Unforgettable in Every Way

Work was busy today. It will continue to ramp up as the year progresses.  Even so, Jenny and I managed to have several interesting interactions today.  I got up around 7, made my coffee and sat down on the sectional/bed 🛌 in my living room/bedroom.  The dog climbed on my lap, and I began to read the news on my phone.  For the first time I can remember since Jenny fell ill, she came out to the living room and laid down on the opposite end of the couch, with her feet closest to me, and her head on a far cushion. We offered good mornings to one another and then she closed her eyes and I went back to reading.  Jenny hadn't moved or even opened her eyes, although she was awake.  After a bit, i picked up a game controller, intending  to play a video game.  The tv lit up, and as it did, Jenny got up and stormed off, upset that I hadn't been cuddling her.  

I started work shortly after this.  And worked all morning.  Jenny and Leiney left for a medical appt at 10 at Kaiser at Capitol Hill. Jenny understandably had an excruciating time given it was the first time there since she had the appointment which led to her diagnosis.

They got home around noon, and I went upstairs (I am now working in a dedicated space in the basement).  I found Jenny laying on the couch, ineluctably sad.  I got her a blanket, and rubbed her head.  I asked her repeatedly if she needed me to do or get her anything, and after she said no, returned to my work downstairs.

Jenny left to get Chinese herbs from Bastyr, a regular trip, for the tea she drinks to fight cancer.  At 215 she texts me to let me know she has finally gotten the herbs and intends to just drive around for a while in the sunshine.  In my eleventy-seventh meeting of the day, I respond, ok.

As an aside, this whole put the Eric pinché motherfucker stuff in a box seems to be working out very well at this time for me. I am steadier, almost happyish, but feel a firm resolve to carry on with this mode of being.  Anyway, we then have this correspondence:













This may seem redux.  It is.  This is now happening every few weeks.  It goes on:





 



















































I



























It goes on.  She is depressed.  Who wouldn't be? 

An important note: In therapy last night, when I noted that Jenny has asked me repeatedly to focus only on her illness and pretend the affair isn't happening until she is "better," she actually claimed she has only said that once, when we had the most recent disagreement about texting Eric the pinché motherfucker, and also claimed that she only meant I was to pretend this during the time she was in hospital.  Not true, as many of my friends can attest, I have complained about this demand for months, and have texts to back it up.

I just now, went to use the bathroom while Jenny was soaking and texting with Eric the pinché motherfucker, she quickly closed the app as I entered.  I asked her if she was mad at me, and she asked back, "What for?"  I said, today you said I was withholding affection.  She said, "Oh that's true."  "No, I told her, I am distancing myself from you because you love someone else."  Recognizing the spring buds  of a new argument, she answered back, "That's withholding."  I could have kept and should have kept the rejoinder to myself, but as I washed my hands I said, "No, I'm distancing myself, withholding is a game people play.  I am intentionally distancing myself. The difference is, I have nothing to withhold." It wasn't an intentional cutting remark, but it was enough for her to respond, "Thanks for coming in here and brightening up my day."  She's welcome.

I think its important, finally, to document that Jenny was upset today that Abby didn't want Jennifer Murray riding to acting while Abby is a student driver.  Jenny texted me in a quandary, because Abby was angry when Jenny suggested that she drive instead of the kid, so she could bring Murray along.  Jenny, who has so few opportunities to spend time with Abby, is seemingly more concerned about her social calendar than anything or anyone else.  So, when she texted asking what she should do, I offered simple advice:








Unforgettable by Nat King Cole

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Life, A Cascading Series of Disappointment

Image
Jenny has cancer.  Terminal cancer.  We learned that in late July. Jenny had  dropped 25 lbs. in the spring without trying.  She had been having vague stomach complaints since October.  As a balm for her concerns, her doctor agreed to do a CT scan for her, but told her they would find nothing.  Jenny wanted to rule out pancreatic cancer, which had recently killed her dad-in the spring of 2019.  Her mother had been sick with lymphoma since February 2020.  The day of the scan, the doctor told Jenny they would get results back in a few days. When Jenny's phone rang that same afternoon, I was in the living room with Abby, where I was torturing her by playing the Rapping Duke on Youtube. Jenny shouted from the room, "Geoff, get in here, the doctor's on the phone." "You have a four cm. mass on your pancreas,"  he said. Jenny made a sound like someone had punched her in the stomach.  "There is a spot on your liver. You have a necrotic lymph nod...
Read more

Still Muddling Through Somehow

Image
At the park, I walked my dog through the rain this morning— not really proper rain— more like air that has decided to shrug water at you out of habit. It suited my mood well enough. As I walked, my thoughts kept returning to the same small universe they often do. They are not new thoughts. They orbit the same losses. They consider the same betrayals, the same questions that never resolve. They have been captured, these thoughts, never to escape, never to be forgotten, never to burn up in the atmosphere. It is simply the gravitational field of my life now. What might seem or feel like self-pity is more like muscle memory, which tells me I need more exercise. The holidays are here, and Christmas has always been central to my life, atheist that I am. It was stitched into Jenny’s life — the love of Christmas — at least as strongly as it was stitched into mine. We carried that love forward with the kids, year after year, without ever needing to talk about why it mattered; it just did. I...
Read more

Don't Do It, Don't Do It, Oh, Lord

Image
It Hurts, It Hurts So Bad.  .  . 3:44 a.m. I walked in the door last night at just before 10 to find Jenny in a ball on the floor--between the giant ottoman and sectional--agonizing pain in her hip. I had ridden to acting with the student driver.  But, let's back up. Jenny had chemo yesterday.  Her friend Jennifer took her.  It was uneventful and she received chemo.  I, as always, prepared the house for her arrival to make sure she wanted for nothing and would be comfortable as she endures the aftermath of all that poison.  Sometime before she came home, she texted, saying the doctor suggested she try Aleve for her hip pain.  Aleve.   She asked me to pick some up for her while Abby was at acting.   During the text exchange I realized she would be alone after Abby and I left for acting.  Leiney was elsewhere and had therapy at 5 and kickboxing later, and her sister Moni had bailed on chemo because she had so much to do (Wit...
Read more