Unfinished Business
January 24, 2019
I published a book yesterday. I’d been looking forward to it with eager joy. But when I saw it for sale on amazon.com, I froze. My brain jammed. My stomach constricted. When I began to thaw, I was confronted by an objectively foolish totally unrealistic terror rising up in my heart. I must face it. I refused to in 2017. I must face it now. Simply, I felt afraid to post the story I relate below.
April 2017
Earlier today, while listening to a YouTube version of “Be not afraid, I am with you always, Come, Follow me,” I began to sob with grief over lost opportunities to love, over years lost to fear. I cried out words of forgiveness for the would-be murderer in this bit of unfinished business. The words, “I forgive him. I forgive him.” rose again and again.
I was surprised. I rarely recalled the incident. I didn’t know the man needed forgiving. I didn’t know that I hadn’t forgiven him. I’d never realized that his intrusion into my life was still troubling me, still had consequences.
I thanked God for mercifully reopening a place that had been clogged for decades. A clear soft inner voice told me to seal the holy encounter by publishing on-line the account I’d written a few years earlier. I couldn’t. I was afraid. That wasn’t the first time I balked over it. The first time was back in 2010, when I began to write it all down. Here’s a bit of that original copy.
May 16, 2010
My old-fashioned doughnut was crisp, its crackling edges doused with powered sugar; my husband’s Bismark was messy and soft, crème filled with glazed frosting. We lingered at the Sunday breakfast table, talking more than usual.
The morning had begun routinely, with no foreboding that the chaos of repressed trauma was stirring inside, ready to bubble up. My husband awakened early. While I slept he listened to an NPR interview on autism and modes of thinking. He was eager to talk about it and I was intensely interested because, in the spring of 1970, at the age of thirty, my primary thinking process suddenly changed from pictures to words.
We speculated about the effects of trauma on the mind. As our conversation dwindled, we dallied over Sunday breakfast. Nibbling up the last crumbs of doughnut and enjoying richly creamed coffee, my eyes turned toward the windows, looking out upon the fields and woods around our farmland home.
Our window casements became frames for living views. Steamy white jet streams dissolved into clear blue skies; turkey vultures, tipping their wings, scanned for food in wide circles above the fields. Swaths and eddies of greens and mauves were deepening their spread across the distant woods before my eyes. My husband scanned for deer; I drifted off into a dream-stirring landscape blushing with spring. Through the open deck door, the clean scent of last night’s rains and the freshness of fast growing grasses teased away the stale hangovers of house-tight winter air.
Suddenly, without warning, my perceptions shifted. A long-gone spring day in a distant state became more alive to me than present-time reality. Time’s warp had mysteriously expanded to move me backwards—perhaps even forty years to the day. I began to relive a buried incident that I generally preferred to forget. Breathing in then and breathing out now, I straddled two worlds—with a difference. What I’d once lived alone, I now shared, telling my husband about a day that had twisted my life into strange shapes and turned me in unexpected directions. While I talked, he silently prayed.
About a Week Later, Still Spring of 2010
Talking to my husband last Sunday was jarring. I jumped in with both feet. Today, writing it down, I steady myself against the shock of sudden entry. My thoughts meander —asking, “What broke my protective forgetfulness? Was it the aura of Spring? Our conversation about modes of thinking? Or did those doughnuts remind me of the comforting box of doughnuts my family and I opened at my Mom and Dad’s kitchen table the morning after it happened?”
Only then, as the inconsequential memories merged, could I begin to face the other memories, the emotions and fears, the unfinished business from a day that clings unbidden on my soul. I’d mentally written it off as an inaccessible will o’ the wisp—although actually, those days were never forgotten, the events were too, too sharply etched upon my brain cells—they were always easy to recall. I’d shared them, with detachment, more than once. But I’d always denied my feelings. The impact of those buried emotions, denied and ignored, has been dancing and hovering at the edge of my consciousness, out of reach, always out of reach since 1970.
It was A Day that Happened. It came, it went; it left a trail of consequences. I know a reader might be thinking, “Why don’t you get to the point?” That’s it. I can’t. I’m like millions of others who fear the dark. I’m still skirting it, taking the long way around. Ordinary life moved out—without good-byes, with no debriefing, no closure. It left an empty place inside my chest; it left part of me unresolved; it left an aching for balm. My badge in boundaries, always insecure, is still frayed and thin around the people and events involved.
