Chapter Six
With bad weather on the way, Julie had decided to take Sunday off her morning run schedule. So before her head hit the pillow Saturday night, she programmed herself to sleep in. No doubt her plan would have succeeded too, except for the unsettling sound of wind-driven rain against her bedroom window, a constant ping-ping-pinging that rattled her out of dreamland.
Once awake, she became immediately aware that she had failed to turn up the thermostat after yesterday’s seventy-two degree afternoon. Overnight, with the change in the weather, the temperature in the house had dropped significantly. Hastily, she jumped out of bed, dialed up the control on her bedroom wall and padded, stocking-footed, into the kitchen to start a pot of coffee. She then quickly returned to bed and wrapped herself in the covers again. It was six forty-seven on a dreary, cold Sunday morning. With nothing pressing her, Julie decided to daydream away the next hour or so in the serene solace of her queen-sized bed.
Pulling the sheet and quilt over her head, she began thinking about last night, about her promotion, and about Mike Tattersall. She felt exhilarated about moving up and out of her dead-end secretarial career. Executive or otherwise, “secretary” has been her only career title, one she believed to be carved ignominiously low on the totem pole of life. But last night she suddenly began an upward climb. In a matter of days, she knew she could demonstrate some real career potential with this promotion. Moreover, she’d also be acquiring valuable technical skills that could further boost her status and increase her worth. And, by entering the realm of marketing-communications, she would be breathing the rarefied air of “sales.” It was a genuine stroke of good fortune, something she could not have imagined just seventy-two hours ago. Yet here she was today — promoted. Her hard work had finally paid off.
As she rolled over and hugged her pillow, it occurred to her that Spence must have recommended her for the marketing job. She made a mental note to thank him, first thing, tomorrow morning. He would no longer be her direct supervisor, she realized. From here on out she’d be working for Mike, and he had a distinctively different management style from his partner. Unlike Spence’s non-confrontational, self-effacing manner, Mike was downright assertive. In fact, he even made her uncomfortable at times, especially lately as he seemed to be taking such a personal interest in her. But that wasn’t such a bad thing, she realized; it would help guarantee her success with the new job, though she had no serious doubts about her potential to succeed. On the contrary, as a dedicated and efficient employee, she felt extremely confident about her future performance as a marketing specialist. Looking out a month or so, she could easily see herself exceeding the productivity Mike was accustomed to getting from Allison Kraft and her counterpart, Sheryll Green. It was even possible, within a year perhaps, that she could take over the responsibility for all of the company’s marketing. But she mustn’t get ahead of herself. Better to simply continue her steady, hard-working pace and let things go along their natural course.
These thoughts led her to the question that had been troubling her since last night — specifically, how was she going to handle things with Mike? First of all, she was uncertain of his motives. Reading him was proving more difficult than she had previously imagined. On one hand, he might simply be acting out of his personal, experiential comfort zone — a touchy-feely guy, treating her no differently than he treats everyone else. This was a plausible theory, and it fit well with her image of salespeople. She knew that, in essence, Mike was a salesman — and a tactile one at that.
But there remained the possibility that he singled her out because he has been harboring romantic aspirations for her. This struck her as strange though, because she could not imagine why he might pick her out from among all the other women he could quite easily have. After all, she was slightly older, of lesser social standing, unsophisticated, and used merchandise. Meanwhile, he — a never-been-married, rich, and drop-dead handsome man — would surely be a great catch for her.
Still, she could not think of a single thing they had in common, personally speaking at least, and therefore a relationship with Mike might never succeed over the long haul. He’d make his conquest (which of course she’d never allow, but she was willing to consider the possibility in order to carry her reasoning to its ultimate conclusion), and then he’d realize what she at this present moment already suspected — that the two of them were entirely incompatible. Then he’d dump her like a bankrupt customer.
The chances were extremely slim of her somehow defying the odds and making a relationship with Mike work. But she might still be willing to give it a try — he was, after all, exactly what she believed she was looking for in a man — except for the undeniable fact that she worked with him and therefore would have to break her rule to do it. Hell, she worked for him! And for that reason alone, she hoped with everything in her heart that things were not at all as they seemed, that she was reading far too much into his manner, his words, the way he looked at her, and especially, last evening’s congratulatory kiss.
Damn him, she thought. I’m not going to let him screw up my future. But at the same time, she was imagining herself living in his gorgeous home up on Long Butte Drive (she’d never actually seen his house, only heard the other women at the office talk about it), just Mike and her, watching the golf carts roll by in the evenings and on weekends, listening to West Coast jazz, sipping white wine, and occasionally making love on silk sheets. She could picture his tall, tan body without any of the usual expensive clothes to conceal it. She rolled over again, clutched the pillow even tighter to her breast, imagined everything, only wondering whether a guy who looked that good actually was that good. In her imagination at least, she assumed he was.
