They
I was
standing on a plush cream rug with blue and pink flowers – one of three such
rugs placed in a long, elegant room.
Before me was a black grand piano at which a striking Brazilian woman in
a red dress and uncovered arms had just given an in-home concert in honor of
our hostess’s birthday. She had played
songs of love and loss.
The concert was over but there was another fun surprise for us: a guest who had recently been to Brazil was eager to share an experience from that trip, and was distributing Fire Water cocktails. The drink consisted of lime juice, sugar syrup and cachaca. It was tart, sweet, and it smelled strangely floral.
I was surprised because I didn’t think parties like this existed anymore. It felt like something I had read about in novels. Yet there I was, with a rare sense of feeling alive to my own loveliness and a delicious sense of belonging within this circle of sophistication.
As I stood taking delicate sips from this dangerously wonderful drink, Darlene – Darlene of the red hair and chic dresses – stood next to me and looked at me with kindness and concern. Earlier in the day she had taken both my hands and intently asked how I was doing and whether I was getting the support I needed. Tears had welled up in my eyes. My divorce was just three and a half months old and at that time grief would spring out from its shy corner at the slightest invitation. That had been in the morning. Now, here she was again with kindness and concern, but with a different question, “How do you do it, how do you go to church and manage it?”
It was a legitimate question. At that point in time sharing a church with an ex-spouse was frequently excruciating – there was this ghost from my marriage walking around, taking the bread and wine, smiling broadly and waiving hello.
“For example,” said Darlene, “at Evensong last week how did you manage that?”
“Well,” I revealed, “I cried through the whole service.” I remembered the particular agony of standing behind Ben that night, literally carrying a torch – for that had been my role in the service, and listening to him sing the words to a prayer that he and I used to read aloud together in bed. “Lord, you now have set your servant free, to go in peace as you have promised…”
But that was not what she meant. Her next words were, “They shouldn’t still be at church. It’s so disrespectful.” Time slowed. I noticed the piano. I felt the coldness of the cocktail glass in my hand and the plushness of the rug under my feet. She was still talking. “They” I heard with clarity. “They shouldn’t still be at church.”
Ben and Laura. So many arguments leading up to our divorce had centered around the time Ben was spending with Laura. I would see something that didn’t feel quite right – a hug with his hands at the small of her back, the way she leaned over to point at something in his bulletin and laugh. There were all those times he’d needed to meet with her to talk about some issue with the interim choir director.
For me those arguments were fraught with self-torture – a nagging fear that I was just imagining things about a man who loved me. Initially Ben would be so patient with my questions, would explain that she was a good friend but just a friend, and say things that deeply touched me. I would doubt my instinct.
“Ben,” I said, standing in our kitchen after my first brave question about Laura, “I’m so afraid of becoming that horrible woman one sees on tv, consumed by jealousy and suspicion.”
“And even if you do become that woman,” he replied, “I will be standing right here, with you.” We made love that afternoon and I felt safe.
Three months after that conversation Laura’s marriage would end. Five months after that, Ben and I would agree to get divorced after repeated claims that his love had ended before our marriage even began. But until the very end, Ben would insist that what he had with Laura was only friendship. I was pretty sure they weren’t sleeping together, but I suspected he was infatuated with her. There wasn’t anything concrete, however, and even our marriage therapist suggested I was reaching for something to explain his distance. Our priest thought it highly unlikely. Laura too would vigorously deny that there had been anything romantic.
So there I was, standing on a cream colored rug with delicate flowers and hearing Darlene say the word, “they.” My stomach convulsed and a voice deep within wanted to cry out, “Tell me, Darlene, what do you now know that I have never been able to know myself with any certainty!”
These, however, are not words one says when standing on such plush carpet, before a grand piano, in a room full of attractive and polite guests. I could feel the weight of my wool dress and the way it framed my breasts and waist and grazed the back of my calves. I was lovely and alive, pulsating with fury and relief. I wasn't crazy. But I recognized that I was in that scene, familiar from so many novels I loved: the party where a chance remark from an acquaintance requires the receiver to stand in quiet dignity and unassailable virtue. It is what our culture asks of women so many times in our lives, to remain immobile and well-mannered, when what the moment truly calls for is an animal howl of pain and rage.
