Today I am sitting in my favorite local coffee shop writing. This is a new experience for me; I’ve never done this before. I’m really not this cool. But it is a gorgeous, sunny fall day and I was determined to get outside and do something, anything. I’m working on changing some habits. I’m determined to improve my health and my life. I’ve become heavy again, having gained weight lately. And I’ve become heavy with sadness. Fast approaching 71, it’s way too easy to sit and stew.
So I’m trying some new things. Beginning with leaving the house more often, moving around a bit. My closest family and friends have expressed concern that I might be agoraphobic. I’m not. I’m not afraid of leaving the house – I just don’t like it. Mostly I don’t like people, and especially crowds of any number. Like, more than 2. I have become phobic about going to the grocery store. Why on earth do people push closer?! I must smell good…or look friendly, which I am not.
I do love where I live. It’s as close to an English coastal village as you’re gonna get here in the midwest U.S. If it were in the UK the tv show Escape to the Country would be all over it. The year round population here is under a thousand, but that increases tenfold in the summer. Being the middle of October now, we are in the “shoulder season”, the weeks between beach and ski weather. Town is crowded today. It’s fall color tour time. Detroit and Chicago tourists pour in to enjoy the glorious hills lit up like they are on fire against the sharp contrast of the deep blue water.
I have had several conversations about the great lakes region with people from other parts of the country. One native New Yorker said to me years ago, “oh, I could never live inland.” And I said, “spoken like someone who has never seen the great lakes.” They are called the inland seas for a reason. Many people are shocked when they first visit. Just fyi, no, you cannot see across them. And, yes, they have tides. Yes, you can surf them. Think north shore of Devon. But colder. And no sharks.
When I bought my forlorn little cottage several years ago it had new windows being installed. They are hurricane windows. We have hurricane force winds here, especially in winter. With no leaves on the deciduous trees and on the lee side of a 118 mile wide lake, the winds git to goin.’ Winters here are not for the faint of heart. But that’s what keeps the population (and the insects) to a minimum. As someone who doesn’t like warm weather, it’s as close to heaven on earth as anywhere I can imagine.
“Oh love, bring every grief you’ve carried with you as a door you’ll walk right by / if you don’t stop to look with that loving heart and a troubled eye.”
Our troubles feel as if they are like stone, a compacted, impenetrable medium which will not allow us in. It’s time to “put my money where my mouth is…” so to speak. Time to show up, front and center, and face that stone inside, standing steadfast between me and my own liberation. I talk a good game, don’t I? All this wisdom about getting free. As if I had a clue.
When I am lost as I am this week, in the rock hard grief of my own making, I have few places I can turn. I can always turn to David Whyte. Ironically, I was introduced to him long ago by a friend I no longer have any contact with. She chose to stay in the comfortable captivity of her abusive marriage, and I had to stop pretending that I could be her supportive friend. If you read this journal once in a while, you’ll realize this theme has carried throughout the 13 years since I began here. I’ve gone no contact with more people than I have in my life anymore. Every single one has been a death I am mourning. In retrospect today, this seems an obvious theme. After all, I began this outlet as a means to help me process my divorce and separation from family, from everything I’d ever thought I wanted. To come up against that rock hard resistance and face the unknown.
C.S. Lewis is quoted as saying how shocked he was to realize that grief feels so like fear. There is good reason for that. Grief is the last doorway between us and our freedom, and we are terrified of our freedom. How, exactly, do we manage to be in the world, but not of it? Get back to me on that, won’t you, please?
It turns out that ignorance is never bliss; it’s really only ignorance. It also turns out that bliss was never the goal. It has always been awareness, whether we care to admit that or not. Bliss would be, well, blissfully easy by comparison. But awareness is how we get to freedom – which is our one and only job here. We like to pretend the god ate our homework. Yes, you read that right. So what is all this angst-ing about? Well, I have come up against the biggest boulder my heart has ever encountered, and I’m guessing you have one, too.
