Chapter 15
So we all gathered in twilight the next evening. Windows open to let in a soft breeze, closing out another warm afternoon. The kitchen filled with the delicious garlicky scent of the dinner we were preparing. Zoe stood at the counter putting together a salad. Sam sliced a baguette, pausing to take in big mouthfuls of the fresh bread, unable to hold out for the last ten minutes or so my bisque needed to simmer.
Doug finished up a long conversation with Heather, and came in to pour himself a glass of wine. Zoe had insisted he tell her the whole story too, and both of them were no doubt plotting any number of modern organic tips for him to de-stress himself. “Heather says hi to all,” he said, taking an appreciative sip. “She wishes she were here, not least because it’s dark and pouring back there.”
“Should you be having that?” Zoe asked, her young face pursed in a mixture of concern and boldness at challenging her father.
I watched just a hint of annoyance sweep across his face. Raised a brow in his direction – that this is how it would be, and we needed to be okay with that.
“It’s fine. A glass of red wine is actually good for you,” Doug said. “Moderation’s the key.”
“Yes, Dad,” Zoe said, her voice mocking but her eyes light with affection.
They’d had a sweet reunion earlier. Zoe rushing into the house, squeezing Doug hard, clutching his shoulders and daintily brushing away a tear. As though she only now realized he was mortal. There would be a day when she couldn’t call him for advice or swing by for dinner, when the fatherly words would all be memories.
It had given me pause, watching. Thinking about my own parents, all the little moments like this we’d missed. And Sam – was it possible at all that he could understand the value of this time together?
I turned to him, laughingly swatting his hand away from the bread. “Leave some for the rest of us!”
Doug invited both kids to the yard to see the new stone steps he was putting in, one of those things we’d been planning for ages. He opened the side door. Zoe followed, graceful and catlike, and Sam lumbered after her, tall enough now to need to duck past the trellis by the door. And I did my level best to just let them go, trying as I had been since I saw Doug’s face the prior afternoon, not to make him more self conscious by my hovering concern.
Though even in glimpses, I was aware of his inner turmoil. The man he meant to be and the guy who had let stress turn to panic being strongly at odds. The confident mask he wore talking to the kids had tiny cracks if you knew to look for them. But I knew Doug so well that I felt pretty confident his rational, take charge self would win the internal battles. Not that those were the best terms to use; I was itching, in fact, for my next workday when I could go use the work computer (without him seeing the search history) and really dig into how we might together address this new challenge. How to not make it a battle but something pleasant and enlivening and precious that we took on together.
Clark nudged my leg and squawked a meow. He had been lurking under the table waiting for food to spill, and now stood at my feet, looking up expectantly. I poured him his kibble – not that that would stop him from seeking more of our food again in a few minutes, but it gave me a moment’s peace.
I checked my recipe and poked at the simmering pan, then lowered the heat. A little more time, a couple handfuls of fresh herbs, and it would be ready. The meal took some time to prepare, but so worth it. I was sure we as a family had many of our best conversations here in the kitchen, preparing good food.
Outside, Sam appeared to be testing one of the new stones by jumping on it, while Zoe bent down for a closer look at the garden. Doug, I could see just by his posture, was regaling them both with the details of how he’d acquired the stones, negotiating both price and assistance getting them into the car and then rigging up makeshift wheelbarrow on this end.
It was good to seem him out there, both now and the past weekends, mucking around in the dirt and being creative. It provided him with a physical workout and went some ways toward taking his mind off work. Clearly important, given what had just happened, his little panic episode.
Just thinking again about that scene yesterday gave me two little jolts: an echo of the fear that had gripped me, and the contrasting flow of relief that Doug’s heart was okay. I watched him in profile for a moment. He looked open, smiling, though maybe still a bit clenched in the shoulders.
Turns out my perceptions hadn’t been so far off after all, it struck me. I knew he was holding a lot of work stress, but I hadn’t sensed something seriously wrong, as in physical aliments. And that was indeed the case.
