The Vines of Love Run Deep

How do you measure a love that’s lasted for 27 years? A love that’s blossomed, grown, wilted, but never really died.  It’s like the old twisty, rooty wisteria that Nick and I used to battle.  It had been long neglected, continuing to grow, overtaking the yard, and no matter what we did to eradicate it, it still puts on a lovely show of delicate purple chains in the Spring.  I think our love is like that too, it’s still there; we have deep roots, despite all we’ve been through, it remains strong.

We were just kids when we first met, I was barely 20, he was barely 19.  He spent many days and nights with me at school, enough so that he became the “token male” in our all-women graduating class.  I remember the long nights where he’d be asleep as I burned the midnight oil writing papers.  He was the first person I called when I was in a pre-exam panic.  He was my editor and reality checker.  Sometimes I wondered how I would have gotten through school if he weren’t along for the ride.

After we got out of school we struck out on our own.  My Dad went so far as to pronounce us married since we would be living together.  We landed in Richmond like two Yankees out of water and spent a tough year there.  We tested the vow of for richer and for poorer; we were so broke our only entertainment was to sit out on our tiny deck with a jug full of cheap wine and a big bowl of popcorn watching the antics of our neighbors.  Nick managed to find work down there and I packed his lunch every day, sticking little love notes inside.  He saved all those notes; every sweet little scrap of paper.

Life was not without its challenges and arguments.  We were growing up as well as growing together.  Once, Nick wanted to discover himself and see what life was like on his own, so we split up for a while.  Turns out we couldn’t totally part ways, we bought matching china and sheets so when we inevitably got back together, everything matched.

We got married.  It’s funny, once we settled on the next phase in our life, the arguments grew less, as if a storm had suddenly been calmed by finding port in each other’s souls.  We threw a party, not a wedding, celebrating the next chapter in our lives with those who we loved very much.

Later, it was my turn to try and find myself, but I went about it the wrong way.  I found myself involved with a man who I though was giving me what I didn’t have in my marriage, validation as a sexual being.  It was lusty and stupid and hurt the only person I loved with all my heart.  I was reckless and dangerous during that turbulent time.  I tried to kill myself twice, believing that dying would be the only way to make things better.  We made it through, battered and torn, but mended.

Then I got sick, testing the next part of our vows, in sickness and in health.  There was a period of four or five years where I was constantly in and out of the hospital for various health reason.  Being institutionalized was especially hard. Nick stayed by my side, arguing with my father that the medicines and therapies were helping.  He was my champion and my advocate, fighting for us when I couldn’t. During Art Therapy I was asked to draw circles representing how I saw my world, the closest circle being what mattered most.  I drew Nick as the closest circle.

The last straw came when I was healing from my brain lesion.  It was a long, hard recovery and I was completely dependent on Nick for everything.  I took him for granted, treating him more like a servant than a husband and I suppose that’s how he felt, he lost his identity.  Suddenly, he spoke up for himself for the first time in his life. He threw off the mantle of caretaker and stepped up.  It was brave, scary and eye-opening, but he did it.

Nick realized that in order to find himself, he had to do it without me.  Our identities had become so entwined it was hard to separate ourselves, much like those twisted vines in our yard.  I had always been happy being Mrs. Hall, the wife who followed two steps behind her husband. I no longer knew who I was, preferring instead to let him create me. I thought I knew Nick very well, and yet I didn’t.  He’s surprised me lately, becoming a strong, independent man capable of things I never knew.  I wonder what could have been had shown me that side.

Yet Nick was still a caretaker; most notably for a father who deserved it the least.  I know, I saw and heard how evil he was to his son, his daughters.  Being a repentant former abusive drunk won’t get his Dad any brownie points in Heaven, but at least it made Nick feel better about himself.  I give him credit; he took on the mantel of responsibility all by himself, something he struggled with for his mother and against sisters who did very little.  It shows Nick’s inner strength to forgive someone who cut him to the very core.

