Whatever It Takes

It’s Thanksgiving at Auntie and Uncle’s house. Let’s all go around the table and say what we’re thankful for.  I’m on the periphery of a family group—the poor relation in more ways than one. “The wine,” I say when it’s my turn, and I mean it.  I’m thinking, when and where and how can I get some more of this here Balm of Gilead. I’m thinking, whatever it takes.

Friday nights it’s all the same, week in week out.  Get depressed and fed up at home.  Might as well be a piece of furniture.  Well, not even.  I meet my friend Dirk for our usual ritual:  we fight, we make up, we have dinner.  Is the fight over yet, I ask?  Can we skip the making up and go straight to dinner?  You know I’m on a budget here.  Not just money, man—time.  Teaching tomorrow morning—Saturday morning—aint that a crime?  Shake me out of this malaise, I’m drowning.

Took the depression quiz on the internet the other day—scored 61.  If you score over 54, it’s bad.  See a doctor, they say.  Well, I’ve done that.  Five years of therapy, what do I have to show for it?  Well, heck, let’s not pursue that line of questioning:  Six years of so-called higher education—what do I have to show for it?

Oh, we’re in such dangerous territory now, a Congo of the mind. I swore I’d never write about my present life.  It only serves as a harbinger of the past.  But I think I may be able to save myself this way, and man do I need saving.  I can’t see through the forest now, I just look at my feet in front of me, dimly aware that there may be a path down there somewhere.  I think of all the first-year students I’m trying to help write their way out of a wet paper bag. I think of myself as disconnected from all but them, and this is dangerous.

Especially at Auntie and Uncle’s, I am grateful to be here, yet unable to stop myself from being jealous of their circle.  I tell my students that the essence of tragedy is this: it’s over.  Life cannot give forth to life; there are no future generations. 

And no baby for me.  Everybody else in this world has a child.  Well no, I know that’s not true.

But imagine living in Auntie’s world, where each of your three sons, raised expertly by you and your loving and competent provider-spouse, marries a lovely girl, settles close by, and—miracle of miracles—reproduces yet another generation of kids for your family.  I cannot imagine it—I cannot imagine what it takes to earn this, to have this.  I have only a vague sense of why I will never be a daughter or a mother in such a family.

I’m happy only in isolated moments—walking with my sad and dear and recently separated friend Ailsa through the woods of the University Endowment Lands, running along the seawall with the vibrant Julia and my personal Madonna, my muse, my Emily.  The rest of the time I think, what is the goddamn point?  Oh no, we definitely do not want to head down this path.  We will end up not in the present but in the past; I will be that strange little person to whom my Nana Hamm pronounces those fateful words:  “I think you’re a very selfish little girl.”

Yes, I am, I think:  Nana was right. Even now, as we speak, I’m writing all this crap for a very selfish reason: I pray it may save my soul.  I don’t really even know the source of my current pain; it would be so easy to blame it on someone else.  The truth is I feel I’m a lonely, depressed and pathetic person (as I try to type that word, “apathetic” and “atheist” sprout from my word processor).  Really, the present time sucks.  Maybe it would do me good to return to a moment in the past.

I’m thinking, Music Camp, Mount Allison University—I’m maybe 13 years old.  Young.  Feelings I remember:  singing the Hallelujah chorus with a hundred other kids, tears of joy and wonder in my eyes; running up a hill en route to a guitar class I was late for—the incredible feeling of physical exaltation I wish I’d ever felt since; swans in the pond; chatty meals with my cousin Callie in the cafeteria, where a jolly chef presided over Mount A’s summer suppers.

            Gone, all gone.  Why bother remembering? Why bother doing anything?  Earlier today, resting my head on the top of the coffee pot (of all places), I had this conscious thought:  “I wish I were…”

Subjunctive mood.

Well, that was before going over to Auntie’s.  I think this Thanksgiving dinner with its numerous glasses of wine enabled me to envision a future (albeit a fictitious one) in which I could renew some ancient ties.  I can go back as far as I need to, to find those links, the ties that bind me to a family in which I may or may not truly belong.  I now realize the true reason for my not going back East this summer:  no one invited me.  Well, maybe they shouldn’t have to.  But honestly, how am I to know where and if I’m welcome?  I don’t just know it—I can’t just announce, I’m coming on x date for y amount of time.  I just cannot bring myself to do it.

