You are currently browsing the monthly archive for August 2008.
Kathy: Here is the Conversation We Never Had
My Mother: Herby asked me to marry him. What do you think?
Me: No. No. No. No.
Eleven year old friend: You have breasts because you drink a lot of milk.
Eleven year old Me: Actually, I drink a lot of Coke. Have you seen my mother?
My Grandfather: Don’t you think it’s time you started calling Herby, “Dad”?
Me: No No No No
Sister Celeste: I’m sorry dear, when I taught that your mother is an adulteress. I’ve found a loop hole in our Catholic doctrine, and I’m sure
she won’t burn in hell for her mortal sin of remarriage.
Me: Whew! Thank you Sister Celeste.
My Father: Maybe I should have let Herby adopt you?
Me: No No No No
Suit in a Boston bar: Where do you see yourself in ten years?
Me: Home raising babies, certainly not interviewing with scummy salesmen like you.
Neighbor: You go to OA? That’s hysterical.
Me: Not nearly as hysterical as me thinking you could hold my private life with sensitivity. I should have known not to trust a thin woman.
My Children: Will you drive me? Buy me? Let me? Give Me?
Me: No No No No
Third grade teacher: He’s not working up to his potential.
Me: No, YOU’RE not working up to YOUR potential. Now find a way to teach and inspire him, because when I gave him to you he had a hungry mind.
Friend: I’m going to be big about this.
Me: That sentence already tells me you’re not.
Another Friend: I don’t think you know how much more than me you talk.
Me: Oh, no, I know. I just let my guard down and stopped measuring my words with you when you told me you LIKED to listen to my stories. Oops!
Son: I bought a car, it needs some work, I just want to park it in the driveway for awhile.
Me: No No No No
Second Son: I want to follow my dreams, ski in Wyoming and work in a youth hostel.
Me: Probably didn’t need an $120,000 dollar degree in Criminal Justice to do that, huh?
Daughter: What do you think? I’m going to wait until I’m married?
Me: How about at least until you stop sleeping with stuffed animals?
Husband: We could live in India for six months.
Me: No No No No
Kim – Here is the conversation we never had…
We never said goodbye.
I knew you were in a tough place. The last conversation we had – a phone call separated by a thousand miles – I knew. But as usual, we shared our woes and made each other laugh. And I wrote myself a note. Call B. There you were. Right there, your name in front of me on a scrap of paper, when that late night call came. My immediate thought – “If I had called, would it have made a difference? Maybe you tried to call me, maybe my phone was busy…”
I was shocked but not surprised. You told me this is how it would end. I told you I wanted to grow old together, two forever friends sitting on a porch, laughing ourselves silly. You told me you had no intention of growing old.
You did this before, but you always came back to us. And so, I wove myself into a comfy cocoon of denial. You did it exactly as you told me you would. In one moment, you were gone.
I want to call you on the phone. I want to talk to the one person in this world who never thought I was odd. I want to bitch and swear and laugh together. I want to hear you say, “Hey, it’s me.” I want to talk about my boy. I want to hear your voice.
You never said goodbye.
Toni – The Conversation We Never Had
There are so many conversations I wish I could have. The man who’s standing in the middle of traffic on Mass. Ave, asking for money in a worn paper cup. “How did you get here?” I want to say to him. “You’re standing in traffic. I’m guilty. I’m in my car with my family on the way to the beach and you’re asking for money in the middle of a busy Boston intersection. I’m sorry your life has taken you here. I could be you and you could be me–I know life is this random. What can I do for you? I hate that you’re out here and I’d like to tell you that, but I don’t know how. Would it help if I did?” Instead, I don’t even roll down my window to give him a quarter, I look the other way and pretend he’s not there, let alone tell him that all this is running through my mind every time I see him.
What about the angry woman at the grocery checkout who is sure she’s been charged too much. She is angry from the start, even before she finds out the total. “That’s wrong,” she says in a nasty and accusatory tone. “Let me see the receipt. You charged me twice for the rutabaga.” I stand in back of her waiting, with seven more things on my list to do before my kids descend on the house and chaos breaks out. “Why are you reacting to being overcharged $1.29 as intensely as you would if you were falsely accused of being Adolf Hitler? Better yet, why are you so mad at the checkout girl who is probably a really nice and responsible person, maybe a college student, or a single mom. If she overcharged you for your rutabaga, she didn’t do it on purpose. There is no conspiracy. It’s just a mistake. And by the way, what are you really angry about?” I don’t say anything. I stand politely, shifting my weight from hip to hip and smile sympathetically at the poor girl behind the cash register.
