I have a beloved sofa. The arms are very high. I sit sideways with my knees bent and my feet on its newly upholstered surface. I am wearing the ancient headphones – the curly corded ones that plug into the stereo receiver. I have on jeans and a black t-shirt. The lights are off except for the china cabinet. The flames of a dozen candles also shadow the room.
I have a glass of cool Merlot. A beautiful glass. A full-bodied wine.
The Cowboy Junkies are filling my head. And then AJ Roach. And then Leonard Cohen. And Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. The official mourning albums. Beautiful music, rich instruments, stunning voices all with an underlying sadness.
I sink into the sofa. I sink into my grief. Those four CDs have lived in the player for years now. The official mourning quartet.
When sadness hits me, my first instinct is to avoid it. Being busy. Being social. Being this, being that. But I have learned that sometimes I just need to wallow in it. Embrace the grief, the pain, the memories.
Eventually, the pain lessens, the memories make me smile and the grief becomes the love I can no longer share.
When we reach the beauty of grief, I will sometimes play Mozart’s Jupiter. Waving my hands in the air and conducting the invisible orchestra in my head. Reveling in the joy of the notes.
Great pain can be beautiful. A terrible beauty, a stark beauty, film noir. And then it emerges transformed into a different beauty. One to wrap my heart in. Almost a joy to behold.
They used to call them the small hours of the morning. 2, 3, 4 am…. small numbers, big eyes. All night long, I am up and down, rolling over, blankets on, blankets off, unable to sleep. Brain churning. Too late? Too early? To take a sleeping pill. Tomorrow–.today is going to be hell.
The talk radio inside my head gets especially loud in the small hours. I replay scenarios from the day, 10 years ago, my childhood, and ones that haven’t happened yet. I worry. I fret. I’d bite my nails but I gave up that habit decades ago.
My clearest memories begin when I was about 8. Things before that are just blurry snapshots of isolated events – none of them particularly memorable which makes it a mystery as to why I remember them.
Fifth grade is especially vivid. At school, they had started a new program for 5th graders. Funny, I remember the acronym SQ3. It involved us going from classroom to classroom for different teachers. I didn’t like it. Though we didn’t know it then, I was ADD and that disruption of moving from one class to another was a form of sabotage. While I remember my 3rd and 4th grade teachers, vividly, I have no idea who taught me in the 5th grade. Mostly, I just remember moving from one class to another. I do kind of remember the guy who taught us History. I wrote an extra credit report on Marco Polo. He questioned whether I wrote it or not. He said it sounded too grownup. I was shocked that he would think I had cheated. I assured him I had written it.
The stone path to the door in the tree is made up of stones too big to be called cobblestones. They are worn and broken in spots – the path was either once well used or has been abandoned for years. I can’t tell which.
The doorway calls to me. Has always called to me. I’m quite certain happiness and contentment lie behind it. I think it is the Tree of Life.
I’ve been trying to get there for years.
Sometimes the heels of my shoes are too high and I can’t negotiate the stone path. Other times, the atmosphere on the way to the door is too foreboding. To inaccessible. Too dark. Too far out of my way. Too something.
I am determined now to go through. I have kicked off my heels and stride barefoot through the forest. Vulnerable and a little bit afraid.
Most likely, the door will be hard to open. I think the hinges might groan. Might be rusted shut. I don’t think many people actually make it through that doorway. Not these days. The times are too — something. I’m supposed to be a wordsmith. I should be able to summon the right word. I can’t find it. Maybe unsettled. Complicated. Perilous. Insane.
If I get through….no…when I get through, I will paint the door red. In opposition to the Rolling Stones.
There is too much black already.
I am so weary.
Once on the other side, I think if I stand in the doorway and look out, the forest will be sun-dappled and green. The path is welcoming and not perilous. The tree may bear apples. Bright red and juicy. Plenty for me. Plenty for others.
I think once the journey is over, I may forget how arduous it was.
That might be a blessing. Reality, which has been far too much with me, tells me that is not likely.
It wasn’t easier with sturdy shoes. But approaching the door naked and with reverence seems the right thing to do now.
I have stripped myself of that which might hold me back. That may keep me from feeling all the feels. I am vulnerable, but I am strong.
I will stride as much as possible across those worn, broken rocks through the dark, dreary forest.
I am tired of the dark. Tired of dreary.
I am tired.
It’s now or never. This crosses my mind a lot. I don’t have a lot of years left. I have spent my life, it seems, in a perpetual state of stress. I can’t remember not being stressed. Not since I was 10. Fifty-three years of stress can kill you. Sap your will to live.
I haven’t lost that. I am not defeated. I am determined.
A second wind has energized me. Or maybe a third wind. Hundredth wind?
I’ve been at this for a long time.
What’s on the other side of the door?
I try to imagine it.
A cozy room with a narrow quilted bed, reading chair, and books?
Another doorway to a sunlit meadow brimming with flora and fauna. Ripe apples? Mine for the picking?
Nothing? Everything. Mindfulness instead of mindless existence.
I am weary of trying to reach that door and failing.
I don’t think I’ve been trying in the right ways. Tried tackling the path with someone or more than one someone by my side.
Nope.
Tried it alone but was fortified for battle and obstacle. Provisions, hiking books, walking stick, pith helmet. Camera to document the journey.
Nope.
Tried it tearful. Tried it prayerful. Tried it angry.
Now, no try, just do.
Yoda is perhaps the greatest philosopher of all time. Do or do not. There is no try.
Maybe all of life is just a journey. But that seems too despairing. There has to be a point. A destination. A place of fulfillment and ease.
Mustn’t there?
I intend to find out.
That door beckons. Has always beckoned. I will push it open.
W. Va. Fur and Root 