How are you, Stephanie?
I hear this question from time to time, as in, how are you, really? the answer is long and complex and very simple. Not all that great. I mean, I am doing very well physically. I am only on one medication for regularity and I will be for the duration. I am not taking anything else except for the occasional Tylenol. There is still no evidence of disease, which is a good thing, I realize. Of course, no one is looking at this point, but there are no gross signs that they should be looking, either.
So, how am I doing, really? Let me tell you a story.
Once there was a woman who had a family and a full life. One day she received a call that she would have to leave for a long journey with little time to prepare. She grabbed her passport, bought a ticket and went to the airport. After going through security and all the checkpoints and procedures, she got the message that she would be taking a boat instead. And the boat wasn't in yet.
So, she went home to her family. She really had not had time to pack or prepare in anyway, so this was a great opportunity to do this. She packed a small bag, said good bye and went to the dock. While waiting, she heard that the boat was further delayed, so she returned home again.
While waiting this time, she took time to get more of her affairs in order, dispose of extra things she didn't need, streamline her life. Again she said good bye. Since this was the third time she was saying good bye, her family merely waved while they got on with their lives. The woman had said good bye to her family, her community, her work and had only her small bag.
She got to the docks and waited, and waited. She was alone. Very alone. No one was around, not even a dock worker. It was totally deserted. The woman was beginning to feel very alone. And worried that things were not going according to plan. Looking around, she noticed a bulletin board with a few ragged notices on it. She went over to read the notices, more out of boredom than anything else.
On the board she read that the ship she had been told would be carrying her to her destination had been detained for an undetermined time. She was alone at the dock with no way to contact anyone to come and get her. Her family and friends had said good bye and her work had moved on, replacing her. She had no place in the world, yet wouldn't be going on this journey. She never had wanted to go on the journey in the first place and yet she was mourning its cancellation. What a loney place to be.
Comments
I am here and have not left your side. I will sit on the docks with you for as long as it takes. And I will go with you on your journey...Remember the whales thru the looking glass of the waves going from Fox Bay West to Stanley on the Marine vessel? They were so big and we seemed so small in comparison. I remember one of them turning his eye on me as he swam by. It gave me the chills...
Posted by: papa | February 26, 2007 2:20 PM
Thank you for your kind and comforting words. I am so sorry to drag you through this. This long slow process is exactly what I didn't want to happen. I watched my mother go through this and it was agonizing for all involved. Please, dear God, spare my family.
Posted by: Ma | February 27, 2007 10:58 AM
Maman, I'm sorry you feel this way.
Posted by: Mara | February 27, 2007 11:46 AM
Hey, Maman!
Thank you for your story. It packs a wallop.
I read that people who have been mistakenly told they have AIDS or cancer and have time to come to grips with it - but then are told that it was a mistake - don't typically react with joy. Typically they go through a period of depression. Because they've redefined themselves in terms of their disease. Your story conveys the reasons behind that and the meaning underneath better than a clinical explanation of the the underlying psychology could.
Well, you don't need to wait on the dock. This kind of boat will come to your door, no matter where you are. So, I want you to come to Scotland again. Come meet Suzy and Ingrida and Ewan and Cat and Gus. Hang out with Keith and Ailsa and Emma. Watch funny movies, dance with the elves and fairies that live in the stones and bones of Scotland, listen to her heart beat.
You don't need to come to Scotland to be alive, of course; you can be alive right where you are.
I love you bunches and bunches and don't plan on stopping any time soon.
- Nathan
Posted by: Nathan Dornbrook | February 28, 2007 7:16 AM
Hey, Maman!
Good to talk to you last night/early this morning. I'm as ratty as a 17th century Italian seaport today. Lack of sleep.
Talk to you later!
- Nathan
Posted by: Nathan | March 1, 2007 10:31 AM
I'm finally here.
XO
Posted by: Cindy | March 4, 2007 10:57 PM
Yeah, the underlying psychology is pretty boring. It is the psychology of grieving. In this case, you are grieving the death of an expectation (a very large, life altering expectation). The struggle is to embrace and express your emotions (often "not feel good feelings") and find support and commiseration while you work to fill in the gap of the expectation (in this case, your whole life! that's a lot of filling in to do, it's also a lot of blank canvas that you get to paint). You can't go back and change the fact that you haven't died, your best hope is understand that your "not dying" is a part of you.
Posted by: Mendon | March 9, 2007 11:44 PM
Yeah, that's sort of a mouthful. I'm just struggling with getting out of bed in the morning.
Posted by: ma | March 10, 2007 1:13 PM
Dearest love,
It is a year later and your ship has finally come to take you. I was with you when you went. The goodbye has left me empty and alone. I wonder when I will see you again and call out your name to the heavens and the seas. But no one answers these exhortations. They are swallowed up by time and deafened ears.
Posted by: papa | March 17, 2008 3:07 PM