Our BetterMost Community > The Polling Place
Your age and your favourite cowboy
ednbarby:
That one made me cry, too, Jeff. But I've told you that already.
Pen, I've seen a woman live out her life in loneliness after losing the love of her life (to divorce in this case) like your friend. She was my Mom. And she died alone and an alcoholic in her little apartment when she was 60.
As horrifyingly sad as her demise was, the rest of her life after my Dad was gone from it was not always unbearable. She sobered up for 12 years between when I was 13 and 25, and she and I had some truly wonderful times in those years. She was the best friend I ever had. We talked about so much and laughed so hard sometimes that I think we both felt like we could paw the white out of the moon, we'd had such a good time. But she never so much as dated another man again, let alone fell in love with one. She said no one could hold a candle to my father - that that was the way it always was and the way it always would be.
I like to think of Ennis finding a good measure of happiness with Alma, Jr., and then with her children, in that way. My Mom *adored* my oldest brother's two little girls. They were the lights of her life, and she babysat them all day when they were babies so my brother and his wife at the time could work. She loved it - it gave her no end of joy. But when he and his wife decided that she was going to quit working and stay home with them, and she told my Mom she didn't want her help anymore (they didn't get along - I think because she was jealous of how close she and and my brother and all of us were), she took to drinking again. She died two years after that.
I like the way you see it, Jeff - not of Ennis dying in utter despair like she did, but having come to, if not being fully healed from his loss, accepting it and being able to glean some happiness from what's left of his life. That was where my Mom was at when she was still caring for my nieces every day. I'd have much rather known she died in the midst of that bit of happiness than two years later and that much more miserable.
Jeff Wrangler:
Barb,
I'm so sorry to hear the circumstances of your mother's death, but I'm sure you must really treasure the memories of the fun times you had with her during the good years. I'm glad you have those times to remember.
Jeff
ednbarby:
--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on May 26, 2006, 02:05:50 pm ---Barb,
I'm so sorry to hear the circumstances of your mother's death, but I'm sure you must really treasure the memories of the fun times you had with her during the good years. I'm glad you have those times to remember.
--- End quote ---
Thanks, sweetheart. Didn't mean for it to be a downer post - really more a testament that someone who's faced a loss similar (granted, not nearly as tragic) to Ennis' can still get some measure of happiness from life without another love partner, as long as they have some form of love in their lives.
Jeff Wrangler:
--- Quote from: ednbarby on May 26, 2006, 02:55:40 pm ---Thanks, sweetheart. Didn't mean for it to be a downer post - really more a testament that someone who's faced a loss similar (granted, not nearly as tragic) to Ennis' can still get some measure of happiness from life without another love partner, as long as they have some form of love in their lives.
--- End quote ---
I, for one, certainly understood what you meant. That's been my own experience, more or less, in my own life since the death of my boyfriend, and--I'm not quite sure how to say this--but it was kind of gratifying--maybe comforting would be better--to hear that my own experience isn't unique, and therefore my fictional imaginings of what Ennis's life might have been like after Jack's death were within the realm of the possible--because this sort of experience does really happen to people.
I mean, I hope this doesn't sound weird, but, for example, reading about your mother and your brother's children made me think of what I had imagined about Ennis and Alma, Jr.,'s children--your mother in reality and Ennis in my fanfiction both took great joy in their grandchildren. So when I wrote that about Ennis, I wasn't just "making something up," I was tapping into something that really happens to people.
ednbarby:
--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on May 26, 2006, 03:38:44 pm ---So when I wrote that about Ennis, I wasn't just "making something up," I was tapping into something that really happens to people.
--- End quote ---
Yes, it's clear in all your writings that you're doing just that. :)
(Check your PMs, by the way.)
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