Find a new post from Jane here: http://ontillmorning.us/
Irish talks about fear. She fell, crushed half her face and lost her right eye. Of course she’s afraid of going back on the boat. No job and savings wiped out by divorce, she fears medical bills, as do many in much better shape. She fears for our relationship.
After losing her job, the day before she fell, she asked me if I “could still love an unemployed miscreant.” Her question was not out of the blue. This isn’t the first time Irish and I had gotten together.
We had connected on a dating site years ago, and … Read more…
By Jane Miller (from ontillmorning.us)
By Jane Miller
What if I can’t do it?
Would it be better to break up now and call it a good try rather than stay, fail, and watch my relationship with Erik splinter into a million heart-broken pieces? Pictures of the boat frighten me. The cockpit seats, the coaming, the small space between the edge of the bench seat and the binnacle where I lay until Erik picked me up.
I am petrified of walking up the starboard side of the deck to the bow and not seeing the entire right side of … Read more…
Irish’s father died last Saturday. We’ll drive from the mountains to the valley tomorrow, pick up her sons in Eugene, and then head to the Oregon coast where the service will be held the next day.
So much for 2017 making up for last year. The girl didn’t have enough on her plate over the last six weeks? Parkinson’s, losing her job over Thanksgiving, four days later the fall that nearly took her life and did take her eye? Surgery days before Christmas, and before the middle of January, her father dies.
I don’t know if I could … Read more…
At the root of our “being,” just below consciousness and mostly hidden from us, pre-spoken emotions and urges guide our behaviors. As individuals we share many if not most of these, though where we fall on any one scale may be different from one to another.
You may have one glass of wine and be content, but your brother’s seven are not nearly enough.
You may be happy to sit quietly with a book while your sister must go out to a movie to allay a slight anxiety at not being “with people.” Or you may stay … Read more…
by Jane Miller
Fear comes like the fog – “on little cat feet.” I had thought I was only afraid of dentists, but now I am faced with stomach-gripping anxiety and heart-skipping panic.
I’m afraid …
… we’re going up to the boat in less than two weeks.
… sometimes I almost remember the fall and the impact that took my right eye and crushed my face.
… the medical bills I’ve racked up over two countries seem insurmountable.
… I don’t have a job and given my list of physical injuries and … Read more…
At 3:30 in the morning of a day in the first week of January it’s almost dark outside but for reflections of starlight off faceted sparkles of fresh snow that’s been falling since before dinner yesterday.
Another year.
The to-do list stretches for pages and hasn’t changed much in months which piles guilt upon guilt for my aimlessness, inattention, lack of focus. I’m writing but not publishing, floating but not boating, sitting and not scrubbing, driving not to any destination. But that’s so often what I do.
Still, it was a year like no other. I was wandering about … Read more…
by Jane Miller
I didn’t really mean to write about all of this. Traveling over the Santiam Pass on New Year’s Eve, I wrote notes for something vastly different. But that will have to wait.
December needs to be revisited first.
I have been so afraid and so deeply sad. I lost my eye. I almost died. My face is still a mass of bruises, swelling, and pain. I will heal, I know, but there will be scars inside and out.
This past month keeps replaying itself in my memory. My world exploded on December 1 – … Read more…
Irish had nightmares nearly all night on Christmas Eve. She would cry out or whimper, and I would take her hand or touch her shoulder or leg, someplace where I could reach actual skin.
“It’s alright. I’m right here,”
She would gulp a lungful of air.
“It was awful. People were coming out of the ground to attack me.”
“It’s just a nightmare. I’m right here.”
She’d fall back asleep but 20 minutes or an hour later, she would cry out again.
“Baby, I’m right here.”
“When I go back to sleep … Read more…
by Jane Miller
My world exploded on Thursday, but the fuse was ignited on Monday when I was fired from my job. I had more than half expected it, work was a toxic environment at best, but the finality of it was daunting.
Erik was determined to keep my spirits up though, and we set off on a walkabout. Being in Victoria with him, being on the boat with him, just being with him made me irrepressibly happy. I was afraid, though, what this change in employment and finances would bring to our relationship. My voice shook as I nervously … Read more…
