Lost Identity

When I first realized that I had lost my identity, I assumed it would take a year or two to reestablish it. Having moved to a small, rural town after 30 years in the city, I lived there for a year before I even realized that my identity was gone. I had never thought much about my identity, it was never anything I had voiced to myself before. But I was having trouble coming to peace in my new home, even though it was everything we had talked about wanting. Driving down the road one day, it dawned on me, “Oh, I lost my identity. No wonder I feel like this.”

In my old life, I had been a neighbor, a classmate, a boss, a coworker, a long time friend, the person who comes in regularly to order a decaf, non-fat latte. I had been Apartment 2 on Hanson Street, the one who liked to cat sit so I could watch TV in the penthouse. I was the one who went to the vet with my friend when that cat gave it up.

Now I am part of the new couple who bought the old Smith house, or the Crow house, depending upon how long you have lived in town. I work at a local magazine, so I am easy to define within that. But what do I do there? Do I write for the magazine?  No, we contract out for most of the articles and my knowledge base is a long way from forestry. Even though I love to write, the magazine is not on my list of goals.  I do business stuff, sort of, a hodge podge of things that need to be done, including answering the phone and taking care of subscriptions.

I am no longer a CFO, not by a long shot. The Deputy Commissioner title had been mysterious even in Boston, but it had an impressive ring to it, much more distinct than “business stuff, sort of”. It’s nice to have a new job just a few miles from home, but the pond is pretty small.  I have traveled from one extreme of stress to the other in record time. I hadn’t realized that the small pond would feel this quiet, a bit too soon in my career.

I have met several very nice people in this new town, and I have had more than one conversation with a few of them. Their roots are deep and their friendships well established. I rarely know what they are talking about, I have not been there when their kids were born. In Boston, I had been there when kids were born, had held them in my arms as my best friend recovered in her hospital bed. Those kids were hitting high school age right before our very eyes. Only I was now 150 miles away. 

I have some work to do. Can I find a friend who isn’t already retired, someone with whom I can compare notes, ask questions, and go snowshoeing with at a time that does not conflict with my work? Can I find work that asks more of me, that gives me a larger context and expectations, that gives me a name? 

I joined the garden club, whose goal is to make sure some nice flowers are kept up at various spots around town. I participated in the swing dance group that ran lessons in winter, making nifty flyers to post around town. This was a welcome contribution, and something easy to do. These groups allow me to dip my toes in, to spend more time with people who I like. But then we part ways; they return to their families and routines, I return to my new home, the Smith house or the Crow house, depending.

Shortly after noting the absence of my identity, I am lucky to attend a week-long artist retreat. I was selected as one of the writers to get the benefit of an endowed week of studio time for Vermont artists. I was thrilled. There are painters, sculptors, photographers, and sixteen dedicated writers, all from within the state. Our writing studios are in one building, two neat floors with a long row of doors. My room faces the river. I could spend hours here and feel content.

I am immediately at ease. The intro questions are simple; which town am I from, what am I working on. We enjoy our meals together and then people excuse themselves, simply saying they need to get back to their studios. We all know what that means, that they are on a roll. Or they are not on a roll but are determined to find their way back. 

We share work and wine in the evenings, comparing notes on painters we love or writers we hate. We rarely talk about our "other" jobs. I have no idea what most people do in their lives at home. Occasionally someone asks what I do. I say I work at a magazine, no, I do not write for it, I do business stuff sort of, and then we move on.

The evening after our public reading, there was a small bonfire behind the sculpture studio. I shared a conversation with someone who had been to studio week several years previous, when his children were still at home. He admitted that when they came to visit on Saturday night, he barely knew who they were. I admitted that I did not have any of the heart tugs that I usually feel when I am away from my husband and our motley crew of pets. I am so self contained here at the studio. It is a parallel universe. Time drifts away. I chat with my husband using the laptop video phone, so I even see his face when we speak. But I don’t feel like I am from that place, not directly. I don’t have much to say.

By the end of the week I realize why I was so comfortable at the studio. I have an identity. Just like that, by showing up, I am neatly labeled and understood. Are you a painter or a writer? I am a writer. I am one of the people in the writers studio. We write. On Thursday night we will read from what we have written. You will get to hear words from all of us, all of the writers. There will be poems, novels, and ruminations. The writers will entertain you, give you pause, take you to another place for a moment or two. That’s what we do. We write. Thank you.