“If only . . . ” Poison words! Right? Unhealthy. I get stuck in if–onlys. If only all the people involved could come back together and we could talk. If only I could hear their part in the story. If only I could tell mine. But it’s impossible. I’ve lost contact with everyone. I remember that Jesus wipes away all tears. I tell myself to trust Him, to surrender to His natural processes— all of them—forgiveness, prayer, deliverance, support groups, counselors and time. I know I must intentionally choose to accept what is—and what isn’t—what can be done— and what can’t, what is given and what is gone. As the slogan says, “Let go and let God.” Let Him turn on the lights, solve the puzzles, answer the questions and heal all wounds. Today, there’s grace for honesty about unfinished business, but in weaker moments a self-pleasing script helps me compartmentalize, cope and deny. It reads something like this—
Thanks to hard work, answered prayer, loving friends and family, thanks to God’s grace and the passage of time, almost all of my old fears have melted away, the old inner conflicts are resolved, the disturbances calmed; the messes in thinking and relationships are cleaned up; light has replaced my darkness and peace and order fill my home.
And, it’s true. I function responsibly. To quote St. Forest Gump, “That’s all there is to that.”
Then why is it hard, almost damnably hard for me to get to the point and write about what happened? In part, it’s because the truth embarrasses me. The gashes I’ve determined to hide, my intensely personal reaction to a trauma that threw me out of kilter, changed my orbit and messed up my mind for a decade was minor, miniscule, a mere mosquito bite compared to the horrors of war, the violations of rape, the life changing disasters of flood and fire that countless others have endured and overcome. It didn’t even happen to me. It was directed against another person. It’s my fault if I can’t get over it. Since childhood my friends and family have been saying I’m too sensitive and need to toughen up.
So—I’d put it all away, behind me, until the budding trees and growing grass, the crispness of sugary fried doughnuts and an NPR radio conversation shattered the glassy walls encapsulating my fear and pain and I started to tell my husband.
Last Sunday the words came and came. The searing in my heart pushed them out, strong. I needed to talk—on and on. My husband listened until the words ran dry. But the processing went on in my head, relentlessly. All week I’ve wondered, “Did anyone ever suspect what that weekend did to me?” Talking and thinking were far easier than putting words on paper today. I’m a writer. Writers want readers. I’m not sure if I want readers for this. I don’t want any flailing attempts at getting fixed to backfire or hurt others. The Holy Spirit has been teaching me to wait for His peace, to listen for inner checks before all significant decisions or disclosures. Disclosures? Why do I fear the truth? (That’s another story.) I didn’t do anything wrong.
Being in a wheelchair is a blessing this morning. It not only gives my leg time to heal but it also slows me down for the important things in life—like reflection.
More than anything, I want to contact Able. I ache to talk with him. He was there. My desire almost obscures reason. I’m convinced that he could fill in the details for me. He might bring the closure I seek. But first, I must finish writing it down. Maybe I’ll write it to him. Then, maybe, I’ll email him. Maybe. I take courage and continue to write—pages and pages.
Fall 2011
I pull out my unfinished manuscript and begin to edit it and add to it. Last year, when I wrote out a full description, I was in a wheel chair. I’m well out of it and growing steadier on my feet—a trainer coaches me toward balance, strength and stamina, After writing out all my memories, I emailed Able. I wanted closure. I briefly asked him what happened, especially to her. It was a dead end. He had no recall of the event, none at all. He was pleasant, cordial even, but an inner check stopped me from mailing my manuscript or bringing up any details. I’d been nonplussed. How could he forget? Did he need the security of denial or the peace of forgetfulness? I felt caution—a need to be careful of him, careful for him. We exchanged a few emails, but keeping in touch felt dicey. It stirred up too much from the past. I was afraid to jog his memory. I didn’t want to hurt him—or me.
But I still speculate about his forgetfulness. Was his mind failing or was he traumatized too? Might his stability and balance rest on denials—like mine had? Being called from bed in the middle of the night into the aftermath of violence is not a triviality to be soon forgotten.
As a writer I know it’s time to stop all this hemming and hawing and get on with the story, but I can’t. I’m not ready. In this rewrite, Able has become my only audience, my imaginary reader. I don’t feel safe about letting him read it, but last year I read my memories to my best friend and a therapist friend. It hit both women and my husband that I’ve been living with unrecognized symptoms of post-traumatic stress for forty years. It makes sense; it explains. Without details, I tell my children and a cousin; it makes sense to them.
