I.
Some fictions though act as pleasant stories--ones we tell ourselves as we walk about in a day. Some mornings I walk and I imagine other ends for Rob, other alternatives, ones that are less traumatic, though no less final.
Instead of traveling to the hospital in the predawn morning of September 14--the very day my father, had he lived would have turned 98, we return to bed and refuse all treatments. We say no to the surgeon who only hours later will insert the infected port that marks the end to Rob's life. In this new scenario, Rob lives for the next 6 months and we make the most of the time we have--time we never got to use due to the doctors, the infections, the mishaps, the carelessness, the surgeries, and the sad, sad collapse of our lives overnight.
In this revised version of Rob's life, the letter he told me he wanted to write his son, gets written.
The trip once more to Maine, gets taken. We lie down together, love sweetly. We see a movie. We talk. He tells me where he put Dev's social security card. We have time to say goodbye, to say all those things we thought were ours to give to one another.
Some truths are too stubborn, too unflappable for deception. For example, I could never mistake my husband's body after death for the man he was before he took that last breath. Immediately after death, the body reveals itself as nothing more than a carrier of the most temporary sort. What makes us human, vital, present is immediately gone and leaves behind an absence we cannot fill.
II.
Instead of traveling to the hospital in the predawn morning of September 14--the very day my father, had he lived would have turned 98, we return to bed and refuse all treatments. We say no to the surgeon who only hours later will insert the infected port that marks the end to Rob's life. In this new scenario, Rob lives for the next 6 months and we make the most of the time we have--time we never got to use due to the doctors, the infections, the mishaps, the carelessness, the surgeries, and the sad, sad collapse of our lives overnight.
In this revised version of Rob's life, the letter he told me he wanted to write his son, gets written.
The trip once more to Maine, gets taken. We lie down together, love sweetly. We see a movie. We talk. He tells me where he put Dev's social security card. We have time to say goodbye, to say all those things we thought were ours to give to one another.
In this scenario, Rob lives outside of the hospital bed. He does not spiral down.
III.
What acts best confirm your fictions?
What confirms the truths you most want to believe?
III.
What acts best confirm your fictions?
What confirms the truths you most want to believe?