The concert was over but there was another fun surprise for us: a guest who had recently been to Brazil was eager to share an experience from that trip, and was distributing Fire Water cocktails. The drink consisted of lime juice, sugar syrup and cachaca. It was tart, sweet, and it smelled strangely floral.
I was surprised because I didn’t think parties like this existed anymore. It felt like something I had read about in novels. Yet there I was, with a rare sense of feeling alive to my own loveliness and a delicious sense of belonging within this circle of sophistication.
As I stood taking delicate sips from this dangerously wonderful drink, Darlene – Darlene of the red hair and chic dresses – stood next to me and looked at me with kindness and concern. Earlier in the day she had taken both my hands and intently asked how I was doing and whether I was getting the support I needed. Tears had welled up in my eyes. My divorce was just three and a half months old and at that time grief would spring out from its shy corner at the slightest invitation. That had been in the morning. Now, here she was again with kindness and concern, but with a different question, “How do you do it, how do you go to church and manage it?”
It was a legitimate question. At that point in time sharing a church with an ex-spouse was frequently excruciating – there was this ghost from my marriage walking around, taking the bread and wine, smiling broadly and waiving hello.
“For example,” said Darlene, “at Evensong last week how did you manage that?”
“Well,” I revealed, “I cried through the whole service.” I remembered the particular agony of standing behind Ben that night, literally carrying a torch – for that had been my role in the service, and listening to him sing the words to a prayer that he and I used to read aloud together in bed. “Lord, you now have set your servant free, to go in peace as you have promised…”
But that was not what she meant. Her next words were, “They shouldn’t still be at church. It’s so disrespectful.” Time slowed. I noticed the piano. I felt the coldness of the cocktail glass in my hand and the plushness of the rug under my feet. She was still talking. “They” I heard with clarity. “They shouldn’t still be at church.”
Ben and Laura. So many arguments leading up to our divorce had centered around the time Ben was spending with Laura. I would see something that didn’t feel quite right – a hug with his hands at the small of her back, the way she leaned over to point at something in his bulletin and laugh. There were all those times he’d needed to meet with her to talk about some issue with the interim choir director.
For me those arguments were fraught with self-torture – a nagging fear that I was just imagining things about a man who loved me. Initially Ben would be so patient with my questions, would explain that she was a good friend but just a friend, and say things that deeply touched me. I would doubt my instinct.
“Ben,” I said, standing in our kitchen after my first brave question about Laura, “I’m so afraid of becoming that horrible woman one sees on tv, consumed by jealousy and suspicion.”
“And even if you do become that woman,” he replied, “I will be standing right here, with you.” We made love that afternoon and I felt safe.
Three months after that conversation Laura’s marriage would end. Five months after that, Ben and I would agree to get divorced after repeated claims that his love had ended before our marriage even began. But until the very end, Ben would insist that what he had with Laura was only friendship. I was pretty sure they weren’t sleeping together, but I suspected he was infatuated with her. There wasn’t anything concrete, however, and even our marriage therapist suggested I was reaching for something to explain his distance. Our priest thought it highly unlikely. Laura too would vigorously deny that there had been anything romantic.
So there I was, standing on a cream colored rug with delicate flowers and hearing Darlene say the word, “they.” My stomach convulsed and a voice deep within wanted to cry out, “Tell me, Darlene, what do you now know that I have never been able to know myself with any certainty!”
These, however, are not words one says when standing on such plush carpet, before a grand piano, in a room full of attractive and polite guests. I could feel the weight of my wool dress and the way it framed my breasts and waist and grazed the back of my calves. I was lovely and alive, pulsating with fury and relief. I wasn't crazy. But I recognized that I was in that scene, familiar from so many novels I loved: the party where a chance remark from an acquaintance requires the receiver to stand in quiet dignity and unassailable virtue. It is what our culture asks of women so many times in our lives, to remain immobile and well-mannered, when what the moment truly calls for is an animal howl of pain and rage.
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