Since my teenage years, all of my relationships have been hard. I am hard. I have always been difficult to get along with. Something inside of me has always been as uncompromising as a boulder. I was the eldest of five children, and the scapegoat in a narcissistic family system. Yada, yada, yada…I married young. I got out as soon as I could, and I wasn’t going back. At the age of 24 I had my son, and he has been the light of my life. In many ways, my salvation. I don’t think I’d be alive today were it not for him, and I certainly wouldn’t be the person I am. He inspires me endlessly. But we are at odds right now, and it is breaking my heart. It has shaken me to my core.
Intellectually, I can explain everything. To tell the entire story, I have to begin with the health problems which impacted that pregnancy. I was always a nervous and thus scraggly kid. In high school I was diagnosed with bleeding ulcers. I struggled all of my young life to keep weight on. So I was considered medically malnourished when I became pregnant at 23, and I proceeded to lose 24 pounds. I gave birth to a healthy 9 pound, 6 ounce baby with teeth coming through his gums, but I left the hospital at just over 90 pounds. I’m 5′ 6″ tall. Perhaps because of this, he has always had some (miraculously mild) learning disabilities, despite an extraordinarily high I.Q.
During his first year in school he began to show behaviors that we would now recognize as autism. I took him to every doctor of every type that I could think of. We checked his eyesight, we checked his hearing, we checked his cognitive abilities. The doctors all told me exactly the same thing: this child is a genius. He is bored. With the wise counsel of some teacher friends we began a discipline of working through a daily checklist. I would write and draw it out on a blank sketchbook page at night, and he would work through it after school the next day. He had to complete it before he was allowed to play. It always included 2 or 3 light chores and 2-3 fun, creative activities. It always included Hug Your Mother (because I’m not above manipulation.) Then, an hour before bed we sat together and read a story or watched a favorite cartoon while I massaged his feet with a grounding oil, usually sandalwood. This routine was working beautifully. To this day, when he becomes stressed he will often create a checklist.
I am telling you this now because he has been struggling again. As mentioned recently, he is quite depressed. The aftermath of the recent natural disasters seems to have impacted him deeply. He is a highly sensitive person. But I, too, am struggling terribly as a direct result of interacting with him, in his mental and emotional distress. And because I am literally the only sober person he knows, I’m the sole voice of reason in his life right now. I must make mental health the priority of our lives.
And yesterday, I suddenly felt terribly helpless. I was consumed with fear, and I blew it. He came out of left field touting some wild conspiracy theory about the corrupt government having created the weather disaster and being out to get us all – and I lost my shit. It isn’t even that I necessarily disagree with everything he was saying, but I absolutely cannot – cannot – function from that perspective. It is mired in fear. It is entirely divisive. And it is utterly hopeless. Talk about a conspiracy!
I don’t know that I have ever screamed that loud before in my life. I screamed at the top of my lungs – at him. I told him he was dead wrong about so much of what he has recently adopted to believe. And in no uncertain terms I told him that he is subscribing to cult behavior, and that I am afraid for his sanity. I frightened him, and I frightened myself.
And so, shaken as I was yesterday, I must ask myself some very tough questions. Do I want to defend my own personal beliefs at the cost of anyone else’s freedom, including my sons’? What if he and I become estranged and never speak, as the current politics has divided so many families? Can I live with that? Are my convictions that important? Are yours?
Do I have other options here, besides finding “the truth” of the situation? Of course. Firstly, I recognize that if I am not experiencing peace, I have given away my sanity. Somewhere in the hours/days/weeks leading up to this blowup I have assigned meaning somewhere it doesn’t belong. If every upset is a setup (and it is,) I bought into somebody else’s agenda. Or in this case, depression. I picked it right up because it’s a familiar habit. And if I picked it up psychically, so did my empathic son. We can put it down just as fast. I’m not going to give assholes my vote this election. My pussy is not up for grabs. Neither is my mind. Out, demons, out! Here’s to our better angels.
Both my son and I lost our sense of humor – and perspective! After all, that’s what depression is. I fell into that bad habit, and so did he. Now I want my funny son back. I want my kind, intelligent son back. I’m thinking that screaming at him isn’t the best approach. But I’ve been holding on too tightly. Too much fear bottled up inside. It is no coincidence that I am having a flare-up of asthma symptoms. I have been holding my breath. I’m done with that. You want to see what created weather looks like? Watch out for that boulder rolling downhill. Tomorrow’s forecast is warm and sunny.
