Good news: I'm functioning pretty well.
Bad news: There were a few moments today. I'm sure there will be more.
I had a bad night's sleep, never sunk into that deep, restful kind. Sometime in the middle of the night, I found myself mentally revising Mike's obituary. I had made a few changes yesterday and passed off the responsibility to Cylin, my daughter-in-law, a professional writer. I felt it was just too much for me to be able to organize it. I called her when I got up, concerned that she had already started on it when I now had my own ideas. She and Damon were busy working on the picture panels for the funeral.
Damon wound up with 150 pictures to select from 60 from me, 1/3 from him, and the rest from photos that people from the church emailed him directly. Some people included condolences and thoughts about Mike. It was meaningful to all of us. Damon is amazed by the responses he is getting from people who knew Mike and old friends who he hasn't heard from in years who heard about Mike's death through social media and reached out.
I had plans to skip Bikram today and go to mass at the Holy Rosary Church, a small building that seats about 50 people, with Judy and Paulette. I was ready, but not out front as I should have been. Paulette had to come in to get me.
We got there early enough, so there was some chat-chit. The lady sitting next to me asked me where I was from. "Here." "Oh, I've never seen you before. Are you new to church?" "I'm Deacon Mike's wife." How's that for a sock in the jaw.
Father Joe Badding was saying the mass. He said a few words before the procession. As his eyes wandered over the parishioners, he spotted me and stopped dead in his tracks. He said something about, "Sorry, Betty." I told him to carry on. He was up there before the mass for the very purpose of announcing Mike's death and funeral arrangements. He asked me if he could continue. I nodded, yes.
This was a hard moment. Not because of the announcement, but because I never went to church without Mike being there. He was either on the alter or by my side, but one way or the other, he was there. Now he wasn't. I thought, "I'd better start carrying tissues around with me." At least there wasn't a repeat of the breakdown I had yesterday at Bikram.
My body feels so different. It's like something's loose that shouldn't be, or at least wasn't there before he died. Mike and I functioned as two independent people who whole-heartedly supported each other if we thought it was for their best. It didn't feel like we were sacrificing ourselves to do this. It always held the promise of personal enrichment. After 45 years of always considering Michael, I now have lost that landmark, that boundary. I feel like I'm fishing around in empty air to find out where I am. It's scary. I haven't just lost Mike; I've lost part of myself or the person I used to be in relationship to him. It is a freedom; it feels like I suddenly have the power to walk through walls. I don't like it. I'm sure it will eventually regulate. How long does it take? My guess is, from all I've read, a full year. Oh, dear.
In the meantime, there are so many doors that have opened for me. The generosity of others is joyous and not overwhelming. Most people respect my boundaries and offer love at the same time. Pretty remarkable.
One of the benefits that came out of this tragedy is this blog. I started it because it was easier than calling all the people concerned about Mike individually, repeating on the phone over and over and over got tired quickly. As you can tell, I'm a thinker. Like Mike, I love the life of the mind. I find it a fascinating place to be. Unlike Mike, I can be in my mind and pay attention to the world around me. One of the issues between us. Sound familiar to any other women out there?
When I got home from church, I did some writing and took a satisfying nap. Yay! I was afraid I was facing a long bout with insomnia. That's what happened after my dad died. I had terrible sleep problems until the day I went off to college. However, I'm not leaving this house. I have to figure out some way to get good sleep.
I walked Elsa before dinner. I've been buying packaged cut kale salad from Safeway. Besides that, I still have enough cooked food for a while. Tonight, besides the remaining salad, I finished off one of the vegetarian soups that Brenda picked up from Costco and some warmed buttered bread and cheese. Hmm! Bread with butter just hits the spot these days.
I am slowly putting things away that are out. I had to put away the pictures I pulled out for Damon. I still have a little bit of unpacking to do. Haven't been throwing things away yet except for those tee shirts Mike used for the gym, which looked like they had been hit by acid rain.
I watched some TV. I'm not watching the shows we were watching together. I can't quite do that yet. I'm rewatching English murder mysteries we watched together and enjoyed, Vera in this case. The Lewis series came to an end. I think the lead performers chose to take a year off, but they are planning to come back and do more episodes. Hope so.