When I go back home I will again be part of the couple who moved into the house on the corner, the one they painted yellow. Yes, it looks much better now, like a grand old house should. The couple who mow their lawn, who expanded the garden, who need firewood. That’s me, only most people don’t know my name. I am an image of something else, the new person. The photo is not yet developed, the face blurs behind a sentence or two.

I don’t need to be a CFO or the boss. I probably won’t be holding many babies since that bumper crop was almost 20 years ago, as my coworkers hit the borderline of needing to get it done. Nowadays my neighbors talk about their grandchildren, people whose parents I do not know. I am not known as I writer in this town, I do not stay home all day at my desk, adding to my publications.

The artist retreat has given me the gift of uninterrupted time, that is what they are known for. But it also gave me an identity, a break from being unknown. I can breath more easily, follow the simple routines. I like my label. I am not anxious to give it up. There are only seven days, so give it up I must. And really, I should. I do have a place to go home to, a place to make my own.

My estimate is probably on target, a year or two to reestablish my identity. I could become the person who bakes wonderful cakes, who puts on a great dinner party when the ingredients come together just right. The person who loves company and unexpected guests. I could become the person who someone calls when they need an opinion. The person who likes to hike and bike, at least in theory. The person who usually needs to start out slow but keeps her feet moving forward. Instead of house sitting the cat, I will learn to feed the pigs up the road so the owners can get away every now and then. We will mow the lawn and work the garden, and the neighbors will stop to talk, comparing notes on the beetles and weeds.

Suspended animation does not come comfortably to me. The gift of being a writer was a short term hiatus, an easy slot to fill, laptop in hand. This borrowed identity reminds me of what I am missing. I’ll give it back on Sunday, hitting the highway south to home, back to the unknown. I will remember this label, this parallel place. I can claim that I am a writer while I find my other names. Boss, coworker, neighbor, friend.

Written May 2, 2009

Gray

I always notice the older women, the ones with gray white hair who have obviously known each other for years. You see them meet at a restaurant or chat while they shop. Their history is deeper than your lifetime.  Just yesterday there was a table for six next to our table for ten. I had a hard time paying attention and had to pull myself back to our own conversations.

The women arrived in stages. A few were already there ahead of the others, waiting to fill the empty seats. Two were about my age and the third women was of that grandmother age, the sporty kind of grandmother with a nifty haircut and stylish clothes. She didn’t get the roller set on Saturdays. Her hair was a clean pure white that is so attractive, the kind of gray that if I were certain my hair looked like that underneath the Clairol, I might let it out.

These women were comfortable with one another; it was not the first time they had shared a lunch. I couldn’t tell if the connection was professional or family, or some beloved volunteer project. It was a sunny spring Saturday afternoon and they were not in a rush. 

Then the others arrived. The three women stood to greet them, and the grandmother quickly stepped forward to take hold of her friend. They held each other for a long time, smiling and exclaiming. It occurred to me that this could be the whole purpose of the lunch, that the younger women were nieces or daughters, getting together in a small college town so that these two grandmothers could have time together. Not that they needed help getting around, they weren’t there yet. But it had been a long time since they had seen each other.

The two older women sat down right next to one another, their short wispy hair almost a perfect match. They had so much to say, nodding happily with good stories to tell. There was contentment that did not reveal any of the loss or pain that surely two friends have shared, when you have known each other for that long and you are still here.

I want that. This is always what I think when I see women like these. I want to be sitting on a park bench when I am 80, holding hands with a best friend who I know better than myself. I want the peace that sits there on their faces. How many broken hearts have they shared, how many have already passed on ahead of them. Yet here they are, maybe discussing the last reading group meeting, how the host had misbehaved, or arguing whether or not it had been a good book choice. Probably they should change the way the books get chosen, “Yes, maybe that would be better if we had more consensus when we decided which books to read. That last one didn’t really work out, now did it?!” 

Of maybe they are planning their next yoga retreat, they had so enjoyed the last one, the one held in western MA entitled Aging Gracefully. There was nothing graceful about it at 6 in the morning, but by 2 in the afternoon, when they sat on the patio overlooking the Berkshires, there had been grace. They were still doing the warrior pose at 80 years old, and it doesn’t get much more graceful than that. They didn’t like to brag, so they didn’t, but they were pleased with themselves. “Well, I think we can take a few hours off to enjoy this horizon, don’t you, dear?” And the other would agree, “Oh yes, we have certainly earned it.”