As I read the 2010 manuscript, I see that it beats around the bush too, delays, detours, and exasperatingly builds up, only to skirt around what actually happened. Just like I’m doing today. It begins: An autobiographical description of an incident that perhaps triggered life-changing modes of thought and Post Traumatic Stress
I begin to revise and write more. Stalled in an indecisive nanosecond, I look upward for a divine Presence to swoop in with supernatural understanding, wisdom, and peace. I ask, “Lord? Will you?” I hear silence, and am pressed to write on, to clarify, augment, delete—always seeking honesty. Maybe angelic scribes will intervene before I finish writing. I hope. I hope. If all this introspective tarrying bores me, it will surely bore some readers. My words will be dismissed as self-absorption, exhibitionism, and discounted as personal therapy—drivel— to all but me. A few curious may read to the end out of curiosity, and hopefully a reader or two might even appreciate a literary artfulness, a realism in all this beating around the bush. Confronting buried fear and facing denials takes courage. Some of us can jump into deep water off a high dive, others need the safety of putting one toe in the water and wading out into deep water carefully, cautiously. Maybe my hesitations will be a vicarious help to a reader facing their own traumas; maybe they will help a reader be patient and understanding about the reluctance off a PTSD victim they love who is struggling against encountering the triggers of their own trauma and and “getting over it.
If I didn’t know the ending, I’d be anticipating events far worse than my sad little story’s climax and denouement. At first I procrastinated with resolution because I don’t know where to start. Now I delay because I don’t want to describe that night.
In 2010, I started with the setting. I needed it. Able might need it too. He has aged too. His mind might be weakening, his memory fading. He’s a political creature, a man’s man with executive and administrative abilities; men who live vitally in the present world of concrete realities often weaken and lose faculties, memories, they don’t use. He had a difficult time that night too. Would he blank it out? Traumas have a way of hiding, readjusting themselves to suit. Was he doing drugs back then? LSD and pot like his friends? Did he get wasted to block off pressures? Highly unlikely, I never suspected it, I saw no evidence—but I’m searching for understanding and a drug-messed memory would solve more than one conundrum.
Maybe we were too disappointed, too disillusioned to keep a dream alive. Once I read that young people write poetry, but only true poets persevere after the passions of their youth have dulled. Was the Utopian dream we briefly shared an illusion, too passionate, too youthful, too pure for our maturity to sustain? Do memories wake up to live on in me alone? Alone…how dreary. How useless. Like days without God.
For context and historical record, I choose the long road. I write pages and pages to chronicle my slice of the 1970’s.
The Times and Setting – Spring 1970
I describe the November night my husband turned to me in bed and begged me to leave— it was after watching a matinee of Alice’s Restaurant. I detail the dreary New Year’s Day that the children and I left, pulling away from the security of our comfortable home and driving to the farm. I write about the farm staff, the farm landscape, the small insecure farm bungalow that the children and I temporarily moved into while the director and his family took their sabbatical. And I describe Able, the interim director. I call him my “Bridge over Troubled Waters, like the Simon and Garfunkel song. I write pages and pages. Then, I duplicate it and delete everything until I get to the set up for my trouble. That matters to my story. And then I wonder why, all of a sudden, this slice of my life, this true, taunting, haunting autobiographical chronicle of reality has become “a story.” I’m relieved. I can choose to identify with a story or distance myself from it.
The Set Up
The farm the children and I moved to after leaving home, husband and father was an outdoor nature/ educational/recreation facility and camp for inner city groups and local schools. Before moving there, I’d agreed with the director to be hostess to weekend volunteers who stayed as guests in the basement bedroom of the director’s bungalow, our temporary home. These volunteers, sometimes a single man or woman, sometimes a married couple, served as weekend hosts to farm visitors. They welcomed new arrivals, helped to oriented them by answering questions and providing directions, made hot cocoa and kept the dining hall coffee urn full of fresh hot brew for the weekend’s influx of groups. An agreed upon schedule of visiting weekend hosts was posted on the wall beside my kitchen door.
These weekend volunteers and my family’s stay at the farm were both token tributes to stability and normalcy, to safely middle class conservatism. My family’s presence also guaranteed that the staff would not turn the director’s home into a party house. In 1970 LSD and marijuana were an intriguing experiment in the spiritual search for many young people. Timothy Leary’s advocacy of mind expansion through drugs was taken seriously. Books on situational ethics were popular. Many farm staffers were conscientious objectors and had chosen the farm as alternate service. Some were on the fringes of the hippie generation vividly pictured through the Washington D.C. scenes of Jenny and her friends in the film Forest Gump. They seemed to respect me, but kept their distance.
I was no hippie and my beatnik days had dissolved a decade earlier with marriage and motherhood. On Sundays my children and I went to Sunday school. I washed on Mondays and didn’t like drugs or keep beer in the fridge. The director’s house was off limits to everyone but me, my children, the weekend farm hosts and Able, the interim director, who, carefully skirting the children and me, occasionally used the basement director’s office for phone calls and perhaps a retreat from pressure.
Leading up to it.
