Empty Hours, Empty Days

When I wrote my previous post, I was feeling hopeful, having just completed a wonderful semester of teaching, despite it being virtual. But now, I am overwhelmed by an unending stream of empty hours and empty days.

Here I sit in my apartment, alone, and the emptiness I’ve tried to deny for the past few months seems to be taking over my spirit. Of course, the last two weeks have been anything but empty in the public arena, with massive protests for justice and reform that I hope will happen. But what I’m feeling these days makes me withdraw, rather than take to the streets.

This week, on June 12th, it will be six months to the day that my husband died. I met Tony when I was only 25, which seems like a lifetime ago. June 11th was the date we were married, so this month I will be alone as I mark our anniversary and then my birthday, that yearly reminder that I’m getting older.

The last part of Tony’s life was filled with caretaking, errands, demands on my time and my body. There were moments—increasingly—when I wanted to be alone. I didn’t want to have to take care of anyone but myself. Not even a pet. But as they say, be careful what you wish for.

Those first months after he died, I was busy. I went back to the classroom. There were mountains of papers to file, calls to make, business to take care of, bills to pay, and so on. I was determined to get it all done as quickly as I could, because that’s the way I am. I’m a worker (I even have a pair of socks a friend gave me that says, “I am going to get shit done”). I cleaned the apartment, even had all the rugs shampooed. I got rid of the hospital bed, walkers and wheelchairs, and other supplies, including prescriptions that could have stocked a pharmacy. I donated clothes and shoes. I then got busy transforming the apartment, buying four wool rugs, colorful velvet cushions and anything I felt would make the apartment refreshed and lovely, as well as a place of solace and comfort. My intent was to make it softer, but upon reflection, I realize I turned it into something like a lovely padded cell.

 For four months I also waged war with Social Security, which had somehow recorded that I had died. By then, Coronavirus was coming. I shifted my energy to stocking up on pasta, tuna, rice, dried beans, tomato sauce, cheese and two cases of red wine. Just before New York and most of the U.S. hit the pause button. 

I don’t “pause” well. Being busy, and productive has always been my way of dealing with anxiety, even if being too busy causes me stress. Ah, the paradox. Even after Barnard moved to online teaching, it didn’t keep me from working. I was fearful about the virus, but I loved teaching and threw myself into it. Trying to make up for the impersonality of virtual teaching, I allowed my students to call or FaceTime me. Teaching provided a shape to my week. More than that, I knew I was living a purposeful life.

But now, with the semester over, there are moments, indeed days, where I feel I have no purpose. Normally, when classes are over, I do research and continue to work hard. This summer I’ve promised to write a book review and a long article on John Milton. But none of these things seems important right now. For maybe the first time in my life, it’s even been hard to get out of bed.

Many people feel that now, especially the unemployed and the poor. Isn’t that a factor in the size of the protests, when a cause larger than themselves has given many people purpose? I know I’m privileged to have the prospect of work come fall semester, to still have an income, but what will I do with my life until then?

It’s not just a new loneliness, having lost my life-partner and being isolated because of Coronavirus. It’s the weight of those empty hours and empty days. A feeling I haven’t had since I was a teenager, waiting to leave home and go to college, waiting for my life to start.

But I did leave and after I finished my higher education, l Ianded my first full-time job at the University of Illinois, where I met Tony. For all these years I’ve been busy, lucky (or blessed) to have a vocation that makes me feel what I do is meaningful. I never looked forward to a time when I wouldn’t work. Tony used to say that if he won the lottery (not that he ever played it), he’d quit his teaching job, have a place in New York City and live the good cultured life by going to museums, theater, and the movies. I, on the othert hand, said I’d just keep doing what I was doing. I was never good at vacations. Sitting on the beach for hours or taking long walks bored me. I have never been a TV watcher. I rarely read for pleasure, a heretical confession I suppose for a literature professor.  

When we were first married, Tony’s idea of a lovely evening was to sit in his mid-century modern Danish chair to read mysteries or detective novels, especially British writers like P.G. Wodehouse. He was truly a literary man, a gifted intellectual with an amazing wit. He’d sit happily reading in silence for hours, but I’d become bored, always wanting to DO something more.

Reading novels had been what I did in middle and high school. It was my escape into another world, a world of possibilities. I loved reading when I was young and was a member of the Book of the Month club -- but books, along with painting, was what I did until I could leave home and have a “real life.” Something more active, such as teaching and writing, which required reading, of course, but also something more. It always felt significant to me.

These days, just to sit and read, aimlessly, or watch a good Netflix series, feels like “passing time.” Maybe it’s because with Coronavirus we don’t know when we’ll be free to live more largely; Or in my case, because I’m still mourning my husband or have seen death. But I am intensely aware that I’m allowing the hours and days of my life to slip by, like water dropping into a bucket that has a hole in the bottom. 

Will I get to see my son and his family? My granddaughters? My friends? For me, such connections are part of what makes life worthwhile. Teaching and also writing connects me with people, which I guess is why I’m writing this piece. How do I give shape to the days ahead when we cannot plan for or anticipate the future?

As I write these words, I’m looking at the Hudson River, always changing, never the same. I know things will change, that I will feel better. But it’s just so hard right now.