Napa
It was time to get on a plane, one of my sacred spaces.
But this meant I wouldn’t be taking Stella to school in the morning. I wouldn’t be there to hold her or sit shiva with her. And I was scared out of my mind. Already covered up by Grief and Anxiety, now I was leaving my anxious child.
My husband, Josh, was trying to do what he could to help me through this dark season and booked a trip for us along with our dearests, My Friend Vonda and her husband Scott, to go back to wine country which is our favorite place for the four of us to be Together away from home. He made arrangements at our favorite hotel in Sonoma.
We drove over to my mom’s while Stella and I both tried to hold ourselves together. We walked into the house, unloaded their bags and blankies. We were avoiding the goodbye. But Josh was looking at me and at his watch and I knew, we had to go. She broke, begged me to stay. I held her on the front porch until I had to let go. We couldn’t be late.
My mother texted me, she will be okay. She was With her. My mother lived through Anxiety with me, comforted me, stayed with me. I knew she was in the best arms, the best love I could leave her with, in lieu of my own. Josh put his hand on me, tried to comfort me but let me sit with Silence and Grief as we drove away. We got to the highway for what should be another 20 minute drive to the airport and found ourselves in a parking lot. We pulled up our traffic apps, and sure enough, we were going to be late.
Frantic was along for the ride by the time we got to the airport and raced to the American Airlines stand. We were in a fucking hurry! It was still forty minutes until our flight's original departure time and the flight was showing to be delayed. We thought it would be okay. But no. They would not check our bags. We would have to wait for the next flight which was scheduled to leave an hour and a half after our original flight. We tried to tell them we were flying with another couple who was already through security and we wanted to go with our friends. No. We were too late. No exceptions.
I put my head down on the counter to avoid eye contact and extended my hand to receive my updated ticket. I knew Josh was furious, though not at me; well maybe a little at me. We got through security quickly to see that our flight which was in fact delayed, was not even fully boarded. We watched from the neighboring bar as the flight we “missed” waited on the ground for another half hour. It was maddening.
Silence stayed with us while we awkwardly had a quick bite and a drink, let our friends know what time we would be landing, shouldn’t be too long after them since their flight was delayed. They would wait for us at the airport.
I can see now that in another season of our lives, this experience would have registered on the comedy scale. Josh and Jesse running late: typical. Watching your own plane board: ironic. Passing the time over vodka: of course. But we had lost hold of lightheartedness and humor. I was covered up, wearing dark lenses casting a shadow over a relatively insignificant inconvenience. I believe if we were late to our flight today, we’d order the most expensive bottle of wine and drink it to the bottom while we laughed at ourselves and sent our friends on the plane crass text messages and awkward selfies.
When we finally boarded the plane and found our exit row seats, I employed my own calming tools. Wordless prayers. Deep breaths. And drawing. Art therapy. I had bought new calligraphy markers and a beautiful new notebook. The man sitting to my left asked me about my drawings. Oh, it’s nothing I tell him. Just trying out new markers, like a child. Just doodling. I’m an ametuer. I don’t really know what I’m doing. “It’s beautiful,” he says. I’m flattered in the most immature way but realize I’m in a pretty desperate space. No one has complimented my work in quite some time. Even my cursive handwriting being beautiful and noticed feels like Something.
My mother texted again and assured me Stella had calmed down. Josh and I were trying to let go of this awkward beginning to our time away and look forward to the respite with our friends. Trying. Deep breaths.
Thirty minutes into the flight I could feel something happening to my body. I was familiar with this feeling because I have had fainting spells throughout my life. I tapped Josh on the arm in just enough time to let him know I was going down.
When I came to, I was lying down across the three seats in my row with a strange man at my head, not the art critic sitting next to me earlier, and Josh holding my feet. I’m alright I told myself. I know how this works. I lay here for an hour recovering. If they move me, I’ll vomit. I need a cold rag and ice chips. More deep breaths. But something was off. Josh has been with me before during a fainting spell. This time he looked afraid.
He leaned down and whispered to me, “You had a seizure.”