One weekend in April or early May, I didn’t want the volunteer farm hosts to come. It felt dark. Not right. Not good. Until then all had gone smoothly. I’d done everything the director and Able had asked of me. No wild parties had come near the house. I’d cleaned and scrubbed and fixed until it was in better shape than when we’d moved in. At Abel’s request, I’d stayed away from the more public guest areas of the facility. I’d been a courteous hostess and maid for the weekend visitors who stayed in our basement: I’d dusted, vacuumed, made up their beds with fresh sheets, put out fresh towels and put flowers or pungent evergreens on their dresser.
But when Able said he had invited one final couple to serve as hosts for one last weekend, I told him it didn’t feel right. I didn’t want these last guests. First off, this couple wasn’t on the agreed schedule, they were add-ons, not asked by the director—but that wasn’t it. It was intuition. Warning.
Able asked to come over to talk about it. I was thrilled. I was lonely. I wanted to get to know him better. But I waited for him all evening—seven o’clock, eight, nine—when he finally knocked on the door, it was after my normal bedtime, long after I’d given up hope of seeing him. Waiting had triggered memories of my marriage—the long hours of keeping suppers warm and putting our children to bed alone while my husband stopped for yet another scotch on the rocks. When Able arrived I was unreasonably upset, triggered, like a vulnerable little girl. I pounded on his chest. He stood steady, unbending like a tree. I calmed quickly. Our voices woke my three-year old daughter. She cuddled up beside me on the couch as we talked reasonably.
He was totally polite and quite formal as he persuaded me to change my mind. He’d already asked a woman and her partner; he didn’t want to go back on his invitation. He said it was going to be a big weekend with lots of guests; he needed their help. I didn’t mind the work or the idea of it. Other folks had stayed with us. But this time it felt funny, different. I was uneasy. Did I know they weren’t married to each other? Would it have mattered? He assured me it would be fine—they would be the last guests of the season.
Embarrassed by my earlier behavior, swallowing unwillingness, I agreed. At that, he left immediately. Just being near him was always calming. He inspired faith. With him nearby I always felt safe—almost as if my grandpa were alive again, covering me with protective love. I really liked him and wanted him to like me. I thought he did. I hoped he did.
Needy women often misread single men—and they, in turn, often give confusing messages. Able was a man of faith, intent on living out the implications of the incarnation in secular settings. That meant helping others. I needed help. I was an agnostic. My marriage had been so shredded that three pastors had told me it was no longer a marriage; all three had encouraged me to leave my husband months before he begged me to leave and made the decision final. I was in a vulnerable recovery and transition time. Abel’s faith and integrity inspired me. I trusted him. I leaned on him. I caved easily.
So, that week I cleaned the master bedroom again, put fresh sheets on the bed and a vase with fresh greens on the dresser. I don’t remember if the couple arrived on Thursday or Friday. They weren’t there to visit me, only to help at the farm. The woman’s young sons came along; her boys stayed in bunk beds in the farm bunkhouse.
It
It happened on Friday night. She was a petite blonde, more than movie-star pretty, with delicacy in every bone and turn. He was big, not fat, big and beautiful. Tall. Filled out in every proportion like an almost mythical giant-warrior-king or a Harlem Globe Trotter. Her Scandinavian skin was pinkly pearl-like in contrast to his dark chocolate. Had I heard her story?
Able had said that she was a pastor’s wife. Her husband was divorcing her. Or was she divorcing him? Whatever it was, it was sad. Able saw her need, or so I thought. He seemed to honor her, like a princess. It seemed he was helping her, just as he helped me. Her partner that night was her new friend.
All seemed well. My forebodings felt foolish. The couple’s presence in the basement was not intrusive. My three children had normal baths and bedtimes. I fell asleep easily and deeply. Screams awakened me. A woman’s screams. Loud. Urgent. High-pitched calls for help. Did I even put on a bathrobe? I hurried through the dark hallway from the bedroom, around the corner and down the hall toward the front entry to open the door to the basement. Looking down the stairs, I flicked on the light switch. One bulb lit the area directly below.
She stood on the bottom stair, twisted, bent, one hand on the railing, wanting to climb up, the other hand turned toward him, upraised, to protect her head. Blood was running down her face and arm. He stood a couple of feet behind her at the foot of the stairs, trying to stop her escape. One big hand reached out toward her, the other hand was high above his head, fist clenched, poised to come down on her again. I don’t remember what she was wearing; I think her nightgown. He was naked. His arm wasn’t the only thing upraised. His male part, bigger than imagination, looked long as a codpiece in a medieval play; it was upraised too.
I cried, “Stop it!” loudly and went down the stairs to help her up. He stopped, and with our backs turned to him, I helped her up to the kitchen. I paid no attention to him. I forgot about him. She was bleeding profusely and needed help.
