One Breath

I just drove by a woman at a crosswalk and almost swerved off the road. She has no chin, no cheekbone that I can see in the split second passing. Eyes hang from something else, not bone. And I think: It’s not about looking good this time around.

She has a funky corduroy hat, with a black and white striped scarf looped around her neck to match. She is in the midst of a day and it’s clear: she wants to be here. You can tell in the stance, the way the head tilts just so, cocked in thought and full of purpose.

I’m caught sideways, looking at the blue house next door. I find myself in time and space with this landmark – it’s steady; it doesn’t move; and I slow myself against its hue.

Day three of Clomid and aside from blurred vision and the tricky, emotional riptide below the surface current, I keep paddling out of this cove – only so far each day – until in a week’s time I expect to be delivered to the big water, blue and moving, undulant and mysterious as ever. With bits of written material in my pocket, collected prayers from land, I go out alone. Even though I will meet my partner in the middle of an estuary, he is just one element to meet in many. The preparation is mine, navigating this dark place – Kali’s domain – is mine. And so. I hold the edge of the boat. Easy does it.

Haven’t heard from my sister yet. Her voice is alive on voicemail but an automated prompt tells me that this subscriber is not able to receive messages. Years ago I spent a lot of time learning about death and dying. I was a Hospice volunteer and learned much from the teachings and writings of Stephen Levine. His book Who Dies? opened the door that connects living with dying, dying with living. One breath.

My mother died suddenly when I was nineteen. For the following few years, still in the valley of that shadow, I suffered from unknown abdominal pain. I found myself unable to walk at times, and so I explored deeply into the nature of physical pain. Pain in the uncertain body.

A few surgeries later, I found the teacher of a lifetime. When I met her, without any recognition of my movements, I just about crawled in her lap and asked, “What is my name?” In the minutes of silence, years fell off my back. I could barely look and so I didn’t. I hung my head in waiting. And it was given. She gestured to her side, telling me to ask the swami what it meant. So I kneel next to the orange-robed man, serene silence around him, too. He whispers, “Love. It means love. Divine Love.”

I was so upset. I ran outside and kicked the dirt. How was a girl in the midst of death and dying supposed to carry love? I wanted something gritty, intense, hip.

But I took it. A few years later I walked into a courtroom in Boulder, CO to legalize the change, and faced a white-haired judge. Expecting a critical eye, instead, the friendliest voice said, “I think everyone should have the freedom to be called by their true name. Just take care of it, my dear.” And so I walked out and continued on and drove into the future decades with the sentiment of love. Love in the suffering.

Nothing changes with all that changes. Some people follow precepts where the awareness of the presence of death becomes a meditation. Others practice devotion and through love they die a bit each day. Many people live with addicts and are forced into dying and the preparation of dying. Some of us try to juggle the disposition of death from all angles.

Every night around midnight I check to see if River is still breathing. Face down on the pillow, or so I imagine as I wait for my eyes to adjust in the dark. I place my hand on her back and for a second I open that door (does every mother?) and stand prepared. And then I release my next breath with hers. We are alive. We are still here.

And now, just now, awake from her nap, she has me straighten the arms of her mommy and daddy dolls. “Huggies,” she says. I move limbs in place and we make cooing sounds, hugs and kisses and love all around.