Another Spring Night

What happens to the soul as sorrows stack?

Rod Sot on Unsplash

When I feel tired in the mornings and empty after meals, I look at the calendar. Two years ago, my parents moved to Japan. Five years ago, I spent Memorial Day apart. Eight years ago, my aunt died. In the spring, these sorrows stack, strata of sorrow through which I sift, searching for soft silence. When I strike a vein of tears, I wonder what my daughter thinks. Can she taste the grief in my milk? Or does she feel the softening of my spine?


Nine years ago this week, I made a promise to my First Husband; until death us do part. It was a Sunday morning. The church was filled with incense and witnesses.


To celebrate the anniversary of that First Wedding, he and I would go to Trotter’s Cafe and Bakery to eat Carolina-style pulled pork. I would request mine on focaccia. We would both get wedges of redly seasoned fries on the side.


Year four and the writing was on the wall. We went to Trotter’s anyway. We made small talk and a point of looking each other in the eye.


After the bewritten wall crumbled, I recruited my friends for a four-and-a-half year anniversary celebration. We went to a different place for pulled pork, followed by a vodka bar. Our server was attractive and in my age bracket. I wrote my number on the back of the check. No one called.


By year five, the First Wedding Anniversary had a more clever name: Anniversary-Not-Sorry. For year seven, my future fiance and I went to Brasa. We sat outside. He didn’t order pulled pork. He complimented the highlights in my hair. I told him it was the sun and shook my head to prove it.


Last year, I made the pulled pork. My husband made sourdough buns.


The traditional gift for a ninth wedding anniversary is pottery. “Maybe I will smash some pottery tomorrow,” I texted my burner friend on Wednesday.


“Smashing pottery seems good,” he replied. “Artistic deconstruction.”


Thursday came. I didn’t smash any pottery. My husband made two pizzas with sourdough crusts. He put tinned sardines on one and sweet potato on both.


All edges soften with time, use, grace. The sharp edge of the First Wedding Anniversary blurs in the distance. The cold edge of Anniversary-Not-Sorry wears away to Another Spring Night. Down by the river, frogs begin to trill.



If you’d like to read more about my journey, click here: Life.