We were in the kitchen, wiping away blood with wet washcloths, trying to find the deeper wound-spots needing firm direct pressure to stop the bleeding when he came upstairs, fully dressed and threatening. In hindsight, over forty years later, I wonder why we didn’t call for help immediately. I think I know why. I think she was in shock. I don’t know what state I was in. My actions were automatic. When I saw the blood my first thought was to stop it. We had to clean it up. We didn’t know how severely she was hurt. We had to stop the bleeding first. Even in hindsight it makes sense to stop the bleeding immediately—which we were trying to do.
The next minutes are a jumble. Threatening her, he filled the small kitchen as he stood over us. At first, I ignored him. I remember washing out more than one cloth, bathing many cuts and bruises on her head. Somehow, she and I were inside a protected circle. I was calm. He said that he wanted to finish the job, to kill her. Then he started saying that he’d kill her first and then me because I’d interfered and stopped him.
He wasn’t reasonable. We needed help. He was intimidating. She seemed stunned, withdrawn, focused on her own pain and what was happening to her body. She barely interacted with him. I wanted to call for help. My three children were sleeping just down the hall. The boys, then only six and eight years old, were behind a thin wall and a hollow bedroom door, less than fifteen or twenty feet away; my little girl, only three years old, was asleep in the end room a bit further down the hall. It was a tiny house.
She needed to go to the hospital. We were his prisoners. I couldn’t leave my children alone. He stood between me and the phone—to keep me away from it. He talked about wanting to kill her. Eventually he sat down on the couch beside the back door; he seemed to be thinking about what he was going to do next and watched our every move. He seemed quieter, but became more threatening whenever I walked toward the phone. I insisted that we need to get help for her. Once I got close enough to pick it up, but I put it back immediately because of the way he said, “Don’t call anyone!”
She sat at the picnic table and bench that served as our kitchen table and chairs.
I didn’t sit. She pressed wet cloths to her deepest wounds, and I rinsed out bloody washcloths at the kitchen sink. We could apply no more first aid ourselves, and some of his hits had opened her skin deeply. Stitches were needed.
Looking over at him, I noticed that his hands were also covered with blood. Compassion flooded me; I turned toward him. “You were hurt too! Let me take care of you.” I rinsed out a washcloth with warm water in the kitchen sink, got a bar of soap, and walked over to help. Taking his huge hands in mine I began to wash off the blood, looking for injuries. The blood was hers.
His mood changed instantly. His attention was diverted from us as he looked down at his hands—almost in wonder. He softened. He began to speak almost sanely. The dialogue continued about calling someone for help. He wouldn’t let me call the police. He wouldn’t let me call a doctor. I went through the names of resident farm staff. He wouldn’t let me call the J’s or the B’s. No, I couldn’t call the H’s. Finally he agreed. He said I could make one telephone call— to Able, just one—and only to Able. He said, “I trust him.” (or was it “I like him?” Or “He’s a good man?” It was something like that.) But, he soberly threatened. If I called anyone else he’d kill us both— and I couldn’t tell Able what was going on over the phone. Not one word over the phone about what had happened. I could just ask him to come over. If I promised and did just what he said, and if Able came, he would talk to Able. Yes, he said, he trusted him.
Was she still or did she take part in the conversation? All I remember her saying was, “I need to go to the hospital.” I think she was silent. Do I remember quiet tears or am I making that up? How wounded she must have been.
I’ve no idea what time it was. Was it two, maybe even three in the morning before he finally let me dial Able’s number, waking him from sleep?
Able sounded irritated. He’d been asleep. He didn’t want to come. He put me off. I kept asking him, “Right away! Now!” He was reluctant. My calm was weakening, moving into desperation. Fear crept around my edges; it must have moved into my voice. Finally Able said,” Okay, I’ll come.” He must have heard my urgency.
We waited. I don’t remember how long. On arrival, he said that he knew from my voice that something was wrong. Poor fellow. He didn’t know what he was getting into. There was more verbal conflict, but now I felt safe. Able persuaded the man to leave and they left together. What a relief when he took the man away. Did he call someone to stay with my children so I could take her to the hospital? Or did I call someone? I don’t remember, but someone came. I helped her dress and we drove through the night to town, to the hospital. Our arrival woke up a sleepy emergency room staff. She required many stitches. When they asked me to leave the emergency room, the wait on a hard bench in the hospital room corridor seemed long.
She came out with bandages on her face and head, her arm was wrapped in a sling. Was the bone also broken? Was a rib hurt too or am I adding to memory?
The morning sun was rising as we drove back to the farm. What came next? Where did we park my car? Almost frantic, controlling her fear, she directed me to the bunkhouses where her sons had spent the night. I stayed close alongside of her as she hurried to find her sleeping boys. The walks outside the bunkhouse were quiet and empty; the only noise was the creak of the screen door as we tiptoed into the dimmed bunk room, trying not to awaken the slumbering children. She reached out to touch one son with reassurance, to give another a mother’s kiss. Relieved to be with her children, promising that she’d be okay and only wanting to sleep, she insisted on sending me home. After seeing her safely into an empty lower bunk and covering her with a green army blanket, with mixed feelings—reluctant to leave her but exhausted and grateful to turn toward home, I hurried across the green to my own children.
