Tonight was my second karate workout since late last century. The theme was break falling, throws, and takedowns. Graceful I was not. Break falling required smoothness and body control. My mind knows what to do, but my body has forgotten the flow of it.
I was less out of wind tonight, but then the very nature of the workout provided lots of time lying down. The blue belt I worked with all night was good. I think we both got something out of the experience.
Mostly I am pleased to be doing something physical again. I know it’ll take my body a couple of months to readjust to the impacts and stresses this activity requires. But the release is important, especially at a time when I am filled with emotional and mental stress.
Next week it’s back to the regular class schedule, Tuesday and Thursday. The week after I’ll only work out once due to Thanksgiving. Easing back into it like this is working out well for me. Hopefully by the time the new year rolls around I’ll be able to complete a work out and not pay for it physically for the next few days.
One of the projects I want to complete this fall is setting up my old Windows XP and Linux boxes in the spare bedroom. There are some development tools I’d like to play with that (currently) only run on Windows, and I’d like to setup file server and perhaps a postfix server on the Linux machine. Since I’m in an apartment drilling holes in the wall to run CAT-5 cord is probably not a good idea.
What I wanted to do originally was to acquire another 802.11b wireless bridge from LinkSys and couple it to my old wired router. I had done this in Illinois and it worked fabulously. The bridge-router-as-hub combo allowed me to hook these two machines up to the LAN from the far end of the house. Easy. Only you can’t buy a 802.11b wireless bridge anymore. I know I’ve looked at all the major tech resellers in town, and more than a few of the minor ones. Sure, eBay has them, but eBay is a hassle anymore and I want the device now not in a week to ten days.
Over the weekend I bought a LinkSys 802.11g wireless router thinking I could use as a bridge. I asked the, ahem, technical salespeople in the computer department if it could be used that way. Their immediate answer was yes. Why do I place my faith in the answers of minimum wage earning high school kids? Will I never learn?
My initial attempts to configure the new router to accept the original router as it’s upstream device failed. Time to do some google searching. If all else fails I can return this box and spend a bit more money and buy an 802.11 “gaming adapter,” which is what LinkSys now calls the only bridge anyone carries and sells.
That or get out my handy dandy drill…
The aspect of my relationship with Michele that is going to be the hardest to live without is the lack of a safe place to vent. We all have moments where the frustrations of the day overwhelm us and we want to lash out inappropriately in order to vent. Who among us hasn’t skewered a fast-food counter clerk, or yelled at other drivers on the road, in an effort to get rid of the build up of anger, frustration, and helplessness? We all have.
Michele and I had some thing we called 20 Minutes. When ever either of us was upset and needed to vent we could start a conversation by saying, “I need 20 minutes.” The listener knew that what followed was just the heat of the anger, frustration, or helplessness being boiled off. The real issue was buried by these hotter surface emotions and could only be dealt with once it was cleared. The listener also knew not to take anything said in this opening movement seriously. 20 minutes is just the irrational emotion talking, once it was exhausted, the real emotion could take over and truth would come out. (By the way, 20 minutes isn’t a literal time limit; some times it only takes 2 or 3 to unearth the truth, others may take far longer.)
I miss having her as a safe place to fall. The world is suddenly scary (scarier) again. I don’t have the luxury of calling her on the phone and saying, “Help me deal with this, I need 20 minutes.” Even without the need for venting the days frustrations I miss being able to connect with her and share what ever was on my mind. I especially miss her calling me. She always laughed at how my voice would change from the professional, flat work-Mark, to the relaxed, loving husband she knew when I would hear her voice on my work phone.
I “wrote” to her yesterday on her site and that helped. I used to write to her every day, some times about nothing more important than what to have for dinner, other times to explain my theories about the existential nature of being. Being with her allowed me to flex my mental and emotional muscles; I grew emotionally and spiritually. The growth will continue, but the path is dim and shadowed now without the light of her sun to show me the way.
On the archive page of this site, towards the top, is a running total of the words written here. Before this posting there were 199,050 words of content contained here. Somewhere in one of the next few postings will be word 200,000.
It is hard for me to believe that I have written this much in just a few years time. In school I hated writing assignments; a thousand page paper due on some topic was cause for dread and procrastination. Now there are times when I can barely type fast enough to capture the thoughts in my head. Sharing myself through this site has been an amazing experience for me. I have exposed some of my biggest failings, greatest fears, highest joys, and happiest moments. Knowing that anyone who wanted to could read these words has added import and power to them.
Having this electronic diary, if you will, has also allowed me to look back at events and relive the feelings I was having in the moment. It is surprising how often my memories of the event are vastly different than what I wrote at the time. The job losses and moves have figured large in my writing, as has the emotional and spiritual growth I’ve experienced in the last few years. And it goes without saying that the recent death of Michele has caused me to write more and more.
