Going to see a movie, even watching dvd's at home, is always a hit and miss affair. I think it is safe to say that Rob and I haven't managed to find a film yet without references big and small about death and grieving. Last night's movie was in keeping with the trend. Despite the fact that we were running late from dinner, we decided to catch the new Naomi Watts and Viggio Mortenson flick titled, Eastern Promises. About ten or fifteen minutes had passed by the time we walked in and found seats on the left wall. The theater wasn't very crowded but we found ourselves sitting behind and in front of couples. Not an awful view despite the lack of stadium seating, but I did hear the woman behind us make a disgusted sound when Rob sat down in front of her and then proceeded to quickly peel off his pullover. Some people don't deal with the "public"aspect of cinema very well. The simple truth is if you want to view a movie without the inconveince of other viewers possible spoiling your pristine cinematic experience, stay home and wait for the DVD.
The Mortenson character in the film was a Russian named Nikolai who worked as a driver for the Russian mafia based in the city of London. The first scene we took in was of this character being called upon to dispose of a body. To say that there were grisly and violent scenes in the movie would be understating quite a bit. There were only a few deaths, but they were graphic. I am not exactly more squeamish since the death of my first husband. But once you have actually watched someone die, the "Hollywood" take will never seem quite as realistic no matter how well done because you know that it's not real. The actor got up when the director yelled "Cut" and went home to family or out to dinner with friends. It can never be as real as real is.
Naomi Watts played a midwife in the story who gets involved with the mafia, Nikolai, after the death of a 14 year old Ukranian prostitute. The girl had jut given birth and it stirs up memories for Anna (Watts) because she has recently miscarried her own baby. Between the grief and the murdering, it was a good movie. The acting was wonderful and it was visually interesting. The story was well told.
After the movie, we sat and watched the credits, listening to the soundtrack too because we like to collect soundtracks that are particularly well done. As the credits rolled it came to a dedication to the production unit manager, Lisa Parker, a 40 year old Irish woman who had died suddenly this past June. The woman behind us had been babblingly loudly to her companion during this time. Mostly about nothing and it occurred to me that perhaps she and the gentleman she was with were on a date. Maybe even a first or second date because women have a tendency to talk far too much in early dating situations out of nervousness. It's only later when you know a man well and are sure of him that you can let the quiet be quiet. The dedication rolls on and the women reads the dates of birth and death and does the math to come up with Parker's age, which she announces too. Then makes some inane comment about what might have happened. It wasn't what was said but the conversational tone that struck me and told me that this women had never lost anyone. If she had, it wouldn't have been a matter for trivia or simply filling spaces in the air.
We got up to leave after the screen went black. The woman and her companion were still seated and she made sure to give Rob a dirty look. Of course he didn't notice. If this woman knew my husband at all she would have saved the effort. Rob pays no attention to strangers because the things they have to say or the "looks" they might throw at him aren't of interest to him. It's one of the the things I love abou him, the fact that he doesn't let random people get to him. I noted her look. I also noted that she was my age but trying to look younger with heavy make-up and dyed blonde hair styled to the point of being wind-resistant. She was jowly and her belly rolled over the waistband of her too tight pants. I don't know what my look said to her. I think I smiled.
Among the widowed there is a small sub-set which treat grief as something you can "self-help" your way out of with a bit of effort. They refer to this as "griefwork" and certainly there is wisdom is the early months and through the first year and a bit to let yourself be sad and mourn all the losses that come with losing a mate, but I reject the idea that the intensity of grief is something that will consume years - two and three and four - at a time until a person can hope to rebuild and reclaim. At some point, in the second year, normality, and the need for this, take over and grieving becomes intermittment and usually triggered by the memories that the randomness of our lives throws at us. But, it's not long-lasting or crippling and not reason to schedule an intervention for yourself. Like last night's movie showed me, again, that I will never look at some things in the same way.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
Friday, October 12, 2007
Chapter 43 and 2/3
Today marks the 201st entry on my original version of this blog (see link below). I began blogging on Tuesday, March 13th of this year, just a few days before Rob arrived from Alberta for our trip to Devil’s Den in Arkansas. Just six day before he asked me to marry him. In some ways this blog has been a chronicle of the next chapter of my life.
