For the past few weeks I have been observing two women who live within my new environment. One, Katie, lives in the house next to mine. The other, Bertha, has an office three doors from mine at work. Katie is about twenty years younger than Bertha, probably in her late 50s. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in Bolivia during the late 1960s and early 1970s. She moved there with a man she married shortly before her departure and left four years later when she decided she could no longer live with his alcoholism and abuse. After floating around Berkeley for several months and traveling to Hawaii, she returned to Ithaca where she had lived several years before her Peace Corps stint, while she was pursing a bachelor’s degree in economics at Cornell. At some point, she bought the white house on South Hill where she presently resides.
The house caught my eye before Katie did. With the discarded boxes and junk that litter the front porch, side of the house, and obstruct the upstairs windows, I cannot figure out how anyone can live in such a place. Katie and her two cats seem to manage. They are quite sociable and often can be seen talking with the neighbors. The other day I saw the black cat sunning herself on the roof.
Bertha’s office resembles Katie’s house, except that the stacks that surround her are comprised of journal articles. I suspect that Bertha probably wrote most of them. She studies carbohydrates and continues to conduct research and teach classes even though she is in her late 70s. There is a rumor that she is a skier. It is hard to believe, since she can be found sitting at the computer in her office just about any hour of the day any given day of the week. I like Bertha. We seem to be on the same break schedule and, as a result, find ourselves meeting in the break room on a daily basis. I find her to be dry, but kind.
Last week it occurred to me that these women are old maid archetypes, the kind that are described in fairy tales. Carl Jung would call them shadow figures, part of the collective unconscious. Although I believe they would both state that they are happy if they were asked, they embody loneliness for me. Witnessing their presence in my life has tapped into the familiar fear that I too will live to be an ‘old’ woman without finding the companionship that I seek. I have spent so many of the past few years in remote places. Although my move to Ithaca will be very good for me professionally, I presently feel isolated and alone living here. In the wake of Dad’s death and in the midst of so much change, I find that I crave companionship. I believe this is why when I drove to Baltimore earlier in the week, I decided to extend my stay. I have been coming to terms with the idea that it is okay to want company, to take steps to seek companionship. In the three days that I spent in my old home, I felt nourished by my interactions with friends. There is something so heartwarming about connecting with a familiar face. For the first time in my life, I am learning how to voice and stand up for my needs.
What happens when fantasies become real? Do you still want them?
These are questions I have been pondering for the past few weeks as I have been helping others realize their fantasies, as I find myself on the verge of living some of my own. Aren’t fantasies just vehicles of escape from the mundane?
There has been tremendous change in my life recently, so much that I find myself feeling apprehensive about the opportunities that await me. “Are these opportunities really good for me?” I keep asking. I cannot imagine choosing anything but to journey forward; however, my confidence wavers. Where is the ground? I feel as if I am floating like an autumn leaf, changing color with the new season, yielding to the fall, but content to rest on a lower branch until the next breeze arrives.
Every evening last week I returned from work to find rainbows playing on the walls of my attic apartment. They were miniature versions of the rainbow I saw at the beginning of August when I drove from Atlanta to Baltimore. The rainbow was the largest I have ever seen. It spanned for miles along the eastern horizon; its spectrum of light contrasted vividly with the overcast sky.
The rainbow appeared 11 days after Dad died. Tibetans believe rainbows are auspicious symbols, often pronouncing the moment when the soul leaves the physical body. Dad’s soul must have left his body when he was cremated nine days earlier; however, I felt his presence the day I saw the rainbow. He lingered throughout the month of August. Some days he felt more distant than others, but he was never very far. While the rest of my family was grieving his absence, trying to hold on to signs of his existence, I found myself feeling angry that he could see everything, that I no longer had any privacy. Last week I voiced this idea to my three immediate family members and a few friends. One friend suggested that Dad might be seeking my help to move to a distant place. Crazy idea, I thought, until I realized he had left. Maybe there was some truth to her words. Maybe it was a crazy idea. I will never know. Nevertheless, I sense that for Dad transcendence might be as much of a process as dying proved to be.
