A snowy day. The weather is changeable in this part of the country at this time of year and not unusual. I walked to a nearby drugstore to get a few things for Carol who is not feeling well. I have winter clothes and it was not unpleasant. Almost no cars on the streets and only two other pedestrians, one of whom, probably in his 60s, was having a ball. He approached me smiling. We shared ‘good-mornings’. I was out running an errand. He was out enjoying himself. Good for him.
I removed the pressure bandage from my leg today. I was told to leave it on for a week, but I was also told that if it bothered me too much, particularly if it felt too tight, I should remove it. It had started to itch excessively, so I did and saw for the first time the incision the doctor made. It is minimal for what she removed. So much better than the butchery done to me by doctors in Hilton Head. She is an artist of doctors.
I have told her of my admiration of her as a doctor. I have never mentioned my appreciation of her beauty. Beautiful women know they are beautiful. That they have won a somewhat conflicted gift—and I hesitate at that word, for most would consider it a gift; some who have received it would not—gift or not, they know the results their physical appearance has on others.
For whatever reasons, many beautiful women have shared part of their lives with me. This is about them, not me. I come from nothing. I invented myself in uncertainty and that some remarkable women responded to me was the first external indication that I might be what I thought I was. Maybe they all made errors of judgement, but I had the advantages of not being threatened by their intelligence and of being able to make them laugh, and perhaps some others.
Of those women, some exalted in their beauty. Some simply accepted it and lived on. An unexpected number were uncertain about themselves, despite their obvious physical beauty and their admirable character. I have thought about that and perhaps their uncertainty came passed on from their parents, particularly one Filipino I knew long ago. I wonder how her life evolved. I wonder how many of their lives evolved. I hope they knew joy. Some caused me pain. It passed. The memory of the joy they caused me, not just with their bodies, but with their presence, has not.
Of all of them, Carol is the one who most downplayed her beauty. It was a detriment to her career.
Carol has always looked ten years or so younger than she is, Most would welcome this, but in her work at times in meetings with those who did not know her, she would be thought an assistant, when in fact she was the boss as she made her way as a woman in what even the professional journals acknowledge is a male dominated field.
I am not being unfaithful to Carol in acknowledging the obvious fact that there were other remarkable women in my life before we by chance came together. She was the right woman at the right time and an inexplicable gift.
So to a great doctor and a beautiful woman who will never know that I admired her beauty, I offer a piece that is on the main site, which I know you visit every day in pursuit of grace and wisdom, but you could do worse than read again.
A Slice of Life
2018
Once not so long ago there was a sailor who crossed oceans alone in small boats. He did this for many, many years and became a legend.
He found purity and joy alone in what he called the monastery of the sea and loved sailing toward the setting sun or toward the dawn.
When as a young man he departed on his first voyage, three tantalizing sirens kissed him good-bye and waved until he disappeared over the horizon and then, as sirens often do, forgot him.
He suffered hardships, not eagerly but inevitably. Sometimes he starved. Twice he almost died of thirst. He learned that thirst is much worse than hunger. Eight times he survived the great storms that are called hurricanes and cyclones.
People often told him he was brave because he made voyages that not only had no one else ever made, but that no one else had even thought of.
He did not consider himself brave. He did not fear the sea and he knew that men do not conquer the sea or mountains, they only transit them. Still he was at home at sea as few others have ever been.
He did fear thirst.
After every voyage he made a pilgrimage to a beautiful sorceress. Wise men told him he must do this and so he did.
The sorceress dwelt in a high tower beside a lake so vast some called it an inland sea. That lake was deceptive, sometimes as turquoise as the Caribbean, sometimes as black as the North Sea in a gale.
The sorceress had coal black hair, a friendly smile, and a gay laugh.
Each time the sailor visited her she sliced small pieces of flesh from him. Though the pieces were small, they did not grow back and over the decades they added up. Each time the sailor returned to the sea he was smaller.
The sailor lived far longer than anyone expected, including himself, and though he grew old he kept crossing oceans. Sometimes he wondered at this. He did not believe in the gods and never asked them to protect him.
Finally when he was very, very old, he sailed his small boat into port and made his customary way to the sorceress’s lair.
The sorceress did not age. She was still beautiful. Her hair still jet black. Her smile still friendly. Her laughter still gay. She welcomed him and cut the tiny remnant he had become into three pieces and he vanished.
(I made my biannual visit to my skin cancer specialist, who is a beautiful woman, today and amused myself on the train ride in by writing this in my mind. I typed it out when I returned home.
Originally the title was a dull “A Modern Myth”. Steve Earley in an email called it a slice of life. Knowing a good thing when I read it, I stole it. Thanks, Steve.)
