Happy happy....

So, Merry Christmas from Paul and me and Einstein.

The Invitation

This is kind of a year-end assesment I give myself; a poem by the Canadian poet Oriah Mountain Dreamer.  I hope you love it as much as I do.  Enjoy the holidays and the wonderful spirit of winter. 

The Invitation

By Oriah Mountain Dreamer

 

It doesn’t matter to me what you do for a living-

I want to know

What you ache for, and if you dare to dream

Of meeting your heart’s longing

 

It doesn’t matter to me how old you are-

I want to know if you risk looking like a fool

For love

For your dreams

For the adventure of being alive.

 

It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon-

I want to know if you have touched the center

Of your sorrow

If you have been opened by life’s betrayals,

Or have become shriveled or closed

From fear of further pain.

 

I want to know if you can sit with your own pain

Without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it.

 

I want to know if you can be with your own joy

If you can dance with wildness,

And let the ecstasy fill you

To the tips of your fingers and toes,

Without cautioning yourself

To be careful

To be realistic

Or to remember the limitations of being human.

 

If doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me is true-

I want to know if you can ‘disappoint’ another

To be true to yourself

If you can bear the accusation of ‘betrayal’

And not betray your own soul

If you can be ‘faithful’

And therefore trustworthy

 

I want to know if you can see beauty, even when it’s not pretty

Every day and if you source from your own life

Beauty’s presence.

 

I want to know if you can live with your failure

And still stand on the edge of the lake

And shout to the silver of the full moon

“Yes!”

 

It doesn’t interest me to know where you live

Or how much money you have-

I want to know if you can get up

After a night of grief and despair

Weary and bruised to the bone

And do what needs to be done for your family.

 

It doesn’t interest me who you know or how you came to

Be here-

I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with

Me and not shrink back.

 

It doesn’t interest me where, or what, or with you have

Studied-

I want to know what sustains you from inside

When all else falls away.

If you can be alone with yourself, and

If you truly like the company you keep

In the empty moments.

Whatsup with Susan Straight?

Check out what's new with the endlessly surprising Susan Straight:  her new book Between Heaven and Here, recently published by McSweeney's, which is the last in her triology.

 

Susan Straight (right) pictured with her three daughters.

Chapter One of Fanny's Memoir of love in Tulum

 