How did they first meet, these two friends now sitting on the patio, or in a restaurant, or on a park bench? Was it when their children were small and they shared tips for survival, the recipes that could be thrown together and quickly feed a fast moving crowd? Did they meet at church, host the monthly Saturday suppers? Were they always the ones who made sure the hymnals were in order before service began? Or maybe they met at work, after the children were in school and they decided they had too much time on their hands. All those young women were going to the office now, so maybe they would, too. Just try it out and see what they could do. In no time at all they were the ladies that the young ones came to during a bad day. They swept out the backlog and had everyone looking forward again. When they finally retired, there had been a special luncheon and nobody really got anything done that day.

So now here they were, sitting together for lunch, catching up on the past few years. I don’t want them to have to go their separate ways when lunch is over. I want them to live right next door to one another and see each other every day. I don’t want one of them to ever be left without the other. There must be a way to time that, to ease the twilight so it comes slowly and no one really notices that the other has departed. I want to hear all their stories, and I don’t want their stories to end.

One of these days I will work up my nerve. I will go over and have a seat and ask quite kindly, “Tell me, tell me how it works. How did you do this thing, this friendship of yours?”

Written April 19, 2009

eRoom of My Own

Okay, we bought the laptop so I could be a writer, so now I will write. 

I like having my own computer space, a place that is all mine, not shared or borrowed. It is the eRoom of my own. Just my stuff, arranged with whatever colors, pictures, set up that I want. The key board is for my fingers. Surely Virginia Wolf would not have shared a computer, especially if she had a new MacBook. I can totally see her with the very laptop that I now hold. I bet she would have loved it. I bet she would have dragged her thumb on the track pad like I do, causing the curser to do funny things that we don’t mean it to do.  But we shall train ourselves to proper navigation.

This is a room that travels with us. We decorate it, we connect to others in it. Sometimes we wander without any real purpose and sometimes we are very focused.  The eRoom accommodates us in all these ways that we are. When I go to my writing retreat, the eRoom will come with me. They will give me my own studio and bedroom, but the eRoom will be my anchor. It will be focused and ready to work. And it will be familiar. 

Familiar is an underrated concept, sometimes even belittled.  We are encouraged to move outside of our comfort zone, to challenge our perceptions and view the world from a new perspective. But let's not forget that the 3 year old moves most boldly into the world when she is able to check back and find her parent there in the background, providing safely through familiarity, allowing the child to move forward with confidence.

Surely as an adult we no longer need the parent right there on the sidelines keeping an eye on us. We are typically aware of our surroundings and changes that we have made. We are often deliberate in choosing to move out of the familiar. Why then is it always such a surprise when we are overwhelmed when taken out of context?  Whether it is a new job or a new town, or a new relationship, it is easy to be taken off guard. Where the heck is that coffee shop that used to be part of my routine? How are things done here? There are things that I didn’t expect and there are things that I did expect, but they seem to be missing. I should have seen that coming. But it’s always the same, I am taken aback. I look for the familiar landmark and it’s not quite there. I can’t even find a Starbucks, whether it was the Kentucky move or the permanent change to Vermont. When you can’t even find a Starbucks, you know your compass is gone.

You want your room of your own, your point of reference as you step forward to the edge. Perhaps that explains the tethered connection to the Internet. My stuff is there, the things I write and the people I know. And now that entire world sits here on my new laptop, the eRoom of my own. At only 3 pounds, it’s a pretty good deal.

Written March 4, 2009

Steps

I can feel the ice under my feet as I make my daily walk down Comm. Ave. I didn’t really expect this weather, just expecting a little colder air as the days wore into December. But now my feet hit hard brick and stretches of thinly crusted snow. The slippery wet leaves seem to be gone, which is rather a blessing. There are always those last few weeks of fall when the piles of leaves become dampened down by late rain, and you simply can’t trust your footing. I prefer the ice, even if the soles of my shoes lose all their softness.

I miss the smell of summer, it is so much more complex. The winter air is bracing, but it is just that; clear and cold. It lacks the subtlety of infinite life, of plants, dogs, and people. It even lacks the sounds of warm weather, the conversations, the open patios, the cars cruising by with radios hopping. In winter, I can barely sense the trees, but I know they are bare, as bare as the earth and the sky. As bare as the car windows rolled up tight. As hidden away as the passers by with their scarves wrapping half their faces. You can hear all that life pulled in tight. The winter air quickens my step, makes me feel sharp and awake, but it separates me from the world. I am on my own now to navigate the way, single steps taken on cold brick.

