Friday Night, Date Night

March 8, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I signed up for an online dating site two or three months ago. It took one entire sleepless night to make the decision to do so. I’m not sure what I was afraid of — moving even further beyond my deceased life mate/soul mate perhaps. Or maybe falling in love again and tying my future to another person. (I’m not ready for that. I still need to find out what my life alone will bring.) Although I’m not looking for a serious relationship, I did think it would be fun to meet people, maybe go on a few dates, but the site turned out to be anticlimactic.

Inadvertantly, I’d created a profile that guaranteed I wouldn’t catch anyone’s attention — I told the truth about myself, used more than 95 words, didn’t downplay my intelligence, didn’t show cleavage, didn’t use words like “fun-loving” that could connote an eagerness for mattress games, and most of all, I didn’t lop years off my age.

Not surprisingly, nothing came of my fishing in the online dating pool. Not a single date. Not even a real message or connection, which I find strange. I frequently make connections over the internet. All sorts of interesting people find their way to me online. Many of my offline friends were once solely online friends. Many other online friends will one day become offline friends when we finally meet in person. And yet, on a site geared to bringing people together, I can’t make a single connection.

Still, I wanted a date, so last night I took myself out. Went to a fair. It wasn’t big as fairs go, but it had a Ferris wheel and that’s all I really wanted. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t let me go on the ride by myself. “It’s fair policy,” the ticket taker said. (I’m not sure how fair this fair policy is, since one of me is easily the equivalent of the the two children who climbed aboard at that momeFerris wheelnt.) As I turned away from the wheel, a young woman asked me, “Did he say you can’t go by yourself?” When I said yes, she looked disappointed and replied, “My daughter wants to go on the ride.” “Don’t you want to go with her?” I asked. She shook her head. I volunteered to partner up with her little girl. And she agreed.

So, we rode the Ferris wheel together, this little girl and I. We marveled at how beautiful the fair looked from the air and how small everyone seemed. She told me she was learning sign language and taught me how to say “I love you.” After thanking her for accompanying me and thanking the mother for letting her daughter chaperone me, I wandered around the grounds. Ate a caramel apple. Tossed pelota balls in a basket (all but one jumped right back out). Threw darts at balloons and won a stuffed frog.

I’ve always thought such games a waste of money — I could have bought a nicer frog for a fraction of the cost — but it wasn’t about the frog. It was about the experience. Immersing myself in a night of sponteneity.

On the way home, in the continued spirit of sponteneity, I stopped for an ice cream cone. (I can’t even remember the last time I did that.)

It was a great date. Maybe I’ll do it again some time.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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Friend of My Soul

March 7, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I learned a new word today. Anam Cara. (I guess that’s really two words, isn’t it?) It’s Celtic. Anam means “soul” and cara means “friend.”

Soul friend.

I call my deceased life mate a soul mate, though I don’t necessarily believe we truly were soul mates.

Some people believe soul mates are separate halves of the same soul, split aparts. To these believers, you are only whole when you’ve met and connected with your other half, your soul mate. Although we were deeply connected, I do not believe we shared a single soul, nor did I ever believe it. Oddly, when I first met him, I entertained the idea that he was perhaps a “teacher.” You know the saying — when the student is ready, a teacher will appear. Well, I was ready, and Broken hearthe appeared. Even odder, when he was dying, long after I’d forgotten this romantic notion, he told me, “I won’t always be here to teach you.” I bristled at that, of course, because it sounded so paternalistic. It wasn’t until after his death when I told a friend of his words, that she reminded me of my youthful idea. The reminder sort of freaked me out, to be honest. Was I correct in that he came here to teach me, to help me gain whatever knowledge I could through his help? I do know that he had taken me as far as he could on my journey, and so . . . what? He went back whence he came and left me on my own? It’s because of this notion that I don’t necessarily believe we will be reunited when I die. I have the strangest feeling that he has gone beyond where I will be at my end, gone to a much higher plane. (What makes this whole idea so bizarre is that I’m not even sure I believe we retain some form of consciousness after this life. I do believe we are eternal, since energy can be neither created nor destroyed, but what form that energy takes, I cannot even begin to guess.)

This idea of his coming to be my teacher certainly is not the personification of “split aparts.” It’s closer to the concept of soul mates in reincarnation, where we supposedly meet the same people life after life. These constant companions, enemies, allies who share our repeated lives are our soul mates. Again, this is not apropos because I don’t believe in reincarnation. Although many people like the idea of reincarnation, I don’t. I think it makes us just a bit too complacent about accepting the unfairness of life. If someone has bad fortune or ill health, somehow it is his or her fault because of karmic debt. If a person has good fortune, that is also because of karma paying off a debt.

