Gashina

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to sleep, get out of my head!”

“No way! This is the perfect time – between night and day, sleep and awakening, the greyness – it’s the only time you’ll listen to me. I have questions!”

“2 o’clockish in the morning is not a good time for questions! I’m tired, I need to sleep, have lots to do tomorrow and can’t afford to have you pestering me, Gashina!”

“Why do you call me that?”

“What else should I call you? Now leave me alone!”

“I really don’t care what you call me as long as you stop being petulant and answer my questions. I have many questions!”

“I know, I wish you didn’t and would just let me sleep.”

“Your wishes are irrelevant and immaterial to the matters at hand!”

“Ich, don’t I know it!”

“Answer my questions!”

“If I answer you quickly, will you go away?”

“For a time. Will you answer?”

“You have not asked anything, just barged in to my thoughts…that’s rude by the way.”

“Again, I don’t care. Okay, what about him?”

“My husband you mean? What about him?”

“He smells.”

“I’ve grown used to it. He’s a man, they all smell.”

“Do you love him? I mean is it a passionate burning love that consumes your soul every time you see him or think about him?”

“Of course I do! He’s the father of my children. As to burning with passion – I did once, but you can’t keep burning that way without being totally consumed by the fire – a total loss of self. Our love has changed and evolved, especially once the kids arrived.”

“Does he love you? I mean really love you?”

“Yes, I think so – but not that all-consuming love you seem to be alluding to – more like a slow burn. Once you have kids, they become your passion…”

“I knew it! You’re settling for less! I would never have believed that would happen!”

“It’s fate I guess.”

“Fate! Nonsense, we rule our destiny! Every decision, no matter how small determines our future! It’s black and white really – don’t feed me pre-ordained nonsense about fate! I’m not stupid you know!”

“No Gashina, you are smarter than me, you also have a lot of energy late at night…which I do not.”

“Don’t patronize me! And about your children, do you love all three equally?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Liar!”

“Okay, so I love my middle child the most – he is my heartbeat.”

“More than your husband?”

“No…it’s a different kind of love, a different flavor.”

“Foolishness! Love is love – in all things love is immutable, unchanging, and eternal!”

“Yes Gashina, I used to think so as well. But life has taught me that most love is variable and fleeting – a beautiful bird in your hand one moment, a distant painful memory the next. It’s still love, but it has different taste.”

“You know he is angry, right?”

“Who?”

“Your middle-child, your son, the one who you have admitted to love above all others.”

“Yes, I had suspected as much. He does not believe he is loved. I dote on the youngest and fight with my eldest – he gets lost in the shuffle. I try to set aside time with him, but he feels my guilt – thinks it’s the reason I’m reaching for him – he doesn’t want to be pitied or pretend-coddled so he stomps off to his loneliness and anger. My heart aches for him.”

“And your daughter, the eldest.”

“It’s difficult.”

“Why? She’s just like you were at that age!”

“Well, not exactly…but yes, she does remind me of myself…and of you Gashina…so sure she is right and justified in all she does. She holds me in contempt because I do not view the world as clearly as she. For her, the answers are clear…for me, not so much.”

“She’s right you know…”

“I kind of figured you would side with her…”

“Don’t interrupt me! I see how you are trying to turn this back on me. That’s not our purpose here this evening…”

“No, it’s to pester me with difficult and painful questions and to slam me for the choices I’ve made.”

“Stipulated. Now back to your daughter, why do you hate her?”

“I love my daughter…we just don’t get along at the moment.”

“Because you are too alike!”

“Stipulated.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt it! You’re jealous of her beauty, her youth, and her clarity of vision!”

“Wow, all that? You are not holding back tonight are you?”

“It’s the truth, answer me!”

“That was a declarative statement, not a question.”

“Gods you make me so angry! Okay, why do you hate her? Tell me the truth.”

“There may be something to what you say Gashina, but as usual, you don’t see the grey zones…my love for her is different. Her father loves her unconditionally and I do feel a bit jealous about that I’ll admit it, I feel excluded from that relationship – as if they speak in a secret code that I’m not privy to – that makes me feel lonesome and angry.”

