I haven’t felt very much like writing the last couple of
weeks. There have been some
circumstances that have had me occupied, sad and overwhelmed. In the last three months, I have lost
my husband, my very good friend, my daughter had surgery, my favorite car died,
my most-expensive and favorite sewing machine died, my youngest child has been
told there isn’t anything else they can do for her medically, my cat has a
terminal illness, and some other things that I won’t mention for privacy issues
are making me sad. Today I
imagined pounding God on the chest and saying to him “you are my FATHER, you
are supposed to make it all better!
Can’t you see that I’m crying and sad here? Do something!”
And then I imagined Him holding me and letting me cry until I couldn’t
cry any longer (because that’s what I do best). And somehow, I just know everything will still be ok even in
this turmoil.
I decided I would write a story about Mark that lets you all
know he wasn’t exactly as perfect as I have led you to believe. Maybe it will help me not miss him so
much… hmmm… I doubt it, but it’s worth a shot.
After we got married in September of 1978, Mark’s dad moved back
in with Mark’s mom. They lived in
Cicero on a dark street in a small house.
There were no streetlights and there was a swamp across the street that
was always a bit eerie to me. We
had been over to his parent’s house for a visit one Saturday autumn evening. It was very dark outside, but I was
inside, sitting on the couch with Mark’s arm across my shoulders, so I was
content. It was a warm night and
the windows were open on either side of the pitcher window. Mark’s father was telling us a
story about his pitch game he had played earlier that day with some friends and
we were all looking in his direction as he sat just to the side of the
window. Mark’s mom was in her
usual chair by the kitchen. All of
us were enjoying Homer’s dissertation about his card game. Some movement caught my eye from
outside and I was not really sure what it was. It looked like a dark shadow moving across the front yard
and then coming closer to the house, but I shrugged it off. It couldn’t be anything. It was
probably just the way the light from the lamp was reflecting off the window and
besides, Mark didn’t seem to notice at all. So I focused back on the conversation and continued to
listen to the antics of my father-in-law.
Then, as if I were living in a horror film, a dark, black, hairy
creature popped up from outside the front yard and threw itself at the screen
window. It growled and screeched
and clawed at the screen. I
grabbed Mark’s chest and screamed at the top of my lungs for I was sure we were
all going to die at that very moment.
All I could hear was the sound of my own voice, high pitched and
terrorized beyond belief. My heart
was pounding so hard, I was sure the animal at the screen was aware of it. But something wasn’t right. Mark, his mom and his dad weren’t
screaming, they were laughing.
Hysterical, I mean tears running down their faces, laughing!! I, too, had tears running down my face
from the horror of what was happening.
It took me a few minutes to realize that I was the only one afraid. As the realization hit me, the front door
opened and in comes Butch, Mark’s really good friend from high school, who was
in our wedding. He is holding a
gorilla mask in his hands and Mark and Butch do the man-hug thing in the living
room and say “we really got her, didn’t we.”
I believe that I was thinking something else that I cannot
repeat here. Utter disbelief came
over me as I suddenly realized that this entire roomful of people had planned
this charade as a funny joke!!
What is funny about that??
I ask you?? Any of
you?? As I type this, I still wish
I had time to tell Mark about how not funny that was…Not funny, Mark Searle…
not funny at all!!
So today’s moral of the story is that even though things look
dark, scary and not funny at all, underneath the mask, beneath the face of fear,
is an explanation, a story, and even a time to remember…all things work
together for good (as long as it’s not really a gorilla at your window trying
to rip your face off…because I think that would be hard to make that sound like
a good thing, no matter how you spin it).
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