            The only place in the world that I know for a fact is mine—pretty ironic, since technically I guess it belongs to the bank—is this condo.  Well, really, what is a condo except an apartment that you own?  The unbaby unspirit in my barren womb is saying, “That’s no kind of place for a baby!  A baby needs a house!”

Sorry, baby.  I can’t even afford this dump, such as it is—I can’t seem to keep afloat financially, emotionally, physically, spiritually.  It’s all sinking, washing inevitably, inexorably down the toilet—leaving skid marks on the bowl. 

I think of the cozy house where my paternal grandparents lived, in Sackville, New Brunswick; my maternal Nana’s pleasant home; the family cottages on the Northumberland shore.  Never to be seen again!  Oh, I feel that so strongly; I feel it in my bones, like a deep, dark, ache of loneliness and despair.  I feel something rotting inside of me—a pungent mass of unexcreted venom. 

I see myself as I believe others must see me:  straggly hair, pock-marked skin, clothes that never go together, some vague and vain attempt to make up my parched and excoriated face.  I look in the mirror and see a shadow of the sunny girl pictured in old photographs, when I knew no better than to venture off to Morton Cove, New Brunswick, confident of my welcome from whoever might be there.

I know the vicious cycle of depression:  I can’t open up to anyone to heal these wounds; I can only try to placate myself as I struggle through each day.  Anything that happens from now on will be too little, too late.  I see the bottom of the world—I see the tortured creatures writhing in pain down here—I see my own pallid reflection.  I see the apparition of one hand reaching down to drag me up, and baby, you know it’s yours.

Laughing in a restaurant the night before with a friend, in the dim light, I make little of my pain; sitting around that festive family table, I hardly know what to think or how to act.  It is the blessing of the wine that releases me—I’m suddenly OK with all this, suddenly able to make conversation with all and sundry.  What a cute baby!  Now how many months old is he now?  And his habits?  And his daily routine? And where is last summer’s photo album?  Now who are these people here?  And how are they related to whom?  How very interesting!

More brandy.

The screensaver on my husband’s computer looks like little helmets of little baby space invaders.   

Oh, do we not have anything to DRINK in this house?  It’s a metaphor of course—there’s nothing here to sustain me, nothing here I want or need.  Or maybe just the opposite—I don’t really want what I think I want, don’t really need what I think I need.  That damn booze would just make me sick, eventually, wouldn’t it?

What would it take?

But this is a day on which we are supposed to be grateful for what we have.  Here’s a list:

Bad hair.

1 and 2/3 jobs.

3.

Oh fuck it!

At what point—if ever—do people finally say: “Enough!” ?

Will I ever get to that point?  Am I already there?  Yes, you know, I think I am.  From now on, I am just surviving.  I see that no help is forthcoming.  I see that I was foolish to expect it.

My mother called today to tell us how she was doing. 

My father asked me if I had bought a ticket back east for him yet.

Well, whatever.

The Next Day.

I wake up at 11:00—unheard of for me.  Could have been the wine…My husband brings me coffee in bed—OK, I must be sicker than I realize.  He must, finally, be worried.  I flash back to the Thanksgiving dinner table yesterday:  each of us going around the table saying what we’re thankful for.  He says he’s grateful to me for the opportunity of going back to school.  Hallelujah, I think. 

Every Thanksgiving is a milestone, every family dinner a moment in time that brooks no argument.  This is what it is, as is my life.  After dinner, we went across the street to the park; while the children (none of them mine, as I am the barren one who makes all the other women at the table grateful for their children) play on the swings, in the sand, in the jungle gym in the deepening childhood.  My cousin-in-law Syl and I sit on a bench, talking about the hermeneutic process of writing down our lives.  Let’s form a writing group, I suggest: I’m trying to create some part of this family in which I’m not on the periphery.  She’s surprised, tentative, but basically in agreement that this might be a good idea.

Does Syl understand me? She sees me as a survivor of a strange childhood—a bleak era in which not one but both of my parents decided they weren’t up to or into raising me.  Oh what a self-pitying comment, Nana Hamm would say.  But Syl understands.  She looks at her two little boys; she knows she’d never leave them to another’s care. 