Julie knew she could fantasize about such things all day if she chose. There was nothing else pressing her. But her mind probably wasn’t going to change about how to actually handle the situation. She was too practical a person, too driven, and too smart. Mike was off limits, and that was that.
The weather outside hadn’t improved in the past ten minutes, but thanks to her stream of romantic consciousness and the new heat pump in her villa, she was no longer cold.
She thought of Tracy and made a mental note to call her later. Trace worried her. There was so much about her friend’s past that Julie did not know. Somehow this street-smart young woman had grown up to the age of thirty-four, got married and divorced, but refused to grow up in so many ways.
Years ago, having encountered a similar personality disorder with Danny, Julie came to the conclusion that he possessed no real desire to mature, especially where relating to her was concerned. He was comfortable being a kid, so he acted like one — playing with the boys, shrinking from household responsi-bilities, recklessly disregarding her feelings with both his words and his actions. He saw no need to change, and he never did. Evidently, he acted differently on the job, always managing to be professional, to do admirable work, and to impress his superiors. But at home and with regard to her, he was emotionally challenged. And from what she had observed recently, Tracy occupied quite the same, regrettable state.
Since in twenty years she couldn’t fix Danny, she now realized that there was little hope where Tracy was concerned either. But she couldn’t abandon her. That would be cruel. In fact, she would never have abandoned Danny to this day had he not done so first, sneaking around with that little tramp, Lisa. It’s amazing that he didn’t pick up some kind of disease from her, and for all Julie knew, he might have. That girl had certainly been around, so Mary Catherine Brooks had reported anyway, before the divorce was final. M.C. had wiggled Lisa’s tawdry bio out of her husband, Bobby, Danny’s no-account best friend, though he was probably clueless as to why his wife wanted to know.
But, getting her train of thought back on track, it suddenly occurred to Julie that perhaps Danny and Trace might both seem helpless and irredeemable because of some flaw in her character, some involuntary signal which she sends out, making all those close to her dependent and emotionally crippled. This hypothesis did not set level with her though; she couldn’t accept it without some kind of proof. And she wasn’t content to view herself as the flame that attracted poor unsuspecting moths inexorably to their deaths. Nor was she about to accept any of that co-dependency blather. No, the coincidence of her ex-husband and new friend behaving in similar, immature ways was probably just that — a coincidence. Or maybe she simply had the misfortune of picking handicapped lovers and friends out of the crowd.
Nevertheless, whatever Danny was doing these days, she wished him well. At least he had been a good family man and a tireless provider — and occasionally even a fun partner. He was just a couple feet short of being able to understand her emotionally, in the place where she truly lived her life. And for all she knew, it was her frustration with him, her pent-up emotion of nearly twenty years, that served as a pretext to their final undoing.
Her hostility toward him had been all but palpable that fall after Clarrie left for school. She’d acted so unlike herself, frequently nettlesome and openly antagonistic. Although aware of her destructive behavior at the time, something restrained her and kept her powerless to change. She seemed incapable of snapping back to the person she believed herself to be: loving, giving, long-suffering, and pleasant to be around. And, though she truly believed herself in possession of those qualities, they must have withered over time until even she could not recognize them in herself — or manifest them in her daily life. She could only imagine how she had appeared to Danny. But that was then.
Now, since the divorce and her move to the coast, she has put forth great effort to cultivate her core virtues anew and afresh, gaining command of them once again. She, in her opinion at least, has been totally renewed, different in so many ways, and consequently capable of managing a relationship with kindness and objectivity.
This morning, however, as she lay alone in her warm bed reflecting upon the waning days of her marriage, it seemed clear to her for the first time that she had been equally at fault, that her behavior had probably served to push Danny out the door and directly into young Lisa’s waiting arms.
Not to mention Lisa’s more-than-amply-sized chest.
There have always been a couple of areas where Julie could not compete. One of them was measured in inches. She would never be more than a 32-B; that was her entire endowment, though she always perceived that Danny felt cheated because of it.
And she was no nymphomaniac either. Her strengths lay in other areas: She was faithful, hard working, considerate and kind, healthy and strong, a good conversationalist, and if she did say so herself — smart. And, given the proper mood and preparation, she could also be pretty good in bed, although she only ever had Danny to prove it with. Having been brought up to save herself for marriage, she had done the next best thing — married the man she’d saved herself for, the same one who had gotten her pregnant. But she discovered a little over a year later that pregnancy came easily for her — too easily, actually. She was as fertile as Mississippi bottom land. Something had to be done, and they eventually agreed that Danny would go in for the operation. Two kids weren’t necessarily too much, but they were definitely enough for Danny and Julie Predmore.