Some people define soul mate as “the one and only,” the person you share everything with including ideas and temperament, a person for whom you have a deep and abiding affinity. Perhaps this defined my relationship with my life mate, but somehow it doesn’t go deep enough. Seems sort of paltry, actually, as a description of our relationship. We didn’t particularly bring each other happiness, we didn’t always want the connection, but we were connected on a level neither of us ever understood. Perhaps we couldn’t understand because we never had a name for our connection.

John O’Donohue, Celtic Mystic, and author of the book “Anam Cara, a Book of Celtic Wisdom,” wrote: In the early Celtic church, a person who acted as a teacher, companion, or spiritual guide was called an anam ċara.  It originally referred to someone to whom you confessed, revealing the hidden intimacies of your life.  With the anam ċara you could share your innermost self, your mind, and your heart.  This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging.  When you had an anam ċara, your friendship cut across all convention, morality, and category.  You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the “friend of your soul.”  The Celtic understanding did not set limitations of space or time on the soul.  There is no cage for the soul.  The soul is a divine light that flows into you and into your Other.  This art of belonging awakened and fostered a deep and special companionship.

In everyone’s life, there is great need for an anam ċara, a soul friend.  In this love, you are understood as you are without mask or pretension.  The superficial and functional lies and half-truths of social acquaintance fall away, you can be as you really are.  Love allows understanding to dawn, and understanding is precious.  Where you are understood, you are at home.  Understanding nourishes belonging.  When you really feel understood, you feel free to release yourself into the trust and shelter of the other person’s soul.”

In the end, it doesn’t matter whether we were soul mates or anam cara or something else beyond life and reason. All I know is that while we were together, he was my teacher, my guide, my companion, my business partner, my friend. Most of all, he was my home.

Now he is gone. Has been gone for almost four years. And I still feel homeless.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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You Don’t Get Over Grief

March 6, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I called a friend today to offer support on the third anniversary of her husband’s death. She is a strong woman, shouldering the burdens of an unemployed middle-aged daughter and a lively granddaughter, which takes her mind off her loss, but still, there are times (such as this anniversary) when grief descends on her once more.

During the conversation, she said, “I wish I could get over it.” The truth is, you don’t get over grief. Grief gets over you. The uninitiated, those who have never lost the one person who connects them to life, think we have a choice when it comes to grief, but most of the time, grief chooses us. We can, of course, choose to ignore our grief, burying it so deeply that we never have to acknowledge it, but doing so is like stuffing an inflated air mattress in a small storage pouch. Eventually, the pressures of the mattress will burst the seams of the pouch, and that unruly mattress will explode out into the open, causing all sorts of unforeseen damage.

As it is, even with accepting the dubious gift of grief, sometimes sorrow bursts wildly into the open, taking us unaware. For the most part, grief is leaving me alone. In fact, I thought I had gotten over the death of my life mate/soul mate, but on March 1, as I began the countdown to my fourth anniversary, sadness returned. My few tears are not at all stormy, more like a gentle mist. Strangely, I miss the grief tempests — they made me feel connected to him because I could feel the enormity of my loss.

To a great extent I have let him go. Somewhere during this past year, I realized that no matter how connected we were when he was alive, we are two distinct people, each on a special journey. For a while, our paths entwined, but now our roads have swung into two different directions. No matter how much I miss him, miss the me I was when I was with him, miss our shared dreams and goals, there is no turning back. The future beckons, and I must go where it leads me.

And yet, despite this acceptance, I still sometimes feel lost. We were together for thirty-four years, were business partners as well as life partners, making joint decisions about every aspect of our lives. He was my support, my inspiration, my cheering section. I enjoy my newfound independence and growing spontaneity, but I cannot forget why we are estranged. He is not somewhere else on this earth, happy and fulfilled. He is dead. Gone. Deleted from my life. Erased, at times, even from memory. (Which makes him seem doubly dead.)

My friend will get to this place soon enough. Grief will be through with her for the most part, and what she will be left with is . . . I don’t know. Herself, I suppose. In the end, that’s all we have for as long as we are here. Ourselves.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Posted in grief, life. Tags: , , , , , . 13 Comments »

Struggling With the Vicissitudes of Life

March 5, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I’m still struggling with the vicissitudes of my life. The major stress continues to be my homeless brother. He is camping out in the garage, which isn’t a problem. Nor is it a problem for me to buy a few groceries for him, do his laundry, sympathize with his plight, and even, on occasion, get him a beer. I’m glad to do what I can for him, even if only out of a perhaps misplaced sense of guilt that I have it easier than he does.