“I knew it!”

“You know nothing Gashina. I love my daughter – blood of my blood – the picture of me when I was young. You and she share many traits – I loved you too.”

“Bah, there you go reflecting back at me, just answer for yourself and don’t bring me into it!”

“Ha, don’t see how that is possible. Anyway, one day I hope to be her friend as well as her mother – but for now I have to accept the role of adversary – I am her safe training ground – she can hurl her arrogance and rage at me and I will absorb it, as I will absorb her tears on my shoulder when she loses her first true love. We will have our time…the flavor of our love contains both bitterness and sweetness.”

“There is only one true love! Again you speak foolishness!”

“Then stop talking to me, I’ll just go back to sleep.”

“You will not get off that easily, we have only scraped the surface of my questions!”

“I was afraid of that.”

“Explain what you mean by her ‘first’ true love.”

“If she is lucky, she will experience many loves in her life. Yes the first will always hold a special place, but she will love again. And become both richer and poorer for it.”

“Don’t speak in riddles! Why can’t you just tell me the truth?”

“I’m trying to. Finding love and living love will fill her to the brim – it will overflow and she will find herself sinking into it – a warm beautiful trap. And then it will end and she will find a piece of her heart has been ripped away. Once the mourning period is done, even as she moves on to find a different flavor of love, she will be a wounded animal – always trying to reconstruct that which has been lost…I weep for her because I know it will never be found. Every time we give our heart to someone, and they return it to us, we discover that a piece has gone with them never to return, they take that piece and you will never ever see it again, so sad. You only have so much heart to share. Hopefully enough to last a lifetime…but not always. Daring to love again after being hurt, that is a true test of our humanity.”

“Are you always so dour?”

“At two o’clock in the morning I am.”

“And your youngest child?”

“So sweet and filled with promise, yet I fear for her.”

“Why?”

“So many unknowns in this world.”

“You old folks sure have made a mess out of it! Things are going to hell in a handbasket just as I predicted they would, and we have your generation to thank for it!”

“We had many generations of help, enough blame to go around. But if it helps you to blame me Gashina, go right ahead.”

“Tell me of your love for her.”

“It has wings, Gashina! When I see her smile, when she gets excited about some new discovery – I am amazed right along with her. It’s yet another flavor of love. She still needs me and I find that I need her so very much…especially since she will probably be my last.”

“If you had to choose between saving her and saving your husband, which would you choose?”

“I would miss my husband very much.”

“Ha, your love is as fickle as they come!”

“Yes, I can see how you might think so. You asked me for the truth; I love but I am also a realist.”

“Are you saying I was not realistic?”

“I thought you said we weren’t going to talk about you, hmmmmm?”

“You are the most frustrating person I have ever known!”

“So sorry…not sorry.”

“Where did you go so wrong?”

“Did I?”

“Most assuredly. I had it all figured out. Things would have gone glowingly if you had just stuck to the plan!”

“The best laid plans…never survive first contact with the enemy…or mice, or men!”

“You make light of it! How did you come to this? Are you not disappointed?”

“Perhaps a little. But I am still happy…would be foolish to argue against fate, eh?”

“It was not fate! You made choices!”

“Yes, and those choices sealed my fate.”

“You have suffered so many heartbreaks!”

“That’s true.”

“So much has been taken from you…”

“Yes, pieces of my heart, gone forever…”

“And yet…”

“I am content. I would not trade a moment of it away. There have been, and still are, moments when my heart still overflows…the pain is deep but so is the love. When I leave this place, I will have experienced every flavor of love…and pain…and I will be fulfilled. Such is the fate I have found.”

“And do you really love me, as you said?”

“Oh very much Gashina, you are the spirit of the girl I used to be – you will always have a place in my secret heart. Always with me, as you have been tonight.”

“I…I love you as well. Now sleep, I suspect I will have more questions later.”

“I’m told that questions are the paving stones to enlightenment. Goodnight, Gashina.”

“Gibberish!”