Classes

 

Not the Sequel but the Original

I'm taking a variety of writing classes this fall: some from Sarah Lawrence and one from COCC (oh, don't get me started on the teaching style in the latter class -- I'm just too old and set in my ways to love a teacher who improvises the class, doesn't go by the syllabus, and says things like, "I haven't read Dickens but I imagine Dickens would write like this . . .").

For the Sarah Lawrence memoir class on Love and Loss, I wrote the following and shared it with the class yesterday and got some nice comments.  The prompt was to write something about loving service in 100 words.

 Christmas Gift

 

The final act of love I performed for my sweetheart of 50 years was cleaning the shit off his shrunken body. But he didn’t experience it as love. In his dementia, he thought me a childhood abuser and screamed curses. “I’ll kill you,” he shouted.  At that moment, in one stroke, his extreme rage allowed him to perform his final act of love for me -- disappearing into the feverish coma that ended in his death on Boxing Day. I was relieved that our suffering was over. I didn’t realize this respite was just a brief pause before I shattered.

 

 

 I wonder if writing and sharing this yesterday was the reason his spirit was finally back this morning, sitting down on the bed around 3:50 when Sequel woke me for no good reason.  I told him "Hello, Sweetheart" and then went back to sleep.