The Rage, it shares the stage with depression.
Depression and rage do share the stage causing mood swings oscillating as a stop sign in a hurricane. Strong emotions to control and they are obstacles dealing with life’s challenges. Being unsure of which to wake up with, you will not be disappointed as the other is sure to appear to as the previous is leaves the scene. Assuming the common root of both is one of those too-high hurdles, until it is defeated or removed depression and it’s elixir rage are going nowhere. One suffering through this will experience one and the question is “Does rage mask depression?” Removing the root hurdle is the safest thing to do, and the golden lesson here is how? Could it be as simple as not denying, but ignoring?
Difficult economic times promote just this happenstance as witnessed by screaming customers upset about mustard on a .99-cent burger, the frustration takes its toll. When logic intercedes depression will remind the suffering what is the true problem, and it is not trivial, often it is staring one’s mortality in the eye. A melancholy attitude is less offensive to the community, but devastating to the individual. Now accepting and ignoring the obvious is a mental exercise that builds strength of will, once accepted and relegated to being a part of life, closure and it’s peace is the reward, with the new, improved will stronger to battle the suffering mind.
Life’s hurdles are a challenge, and someone suffering terminally that you are close to is sufficient to enroll you in this set of lessons. The courage it takes to dismiss the soothing elixir of rage instructs the psyche on the benefits of defeating depression. Some pray, others exercise, and many abuse food, wine, and song. Finding the correct path that get’s you to a peaceful place instead of reckless bucket listing is a gold nugget of happiness, and is a reward for persistently taking control.
Jack and Laura were a great couple. Jack was about six-foot tall, athletic, and a happy, quiet young man in 1969. He had a boyish smirk akin to Peter Pan and a twinkle in his blue eyes. In 1969, he was a freshly graduated from Kent State with a degree in economics and studied commercial lending. He came home after graduation while the country was in turmoil over the war, but somehow was never sent a draft notice. He was focused on working in the insurance industry, managing sales and long-term investment. This fit his temperament; anything he did was worth persisting for the long haul. He had a quiet, charming personality that most found appealing.
Laura was two years behind Jack in school and had attended community college twenty minutes from home, she worked at the town’s large law firm, first as a receptionist and promoted to Para-legal work. She was tall and willowy, natural blond and wholesome. She learned fast and possessed focus to her work. She was pretty and could have been a model, but she was too anchored to reality to dream her life away. Laura was driven to grab life, was tired of school, and pleased to be working. Jack fell in love with her and her sparkly eyes, and she remembered him from High School, she found him mature and appealing. They grew up within ten blocks of one another, but had never socialized, or even spoke to one another, but she knew him. They met when Jack paid the law office a visit attempting to set appointments with the staff for life insurance, and he sold himself to the receptionist.
Jack and Laura married in 1970, both young professionals worked long hours to build the life they desired. They both lived by the creed, “Work hard at life and you will reap what you sow.” They did not have time for politics or recreational drugs, content to live their lives based on work and spending evenings relaxing at home after dinner. Weekends usually included Saturday night at the movie theater or a dinner at a local restaurant, and sometimes both.
In 1975 Laura had a worrisome annual exam with her gynecologist, and after a lengthy regimen of test and biopsy, Fibroid ovarian tumors were found to be the culprit causing her ever-growing discomfort. In 1975, radical hysterectomy was the safest option when the ovaries were encased in fibroid tumors as hers, some the size of walnuts. She chose to have her doctor remove her ovaries, except for a small portion of the left one, hoping it would regenerate.
Jack enjoyed great health, an even-temperament and never lacked the energy to accomplish what he drove himself to do. In his school days, he played six seasons of soccer and anchored the defense as a goalie each season. That is a tough position wrought with injuries to the hand and its digits, as well as the common shin splints, weak ankles, and other maladies common to the sport. It speaks to his quiet determination to know he never lost his cool as that heavy ball ripped at his fingers, jamming his thumb and breaking his wrist, those little bones are connected nerves that can scream loudly with the best of them. He was an American kid like the old cowboy stars, or the famous quarterback that claimed if you don’t mind, it don’t matter. Those unflappable, strong, silent types is what many mothers hoped their sons would be.
In 1987, Laura’s gynecologist found an alarming result from her always-imperfect Pap Smears and after some added diagnostics suggested the hysterectomy, a procedure she had avoided more than a decade ago. Since she never conceived a child, she relinquished this time and underwent the procedure. After a normal convalescence at home she returned to work as she hoped.
Her emotions began to sneak up on her and she was disturbed by her newfound challenge to resist being too blunt. She was on edge and nervous, and before long she was not the Laura her workmates had come to admire and respect, she was prickly, like a cactus. Jack grew accustomed to having the spurs put to him as well, and he never lost his good attitude, the way he had always been, mellow and unflappable, impossible to draw into an argument. In 1996, Jack had a massive coronary and died, he was 50 years old.
Laura had a difficult time accepting Jack being gone and became short with the office she had managed for over 20 years, many of the people she had trained and nurtured became distant, which increased her suffering, without Jack her life did not work at all. She attempted repairing the old camaraderie, but had burnt those bridges long ago; she was simply their boss, not their friend.
Jack had became an expert in long-term investment and left her with plenty of passive income. She retired in 2000, and began unraveling her tangled life. Her father had passed before Jack and she brought her Mother home when her health began to fail, age had taken its toll.
Her Mother’s name was Mary, and they spent their days shopping, visiting family and most things her mother wanted to do. Laura suffered the loss of Jack and knew someday she would lose Mary; this gave her some patience, which came in handy sometimes. As the time passed, they spent more time at home, but still visited her cousins and Aunt Debbie, her mother’s sister and also a widow. Oddly, she found her new life was at home with her Mom, and it was good.
They spent plenty of time discussing life, they both shared the view that the best was done. They were not bitter, but philosophical in there talks, and Laura made mental notes on her mothers thoughts. She knew her mother had hoped for grandchildren, and she found the grandchildren to love with her sister’s grandchildren; she was a Great-Aunt and loved the children as her own. She was widowed as Laura was and the calm demeanor she approached that challenge showed Laura a way to overcome the bitterness of being without Jack and like her Mother, had no intentions of another man to train.
The calming presence of her Mother brought her the means to calm herself, and she adopted her cousin’s children a lot like the great Aunt like Mary, and found the children she thought she would never have to love. She followed her Mother while propping her up to walk her final days, and when she passed her family circled around her and involved her in every aspect of life they had, and she found her way to peace. When Laura passed away in 2010, she passed happily and content, with her loved ones near.
A great story and beautifully written...
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