If he would leave me alone, I’d have no objection to his being here, but his anger seems to be centered on me. He speedblames me for his estrangement from our father, he blames me for . . . well, just about everything. I suppose, from his point of view, I am to blame. When he gets in one of his “states” (whether bi-polar, the manic part of manic-depression, narcissistic rage, or whatever his as yet undiagnosed problem is), he is truly appalling, demanding attention by banging on my windows, sometimes up to forty times a night, calling me an evil bitch, screaming invectives at me, explaining ad infinitum that I, as a woman, have no integrity. (And these are the most pleasant things he says when he is in his manic mode.) Afterward, he doesn’t remember how ghastly he behaved. He only remembers my reaction. And there is no right way to react. If I yell at him in frustration, trying to get him to shut up, he perceives me as the instigator of our conflict, never remembering he was the one who banged on the window for my attention. If I have no reaction, that too is an affront to him. If I ignore him, he goes into rage overdrive.

I can’t track his moods. He likes to read the newspaper. Sometimes he gets mad at me if I don’t remember to give it to him. Other times he gets angry when I do give it to him because I am “invading his space.” (This is the same man who, when he stayed in the house for a couple of months, came into my room every single night to harangue me.) He hates that I buy food for him (hates the food I buy even though I buy things on a list he once gave me), and yet, most nights, he knocks on my window to see if I have something for him to eat. If I’m nice to him, he gets upset with my “sugary sweetness,” seeing it as phony. If I stop doing things for him, he gets angry with my selfishness.

In addition to his mental issues, he has a lot of physical problems. He goes for days without being able to keep food down, but he won’t let me take him to the emergency room. Oddly, when he is at his sickest, he is at his calmest. Either his anger at me cools because he needs my help, or else he is too weak to sustain a rage-full state.

Added stress comes from the situation between my father and brother. My father doesn’t want to deal with my brother, though he likes the idea of helping him. So it’s up to me to be my father’s surrogate. Not a pleasant situation, by any means.

The hardest part for me was when my brother’s anger would bounce through me and back to him, because I was afraid I’d fatally hurt him. (I even kept a journal for a while in case I did hurt him and needed a defense.) I don’t have that problem any more. I make sure I never get close to him when he is in a rage.

But still, it is an awkward situation. When he goes through calm times, I feel like an ogre, keeping him from the comforts of the house, but always his cycle comes around to rage again, and I am grateful that he is locked out.

I wish he were strong and healthy. I wish . . . oh, I wish so many things, but my wishes tend to have little strength. Writing about the situation gives me no peace, no answers, but it does help to vent my frustration and my sadness, which is a big help to me if no one else.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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Counting Down to Four Years of Grief

March 3, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I’m counting down to the fourth anniversary of the death of my life mate/soul mate. I used to count the minutes and hours, and now I count the months and years. One day I will count only the years, or maybe just the decades. He is gone, so very gone that I seldom think of him any more, though something deep inside of me will never forget.

I remember how hard it was for me even to take a breath right after he died — each gulp of air took all my strength and will. The pain consumed me — at times, all I could think about was getting through that very minute. And now I have managed to get through 2,065,726 minutes, one minute at a time.

At the beginning of my grief, a friend passed on words of wisdom from her mother that I never could quite figure out. The mother said that “you never get over losing someone. Their absence just becomes part of what their presence always meant.” And now, all of a sudden, I understand what she meant.

In my case, his presence gave me courage to be bold, to try new things, to be spontaneous and not to worry too much. At least, that’s the way it was at the beginning. When he got sick and continued to get sicker for many years, our lives became constrained, both because of financial troubles and because of the demands of his health. During those years, I sunk into myself, unable to bear what was happening to him, to us. Now that he’s gone, his absence gives me what his presence once did — the courage to be bold, to try new things, to be spontaneous and not to worry so much.

From the beginning of my grief, I knew I couldn’t continue to do the things that we did together. His hard-won death set us both free, and if I had continued to live the way we always did (or do what I so often wanted after he died — just go to bed and nurture my pain) — then I would have wasted his death. Instead, I used grief’s anger to propel me forward.