While I was watching, my phone rang. My whole body responded before my mind could intercede, "Mike." Whenever Mike was away, he would call before he went to bed to say good night. My external body sat calmly, but my innards leaped with joy. "Mike was calling to say good-night and tell me that he loves me." This man told me I was beautiful and that he loved me every day of our marriage until the sedatives silenced him.
Many years ago, when we were living in Princeton, we did a presentation for a marriage preparation class program on communication. We each gave a speech. I started mine with, "You may not know it, but I'm the most beautiful woman in the world." I expected people to respond somehow. Titter, turn their heads away. But no, everyone remained rapt. "At least, that's what my husband tells me every day." Still no real response. "If he didn't do it on his own, I'd be willing to pay him to do it." Finally, laughter. I hoped those kids got the point. Say nice things to your partner, gratuitously nice things, randomly nice things, whatever. Be generous.
Mike and I both came from backgrounds where we didn't hear a lot of nice things. My parents were always civil to each other, my father was to my sister and me too, but my mother didn't understand the concept of talking civilly to children. She actually believed it was harmful to us.
After my mother moved in with Mike and me in our Princeton house in 1983, she said something stunning. "I know I shouldn't tell you this. It isn't good for you. But I've been telling everyone what a good daughter you are." Huh? Well, that explains a lot. I was told by a woman of my generation that immigrated from Germany that my mother's ideas were German but writ large. She was an extreme example of this concept of child-rearing.
We know now that constant negativity takes a toll on a child's development. We also understand that no criticism but constant praise has the same effect. I heard years ago that the children of extreme poverty and the children of extreme wealth both suffered in similar ways. Sounds like honesty and balance is always the best choice. There is also knowing when to offer criticism. Sometimes it not only falls on deaf ears, but it raises a person's defenses so they can't hear even when they are somewhat ready. Again, as in comedy, timing is everything.
Mike's mother yelled at everyone. She doled out unpleasantness equally. This is not to say that there weren't good moments with her. I enjoyed watching tv with her. When she was up, she was safe. I think the difference between our two mothers was that my mother was a genuinely loving woman, at least to her children. She wouldn't show it to us, but there were many times we would turn to catch her looking at us with love pouring out of her eyes.
I don't think Mike had that with his mother. She resented him for being male. She told me that when he was born, she promised she was going to make damn sure he never thought he was a prince. Now aside from the fact that all babies think they are the absolute center of not only their own universe but everyone else's, what baby comes out thinking he will be better than everyone else, particularly women. They don't even know there is a distinction.
She got this bias from her background. In her home, the men were superior to the women. The men got to do 'what they wanted to do. Not really. They were confined by tradition just as much as the women were. It was just that the women thought it looked better on the other side of the fence. And, the men were raised to believe they had the better deal too. But when you have half the population oppressed, no one is truly happy. Doesn't work that way.
Actually, I read something which contradicts the idea that the oppressing group doesn't benefit more recently. There are two ways to induce oxytocin release: one is bonding with members of your own group, and the second is attacking those who are not of your group. Both serve to strengthen our sense of our place in our own group. But in today's world, like it or not, or lives are all linked intimately. There is no functional 'other' anymore. We're interdependent. We're in many ways all part of the same group.
I think the rapid dissolution of tribal identities is one of the reasons for the rise of nationalism and tribalism again. We've changed a little too fast. Our identifies feel too loose. Some can cope with it and those who can't. We all need to have some compassion for each other. Some believe it was our lack of empathy and respect for a group needing more stability, or our denigration those with a less complicated vision of the human condition, which has now contributed to the political mess we are in. I admit to being part of the group of intellectual elites who judged others for their ignorance, lack of sophistication, and intolerance rather than have some compassion for their plight. This, by no way, means that I condone this rebirth of tribalism, just that I understand it. We all have to look for an alternative to help us all have a secure place in our social world, that is held for us we deep respect for our humanity.
Mike and I managed such a respectful relationship with each other. It didn't fix the whole world, but it was a start in our little corner of it. Shortly before Mike met me, he asked a colleagued what he should look for in a partner. He said, "a worthy opponent." Mike saw that in me. He told me that he saw me as someone who would take care of herself and be equally concerned about his needs. Well, this is certainly how I like to see myself. What a smart man! I assure you others in the world are not as 'smart' as Mike was. Some are in my family. But I did have that with Mike. We worked well together. He liked to say that our relationship worked as well as it did, "because there was always one adult present," and it wasn't always the same person. Neither one of us could appropriately address the other's needs consistently, but the respect for our needs as expressed was there. Neither of us took advantage of the other's generosity, either.
