I am walking along the river. I used to walk along here everyday. Back when my life was in pieces. Supposedly, the river is never the same twice. The water’s transformation makes me think about the theory (or fact?) that skin cells shed in such a way that every 7 years your entire body is renewed. 

I wonder if it’s true. 

December 23, 2018, 7 years ago, my divorce was 3 weeks old. When I walked along the river then, I had no idea what my future was going to look like. I couldn’t really imagine how I could possibly rebuild my life. But I did. One skin cell at a time. 

Walking along the river today, the water is perceptively still. But I know that underneath the surface, the current moves, awaiting a westerly wind. The logs and rocks and debris that jet up from the surface will not be there tomorrow. 

This is why having faith makes such a difference. That which seems impossible to navigate today will be downstream tomorrow. Just wait. You’ll see. This too, shall pass. 

“Moon, moon moon, shining bright. Moon, moon, moon, my night light. Moon, moon, moon, I can see you’re taking care of me.”

— Laurie Berkner

I am not yet 60, though it feels like I am. I am 59. I live alone and I am not lonely. But some nights, when there is a warm, dry breeze blowing and the house is quiet except for the kicking on and off of the HVAC fan – the house not sure, either, what season it is. Too warm for fall, too cold for summer. The time change has happened already and it’s black as pitch by six, which makes me want to just put on my pajamas and crawl into bed, though it’s too early, even for dinner, much less sleep. On nights like these I am aware that I am alone. And I take a little less comfort in it than normal. But, if I’m lucky, I’ll hear what has become my favorite sound, the muted “badoomp bump” of the Google chat notification on my phone. One of my girls is texting and has a question, how to cook brown rice? Or wants to share a picture of the sunset or her latest outfit. On nights like this one, so peaceful and quiet and alone-ly, that little sound sends me to the moon.

“But I was there and I am here,

And it’s what I know”

— The Way I Go, Dar Williams

I was standing under a really hot shower tonight. Other than its backing to the beautiful woods that lead to the river, my favorite thing about this little townhouse is the shower in the master bath. There’s a showerhead on both of the walls facing each other and on nights like tonight when there’s a chill in the air, I like to stand inbetween the two streams, the water as hot as I can possibly make it. One stream, with a wide aperture and a delicate spray on my face, the other narrow, focused, pulsating on my back. I stand there feeling the water on me and I think. And I realize what a gift my life is. In my previous life on the cul-de-sac I had all of the big things. Big house, big car, big closet. But now that I live all by myself I have all of the best things: serenity, joy, time. I can live my life at my own speed. And no one can tell me that I’m moving too slowly. I wonder about that old version of myself the one who took care of all of the people around her so well that she began to disappear for lack of care of herself. Then I think about the tomatoes that I grow now, and the salads that I make, doused in olive oil, salt, and lemon. I have everything that I need to bring out the best flavor in life. I live by myself, but I’m not alone. I am surrounded by comforts that I have curated, paintings by and from women I love, soaps and candles that remind me of old friends and former lovers. Books I may never read, but whose nearness make me feel rich. Stories that unfold like mine, the turning of one page at a time.

Transcendance

The act of becoming who you were always meant to be through movement and music. 

Look at the way she carries herself, so sure, so pure, as she floats across the wooden planks. Her feet barely touch the ground. She is beautifully alone in her own transcendance.

It’s been many years now since I’ve needed to get myself ready for the first day of school. And yet, every September I feel the call to reassess, get organized, start something new. Last year I joined a choir, though anyone who has stood next to me at a concert or religious service (to some these are one and the same) knows that I can’t carry a tune. But join I did and am grateful for the camaraderie and gentle encouragement of those around me. This year I’m taking on much needed, and let’s face it, overdue, projects around my house. I’ve never made this space my own despite having lived here since just before Covid. I was a tenant at first, then bought it halfway through my lease when the landlord declared the market was getting hot and she was going to sell. I did not want to move again. Currently there are at least a dozen paint chips on my counter, a rainbow of off-white to deep tan. So many choices, without much variation, to freshen up my space. Perhaps I’ll buck all the sage decorating advice my best friend the hot shot realtor has given me and paint the house a color I love. If only I can pick one from the multitudes. What I do know about this inclination to do/change that comes over me every fall is that I have only about 4 weeks to execute it. If I don’t do it now, I’ll get lost in the pending pumpkin spice turned peppermint mocha latte months ahead. At work, my job is to communicate program changes, events and important updates. In other words, it’s always fall. Our work is always evolving. In my opinion, that change is good. It keeps things from getting staid. Like my living room paint. What colors await as the temperatures drop? And what progress will I have to show by Christmas? Perhaps by then I’ll have found the harmony I seek in September.