The screaming corporeal punishment mother always makes me want to scream and give her a little corporeal punishment. Her child has been bad. Maybe he’s eaten some sand, taken one of perfect little Emma’s stupid toys, climbed up the slide instead of sliding down it. “I told you not to do that,” she bellows, grabbing him by the arm and dragging him over to the bench. “How many times have I told you not to do that. You don’t listen. You do not listen.” She hits him hard on the behind, as she continues the scolding. The tears well up in his eyes, as the steam streams out of the mom’s face. I sit back watching, wanting to get the mother’s attention. “What are you doing? Don’t you know this will be therapy session 79 – ” my – mother – used- to –hit – me – and – shame – me – when – i-did-something-like-sip-my-juice-before-she-said-i-could . Did your parents yell at you? Did they get out the belt when you were bad?” I want to ask her. I want tell her that there are better ways to show her son how to be in the world. I stay silent, thinking about how being a parent requires no license, no fitness test, just the ability to fuck.
I wish I could talk to the crazy driver who would rather hit your car than allow you to follow the rules of the road, which clearly state that when there is a traffic jam in a parking lot, or two lanes are being merged into one, one lane’s car goes, then the other lane’s car goes and so on. But this driver will not hear of it. He honks, shooting dirty looks at me, screaming “bitch, move your fucking car,” edging ridiculously close to my fender. I want to say, “are you going to hit me just to show me how mad you are, how right you are? Are you going to get out of your car and spit in my face? Are you going to give yourself a heart attack so you can get to wherever you’re going approximately 64 seconds earlier?” I ignore this guy, let the annoyance that feels like fire, keep igniting in my stomach and allow my day to be ruined, or at least the next several hours.
I’d really like to have a little conversation with Mr. Maniacal Baseball/Football/Soccer dad. The guy who watches his kids play like they’re in the Olympics, saying things when they fall down like, “What are you a girl, Billy? Get up.” Or the response to a missed at bat/touchdown/goal, “Pay attention, Max. Are you sleeping?” “Look dad,” I want to say, “You need to pull yourself together. It’s a game, dude. Your kid’s doing his best. Can you just mellow out and support him. Winning isn’t everything. Try and act like an adult who knows this is a game, not brain surgery or the cure for cancer.” I just sit, seething at these big babies who think they are real men. The best thing I can do is glare. No smile, no frown, just a pissy face. My best pissy face.
There are so many conversations I’d like to have, so many I will never have, that I will swallow. And I will wish that I were braver and wonder that if i were, if I might change the world just a little.
Barb – The Conversation We Never Had
We’ve never met but I feel I owe you a debt of gratitude. There are plenty of
questionsI would ask. What was he like growing up? How did you deal with four
kids? When did you leave? Was there a part of you still trapped in your body,
understanding but unable to communicate what you wanted to say?
I wonder how much of you I would see in him. What would you have said about
parenthood? I can see my mother’s mistakes but what about you? ( I hope to
make new and different ones, myself.) What would you have done differently?
He doesn’t speak of it much, but he does miss you. What makes a person make
the choices they do? He had options. Taking care of you didn’t seem require
much thought. Would I have had the strength to make the same choice?
At the same time during our separate lives, I was a lonely mess. That was more
selflessness than I certainly had. I couldn’t fathom the concept of not working
or dating (or trying to date in my case) because of the calls. “We found her
wandering in town; can you come pick her up?” The police always knew
who to call.
When he forgets things sometimes, I get scared. I know the genes aren’t
perfect. I knew it the day we married. I tell myself I went for quality, not
quantity. Still, I don’t know if I could handle watching him slowly forget me,
forget our life together. Knowing I’m not strong enough makes me push the
fear out of my head. ‘You’re being irrational’, I tell myself. Sometimes the
fear is as palpable as the fear of my own death.
He isn’t perfect either. He always leaves lights on, cabinet doors open, and
sundry items from his pockets on the closest clear surface. It’s the important
things that somehow worked. We are not born helpful, but he volunteered to
be an EMT. I know plenty of people have. What makes him almost alien to
me sometimes is the question of character. I don’t know how I would have
handled what he faced. Volunteering to care for strangers, sometimes ungrateful,
for no pay, and at all odd hours, much less putting your life on hold for someone you
love, that is uncommon character. It’s amazing to me that he thinks himself ordinary.
