Chapter Two: Awareness

Awareness: separateness is just an illusion; nothing to get excited about, regardless of how confusing and tragic is may seem at the time...ah so, wily Universe.

When God talks, you better listen. Convinced their marriage is preordained, Sam and Mimi hear God speak from the top of parking decks during conversations regarding architecturally significant buildings and how the perspectives change when viewed from above. They find God on the grocery store bread aisle while discussing the merits of white bread and its relationship to homegrown tomatoes. They urge God to bless their union every night after watching Harold and Maude for the twenty-seventh time, collectively.

God leaves it up to Sam to tell Mimi about his alcohol addiction. Mimi wishes God would have punched her in the shoulder, insisting she pay closer attention during that conversation. "Mimi, you have to know this up front," Sam says seriously. "I just went through a thirty day stint at the farm." Sam pauses. "And it wasn't the first time." Mimi looks at Sam quizzically.

"What's the farm?"

"Rehab, Mimi."

"What kind of rehab?" Mimi is dense when it suits her.

"Alcohol," says Sam, never taking his eyes off her.

"So, what's that mean?" Mimi needs a schematic.

"It means I'm a recovering alcoholic," Sam says slowly, so Mimi can absorb every word of this short sentence.

"I get that part, but what does that have to do with us?"

"Everything, Mimi. I feel so good right now. I've been sober sixty days." Sam paces and runs his hand through his curly hair, then turns back to Mimi. "I have a plan and it includes you. But you have to know there will be challenges." Mimi pointblank fires her answer - shooting from the hip, as usual, and cocks her head. "So, yeah, there's always a challenge. But is there a problem?"

"I don't think so," says Sam. "But we're forewarned about the dangers of making big life changes in the first year of recovery. We're encouraged to do nothing more than buy a plant and keep it alive." Mimi smiles. "Yeah, I've seen that in a movie somewhere," she says. Sam's eyes lock on Mimi. He will not be the first to break contact. He takes a deep breath, and forges on. "I feel strong," he says, "and ready. It's over, this drinking binge. I want to move confidently toward my goals. Are you with me?" "All the way, baby," says Mimi as she moves in for a hug. "Then strap yourself in, woman. We're going for a ride." Sam emits an audible sigh as he wraps his heavy arms around Mimi's strong body.

Ah, Sam. Mimi thinks you're beautiful and strong and confident and vulnerable and honest, and she finds that sexy. She sings a song of blessings out loud, but Sam doesn't recognize the tune.

...

Dr. Jake Reston - serial heartbreaker cum emergency room physician - is famous for his compassion, for his ability to comfort families of the dying, and for throwing a scalpel straight into the bull's eye of the dartboard on his office wall from twenty paces. He throws from out in the hall through his open office door into the red ring - the cherry - with 80 percent accuracy. Jake's day job forces him to engage spiritually while disengaging emotionally, while trying in vain to distance himself from the death and sorrow that surround him. He fails. Jake cries at least once a day. He sobs behind his office door to release the grief that he soaks up like a sponge, gushing an ocean of high-tide tears before his next round of darts.

Jake must maintain some balance between humor and grief. It's not unusual to witness this type of interaction from the VIP seats: Code Blue, Code Blue. Paging Doctor Reston, Dr. Reston to the emergency room, please." And Jake, after throwing dead center, might say, "Gotta run, Bill. Another cold one on the board. Don't touch my scalpel."

Old women love Jake. He looks them in the eye and connects with their spirits. He sees them exactly as they were before enemas, before loneliness, and taps straight into their juice with the finesse of a Vermonter tapping into a maple tree for grade C syrup. Although Jake's patients are only his during their stint in the emergency room, anyone who Jake has touched remembers him. Jake is a lady's man of the most extraordinary kind. Plenty of men are better looking and better built than he is, but few have his compassionate demeanor. Few cry as well or as often as Jake. He cries behind that closed office door, but doesn't hide his grief behind muted sobs. No, Jake bellows in his sadness, bellows loud enough to wake the almost dead.

A critical patient, grogged out on drugs, asks," Where am I?"

"The emergency room," a kind anesthetist answers.

"What's that noise?"

"That's Dr. Reston. He's crying."

"Can you turn him down? He hurts my head."

Jake does his best emoting behind a piano. On most Friday afternoons, he leaves work and heads to The Dragon, a local club, to set up his keyboard before heading home. Julie rarely accompanies him anymore. Straight ahead jazz bores her - it all sounds the same regardless of how far out Jake drives Caravan. Julie is no longer just a nurse. She is Head Nurse, Ground Control, after recently earning her MBA and accepting a promotion to Director of Administrative Services, Eastern General Hospital. Her office is two floors and one wing to the right of Jake's. Julie's interests lie far beyond any chord Jake strikes on a mere keyboard. She's turned on by a different kind of power.