Chapter 1

I woke with the kind of snort that happens when you have your head resting back in the car or, more embarrassingly, at a meeting when you fall asleep at the conference table. I looked around, having forgotten where I was, then inhaled deeply as we passed a break in the seaside jungle and I saw the cobalt blue of the Caribbean Sea. “Incredible”, I said sleepily and then to my friend who was driving, “Ned. Look.”
“Beautiful” she replied.
“Magnificent”, I answered and then, pulling myself up in the seat, “Are we here?”
“I am pretty sure Vita e Bella is just around the corner”, Ned answered.
We were driving a white VW beetle with a bimini roof that we rented when we got off the plane from Boston in Cancun. We had been horribly lost in a maze of Cancun hotels and tourist bars, but now, after nearly 3 hours of clumsily driving this roller skate of a car, we saw the waves breaking over the reef as the jungle opened to expose Tulum beach once again.
“You made it”, I whispered to myself, as we pulled into the sand parking lot of “La Vita e Bella”, a group of brightly colored thatched roof cabanas called palapas that were tucked into the dune on the Mexican Caribbean.
We checked in, peeled winter clothes from our sweaty bodies, pulled on bikinis and walked down the stone steps that led to the beach and the beach bar. The sand was soft and white and the waves called to us to enter. “Let’s have a margarita”. It was always a drink with Ned. I never objected. I loved the fact that I never felt I drank much around my Irish buddy. Like Ned, I loved a cocktail. Unlike Ned, tall, blond and very able to drink, I was a petite, mousey haired athlete who could barely drink more than two glasses of wine without suffering for at least one day. Now I was leaner, not so resilient and much less able to tolerate alcohol. We sat on the patio in the sand and looked over the undulating cobalt blue that gently caressed the shore in front of us. I wiggled my feet into the sand as we sipped our cocktails.
Before we could order guacamole, two dark Mexican men in surfer shorts sat down with us. They didn’t ask, they just occupied the empty chairs at the table. they were slightly drunk, and seemed harmless and amusing. Neither was particularly handsome. The one who sat next to me was charming and the yellow tipped dreadlocks that framed his face made him somehow exotic. It was after 3 pm and he still had sleep in his eyes. His smile was contagious. As he spoke, I couldn’t help but stare at that speck of sleep still in his brown eyes. He spoke good English, certainly better than my nonexistent Spanish. But I found myself not listening, staring at that speck and wondering if he ever looked in a mirror. Then I realized he probably did not and that made him irresistible. Without warning, he lifted the sunglasses off the bridge of my nose to see my eyes.
“They are beautiful.” he said.
“I know.” I replied, putting my glasses on the table. My eyes were green, sometimes a little yellow and my favorite thing about myself.
“Want to swim?” I asked, dieing to get into the water.
“Of course”, he purred.
Not hesitating, he took my chair from behind me and helped me to my feet, taking my hand. Ned raised an eyebrow and I said, “I need to swim”, as I left her with her ‘friend’ and walked down the few stairs to the beach with a confidence and a flair I had only recently acquired. I was not sure if it was from surviving cancer, my surrender to taking a vacation and leaving it all behind, from the tequila after the long journey or from this indigenous man who was walking behind me. But I felt like someone everyone wanted to know. I turned back to look at him as I walked into the warm water and smiled.
“What is your name?” he called to me.
“Joanne. And yours?” I asked.
“Amador.” he said with the accent on the third syllable and a roll on the r.
“Hi Amador.” I said back, successfully rolling my r as well.
I dove into the soft waves, and let the water embrace me. I immediately felt new, not necessarily happy, but clean. I started to cry, forgetting anyone was there I was so moved by the sea, the alcohol and the warm breeze that touched my face when I surfaced. When Amador touched me, I was startled.
“I want to marry with you”, he told me as I turned to face him and let the sun dry my tears. I laughed, loudly, deeply, happily. Somehow, I was flattered, even if his remark was only amusing.
“You don’t even know me.” I replied looking into his eyes.
“I know you”, he said with certainty and continued, “and I want to marry with you.”
I smiled and swam away from him to put some distance between us. I was unsure how to respond and I wanted to just enjoy the sea. I wanted a love affair with the Caribbean, not another man. My experience with men hurt and I did not want any more hurt in my life. But what he said made me feel good and I wasn’t sure why. “Are you that damaged?” I asked myself.
He followed and I relished the attention. With the warmth of the air, the coolness of the sea, the beauty of the sun on the water and an interesting dark man with blond tipped dreads following me, I was in heaven. Amador swam up behind me and put his hand on my lower back. I turned quickly as electricity ran up my spine. I stopped and treaded water.
“Listen, we can be friends”, I said, “That is all. I am not sleeping with you, if that is what you are looking for.” I blurted and smiled at my frankness.
“Too bad,” he said, as if we were both missing something and then followed with, “But, o.k.”, and smiled an incredibly infectious smile. I marveled at his self-confidence.
Un-phased, he pointed to his side and asked me “See this scar?” I looked over, both of us treading water now.
He put my hand just above his waist and took my fingers to gently trace the outline of a 4-inch scar down his side.
“Ouch. That must have hurt.” I told him.
“Si. Baracuda,” he replied.
I laughed and said, “Oh, really?”
“And this one?” he asked as he took my hand and brought it down to his thigh where I felt the scar from a 2 inch gash. I started sinking since he had both my hands but I did not pull it back because, even though I feared it, I was enjoying the feel of a man.
I smiled and replied, “shark?” as my head went under the water and I took back my hand to swim back.
“How did you know?” he said as I surfaced and he followed me toward the shore.
I walked out of the sea and onto the beach that stretched for miles. In my red bikini with orange accents, pale and marvelously thin with baby hair on my head barley half an inch long, I looked different, perhaps alien to some. But I felt exceptional. No one here but Ned and I knew it was from cancer.
As he walked me back to the table, he asked, “May I kiss you?” I hesitated, looked into his brown eyes and noticed the sleep was no longer there. I made him wait a moment and then replied, “Just a little one”, and kissed him on the lips with my eyes open. Ned looked the other way. Her ‘friend’ had already started up the beach.
“Adios.” he said with a little melody to his voice.
“Adios.” I replied and sat down. Then he strolled down the stairs and along the beach. He did not look back as I watched him.
I looked at Ned and we laughed. She shook her head.
“You should have seen how everyone looked at you. They didn’t like that you swam with him”, she reported.
“Really? Why is that?” I asked.
“You know.” she said.
“No. Really. I don’t. What do you mean?” I honestly wanted to know.
“Well, he is black you know.”
I looked at her incredulously, not believing she said it. Then I smiled.
“No, he is not black. I know black and he is not.” I said with innuendo since the last man I let butcher my heart had been African American, Southern to boot. We both laughed. I let her racism slide but it bothered me. And, I could still feel the touch of his scars on my hand. I am not sure which bothered me more, her reaction to his color or how good it felt to be close to him. Before I became confused, I finished the rest of my margarita and put my head on the back of the chair to feel the sun and just be in that moment. I did not want to think about anything, so I forced myself to just feel and not think at all.

