JOURNAL, Monday, March 25th

This morning we made love, and in the moments that followed, as we lay in the luxury of a few more minutes in bed, the real world gently nudges me to consciousness and reminds me that I have to bring an article to school for Karen, that I have to go to the dentist before class tonight, and gently but persistently it reminds me that I’m dealing with Death.

Death – it’s like a dull ache that sometimes goes unnoticed, only to resurface when I begin to relax. I’ll be settling in to read for a few minutes before going to sleep when some word or phrase will trigger morbid and persistent thoughts of last week’s activity that stay with me throughout the night. Or I’ll be soaking in the tub after coming home from the work and I’ll close my eyes only to see Amanda and Claire, their faces blending into one single mask of suffering. I scrunch up my eyes and shake my head to dislodge the vision, but still I’m left feeling sad and lost.

It was a week ago yesterday that we heard about Amanda. That night I couldn’t sleep in our bed. I told Danny that it was because I didn’t want to disturb him in my restlessness but it had more to do with not wanting to be touched. The shock, the half told story, the violent images made me instinctively want to protect myself. I could never have slept thinking that I may be startled in the night by the sensation of skin brushing against skin or the weight of a hand on my chest. That night I wrapped myself in a fleece robe over long pajamas and cocooned into a sleeping bag on the couch, burrowing far into the crease where cushions meet.

Of all the emotions that I experienced last week, this instinct to protect myself, even from Danny, was the darkest and most upsetting. It made me question why I would turn away from him at such a time, and it made me wonder if I’d really come as far in my trusting of him as I thought I had.

I spent a lot of time during the week thinking about my reactions to what was happening and I realized with a strange sense of relief and even gratitude, that although everyone around me was grieving for Amanda, they had no way of knowing that I had also just lost Claire.

It doesn’t take a psychiatrist to understand why Amanda and Claire are one in my mind these days. Having to deal with Amanda’s passing is a morbid and urgent gift that has allowed me to feel all that was ignored for so many years, and to look at all that was left unsaid and undone after Claire was gone.

On Saturday morning, I decided that although he was fully aware of how difficult things were with Amanda’s death at school, I had to let Danny into the rest of the story that I was living. I don’t want secrets between us. I asked him to sit with me on the couch and we read the letter that I wrote to Claire about the day she died. I wasn’t embarrassed that he should know that I write letters to dead people; I wanted him to understand what I’d seen and felt

I have come to trust Danny’s love and I think that I understand now that there are times when every individual needs to shield themselves for a while, and times when they have to share, but that they are all times that will bring us back together.

Sometimes I still feel that I don’t deserve him, that I’m not capable of such unconditional love in return. When I speak of this to Jean, she tells me that baby steps are better than backward steps; she speaks of the courage that it takes to heal and to seek help in the process. She believes that I can learn to trust myself.

We read Claire’s letter together, Danny and I curled up on the new couch, and when we had finished, Danny read it over again then put the pages down. For a long time he said nothing as we sat there in the gray afternoon light, watching the cold, hard raindrops on the window across the room. Pussywillow jumped up on his lap and brushed my cheek with her tail as she padded to find a comfortable place to join us. We laughed at the intrusion. Finally, Danny pulled me closer to him and kissed the top of my head. “I wish I could have been there with you,” he whispered.

He lifted my hand to his face and kissed the tips of my fingers and held my palm against his cheek.

Danny heard this week that his contract is being extended through next year so we’ve discussed looking for a bigger apartment. I’ll be sorry to leave this place; it’s so much a part of me. But despite feeling emotionally washed out by everything that’s been going on, I’m delighted to realize that I can actually look forward to apartment hunting with Danny, and establishing a place that we can build together.



Copyright 2003