ElderChicks

Merry-go-round in a carnival that is deserted.

Cobwebbed stage set in a boarded up studio.

I walk around in the drama that was Lynne and Joe, playing the part, going through the motions, but Joe is gone. No one else exists, and I continue to do by rote, the chores and motions of existence although there is nothing to prove or underscore the suggestion that I am still alive. I move wraithlike through the empty space, attempting to reaffirm my existence, lost in the faint tinkle of carousel music, cutting through invisible formless tasteless space, seeking a small semblance of reality, drowning in the emptiness.

***

I startled myself this morning, just a slight jolt, when I stood on the rear porch waiting for the dog to return from his morning jaunt and I noticed the joyful juxtaposition of colors in my winter landscape, the reddened euonymus leaves curling around that old stump that used to be Friedle’s driftwood and junk sculpture that sits now in front of the fish pond, branches and leaves bravely standing straight up in the morning cool contrasting with the yellowed bamboo grass, the deep leathery green rhodie leaves now reopened after the frigid days into their broad dramatic bravado, the deeper red of the small leafed rhodies, pgms. I think, my white birch clump standing out right in front of them…fallen leaf and yellow pine needles covering the rocky bed of the stream that leads to the pond. It all stood out there for a moment, the first in a long time that I have been able to see such things clearly. I watched the black winter covered pool, surrounded by rich brown empty flower beds, noted the brave fearless new leaves of the butterfly bush always so irresponsible in winter and almost laughed; I am suddenly seeing again.

I recall laying on my back, floating in the pool  last summer as Joe watched from the shade of the patio, unwilling to attempt a swim any more, and how I murmured something about wondering if this would be my last summer on this earth, oblivious to the reality that waved its hands in warning in front of me; would I ever get to see those immense pines rising all around me in our woods, see the roses and trumpet vines and hibiscus in their rampant glory, note the wild profusion of dahlia and caladium and hydrangea, feel the warmth of the soothing water as it burbled around my body, felt the hot sun and soft breeze. Would this be the last time? Joe just smiled at me, sitting in his chair, holding his flannel shirt tightly around his body, slipping his feet in and out of his moccasins… I never even thought…

On the front porch, I can see my camellia, a young lady fifteen feet high, only recently an infant of two and a half feet, full of fat nearly bursting buds, waiting to bloom. I want to tell her that it is way too soon, that spring is a long way off, but I smile to myself, she knows that although I have just recently learned this fact.  She will burst open, display her scarlet flowers when the time is right, even as she appears to be in too big a hurry. So also, the irises and day lilies that seem to be ahead of their time. There is so much more winter yet to come.

Yesterday, when I ran out to do some errands, I was also startled to notice the mauvey gray pink juxtaposition of patterns of the trees as I drove by, previously a favorite sight for me, winter trees, winter landscape, and a source of joy in other days. And I wondered that I could feel again…

Impatient. With myself, with Lacy my elderly Bichon, as I was impatient with Joe in those last months. Really, I am most impatient with myself as I feel myself failing, slowing down.   Is it the fear of the unknown? Is it the worry and terror of future loss that triggers that impatience? Oh Joe, I want to tell him, I never meant to say those edgy things when exasperated, I was so afraid of losing you and now have indeed.

Something is happening in me. It is not that I am no longer mourning, that is something that will never end. It is something else. It is a slowly returning strength, a kernel of life, a flickering spark deep inside that is struggling to become a flame, a tiny flame, seeking oxygen. I am beginning to feel my body again, feel my mind moving, becoming ready to move again. At first, when these thoughts came to me and I heard that familiar voice inside telling me to get up out of bed and write it all down because in the morning the thoughts would be long gone and forgotten, I struggled with myself, sank deeper into the quilts and pillows, wanted oblivion so badly. But I did it, forced myself to rise and boot up. Then the computer would not begin its ritual because it was busy upgrading itself in this middle of the night and I had to wait for it to complete its process. Oh God, no, I thought, I will never remember all this stuff that I have written in my mind while half asleep, it will be gone, what are the odds? How has this happened? What miserable timing I have, as usual.

But I did it, and there it is all booted up, and there is Joe’s smiling face on my screen saver as usual, but for some reason I do not feel sad, I feel happy to see him. And I open Word and begin to type and I am back…good grief, I am back. Maybe tomorrow I will be able to get into the studio and begin some artwork. Maybe I can be alive again. Joe smiles…

— By Lynne Heffner Ferrante (http://www.lynneheffnerferrante.com/)