Boston, Massachusetts

I've put off posting this blog entry for too long, without quite knowing how to begin or having the courage to say in words what has turned out to be true. On Christmas Eve, I took Karl to the emergency room in Chattanooga with a severe headache. It had come on when he arrived, and was accompanied by fever, exhaustion, vomiting, and a complete lack of appetite. It turned out to be a kind of rare fungal meningitis.

He was released three days later and we decided to postpone our return tickets to the Bahamas in order to return to Massachusetts where we have health insurance and doctors. On the way back up he had a relapse. He's been now in the hospital here almost a week with no end in sight. Even once he's released, the doctors say he'll need a two-month course of hardcore anti-fungal drugs.

Obviously, my first concern is Karl's health and the second Secret. That being said, I dream every night of her. One recurring dream ends with three of us, who I don't know, plunging into crystal blue water, laughing, swimming to where I can see Secret nestled securely in an empty bay. I wake up in horror and fear, and gather my shreds of courage around me like a blanket.

I turned thirty this week. Everyone remembered--my family sent exquisite packages, Sally gave a card, and Karl, at one in the morning, reached over from his hospital bed to hold my hand where I lay on my cot next to him and said, "Happy birthday Melissa." I couldn't ask for a better present than that. Still, I feel like everything I love and have worked so hard for has been taken away. I was so close to grasping the dream, to holding it tightly in my hand, and its dissolved in my fingers.

It's at times like these that I'm glad I didn't name this journal "The Voyages of the Good Ship Secret" or some other such inane thing. I named it Casting Off for good reason. I can only believe that this is happening because I haven't cast off enough, haven't sacrificed enough, because God knew I need more things stripped away: my pride, my ambition, my sin.

I can only believe that I'm being punished for something. But maybe that's just New England at this time of year bringing out the worst in me. Perhaps there is simply too much Indian blood and too many whale bones scattered among the foundations of these cities. I've started dutifully taking St. John's Wort to combat my Seasonal Affective Disorder, but I'm not sure it's working. I keep wondering if it's named such after St. John of the Cross's dark night of the soul.

Why? I keep asking myself. Why now? Why here? What can it mean? Does it mean anything? Or does nothing mean anything and it's all a great big magician's trick? The cloth is whisked away and ta-da! Everything's disappeared. God as the great malevolent illusionist.

Have I traded all my hope for a lie? I can't believe that, so I don't. I'm writing late at night, alone. I don't know if these thoughts are fit for public consumption. It could be so much worse. I should be grateful, not angry. Karl's condition is completely treatable. He's only weak, not dying.

One of Karl's friends, on our drive up to the hospital, told me a story of another friend of his who's been diagnosed with bone cancer. His ribs are dissolving. The doctors say there's no point in even giving him chemotherapy until the pain gets too bad. It's only a matter of time for him.

By comparison, my complaints seem insignificant and selfish. Things could be so much worse. We have families and friends who love and support us. We have each other. We have our memories of the last four years. And we have hope. Or I try to have hope. I fight to have hope that one day that'll be me diving into the water to chase Secret again.

At church on Sunday, I kept breaking into tears every time the priest said, "Grant us thy peace." Grant me thy peace, Lord. As impossible as it is to imagine.

I remember the words of Keats: "Fled is that vision. Do I wake or sleep?"

And I cling to the words of the ancient Christian mystic, Dame Julian of Norwich, who says, "All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well."