic and painful final ending to her bright expectations - The saddest service I've ever attended, my grandmother told me one Sunday afternoon in The Memory Garden, Just ain't natural to outlive your children no matter how you come by 'em.
The small but vocal wages of sin crowd took a different view, of course. The more Tizzie refused to repent and be saved, the more they labeled and shunned her, no easy accomplishment for a tiny island community so closely knit and dependent upon one another. It was not until James preached a fiery and passionately Christian sermon on tolerance and stone throwing that they backed down - he didn't name names, but as Lillie remarked, They know who they are. After that, the wagging tongues were shamed into an uneasy but effective silence.
Tizzie buried her child and went on with her life. She eventually married one of the painters who had come to renovate a summer house, moved back into the little house on the lane, had four more children. Her life had not been easy and when it was her time, she took her bows and let go gracefully, content that she had done her best and that a new audience awaited.
Sitting on the screen porch of the cabin in the cool of the evening and listening to the wind make its way through the trees, I was once again of thinking of leaving.
It was an easy enough thing to do, a voice in my head kept repeating - pack your things, get in the car, go and don't look back. Everybody makes mistakes and there's still time to correct this one. Write it off, clear the slate, get on with your life and free yourself. This marriage is going to bury you if you stay.
I'd been having this same conversation with myself for years, so many in fact, that it was beginning to feel like a novel I'd read and reread a hundred times. I'd memorized both the pros (real) and the cons (imagined) and though the smart ending was clearly to start a new book, I kept coming back to the old, familiar one where I knew the plot and every word of dialogue, chiefly because it never changed. I tried desperately to believe each new pledge of sobriety, each tearful breakdown with its sorrowful old promises of change - and just as I was close to thinking it might be real this time - I'd open a cabinet or a closet or the washing machine and discover a fresh cache of empty beer cans. The following fight would rage for days or weeks, sometimes even for months, and then wear itself out. There might be a luke warm apology, there might not be, but in the end, exhausted and out of energy, I'd give up on the threats and ultimatums and tantrums and agree to start over. A few days or a few weeks later, the cycle would repeat all over again - it was as sure as the sun coming up each morning, as reliable as rain. And still, though I knew it was the right and only solution, though I'd witnessed the same sorry drama between my mother and daddy, still I couldn't bring myself to the exit, couldn't face and make public one more failure. Shame survives and rules because it's kept private - it's power was in my mind and my pride - disclose it and everyone would know the secret, might even pity or judge me. The thought was paralyzing.
I tried to rationalize my staying with fear.
I had nowhere to run.
I'd taken vows.
He wasn't evil, just sick.
I was loyal.
I was right.
I was not at fault.
I was afraid.
I'd be alone.
It took several more years but I did get out in the end - I didn't die of shame, didn't starve to death or end up homeless, didn't have to part with a single one of my animals. It was hard to admit that every reason I had for staying was wrong, harder still to finally realize that I'd been taken in. I'd confused love with sickness and codependency.
And now, as I watch this happen to a friend, I feel dragged back into the past. I want to shake her to her senses, want to scream at her. Instead, I focus on my work, my music, my photography. I set boundaries for our friendship, explain unacceptable behavior, define limits. I try to be gentle without pitying her, try to be there for her without enabling. Detachment isn't the same as abandonment, I remind myself, but sure as sin, it's hard to watch as everything slips away.
It's not my fault.
A friend posted his picture on the social networking site and my heart skipped a beat. Sensing the danger, I went immediately off line and crawled into bed, lulling myself to sleep with all the reasons that I'd be certifiable for taking in a third dog. To my dismay, the image crept creeping into my consciousness. Sleep didn't come and I found myself repeatedly waking and signing back on line - Yep, still there. Still precious. Still needing a home. Each and every time. By morning, it was clear to me that the battle was in its final stage - by then I was pretty sure I was on the losing side - the decision had been made the moment I saw that face, I realized, no amount of reason was going to prevail. The following day I filled out the adoption application, called my vet to instruct her to release my records ( and ask that she not tell the adoption agency that I was completely nuts ), stopped at the pet store for a new food dish, a collar and a lead. I didn't break the news to the five cats and two dogs already in residence. Everybody likes surprises, I told myself.
We met later that evening and any lingering doubt vanished the second I set eyes on him - small, wirehaired and dappled, his low to the ground thin frame and hopeful face took my heart at first sight and I for a moment I thought I would cry - but then he gave me a gentle, welcoming kiss and crawled into my arms and a feeling of rightness flooded through me.
