I've started to wonder sometimes if people are tired of hearing me talk about Meg. Because it's in my head at every moment of the day (mostly) it's difficult to determine how much I'm really talking about it and how much it's just me thinking that I've been talking about it.
Last night, some friends of mine cooked a lovely dinner for Mario and I: big red-leaf salad, good bread, penne with local-made sausage, a zucchini/eggplant parmesean. Lovely. And before we sat down I just started talking about it: "I guess you want to hear about all the Meg stuff?" These friends had plans to drive to Northampton for one of the memorial services, but were unable to make it at the last minute. So, naturally, I feel like it's my job to translate the experience of the memorial services, and all the details of Meg's life, and many people want to know the details, often the exact logistics, of her death: where was she riding, what kind of truck. "Now, what happened?" they ask uneasily.
And because I've told the details so many times, talked about the orange spray painted lines on the pavement which marked the trucks wheels, told how I held my hand on the concrete where her head was, I find myself just dumping it all onto people, throwing it all out at the wrong speed.
How like me to be worrying about other people in a time like this.
Showing posts with label meg. Show all posts
Showing posts with label meg. Show all posts
Monday, October 10, 2005
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Us v. Them
What happens now is, apparently, you begin to separate the people who know from the people who don't. For example, I'm standing in line at the bank today and I realize that the people in front of me, and all the nice ladies behind the counter, have no idea that what I'm thinking about at that moment is Meg Meg Meg, all the time, without stopping.
Obviously, everyone in the line at the bank today is suffering through their own lives as well -- maybe divorces, or cancers, or drug additions, or what have you. And I suppose what hit me hard today is just how alone you are when something like this happens. People tell you to lean on your family and talk to your friends. But what it all comes down to is what you do with the mechanics of your own mind.
And I can stand in rooms and in fields hugging people who knew her, and who know best what I'm going through. But all we can do is look each other in the eye, and wish one another the best of luck.
Obviously, everyone in the line at the bank today is suffering through their own lives as well -- maybe divorces, or cancers, or drug additions, or what have you. And I suppose what hit me hard today is just how alone you are when something like this happens. People tell you to lean on your family and talk to your friends. But what it all comes down to is what you do with the mechanics of your own mind.
And I can stand in rooms and in fields hugging people who knew her, and who know best what I'm going through. But all we can do is look each other in the eye, and wish one another the best of luck.
Monday, October 03, 2005
Some Things She Left Behind
Imagine all the things you leave half-done in your house if you're planning on coming right back. I cleaned out a big pot of something Meg was in the middle of eating when I got to her apartment on Friday afternoon. Something with squash and millet. She hadn't even unpacked her bag from when she was visiting me in New York.
On Saturday night, all of us standing around the bonfire with our hands out, like at communion, Meg's sister Laura walked around the circle and gave each of us some of Meg's ashes. I brushed my finger around in them for a moment, feeling the smoothness and the tiny bits of bone. I wanted to taste them, but I didn't. Then we all leaned in close to the fire, with glowing orange faces, and tossed her in.
My friend Alessandra drove her van up to Northampton and so we were able to fit Meg's writing desk into the back of it, which I'm now using as my dining room table. We also brought back a rocking chair she had painted hot pink, which Becky took, and a box of other small items that I took for myself (her pale green Remington ten forty typewriter, a book or two, a screen printing stencil that reads 'Leevil' she made for me, more little things,) and for some other people, things I'm sending soon in the mail: scarves, small boxes, trinkets.
On Saturday night, all of us standing around the bonfire with our hands out, like at communion, Meg's sister Laura walked around the circle and gave each of us some of Meg's ashes. I brushed my finger around in them for a moment, feeling the smoothness and the tiny bits of bone. I wanted to taste them, but I didn't. Then we all leaned in close to the fire, with glowing orange faces, and tossed her in.
My friend Alessandra drove her van up to Northampton and so we were able to fit Meg's writing desk into the back of it, which I'm now using as my dining room table. We also brought back a rocking chair she had painted hot pink, which Becky took, and a box of other small items that I took for myself (her pale green Remington ten forty typewriter, a book or two, a screen printing stencil that reads 'Leevil' she made for me, more little things,) and for some other people, things I'm sending soon in the mail: scarves, small boxes, trinkets.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
The Day After
Things begin to congeal. The energy lessens, and what used to amount to nothing--a strangers accidental touch on the subway, imagery (a bike, a piece of clothing), the approaching winter--becomes charged with meaning, with an immeasurable sense of what is possible at those moments, in the random (but are they random?) crossing of trajectories (and how I know so much about the crossing of trajectories now,) but also what seems impossible. Everything. Sometimes everything. Other times I forget.
She was all around me in the ether today. Meg and I rarely left voice messages for each other, but rather we would leave about 15-20 seconds of a Sade song, a particular lyric: "I want to cook you a soup that warms your soul," or my favorite, "There is a woman in Somalia..." And today, when I got on the plane to return to NYC, a woman sat down next to me and began listening to Sade on her iPod. Then, I got in a taxi, and guess what was playing on the radio? Yes.
Jennifer Miller told me a story today about a pigeon that landed on her windowsill and seemed sure on finding its way inside her loft. She ignored it for a time, but it was persistent, and so she let it inside, where it walked around the apartment for a short while, and then left.
She was all around me in the ether today. Meg and I rarely left voice messages for each other, but rather we would leave about 15-20 seconds of a Sade song, a particular lyric: "I want to cook you a soup that warms your soul," or my favorite, "There is a woman in Somalia..." And today, when I got on the plane to return to NYC, a woman sat down next to me and began listening to Sade on her iPod. Then, I got in a taxi, and guess what was playing on the radio? Yes.
Jennifer Miller told me a story today about a pigeon that landed on her windowsill and seemed sure on finding its way inside her loft. She ignored it for a time, but it was persistent, and so she let it inside, where it walked around the apartment for a short while, and then left.
Thursday, September 22, 2005
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