I always shared my new postings with Michele. Often I would call here from work when I’d had some new thought and captured it here. I would read it to her or listen to her read it, and our connection would be that much stronger and that much deeper. I like to think that because of the focus these words have in my mind as I write them, that my thoughts can bridge the gap between this place of existence and the one where Michele’s essence is now. While I can’t know she is “hearing” these words, I still feel like I am sharing them with her. The sense of validation I got from including her in this process is still strong and still important to me.
200,000 words down, millions to go.
So one flavor of spam spoofs the sending address to be the same as the receiving address. Thus it looks like the mail came from yourself. I am not sure what the asshole creating the spam thinks this will cause me to do, but there you go.
For the past month I have had Michele’s email account set to be read in my email client. I wanted to make sure I had gotten ahold of everyone she knew, and for some I only had email addresses. Tonight when I checked the mail there was a mail from Michele. My heart stopped for a moment. Then I realized it had to be some cowheaded spammer spoofing her address.
What I wouldn’t give for five minutes alone in a room with this vile creature and a baseball bat.
The thing about grief is that it is relentless. People talk about things being 24x7, meaning all the time, but until you have lived with the constant pressure of grief pulling at you every second of every minute of every hour of every day, until then you don’t know what relentless really means.
You can’t escape it for more than a few minutes here or there. You try to absorb yourself in a book only to find that you’ve read the same page over and over and still don’t know what it says. Television is mindless crap and so it doesn’t impact you deeply enough to provide any shelter from the onslaught of emotions pouring through you. Anger, pain, sorrow, rage, tears, physical exhaustion, helplessness, mania, and so on.
The slightest things set you off - this afternoon I was unable to dice an onion finely. I flew into a rage, stabbing again and again at the onion and cutting board until I broke the tip of the knife off in the wood. I was sobbing uncontrollably, mucus and tears streaming down my face. With the initial spurt of anger spent I crumpled to the floor and cried and cried. After a brief attempt to clean the bits of onion from the walls and floor I gave up and stumbled to our bed where I laid and bawled. Clutching at one of her favorite dresses I cried and cried until I was spent.
I am so mad at her for leaving me behind to pick up all the pieces. I am sick and tied of answering questions, dealing with paperwork, and trying to carry on meaningful conversations with people. It is so unfair that I have to deal with all of the bureaucratic bullshit. I hate having to call banks, and utilities and explain that my wife is dead can I get our names changed to just mine. I have leaned to hate the question, “How are you?” I’m FUCKING miserable, okay? I will continue to be miserable for the foreseeable future. Eventually I’ll just be unhappy. Until then don’t ask if you don’t want to know.
I have lost the one place where I could sort this out. Michele and I spent so much time talking about our deepest truths and fears, dreams and worries, that we knew what each other was thinking and feeling almost before they did. I didn’t have to explain everything to her in order to talk about my stuff. Now I am forced to explain references and half completed thoughts because I only know how to communicate with Michele. I am lost and adrift in the sea of other people. I loved Michele for many reasons, including her ability to intuit me. I hate that I now am cutoff from the expression of feelings and thought we shared.
Depression dogs my every step, and hounds me when ever I stop to catch my breath. I feel as if I am forced to keep moving or lose myself to the demon dog behind me. I feel like I must take care of the people around me so that they will think I am okay. I would have felt safe exposing my inner most feelings about this to Michele, but I feel very unsafe exposing them to most people. (I realize that expressing them here may be the height of irony. I don’t give a shit.)
I have thought about pursuing a grief group, or a survivors of suicide group. And I suspect it would do me good. But I am so out of sorts with myself now that I can’t bring myself to try something “new.” I want my friends to call me so I can talk, but then I feel guilty for dumping my grief into their lives. All I know tonight is that I feel like I am just going through the motions, and that the only emotions I have are ones of sadness, depression, and anger.
For no particular reason, and in no order, here are the books on my desk this evening.
Prefactoring: Extreme Abstraction, Extreme Separation, Extreme Readability by Ken Pugh
Finding Your Way After Your Spouse Dies by Marta Felber
Eragon by Christopher Paolini
Emergence The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software by Steven Johnson
The Noonday Demon by Andrew Solomon
The simmering lake of anger that exists just beneath the surface of my facade of normalcy boiled over today. The hapless target of this were various members of the Lexus service department in person, and the manager of that department later on the phone.
On Monday afternoon I called Lexus and made an appointment for the car to be serviced. As always I requested a loaner car for the day. I was told that today, Thursday, was the first opening with a car available. I deliberately scheduled the drop off for 7:00 am as that is the earliest time available.
This morning I arrived at Lexus shortly before 7:00 and was waiting when the opened the garage doors. The “greeter” was unable to find my name on his list of expected drop offs. A trip inside to the computer terminal also failed to turn my reservation up. After some heated words on my part they agreed to take the car today anyway, but then it turned out they had no loaner for me. Therefore no way to get to work and back without relying upon rides - rides which I hate to ask for and didn’t have pre-established.
