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2003-12-27 - 4:46 p.m.
Swan Song I had never ridden a swan before but there I was, perched rather ungracefully, on the back of this creature. The wooden plank bench, set in an array of a dozen identical ones, sloped slightly to the left and I crossed my legs to balance the weight of my eight week old daughter who was asleep in my arms. I had never ridden one, but I remembered having once read a story about the migration of a duck family through the streets of Boston to this very pond with it's famous boat. Summer was still in the air, though it was early September and the leaves were already beginning to turn. I glanced around at the sprinkling of other folks; some wore bright hats, others donned cameras. It was apparent that most of them were visiting this place for the first time too. An old woman, obviously homeless, was sitting alone near the back of the boat, talking quietly to herself as she dropped little bits of bread over the edge. She'd been here before. We glided our way through the water, not in any hurry. It didn't appear as if anyone had anywhere else to go. Ducklings trailed alongside the boat, circling, darting here and there, dipping their beaks in the pond to catch the breadcrumbs. Were they simply looking for food or did they think the boat was their mother? I noticed the skyline around us and felt as if I were back in New York, in Central Park. I searched for bits of debris floating in the water and, not seeing any, remembered that I wasn't. New York was "home" or at least the last place where my family had been whole. I turned to look at my three year old. She sat next to me on her daddy's lap, immersed in the "little tyke" plastic people she held in her hands, unaware of the boat ride or of the event that was about to drastically change her life. The day before, I had boarded a plane in Los Angeles with two children, three suitcases, a stroller, car seat, diaper bag and hope in hand. My husband, an actor, had signed a contract for a two-year stint with a major Broadway National Tour. We had packed up our apartment in N.Y. and, needing a nesting place for the birth of our second child, I had moved into my parent's home in a suburb of L.A. The plan was that the three of us would join him on the road after the baby was born. A month ago he had informed me that he had "met" someone, a girl in the cast, and felt that it was something he needed to pursue. This trip was the culmination of a month long series of sleepless nights and lengthy phone conversations. He had agreed to break it off with her and was willing to work things out. He had asked that we come to Boston. He looked good at the airport. Tanned, which I thought strange for an actor whose typical day begins around three o'clock in the afternoon and lasts well into the wee hours of the morning. His typically less than meticulous attire had been replaced by what I referred to in those days as "the Don Johnson look.". My daughter ran to him and he swept her up, swinging her around in the air. She was her daddy's girl, that was for sure. Then he looked at me, smiled and pulled me and little sister into the family hug. For a moment it was as it should be. I was 'cool' in the cab. He was cautious. There was so much to be said, but not now. Our conversation consisted mainly of "How was your flight?" and of our daughter's experiences in preschool. The radio played Bonnie Tyler's rendition of "Total Eclipse of the Heart" as the driver pointed out various points of interest. We nodded our heads and appeared to be aware of his travelogue. He had rented a railroad flat across the street from the theater, but in a location separate from the festivities of the rest of the cast. I needed to be with others, to socialize, to pretend that life was normal. I didn't want to talk about our situation. I wanted to pretend it wasn't happening. The fridge was stocked with food, from delicacies we had made tradition of, down to the Spaghetti-O's and Gerber delights. It didn't matter that our baby was not yet on solid food, it was obvious that he knew we were coming and had put some thought into it. We had lost three hours due to the time change, making the day seem earlier than it was. But nearing seven o'clock, he needed to leave for the theater (and her) to make his eight o'clock curtain. Settling in, I busied myself by unpacking and familiarizing myself with this place that was to be our home for the next two weeks. Whether or not we would go with him when the company moved on to Seattle was a thought I didn't dare think about right now. I entertained the children as best I could with the small bag of toys and games we had brought along and tried to concentrate on the television, but focusing on anything, besides the disorientation I felt, was a difficult task. After the girls had been put to bed for the night in the room at the far end of the flat, I walked, just walked from one end to the other and back again, pausing occasionally in front of the mirror to ask what it was he saw, or didn't see, when he looked at me. Why was this happening? It hurt so much! Our marriage that had followed a fairy tale format was in grave danger of ending. Could it be fixed? I remembered our courtship seven years earlier, similar to the one he was now engaged in, "on the road"... not to be confused with "reality"... just performing, and being in love. I thought about our little family, a living, breathing entity which together we had formed and created. Would it just cease to exist, along with the lifetime of plans made? No! It was supposed to be bound together, not only by the vows we had spoken, but by something much stronger and unspoken, by some insoluble super-glue. There had never been reason to think it would be any other way. One couldn't just change one's mind. He thinks he's really in love with this girl. He thinks she may be the one for him, his "soulmate." I close my eyes and I see her, or what I imagine her to be. I have such a need to know her, to be inside her, to experience what she's felt since she first became aware of him. I search for answers but don't know enough about the questions. I make up pictures in my mind but I don't know anymore what's real or what I've composed. Whatever, I feel as though I'm turning inside out and wonder if I'll ever feel right side out again. When will I be able to get past HER and begin to deal with US? I want to go home, as if that