He slept most of the way home, curled up in the passenger seat nose to tail, while I planned our grand entrance. I was prepared for some resistance but counting on his small size to reassure the family that he was no threat. I also thought that his being non-confrontational worked in out favor - no soap opera dog, this one - at the first sign of drama, I sensed that he would walk (but not run) away. And that was exactly how it happened. The small brown dog went from curious to completely accepting in a matter of minutes, the cats patted him down and basically shrugged him off, clearly indicating he wasn't worth their time or attention. Only the black dog showed any sign of hostility - showing her teeth when he got too close but after a few hours even she realized he was harmless. At one point when she gave him a warning growl, he sat down and cocked his head in puzzlement, then without giving so much as an inch, laid his head on his short, stubby little paws and just looked at her. I could almost see the wheels turning as she tried to decipher this body language and determine how to react and I confess, a part of me enjoyed her bewilderment.
Over the next day or so, we sort things out, summarize house rules, set up the logistics of who sleeps and eats where and when, and review the one immutable household law:
LITTER BOXES ARE OFF LIMITS
TO ALL NON CAT PERSONNEL
It's another mouth to feed, a higher vet bill, less space in the bed. More watchfulness will be required and my stress level is likely to rise.
It's also the best decision I've made in a long while.
As it did every Saturday night, the dance ended precisely at the stroke of midnight with Johnny Horton's version of "My Special Angel" and the crowd broke up and drifted off in small groups and pairs and alone. Some headed for Tiverton at the other end of the island, some piled into cars to make the last ferry to Westport. Gene and I, with Buttons dutifully leading the way, began the walk to The Point, in no rush to end the evening - we were young, there was a full moon, the scent of the ocean was in the air and the stars seemed close enough to touch.
Later that very early Sunday morning when I couldn't sleep, I slipped out of the house and walked down the front path to the water's edge and my favorite sitting rock. It was a place I often went to think, ponder, wonder and dream. The night was very still by then and the ocean serenely dark and calm - the boats at their moorings seemed like still lifes and what few lights were still shining might've been fireflies. I listened to the gentle tide washing up on shore, crickets sang and sometimes, though I couldn't see them, I imagined I heard the flutter of a seagull's wings. The soft summer night was just beginning to think about being morning when someone called my name - I turned and sensed rather than saw Sparrow's silhouette, not much more than a shadow on his front porch, his faraway features briefly lit by a match flare.
Up late for an old man, I said as I walked up the path toward him.
Mebbe, I heard him say, Or mebbe I'm jist up early. What be your exuse, girl?
I climbed the old steps and sat down Indian style by his rocking chair, accepted a hand rolled cigarette and declined a drink from his jug. The old hound dog by his feet woke just long enough to recognize and give me a friendly nudge. Sparrow just rocked and smoke, smoked and rocked.
Thinkin' 'bout marryin' that boy? he asked presently.
Thinkin' 'bout it, I admitted after a few seconds.
Won't work, he said mildly.
Why not? I heard myself ask, despite the certain knowledge that I didn't want to know.
The old man struck another match - his fingers tremored ever so slightly and his face, old and tired like dried out leather, was unreadable. First light was starting to work its way over Westport and I could tell it was going to be a clear, fine, island day - just the kind the summer people prayed for, the kind of day you might remember for a long time. The hound dog woke again, stretched and shook himself, then wandered down the steps, circled a patch of grass and gave a mighty yawn and eventually laid back down, his head resting on his front paws. Sparrow blew smoke rings into the lightening air, a trick he'd always refused to teach us, and leaned his head back to watch them break apart and vanish. I could've asked a second time but it'd have been a waste of time and breath - island folk spoke when they were ready and took a dim view of being rushed - and it was several more minutes before I realized that the old man had fallen asleep.
I finished the cigarette and ground it out just as it turned full dawn. Here, I dream, I thought to myself and headed home. Sparrow and the dog slept peacefully on.
It all came apart after thirty-two days of being married and she cried all day - bitter, angry tears she tried to keep hidden while struggling to stay focused on work and pretend nothing was wrong. I kept thinking of my adage for every occasion grandmother.... Marry in haste, repent at leisure, she would've said and shaken her head.
It's wrenching to discover someone you think you love wears a mask. In public, he's a devoted and loving husband, patient and affectionate, laid back and easy going, a gentle and good humored man who appeared when she was at her most vulnerable and rescued her.
Mask off, he makes her cry. He drinks and drugs and keeps rough company, piles on verbal and emotional abuse, makes the children edgy and keeps her in line with threats of suicide.
It makes me think of Robert Mitchum in "Night of the Hunter".
After thirty-two days, she's wrung out, exhausted, confused and borderline helpless - it shows in her eyes and her pale face and in her shaking hands. She may have been a willing victim but she didn't count on this and having been through the same kind of chaos and shame myself, my heart aches for her. I don't like the image of Shelly Winters dead at the bottom of a lake and her children on the run from a sadistic and sick imitation preacher.
My grandmother would've slapped her silly and railed until she came to her senses, called the police when he dragged her out of the car in full view of her family and children, stood her ground like a statue against the namecalling and verbal battering. And it would've been as useless as trying to empty the ocean with a teaspoon . A short and not so sweet twenty four hours later, things had turned around - she announced defiantly that she was sticking with him come hell or high water. By the following morning, her fifteen year old daughter had moved out, frightened, betrayed and devastated that her mother would put her second and choose a new husband over her own blood. Her sister pulled away and her mother was barely speaking to her. She didn't show for work and didn't bother to call.