Cancer has altered my whole perspective on life and what matters to me. When we divorced, we sought peace and happiness for each other, something all the money and property in the world can’t buy. Our divorce wasn’t bitter and acrimonious, it was sad; another chapter in our life closing. I hate it when people tell me now I can find “the new normal” after getting divorced; that it’s a great opportunity to figure out who I am and what I want out of life.  I thought I knew that before I got divorced, I thought I had the life I wanted, but it was at the cost of someone else.  Then along came cancer, how do I go about trying to factor in the grim statistics on death and dying while I’m still trying to figure out the rest of my life.  It’s not fair, I felt like I was about to get there.

Nick and I started a new chapter as friends.  It’s something we’ve always been and I think it’ll be something that will always be there.  We can talk to each other and be brutally honest.  He’s still the first person I talk to about my cancer treatments and the first person I cry to when things are tough.  I am scared to die, I can’t imagine doing it without Nick by my side.  I wanted my last memory to be his face smiling at me, offering me the peace that I never got in life.

I have a new love, but there is a wall between us.  Nick was the only person who could break through that wall; the only person I truly fully and openly trusted.  I gave him my soul.  He gave me his and trusted me truly and deeply too.  I will never forgive myself for breaking that trusted bond.  In the end, it wasn’t sickness that drove us apart; it was my shattering of his trust, his heart.  Sometimes I think cancer is my punishment for destroying the person I loved more than myself.

I am lucky that I have room in my heart for two men.  Hunny says that he knows he’s second in my heart to Nick and he’s ok with it.  I know he’s not, he wants to tear down those walls, and for some reason I just can’t let him. I know I am not an easy person to love.   He is a great guy; he wears his heart on his sleeve and is very passionate.  I love him; do I question whether I am in love with the idea of being in love and whether I am just seeking companionship? Yes I do, every day, especially after an argument.  I do get that warm fuzzy when I see him, when I see his smile, when he pulls me over to him when he wakes up first in the morning, when he brings me that steaming cup of hot tea in the morning or that cold martini when I get home. Is he worth it?  Yes.  Will I keep trying to let him in?  Yes.

Nick has a new love too. I think she’s pieces of me that he’ll never see.  He says she may be The Next One.  Part of my soul shattered when he said it.  I felt a little like Voldemort every time Harry destroyed a Horcrux containing bits of his soul.  Nick still carries a bit of my soul and I carry part of him too.

Time to wave goodbye now
Caught a ride with the moon
I know I know you well
Better than I
Used to haze all clouded up
My mind in the daze of why it could’ve never been
So you say and I say
You know you’re full of wish

—Tori Amos, Tear in Your Hand

Yes, am full of wish, for what was once, what could have been and for what the future holds.  Sometimes I wish we’d had that strength and forgiveness to keep our marriage going. I am full of wish because I want to be the person I should be, to be the person that Hunny is in love with.  To be the person I should have been for Nick.

I know I should wave goodbye now, but 27 years of memories and a shared life is hard to forget.  The vines run deep and strong and every time a purple bloom appears, it’s a like a memory, something fleetingly beautiful to behold.  It’s something to press in a book, like that gingko leaf we pressed in our Frank Lloyd Wright book to preserve a vestige of our trip to Chicago.

I don’t want memories of me to die. It scares me to think that someday it will.  I’ll be gone and all that’s left is a refrain:

What you’ll remember of me tonight
Well, it almost makes me cry
Yeah, it almost makes me cry

—Sheryl Crow, The Difficult Kind

In My Life

So next week I celebrate 25 years since graduating from college.  Scary I know.  Sometimes I forget that I am that “old.”  Especially when I hang out with the Millennials in my life, I act just like them don’t I?  Wow.  25 years ago I was a shiny-faced college graduate with the whole world ahead of her, oblivious to what would come down the line.