Like many bereft in my grief “age group” —- those who lost our mates about the same time — I have developed an inordinate need for adventure. I’m not sure why we feel this need except that perhaps both our love and our grief were so immense that only something equally immense will satisfy our souls. Oddly, few of us are able to indulge in adventure except in a minor ways — we seem be gripped by responsibilities, either taking care of young grandchildren or elderly parents. It’s possible that before we are able to set out on an adventurous life, the passing of the years will dim that craving for adventure, and we will shrink back into small lives.

I may not have the physical strength and necessary skills to undertake such an adventure as hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. I may not have the financial reserves to spend my life on the road, traveling around the country. I may not even have the desire to try to walk 1000 miles, live abroad for a year, or take a freighter to New Zealand. But I will do something epic, something just a bit beyond my desires, strengths, skills. His absence gives me the courage for such a step. In fact, his absence makes it necessary to live large.

But oh, just between us, I am tired of trying to live large, tired of trying to expand my sphere beyond the day-to-dayness of life. I’d give anything for one more comfortable day with him, one more conversation, one more small smile. But such is not possible. And so I continue on alone, living each minute to the fullest, with whatever courage, boldness, and spontaneity I can muster.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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The Academy Awards and Me

March 1, 2014 — Pat Bertram

The Academy Awards are on tomorrow night, and so am I! I won’t be on television with all the stars, of course, but I will be the star of a radio show that runs at the same time. Maybe I’m exaggerating a bit about being a star, but they are billing me as a special guest, so that has to count for something. I’m also the first guest ever on this new show, which is a great honor.

AW

The Authentic Woman is a weekly radio show that will be airing Sunday nights at 8:00 pm ET, beginning March 2, 2014, on the Authors on the Air Global Radio Network. The show will be hosted by Shannon Fisher, a writer, civic leader and social justice advocate who strives to enact positive change in the world one day, one issue and one person at a time. On her show, Shannon will explore every aspect of the female experience.

Interviewing both well-known public figures and everyday Janes (and Joes), Shannon will delve deeply into the world of writers, artists, community leaders and celebrities. Each week, Shannon and her guests will immerse themselves in themes that have sculpted their own personal perspectives — and their cultural and societal experience as a whole.

Sounds heavy, doesn’t it? But since I’m the guest tomorrow, the show will be conversational. Just two friends talking. And if you call in at (347) 884-8266, then it will be three friends chatting! We’ll be talking about my book A Spark of Heavenly Fire, my life experiences, and my latest interests. (I’ll bet you will be surprised to hear what those interests are! I sure was.)

The live show begins at 8:00pm EST here at this link: http://tobtr.com/s/6078195. If you miss it live, then use the same link for the podcast, available immediately after the live interview.

I can hardly wait! It should be a fun evening.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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To Everyone Who Has Shared This Day With Me

February 27, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I am always touched by the comments left on this blog from those who are also struggling to live and find meaning after the death of the one person who meant more than anyone else in the world. So often I feel as if I am merely indulging myself by continuing to chronicle my progress through grief and into a renewed interest in life, especially when all I have are dreams and tentative plans that might come to naught. The comments left here show me how narcissusconnected we are, those of us on this difficult path. Although our situations are different, although our grief is individual, many of us face the same blank future that we need to color with dreams, goals, fantasies, interests, and especially a renewed love of life.

It’s as if we are children again, carefully building our futures one dream at a time. As when we were children, these dreams might not come true, but they help us expand our “what is” into new paths of “what might be.”

It could be our time of life that makes this struggle so complex. Although young widows have the same struggles we do, life is still rushing in their veins. Often they have small children, which makes their loss at once easier and more difficult — easier because they have built-in meaning so they don’t have to go searching for it, more difficult because they have to raise the children alone without that special person to share in the joys (and worries) of caring for the young ones. (Please know I am not denigrating anyone’s loss. All losses are unbearably painful, but each of us has our own unique set of collateral losses to deal with.)

As we age, we lose many things we counted on, not just people but jobs, stamina, health, and we need to find a way around these limitations to some sort of revitalization otherwise the last decades of our life would be nothing more than waiting for entropy to win. When grief and the destruction of a shared life are thrown into the mix, it’s even more difficult to find a way through the murk to joy.

And yet, somehow we do find our way. Today is the 47th 27th since the death of my life mate/soul mate. (For those of you who are arithmetic-challenged, that means in one month it will be four years since his death on March 27, 2010.) Despite my complicated and sometimes stressful situation — looking after my 97-year-old father and dysfunctional brother — I am happier than I ever imagined I could be four years ago. And I expect to become even happier.