But before I gave myself too many kudos, I could think of half a dozen things I might have done or said to help him alleviate the stress, instead of just being quiet witness. I watched the three of them in the yard, the marked difference in body movement between the young people and Doug. There was more going on with him that just the work stuff, I was suddenly sure.
Aging, and the many minor grievances associated there. Doug would be turning 54 in a couple months, and I would soon be 49. Yes, there the pair of us were, riding upwards on that bubble before Medicare but when costs skyrocketed. When serious health problems were more than a vague possibility, but had in fact happened to people we knew, to peers. And when the loss of a job would make him a tech-challenged 50 something competing in a not great economy with people younger, more agile, less burdened.
I worried for my job now and then during the funding crises that had popped up. But I was covered by Doug’s health plan, by his corporate firm. He, no doubt, felt he had no such back up. Bigger than the gap between Doug’s game face and the barely controlled adrenaline surges that fueled his panic was the chasm we both felt, between our idealized retirement and the reality that we may not ever get there. A few bad turns and we could face years of struggle – bad jobs, poor benefits, harsh conditions that would only contribute to worsening health.
What had that doctor said? A cascading effect. I could almost visualize the swirling chaos Doug might be feeling these days. The work taking so much of his time and attention, draining him from the better parts of his life. And even there, home life, family life, entertainment – weren’t these all too on a slow decline? When it came down to it, perhaps he also worried about me. I knew that his ex had given up on their marriage in part because she always felt second fiddle to his job.
That had never been an issue with me. But if I was being honest, I’d have to admit I had maybe taken a step or two toward straying. Busy as Doug was, he had to have taken note of my recent activities, my greater energy these past few months. My sudden new friends, my seemingly clandestine meetings – these could have been factors for him too.
Daniel. Everything about him seemed so irrelevant now. Even on whatever path I eventually strung together toward greater awareness – he would be little more than a stepping stone on the way, a small wobbly one at that. He had fostered some brief insights, but nothing more than I would have stumbled to on my own. Maybe the best I could do is eventually read whatever he published – assuming he ever did publish and the whole thing wasn’t a scam for online therapeutics – with mild regard. Look for some small piece of myself in there but then file it away with a collection of items of interest on the topic.
The topic being, what, precognizant dreams, my tiny bursts of ESP? Or more broadly that there are more fulfilling ways to communicate than texts and tweets. That I should keep paying attention to those little hunches, not just write them off. That we all need to slow down, observe, listen, be present in our own lives. Really see what we have, where so often it seems people focus on what’s lacking. Even the idea that it’s worthwhile to take some risks, make changes, be – even in the tiredness of middle age – spontaneous.
Doug and the kids piled noisily back into the kitchen, as plain an illustration of what I value as imaginable. I ladled out the bisque, breathing in its steamy goodn
ess. Sam’s face exuded such anticipation and simple pleasure that it was hard not to laugh, he was like a human version of our cat at mealtimes.
We’d never been ones to say grace, but Doug and I sometimes clinked a glass over our particularly special efforts. Or we toasted the family occasions. I liked the concept – the moment of small g grace when you took that tiny interval just to appreciate the food and the company.
Doug, as if reading my mind, lifted his glass. “To all our kids,” he said, smiling equally at Zoe and Sam. “And many more meals together.”
“And to you guys too,” Sam exclaimed, zipping his glass back up so fast his wine threatened to slosh out.
“And to all our good health,” I added quietly.
“And to your anniversary,” Zoe finished out the set, grinning impishly.
I met Doug’s eye again as we clinked and sipped. Our ten year was approaching. Doug would just as soon not be surprised by some big shindig, but he was a sucker for pleasing his daughters. Who knows what they’d be scheming. At least it wouldn’t occur to Sam, I felt confident, that he had a big role in the thing.
For a moment, the only sounds were of silverware and plates.
“Good,” Doug murmured. His expression stayed simple: sated with food, mind off the office, and carefully not monitoring pulse or his heart rate.
Zoe had an eye on him too. I suspected she was censoring herself a bit. She liked to talk about her work, and enjoyed both bantering with him and seeking his opinions on cases, but she was making a point not to bother him with anything legal.
