starting a new life | Bertram's Blog

Winging It

April 22, 2015 — Pat Bertram

Yesterday was my last night of being homed. Today I start my odyssey as a homeless woman. I could rent an apartment (that is, I could if they didn’t do a credit check — I have no credit, never having borrowed any money, mortgaged a house, or bought anything on time), but I can’t force myself to do that. It just seems so terribly sad to settle down without Jeff. And then there is the problem of incipient stagnation. At first, I’m sure, I’d do things, but gradually entropy would set in, and there I would be . . . the crazy catless lady.

That scenario is not entirely accurate, but it feels accurate, and that’s all I have to go on . . . feelings. And my feeling is to wing it for a while. “Wing it” meaning to do something extemporaneously. “Wing it” meaning to improvise. “Wing it” meaning to fly.

And oh, I’m alive, I’m alive, I’m alive
And oh, I can fly, I can fly, I can fly
And oh, I’m alive, I’m alive, I’m alive
And I’m loving every second, minute, hour, bigger, better, stronger power

(Chorus from #thatPOWER sung and written in part by Justin Beiber.)

The most complicated aspect of this homelessness is that at the moment I am also carless. My vintage VW is in the shop being prettified (it’s one thing to be homeless, another to look like it). I have also promised to stay in the area until after May so I can perform in a dance program at the local college. We will be performing two of my favorite numbers, a trio of Tahitian Apurimas and a powerful rendition of Hawaiian War Chant, so the promise wasn’t hard to make.

People are being very kind to me in offering to house me for a few days (and even longer), which is especially generous because my situation is of my own making. As I said, I could probably find a place to live, and my carlessness isn’t due to an emergency. (It’s like trying to get sympathy for a hospital stay when the surgery is strictly cosmetic.) On the other hand, maybe it is necessary. These visits will help ease my way out into the world.

I’m looking forward to seeing what happens. I’ll try to continue to blog every day (or most days, anyway), but don’t get concerned if I disappear for a few days. Ah’ll be bock. (That’s supposed to be a phonetic rendering of The Terminator’s infinitely imitated accent.)

Thank you for your support during these past five exhausting, angst ridden, grief stricken, terrible and wonderful years. Wish me well as I start this new phase of my journey.

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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.” Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Posted in being me, culture, life. Tags: being extemporaneous, being homeless, dance, Hawaiian War Chant, starting a new life, wing it, winging it. 2 Comments »

Letter to Jeff, Day 434

January 9, 2015 — Pat Bertram

Hi, Jeff.

It seems so damn pathetic that after all the trauma of your dying, all the grief, all I’ve done in the past fourteen-and-a-half months, all the striving to fill my life with newness, I’m still basically the same I was before you died. I tried to explain this to my grief group today when they were talking about the changes that a death brings, but after I spoke, they backtracked and said that death brought changes to our lives, not us. That we didn’t change. Shouldn’t we? More specifically, shouldn’t I? After all I’ve gone through, how can I still be so much the same?

They talked about the importance of hope at the meeting, too. For all these months, I have had hope. Hope for a new direction in life, hope for success, hope for some sort of personal growth (and I don’t mean a tumor). But now it seems as if all my hopes have died stillborn.

If my continued survival isn’t about hope, if it’s causing me more pain than happiness, what’s the point? I’m curious how this hand will play out, and that’s what’s keeping me going. Maybe it’s enough, particularly since I think people are wrong about needing hope. It’s easier (and less hurtful) to live without hope. So many of my dreams never came to fruition. So much of my grief was about hopes that were never fulfilled. Wouldn’t it have been better if I hadn’t hoped for anything in the first place? Sometimes I wonder if what I miss is what I never had. It’s just too damn sad — you, me.

Adios, compadre.

***

Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Unfinished, Madame ZeeZee’s Nightmare, 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.” Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.