Still, Danny had been her first and only sex partner. And since she found out about his affair, two years ago, no man has come close to “oneness” with her again. Not willing to compromise her principles where sex was concerned, she planned to wait until she fell hopelessly in love with the right man — if that ever happened again.
Just the same, she hated what she had become prior to the divorce when she had allowed negative emotions to rule her, decree her words, and command her actions. Thank God, all that was behind her now. And, as she thought about her marriage and divorce for the first time in weeks, she felt certain she had been relieved of the nagging burden of them, except for a fresh recognition of her own culpability — something that was now suddenly evident to her, visible through the cold, gray light of this winter morning, illuminated in a way which forces one to see things introspectively, convincingly, and with the bite of steel.
Then another sad reality lit up before her mind’s eye. Over the years, the love she once had for Danny had slowly faded and fallen away, like the leaves of a tree in autumn, until she had become barren and wan. And in that wizened, unattractive state, she’d been incapable of anything more than the tragic behavior she displayed in the end.
So she vowed to herself never to become cantankerous again, no matter what kind of stress was applied to her life. She would find a way to bear everything cheerfully. She liked herself much better that way.
The lead article on page one of the Sunday Detroit News and Free Press described the deadly severe weather which had a stranglehold on New England and Quebec. Sweeping suddenly down from the Canadian plains, a frigid air mass met with a classic Nor’easter along the Atlantic coast, and the resulting storm had coated forest and city alike with ice as thick as bank window Lexan. Blame for all this was being attributed to none other than El Niño, the misbehaving cyclical weather-maker out in the Pacific. This, the latest of El Niño’s incarnations, had claimed eight lives in the past three days. Livestock were dying on the hoof in frozen fields; hundreds of miles of roads had been rendered impassable, and millions of citizens were shivering in their homes without power, heat, or fresh water.
And now, another blast of winter was headed east. With the jet stream continuing to whip up moisture from the Gulf, and more arctic air blowing in from Canada, a major winter storm was bearing down on Michigan with a full head of steam. Forecasters were promising six to twelve inches of snow for Detroit with wind chills below zero. It was little consolation to Danny that others had it much worse — central Maine for example, where the mercury had dropped to minus eleven Fahrenheit with wind chills of thirty- to forty-below, and where nearly half of the trees were snapping under the burden of more than an inch of ice.
Yesterday, he believed he needed a vacation; today he was considering a move to a warmer climate. Naturally, he’d had similar thoughts before but had never actually come close to moving, always managing to stick it out till spring arrived. He would, of course, welcome the prospect of milder winters, but not as a trade-off for the delightful summers that Michigan consistently delivered, year after year. Except for that one year when the volcano in the Philippines screwed up everything, and the entire summer was like one extra-long and damp April. And last year too, when winter ran clear through to the end of May. But then September and October turned out near-perfect, providing Michigan with the finest autumn weather in decades. By then, everyone had forgotten about how cold it had been in May.
He reviewed his options: sultry Florida was out, along with most of the sweltering Sunbelt.
Virginia and North Carolina have occasionally appealed to him, but Danny believed that northern transplants don’t ever feel completely at ease in the South — and his nasal twang would certainly give him away.
Texas is another state of mind altogether, and most of the habitable parts of the Lone Star State get their share of nasty weather as well. So forget Texas — and its crusty and dusty neighbors to the north for that matter.
The heartland has never appealed to him. And, apart from the plentiful sunshine, since he’s not a skier or a jet-setter, the Rockies don’t buy him much of anything at all.
Ditto for the Northeast.
He briefly considered the desert, (nah); the Pacific Northwest, (he’s not that fond of rain); and California, which sounds ideal until you examine the cost of living and the probability of being victimized by the elements or the underclass. Besides, in the past he always resisted Julie’s promptings to consider moving to her home state on the grounds that it was too far from everyone and everything he knew and loved, too expensive, and no place to raise a family — arguments that were partly specious but he stood by them anyway. Now, of course, she was there. So unless they reconciled, he couldn’t consider California as a viable destination for living out the rest of his life. Moving there would make him look both weak and hypocritical, and he was neither. Plus, there were all those predictions about this year’s El Niño performing many of his nefarious tricks right there in the Golden State. Where else? The place was a veritable circus of devastating natural phenomena, a showcase for human tragedy.