Robert Mitchum was caught in "Night of the Hunter" and although the children were eventually rescued, their mother was still dead.
It was a happy ending, all things considered.
But that's the movies.
At least it can't get much worse, her younger sister tells me with a sigh.
Wanna bet?
Nothing to it, the sales rep assured me confidently, I'm putting the request through now and if you call back in a couple of hours, we'll have your new number for you.
Will they need anything beside my old phone number? I asked, trying to keep the suspicion out of my voice.
Absolutely not, he said with that programmed cheerfulness required by all customer service reps, It's as good as done.
Three hours later I dialed the number and explained to a new but equally perky sales rep that I had requested a change of telephone number for my cell phone and was calling to get the new number. He automatically told me how he would be more than happy to assist me and asked for my cell number - which I gave - and then my account number. When I said I didn't have it, I could almost hear him sigh but he regrouped quickly, asking for my name and address and telling me that he could look up my account number.
So, he resumed several minutes later, May I have your new number?
A gnawing feeling began to grow in my gut and reminding myself that nothing would be gained if I lost my temper this early, I patiently repeated that I didn't have the new number and that getting it was the purpose of my call.
Hmmmm, he mused, Let me check a little further for you.
The second wait was longer and the gnawing feeling was picking up speed and intensity.
There seems to be a problem, he began when he came back on the line, Your phone isn't equipped for a number change and you're going to need an upgrade. I'm transferring you to tech support.
The third wait was well into double digits and by then I was fuming. Tech support began with an apology for the delay - then an apology for the misinformation provided by their sales people and a third for the fact that I was going to be inconvenienced since a new phone wouldn't arrive for 3 - 5 days and my current phone wouldn't be working in the meantime.
And what is all this going to cost me? I asked tightly.
Let me check with my manager, he said a little too quickly, I'll see if we can get you a discount.
After the fourth wait - just under a full ten minutes this time - he was back. A few more apologies,a chipper attempt to sell me a more expensive monthly plan, an empty promise of free shipping and finally, the fact that the upgrade would be at no cost to me - a goodwill gesture for my loyalty and patronage.
Forty minutes of my life I'd never get back, I thought, trying to be philosophical.
Patience, Grasshopper.
Venom
One part fear, shame, humiliation or failure.
Add a healthy dose of guilt.
Stir in equal parts distrust, confusion and resentment.
Mix well with alcohol.
Season with neglect.
Top with verbal or physical abuse.
Serve chilled.
Although I never knew her to refer to one, my mother kept a collection of cookbooks on the kitchen counter where they grew old, faded and gathered dust. She'd received most of them as gifts - the thought of actually purchasing one seemed to offend her - and she cooked pretty much as she raised her children - on the fly,
when the mood struck, and rarely bothering to clean up the mess she left behind.
It was this memory that came to me on a recent visit to the nursing home to see my friend, Henry, and listened to him talk about his own daughter.
As a little girl, caught between two adults at war with each other, she mostly tried to keep out of the way. When taking sides was inescapable, she stood with her daddy - it was quieter, safer, a little more sane and as a general rule, comfortably predictable. As she grew up, she came to accept that madness was a way of life, that violence was the backdrop, and that she was the main point of friction. As a teenager she began to plan her escape - first college in another state, then the nearest and most faraway harbor she could find - marriage.Through it all she stayed on her daddy's side. Her mother's vicious tantrums and scenes were so second nature that she barely gave them a thought, becoming adept at shrugging off the wild behavior, the threats, the domination and escalating hostility. She never once stopped defending him, never once considered him anything except a victim. Even so, she fled as soon as possible, detaching and putting distance between herself and her parents. A child and divorce followed in quick succession and not long after her daddy's debilitating stroke, she remarried and abruptly changed direction, taking her mother's side with a fierce determination. This about face, brought on by the possibility of everything becoming public and destroying the carefully concealed facade of a marriage in desperate trouble, undid her and she turned on the man who had always protected her with a calculated vindictiveness no one would've thought possible. The little girl who had spent most of her life covering for him, taking his side, and repairing the damage, was suddenly a grown woman with a new outlook and a stunning new interpretation of what was was wrong with her parents' marriage - she turned angry and distant, refusing to visit, call, listen or forgive. She blamed him for it all, passionately justifying her mother's rage. At the mention of a divorce, she exploded.
You'll lose everything, she warned him coldly, Your home, me, your grandchild. You'll be all by yourself with no place to live, no money, and no one to take care of you. Now, leave me alone!
Her words, so hateful and so like her mother, struck him like a blow, doing more damage than the stroke itself.
Mind what you put on your children's plates.
