Year of Magical Thinking

I went to see Vanessa Regrave in the play "A Year of Magical Thinking," and it left me really thoughtful about Chelsie and the loss to our family. The play is about a woman who loses her husband and daughter in the same year. She talks about how, to cope, she resorted to "magical thinking," suspending her logic and reason to keep herself from grasping the full loss. So she would think things like, "This looks like a fun vacation, we'll have to go on that when Dean gets back." She tried throwing out his clothes, but couldn't because it meant he wasn't ever going to use them again. She made elaborate plans for the funeral, redid her apartment, organized all her files, thinking that she would have everything ready for when they got back. She pointed out that she didn't say to herself directly that they were coming back; and she wasn't expecting some miraculous resurection or mistaken identity. Just that she led her life in a way that would allow them to come back. It was the only way to survive for her. I just thought it was such a beautiful thing, because I feel very much the same. At the end of the play, she talked about the huge conflict in her emotions. She felt relief to be moving on and not weighed down with sadness, but she felt pain at having to let go of her family for good and admit to herself that she was alone and they weren't coming back. She said the last battle was finally admitting to herself that death was real. The play was a lot more eloquent than I can type here, but it really struck home how any reaction is normal, we all do what we have to shield ourselves from too much emotional pain, and that it all just takes time.

I remember we had an oration competition at school, which I'm not sure why. Chelsie had just been born and we had just moved into our new house, so I wrote my speech about all the changes in our family. I talked about changing diapers and how we were all excited to bring her home and took turns holding her. Chelsie found that speech later in one of my scrapbooks, and for a few years she always mentioned it to me. It was a time when she was having trouble getting along with the family, and I think it suprised her how much we all loved her and were excited for her when she was born. I think it suprised her in a way. I'll always remember how much it touched her, and it makes me think how rarely we tell people how much we enjoy having them in our lives.

-Cory

Bike Ride

One time when I was home from college, I was trying to keep up my running schedule. Chelsie was so mad that I was taking away from our bonding family time together, she went and got a bike and followed me my whole run, talking my ear off. Most of what she was talking about I wasn't really listening to: about her friend Britney and some jerky boy at school, etc. But I remember her saying, "You know what the secret to being popular is? It's just being nice to everyone." I thought it was such a sweet thing to say. Of course, then she said, "Too bad all the boys in my class are too stupid to be nice to." Hahaha.

-Cory

Chinatown Shopping

When Chelsie was living in NYC, I visited her one weekend and we toured the city. All she wanted to do was go shopping. We decided to go to Chinatown cause everything was cheap. So we were walking down the sidewalk, and she kept finding these she liked, and I kept telling her everything there was crap, and would break as soon as she got home. So at one shop, she found this $40 purse she really wanted. I tried to talk her out of it, but she jewed the poor chinese woman down and down and down, until she finally got it for like $10. She was so proud of the good deal she got. That night, when we got home, she was transferring all her stuff from her old bag into the new one, and suddenly the bottom of the new bag ripped out and everything fell onto the floor. We looked at each other and started laughing. She kept trying to get me to go back there so she could chew the shop keeper out.

-Cory