Then again, who was he to divine the future, especially where his own fate was concerned? It did occur to him, however, that, having sent her that letter, perhaps Julie might consider taking him back. If she did so, it might tend to mollify the harsh reality of moving someplace where the earth moved regularly under your feet and you wouldn’t consider leaving the house without a trunk full of survival gear and emergency foodstuffs. He could probably find a job there in recruiting, and the kids were no longer a controlling factor, holding him in the Wolverine State.
Still, it was better not to pin any hopes on a favorable reaction from his ex-wife. When he last saw her, she had cut him a departing look with her stone-cold eyes, a look that could have started the next ice age. And then there were her words: “Good-bye Danny, have a nice life. It’s too bad, just too bad...”
Realizing, suddenly, how unproductive these thoughts were, he tried drawing a curtain on them in his mind, hoping to get his day to play out more positively.
At least he had slept off his melancholia and come to his senses somewhat. That was positive. But then he remembered what he wrote to Julie in last night’s letter, and a feeling of embarrassment washed over him like a wave of tropical water. It was so unlike him to express himself emotionally, yet, oddly enough, he did not regret doing it. And now, in trying to sort out his feelings on the matter, he hoped that he had not actually gone soft, as it were, because, of all the adjectives he might use to describe himself, soft was not among them.
Where the letter was concerned, however, he wanted to believe he was honestly communicating his true feelings. And that was a positive thing. It was indicative of progress being made, at least where relationships were concerned. Besides, he would not necessarily change a single word if he had to write it over again. Those words needed to be said, and it was long past time for him to say them. Therefore, he concluded that it was very much “in character” for him to do what he did. He could only hope that Julie would find his words believable, and that she might respond in kind.
But he wasn’t really expecting to get his wish. On the contrary, he was prepared for the worst. After all, he probably still had at least one more insult coming before time ran out in the game of life, and he was certain that Julie was capable of hurling a big, nasty one his way, despite the two thousand miles between them and the eighteen months since they last spoke. Good thing that, as a recruiter, he had learned long ago how to deal with rejection.
Besides, there were plenty other fish in the sea. He wasn’t going to lose sleep over one that might have gotten away.
Julie quickly discovered that she was living in a gesellschaft type of society as defined over a century ago by the sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies. In fact, the entire modern western world is characteristic of the gesellschaft model, one of complex social constructs and primarily economic inter-dependencies.
By contrast, the gemeinschaft model suggests a much more simple and homogeneous society where people are apt to be closely related in values, activities, and customs. The predominant structure in these, mostly agrarian societies is the family unit, and gemeinschaft families tend to be self-sufficient. They typically provide for their own basic necessities, with members often functioning as “teacher” and “employer” to other members, while fulfilling their unique roles in the reproductive and emotional support of the species.
Engrossed in her study of this material, Julie discovered an unfortunate truth about modern, western societies, the U.S. being the consummate example. In contradistinction to agrarian societies, here in the United States, the contribution of the family has steadily decreased to the point where it is today, a point far down on the scale of influence over the lives of individual family members, themselves. In America, at the close of the second millennium, AD, large, impersonal, and disinterested entities such as the government, schools, companies, and religious organizations eclipse the role of families and supplant them as the central focus of our lives, dominating us individually and collectively more than ever before. In our highly complex, contemporary world, there is not much of a role left for the family to fill beyond procreation and a modicum of personal relational interplay. Even child rearing is performed more and more by non-family specialists, either in child care centers outside the home or within it by sitters, nannies and au pairs.
Having evolved over the last century to a position well beyond family-centric provincialism, modern America has become a nation of individuals, each consumed by the desire to get ahead financially and equipped to tap the resources of the modern technological world for best personal advantage. And also for the secondary purpose of pushing everyone else aside and every other priority down the list. Like automatons, Americans function according to the gesellschaft’s mass-prescription for personal and financial success, living increasingly empty, depersonalized, and meaningless lives, piling up more and more personal wealth but having fewer and fewer people to love and share their possessions with. All the while, Americans internally resent the way society has poured them into its mold. Then they react by striking out in support of one cause or another, searching diligently for the meaning in life everywhere but in perhaps the only place it can be found — the home.