Life is full with new friends, new activities (mostly physical pursuits, which is odd considering that until recently, I preferred a more literary life), and new dreams.

None of us knows what the future holds, but those of us who have survived a profound loss seem especially aware of that truism, and we try to live each day to its fullest. It’s all we have. It’s all anyone has — this day.

To everyone who has shared this day with me, whether in person or online with a comment, thank you. You have made this day a joyful one.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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Dreaming of Adventure

February 26, 2014 — Pat Bertram

I’ve been spending way too much time lately thinking/talking/writing about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, especially since I doubt I will ever travel more than small pieces of it. There are many problems to deal with when hiking the length of the trail — food (two pounds a day is recommended), water (either too much in the high sierras, with swollen rivers and icy trails, or too little in the deserts), heavy packs, wind, ticks and other unfriendly insects — and I would prefer a trouble-free life.

Still, just thinking and researching the logistics of such an adventure are an escape from my life. In looking after my 97-year-old father and dealing with a dysfunctional brother, I amcamping always aware of others, either listening for signs of distress from my father or listening to my brother’s moans and cries without knowing if these sounds come from pain or are a way of manipulating me. When one is hiking alone, away from civilization, away from other hikers, even, one only has to listen to oneself, only has to fulfill one’s own needs. That idea is restful to me. One foot in front of another, nothing to think about, no one to worry about.

Even more that that, thinking about such an adventure is like working a puzzle, helping to keep my mind active and alert despite too much loss of sleep. I’ve even gone so far as to join a few Facebook groups, including a couple just for woman hikers. Lots of good information in those groups, lots of things to consider. Planning such a trip gives me a new way of looking at ways of life we take for granted. Modern plumbing, for example, has made basic body functions easy for us. But what if there isn’t a restroom for hundreds of miles? How does one keep clean? How does one remain infection-free?

Thinking about living an adventurous life (simply thinking about it, not living it) has also helped me past the last hurdle of grief, giving me something to concentrate on besides what I have lost. It’s been almost four years since the death of my life mate/soul mate, and I have adjusted to life without him. In fact, sometimes I forget that I once had a different life, that once someone loved me. I don’t want to forget — I loved him deeply — but I can’t spend the rest of my life yearning for him, can’t be always looking to the past. Thinking about a life on foot makes me realize that, whether my life will be on my feet or on my behind, I do still have a life.

Throughout all these years of grief, I have been afraid of the future alone, afraid of becoming the crazy cat lady (sans cats, of course), afraid of settling somewhere and waiting for entropy to take its course. Thinking about other possibilities — hiking the PCT, walking to Seattle, car camping, going abroad and just winging it, taking a freighter to New Zealand — helps me realize that I don’t have to moulder. I can live. I can be adventurous. I can take chances. I can try new things. I can learn new things. I can become the sort of person who could hike the PCT if she so desires.

I don’t know what I want to do, and there’s no reason to make any plans since my stay here at my father’s house could continue for many more years. But I can prepare. In fact, tonight I will take a backpack on my Sierra Club walk (I walk with the club three nights a week) and fill it with a five pound weight. Five pounds is heavy! I cannot imagine trying to carry thirty pounds for any distance, but at least, this will be a start.

But a start of what? Maybe someday I’ll find out.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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High Tea, Afternoon Tea, and Hilari-tea

February 25, 2014 — Pat Bertram

The town where I am temporarily residing hosts a high tea once a month, or at least, that’s what they call this particular social occasion.

Like many Americans who have grown up reading English novels, I know what high tea is — a heavy meal served in the early evening, generally around 5:00 pm when the working class returned home from their labors. What I didn’t afternoon teaknow until just now when I did a bit of research is the reason it’s called high tea — because the baked goods and the meat, potato, and vegetable dishes were served from a high table. Seems reasonable enough.

Afternoon tea is served earlier, around 4:00 pm. From all the English books I have read, I’ve gathered that it is a genteel snack of tea and delicate finger foods such as scones and watercress sandwiches with crusts removed. (I’ve never had a watercress sandwich, but so many fictional characters seemed to dote on them, they must be a true delicacy.) Afternoon tea is considered to be a low tea because instead of being served at high tables, it is served at low tables.