“You too have travelled from so far away to be here, once reluctant and now as solid and as here and as willing to be touched as everything you have found.” Thank you, David Whyte.
“I need a God who thinks I’m funny.” – Elizabeth Gilbert
Me too, Liz, me too. Gilbert’s relationship with consciousness, or God, is very similar to mine. And only recently, through a Buddhist friend, have I realized that we also have much in common with some basic Buddhist tenets, mainly that a human incarnation is a rare and extraordinary occurrence. To be profoundly revered. That is not to say easy. As Liz also reminds me, “Even a good life is hard.”
I woke with a migraine a few days ago. I had blissfully forgotten how completely debilitating they are. I used to get migraines chronically. They stole days out of every week. The leading neurologist treating me began with new, cutting edge migraine treatments and eventually resorted to Dilaudid (generic morphine). Administered 20 minutes after Compazine for nausea, so that I didn’t waste the morphine. And it never once took away the migraine. My body was screaming at me.
Dr. Bessel Van der Kolk wrote The Body Keeps the Score, and he likewise knows, “the mind hides it.” When I was having chronic migraines in my 40’s and 50’s I was desperately trying to find something – anything – to relieve the pain. But there was something seriously wrong. As in, my life had gone flaming dumpster fire awry. I was dying.
Liz Gilbert is right about something else – the closer we get to living our true self imperfectly, the more displeasing we are to the world. I was this many years old before I didn’t care how the world finds me. Alive would be good.
Knowing this and doing it is much easier said than done. Those old childhood habits are deep and strong. I do so want you to like me. In fact, that inner child in me needs you to like me. My life depends on it. I think you must know something I don’t – and I’m waiting for you to share that with me so I can get on with life.
The task here is to become as generous with myself as I am with you. Maybe – just maybe – I know something. Maybe my body knows it even if my mind doesn’t grasp it yet. Maybe I have always known it. Maybe it is my core. And maybe the real issue – where the healing will occur – is in my being more greedy than needy. Greedy for my own company, my own council. Greedy with my solitude. Or as I used to tell my self-righteous, narcissistic, fundamentalist family when they would call me crazy: I choose MY crazy.
I choose MY crazy, not yours, nor anyone else’s I might momentarily assign authority over my wellbeing. I get to decide what it means to be sane and well. I get to choose peace. I’ve got this. No soliciting here. Go away. I’m finally becoming very greedy. I cannot wait for some other person I’ve deemed worthy to honor me; it isn’t in their best interest. It seems their God has no sense of humor. Sell crazy someplace else. We’re all stocked up here.
From this new practice of greed there are no longer many people I will give access to my time and attention. Maybe because I’m older now; being needy seems frivolous. If you are trustworthy, you will defend my solitude, and I yours. And Elizabeth Gilbert is our spirit animal.
Ugh. I’m not sure where to start here today. This writing thing isn’t getting any easier with time. It keeps me raw. I’m so fortunate that I no longer have to function in social or business situations. I no longer have to work everyday. It’s the lifestyle I’ve wanted all of my adult life…I’m living the dream. Ha.
I like to think I’m pretty self aware. Three people close to me to have directly said to me, “you are not as self aware as you think you are.” These occurrences were separate and years apart. THEY brought the subject up. One of these people was a former husband, one was someone I almost married, and the other was my sister. As it happens, I am no longer in contact with any of them. They are all blatant narcissists. Undiagnosed, of course, because narcissists don’t do therapy (let alone introspection), two are covert and one overt. We got along fine as long as I was in people pleasing mode and they were in control. So pardon me if their opinion of me doesn’t matter a rat’s ass.
I repeat, I like to think I’m pretty self aware. I’m aware enough to know that this is a life-long process and that it is humbling. We all have blind spots in our self awareness. We all have an unconscious. If we didn’t we would be enlightened, and while I’m sure there are enlightened people around, I do not personally know any of them. The rest of us are all in the ‘I coulda had a V-8’ school of human experience.
At the moment, I am doing well, other than being quite concerned about a few people I’m close to. These three people, who I am in regular contact with, are all dealing with the aftermath of the recent natural disasters. My son’s father lost his home in hurricane Helene and hasn’t been able to even begin to think about rebuilding or moving on since Milton hit. He won’t have a home again for some months. But he and his partner are safe and have a temporary place to live.