     copyright 2012Fanny Barry

Fanny Barry bares all in her memoir. Here's the Prologue.

Prologue

I was reading under the soft white mosqutio netting that covers my bed when I heard footsteps. I looked up, inhaled and strained to listen. I hoped it was only the ugly possum that sometimes cut across my property. But the steps continued toward me, a two legged animal. Barely breathing, I quietly came out from the netting to stand in the candlelit window of my Mexican casita.

In the moonlight, I saw the moving shadow of a man. I felt a sudden chill despite the hot jungle night air. The dogs joined me in the window, slightly agitated. Ama, my yellow lab mix let out a nervous bark as I lit the shadow with the flash light I kept by the bed. He continued moving toward us. It was my ex, Amador. I froze. The dogs did not move. It seemed that even the geckos stopped chirping as he moved closer.

“Amador, go away”, I finally rasped through what felt like a desert in my mouth.

I prayed he would leave. Yet there was a part of me that liked that he would not stay away. It was a sickness born of some sort of insecurity and low self-esteem, I knew. I had read the books, been to therapy, talked to myself in the mirror. I knew I was better than this. I was successful. I was together. I had hired and fired men with real credentials, real values. Amador didn’t even wear shoes. God knew the last time he had brushed his teeth. Yet, still, I had loved him. Truly. Passionately. Desperately. Some, including Amador, argued I still did.

“No. I no go. I want to talk to you.” he finally responded, continuing to progress toward me.

The throaty, sweet, heavily accented English frightened me where before it had seduced me into thinking he was the man I wanted. I admit, it was my fantasy. But it became real enough on occasion: that first night he reached for my hand and led me onto the dance floor barefoot, the nights we slept on the beach under the stars, the days he led me into the jungle to find birds by the clear fresh water cenotes, the nights he softly snored by my side with his leg over my body as if to hold me down. Too, I enjoyed breaking the social status quo by being a white woman with an ethnic man, and more, with a beach bum. I never dreamt that my socialist attitude was giving a junkie access and money to feed his addiction. I was his ‘vieja”, happy and proud to be with him, anti–establishment, breaking contrived barriers to ethnic people’s success. I was the gringa—smart, beautiful, capable of taking care of herself, a writer and an artist, an engineer who was an expert in her field and I gave this man value. But once I realized with whom I was and how deeply I was in, I was terrified. Once I saw clearly, it was too late and things started to fall apart.

“I don’t want to talk to you, Amador. Go away”, I said firmly, as I watched him advance onto the porch and held my dog Ama’s mouth to keep her quiet.

I strained to listen as he came up the outside stairway and I jumped at the sound of breaking glass as he kicked a votive candle on the way. Then he was on the balcony outside the upstairs bedroom. I silently cursed myself. Again, I was dealing with the drama of a drug addict who had taken all of my money and most of my love. We had crossed the line from love to hate. I was no longer rich and he was no longer loveable. I had vowed never again to live in these repeated dramatic episodes, the victim of his tirades, yet here I was.