will solve something. I want to run, but I can't. Nowhere I can go will ever take me away from here and the feelings I have. His briefcase revealed nothing more than some music manuscripts he'd been working on, a letter from a "friend" telling him "life is short" and "you only live once" and a charge receipt from an Inn at Cape Cod, which actually revealed more than I really wanted to know. The window overlooked the street and I began to hear sounds of people scurrying from the theater, hailing cabs, talking, laughing, going about their lives. The girls, asleep, provided no diversion for him when he got home. I would have given anything to postpone it as well, but knowing the time had come, we sat down to talk. I listened to his pain and he listened to mine, trying so hard to understand. I searched for the one word I could say to make him change his mind. There is nothing on earth emptier than a moment when you realize there can be no compromise. We talked well into the night until it seemed there was nothing left to say. Though there would be years of "things to say" in the future, for now it was what it was... over. The morning air was warm and still and a shock from the overly air-conditioned chill in the room, but the need to get out was overwhelming. I hadn't smoked in more than a year but the need for a cigarette pulled me into a corner market where people stood around discussing some disaster that had taken place the night before (ha!)- a plane crash or a major earthquake or something like that, I don't remember. I wondered how anyone could have the energy to even think about something that had happened outside their own sphere of reality. I was living my own plane crash, my own earthquake... I couldn't deal with anyone else's. Filling our day with "busy-ness" we walked. Walked anywhere. We stopped for lunch at some fast food joint, not yet having lost my taste or desire for food as I would in the days that would follow. Across the table from him I stated simply, "I get the car" and he looked at me sadly as if wondering how I could be thinking of things like that at a time like this. What he didn't see was how afraid I was. On to the duck pond where, for a mere fifty cents a piece (and children ride free) we could kill another hour. How many hours ARE there in two weeks?... I wondered. Way too many?... not nearly enough? It must have been during that hour that I decided what it was I had to do. If not, I might spend the rest of my life traveling around in circles on a damn swan boat. When he had left for the theater I made my frantic phone calls to the airport, to home, making all the necessary arrangements for my escape. Clothes were thrown into bags and a hastily written, incoherent note, something about wishing him well, was hung on the refrigerator. Other than that, there was no sign that we'd ever been there. Only one thing left to do... The stage doorman was quite kind and directed me and my crew to a dressing room just off of stage right. "I want to meet her." The "chorus girl" dressing room was down the stairs and to the left. An assortment of elaborate costumes guarded the hall as I made my way. It was not like me to do this. Never before had I been the confrontational type but for now I had no other choice. I pushed the door open and my senses were thrown into the familiarity of it all; the sight, the sound, the smell. It seemed as if half my life had been spent in rooms like this. Rooms filled with the aroma of greasepaint, of cigarette smoke of too much perfume; rooms reeking with a sense of belonging, of being somebody, of ambition and... hope. But something was very different this time. "Excuse me, is there a restroom in here?" (Of course there was.) The Equity Deputy, simply a name for the cast member elected to make certain all union rules are observed, stepped into my path. "I'm surprised that you, an Equity member yourself, would not know that visitors are not allowed in the backstage area after 'half hour' has been called. If you'd like to use a restroom, there is one upstairs on your way out." So, I never did meet her that weekend, and for a long time I struggled with the justice of it all. If there had been "rules" broken, I felt certain that mine had been the lesser of the two. I met an angel on my way home. The plane was nearly empty and the stewardess took my overly rambunctious three year old and entertained her for the long coast to coast flight. I don't think she knew it, but somehow she was telling me that things were going to be alright and that there would be other angels to follow. That weekend in Boston changed my life forever, but not only for the obvious reasons. I had known all along what the outcome would be, but I had wanted so much to believe I could change something beyond my realm of control. You can't control another person's right to choose his own path, no matter how much you want to, and no matter how justified you feel. You can only control your own attitude about life's circumstances. The flight "home" has taken much longer than the actual airtime. Forgiveness is also within one's control. It is an action word, not something that happens to you when you least expect it. THAT has been difficult for me as well, but it's been made easier by counting my blessings each day. I have two beautiful children who have inherited the best traits and talents from each of their parents (and who have picked up their peculiar ones, obviously from strangers along the way). Our family, which my seem incomplete to some, is a living, breathing, entity despite its numbers. My life has taken a completely different road than the one I had originally set out on but it's not one that is necessarily better or worse, just different. I have experienced and accomplished things that never would have come to pass in my former life. Most of all, I know that I am strong enough to endure any challenge that is put in my path, and that wasn't always the case. All in all, the reflection that I now see in the pond is a dramatically different one than I beheld that weekend in Boston those many years ago.
The preceding was written in 1995 as a school writing assignment. The subject: A Significant Life-Changing Event. It does not necessarily reflect my current state of mind. It was the first "essay" I had written in years, however, and so I thought that I would share it here. And now... on to other stuff.
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