Into the Vortex

I am embarked upon a day I have been dreading. It’s one of those unpleasant duty days, a day that will not belong to me. I was up at 4 am to drive down here with Monte and I am now fueling up at my favorite coffee shop, staring into the red vortex of an ugly painting that’s hanging on the wall. (I have been tilting my head, trying to see it from a more auspicious angle, but it’s ugly any way you look at it, the color of a bloody wound with a gaping darkness at the center.) An old Gordon Lightfoot song is playing at this moment, which reminds me of long-ago days with R., which in turn reminds me that on this day forty years ago I was sitting with him in a Long Island living room watching a man walk on the moon. Consider the span of forty years. Funny how it seems so fathomless in one light, so fleeting in another.

The duty of this day is one I have taken upon myself. It involves a job very commonto people of my generation now, that of tending to an elderly parent. I used to think it was especially hard for me because this parent who survived was not a very good one even in her prime, but I have since concluded that the way I treat her in her old age is not about reward or punishment but merely my own sense of decency, nothing more or less than that. I have also learned that very few of us had an idyllic upbringing, and this stuff is hard for everyone. So I am dealing with it as best I can.

My approach to duty is the one my father modeled: you jump right in and do the hard stuff first, work before play, that sort of thing. Unfortunately, my father never saw an end to his duty and never found time for play. And I certainly strike a better balance in that regard -- lots of frivolity in my life -- but I cannot imagine embarking on anything carefree today until after I have entered that vortex and emerged. I would be far too preoccupied to enjoy myself. It's just not the order of things.

Well, sometimes I do I eat dessert before dinner. Or dessert instead of dinner. Last night, for example, we went to Jeanne’s house to see her new rooster and taste-test some of her creative flavors of granita. (I am mad for the mango chipotle.) It had been a hot day, but I managed to ride my bike and putter in the little flower garden I’ve planted in memory of the dog. It was a day of sweet sultry heat on dusty roads, a day that included a phone call with a daughter and messages from friends, a day that smelled of lavender and oranges, a day when dolphins were glimpsed. To want more than this would be nothing but greed.

So I guess I am fortified for the hard part. And it's time.