I went to the double door that opened onto the balcony. I could see the outline of his body through the cracks in the oversized planks of dark tropical wood. I could hear his breathing as I tried to control my own. I put my back against the door, exhaled heavily and closed my eyes, as I tried to gain the strength to refuse to engage him.

Then his voice snapped. “Open the door”.

I stood motionless not knowing what to do.

“Oye, puta, abrir la puerta”, “Listen, cunt, open the door.” he commanded.

I put my back closer to it and closed my ears to his insults. I almost smiled as I remembered telling my friend over a bottle of wine that with Amador my nickname was “Pinche puta perra”, “Fucking whore and dog”. I lost the smile as I remembered it was after an episode that involved a police restraining order.

I answered, “No, I don’t want to talk to you.” and then, praying, “Please, just go away.”

“I not going anywhere puta. Open the door”, he said forcefully.

Then, he added in a voice filled with fatigue, “I just want my dry clothes.”

His voice was filled with pleading and reason as if I were over reacting. I hesitated, stayed silent and unglued my body from the door. I went to the bed, reached under the mosquito netting, and lifted my cell phone from the under the covers where I always kept it for emergency.

“The police?” I thought.

He would hear me dial and it would infuriate him. “30 to 45 minutes away at best”, I told myself. And I knew the police concept of emergency did not include domestic disputes. I kept the phone in my hand and walked to the open closet and pulled Amador’s clean, dry clothes from the shelf where I had put them that morning with love and the illusion that we could start again, maybe even have a life together.

“What were you thinking”, I asked myself critically.

I carried the clothes toward the bolted double door. Afraid to open it, I looked to the big screen window, opened that instead and handed the orange shorts and white shirt to him around the wooden support column. My hands were shaking as he took his things from me gently, touching my hands as if to hold them. I felt an electric attraction. He didn’t grab me. He just touched me, in a loving way. I was confused. He was quiet for a moment and I relaxed a little, thinking perhaps that was really all he wanted and he would quietly leave the way he had come: over the fence.

But suddenly, he pounded his fist on the door. I screamed, a high-pitched, girlish sound and then inhaled and chastised myself for the cry’s weakness. But no one was listening. I pressed my body back into the door.

“Don’t scream puta”, he commanded into the crack between the double doors.

I could hear the spittle on the sides of his mouth, like a rabid animal. I screamed again, fear overtaking my reflexes, and prayed for help. I knew my cries fell only on the jungle. My neighbors were close on either side but one set would ignore me, believing I deserved what I got from my ex-boyfriend. After all, I repeatedly let him back into my life. But what was I to do? Let him die on the street in front of my house? So many times he came to the door bloody and broken, or sad and with flowers, begging forgiveness and some food. It was hard to escape him and even more difficult to be hard.

On the other side of my house were Amador’s buddies and they generally returned well after 3 am. Regardless, abuse was another part of their routine.

“Don’t scream or I gonna knock the door and kill you,” he yelled.

Instinctively, I screamed again, loudly and forcefully, and searched for the correct buttons on the phone to dial the police.  Even in Mexico, they don’t condone killing their women.  As I hit the send key the door slammed against my back from outside. I fell to the floor on the other side of the room and saw the splintered deadbolt hit the floor next to me.  Amador followed, an animal looking for its prey.  When he saw me in the corner, he slowed and smiled cruelly as I pressed the phone to my ear.  He reached me in the exact moment that the call was connecting and, with the same twisted smile, ripped the phone from my hand and threw it against the far wall.  I screamed loudly in a rage of frustration. He grabbed my throat, forcing me to stop.  I started to choke under his tight grip.  Then, his face turned to an old photo negative and then disappeared as I lost consciousness.

 copyright 2012 @Fanny Barry

 

Susan Straight discusses restoring homes as an art form.

The great and funny Susan Straight, whose latest book is Between Here and Heaven, talks about home....in a new twist.

Mary Flood does it again: her poem "The Party's Over" will hit you right in the solar plexis! One of the Best of The Memoir Writing Conference 2012

The Party’s Over

By

Mary Flood

 

Sunday morning always meant mass

And breakfast after.

 

That cold Sunday morning our driveway was

Crowded with cars.

 

“A party,” my seven year old self thought.

We went to the front door like invited guests.

 

My mother and aunt greeted us.

“daddy went to heaven.”