I doubt he was asked to give up so much to care for you. If I had to guess, I would
say he offered when no one else would. I’m sure to him, it just made sense.
What I find admirable is his having truly lived versus taking up space. Leaving
a footprint behind that’s more than carbon is a life well lived.
I was never as enthused as some about having a family, yet I know as sure as
breathing that this kind of character should live on. We are expecting a baby
girl soon. She will not know you directly, yet twenty years later, we still feel
your touch. Long ago, you gave two people you never knew an enormous gift.
You raised my soul mate and you gave my baby a father I hope she imitates.
Thank you.
Michele – Here is the Conversation We Never Had
How tired I grew of my own voice, the plaintive tone nearly begging you to respond. My desperation seemed to deepen your resistance. Almost a game to you, you took pride in how locked up you could stay, how little of you, you could share. You’ve admitted you don’t even share with yourself. Introspection is your enemy.
What makes a man so self-protected he cannot share his inner thinking with the woman he chose as his mate more than three decades ago? How is that with time, he used fewer words not more? Why would caution be the banner in the most intimate of relationships? We have shared childbirth, adoption, raising children, the arrival of grandchildren, the deaths of three parents, one grandparent and a special uncle, illness, injury, failure, triumph, three houses, a garden, many, many beaches, three golden retrievers, one cocker spaniel and countless cats, even though you claim to be allergic to them. Why then couldn’t we share words?
The less you said, the more I bled all over you with my words. The more I did to cope and struggle to save us, the more you were filled with inertia and later paralysis.
You controlled me with your silence. It was never enough. No matter how much I earned, how great the meal was or how supportive and understanding I tried to be. When I expected you to hold up your end of the bargain and provide me with some of what I gladly gave to you, you balked. As I grew angry and hurt and pressed you to tell me why you would not return what you readily accepted, you turned on me. It was my fault, you see. Something I did was always responsible for what you would not do. Devastated to think that I might be sabotaging your ability to contribute to our relationship, I retreated, apologetic and immobilized.
After some couples counseling nearly a decade ago, I caught on to this tactic. I learned how by turning on me, you diverted my focus, laid responsibility on me and evaded any complicity you had in our withering marriage.
Finally, when my body screamed, “No more, you’re killing me,” I quit. I asked you to leave because there were no more words to fill the gaping wound.
You never said, “I don’t want to lose you or the years we have spent raising a family, being together huddled in blizzards, under Palm trees, beneath flannel sheets.”
You never said, “I will miss you.”
You never said, “What can I do to prevent this from happening?”
You never said, “I am sorry for whatever role I have played in us coming to this point.”
You never said, “I love you.”
Terrie – Here is the conversation we never had
Here is the conversation we never had, Mom…the one where I tell you how angry I am at you and your brother for the lethal legacy you left behind. Did you know that every time someone commits suicide, the chance for another suicide in that family geometrically increases? It’s as if you and Mickey gave your blessings to your children and grandchildren to consider this as an option when things are painful or difficult. The taboo disappears. Instead of the old fighting Irish spirit we are all so proud of, instead of that indomitable mountaineer gumption, you passed down permission to cave.
So you don’t know how I felt when my lovely and luminous mermaid of a daughter, the one that wild animals would come up to, the one who saw angels at the foot of her bed when she was small, took a bottle of Tylenol when she was thirteen. You don’t know how I felt when I found her diary that night and read the entry written she was only nine: “I always think about my Granny Viv. One day I will probably do what she did.”
That is the night my sadness over your decision, my image of you as a victim, vanished. Instead I wept tears of fury and helplessness that turned into a fierce, protective anger. And when my daughter came home from the hospital, we began the hard work together, we talked about suicide, and we talked about you.
RAJKA – HERE IS CONVERSATION WE NEVER HAD
I am sitting on my patio, looking at the chair where you always sat. Stubborn chair still waits for you. It has witnessed many times the gigles of two adult women behaving like schoolgirls.
‘Do you remember how we met?’
‘‘Of course. I heard you before I saw you.’
‘How is that?’
“We were in Philosophy 101. The old McDowell asked us to introduce ourselves to the class. I heard this voice with an interesting accent. Turning around I saw a nice face of an“older”student. What a relief! I am not the only one,’
‘Yes, that was the beginning of a beautiful friendship. The kind that lasts forever. I never told you how it almost ended.’
“No way!’