After voicing rather loudly my displeasure at the entire situation I left in an extreme state of agitation and anger. I believe I left a patch of rubber on their nicely polished floor. Upon arriving at work, my anger now at a nice boil, I immediately called the service department and asked to speak to the manager. I will hand it to Craig, he is very good and dealing with outraged people who don’t want to be handled. I admire him for his patience as I vented my frustration about the last three weeks of misery and pain through this small, insignificant event. He even managed to calm me down and schedule a new appointment for next week. And, as a bonus, the drop off time is the night before so I won’t have to be late to work the next day.
As with the several bouts of uncontrolled crying I’ve had recently, this venting of anger has left me feeling much better. I have talked to close friends about the need to find a survivors of suicide therapy group so I can vent my emotions in a healthy and appropriate manner. This morning’s eruption of anger, coupled with little fits of anger last evening, and a hour of uncontrolled weeping, are clearly showing me that I need to take my advice and find a group.
I had my first karate work out in over five years tonight. I am so wiped out it’s not even funny. Excellent class, they didn’t segregate me at all. I just worked at the end of the line and kept up as best I could. I’m 40 pounds heavier and 7 years out of practice. It was ugly at times, but I survived. 8 students there tonight, 4 black belts, 2 brown, a green belt and moi.
Started with good warmup, followed by kihon, mostly combinations, with lots of emphasis on hip rotation, tension in the abs, and fluidity to the next movement. We did a tension kata whose name escapes me now. Not tensho, one that started with an “s”. Next was working in pairs on a move from heian yondan (?). Crossed knife hand block, rolled into an arm bar and take down. Next was a variation on that - what to do when the arm bar fails and they try to elbow strike to your face. A nice reversal and take down. Final segment was to work on the kata for your next belt test, in my case heian shodan. They add a knife hand strike as the set before each of the up blocks moving up the floor, and the final knife hand blocks were done in a modified cat stance. Again the name escaped me. Both feet flat on the floor, rear foot turn forward about 45 degrees with 75% of your weight.
All in all a good workout. I worked pairs with the green belt. He had no control, during the arm bar portion he kept slamming me to the floor (hard wood). I was glad when it was my turn. While I was clumsy with the foot work I remember how to crank on an arm bar.
Sensei High said at the end of class I could wear any belt color I liked. I replied that until I could finish a class without gasping for air that I’d stick with the while belt. He again said I could were the color of my choice, and that when I was ready to test that would be fine.
I can’t make it next Tuesday due to a team dinner sponsored by IBM, but next Thursday I’ll be there. They are meeting at a different location because it has mats. They are going to work on breakfalls, rolls, etc. I am already sore.
Took a hot shower, two aleve and two quarts of water. Tomorrow I may need to crawl into work, Both knees are achy, and the pad on both big toes is sore. I wore a neoprene knee brace on my right knee - all it did was get in the way of bending it fully. Next time I’ll try just knee pads on both knees.
On a Saturday in early June 1997, Michele and I picked up our wedding rings from the jeweler. Two plain gold bands, their newness shiny and their import heavy in our hands. Naturally we both tried them on, and then we left them on for we considered ourselves married, the upcoming wedding was just a formality.
A few days before our wedding in July we took them back to the jeweler so they could be polished for the ceremony. By then I had started to grow used to this bright band of metal around my finger, I liked the way it looked and I was pleased with what it indicated to myself and to the world around me. With the exception of one or two subsequent polishings, and time spent in our pool, my ring has never been off my finger. The skin there is grooved, an impression of the band, all around the digit. There is a slight callus at the base of that third finger, where the ring rubbed my palm. It is safe to say that in the eight plus years since I first put it on that ring has become a part of me.
On the inside of each ring there is an inscription. Mine reads, “In Love Truth M+M 7-26-97”; hers, “In Truth Love M+M 7-26-97”. We both liked the phrase, “in truth there is love, and in love there is truth.” It was pleasing to us to have it inscribed across our rings.
In time we saved our money, and with the gift of her mother’s engagement diamond, we were able to buy a beautiful ring set made of filigreed gold. Michele referred to this as her big ring, and only wore it occasionally for special events. The plain gold band was the real wedding ring to her, and to me.
Her ring was returned to me in a plastic bag. I’ve kept it in the bag, and in my pocket ever since. I could reach in and hold it any time I wanted. Today the constant worrying tore the bag open and her ring popped out. For the first time since she wore it I held it in my hands again. It felt cool and still to my touch, but warmed quickly as I turned it round and round my finger. Both rings are dulled and scuffed with little marks of everyday wear. They are well lived in, like the marriage they represent.
I have both of them on a chain around my neck. Sometimes when I turn they clink together reminding me of all the times we clinked them together holding hands across a table. Clinking our rings was but one of the ways we said, “I love you.” Hearing it again is bittersweet, perhaps slightly more sweet than bitter.
My hand looks empty and odd to me, without the gold band I have worn so long. In my mind I am still married, my heart still belongs to Michele, but the world considers me a widower now. The club of married couples I joined in July 1997 has left me behind. Before marriage I was single and after marriage I was a part of something larger than myself. Now I am not a couple and not single either. Not really. I suppose I am part of a new club, the club of lonely, lost people whose love lives on while their loved one does not.