Sam entertained us instead, chattering in that way he had where his brain moved faster than his mouth and speeded up his speech till he almost tripped over his words. (I flashed on memories of him from a dozen years ago – small and skinny with a thin piping voice, the way he’d almost hop up and down from the excitement and frustration of trying to articulate all the elements of his ideas. Master of the compound sentence, I’d joked about him back then.)
He had been reading up on studies on brain research involving stem cells, an offshoot of the computer simulations involved in his internship. Brain stem cells, it sounded like, or new stem cells to be somehow introduced into the brains of people suffering from post traumatic stress. The directors at Gallagher were launching a similar sounding effort with a couple other universities, trying to foster shared research and findings. It was somewhat of a departure, as PTSD was not an illness as defined in our charter. But quite fundable, what with the ongoing conflicts and sobering statistics about the number of soldiers who had come back from Iraq and Afghanistan with head injuries and traumatic stress.
I tuned back into Sam’s voice, telling myself to pay attention. “They know that people PTSD have a statistically higher rate of developing other stress-related diseases. Maybe even Alzheimer’s. This MRI study on returning vets found that the part of the hippocampus devoted to short term memory is smaller. Significantly.” He paused.
“So how do you make it bigger?” Zoe asked.
“Yeah, that’s the question.” Sam paused, attention momentarily diverted to his food.
“It could be years yet before they develop any viable procedures,” I cautioned.
Sam, like so many of his generation, expected near instant results. With a newly upgraded, cheaper device available shortly thereafter. I worried that he wouldn’t understand, or would be frustrated by, the slower pace of biological or medical applications.
But he just shrugged. To him, I suppose, this was more like an engineering puzzle than a real world human concern. “I read about these guys,” he continued, “War vets who come back and then take all these risks, or drink or do extreme sports. Because their brains got used to feeling constantly in danger and it’s like it changed their body chemistry and they keep needing a new rush.”
“That’s sad,” I said, feeling an involuntary shiver. I couldn’t imagine seeking out dangerous things as a way of feeling better.
“Well, maybe, but it’s a real phenomena. I read something else about aid workers. It was like a personality type they found a lot of them have, like a drive to rush in to help in a place where most people are fleeing. They need that kind of emotional intensity just to be able to feel anything inside. They wonder if it was something in their brain that made them want to go, or something that happens to their internal wiring once they’re there.”
“I think I saw a link to that,” Zoe exclaimed. “This guy I went to school with is totally like that, all these different friends were like, yeah, that’s Jason.”
“That’s pretty much the opposite of you, Mom,” Sam said. “You need things all calm and quiet and done in the proper order to feel right.”
Everyone laughed as I gave a rueful, guilty shrug. I couldn’t deny it. I thought about Kylie, the way she talked about airports. The conversations she and I had had about coping strategies for dealing with those sort of places that teemed with other peoples’ anxious nerves. Because we both understood that the simplest solution, pure avoidance, was not viable. “Surprisingly enough,” I told them, “in spite of that, I will nonetheless give a nod to change and spontaneity. Tempting and comfortable as my regular routines are.”
“I’ve been thinking about Costa Rica,” Doug put in. “While we’re on the topic of being spontaneous. And our anniversary.”
I felt my mouth form a surprised O, and quickly took in how much pleasure eliciting a surprise from me gave him.
“We had grand schemes for a trip there on our honeymoon, you may recall,” Doug continued. “Before small hiccups like the time and cost intervened. But both of us have always wanted to go; we talked about it I think on our first date.”
I nodded, smiling back, recalling immediately the energy of those early conversations between us, the fun and yes, spontaneous ways our ideas flowed back and forth. How we had squeezed the time for each other out of our busy lives, then luxuriated in it. We could still do that, I told myself.
We had ended up taking a shorter honeymoon, staying very inexpensively at one of the partner’s condo in Cabo. It’s not that we had been broke or anything, but the wedding had been more than we first anticipated. Heather had just chosen a private college, Sam needed braces, Doug’s father had a series of operations that necessitated his flying back several times. Things conspired, the way they do.