“Oh, yes, the cloud of betrayal was floating between us when you divorced Jim and decided to go away, to find yourself. Our great inseparable friendship could not hold you here. I can understand that, but I could not understand why were you so secretive. The fact that you did not tell your best friend where you will be, broke the powerful bond we had.’
‘You know that you were the first person I invited to come to my cabin. That is surely the sign of deep friendship.’
‘This is what hurts. I could not tell you what I felt and thought. I am going to tell you now, even though you are just my memory of you in this chair.’
‘Hmm, than how can you have a conversation with me if I am not there?’
‘This is the only way I can tell you the truth. I was very excited. Jim drove me to your cabin in the backwoods of West Virginia. We drove as far as the car would go. Then we started walking through the wilderness on a narrow path that only one person could walk, often sideways.
More than half an hour later we arrived, both out of breath. I had mosquito and some unknown bugs bites. I do get hysterical about that. All I wanted to do is to hug you and take a shower, immediately. What I saw took my breath away. First time in our lives, I had to be a hypocrite I just could not tell you the truth.
“My goodness. What is happening to you? This is not a cabin. This is a shack. You even do not have a shower or a bathroom.”
“That is true. I have this large tub. When necessary I can heat up the water on the stove”
“Gee, I cannot believe that people heat their stoves with saw-dust. This is 21st century.
‘This is a great thing. I do not use electricity. I have as many environment friendly things as possible.”
‘I know. you were always concerned how to make our planet a better place to be.’
‘That is why I am here.’
“Sorry, may I use your bathroom?”
“Sure, it is right over there.”
I am looking in the direction you pointed out and do not see a bathroom. All I see is a miserable place put together with wooden boards. The outhouse.
“Oh, no! How disgusting. How can anybody live like this. I cannot stand looking at you in this horrible deserted forsaken place.”
“I love being here. Alone, becoming one with nature.’
“What happens when you need to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night? Walk over dirt to your outhouse?”
I wanted to leave immediately but could not hurt your feelings about your deep love for your miserable primitive life-style. To think that the day would come when I want to get away from you for reasons of comfort would seem improbable
***
At the end of the day, as the sun was setting and moon was peeking through pinkish clouds, we sat on the old wobbly bench and looked at the sun disappear behind the trees. It was a magical moment. I told my friend: “You certainly escaped from the hurly-burly of civilized life.”
We looked at each other and burst into laughter. Now I feel our friendship is and always will be with us, wherever we are.
Beth – The Conversation I Wanted to Have With You
You were often right there, sitting next to me. Our time together had more to do with proximity than conversation. It was mostly about feelings that were soulful and undefined, like a swath of fog pausing over the bowl of a pond, drifting over the leafy trees.
And I wondered about the purpose of our togetherness which seemed so genuinely real and comfortable as we walked side by side or shared a meal.
That untold awareness of each other extended into my later recollections as pleasant, yet puzzling. I wanted to have a conversation about the mystery of how two souls can share the same space in unaccustomed comfort, undefined by words.
Our eyes, our gaze shared the distance between us, but what I remember is plants in clay pots, their green leaves and pink flowers, and sinking my fingers deep into the dog’s fur. And the way you worked, with tenacity and drive, I breathed for us both and gave all of what I had to offer right up to the last.
When it was time to say good bye, we finally spoke and in my heart I am still listening to you, responding to you, still learning from you.
Julie – The Thing About This Body Is …
… She always knows better than I do – always. No matter what I have put Body through, no matter how I have criticized her, no matter what others have done to her, Body always remembers how to keep us alive. Of all the parts of me, Body is unquestionably the most miraculous.
Body started out this life in the usual cherubic baby way and we felt very adored. So our foundation was solid – well, mostly. There was that time when my Mom accidentally left us behind in a store. I am one of five daughters and when a cousin of ours once visited with us, my Mom counted 5 heads as usual (including my cousin, but not me), left the store and drove away. There we were, 4 year old Body and 4 year old me – alone, scared, forgotten. Big wound #1. We had to find somewhere to put that “I am forgettable” injury so Body began her new role as Keeper of the Pain.
Throughout most of our childhood Body and I got along famously. I was the perfect attendance kid and oh how we loved to move! Swinging on a swing, flipping on a trampoline, climbing the highest tree, jump rope, hopscotch, hula-hoops … we were just insatiably physical! And then we found Gymnastics – heaven on earth for Body and me. The ecstasy of tumbling, the rapture of performing and the perpetual pursuit of perfection just consumed Body and me. We found our passion, our purpose, our pathway to that glorious place where time stands still and all else ceases to exist. We found our Self.