The other, a dear friend, is ill with RSV and has only yesterday been able to get to a doctor in Florida. She spent days in bed with no power, food or drinking water. No one could get to her because the roads were blocked by downed trees and power lines. At least now she has medicine and can hopefully make a fast recovery.
The third person I am concerned about is my son. Here, in NW lower Michigan, where we have not had severe weather. Because he is going through what I can only call a dark night of the soul, and it is a direct result of the recent hurricanes. He was sick worrying about his Dad. He felt utterly helpless. Then a friend and fellow carpenter reached out to him. A few local men were getting together to travel down to North Carolina and work for a volunteer agency, helping to clean up and rebuild. Could he please join them?
Now, my son is a genius (identified early in his school career by doctors, not just because I think so.) But he is also an empath. He would have to give this request a great deal of thought. He knew that he would have to “go into warrior mode,” and put up a shield. Through this agency and men he knows who were already down there, he was seeing a gruesome picture of death and devastation – far beyond what the nightly news was reporting. Could he keep it together and be useful was his concern. He decided he would volunteer, filled out the requisite paperwork, and began pulling his gear together. I was just trying not to panic.
It seemed to actually be helping him mentally. At least he had a goal, a focus. As he said, a channel for his grief. But it was not to be. He got news last night that the government was shutting down all volunteer operations and moving the military in. And his grief has increased. He is back to feeling absolutely helpless.
Now, between you and I, hearing him talk to me last night was triggering. But I was determined to listen and not respond; to let him talk it through. I trust him. I trust his genius to take him where he needs to go. I also know how to identify when I am being triggered and why. And I can tell you exactly what I saw in my head: I am 16 years old. I am laying on the carpet of my bedroom in front of a small television set. I am watching the Vietnam war. I see a Vietnamese child running naked on fire. I keep having to run to the bathroom to vomit.
It was the first time in my sheltered childhood that I had witnessed trauma. I had not yet lost anyone near to me. I still had four grandparents and two great-grandparents, and all of my immediate family. They would face death shortly thereafter, but at the time I was entirely unaware of our fragility.
I also trust what my son was telling me, and I know he wasn’t sharing all he knew. I know the worst of any human suffering never makes the television reports. The advertisers don’t like it. And from the perspective of age I now can know that my son is grieving deeper traumas than the obvious. Helpless is the very definition of grief. Like any of us who are given the great privilege of time, he will come to terms with his smallness, his vulnerability, his place within the world. He says he doesn’t know what to do with all of this anger and grief. He doesn’t know how to switch it off, how to go back to functioning fully. How to return to life.
All I can say to him is that life will never be the same again. I tell him he’ll come though it, but he won’t ever be the same. One day perhaps I will tell him my stories. I will remind him what he faced when diagnosed with cancer in his early twenties. But not today. I cannot help him today; I can only listen and trust. Author Elizabeth Gilbert says, “you can’t avoid grief. It knows your home address.” So it would seem.
My friends and I are all getting old. Our children are middle-aged; our grandchildren and nieces and nephews are no longer young adults. And, sadly, I have to report that I do not personally know anyone who isn’t struggling. We are all finding it increasingly harder to make ends meet; we are having to make difficult decisions every month, or week…or day. For me, still living relatively comfortably, albeit paycheck to paycheck now, it means I drive an older used car. I’ve long since given up vacations. I eat out far less often. I cannot afford to adopt another dog after losing my darling companions, and if Medicare doesn’t cover the prescription I look for a natural alternative. Uncomfortable, yes; life-threatening, not thus far.
When we are honest with ourselves the future is rather scary. When we are honest with ourselves, we must confess that the middle class is gone and our leaders haven’t had our back in decades. Our food and water supplies are largely toxic to us now. You heard it here first – I’ve been saying this since I was a young woman. I began acknowledging that we are living in a military state here in the U.S. when Reagan was in office. No one was listening. That awareness came to me in a dream. Wurnt nobody listenin’ to that woowoo…
Among my closest friends, including those who don’t know one another, there is a profound concern for the welfare of our children and grandchildren. But I am having to talk most people I know (and sometimes, myself) down off a certain ledge – the concern that our children are not self-sufficient. And no one seems to be aware of the scope of this phenomenon. Yes, the most recent census told us that over 50% of baby boomers are helping to support their offspring. More than half of American households now house at least two generations.