“Clarissa’s Spanish is quite impressive,” Doug was saying, “though I imagine many people speak some English.” He continued about some of the rainforest creatures he thought would be interesting.
Zoe told us about a similar trip a friend of hers had taken, only it might have been to Guatemala. Awesome though, they had loved the flora and fauna as well as the slowed down pace.
That got us all talking about what Sam might do – or not do – during the last couple weeks of his summer vacation. The topic of an anniversary trip fell away.
A couple hours later though, Doug and I sat in companionable silence, relaxing in the living room. Zoe had gone, only after extracting promises from Doug that he would take care of himself. Sam was out with friends, hopefully just hanging out in a somebody’s old bedroom watching reruns of Battlestar Galactica and hollering dude at each other.
It was too early to admit to wanting to go to bed, though I was tired. Doug looked about ready to melt into the couch, though his eyes were still tracking the Giant’s game.
He glanced over. “That was nice,” he said. “And I feel okay. Zoe better not check on me more than once a day though.”
“She’s sweet. I think she was really shaken up.” We all were, I thought, but didn’t add.
Doug just shrugged. “I don’t know how I’ll find time to make that follow up appointment. But I will,” he added, at my look. “It really will let up a little once we settle the biggest one.”
It had better let up, I thought, but didn’t even bother to say out loud. He or I or both of us together would just have to make
things happened to lower the stress volume in his life. “So were you serious about Costa Rica?” I asked. “In October maybe?”
“I’m holding the vacation time; you are too, right?”
I nodded. We hadn’t gotten farther in our planning than that though.
“You know, we could choose anywhere,” he added carefully. “I was thinking about Costa Rica from, you know, the honeymoon. But we could go somewhere that you’d really like. Maybe there’s a place more in line with the things you want to pursue. The psychic stuff.”
His expression, his eyes were without guile. This was genuine, he was reaching out, and I felt a sudden lump in my throat. “Thanks,” I finally murmured. Trusting he could hear the gratitude that went beyond just the offer to the acknowledgement that I had these things to pursue. “I can’t think so much of a place for all of that, though,” I added. “It’s more a state of mind, wherever.”
He sighed. “Well, I think it’ll take me really being somewhere different. Somewhere away from all this.” He waved his arm toward the TV, but presumably meant his working world. Cases dragging on, client problems, co-workers texting him, the way he felt tethered to his devices.
“Well, we should do what we talked about back then,” I said, sapped energy returning as I recalled the happily energized weeks we spent planning our so called simple wedding. “Get tickets and find a nice base to stay, but no more agenda than that. It’ll be a better experience that way. Worth taking some risks.”
“No TV. No news. Leave the phones behind.” We looked at each other. “Or just take yours,” he amended.
“But only for emergencies. Well, and finding stuff. Good local restaurants. GPS.” I laughed at how much my idea of roughing it has changed over the years. “But, Doug, this really is what I want to do, what I need to go after – just getting out there. Going somewhere and having the experience. Living it, not worrying before and after. All my senses open.”
He grinned. “That actually sounds pretty good. You can tell me what the guides are thinking,” he teased.
“Be nice, or I won’t translate for you.” At his surprised look, I added, “from Spanish, what did you think I meant.”
“Not telling.” Doug purposely turned his face away.
Even that gesture, it seemed, was another little sign of his admitting I had a small talent of some sort.
We continued to sit in companionable silence. I thought about my so called talent, this thing I’d come to appreciate as a small and rare. And perhaps the knowledge of it was rare as well. More and more we plug our ears and minds from a young age. Kids fantasize about Harry Potter magical powers but drown out those subtle under the surface things that we’re all at least somewhat capable of processing.
I thought back to that morning when Yvette had died. How I had heard the voice in my sleep, and understood the loss. But then been focused on explaining it, rationalizing it, disproving it. Coming to terms with its strangeness and with my own odd history of unexplained perceptions.
When the real issue was that my friend had died. That I had had this dear friend, and that she was gone. But that I was still here. She had lived a good long life. I had lived for awhile, but had awhile longer too. I should keep moving forward.
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