Written December 5, 2005

Evolution

If you kill a spider it will rain for seven years or at least that’s the way I think it works. This rain could come in very handy in many parts of the world and perhaps Oxfam should look into it. Of course, you would need another bug to stop the deluge from taking over. And then the insect-rights people might get concerned, sacrificing all those bugs when really they were here first. Who are we to impose our species onto the rest of the world, and why do we really think we are the sign of intelligent life? Seems almost the opposite if you look at it closely. How can a species get rid of its own piece of sky when clearly it needs it to breath? Sounds to me like we are definitely making room for someone smarter.

Maybe it really is the cockroaches. After all, they have figured out how to live in all those Manhattan high rises rent free, snacking on brioche crumbs and organic veggie shreds. You can’t get much smarter than that. Darwin probably overlooked this when he was figuring out survival of the fittest. Might have spent too much time with the birds on tropical islands.

A few days ago I watched a heavy set woman walking down the sidewalk with her young daughter. The bright-eyed girl looked to be about eight years old. Just before we passed each other, the young girl skipped excitedly towards a pigeon, exclaiming about the bird. Her mother caught her in her tracks, “That’s not a bird, honey, that’s a pigeon.” And so in goes. In the survival of the fittest, the pigeon is no longer considered a member of the bird family. Probably not elegant enough, or clean enough. Certainly not like a red cardinal or a swift hummingbird. The little girl is learning that some things are just not quite as good as others. Many people might agree with this when they are not speaking in public. Some of us are pigeons and some of us are hummingbirds. The trick is to find a niche that allows you to survive.

But quite honestly, I suspect the hummingbird would actually go down first, the way it needs to flap its wings like it is completely mad, and find those nice little red plastic feeders with the sugar water in them. Pigeons could hang on a lot longer than that. They’d be tussling with the cockroaches long after the last flowers were gone, after the feeders had all been left empty. Their proud chests would stay plump for years after the last trash bag had been put out on the curb. And there would probably be enough air left behind to keep them going for awhile even with that big hole we made in the atmosphere. They don’t need sun block and they don’t mind their own crowd. They would finally be left alone to sit together in the park or perch above all the fancy gargoyles and cornices we tried so hard to protect. And the cockroaches, they can get by with the crumbs, ruling the underworld away from the birds. Or make that the pigeons.

Where is Darwin when we really need him, when we need to figure out how to get more fit? When we need to know how to save ourselves from ourselves? I suppose spending all that time defending himself in court did not make him prone to sympathy for his fellow kind, trying to convince us that we were just animals. How could we, the ones with intelligence, be just another evolved mammal creature? After all, we invented The Gap! Certainly some greater power deliberately chose to place us here, the icing on the cake. The big Day Seven bonus. We get to rule because HE said so. If you popped into this world as a spider, well, we just might squish you. And if it rains, well, we’ve got umbrellas, that’s how smart we are. Too bad about the Garden of Eden, though. I think it only rains there when you want it to. Now look what we’ve got, hurricanes and droughts everywhere you turn, although I have to say, they seem to be more regular events in the places where God is particularly big news, where He has been carefully interpreted and decided upon. In places where Darwin was shown to the door.

Maybe the Garden of Eden is just a made up story, put there to show us what a good life could be like. If we weren’t all so smart, changing the world to try to make it more comfortable. Maybe it was just fine the way it was, with the spiders and cockroaches, the birds and the pigeons. Maybe extra intelligence is not so much the gift as the challenge. Can we figure out how to stop flapping our wings like we are completely mad? Goodness knows, those little plastic feeders will not be there forever. We’ll be looking for the scraps soon enough, trying to find cover. Hoping not to get squished.

Written August 6, 2005

WIUG

Silent

I have slept soundly

from evening until now,

but still I do not awake.

I move into the day,

eyes heavy, voice silent.

The bed did not provide

what was needed.

The lace overlay a

comfort that cannot be complete.

The morning sky through the mountains,

the jungle path to the river,

left for another day.

Written August 7, 2005

WIUG

In The Yard

The red umbrella shielding her,

she strums her guitar.

Her companion.

The pages slipping away.

But she catches it,

she captures it with a pen,

brings it to the strings.

She will sing it

when she’s ready.

Not before.

And certainly not after.

Written August 6, 2005

WIUG

A Saturday Alone

A lone bird swoops down to the water before lifting up to join another. They move together into the leaves, escaping the bright afternoon heat. A small bee settles onto the with clover blossom in the freshly mowed grass. The flit of tiny insects dashes everywhere, making quick sparkles across the river.

Two dragonflies climb the embankment, one over the other, always together. It is not hot here under the tree where I sit, on the cold marble bench left in somebody’s honor. The breeze carries the scent of the dirt and the green and the heat, but I do not feel it, only sense the heavy air that is just beyond. Beyond the small winding tree with ancient bark marching upward in thin narrow columns, gracing the curves of the branching trunk. On the ground just below, a bush hides its brown leaves, passing them off as berries if you do not look too closely.