I suspect those numbers are conservative, for we don’t understand much of what the increasing poverty is telling us. Poverty causes depression – and depression means that the people behind the doors of those little houses do not care about your survey. Even I have a No Soliciting sign on my front door. I am 70 years old. I do not need you to help me decide how to vote; I have been politically active since 1972. Go away. I especially do not need you to help save my soul. Go away. But I digress…
WHY are the younger generations not trying to improve their lot? What is wrong with them? Well, I will argue that there is, in fact, something RIGHT with them. Weren’t we idealistic back in the 1960’s?! We thought we would change the world. We thought we would end the Vietnam war and save the planet and the polar bears. We would change the government leadership. We would wake everyone up…and here we are, old and sick and tired. We had no clue what we were up against.
Now, before you think me too cynical, let me tell you why this is exactly as it should be. This is not, I repeat NOT, the end of the world. It is the end of the world as we know it. And baby, that sucker needs to burn. The systems and infrastructures and cultural expectations of the past must be transfigured. It won’t be pretty. It won’t be easy. It has to happen.
And the revolutionaries and shamans and visionaries that will bring a new way of life into being are your children, and my child, and our grandchildren. They already woke up – while you and I were scrambling to make ends meet, arguing over who is woke, and subconsciously functioning in “what the everloving fuck is happening?” mode. They are biding their time and not wasting precious resources (including themselves) trying to fit into in our dead culture.
Molly Tuttle was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease at the age of three. It causes her hair to fall out. While I am whining about my achey joints and not feeling creative, she’s years past worrying about what might get in her way. She isn’t letting anything hold her back.
“And who am I to wish I wasn’t just the way I am?!” she sings. And who are you? Insert here my stubborn argument for A) healing our codependent addictions before they kill us all, and B) while we are at it – HELP SUPPORT OUR CHILDREN to the best of our ability. Any way we can. If you haven’t got any children, help support someone else’s. Any way you can. Because who do you think you are that you know how to fix this mess? And don’t you DARE give up on anyone, let alone everyone. Don’t you dare lose heart. Don’t come to my door selling your beliefs and your outdated culture. You won’t like me when I answer.
Meanwhile, back here at the ranch, it’s gonna be a big week. So buckle up, buttercup. A hard rain’s a-gonna fall. And trust me – you need to trust your children. They are a crooked tree.
Okay, well. As a general rule I do not like anything modern. Give me cabbage roses and old wicker any day. Maybe because I was born in the 1950’s and lived in a chaotic household? I am not knowing. Modern, contemporary, mid-century architecture and interior design gives me the willies. Like fingernails on a blackboard. But here is an entirely modern home filled with colorful art, and I quite like it.
In the interest of curiosity, and to challenge my creative limitations, I watch videos like I used to read shelter magazines, and still do read design books: I imagine myself in the space. I walk around, sit, sip, and relax myself with the use of my imagination. I learn a lot this way, both about how spaces can work, and even about myself. It’s what artists do…
But truth be told, while I can appreciate much about Margo Selby’s home, I’d be much more comfortable living in something more traditional. I will always be grieving the loss of Julia Reed, even though I did not know her. I loved her books and her attention to detail. She was a friend of the late Furlow Gatewood and wrote a gorgeous book about his houses, One Man’s Folly. She called her NOLA apartment her cabinet of curiosities. Whatever, wherever, however you make your home, take this tip from Julia: surround yourself with the things that make you happy.
Remember Sark’s famous poster of 1990, HOW TO BE AN ARTIST?! When I first had one I crossed out the word Artist at the top and mimicked the colorful font, writing Alive above it. I thought it was great.
Life was so much simpler then. The poster gave us directives that were actually…do-able! Now I’m an old woman, and most of the directives on that poster seem very childish to me. Never mind impossible. I wouldn’t go back in time; nor would I trade places with anyone. I have so much to be grateful for. But I would be remiss were I not honest with you – the losses have taken their toll.