I’ve seen so much in 25 years. Operation Desert Storm, Waco, Oklahoma City, Columbine, 9/11, Red Sox winning the World Series, Operation Enduring Freedom, more war, more love and more loss.

I’ve seen too many people I know die. A dear college friend, my grandfather, my sister, my mother-in-law, my Dad, my sister-in-law, my father-in-law.  And how many were from cancer you ask – four of them.

I got married and divorced.  I’ve loved two men with all my heart.  I watched my family and friends get married and have kids; some of them are even graduating from high school right now!

I’ve lived in four states – Virginia, New York, Maryland and South Carolina.  I’ve had six cars, (3 of them VWs, lol).  I’ve loved five cats and helped my parents say goodbye to 10 dogs.

I’ve had too many surgeries to count and spent way too much time in hospitals.   In fact, I’m recognized by face at Georgetown Hospital’s ER. I’ve visited their psych ward too; I tried to kill myself twice.  I’ve cried and screamed out of anger, fear and frustration so much my voice was raw.  I learned how to walk and talk again after having a brain lesion; some days even the simplest of things seemed the hardest.

I got cancer.  Is this really the worst thing to ever befall my life?  I’m not sure.  It’s certainly been a challenge, but I’ve faced a lot of other challenges in the past, and I’m sure I’ll face more.  I wouldn’t call it life-changing.  Yes it’s changed my life, I have a disease that I have to live with, but I don’t see it as a means to reinvent myself like so many claim to do when they face cancer.  I’m still me.  I have less hair and energy, but I’m still that same person enjoying the same things in life that I always did.

I’m excited and nervous to see my friends next week.  We are all strong, fierce women who have carved our own lives with brilliance and grace. Gosh, one of my closest friends is the Commencement Speaker this year!  And to think, back in college she was famous for sticking fake cockroaches and rats in our beds.

When Nick and I got married we played In My Life by the Beatles for our wedding party dance.  That song resonates a lot.  Especially this:

Though I know I’ll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know I’ll often stop and think about them

I do, every day.  I’m one of those people who never forgets anything.  I suffer from nostalgia too.  Some days I wish I could go back to being that shiny-faced innocent college grad.  Life seemed so boundless then.

Sadly, this may be the last time I see these women as I doubt I’ll live long enough to make it to the next milestone reunion, I think that’s 30 years?  Yeah, cancer has my number and I have a date with death sometime in the near future.  Yes I know advances are being made every day and new thing come out to combat this dreaded menace. Heck I’m on a new fighter drug right now that’s supposed to buy me time.  I hope it does.  I’m not ready to give up the fight just yet.

Do I have any regrets? Yes, lots of them.  But they taught me a lot.  Am I happy with where I’m at in life?  Yeah I guess so, but it’s tempered by some of those regrets.  But I wouldn’t trade my life for anything – it’s been fun, adventurous and blissful too.

Where have you journeyed in 25 years?

Art Appreciation Part II

   I recently took a class at the Life With Cancer Center that addressed preparing for the end of your life.  It was a tough series of classes.  Especially the one where we talked about what really happens when you die; it’s not pretty or peaceful.  It’s ugly and painful.  I walked out of that class too rattled to sit through the realities.

There was also a class on planning your end of life ceremony.  That’s a reality that’s hard to face too.  You want to be remembered and loved, but it’s up to you to shape the outcome.  From flowers to prayer cards, to what you hope people will say about you in the end.

One part of the ceremony is music, what would you want to hear played at your service?  When Nick and I got married, we painstakingly selected our music, right down to the cellist playing before the big march down the aisle.  Alas, neither of us got to hear what we’d paid for since we were ensconced in the back of the church waiting for the ok go.

Music was a big part of our relationship.  I am thankful for all the new and sometimes strange music Nick exposed me to.  We saw many amazing concerts, ranging from the Judds to the Sex Pistols.  I fondly remember the evenings we’d turn on a jazz album and sip scotch by the fire.  Even our parakeet was named Miles for the great jazz trumpeter Miles Davis.  That bird loved to sing along with jazz music, belting out each birdie note with pure joy.

