Angels and Regrets

I’ve been writing since I could hold my first chunky, lead-free pencil. Stories and writing have always been my go-to and greatest joy. Even when I career-pivoted away from being an author, I kept writing (as the three people who read this blog can attest). I stopped writing recently. I had surgery and expected a three-week hiatus while recovering. It’s been four months and I’m still not back to pre-surgery levels of resilience or writing.

The surgeon told me it would take six weeks to recover. My mom had the same surgery 20 years ago and healed much faster. I thought I would too, because genetics. But genetics are a crapshoot. I got my mom’s thick hair and a penchant for list-writing and throwing parties that I don’t actually want to attend. I didn’t get her resilience. Three weeks for her, six months for me.

I had to go back to work while still nauseous, in pain, and super anxious. For a long time all I wanted to do was quit and rest. I got talked out of that by the men in my life, and as the potential end of ACA looms, the practical side of me is glad I stuck with it. The emotional and creative sides of me, not so much. There has been some 5 AM fretting. Not feeling well enough to do my job or withstand the stress of finding an easier one, feeling like I don’t have time for the things that nourish and heal me, like writing and stories. How did I get here, why aren’t I earning more money, doing more creative work? Why did I make the choices I made?! I recommend sleeping until at least 6 AM if you can. Five AM is literally for the birds.

Then my aunt died. She had the same thick hair as my mom and me. She also got the resilience gene. She was diagnosed with cancer four years ago and fought the hell out of it, a battle that made my surgery look like a picnic. Eventually the cancer won. She died at 2 AM on a Saturday morning with my mom by her side.

Later that same morning my family gathered outside on the porch. It was hot for November, very sunny. My aunt would have liked that. She loved the sun and warm places. We ate, drank, reminisced, and my dad told one of his guided-by-angels stories. He has a lot of them. The one he told that morning was about driving a motorcycle through a crossroads in Australia and getting the cosmic message to go hang out with the Loustaus once he got back to the States. The Loustaus were a family in his hometown that he had heard of but never met. He zoomed through that crossroads, followed the leading, and eventually met the five Loustau kids, including my aunt and my mom. That’s where the possibility of me began: as a message from the angels. Or spirit or cosmos, whatever you want to call it.

Hearing the story made me feel bad. Stuck in my post-surgery regret spiral, all I could think about was how I don’t have angels the way my dad does. For example, it wasn’t a cosmic calling that led me to my partner. In his Bumble profile pic he wore a T-shirt that said “Real men eat arugula.” That was my sign. Produce, not angels. The produce was right on; my partner is the best. But maybe my 5 AM career/purpose fretting wouldn’t be happening if I had more guided-by-angels stories like my dad.

When I got home that night, I decided to read a book. I hadn’t read one in months. It’s not something I can do when I’m really anxious. Nonetheless, I picked up the first book on the pile: Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library. I opened the front cover and found a note written by my aunt. Yes, the same aunt who had just died that morning. It was a review of all the things she’d liked about the book.

“I found myself falling inside the same boxes as the main character, hence I absolutely loved learning from the Librarian’s wise words.”

Only slightly spooked by finding a note from a dead woman and wondering if I too might learn from the Librarian’s wise words, I started reading and discovered the premise of the story. Hovering in the space between life and death and getting to live out all your options until you discover the one that makes you most want to stay alive. There were handwritten notes throughout the book:

“Regret”
“Want/lack”
“Happiness/sadness”
“Choices not outcomes”
“Some truths impossible to see”
“Undoing regret, making wishes come true”

The last passage she underlined was this:

“There was more to her than a flat line of mild to moderate depression, spiced up with occasional flourishes of despair. And that gave her hope, and even the sheer sentimental gratitude of being able to be here, knowing she had the potential to enjoy watching radiant skies and mediocre…comedies and be happy listening to music and conversation and the beat of her own heart.”

I’m still anxious and in pain, still struggling with my job. I’m sorry that my aunt regretted not having a daughter or grandchildren (I don’t have those either) and died young, and my mom will miss her so much. But I was wrong about not inheriting my dad’s guiding angels or my mom’s and aunt’s resilience. It’s time to start writing again.

In loving memory of Tina Zaleski