Some widowed people mark the chapters of their lives in terms of significant others. Following that example my life didn’t begin until I was 34 and met and married Will, and my life stopped with his physical death in January of 2006, not to begin again until December when Rob came into my world. Personally, I find the idea of my life being so insignificant that it isn’t worth a mention unless I am mated to be a tad insulting though I can understand why people who have always been with someone would feel this way.
If my life were a book, it would have covered many pages through a variety of chapters of which Will and Rob are characters woven into the richness of the text. More significant than most of the other characters but not sole standouts in a desolate landscape passing for a life.
Three months from yesterday I will be 44 years old, and in many ways I feel quite new to all this life stuff. Who knows how many chapters I will write between now and then.
Some widowed people mark the chapters of their lives in terms of significant others. Following that example my life didn’t begin until I was 34 and met and married Will, and my life stopped with his physical death in January of 2006, not to begin again until December when Rob came into my world. Personally, I find the idea of my life being so insignificant that it isn’t worth a mention unless I am mated to be a tad insulting though I can understand why people who have always been with someone would feel this way.
If my life were a book, it would have covered many pages through a variety of chapters of which Will and Rob are characters woven into the richness of the text. More significant than most of the other characters but not sole standouts in a desolate landscape passing for a life.
Three months from yesterday I will be 44 years old, and in many ways I feel quite new to all this life stuff. Who knows how many chapters I will write between now and then.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Fight
"The best thing one can say of anyone is that they fight," Doris Lessing, British novelist. She wrote this in The Golden Notebook, her 2007 novel that won her the Nobel Prize.
I found the quote above in this week’s Newsweek article about Doris Lessing. It spoke to me. I think that you should fight until you haven’t the strength to take one more swing, and then after a good night’s sleep, get back in the ring and start swinging again.
I was often chastised in my early days of the widow message board by my “elders” for not accepting the status quo, but I have since come to realize that making a plan and executing it is too much a part of who I am. Doing nothing has never solved any of my difficulties or made my life better. What it leads to, in my opinion, is frustration and bitterness, and a deep sense of helplessness. Some of my battles have been long. Some were short. Sometimes I received assistance. Often I was expected to go it alone. The point is though that I came out of the other side of the struggle better for it whether the outcome was preferred or not.
I think that it is Dylan Thomas who writes about “raging” against the coming of death, but his comparison is not too much different from Lessing’s advice. Life is meant to be lived and forcefully if necessary.
I found the quote above in this week’s Newsweek article about Doris Lessing. It spoke to me. I think that you should fight until you haven’t the strength to take one more swing, and then after a good night’s sleep, get back in the ring and start swinging again.
I was often chastised in my early days of the widow message board by my “elders” for not accepting the status quo, but I have since come to realize that making a plan and executing it is too much a part of who I am. Doing nothing has never solved any of my difficulties or made my life better. What it leads to, in my opinion, is frustration and bitterness, and a deep sense of helplessness. Some of my battles have been long. Some were short. Sometimes I received assistance. Often I was expected to go it alone. The point is though that I came out of the other side of the struggle better for it whether the outcome was preferred or not.
I think that it is Dylan Thomas who writes about “raging” against the coming of death, but his comparison is not too much different from Lessing’s advice. Life is meant to be lived and forcefully if necessary.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Soup and Sandwiches
Last night it was vegetable barley stew with tuna sandwiches. Tonight it will be minestrone, romaine salad and fresh bread. Did I mention the soup will be homemade? Like last night’s stew? No, well it will be. How did this happen? Me cooking.
When I was young and my mother wanted to teach my sister and I to cook, she meant baking. The kinds of things that my father liked to have around that were time consuming to prepare, and she didn’t feel like doing herself. While I don’t think my parents had children with the intention of fobbing off their least favorite chores on us, over the years that is what happened. I am sure that I was never taught to cook a meal though my mother claims otherwise. I am sure for the simple fact that my father wasn’t someone who wanted his meal ready and on the table when he arrived home from work in the evening. He wanted to read the paper. Have a few beers. And then a few more. Smoke the cigarettes that had been burning a hole in his pocket during his ten hour shift at the meat packing plant. While our friends were having dinner, we were playing outside,waiting for them to be done, but by the time they were finished, it was dinner time for us. After enduring family meal, a ritual that became more and more arduous as the years rolled by, my father’s drinking got steadily heavier, and my parent’s relationship more strained; my sister and I would hurry through the clean-up the hope that would still be enough daylight left for play or homework or whatever. As a result, I never learned to cook a meal.
