I don't own a T.V. any longer. It was one of the many things we shed as we made our way from the old life into this new one. I have to say I haven't missed it. And yet, I was recently faced with what to do when I wanted to see the season premiere of Grey's Anatomy, the one show I have followed faithfully these past few years. For the first Packer game of the season we were fortunate enough to find a Packer bar in Sarasota that serves good beer and good food and so David was happy having his fix that way.
But I couldn't count on finding a Grey's Anatomy viewing spot and so we planned to go over to David's friend's house - the friend who so generously let us stay with him for a whole week when we first arrived in town and were looking for an apartment. I promised to bring him Thai food from his favorite restaurant for the favor. But we are trying to conserve money so when David found an online site that would play the premiere real-time (as opposed to watching it on abc.com the next day), we instead did a home-cooked dinner (David made the most yummy broiled alligator with lemon-pepper seasoning), and I was able to watch it in the comfort of our tiny new beige-tiled apartment.
After re-watching last year's season finale, just as a refresher, before I watched the season premiere I am amazed all over again by how well they write this one-of-a-kind show. I took a lot of lessons from both episodes. And that's what this blog post is all about.
The season finale I originally watched in May, of course, and it completely jibed with where I was then in my life. It also dove-tailed nicely with the planned epigraph to this book I want to write, a little bit along the lines of Eat, Pray, Love's "Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth". Mine is "Do it now, do it now, do it now." At that time, I was preparing to finally quit my job and our plans to leave Wisconsin were moving ahead fast & furious. And so naturally it felt like the Meredith voice-over at the end (when George and Izzie were both dying), was speaking directly to me, telling me there really was no time to lose:
"Did you say it? I love you. I don't ever want to live without you. You changed my life. Did you say it? Make a plan, set a goal, work toward it, but every now and then look around, drink it in, cuz this is it. It might all be gone tomorrow."
I've been especially feeling that "it might all be gone tomorrow" because of my health concern as of late, and the worrying-slash-disasterizing that I do so well. When my early August endoscopy showed nothing (for which I'm grateful, believe me), the Physician's Assistant who called to give me the good news said the next step would be to get some "imaging" done. But there was the intervening trip to Seattle and then getting settled in Florida, so it was only last week that I finally had an appointment to address that.
David came with me and we met with the most wonderful family physician, who sat and talked with us for what seemed like an hour, unrushed and completely willing to admit she didn't know a ton about diet and naturopathic options (when I declined the Nexium she was recommending), but gave us names of those who do. From there we proceeded to the diagnostic lab just across the street for X-rays. We concluded that it must be a "patient's market" here in Florida, with all the older people and their health issues, because we were treated extremely well throughout our medical morning and it felt like quite a contrast to the way they do things "up North."
I told the doctor about my history of drinking and smoking. Then when she listened to my lungs she said she heard some "congestion" on the left side and I might have some pneumonia in that lung. Dear god, I thought this was all GI-related; could it be I've just had walking pneumonia for 6 months and that's why I've felt this pressure under the left side of my ribs? Astutely detecting my tendency towards hypochondria - as well as my mild OCD, she said she wouldn't be surprised if I color-coded my clothes and I admitted "well, I do wash my hands a lot" - she reassured me that it didn't "sound like cancer." Although the pessimist in me thought: how on earth could she know that?! Well, she was right - the X-rays came back and everything is "normal." Damn it! Why couldn't it have been something I could just treat with some drugs and get past?! Don't get me wrong, again I'm so grateful for the good news. But completely confounded by what the hell is going on with my body still. It's driving me crazy.
But that's where Grey's Anatomy comes in again. The season premiere - starting out with Elisabeth Kubler-Ross' Stages of Grief, counting down the days since George's death, and including the girl who's unable to do anything but sit outside the hospital on a bench because the man who saved her life had died - was wonderful. I loved it when Izzie told the girl to go live her life, and the girl plaintively says "I don't know how" - Izzie tells her truthfully "no one knows how!" and that she basically owes it to George to figure it out. But as usual with the way they write this show, Izzie was also talking to herself. I also heard it loud and clear.
So, do I owe it to my Dad or to my husband or even just to myself, to figure it the fuck out finally? Perhaps. And I wonder too, if my Dad looks down from some kind of Heaven, sees the suffering of his four children and wishes he could tell us all the answers that he knows now. That it shouldn't all be taken so seriously, that it will be OK in the end and there shouldn't be so much suffering along the way. That we are alive and should enjoy it while we have it, it could be gone in an instant. That we should laugh more often, love longer and harder, and let go of our anger and resentment, all our grudges and stubborn judgements, more easily. That one message alone could save us all from countless hours of teeth-gnashing and pulling out our hair, I think.
But it's not easy, as the first episode of the two-part season premiere stated so beautifully, "In medical school we have a hundred classes that teach us how to fight off death and not one lesson in how to go on living."
And as the second episode ended, another message that went straight to the heart of how to go on: "Grief may be a thing we all have in common, but it looks different on everyone. It isn't just death we have to grieve, it's life, it's loss, it's change. And when we wonder why it has to suck so much sometimes, has to hurt so bad, the thing we gotta try to remember is that it can turn on a dime. That's how you stay alive. When it hurts so much that you can't breath, that's how you survive. By remembering that one day, somehow, impossibly you won't feel this way, it won't hurt this much. Grief comes in its own time for everyone, in its own way. So the best we can do, the best anyone can do is try for honesty. The really crappy thing, the very worst part of grief is that you can't control it. The best we can do is try to let ourselves feel it, when it comes. And let it go when we can. The very worst part is that the minute you think you're past it, it starts all over again. And always, every time, it takes your breath away."
They were like two perfect bookends, last season's finale telling me to "do it now" and this season's premiere telling me to "get a life!" and stop dwelling on the health issue, on my dad's death, on everything that's not present moment living, or at least future plans. It's somewhat true that I've been sitting on my own bench, since I left the job in June, not moving forward with my life emotionally. This blog itself has been a lot about looking back. But it's time. I still don't know exactly what I will do next - I'm currently researching caretaking and WWOOFing in Florida, the Caribbean, Hawaii and, of course, Panama! - but it's going to be great. I hope it takes my breath away.
http://www.abc.go.com/watch/greys-anatomy/93515
http://www.elizabethgilbert.com/eatpraylove.htm
http://www.ekrfoundation.org/
http://www.caretaker.org/
http://www.wwoof.org/
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