 

I thought, “good for him.”

Wasn’t that what they told us in church?

 

“Live a good life so you can go to heaven.”

Daddy did that as well as he did everything else.

 

Why was everyone crying?

So many grown ups with tears on their cheeks.

 

I squeezed out a tear or two myself

Although I wasn’t really sure why.

 

And though I didn’t know it then,

The party was over.

 

Copyright 2012© Mary Flood

Peggy Fagan's "Packing" is a beautiful meditation on the bittersweet chore of dismantling your childhood house. One of the Best of the Memoir Writing Conference 2012.

Packing

By

Peggy Fagan

 

 It is a long lonely process, dismantling all of the stuff of one's youth, the dusty old toys, the moth-eaten books, the 'Game of Life' well used, played constantly, giving us no idea that life is not a game, but a long hard road with very few shortcuts to happiness. My father's house is a house of memories, some good, more not so good. Getting him packed up and moved from here seems like the right thing to do, but the cost is high. The unpleasant echoes of violent arguments heard through sheet-rock walls still frighten me, along with the ghostly clinking of ice in a glass in a darkened room at night, forcing one to tiptoe past the door in the hopes of not being observed. I can hear weeping, and I don't know whose it is, mine or Mom's. Her life of sadness and disappointment saturate these walls, the air is thick with despair and I find it hard to breathe. This packing must be done, and so we forge ahead.

       The always-creepy basement is full of ghosts. My friend Joanie in her sleeping bag, shivering while Pat told those scary stories about men with hooks for hands and monsters lurking outside waiting maim and kill small children and teenagers in the most horrific manner. Those stories caused a fear of the dark that has stayed with me for over 40 years. I run up the basement stairs still feeling that tingling between my shoulder blades, still.

The old pool table stands forlorn, pockets empty, cue sticks tip-less, chalk useless. The bar, so cool with it’s own sink and Naugahyde covered swiveling bar stools where we would spin ourselves far out into another galaxy...close our eyes and spin, faster and faster until once stopped, the world revolved around the us, the spinners, our disorientation and escape complete, if only for a few moments.

        Everything seems so small, so much smaller than my memory recalls. Nannie's china chest, filled with irresistible, untouchable trinkets: now the doors are open wide. Dad’s scary table saw that sounded late at night: that night when hollering woke me to the blood stains that trailed down the hallway as a neighbor tried to wipe them up. Daddy had an accident, it's okay, go back to bed. OK.

      The rest of the house filled with treasures gathered from far away places. A few of them will go to new homes, cherished family heirlooms. But what of the rest of the items so lovingly collected and displayed? How does one get rid of things that were bought for their beauty or novelty, the buyer on a gleeful holiday free of any inkling of what the future holds? These items now sit on the dining room table, next to the breakfront filled with the precious china and leaded crystal goblets that made the table at the holidays so beautiful and festive. It is hard to look at these things and not think about how much they were loved, how dear they were, how much pleasure they brought to the one gazing through the glass. But there is so much collected in a large house where seven people lived their lives, lives truly of ‘quiet desperation'. Who wants all of these things? What do they all mean? After all, they are just things. But they meant something to the one who brought them home and they feel important in someway. Maybe it is the memories stored away family visits. Those memories remain after the things are gone but are somehow diminished when these things are treated as if they have no value.

     The attic is a magpie's nest of cards and letters and photos saved over the course of almost 60 years. Tiny bridal shower cards, with Mom's dearly familiar handwriting on the back detailing the gift that came with them, wedding cards with sweet little flowers and glitter, baby showers, birth announcements, kindergarten graduation certificates, the beginnings of a family and a life with all of the hopes and dreams that accompany young love. All of it saved in an attic that suffered invasions by rapacious raccoons, squirrels and other chewing critters that ate their way through most of that hope and left the remains piled in the corners. All of those things so lovingly saved, so precious, so ruined, meaning nothing to the one who was left behind. The sadness of sweeping up and throwing away these things is overwhelming, the resharpened feeling of loss and heartache cutting back through to the surface. Tears leave wet tracks down my cheeks    

       There is one box, untouched by the marauders, just a shoe box, just a treasure chest of photos of childhood friends, of letters written by young friends long forgotten, letters from the once cherished, now estranged sister, from beloved grandparents written in that fractured English that 50 years of living in America could not fix. Pages of bad poetry, reading of longing and loss wishes unfulfilled, pages of teen-aged angst that still feels all too familiar.

