Shakespeare and Ponyboy

I had so much fun at the Shakespearean Festival last weekend that I didn’t want to come back to real life. I would have loved to see the rest of the plays and stay another week at the hotel. It was such a ball to go to breakfast, lunch and dinner with Chelsee, Allison and Steve, then to the plays, then to the hotel room for a glass (plastic cup, really) of Reisling or Muskat and good conversation. On our last day there, we walked to a monument on campus with statues of 12 great men and women in history: great thinkers and innovators who changed the world in their time, for all time. Allison will have to post some pictures we took of her “interactive tourism.”

Yesterday, I was at the verge of tears all day. I don’t know if it was because I have gone off my anti-depressant medication or because my life seems so sterile and pointless right now. I wanted to quit my job, go home and isolate myself from human society altogether. When I did get home, I did some laundry and watched “Cast Away” again. It had been a while. I always identify (just like Mom and Ponyboy!) with Tom Hanks’ character toward the end of the movie when he is talking to his friend. He says:

“We both had done the math. Kelly added it all up and knew she had to let me go. I added it up and knew that I had lost her, because I was never going to get off that island – was going to die there – all alone. I knew I was going to get sick or get injured… The only choice I had – the only thing I could control – was when and how and where that was going to happen. So, I made a rope and I went up to the summit to hang myself. But I had to test it, you know? Of course! You know me. And the weight of the log snapped the limb of the tree. So I couldn’t even kill myself the way I wanted to. I had power over nothing.
“That’s when this feeling came over me like a warm blanket. I knew somehow that I had to stay alive. Somehow, I had to keep breathing, even though there was no reason to hope and all my logic said that I would never see this place again. So, that’s what I did. I stayed alive. I kept breathing. And then one day that logic was proven all wrong, because the tide came in and gave me a sail. And now, here I am. I’m back – in Memphis – talking to you. I have ice in my glass. And I’ve lost her all over again.
“I’m so sad that I don’t have Kelly. But I am so grateful that she was with me on that island. And I know what I have to do now. I’ve got to keep breathing. Because tomorrow the sun will rise. And who knows what the tide could bring?”

I always cry through that part and I did again last night. It felt so true that I have control over nothing. All my best efforts are ineffective, and I am envious of the self-confidence that Allison has found. What I want is beyond my power to get for myself. I have a wonderful family and that certainly counts for a lot, but I want to be loved for myself as an individual and not just because I am a mother and have great children. I feel like I have lost the love of my life and there will never be anyone else for me. What hurts me the most is how easily his life goes on without me and how he has replaced me with someone so ordinary.

“He is a majestic mountain lake,
Content in its reflecting stillness
And I make small waves when I pass.”

But, after I felt sorry for myself for a while, I thought how grateful I am that Wes stayed with me while I was raising my small children. I didn’t have to leave any of my babies to go back to work like Kjersti and Danae have to do. And I know if I just keep breathing, the sun will rise. The tide may yet bring me the desires of my heart.