Afterward
I do not know how she spent the day. I hope in the safety of someone’s home, with comfort and care.
That Saturday was memorable. I was short of sleep. An abnormal fatigue buzzed through my head. Early that morning the farm activity director, who had never visited me, barged in the house. She didn’t knock; she didn’t say good morning or how are you. She only said, “Where’s Able?” She walked around the room, eyes searching, as if she expected to find him; she looked me over, terse, tight, upset, asking why I’d called Able instead of her. I told her I didn’t have much of a choice. The man had threatened to kill us both. He only wanted Able. He was calling the shots, not me. He said he’d talk to Able. The activity director left, as abruptly and rudely as she’d come, perhaps not believing me.
The day itself was beautiful, perfect temperatures, light breezes, the fullness of spring. Mid-morning, I took the children into town to visit my parents. A box of doughnuts, a special treat for us all, was open on the kitchen table. The children gobbled theirs and ran out to play. Calmly, as if describing a movie about someone else, I ate my doughnut, drank a glass of milk, and told my parents about the night’s terror. They were concerned. I wasn’t. Perhaps I was numb from shock. I’d an impromptu noon wedding to attend and needed to buy a gift and pick the flowers that I’d promised for the bride’s bouquet. As usual, my mind was clear, ordered, and flexible; the day flowed easily with familiar structure and in peace. (If you’re interested, you can read about the wedding on my website, it’s a reminiscence named “Charley and Sheila.”)
After the wedding, the children and I drove back to our temporary farm home for dinner. I’d promised them we could go back to town to the carnival that night. I was glad to say yes when someone asked if her two sons could join us. Able gave me a couple dollars to treat her boys. We checked out every booth and ride on the grassy carnival grounds. My little girl picked yellow rubber ducks out of cold water; we all cheered and watched as one of her sons won a kewpie doll; and everyone, including me, rode the tilt-a-whirl. We all ate cotton candy and didn’t leave until the sun was down, the moon was rising and our money ran out. I didn’t see her when we returned. I never saw her again. I wasn’t told what happened to the man who hurt her. I can’t recall their names. And I’ve disliked carnivals since that night.
A couple days later, when my boys were in school, my daughter was napping, and every group and guest was gone from the farm, I walked across the green between our house to the main buildings. I wanted to debrief. I needed to talk—to ask how she was, to find out what happened to her abuser, to know what upset the activity director, to be sure that Able was okay.
Able and the camp accountant were alone in the office. No one else was around. I knocked on the locked screen door and they let me in. I asked. It was awkward. I felt like I’d done something wrong. Able was silent. The accountant said Able didn’t want to talk about it, that it had been a difficult time for him. The accountant looked down and almost mumbled about Able having a hard time. He said it under his breath, almost as if Able didn’t know what happened, like he was telling Able about it too or making something up for him. I later heard that Able had driven the woman and her children back to the city on Sunday. How could he forget that?
I wondered if there’d been force or a fight. I wondered if the police had been involved. I wasn’t told. Later, another staff person told me that the couple had met in a mental institution. She’d been released a couple of weeks earlier; he’d been released that week. After that night, he was readmitted. That was all I was told.
That was all. All. If there was more, I’ve blocked it out. I left the office still needing to hear what happened that night, still needing to know if she was okay, needing to know if Able was okay, needing to know what he had done and gone through. Needing to talk. I wanted to share what I’d been through with others who were involved. No one told me anything. No one asked me about my role. No one heard my part. No one wanted to.
I still wonder, were the police involved? The hospital should have filed a violence report. How did the man get back to the mental hospital? No one told me what happened. Did they do drugs together that night? Was Able hurt? The man was huge. Threatening. He had been violent. What was so hush-hush?
I walked away from the office feeling utterly unwanted, that my desire to debrief was an intrusion. Did I do wrong? Why was my question inappropriate and unwelcome? Embarrassing? What was wrong with me? Were others accusing me? What happened to Able that night? Not until writing this, forty years later, did the thought cross my mind that the official version of events that others heard and understood might have misrepresented truth. Did others blame me? Think I did wrong? Or did Able feel guilty? Did he blame himself? Was he hurt?
I tell myself, “God’s bigger. He sits in the heavens and laughs, releasing redemption into the foulest places, if only we ask.” I asked.
