8:02 a.m. - 2005-08-04
Mountain Rant
I realize that what disturbed me most about Ron and his entourage was their cavalier and blatant ability to indulge themselves in harmless ways. A massage. A pedicure. A Perrier. I had been raised to believe that this kind of thing was categorically wrong. Just intrinsically wrong. That nobility is found in extreme self sufficiency. Better still, extreme self denial. That life is meant to be a constant struggle. A "vale of tears". On returning from Hawaii, my mother casually pronounced, "Well, you got THAT out of your system!". My first response was one of irritation, even anger. Asceticism had long been accepted out of hand as fact, mandate, curse. And then something appeared that I recognized at once after all these years. The clue. The puzzle piece lying, all along, on the coffee table alongside those oversized picture books about World War II, Norman Rockwell and Cape Cod. Overlooked all these many years. Dusty as a gold dubloon at the bottom of the Hardy Boy's recovered treasure chest. Shining, so suddenly obvious. Catching just a glint of this morning's sun. This morning so like any other and so different. And I knew in the way that one knows that they know that they know. And though the "what if's" arising from this new knowledge are hard to bear, they open a window for the rest of my life. And so, my story continues ...
Ron's daughter, Shane, was particularly amused by my diet. "Look at what she eats!," she would squeal as I salted my bacon, washed down my greasy hash browns with refill after refill of Diet Coke. Ron was fond of reminding me that, at two, Shane's favorite food was sushi. Shane was what you could only describe as polished. At seventeen, she carried a Day Runner, not a purse. In it, she scribbled her many appointments. Highlights. Nails. Psychic. Her french manicured toes peered boldly out of delicate stiletto sandals, damn the season. She was an aspiring singer certain that, given her considerable talent and Ron's connections, it was only a matter of time before every tongue confessed her stardom. I believed it, too. She was really very gifted. And, though I am making her sound entitled, she was welcoming and treated me with an easy warmth. Shane carried herself with a confidence I had never approached. She was tall. Very tall and dating a drummer who barely brushed her bony shoulder when she wore her three inch Donna Karan's. Shane did not stoop or hunch. She stretched her neck like a slender crane, looking toward a future that did not include a "vale of tears". Shane, still a teen, was elegant. Gracious and hip at the same time. Her beagle puppy, Rudy, sat beside her in the outdoor bistros on Melrose, begging scraps of tofu as the steady stream of goths and punks meandered in the thick white L.A. sun. I sat like a cautious guest, enjoying the shock value of my middle class habits. Yes, Tobasco, please. I never spent time alone with Shane the way that Carrie, Ron's ex continued to do. Carrie had Chronic Fatigue and a white Volvo ( often companions, I am told). She was a published poet with lesbian leanings, on the cutting edge of the L.A. writing scene. She was small and sure, with dark loopy curls and the smug eyes of a pedigreed lapdog. I was kept from her like a virulant germ. My wayward ways, they feared, contagious. When Shane moved into her own first apartment on Stanley, there on the hardwood floor beside the white slipcover sofa was a tasteful basket of pots and potions. Carrie. When Ron and I would go to the mountains for the weekend, more often than not there was a breathy message on the answer machine, reminding him to have a very good time. Who but a giggling Carrie? Ron almost convinced me that my insecurities were vestiges of some embarassingly quaint plebian ethic. While Carrie and he had lived together some ten years, he assured me that she remained in his heart much like a maiden aunt. Certainly no threat to me. He tolerated my tears in a condescending way. Dear, dear. But Carrie remained a continuous gnawing presence, the underlying melodic theme of his life's symphony. He explained that I needn't join him at Carrie's family functions. Her condition was, after all, guarded. Anything could send her spiraling into an abyss of depression and social withdrawal. I, on the other hand, was self reliant. Strong and tall. Blond and energetic, ingesting hot dogs and smog with no apparent ill effects. Where was my compassion? Our first New Year's Eve, Ron and I flew to San Francisco to stay at the famous Fairmont Hotel. Once in our room, he slumped into a velvety chair, confessing that he realized too late that he could not allow himself to have a good time as this was to be Carrie's first holiday alone. New Year's 1992 was ushered in with shame and tears, perhaps a vale of them. January 1st found me wandering the Castro district for solace. Slouching across from Ron, I cried over breakfast, lunch and dinner. On the taxi to the airport, Ron told me that perhaps he was afraid of engulfment and that was why he was unconsciously sabotaging our new romance. The next week, back on Ward I, a bouquet of long stemmed red roses arrived. Coming from a staff meeting, I found it among the blue patient charts and cups of pastel pills. The small enclosure card begged forgiveness. Like a misbehaving child, he had scribbled a sad face next to his name. I honestly don't know if I stayed because I believed things would change or if I was just as afraid of engulfment as he. Ron had been in therapy for twelve years. His therapist, also his friend, operated her successful practice on a midsized boat moored in a pricey slip just next to the Cheesecake Factory in Marina del Rey. She was expensive and bohemian. Smart and scatter-brained. She advised Ron that he was now at the developmental stage known as "rapproachment", normally achieved in toddlerhood. After twelve years, she had assisted him in becoming a precocious toddler. The rare toddler who had purchased a boat. He took me for a joint session. She had that wiccan laugh, unabashed and hoarse. Windchimes and tea. Freud and tarot. She explained that Ron was "fragmented" and that I would be wise to stick with him through this process. He was well worth the wait. Trust her. And, though I didn't, I did. I stayed. And stayed. He took me to London and Paris and Rome. In the lobbies of high end hotels, I would find him on the phone, speaking in hushed tones. He took me to his high school reunion in Glens Falls, New York. Just outside the celebration, I would find him on the phone, speaking in hushed tones. He took me to the mountains most every weekend. He would sit in his wicker rocker on the wooden deck of his beautiful A-frame home presumably doing his 'morning pages' when I would notice him, speaking on the black cordless phone in hushed, muffled tones. And, while it hurt very deeply, I told myself that, by this time, I had earned whatever benefits might come from being with someone so privileged. By now, I felt entitled. And so, when he was out hiking, I would search his journal for clues. Ashamed and brimming with tears of self reproach, I would search for clues. Peruse the trash for credit card receipts. Belittle myself with accusations. Anything to verify what I felt. There was nothing. And still, I felt what I felt. Ron continued to be generous, emotionally as well as financially. He invited my family up for a weekend. He played the piano while my mother crooned hits of the forties. My father was so happy to see his beloved wife so happy. He seemed pleased that I had fallen into this new life which afforded her this kind of experience. My son was not particularly impressed, but enjoyed the woods and seeing his grandparents finally so at ease. I played the grand dame, entertaining with the sophistication of a little girl stumbling around in her mother's heels. Pouring room temp merlot. Pointing out the gold records Ron had casually strewn along the stairs. Flaunting the life of which they had only dreamed. The life they believed came only with great personal sacrifice, only to the ants of this world. Yet here was their grasshopper flying in the face of all she had been taught to believe. Enjoying daily the riches of another. The only expense, her authenticity. Not having the first idea of who she might be, authenticity was just so much excess baggage. Mismatched and cumbersome. Much more to the point, who she was not was finally and at long last confirmed. She was not a loser. Not even in her father's eyes. The only eyes that mattered. This grasshopper had inadvertently arrived, quite out of her element, there on the mountaintop. Literally. Painfully. Fleetingly.
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