I had my first fainting spell the morning of my eighth birthday. My sister was curling my hair in her bathroom. I went down. I went to all the specialists: cardio and neuro. MRI. EKG. Initially diagnosed with epilepsy, my parents got a second opinion and we moved on with this unknown but relatively undisruptive issue. The spells happened rarely but persisted throughout my life. But aside from that EKG at eight years old, this is the first time my body has seized.
The man at my head leaned over me. He was very calm. He is a doctor he tells me. And my vitals are all very good. I am going to be ok. He does not want me to worry. The flight attendant came over to Josh asking for us to complete some paperwork. “No,” he told her, “we aren’t doing this right now.” He was afraid. I was afraid.
I started letting my mind go into the darkness. Already a skinny woman, I’ve now lost fifteen pounds and I’m barely hanging onto 100. My hair is thinning; my face is gaunt. I look terrible. I feel terrible. Shame is there. Fear is there. Anxiety is there. All my foes have been invited to this episode. Deep breaths. There is a numb feeling all over my body.
I realize at some level, I let this happen to myself. I had been living in mini-crisis after mini-crisis for the past few years with chronic stress and more than my share of cortisol pumping through my body. Not sleeping. Not exercising. Eating for survival. Skipping meals. There was no rhythm to our life, no order to my days. There was work. And more work. A dismembering of my professional identity and my spiritual identity. Panic attacks in the back of cars and closets and bathrooms. I’d lost Something. What had I lost? How did I let myself get back to this place where Anxiety and Fear and codependency had more control over me than me.
Right there on that airplane was full stop. Mind. Body. Spirit. Total depletion. It all went too far.
By the time we landed I thought I would be able to walk off the plane. They let all the passengers off, brought on a wheelchair and I slowly tried to sit up without vomiting. I was trying to “take my time,” not feel embarrassed and pray I had not ruined this trip for us and our friends.
They wheeled me out of the plane and into the San Francisco airport and there sat Vonda and Scott.
We rode out to Sonoma together quietly through the dark night. Everyone was ready for bed. We needed a do-over on this day. Maybe tomorrow we would see Hope. Hope is always in California. I think that’s where she was born.
I woke up the next morning ravenous. Breakfast is our favorite part of this boutique hotel. The rooms are a kind of Tuscan romantic, each with their own fireplace and soaker tubs. Details are the delight there: boxed matches next to a candle by the bath, romantic music playing when you get in each night, delicate sheets, windows everywhere with views of perfectly symmetrical rows of vines divided by wildflowers.
California also has the best oxygen. Maybe it’s all those vineyards or the type of Happiness they grow there but every time I go to the valley, my lungs and my soul crack open.
After our perfect breakfast of thick, crispy bacon and fresh squeezed orange juice with poached eggs and homemade jams, we got on the road and drove to Spire, a neat collection of wines made by world class winemakers has come together under this heading for a play lab of small vineyards producing small yields. The record table was spinning The Rolling Stones when we walked in. Spotless wine glasses lined the table. I was going to be okay. This place was speaking my language.
We love winemakers and tasting rooms because they bring together passion, creative storytelling, and of course, wine. Even if they carry a slight snobbery, they have taken the pill, so to speak, drunk the Kool-Aid of science plus art, chemistry plus mystery. The gentleman taking us on the Spire journey was a former professional mascot so it’s not without irony when he starts to tell us about the very particular and beautiful process of growing the fruit which will become the wine.
“We have to train the root,” he tells us about the wines of Mount Veeder. “During their youth,” he says, the vine’s roots are trained to climb down the mountain. We have heard on more than one occasion of this Life imagery offered by the vineyards: the winemaker stresses the plant which in turn causes the vine to dig its roots deeper into the earth for moisture and nutrients. The more stress on the plant, the richer the fruit.
I looked out the window there on that grey, foggy day in the valley and I saw her walking through the vineyards: Hope was out there. She gets this. Hope knows Stress and Anxiety and Fear only grow me up, send me deeper into the journey of becoming. Hope knows these dark days where it felt like the lights were off, where that dark reality of now persisted, was making me dig deeper into the earth and into the Light and into my true self. Hope knows when we go to the Valley in January, we don’t see dead vines, we see vines that have been pruned and cut back, vines ready to grow and bear good fruit.