     There is more, much more before this project of packaging up 50 years of life will be complete. There is no escaping the memories, they are there in every item picked up and wrapped : sometimes they slip in, causing a rueful smile, other times they are like a sucker punch to the midsection, leaving a weeping wreck in their wake. But this job must be done; this move must be made in this life, so close to over. It is a long process, sad and hard, with few light moments in between.

     New memories are made every day and gradually replace the melancholy of the old, my life is truly happier now; the good finally outweighs the bad. When this project is complete, and the move to a new life is made, my father will settle in his new chair in front of his beloved television, clinking glass in hand, with the few chosen mementos carefully placed around him. And for him the old memories will slowly fade into the background.

     Hopefully for me, what remains of the past will lose its sting of sadness and I will finally come to an accommodation with my past, with my losses, and I will put the memories away in a quiet place, to trouble me no more. I can only hope.

 

Copyright 2012© Peggy Fagan

It's always hard to get dumped....Jane Kenealy tells us in spectacular detail why that is! Enjoy. West Virginia in My Head by Jane Kenealy--one of the Best of the Memoir Writing Conference 2012

 

 

West Virginia in My Head

By

Jane Kenealy

I am an ex-reference librarian, occasional bakery clerk, and novice web designer. I began my first novel when I was seven, but had to abandon the project when I lost my pencil.

 

He came home, and went upstairs in silence.  No “good night”.  No “I’m going to bed.”  As usual, nothing.  I sat in my chair and watched him go up the steps, my legs curled up toward my body, my arms cradling my stomach.  I had confronted him a week ago about the other woman, and he had sworn that he would end it.  But then he had gone out again that very night, and every night thereafter.  This whole past week had been one of silences from him, and reading relationship rescue books for me.  Things were not going well. 

      I looked at the cover of the latest chirpy “you can fix it if you try” book that I had gotten from the library, and felt myself giving up, at least for the night.  I crept up the stairs to bed, quietly, each step careful to avoid the old house creaks.  I didn’t want to disturb him.  He got up earlier than I.  He was snoring already, just slightly.  I carefully crawled into my side of the bed.

            His cell phone lay on his dresser, mocking me.  West Virginia stirred, and I heard Nanny’s voice in my head.  “How long are you going to go on like this, child?.”  “Not long,” I thought.  “Not long at all.”  “Then get up out of that bed and DO SOMETHING.”  I obeyed, and slid my legs back out from under the sheets.  I reached for the cell and walked back downstairs, making the right at the bottom to go into the dining room.  I thumbed the machine on, and hit the menu choice for “Outgoing Calls”.  He had called Her five minutes after leaving home that night.

            Nanny was wide awake now.  “He ate your food and then called his hoore?”  Her remembered twang turned the noun into some sort of medieval epithet.  “He ate your food and then called his hoore with your dinner in his belly?”  Somehow that made it all worse: the ultimate insult.

            Nanny picked up a cast iron frying pan, and I picked up the cell phone that I had dropped.  We went back up the stairs together.

            I stood in the doorway, looking at the huddle of sheets that was my lying, cheating husband.  I hefted the phone in my hand, wanting to throw it at him, longing to scream unforgivable unforgettable devastatingly wounding things just this once.  My heart was banging in my ears, barely drowning out Nanny’s rumbles of rage.  “Heck, that little thing isn’t going to teach him anything.  You need a good frying pan.  Here.  Take mine.  Now that will get his attention.  Do some damage.  Show him you mean business.”

            “All that will do is get me arrested.”  I pictured the squib in the next day’s Times-News police blotter: “Angry librarian attacks husband with kitchen appliance.”  The Times-News always got things a little off-kilter.  Not good.  I would end up shamed when I was not the one who had done anything to be ashamed of.  Peter, the bastard, would become an automatic object of pity and concern.  “So sad.  Who knew she was so crazy.  What he must have put up with,” the populace would cluck.  He would love it.