Today would have been the poet Andrea Gibson’s 50th birthday. Her partner, writer Megan Falley, shared a beautiful love letter on her substack that would make the least sensitive among us weep. For me, who yearned for a marriage like theirs, of the soul, it was a touching reminder that love like that is possible. I am so happy they found each other and shared it, for while, at least.

I am no longer looking outside of myself for that kind of connection. And I’m perfectly fine with that.

This evening, flipping through my old lyrics, I came across the first song I ever wrote. Three months before the first Dar retreat, four years before our separation, and five before the divorce. I guess I knew then, perhaps I always did–what we didn’t have–and how badly I needed to break free.

The drive to Michigan
took two long days.
We shared our souls
in many ways.

We talked and laughed and
we sang
but my heart cried out with that old
familiar pang

I just don’t love you
as I should:
Babe, it’s wonderful, but it’s just no
damned good.

The further I get from you
the clearer I come into view

The train slogs along
the mighty track.
Sometimes I think that I ain’t never
coming back.

Hear that whistle
in the night.
Don’t know what makes you
think you’ve got the right.
To love who you think I am,
But I’m hiding in plain sight.

The further I get from you
the clearer I come into view

I knew I’d love you,
when first I saw your face,
Didn’t know then, I’d be
exhausted from this race.

If they’d have chosen for me,
would this have been the choice?
A picture-perfect life,
left me without a voice?

A lifetime waits for us
on the other side.
Don’t go feeling bad…
Cause I know how hard we tried.

The further I get from you, (3x)
the clearer I come into view

Maura Greenman
May 2013

When I die
I know there will be music played
Stringed guitars and violas
The fingers of my friends and daughters
Hands that I birthed
Intonating the way into the next

When I die
I know there will be poetry read
Sounds combined into words combined into measures combined into feelings that break and reassure your heart
Who knew that the ear was the direct line to mine?

Someone please read Timepieces by Andrea Gibson, that beautiful missive about going home, not to the end, but to eternity. “None of us have ever been our bodies, if we were how could we fit into each other’s hearts?”

That’s been my work here. Find yours, lend you mine, mix with your blood and your oxygen, offer relief. We carry each other this way, when it’s been safe enough to do so.

I am grateful for the hearts I’ve been entwined with. In my next life, if I’m able, I’ll do better at letting people in to mine, whose chambers were closed before I was born

Guarded, protected, armed against love that was not love. Armed against wounding masked as caring, like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and an apple in a brown paper bag packed by myself, everyday.

I was loved, but not in a way that didn’t also hurt.

But I didn’t keep that from carrying, from caring. I’ve tried my best.

To love.

Alex, the irises are about to bloom again. Tomorrow, or maybe the next day. They’re the ones I took from your old townhouse in Herndon the last time I ever went there with you. I’m glad that I have something from then that is still beautiful. Do you know that I don’t remember the name of your street? Isn’t that funny? I spent so much time there in that basement apartment of yours with the red bedding. I’m grateful for the memory lapses. I guess the details that matter stick. Like the way you made salad or coffee or chicken on the grill. You certainly fed me well. The rest of it I let go pretty easily now that 4 years have passed. 4 years have passed. An entire college tenure. I am so grateful to have graduated from that time. It’s spring again and tomorrow or the next day the irises will bloom. And then I’ll forget about them again for the rest of the year. What time we had. What a short-lived flower. 

I am sitting outside on the most perfect spring morning 

Coffee cup in hand and feet propped on the deck rail

Two pileated peckers are spiraling their way up a deserted oak tree in an endless game of bird tag.

I am thinking about what I will plant in my garden.

In an hour I’ll drive to an old church in Herndon to celebrate a woman I didn’t know well, but who was there when I needed healing.

Life is dense and packed with small seeds which can be planted and bloom into abundance. Or, become lodged in between your teeth.

Just for today, I am taking a bite. And savoring the sweetness of the fruit.

Suddenly she realized it was him crossing in front of her car at the Home Depot, Sunday afternoon when at least half of the community would be out buying mulch.

He was gaunt and gray. He didn’t look up or acknowledge any recognition. Neither did she. Just sat there, stunned to see this stranger she once was married to, carrying brand new deck coverings out of the store. 

She wondered who, now that she no longer lived there, stocked the fridge, prepped the salads, prepared the meat for the fire–as she’d done, back before she was the talk of the town?

She forced herself to remember, not the little details of life that they’d shared, but rather, that her infamy exists in her head alone. The others, all-too-consumed with their perfect suburban flower beds.