I knew what to expect from this local “high tea,” or at least I thought I did. They enticed me with their description, “Want to escape the daily grind and meet new and old friends over a cup of tea? Join us for tea, coffee, and cookies. Get to know new people. Laughter and conversation are guaranteed.” (I wonder if the pun in the first sentence was inadvertent or a sly dig — escaping the daily grind for tea.)

Being in the mood for conversation and laughter, I dressed up (as dressed up as I ever get, which isn’t “dressed up” by anyone’s definition except mine) and moseyed on over to the town hall for this special occasion. The receptionist greeted me with a blank stare when I asked where the tea was being held. Finally, after a long silence, she directed me to a woman from the Parks and Recreation Department who escorted me to the Recreation Center. And there I found . . .

No one. Just a table with a plastic covering, spilled coffee, and a small package of store-bought scones. High tea, indeed.

Still, it was fun. I talked to the woman from the Parks and Recreation Department for a few minutes until she had to return to work, then I called a friend from the Sierra Club and we chatted for a while.

(You can probably guess what we talked about since it’s been my almost constant topic of conversation lately. Hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. Yep, I’m still talking about that, wondering if it’s at all feasible. She says yes.)

The high-tea didn’t really offer much hilarity, but it did amuse me. I might go again sometime, even if it’s just to grab a scone and visit with myself.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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Simulating the Future

February 23, 2014 — Pat Bertram

Fiction is a type of simulator, much like a flight simulator, where we can experience life at one remove. Just like a flight simulator, the situations we encounter in fiction (particularly fiction that poses dilemmas) seem real, and they have real effects on our minds. Although this is recent research, I have known it since I first learned to read. I never read fiction just for entertainment. It was more real to me than that — like practice for life. I didn’t see myself as the main character, rather I read myself into the story, trying to figure out how I would act in a similar situation. Unlike many of the youth of my generation, I never had to use recreational drugs to understand what could happen. I knew secondhand through books the possible consequences. I also knew the consequences of teen-age pregnancy, drunk driving, and whatever other trouble kids my age could get into, and it made me cautious. Maybe too cautious. Still, I never got into a mess I couldn’t get myself out of.

As I grew older, potential problems became more serious, and again, books simulated various scenarios I was able to sidestep. I might have continued to be too cautious, but I never saddled myself with avoidable problems such as overwhelming debt. (I was going to change this cliché, but I got an image of debt as a saddle with a banker as the person sitting on the saddle riding me, and I thought it was an apt image, so the cliché stays.)

Popular books, easy books, happily-ever-after books, books without major moral dilemmas never did much for me. In fact, if I read too many of these “junk food” books, I’d get depressed. Oddly, all books now depress me the way these books once did, perhaps because the situations in books no longer act as a simulator. I know I will never be an unwed mother, a single mother, or a woman struggling to handle a family and a career. I know I will never solve a murder, either as an amateur or a professional. I know how it feels to love. I know how it feels to lose the one man who made life worth living, know how it feels to take care of an aged parent, know how it feels to be the subject of a brother’s rage.

But I still have a “flight simulator” — my imagination. Although imagination isn’t as good a simulator as fiction since we tend not to be able to project our true feelings into the future, a life time of reading and living has trained me at least in a small part to imagine how I would deal with certain situations.

Pacific Crest TrailI’ve been writing lately about my idea of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. I have been hiking small sections of the trail (some of my typos crack me up — I just wrote “trial” instead of trail, and that is apropos at times of hiking the PCT — a real trial). These Saturday hikes give me a small taste of the dream. But more than that, talking/writing/thinking about walking up to Seattle expands my mind the way reading a good book used to.

If it sounds as if I am backtracking (instead of backpacking), the truth is that as much as the idea intrigues me, I really don’t think I could do it. It’s way too dangerous for someone who isn’t fit and has no camping experience. Besides, I cannot see me wielding an ice axe to keep from falling off a narrow icy trail, cannot see me coming face to face with a grizzly who wants to wrestle me for my scant food supply, cannot see me “out packing” bags of used toilet paper, carrying the stinky package for hundreds of miles until I came across a place where I could dispose of it. Nor am I interested in doing something that takes such massive planning — the preparation takes longer that the 2650-mile hike itself. I want to be spontaneous, just take off walking and keep on walking, and that is so not possible on the PCT. It’s also expensive — hikers typically spend $4000 to $8000 for the 5-6 month jaunt.

Still, I want an epic adventure someday, and I want it for real, not second hand from books — if not the PCT, then perhaps something that stems from this particular simulation. I’ll keep imagining, keep throwing myself into the future, and see what happens.

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Follow Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

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