            “Shut up, Nanny,” I told the voice in my head.  “There’s got to be a better way.  One that will shame him.  One that will remove him.”  “One that will teach him good!” Nanny piped up.  “No, Nan.  I’m not interested in him learning anything.  I just want him gone.”

            I turned and slid back downstairs, the phone still in my hand.  “Knowledge is powe,” I remembered from the posters at work.  This time I went through each text message, scanning it, then forwarding it to my work email.  Logging the days and times and numbers of the regular calls on the back of an old envelope.  Rummaging through his contacts list, and writing down Her phone number.  I worried momentarily that he would notice that I had been messing in his phone, but remembered that for all his pride in his technological know-how, he was really just a child performing simple monkey tricks when it came to electronics.  He could barely handle his email or find a document once he had saved it.  I was the technogeek of the family.  

            Guilt began to pick at me.  I was invading his privacy.  Dewey and a century of librarians waggled their collective fingers at me.  I told them to shut up too.

            I sat back in my chair again, brain spinning.  What to do?  How? What? The guilt thing rose up again.  How could I think of doing something to my husband?  Maybe I really was crazy.  I had my dead grandmother screaming in my head.  Was that normal?  Then I looked again at the stream of daily messages to Her.  I slid the plain gold band off my finger for the first time in twenty-eight years.  “I divorce thee,” I whispered to it.  “I divorce thee.  I divorce thee.”  I placed the ring carefully on the table by my chair.  It had meant something to me.  But women in my family just plain did not divorce.  There had to be another way......

Copyright 2012 © Jane Kenealy

Between Heaven and Here

 

Susan Straight's eighth novel was published yesterday.  Read this fascinating piece on how an image can spark a story. 

 

 

Artist and writer, Fanny Banny, talks about "The Point" in her terrific memoir piece. Another "Best of the Memoir Writing Conference 2012". Grab a cuppa Joe and enjoy!

The Point

By

Fanny Barry

Fanny Barry writes, paints and teaches yoga in Tulum Mexico.

 

I closed the door of the phone booth and felt the remoteness of where I had chosen to live.  My house had no signal for a cell phone and “land lines” were only available in the pueblo, 20 minutes away. I liked being out of touch yet sometimes I needed someone. I dialed my mom, waited and hung up just before the click for voicemail.  I left the “casita telefonica”, little house of phones, and shuffled down the nearly empty, dusty Avenida Tulum, and recalled phone conversations from just more than a year before. 

“It is cancer Mom. Sorry.” I felt badly. 

“Oh my,” she said and then, “Don’t be silly Joanne. Nothing to be sorry about.”  Her voice cracked as she asked.  “What did they say?”

“They called me this afternoon and told me, just like that,” I said, starting to cry.

“Are you ok?  Want me to come see you?” she asked.

“No.” I fought tears.  “No Mom, it’s late. Is Calzi there?” I asked.

“She is, of course, sweetheart.  Talk to the nurse.”  Calzi was also my sister and best friend.  “But if you need anything, just call.  I’m here”, she reminded me.

“Thanks Mom,” I meant it.

As she passed the phone, I started to cry.

“Hey Fans what is up?  Mom looked worried.”

“I have cancer, Calzi.  Can you believe it? Fuck sake.  They said ‘metastatic’,” I blurted through tears.

She said softly, “Shit,” and paused before she asked slowly. “What exactly did they say?”

“Well, I know they said that word because I asked about it.  But I mean, to tell me that on the phone. What the fuck?” I knew I could confide in her.

“I am sure there is more to it,” she said confidently.

“They’ll call tomorrow.  But shit.  Really, doesn’t metastatic mean everywhere?” I had to know.

“Depends Fans. Don’t worry,” she said and then followed with, “Shit. Want me to come up?  Are you ok?” 

I had not been afraid but now I felt unsure.

“I am a mess but I am ok.  I mean, what can I do, right?  She told me to call a surgeon.”  I started to cry.  “Like I have one. It is so messed up.”  I took a deep breath, “Yeah, I guess you could say I am a little freaked out.”

“Understandable”, she said and then, “I cannot believe she would tell you that on the phone.”

“Me neither,” I agreed.

Calzi continued, “Well, get some rest and call me tomorrow after you hear, ok?”

