Rain Therapy

Beau is down, real down. I am starting to feel like I have two lives – the ME life that begins whenever I wake up and consists of all the selfish, guilty pleasures that have become my routine. Lots of playing Civ IV, watching TV (Dr. Phil is my new obsession), and doing all those other things I’ve talked about, reading, gardening, and especially cooking, which I am becoming a real pro at. I’ve even started up a new canvas in my oil painting hobby. I should probably try finishing one of my four or five UNfinished canvases, but when I get the inspiration to paint, I don’t fight it or redirect it, I run with it. And although many (including those in this teeny town) think I’m a bit cuckoo for living such a life of isolation (as if the fact that Beau actually gets “isolation pay” for working in this “town” shouldn’t be enough of a clue to THEM), I rather enjoy it.

The second life is the BEAU part. It begins when he steps into the door, usually for anywhere from 30-75 minutes around lunch time, then a brief departure to teach his last class, before he returns for the rest of the night. He always walks in the door completely demoralized and just plain sagging. To see the person you love more than anyone or anything look like that, day after day, is completely heartbreaking. So, from Monday to Friday, I feel myself on a mission to get him through the week. I try to be upbeat, have fun with him, make him feel special, and of course, cook him lots of good meals and sweets (oh my GOD I have recently made the most amazing coffee cake, and I’m not even a big coffee cake fan). He’s beginning to grumble about the cooking since he’s gained about 25lbs, but is otherwise enjoying himself in that regard.

Now this doesn’t mean I’m a Stepford Wife all the time. We still fight, he can still get distant and I can still get moody. But, I am trying very, very hard to help him through this. I’ve lived only for myself for so long, and now I’m living with another person who has his own needs and problems. It’s an adjustment not thinking of only yourself. The worst part, is that most of the time I feel like I’m failing. When you try so hard to cheer someone up, get them through a rough patch, and they’re not doing cartwheels, despite your efforts, you feel disappointed in yourself and your powers of good in the relationship. You want to believe you can be more than what gets him through it, you want to be his inspiration to fly.

According to Beau, I am all those things. But truthfully, I know I’m not. I’m not that insecure, I know that without me, he’d be in big trouble, but I’m not making this experience what it could be, what it should be for both of us. Very slowly, I am watching him be squeezed smaller and smaller, the life being crushed out of him. Selfishly, I want to stay here! I want to try again in a new place, in a place with a normal school, where I truly believe when he gets into a more "mainstream," academically-oriented school, and I get a frickin job, we will both begin to blossom. But I’m losing hope that that will ever happen.

One recent Saturday it was pouring rain out. This is not such a strange occurrence around here and one of the few drawbacks to the area’s nice weather and beauty. Beau sort of stared out the window at it. He began to talk about his frustration and what he really needed – that opportunity to just scream, SCREAM!!!! That release of built-up disappointment and anger. Doing it in our house is not really an option. Our house is basically like a flat townhouse, one loooong house chopped in half, with one family in one, and us in the other. We can hear each other, though not too clearly (thank god). But a glass-piercing man-scream might draw their attention.

So, I pointed to the murky beach just across the road from our house, naturally deserted in the weather (and pretty much at all other times as well), and suggested we run out there, helter skelter in the onslaught, and let it all out erupt from his mouth out there. He surprised me a little when he agreed.

We put on our rain gear, heads up, and ran like two six-year olds out to the beach. Bear, my beloved, occasionally-adopted german shepard (he belongs to a local but runs wild half the time), followed us every step. God, I love that dog. We ran down the beach at an awkward, tripping sprint until we were out of breath, which didn’t take too long since we’re both terribly out of shape. The time had come for Beau to let it out, and I was excited, but the run down the beach had pretty much been all the exertion he’d needed. So we stood there, under a dripping branch just off the water, soaking wet and panting. I couldn’t believe it, but it felt so good. It was supposed to be Beau therapy, and it seemed to be helping, but it was therapy for me too. With a whiny, but loyalty-til-death, Bear following along, we scrambled up the slippery slope to the top of the “hill” that runs around the coast. We got to the top, still with rain splattering our faces (including Bear’s), and we looked out from our lofty perch out at the vast ocean. The sky was grey, and the ocean was grey (and nasty), but utterly beautiful. The waves were some of the biggest we’d seen since we arrived. Looking out, I was taken in by the romance of the ocean, by its beauty and terror, by the sailors that had sailed above it and died below it.

Beau looked out at the water, but he couldn’t feel it too. It’s hard for someone to match what I feel, considering my ridiculously romantic nature, but he couldn’t feel it, hardly at all. He could recognize the beauty of the ocean, but couldn’t feel it. The weight of all his difficulties here acted as a wall between him and all his surroundings. I’ve felt like that before, I understand it. When I was studying abroad in France, I was deeply depressed (my first marriage was in shambles), and I knew that I was going through this great experience abroad, but I was so completely saddened by my personal life that it was like walking around half alive.

He recognized that the wall was there, and it just made him feel so sad inside. And me as well. It's hard to know what to do. We stayed out for awhile, my jeans and shoes getting soaked, Bear getting soaked, Beau getting soaked. Despite the sadness there at the cliff, the rain did us good. Ritualistic washing away? I try not to get too deep into that kind of thinking, but I know that in a strange way, it was a special day. Bittersweet.