When I went out on my own, meals were haphazard affairs. I am the kind of person who can eat the same thing for weeks and months on end without thinking much about it. Variety never had much to do with food for me. Even now, I have certain preferences and if not for Katy and Rob, I would rarely spice up my routine beyond my few favorites.
My late husband liked to cook, and he was easily bored with routine. He did most of the evening meal prep when we ate in, but because we were childless for the first while, we ate out a lot too. Later on his illness effected his appetite to the point where he didn’t eat much, and Katy was still a baby, so there was no need to prepare meals in the traditional sense. I got into the habit of feeding the two of them and then eating breakfast foodmyself, if I ate at all.
Rob had limited rotation of meals when I first met him. When it became too tedious for his daughter to bear, I think, then Jordan would cook to change things up a bit. So, when he and I blended our lives nightly meals became something that I to truly deal with for the first time in my life. At first, I left it to Rob, who was pretty good about it despite the fact that he had to work all day and come home to the additional work of preparing the family meal. He would give me jobs to do like vegetable prep or salad making. From there I progressed to making lunch for everyone, as Rob came home most days, and it was a bit like making supper but with a less demanding menu. After a time the occasional meal became my responsibility. And now, I am making soup from scratch.
I know that many women would find my pride in this accomplishment laughable especially because in my peer group, many married young and have been juggling husband and children and jobs and cooking for decades now. But for me, I am still quite impressed with myself. First I am writing regularly, and now I cook. On par as far as creative endeavors go? Perhaps not, but both are outlets in my quest for personal growth and discovery.
When I was young and my mother wanted to teach my sister and I to cook, she meant baking. The kinds of things that my father liked to have around that were time consuming to prepare, and she didn’t feel like doing herself. While I don’t think my parents had children with the intention of fobbing off their least favorite chores on us, over the years that is what happened. I am sure that I was never taught to cook a meal though my mother claims otherwise. I am sure for the simple fact that my father wasn’t someone who wanted his meal ready and on the table when he arrived home from work in the evening. He wanted to read the paper. Have a few beers. And then a few more. Smoke the cigarettes that had been burning a hole in his pocket during his ten hour shift at the meat packing plant. While our friends were having dinner, we were playing outside,waiting for them to be done, but by the time they were finished, it was dinner time for us. After enduring family meal, a ritual that became more and more arduous as the years rolled by, my father’s drinking got steadily heavier, and my parent’s relationship more strained; my sister and I would hurry through the clean-up the hope that would still be enough daylight left for play or homework or whatever. As a result, I never learned to cook a meal.
When I went out on my own, meals were haphazard affairs. I am the kind of person who can eat the same thing for weeks and months on end without thinking much about it. Variety never had much to do with food for me. Even now, I have certain preferences and if not for Katy and Rob, I would rarely spice up my routine beyond my few favorites.
My late husband liked to cook, and he was easily bored with routine. He did most of the evening meal prep when we ate in, but because we were childless for the first while, we ate out a lot too. Later on his illness effected his appetite to the point where he didn’t eat much, and Katy was still a baby, so there was no need to prepare meals in the traditional sense. I got into the habit of feeding the two of them and then eating breakfast foodmyself, if I ate at all.
Rob had limited rotation of meals when I first met him. When it became too tedious for his daughter to bear, I think, then Jordan would cook to change things up a bit. So, when he and I blended our lives nightly meals became something that I to truly deal with for the first time in my life. At first, I left it to Rob, who was pretty good about it despite the fact that he had to work all day and come home to the additional work of preparing the family meal. He would give me jobs to do like vegetable prep or salad making. From there I progressed to making lunch for everyone, as Rob came home most days, and it was a bit like making supper but with a less demanding menu. After a time the occasional meal became my responsibility. And now, I am making soup from scratch.
I know that many women would find my pride in this accomplishment laughable especially because in my peer group, many married young and have been juggling husband and children and jobs and cooking for decades now. But for me, I am still quite impressed with myself. First I am writing regularly, and now I cook. On par as far as creative endeavors go? Perhaps not, but both are outlets in my quest for personal growth and discovery.
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