I’ve asked more than once, was a curse released? Very shortly after that, on a dark night, another man, part of the staff, was waiting for me in the shadows beneath the giant oak outside the tiny house we lived in. I was alone, walking from the car to the house when he stepped out, stopping me. Immediately I sensed that sexual assault, even rape, was in his eye and tone. Knowing him distantly, I started asking him cogent questions about himself and his life and he was diverted.
A few days later, I think the very next Thursday, on another warm spring evening, once again after dark while walking the short distance from our tan Mercury Comet to the house, I suddenly felt afraid. I’d been gripped by fear before. With an almost OCD hold, a fear of tornadoes had once plagued me, but this fear was different, it held my heart in its hands. I was afraid the big man was going to come back and keep his promises. I feared he’d fulfill his threat to kill me. I told no one. I hid it. I had no one to talk with. No one I trusted wanted to talk with me.
Continuing
Not long after that, I developed a brief but intensely painful rash on my feet. I could not walk to care for my children. My parents took them in while I recovered in isolation, alone in the little farm bungalow living room. I could not walk, so I crawled. No one on the staff knew; no one called; no one came to visit.
Then, about this time, my mind changed. Strange thoughts, whole conversations, began to speak words into my head. Until then I’d thought in pictures. Now torrents of unstoppable words filled my brainwaves. I clearly recall standing by that picnic table in the kitchen, standing right where she had sat that night and thinking, “If I’d take the time to write all this down, America would finally have her “Great American Novel” and I’d be the author.” How grandiose. I wrote nothing down and ignored the voices and words. I had to. I was a mother; first of all I had to take care of my children.
Until those voices came, my mind had been generally still, serene and ordered. About that time, I began to paint pictures, as if I were another person, not myself—or maybe my real self? Soon, my fears became generalized. That summer, 1970, was a hot one; back then open windows were our only air conditioning, but I insisted on keeping all my windows tightly shut and locked on the hottest of nights. Fear escalated; two years later I feared to go to Chicago—it was during the cold war and if a bomb might fall, I couldn’t stand the thought of separation from my three children. Once fear takes hold, it becomes irrational in finding reasons to justify and extend its control.
Repercussions – Summer 1970
My need for healing from that weekend of violence and isolation was exacerbated about two months later by another trauma. This time it was a spiritual intrusion, not a physical event. It began as a thrust of destruction from a dark spirit—the kind of demonic manifestation one reads about coming out of witchcraft and voodoo curses. i’m not saying it was that— someone, as a joke, might have slipped a psychedelic drug into my drinking water. Shortly after, I developed lupus symptoms— perhaps a few capillaries broke in my brain. Maybe I had a psychotic breakdown triggered by a real event that night, or, possibly, it was a one-time symptom of post traumatic stress from the fear that bit me that night two months earlier.
Does it matter? Whatever happened, I stood on the edge of insanity until God broke through with a ray of lightI saw a light more real that the sun or any electric bulb coming toward me through the darkness and pierced through my forehead into my brain. It supernaturally preserved my mind. I held onto that ray of light for three days and nights, pacing the floor and praying, “Jesus have mercy on me.” He did. Mercifully. I only lost my ability to function for those intense three days. But my physical health was broken; I had lupus fevers for six months; my head hurt, almost without stop, for eighteen years, and strangely misunderstood side effects (like seeing into the invisible world) followed the experience. Fortunately, I could usually hide my struggles and continued to function as a homemaker, employee and responsible mother. Jesus did have mercy on me.
Were the two traumas related? I may never know. I do know that instantly, I became a believer. That flash of light into my brain destroyed all agnosticism. God’s intervention was real. His light saved me and His mercy led me to seek Him. Trusting Jesus upon the cross, seeing that evil and darkness could not erase His goodness and light, and growing to understand that God’s love is predicated on a freedom that allows human choice for good as well as for evil helps me live with unanswered questions I may not have fully given to God.
It took years to build courage. Occasionally, losses are restored in a flash, by supernatural breakthroughs of healing or deliverance. Most often restoration is process. Recovering from embedded fear requires building new strong neural pathways to override the fearful ones. Eventually, my love for God grew stronger than my fears, my desire to follow Him became stronger than my insecurities, and my trust in His ability and wisdom became greater than my lack of confidence and understanding.
But the questions remain. I still ask, “Have I harmed others?” Not knowing, I find comfort in knowing that it was for people like me (who have unresolved questions about our own guilt and need for forgiveness) that God gave Moses sacrifices for unintentional and unknown sins. And since Jesus fulfilled the laws given to Moses, it is reassuring to know that in Him, by His blood-sacrifice, I’m forgiven.
