I was surprised that I woke up this morning. No reason. Just mildly surprised. I don’t remember any dreams--unusual for me. I start my day normally. Throwing up. I thought that would end now that I have reached the post partum phase, but no bother.
Without thought I begin moving forward. If I don’t go buy cat food today there will be a major riot. And while I’m at it, there are a few other things, and Rich and I are all about being efficient consumers of vehicle petrol. I’m starting to think this is a good idea. I can still be alone, but I’m getting out of the house and dipping my toe back into Normal.
I soon discover that just like the obituary, no amount of prepping, proofing, and preparing prevents me from making a few mistakes.
Our most favorite weekly errand is grocery shopping. We long ago fell into a thoughtless, comfortable pattern, disrupted or modified periodically over the past three years by the cancer. I head out and it occurs to me that I have not been to the grocery store in four weeks. Just now and then popping in and out of somewhere to pick up one or two critical items. Not OUR trip OUR way to OUR store. I am ten minutes out before I realize that cleaning out the fridge should have come before shopping.
When You spend three years cooking from scratch, and that routine comes to an abrupt halt, there is about three weeks worth of stuff in the fridge that needs to be put out of my misery. Oh well.
There is a “landmark” on our route. We call it the estate (not really an exaggeration) that has a lovely pond in front near the road and a sister pond not quite connected that is further back and curves around behind the mansion. Since the completion of the Estate, sometime within the past five years, a pair of swans took up residence in the ponds before the sod was completely laid. Since that time, at least once a week we drive past to run errands and every time look for the swans. Season after season. Every time.
Most times we see them. Once in awhile they’re out of sight from the road. But still, every time we slow and look, Their presence in that ideal setting started to take on meaning for us over time. Nothing that we analyzed or discussed, just a special thread in our tapestry. Like coins in a fountain, each insignificant encounter creating shiny speckles beneath the surface until each speckle blended into the whole and it was lovely.
I near the estate this morning and automatically slow by rote, and there is the pair of swans in the middle of the front pond, their white feathers glowing in the brilliant sunlight. Like to blind you. Swimming with them were five baby swans, just as white, not quite as graceful. All the air was sucked from my body and the tears gushed in wrenching silence. Not because Rich couldn’t see the baby swans. Because I couldn’t see his smile at the sight of them.
Quick maneuver out of the tailspin and I continue on. I spend too long in Pet Smart for cat food. Just because I can. I feel no panic to return to him as soon as possible, to get to his bedside. I allowed myself a moment with the dogs needing adoption confident that I have the sense to know it would not be a good idea. I spend a long time watching the birds. A long time. I pass the aisle with the pet rat food and giggle. No desire for a pet rat but I I’ve got a couple of Voices who want to entertain me with the various reactions that would be elicited by my acquiring a pet rat the day after my husband’s funeral.
Then the grocery store. Like most people, we have a favorite, and I’ve not been here in more than a month. As soon as the doors slide open for me, and the cool air and subtle, familiar scent hit me, I realize I may not have thought this through. One of the voices stops me from switching from my Rx sunglasses to my regular glasses. Good call.
How can something be so familiar and so foreign at the same time? Right off the rip I am slapped up the side of the head that I am no longer shopping with Rich or for Rich. I have to move past all the familiar, weekly items that are guided naturally into the cart. Up and down the aisles without purpose. I’m not shopping for us anymore. Just me. I have no one to cook for anymore. I try to shift gears, glad I have my extremely dark sunglasses on, dabbing at my eyes now and then, taking ease from the fact that I don’t look like a Diva-Wanna-Be; clearly I have an eye problem since I have to hold everything 4 inches from my nose to be sure of what I’m selecting.
And thank gawd for the Voice who kept my sunglasses on. Like everywhere Rich goes on a regular basis, half the employees here know and engage him at every visit. They’ve seen him at every stage, and when they couldn’t ignore his appearance they would ask, and he’d lightly, smiling tell them “just working on some pancreatic cancer. It’s going well.” then he’d make a joke and get them laughing.
Please, please, please don’t let anyone recognize me and ask after him.
Thank you heaven above for the Voices in the Van (now just the Voices), because when I cannot bring myself to suck energy from another person, or my desperate call goes to voicemail, any one or more of the Voices steps up and moves me along.
I made it!! I got through it. I ran the gauntlet of our favorite grocery store, where Rich stepped, stepped, leaned onto the cart and rolled down the aisle like a twelve year old; where he would call loudly from the other end of the aisle to me, “Pupshn! What size tampons am I supposed to get?”; where just the right song came on over the intercom and he stopped the cart, grabbed me up in his arms and danced me between the canned goods for a complete verse, kissed my cheek and released me to my giggling and blushing. Where every baby who caught sight of him locked on, eyes wide and their little mouth opened with a silent “ooohhhhh,”
I made it through the rush of memories I thought were lost in the trips with him struggling in the riding cart, and the stubborn weakness that transformed the shopping cart into a walker. I made it.
I leave the comfortably cool air, nearly bearable canned Muzak, and the fear and endure the blast of heat and blinding sunlight. Like a thousand times before I hit the button to open the hatch on the back of the van.
Instantly the heat and blinding light are gone. I’m gone.
Fuck, fuck, and double fuck.
There in the back of the van that should be empty and waiting for groceries are the clear plastic bags. The bags from the hospital with his clothes, shoes, hat and toiletries. The clear plastic bags with his last belongings I removed from hospice. The Britta water pitcher because I could not bare the thought of him drinking nasty tasting tap water. The gift he gave me at the birthday dinner he arranged for me in the hospital. The cheery bag with my birthday gift from the nurses on 5400.
I hear the Voices hotly whispering and arguing about who dropped the ball here. Just as I remember to breathe, I find myself entering a strange place that scares …even me. It’s one thing to spend energy trying to comfort other Humans; now I find myself in an unfamiliar dimension where I am trying to comfort the Voices. Unfortunately there was no one to dump a bucket of ice water on me. I was instantly, deeply scared like a grown person should not even remember being scared.
I start loading the van, on top of the plastic bags filled and visible with everything I’m thinking that I am not yet ready to see. All the time whispering, “it’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.”
The last item from cart to van is the little package of sushi. Another thread of us. A little, lovely tray of sushi that would sit on my lap like a reward after every weekly trip to the grocery store.. On the way home, a bite for me, then a bite for Rich, back and forth until it was gone. Yum. Magic energy to unload the van and put groceries away.
Without meaning to I went home a different way. I’ll see the swans again another day. Baby steps.
I emptied the van, groceries put away, but the plastic bags sit on the floor behind the love seat. Not visible from where I sit now, and as long as I don’t look down, I can walk past them without vaporizing.
I’m going to be okay. I have every intention of returning to normal. But you can’t take a three year journey and expect to stop, turn around and return in the wave of a wand. Today was the Beginning of the Firsts. They’ll continue to come, one at a time, and I can only hope they are properly spaced.
Yesterday was beautiful. But it was not closure for me, and luckily, I did not expect it to be. My closure is not like the closing of the door. I suspect that it comes in drops, changing and continuous until suddenly the clouds part and you suddenly stand upright and see the world without rain for the first time in a long time.
Okay. I’ve seen “Forrest Gump” way too many times.
Day One in the Beginning of the Firsts.