We marked our relationship with special songs which held meaning to only us.  Nick made amazing mix tapes; I miss them even to this day.  Our first special song was “Feeling Stronger Every Day” by Chicago.  Later at our wedding we danced to “Maybe I’m Amazed” by Paul McCartney.  For the longest time after our divorce I cried every time it came on the radio.

Our post-relationship song is probably “Oh Yeah” by Roxy Music.  And every time I hear Adele’s “Someone Like You,” I crumble.  I can’t hear Steely Dan’s “Deacon Blues” without thinking of Nick; he greatly identified with that song, channeling Donald Fagan’s cynicism and wit.  Tori Amos’s album Little Earthquakes came out at a pivotal time in our relationship and many of the songs spoke volumes about what we were going through.  I memorized every word in “Silent All These Years.”

Music reminds you of time and places.  Boston’s first album will remind of days spent with Nick on Cape Cod.  We’d always laugh about that line about “dancing in the streets of Hyannis” because we knew no one ever did.  The song “More than a Feeling” holds a special place for me.  It’s my phone ringtone.  But it’s also the song we played at top volume in our car as we sped along the winding, dark roads back in my hometown as we came from the hospital the night my Dad died.  I sang it at the top of my voice with my head out the window, hair flying and tears streaming down my face.

Forever etched in my head is the song “What Sarah Said” by Death Cab for Cutie.  It came out when Nick’s mom died and the line “love is watching someone die” eerily touched me.  It’s true, you want someone you love by your side when you die; they’re the last bit of peace and comfort you’ll have in the end.

What would I want played at my service?  Jokingly I could play “Never Say Die” by Black Sabbath; but it might not set the right tone.  Do I want Nick Drake’s sadly beautiful “Cello Song?” Maybe Depeche Mode’s “Blasphemous Rumours” because I really do think God has a sick sense of humor; especially since I’ve been blessed with cancer. Or perhaps Alanis Morisette’s “Ironic.”  Because it is, I really do think.

I don’t know if there’s a song that identifies me.  Perhaps Van Morrison’s “Brown Eyed Girl” because I am. Or maybe “Just Like Heaven” by The Cure. I am strange as angels, lost and lonely.  I’m also that guy “standing on an island in the middle of the road. Traffic either side of me, which way will I go?” in the Kinks song “State of Confusion.”  Yup, this whole journey is confusing and tumultuous. But at the end of the song the Kinks sing, “Should be happy, should be glad, I’m alive and it can’t be bad.”  They’re right.  I am and it’s not.

Some people urge you to have a “Cancer Theme Song.” One that will get you through your worst of days; empower you to keep going. Hmmm, that makes me think I’d want to hear P!nk’s “18 Wheeler,” or maybe Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive.” I can also relate to “Don’t Stop Now” by Guided by Voices. Or I could go the opposite way and use the Johnny Cash version of “Hurt.”  His raw, emotional rendition makes me think of the pain I experience.  The video from that song makes me cry.  He died soon after it came out.

Music sets a mood, a feeling, a memory. I remember the morning of 9-11, it really was a beautiful day, and that song was playing in the car as we drove over the Key Bridge in D.C. to go to work.  Little did we know our lives would be forever changed that day; the sky turning from vivid blue to a horrifying pall of smoke.  Listening to Roxy Music’s album Avalon evokes pure romance.  “Take it Down” by John Hiatt reminds me of love lost.

At my service I would want people to know my love of music, to laugh at the picture of me playing clarinet in marching band; or reminisce about my days spent in chorale at college.  I would want them to know that music was a soundtrack for my life and my memories. I think I would close with Schubert’s “Unfinished Symphony,” because my life will never really be finished; cancer will have robbed me of that opportunity.

The Beatles said it best, “in the end, the love you make is equal to the love you take.”  I will make sure that mine is.