Today is good. After Peniel Jacob limped, but he knew God. Although that season of trauma was not reflective of how most of us usually understand God’s goodness or Jesus’ nature, for me it has all worked for the good. The light of God that shone into the darkness of those days continues to weave golden threads of life through His present purposes for me on earth. May His life in me shine on as a ray of light that has overcome the darkness that once tried to consume a human soul—me.
But— Finishing Old Business, January 2019
My May 2017 ending would have been a good place to stop. I thought I had worked it all through; I thought I was done with fear. I was wrong—again. Once before I’d beaten fear to the ground. It was in the 1990’s when a journey to visit friends took me around the world. As the Aeroflot from Seoul, South Korea bounced it’s way into the Moscow airport and seasoned Russian travelers clenched their fists and blanched, I rested in faith. A few years later, in 2000, I thought I’d put fear down for good when I took another huge step by remarrying my husband after thirty years apart.
And again, in 2010 and 2011, when I began to talk and write about this bit of unfinished business, I thought for sure that I’d put all my fears into a coffin, closed the cover, and buried them forever. I discounted, ignored and denied as irrelevant the mild apprehensions and cautions I felt about sharing this story of mine on line or actually talking with Able about it— until yesterday, January 24, 2019. Then, it came up again. Just yesterday. It came up huge!
Yesterday, as I said, I published Giving, a book of poems with Kindle Direct Print. I’d been eager, joyous, and excited about this book. It is different than my other books. These poems are early ones— I began them in the 1980’s when I was taking huge steps to pull away from pain and fear and into a courageous, healthier, happier new life. The poems are not about me as much as they are about God and my love for Him and how good He is. Yesterday, the very instant I saw the cover on amazon.com, I froze with fear.
My head stopped. My stomach got tighter than a golf ball. I knew I could not advertise or share this book until I had faced my fears, all of them. My fears ran from mild and unlikely fears—fears that my dead parents, my family, my cousins, would dislike my book, to moderately possible fears—fears that post-Christian liberals will lambast the heart-felt devotion in these poems, to wild projections like a jihadist sniper wiping me out in retaliation for my witness to Jesus. I’ve been sane and fear-free too long to tolerate such spooky projections.
I’ve published other books of poetry. Boxes of them sit in my basement. Those books can just sit there—that’s okay, they’re mine. But this latest book, Giving, is not mine. I believe it is God’s. I believe that God gave much of it to me and that the Holy Spirit wants to talk with many people through my simple rhymes. If that happens, they might inquire about me. I dread that. Why? Do I still fear that man will find me and hurt me?
Publishing this on my website is a fear I will face. It’s hypocritical to speak of God’s love, a love that casts out fears, if I’m still hiding from a nameless abuser who hurt a nameless lady and threatened me almost fifty years ago.
I’m also afraid to talk with Able about what happened that night. I’m afraid of hearing what might have happened to him. I want to thank him for the goodness of his unspoken love for me and for answering the telephone. Who knows what might have happened if he hadn’t picked up that phone and come. If he has forgotten me and washed away all memory of that time and night, I haven’t. I want him to know that he is fully, totally forgiven for inviting the couple to the farm. And if he was hurt, and hasn’t forgiven me, I want to ask him to please, please forgive me for any way I may have brought hurt to him. I loved him dearly for his goodness and always will.
My determination to publish this on the inter-net is about God’s command to “Fear Not.” It’s about DOING His will by walking into and through my fears. As soon as this “Unfinished Business” is posted, I shall email my friends and family and tell them about my book.
OH — I also apologize for all the redundancy — conciseness takes time. And if you want to read my poems, enter my name, Ginny Emery, into amazon.com to draw up Giving. Fairly soon it will be for sale on my givenwordnow site too.
OH, OH— This is bigger than me. Our nation is beset by fear. If we, as believers, as citizens, don’t face and overcome our individual fears one by one, we might be pulled into climbing aboard one of many contentious controlling bandwagons, and forget about freedom, and lose our love and trust in God.
Objective observations
Before that night and its aftermath, I thought visually and lived primarily in the present; shortly after that difficult night and day I began to think in words. Following that time, my objectivity was stunted. I got stuck in the past; it was hard to get out of it. Before that, life was filled with confidence and promise. After that, I felt defeated. Before that, I had been accepted, admired and respected by many. During and after that time, I became insecure. I knew a season of rejection, condemnation and disrespect as my family’s black sheep and scapegoat. Before that, I lived in a larger community. Since then I’ve tended to isolate. Scars from the 1970’ s occasionally feed unwarranted negative or cataclysmic world views and foolish projections. For years I misunderstood the symptoms of undiagnosed post-traumatic stress. Fortunately, I’ve been carried forward, one day at a time, by my love for God and by His continuing restoration and healing Today is good—Very Good! Life in Jesus is full of peace and joy! So, despite the challenges of aging, life keeps getting better.
