Last month I read "Rodham: a Novel" about what Hillary Rodham Clinton's life might have been like had she not married Bill. In real life she turned down two marriage proposals by him. What if she turned down the third?
I'm often fascinated by the road-not-taken stories. One movie I have thought about many times since seeing it in the theaters in 1998 is "Sliding Doors." The movie is told in parallel story lines -- what happens if she caught the earlier subway vs. what happens if she misses it. As I recall, both stories end in the same place. In the case of Rodham, it doesn't, though she and Bill's lives continue to intertwine.
As fascinating as I found the plot of Rodham, I keep mulling over the nest she forms in each of her residences, we follow her journey from Yale Law School into her 60s.
Forgive me, I forgot to note the page numbers.
"On arriving home at night -- often this was at nine or so, after a lecture or meeting -- I'd eat something quick if I hadn't had time, peanut butter on toast or soup from a can, followed by a pot of chamomile tea. Then I'd change into blue pajamas and a red nylon robe that my mother had given me before my freshman year at Wellesley. I'd pull my hair into a ponytail, set a cup of tea on my nightstand next to the lap, sit on my bed with my pillows propped between my back and the headboard, and make the list of what I need to do the next day. In addition to using a spiral notebook, I kept a daily planner, which was eight by four inches and which I reordered by mail every October. I thought of this arrangement of tea, pillows, notebooks, calendar and textbooks as my nest."
...
"In college and law school, these had been the hours when I felt most like myself. I liked being around other people during the day, and I was relieved to be alone late at night; it was the latter that made the former possible. In fact, setting up my next often made me think of a Wordsworth phrase I'd learned in English class as a high school junior: emotion recollected in tranquility."
I keep reflecting on these passages because they resonated with what is missing in my life right now. Don's office because the exchange student's room. Don moved into my office. Don is still working from home. All of which makes logical sense.
That is until I am looking for that place where I can always go to recharge.
I moved my desktop to the dining room. Certainly a temporary solution. It is not cozy. The computer is on top of an antique marble top table. I'm sitting on a wooden chair with an upholstered seat that once used to reside in his grandmother's house. When not in use, it looks pretty in the corner, but I could never describe this as cozy.
As the pandemic is reaching month 22 and cases skyrocketed to 30,000 plus every day, we need to hunker down again. We had fun during the holidays, and visited more people than we probably should have. It will only be through the grace of God (and vaccines and boosters) that we have stayed healthy. Being physically healthy, though, does not mean mental health is not suffering. In my case, it it.
Like the fictional Hillary, I like being around people during the day, and am relieved to be alone late at night. Unfortunately, the current life is leading the reverse -- hiding from people during the day at work (behind masks, keeping my distance, hiding behind doors) and being around people at night (family) who, too, is keeping away from others during the day.
May this pandemic come to an end soon so we can all fly from our nests during the day, and have the opportunity to return at night to recharge.