Poor Jake. He loves his gloriously vain wife and misses her companionship. He had only two short-lived affairs in ten years, both of which Julie sniffed out, but chose to ignore. Oh, yeah, and the masturbation episode, but that was on the road and they didn't touch each other, only watched each other. That doesn't count, does it?

Julie has been unavailable emotionally for the last year, due in large part to her work overload, Jake imagines. He was patient and supportive while Julie was in grad school, believing her need to succeed was admirable and good for her morale. Jake is drawn to strong women. Professional women with Barbie doll bodies, small feet, and big brains. Petite women dressed in designer suits and high heels. Julie was a highly proficient woman with a double major in nursing and social work when they met. Within a few years, Jake learns that Julie wants a title other than Mrs. Reston.

Julie is driven, but her drive requires a super highway and Jake is a two lane country road. When will she lift her foot off the pedal? Julie is a full throttle woman looking for a navigator who will feed her compact disc player something other than a steady diet of Romantic Warrior. Julie needs a ZZ Top kind of groove. Don't turn the beat around on Julie. Give her time she can count.

Jake and Julie live in a beautifully restored 1930's Dutch Colonial in a neighborhood filled with well-tended homes that could be featured in Architectural Digest. The neighborhood bustles with lively children and blooms with lush landscaping - although no lively little feet patter around the Reston interior and the flowerbeds are, well, disheveled; Julie doesn't like to get her hands dirty. The decor is richly comfortable, filled with heavy antiques, luxurious leather, stone fireplaces, and thick, expensive rugs. Then there's the art. Something about the art belies original, perhaps because the hangings are mundane reproductions that represent muted taste rather than tasteful restraint. Everything is in order - even the big stack of unopened mail on the foyer banquet is arranged by size.

Jake advances to home plate, opens the heavy oak and wrought iron front door, and is met by a thick wall of stale quiet. "Julie? I'm home...Jules?" No answer. Typical. Jake's voice rises along with his blood pressure. "Julie!" "For the love of God, Jake, I'm in the living room," Julie shouts back, not giving an inch toward him as he walks to her. "Hi honey, how was your day?" Jake tries, he really does. "Good." Julie says this with the passion of a dust mite, but Jake continues his effort to engage. "What are you reading?"

Julie places the book in her lap, sighs loudly, and says, "The same book I was reading yesterday." Jake takes off his coat and sits beside her. "Is it getting any better?"

"Mm-hmm."

"Do you want to get something quick to eat?"

"Not now Jake. I'm really into this book. There's leftover spaghetti in the refrigerator. Nuke it." Julie's eyes return to the page. "But clean up your mess. And feed Molly, too, please."

Jake feels like a stranger in his house. But, he tries again. "Do you want to go to the club with me tonight?" "No thanks," Julie says, without looking up. A chill wind works its way through Jake's stomach, so cold that he subconsciously looks at his jacket. "Will you be awake when I get home?"

"Jake, please! Let me read!" Third strike, you're out. Somebody moved home base.

Jake turns for the kitchen. "Okay, Julie. Okay. Excuse me for disturbing you. Don't mind me, your husband. Remember me? The man you married? Damn."

A dejected Jake walks slowly to the bland, dark-paneled kitchen, looks in the almond Frigidaire side-by-side, and grabs a designer beer. He opens the Dutch double back door - the best kitchen feature - and invites Molly, his nine-year-old Golden Retriever, in for dinner. The good dog was meant as a first anniversary present for Julie, but the fair wife has never taken an interest in anything other than herself. Jake chugs half his beer, then walks upstairs for a pre-gig shower. He shuts the bathroom door, peels off his dirty clothes, and places them in a neat pile. He washes his hands, urinates, then washes his hands again. Glancing in the mirror, he strikes a pose and slaps his flaccid penis against his leg for laughs and sensation. Jake considers pleasuring himself, but he has a gig tonight. He needs to conserve that energy, transfer that energy to the keyboard. "Hands off!" Jake says out loud.

Jake's light shines brightest at night; the darkness of his black clothes cannot hide his beacon. He beams a broad swath across the smoky club, playing for the injured and dead, for the grieving and newly widowed, for the palpable loss of his wife, Julie. But if one relaxes one's eyes and looks softly through the smoke, one can see not one, but a covey, a village, a world, nurturing Jake. He is but one creative part of a connected whole, the whole being one.