And honesty, or it’s new buzzword, authenticity, is the only way to live. But like all of life, it takes on a deeper meaning as we age and hopefully, mature. We learn too late in life to take people as they are. Most people will never live authentically. They don’t know themselves well, and although they might believe themselves to be honest people, their honesty is superficial. It means they aren’t living a life of crime; it doesn’t mean they are going to be emotionally vulnerable. Or see any value in that.
Here’s the thing about vulnerability that is hard for me to grasp: it requires everything of me, and nothing of anyone else. This morning as I write millions of people are struggling to survive in horrific conditions, still and again. As it happens, here in the United States, much of the country has been devastated by back to back hurricanes. One of my dearest friends is fighting for her life in Florida. She is terribly ill with RSV, and days without power, food, fresh water. Her daughter has tried to drive the hour to her only to be turned back by police. The roads are not passable. And this is not where the worst conditions exist.
Life is daunting. I guess that I naively had some romantic notion that it would get easier as I got older. That’s because I was shielded from the harshest realities of life – from the honesty of it’s brutality. I believe that was probably true for many of my generation. In our elders’ defense, I think they believed that medical science would save them from suffering. If only that were true.
Let me tell you, I am far more fortunate than most, and I know it. It is almost impossible for my body and mind to contain my gratitude some days. I cry my way through many days. I’m scared much of the time. In many ways, life is harder – but it is also simpler. When it gets real, and it will, it gets distilled right down to the bones. That’s where I want to live now. Stripped of defensiveness. Authentically vulnerable. No more pretending that everything is going to be alright here. It’s not. Let’s just accept that and go from there, and see where life takes us.
The poster did get some things right, gave us some useful advise, especially DO IT FOR LOVE.
How to drive me to contemplate murder? Talk to me. It’s just about that simple. Okay…not really. Although, I wouldn’t risk it first thing in the morning if I were you. Dear Jen, who I consider a kindred spirit, explains how her introvert-ness works. She is right on. But I must differ on a couple of points. I went through a nervous breakdown (or breakthrough?) about a decade ago. I’ve written about it here in previous posts. I slowly and painfully extricated myself from Manville, where I was being held hostage in the House of Curmedgeons. I divorced my husband, my father, and my brother all at once. I didn’t want to. But they were killing me.
They were so dysfunctional and I had tried absolutely everything I could think of to try to make that household work for all of us. And one day something snapped inside me, and I was done. Done. In many ways I think of it as a near death experience; at least that’s a great metaphor. Subconsciously I knew it was them or me, and I chose to live. I chose me.
I was actually rescued by a friend who bought a house for me to live in, in her heroic effort to save my life and entice me away from my family. It worked. I literally credit her with saving my life, and she knows this. She was watching me struggle to find a place to rent with my 2 dogs, very little money, and an insatiably needy family of addicts who were sucking the life out of me.
It broke me. At least, my nervous system. I thought that some time to heal would result in my becoming “nice” again. All I needed was some uninterrupted rest and I’d bounce back. It hasn’t happened. I had stayed far too long.
And when I recently admitted that, yes, I am autistic, and yes, I am ADHD, that changed me also. It has served to explain my entire life. I’ve been burnt out on caretaking and people pleasing – probably since high school. Maybe earlier. I became the parent in my childhood home around the age of 10. I often tucked my drunken parents into bed around 2:30 a.m. after loosening their clothes. And then I got back up a few hours later to help dress my younger siblings for school. I was in survival mode, and I would live in survival mode until….well, I’ll have to keep you posted.
As wise woman Jen of Silver and Solo alludes to here, there is not enough solitude. There just isn’t. There never will be in this lifetime. I overdid it. Big, noisy family growing up. Big, noisy retail and service careers. I was on duty every waking moment. I’m off duty now. It was hell getting here, and I have remorse about how it was accomplished. It was not pretty, or nice. I have no use for nice. I’m a good person, but nice won’t be happening.
You always know where you stand with me. If you are in my life, know that you are invited, cherished, respected. Without any patience left in my energy reserve, I am asking for your patience. And sometimes there will be months where I disappear. When I was younger I’d laugh naively about this, telling people I’d “gone south for the winter…” Know that I’m doing the best I can. Please take a number.