The river gives up its current, shining circles changing location when you look away. The clouds pretend to be still as they show off their form against the stark blue sky.

Nobody calls nature a workaholic, but nobody tries to keep up with it either. We are lucky enough when we look up to see it at all, when we know there is dirt in our bones. When we decide to move together, one over the other, finding solace in the shade.

Written August 6, 2005

WIUG

Hankies

I am ironing hankies on a hot summer day. The only light on in the house is above the dining room table where my table linens and slacks have already been gently placed after their pressing. I am careful with the hankies, their thin cotton dotted with flowers. The iron is turned from highest heat to lowest delicate, to avoid burning or browning.

My favorite one has dark red roses embroidered large in one corner, then perfect, tiny loops of color to make a lacey border. I smooth out the circles all the way around. This is the one I used when I waved at the crowd during the gay pride march. I’m not sure what Nana would think of that, her hankie such a delicious prop for my outfit, the perfect accent. Of course she loved my brother Arthur and would be pleased to see me still honoring him more than ten years after we lost him, as I fight to stand up for those still living. But the parade itself might test her relationship with the Pope. She was a true believer, hoping to protect us with her rosary and prayers. What would she think of gay marriage, certainly a long stretch for her French Canadian mind? The sister of strict nuns in Quebec, she would likely disapprove. But still love her grandchildren. And their children, whatever the arrangement. The heart was her foundation, guiding the pragmatic mind. She would recognize that each generation takes another mantel, changes definitions of God to include the most righteous definitions of love.

My mother would have wanted to be on the sidelines of the parade, cheering with pride of her own, tickled pink at my stylish church lady outfit with the hankie. Bragging to anyone who would listen. Mostly proud of the writing on my sign. She would agree with the politics, and the religion, of the first side, “Real church ladies don’t discriminate”, even if she didn’t understand the WWUD without an explanation. The second side, however, would make her a little teary. “All families are precious families, my momma knew that.” A big red heart makes the point. But it is the past tense. She is not on the sidelines, or anywhere near the parade. If she watches us from heaven, a little of her Canook French is heard in her happy exclamations. She is so glad she saved all those hankies, adding Nana’s to her own. She just knew someone would need them someday and she would have a ready stash. Like all items she saved, filling her house to bursting, hoping to make the match and save someone’s day. You just never know. And now I prove her point, despite my lifelong efforts not too.

The hankies will become the symbol for the official church ladies as one marcher grows to be a contingent, representing our liberal church and what we really think it means to be Christian. The hankies reject disgrace. They are proper, friendly, and correct. They will not be denied. And the strong women who came before me are my cohorts, lending their style to the next fight. Unwittingly, but not begrudgingly. They see the light in my eyes and know I take their strength, that I do what makes sense for me and lead with my own heart, as they did. The hankies fold softly into place on the table. A century of small cotton squares. Not to be denied.

Written June 26, 2005

Ave Maria

Half an hour after you died, someone was singing the Ave Maria at Ronald Reagan’s funeral on the nursing home TV. You would have loved the irony of that one, showing your wry smile as you joked that the bigger funeral certainly did not mean the more charming or intelligent of the two people. But already we can’t share the nudge. Already you have taken the whit and wisdom with you. Just when we thought we had you happily settled. It is still a shock half a year later that nobody else sees the world the way you do. Or would, if you were here. Can it be that for all forty-five years of my life my jokes were only good for you, my unpredictable mother? Can it be that my humor is yours? My husband says it’s true. Quite frankly, I didn’t see it coming, so how could I know I’d miss it? But of course I do. And you. You chose to go below, quiet at last. Now you dance in slow circles with the others who have left us, sweeping arms softly across your new sky. You are so happy that you don’t have to worry about your hair color anymore and it stays that perfect shade of red, L’Oreal #7AL. I am the one who has been cheated, not you. And I still have to pay eighty bucks for my hair color. That would make you laugh too, right after you stopped wincing over the price and wondering why the boxed version wouldn’t do. Allowing only a brief shake of your head because you know exactly where I am stubborn. But still the twinkle in your eye, either way. Once again I lose the focus of the stoplights as I cry unexpectedly in the car, listening to my favorite CD. Someday I will learn the right words. Can you believe that I thought that song was about? No. You’ve known the right words all along, simply moving through the mysteries.

Written November 17, 2004