“Okay,” I said and then, “Calzi?”

“Yeah?” 

I hesitated and then asked, “Don’t tell anyone, ok?”

“Okay.  But why?” She sounded incredulous.

“ I don’t know.  Just don’t, O.K.?  Ask Mom not to as well, would you?  Not until we know.”  I was surprised, but I felt embarrassed and didn’t want anyone to know.

She didn’t understand.  “Stay cool, Fans.” she told me. “There are a million more things you need to know”.

“Really?” I needed to hear it again.

“Yes,” she said definitively and then followed with, “Shit, yes,” which somehow inspired much more confidence. “There are lots of different cancers and different metastatic cancers too. Okay?”

“Okay.”  I was a little more comfortable in my own skin.”

“You sure you will be alright on your own?” she asked me.

I loved that she cared about me.  “I’ll be okay.  I’ll be asleep before you could even get here.”

“I love you Fans.”

“Love you too Calzi.”

“Call me tomorrow,” she reminded me.

“Will do. Give Mom a smooch for me, okay?  Tell her I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.  You have nothing to be sorry for.  Now, go on.  I love you”, she said.

I was smiling when I hung up. 

The next day, Dr. K called me at work.  I forced myself to answer.  I was so afraid.

“Hello?” I said quietly.  I did not want anyone to hear through the thin walls of my cube.

“Ms. Barry?” Dr. K asked.

“Yes Dr. K?”

“The next series of tests determined it is only breast cancer.” she said almost happily.

My heart stopped pounding, “only breast cancer”.  I had hoped she would say it was all a mistake.

“Great,” I said, meaning it but not liking it, “Only breast cancer.  Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” she said sincerely and then, “We will forward the results to your primary care physician, Dr. Gleysteen, right?” 

“Yes,” I confirmed and then asked, “Is there something I should be doing?”

“Did you contact Dr. Koufman, the surgeon”, she asked.

 “Yes but I need a referral.”  The insurance companies had more than a few rules.

“Stay on top of it”, she cautioned.

“Okay.”  I mean, did anyone just forget that their doctor told them they had cancer?

“Good luck, Ms. Barry,”she said genuinely.

“Thanks very much.” 

I hung up and repeated, “Only breast cancer”.  I didn’t know what to do. Should I be happy?  I called Calzi and thought, “Breast cancer they can take care of, can’t they?”

“Only breast cancer.” I said when she picked up the phone and I started to laugh, a nervous silly laugh.

She asked me, “Fans, you ok?” 

“Yeah, just relieved.”  I couldn’t stop laughing.  “Funny how breast cancer could make me so happy.”

“Well, it is good news, relatively speaking.” she admitted.

“Everything is relative, as Dad used to say.  I am going to call Mom.”

“Yeah, call her. She needs to hear from you”, Calzi said.  “At least we can do something with breast cancer. Do you know what to do next?  I mean, what did they tell you?”

“To call a surgeon.”

“Do you have one you like?” she asked me.

“I have an appointment Friday.  But I need a referral.” I told her.

“Shouldn’t be hard to get. I’ll go with you” It was not a question.

“Are you sure Calzi.  I mean, it will take your whole day.”

“Fanny, don’t start.”, she nearly scolded.

“That would be great”, I said and then, “Thanks Calzi”.

“We can drive together.  What time?” She was all business.

“The appointment is at 2 on Beacon Street.” I was thrilled to have her help me.

“I will be there around one.  Love you, Fans.  Call if you need anything, ok?” she reminded me. 

“I love you too.”

We hung up and I walked outside to call my mom.

 “Sweetheart.  How are you?  Did they call?” she asked me.

“Yes. It is only breast cancer”, I hated that I had to tell her.

“Well,” she paused, “what do you need to do?”

“I’m not sure,” I answered honestly.

“Oh, darling.  Want me to come and have dinner with you?”

“I would love it,” I said to myself as I looked up at the blue sky and wished I were so close again.  All of a sudden, I didn’t understand why I was in this hot Mexican beach town. My family and friends understood it less.  But between the remoteness and the bad connections, I was learning to rely on myself.  Maybe that was the whole point.

 

Copyright 2012 © Fanny Barry