Thank you for indulging me this week as I shared my fascination with murder mystery television series. I make jokes that I feel homicidal at times; I hope you know that I can’t really wrap my head around that. I know that most murders are crimes of passion, and almost always committed by family members (after all, who can infuriate us more?) but it is hard for me to imagine losing control to the point of becoming violent. Mean, yes. God knows I have said some very ornery things to the people I’ve loved and respected most. If you’ve ever won an argument with me, it’s because I let you. That is not something to be proud of.
Like generations of girls before and after me, I was raised not to express anger. Sugar and spice and all that…seen and not heard. I learned to stifle anger with the best of them. The very best of them being exemplified by my Mother. I don’t believe I ever saw or heard her angry. And I do believe that is what killed her. She was never angry until one day she was sick and full of cancer. A particularly aggressive, fast growing cancer – liposarcoma. Cancer of the fat cells. She didn’t have any fat. She weighed about 90 pounds. She had been struggling with anorexia. It was not nervosa, it was a medical type of anorexia where she simply had no appetite.
One morning when she suddenly couldn’t walk we rushed her to the ER and within 24 hours she had emergency surgery. They removed an eleven pound tumor from her tiny, weak body. She would live another eight months. Her oncologist, who had also been my sons’ cancer specialist and would later become my sisters’, told me “it’s the cancer of unexpressed anger.” I believe him. And I know exactly what it was about. If anyone ever had reason to commit murder, she did. She thought about it. She talked to me about it one day, devoid of any emotion in her voice. And I understood completely. But she didn’t do it. She really wasn’t capable.
I don’t hold back anger anymore. I let ‘er rip. I’d get out of the way if I were you. I might scream and even throw stuff – but not at you. I abhor violence. I’ve been the victim and the witness to it more than I care to report; it grieves me deeply. We were given a clear divine directive: on earth as it is in heaven. There is no excuse for physical violence – NONE – ever. That includes hunting sentient life, and any mistreatment of animals. And it includes war. It has no justifiable place on this planet. PERIOD.
If you have violent outbursts, do whatever you must do to learn how to manage your anger before someone gets harmed, including yourself. Get help somehow. One of the ways I channel my angry fantasies is to read or watch murder mysteries. I love good storytelling. I like problem solving, and hatred and bigotry are problems. Big problems. I must confess, however, that I vet these mysteries ahead of time as carefully as possible. If I do see the violence take place I will have nightmares and be unable to sleep afterward. That’s why I like the genre called “cosy mystery.” You never see the attack. There is little blood. I want the violence pre-managed for me, thank you. Keep it cosy. And believe me, the irony is not lost.
Believe me, also, when I tell you that if I do ever decide to commit murder, it will be slow and painful; absolutely premeditated. They won’t see me coming. I will never get caught. But don’t worry, it won’t be you.
Well, I must go back on my word. I said I’d share some of my favorite murder mysteries this week – but only the funniest. Three Pines isn’t a cosy mystery. It does, however take place in a small village, populated with quirky characters – one of the cosy mysteries basic premises. This is a police procedural. It isn’t funny. Don’t watch it alone on a stormy night. But it’s too brilliant to bypass. I’m often asked why I am so obsessed with murder mysteries. And my simple answer is this: when well written they are some of the most complex and interesting human stories, and they come to a logical and cathartic resolution. Oh but that I could expect the same from life. Again, a single season of 8 episodes, this is based on the Inspector Gamache novels by Louise Penney. Your local library has them, and they will keep you intrigued all through the cold, dark winter…
However, in the interest of full disclosure detective, I have now realized that I must review my previously held opinion that the best murder mysteries are British. Three Pines is Canadian. Ludwig is British, as is Queens of Mystery. Only Murders In The Building is American, and Recipes for Love and Murder is produced in South Africa.
There is one more series I will mention here, and it is from New Zealand. So Anglophile confession, detective, I guess I’d have to admit the Brits don’t have the corner on this market any longer. So, okay, they started it. I think. Brokenwood Mysteries seems a combination of small-town-quirky-character cosy mystery and police procedural…it wouldn’t be nearly as funny were it not for one particular character who is simply hilarious, that of the Russian forensic pathologist and love obsessed Gina. You’ll enjoy getting to know her.
A Painterly Home 