What do you write about, Syl?

Well, back to today.  I guess I want to recapture that feeling of yesterday, and to imprint my own pattern on this festive (ha!) weekend.  Is it too late to begin thawing the small turkey I bought last week, I ask?  We look up the instructions in Nana’s old Good Housekeeeping cookbook—it’s just within the realm of possibility that my harebrained scheme may work out.  Into cold water in the sink goes the “Young Turkey,” a sacrifice to my needs and mood.

It’s thawing as we speak.

But that’s not all—I make mashed potatoes to heat and serve later, bread (in the bread machine) for the stuffing, fruited cranberry sauce, rice pudding for dessert, muffins for mid-afternoon tea.  I do three loads of laundry, take the dog for a walk, and do the dishes. 

My dear friend Emily has invited me to the gym, but I’ve declined.  You can’t fight a cold and build up your abs (and whatever) at the same time.  “Do you have a good book to read?” she asks.  She knows me so well. 

I’ve left a message for my best frenemy Dirk, who’s at his parents’ home in Tsawassen, having a turkey dinner, his own Waterloo.  Is his car fixed?  Are we having lunch tomorrow (no pre-fighting necessary on Tuesdays)?  Does he want to run after school with me and the girls?  Really all of those questions are just excuses to reach out to a lifeline.  I know I have to learn to save myself, as he never tires of telling me.

On the walk with the dog—a longer one than usual: it’s a ritual to go for a Thanksgiving walk, after all—I satisfy my curiosity to see the house where Ernie(formerly[?] of Ernie and Ailsa) is staying during their trial separation.  Ailsa took me out for dinner on Saturday night, to a Mexican restaurant within easy walking distance for us both.

This has been her first week of life as a single mom—she tells me about the day he moved out.  He’s got the kids for part of the weekend, so she’s free to go out to dinner with a friend, unencumbered for a change.  I remember another friend telling me how hard her first weekend alone was, when the girls (my cousins) had gone to see their father.  When Ailsa called me to ask me out for dinner, I knew it was important to say yes.

Why not?  Actually, there was a reason:  such a pathetic one, really.  My husband and I had planned a “marital harmony” evening, a date, whatever you want to call it.  But he was more than willing to change the plans, so I guess I should be grateful for such flexibility. 

As far as I could tell, Saturday was ovulation day (maybe—or maybe I missed it as usual, or maybe that’s not the problem).  I didn’t tell him this, of course.  He does not want to be complicit in the planning of something that he feels it would be better to wait for.  Until we’re more financially secure, etc. etc.  I tell you, my biological clock is running down and out right now, man.  So I seduced him on Saturday afternoon, a miracle of sorts in its own way—we’ll see if anything comes of it.  I have my doubts.  It’s not much of a chance, believe me, and it seems less likely every month as I confront the dark red stain of my moral, physical failure at the one human task that supersedes all others in importance.

I hate being the one who doesn’t belong.  Not really part of the family, just a distant cousin; not really a woman, just a barren failure, a hollow shell.  The more time that goes by, the less I feel entitled to anything, anyway.  The more I care.

And meanwhile, I pour out this vitriol on paper (my new resolution)—so I won’t have to let it poison my interactions with others.  It’s a Dorian Gray kind of thing.  I’ll still be reasonably pleasant in the self I present to the world, while this hideous misshapen manuscript festers and grows to its deadly fruition in the blood-darkened womb of my mind.

It’s what I can do to survive each week—a project for the Sundays and Mondays that depress rather than relax me.  It’s better and cheaper than becoming an alcoholic.

I just need something to keep me from drowning right now.

I must stay afloat on this ocean and pay the ferryman his due.

I must stay afloat. Whatever it takes.

 Deborah Blenkhorn writes memoir-based poetry and prose. Her work has appeared in venues such as Blank Spaces, Dreamers Creative Writing, Moss Piglet Zine, and Prosetrics.  She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband of 35 years, and has two teenage daughters; this story recalls a darker time of struggling to keep the faith.

 Image credit: Kelly Wright via D-ALLE, Ideogram, and Midjourney.