When we first met, I helped establish a way to set boundaries. We had come from homes where there was no such respect. If one of us didn't like what the other was doing, we would give a 'lifesaving tap." The lifesaving tap was something I learned in a lifesaving class. (The only course I failed in college because I didn't study for the written exam.)
In a water lifesaving class, you partner with another person; one of you is saving, and the other is 'drowning." Now, people who are drowning struggle. They are scared and desperate; the 'drowning partner' has to act scared and desperate. Well, what if one of the pair in the practice session is really drowning. You can't speak as say, "Get off of me." Ergo, the lifesaving tap. You tap your partner underwater, and the exercise comes to an immediate end. Mike and I had a deal: if one of us delivered it to the other, that person would stop what they were doing immediately unless it was a life or death matter. It made both of us feel safe. And, neither of us ever abused it. It took me years to realize that someone could use it abusively. But there is no silver bullet for nice. What a shame!
There was an advantage coming from such difficult backgrounds. We were continuously grateful for the kindness and respect of the other. Again, was our behavior always perfect. Absolutely not! Not even at the end, after 45 years of marriage had we ironed out all our difficulties, our annoyances. It was just that we were both committed to working on them, not only for the other's sake, but with the clear understanding that each of us would benefit from these changes we made. I live by that creed.
Back to that late-night phone call: My body was bounding. God, I miss him, and I'm going to miss him so much more. What am I going do without his daily dose of love? It was part of our ritual. I don't know if we loved each other more than any other couple. But I do know that objectivity we showed that love more than most couples. Is it because we didn't have children of our own? I think some people have children just to experience that delicious feeling of pouring out unconditional love with abandon. You only get that freedom with a child for a limited amount of time. If you share it with an adult, it goes on for years and years and years. Again, I am so lucky that Michael chose me, and it was he that chose me.
I looked tough, but I was one frightened girl. I do well, have always done well, at getting to know people casually wherever I go. I also do well in strong intimate relationships. The easiest thing for me is to move in with people and work on the relationship. (I understand this is Nicole Kidman's approach to marriage too. Get married and then worry about the relationship.) I had just resolved to date anyone who I didn't think would do me bodily harm. The bar was pretty low. And then, I would do exactly what I wanted to during the date. I would only date someone once a month, and speak to someone on the phone a maximum of once a week. I was setting old-fashioned boundaries. I never had more offers of dates in my life. Go figure.
Mike and I met the Wednesday after a July 4th weekend in 1973 in a therapy group in Manhattan. It was my first time with this particular group. ( I had just been kicked out of two others. I have and had my own ideas of what therapy should entail and strenuously disapproved of a lot of the tactics at the time, but it was what was available. Note: the profession has come around more to my way of thinking, I am told.) He came in late in a suit carrying a briefcase. I thought, "He's cute." He explained that he was late because he was visiting his girlfriend in the hospital after having had a hysterectomy. Well, that ended that. Wound up, he was breaking up with her. Not because of the hysterectomy.
November 8th was our first date. We went to the Library, a restaurant on the upper west side of Manhattan. Things clicked. He seemed to see me as I saw myself and wanted to be seen; I was comfortable with that vision. The coins kept dropping on subsequent dates. I wouldn't have described myself as madly in love with him; I just knew this was right. It was in February of the next year that I accepted him as my life partner. I don't mean it was the first time we were intimate. Nor did we get married. I mean I knew this was it, period end of sentence. I had looked at him and thought, I can live with what he as is even if he never changes.
Oh, there were revelations of personality that were a surprise to both of us. Those jokes Mike told, putting people and their ideas down, were not jokes. He was genuinely arrogant. Of course, as I looked back, his arrogance was one of the things that attracted me. He reminded me of my beloved father. I think I reminded him of his not so beloved mother, too. Like her, I am an expressive, loud personality. Not exactly the shy retiring type. I don't know about his mother, but I'm perfectly prepared to make a fool out of myself for any number of reasons: humor, safety, justice, concern. I suppose we can say for now that the rest is history. I hope to fill these pages with more "Michael and Betty stories."
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