As Julie wrote the first draft of her paper on the quality of life she found herself fighting back tears. She understood the truth of Tönnies’ observations and theories first hand. She had already been victimized by the inhumanity of modern society and by a husband who had become caught up in it. Try as she did to hold the family unit together, to make it a fountainhead of love and understanding, and the cornerstone of all their lives, the outside pressures eventually won out, shattering the world she had built. And what did she have left to show for her life today? She possessed neither financial wealth nor a family life. She had failed to gain any prize whatsoever for her efforts; she had struck out within society and family alike. Regretfully, she could only think of two things that distinguished her life today: her independence and her job. The appraisal of her near-bankrupt state saddened her. But being an optimist at heart, she managed to encourage herself in spite of how things looked. She could and would start over today; it was not too late to make something significant and valuable out of her life. And fortunately for her, a brand new job awaited her, a fresh new vantage point, carved out of the mountain of life from which she could view the world and society. And this time, she knew what she was looking for.
Upon finishing the draft, Julie got up to pour herself some hot coffee and make a tuna sandwich for lunch, setting her laptop computer down temporarily on the snack bar. She refilled her coffee mug and sat down again to enjoy her lunch, thinking she should log on to the Internet to check her mail — she hadn’t done so since mid-week. Hoping to find a letter from her daughter, she clicked on the mail box icon. There was e-mail awaiting her, but not from Clarrie. The sender’s address read: dpredmore@mercurynet.com. Clarrie must have finally convinced her brother to write — what a pleasant surprise! She highlighted the address and pressed Enter. And there it was:
Dear Julie,
I suppose the last thing you expected today was a letter from me. Remember me, Danny, your husband of almost twenty years. I wouldn’t blame you for trying to forget. I have tried to get beyond those years myself, but what we had together is still so much a part of me, I just can’t forget. I suppose the reason is that I left out one important thing from our last meeting and that’s why I’m finally writing to you — to apologize. Seems I never actually said I was sorry for spoiling things between us, and I know it was primarily my fault. You didn’t deserve what you got in return for pouring your whole life into our marriage and family. I guess I was just screwed up in the head and couldn’t see anything but my own problems at the time. So, before I go on, let me say for the record, “I’m sorry and I hope you will be able to find it in your heart to forgive me.”
So, how are you doing? I think about you quite a lot, wondering how you’re making out, how your job is going and all. Clarrie says they’re not paying you enough. She also said your rent is high, but that you live real close to the beach. I sometimes wish that was my situation as well. It’s been pretty cold around here. We’ve got about six inches of snow on the ground, and we’re supposed to get another major storm by tomorrow night. Remember those bad winters when the kids were little? We had so much snow piled up along the driveway that I could barely lift the shovel high enough to empty it. Dan and Clarrie loved it though. They built forts and igloos and made at least a dozen snowmen. Those were good years, don’t you think?
Earlier today I found the picture we had taken at Disney World. Remember that trip we took? The kids looked so young in the photo. It’s hard to believe it was just a decade ago; they’re so grown up now. They don’t seem to need us much anymore, or at least they don’t need me. But I miss having them around. It’s sometimes lonely here without them, and without you too. I’d be lying if I tried to pretend otherwise. Right now, I wish I could see you, talk with you, help you understand how I really feel, see some forgiveness in your eyes, hear you say it’s okay, that you don’t hate me. But then I think that perhaps it is too late, that you may never be able to forgive me for being unfaithful to you, that you don’t desire to ever see me again.
I’m not asking you for more than what your heart will let you do, but I would love to hear from you, Jul. Everybody likes to get mail, so I hope you’re not sorry you got this letter from me. I’m sorry it took me so long to write it, but I won’t bother you again if you prefer not to hear from me.
Love, Danny
Tears ran off her face and fell onto the snack bar. She had only eaten a couple of bites out of her sandwich, but she didn’t have the stomach to go back to it. Danny’s letter was a surprise, and no, she was not upset that he wrote to her. But neither was she ready to pick up the phone to call him. Still, something about the letter had stirred her to tears, releasing a flood of emotion that has been bottled up in her for two years. It was not as though she hadn’t cried about the loss of her marriage until today. More than one box of Kleenex had been necessary to soak up her feelings on the matter. But she’d never had Danny’s apology before; that was one thing. And she’d never seen this softer side of Danny; that was something else.
She remembered how, just this morning, she had finally acknowledged her own culpability in the matter of their break-up. And here was Danny taking all the blame. So maybe healing was right around the corner, and they could get on with their lives after all. She decided to write him back and grant the absolution that he seemed to need so desperately. Then, if he truly had begun to mature and change, they could at least be friends, confidants across the miles, perhaps. Knowing his personality, his strengths and weaknesses, she was at least reasonably comfortable with him in that role.
She dried her eyes with her napkin and felt the edges of her mouth suddenly turn up into a smile. It seemed as though the stars in her universe were finally beginning to align in some kind of long-awaited, harmonic convergence.