So the blows of being teased in Jr. High and High School were cushioned by the joy of being Julie the Gymnast. Body had to store more than a few insults, several of which knocked the wind right out of us like a wrecking ball through the solar plexus. But we were tough, we were strong. Body and I were invincible. Or so we thought.
We could never have foreseen this. Body and I were clueless in every sense of the word. So when my beloved and most revered Gymnastics Coach decided that it was his right and his place to teach me more than just Gymnastics, we were blown apart – literally. I left. I just left poor Body to fend for herself. I went up and to the right and watched it all happen. Shock will do that to you, you know. It will jettison you right out of your own Body in an effort to self-preserve. This, of course, was faulty logic, but it was the best we could do under these excruciating, horrific, unendurable circumstances. In numerous ways this was the ultimate violation. This was the Mother of all wounds.
I eventually returned to Body – but not completely. And we were never the same. Where was Body to store all of this shame? How could I have abandoned her when she needed me most? And why was I perpetuating the agony by stuffing those secrets so deep into the cells of me? What’s a Body to do?
Well, we got anorexic for one thing. No more of those alluring, feminine curves. Fat was BAD so I removed as much of it as I could from Body to keep us safe. My intentions may have been noble, but they were severely misguided. Poor, starving Body. There was no such thing as “thin enough” so Body had to get sick to make me eat again. Round #1 of illness. Ironically, this was the only way Body could get me back health. But one misguided action invariably leads to another and another.
Throw in a heart break or ten and we were in serious trouble. Each emotional blow blew Body and I further and further off course. I would vacate my premises when our ridiculously high threshold for pain was maxed out and Body would have to get sick or injured in an attempt to pull me back in. After one too many of these vicious cycles spun me out of health, I got so frustrated with Body that she and I were barely on speaking terms. Body was failing me. I thought we were a team… .
Or was I failing Body? Body had endured the unimaginable – alone. Body had been raped and starved, under-slept and over-worked, under-appreciated and bitterly criticized. Body had housed all of my issues in her overloaded tissues for so many years. Hadn’t Body always been here for me? I owed body a long-overdue apology and a lifetime of gratitude.
Body and I have made 48 trips around the sun and at last I realize the truth. Body has been my most loyal friend. Body has been an incredibly resilient, remarkably resourceful gift from God. She’s my consummate hero and my Master teacher. In her own patient and loving way, she helps me remember that although I am not my Body, we are ultimately on the same team. Truth be told, my Body is a miracle. It has taken far too long for me to trust her again. I may have forgotten for a while, believing that I alone knew better. Thank God, Body always knew best.
Tyler – Here is the Conversation We Never Had
The conversation we are not having is that I am having a happy, productive
adult life and a lot of you are ruminating over insecurities and lost
opportunities. Perhaps it was my grabbing the reins and finishing college on
time, going into therapy, and coming out the closet to meet a high caliber man
like Brian. No one told you not to seek marital counseling sooner, no one forced
you to sit there and pretend things were going well, and no one told you not to
stand there paralyzed while people walked all over me. The rest of the
conversation would be the fact that as I write I get more and more in tune with
the truth. The truth is the only thing that should be published. Exaggeration
and fabrication are never tolerated in writing. What newspaper editor would
allow his editions to fall into the hands of daily readers knowing that the
information would be refuted? What book publisher wants it on his/her hands that an author sent in a manuscript that was full of embelishments.
Kudos do go out for the fact that I was able to finish high school and college on time. That fact and praise for it will never be taken away nor discredited. However, learning years and years later that you wished you had spoken up to the incompetent school bureaucrats, seeing how miserable I was for most of my education, and being uncomfortable with discussing my being gay took my years to finally steer through the invalidation. I guess when thinking about it further that nothing was done when the school principal did nothing about the incompetence or not speaking to the teacher all the times I came home from
school sobbing shows also that you’re vulnerable. That it must be difficult for
yourself to go through life being told what is right, what is proper, what is
parochial etc and then learn that some of your children may actually be unhappy,
that people do not want lives smitten with materialism, organized religion, and rooting for college sports teams.
Like the years it took me to accept being gay must be similar to years spent living in that other closet where people do not make expecations or that they do not meet those same
successful criterias that other parents’ children made.
I can see it now. Of the things I inherited I can see that in addition to
the command of the English language, having a life where it is easy to make
friends and good business relationships, I also inherited being human. The one
thing every person gets from their parents is their mortality above all else.
