I'm back.

That was an ordeal.  You would think that having lived in Southern California for a decade, I would be emotionally equipped to handle forest fires.  I have, after all, dealt with them before.  But those fires were "in my vicinity," and the worst element of each was the effect the resulting air quality had on my wife's lungs.  This fire, while not nearly so dangerous as those, was actually "near me."  I'm talking consider-the-view-from-my-apartment-near-me:

I took that picture after returning home from the teaching gig that I have to wake up at 5 a.m. in order to commute to.  I was informed that I might need to evacuate at a moment's notice at approximately 7:45 p.m. on Thursday.  I started packing the car almost immediately, but kept having to sit down and force myself to breathe or I would've had a full-fledged panic attack (just in case you were wondering when I was on Facebook).  Part of the panic emanated from your typical what-to-take debate: running around the apartment evaluating the relative worth of Item X versus Item Y.  

As the night progressed, however, I became increasingly concerned that my evaluations were too much about me.  My wife is currently in Italy, where it was then currently the middle of the night.  I became haunted by the possibility that I was selecting items of marginal value to me over items of intense value to her.  So I started having to think like her—to look at our life through her eyes—the result of which was that I felt (and still feel) profoundly close to a sleeping woman half the world away. 

Nothing makes a person ache for the woman he's loved for over than decade more than an adrenalin-fueled tour of that time.  But then another possibility started dogging my thoughts: the potential for there to be something of hers that my forgetting (or remembering but valuing less than this other thing) would appear evidence of a diminished love.  Against my will—not to mention knowledge of her character—scenarios arose in which she became distraught upon learning that I had neglected to save her wedding dress but remembered the Kitchen Aid mixer. 

So after having been at this for hours I began a desperate attempt to a contact a sleeping woman on the other side of the world with no cell and sketchy internet access.  As the night deepened, exhaustion vied with adrenalin in a toxic combat that severely impaired my judgment.  I thought it perfectly acceptable to hijack her Facebook account and contact Italian friends I thought could maybe get in touch with the people staying up the road from her.  It didn't even seem like a good idea at the time: I was simply that desperate. 

What had begun as a feeling of deep reconnection with my wife became, as night turned to morning, a fear of a future condemnation by her so fundamental it would kill the marriage.  In my mind there came to exist a singular object so valuable that failure to save it would constitute grounds for divorce—not because of the loss of the object itself, but because of what my failure to save it represented about my love for and of her.  Like I said: my judgment was severely impaired.

Sometime around 4 a.m. they informed us that the winds had shifted and we would not have to be evacuated.  I had been awake for 24 hours at that point and had spent the last twelve of them trying not to have a panic attack (which is like trying not to think about that elephant on a table).  I want to thank everyone who helped me through that night and apologize to all those I sucked into my vortex. 

But the most important person I need to apologize to is my wife, not only for actually hijacking her Facebook account and causing no small amount of worry to her friends and family, but for doubting her love (even if only in a panicked hypothetical).  No amount of insomniac impairment can account for that.  

Comments

[SEK]

Just in case anyone was curious what it is I took time off to process. Not of general interest, I know. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to continue to put the apartment back together. (Needless to say, I wasn't rifling through the place the other night gently.)

[Ahistoricality]

Wow.

I think you might want to take another week....

[SEK]

I think you might want to take another week...

Would, but can't, do. I need contact with the world, because with Meg gone, I'm flailing. And honestly, if any future employer can't recognize why I thought being set on fire was a reason to get a little panicked, I'm not sure I'd want to work for them for fear, you know, of being set on fire.

[p.t.smith]

Oh god. Is this where my absurd anxieties and absurd, illogical oveveranalyzing thought-processes goes when I get that close to someone? I recognized all of this decision-making, except I've never been in love with someone for a decade and been almost set on fire.

[SEK]

Ahistoricality,

I was snarking future, unreasonable employers there, not you. Just wanted that to be clear.

P.T. Smith,

Is this where my absurd anxieties and absurd, illogical oveveranalyzing thought-processes goes when I get that close to someone?

Yes. On most days, it's bearable, but the fire chose to spring to life on a Thursday, when I'm already exhausted from teaching and the commute, so I was primed to overreact.

I recognized all of this decision-making, except I've never been in love with someone for a decade and been almost set on fire.

I wouldn't call it "decision-making," more like "descent in temporary madness that vaguely resembles decision-making but really isn't." Or something. I'm still fried. I thought that writing about that night would get it out of my system---but the fear creeps back when I least expect it.

[Rich Puchalsky]

My best advice for a panic attack: sit down and meditate on doing nothing but slowing down your breathing. Your mind thinks that it's panicking because of whatever issue you're thinking about, but really you're mostly panicking because your body is caught in a spiral of escalating panic.

As for "hypothetically doubting [your wife's] love", you're being melodramatic. (Is this helping? Hmm.) I've been married (or monogamously cohabiting, before marriage) with my partner for two decades now, and what lets people do that is communication. The idea that love is supposed to be some mystical state where you never doubt each other or annoy each other is a myth. You were doing the right thing in trying to get in touch with her at this crisis, for both your sake and hers. Well, the idea that it might be a divorceable incident was over-the-top, but after all you were panicking.

[NickS]

I'm glad you're safe and (mostly) sane.

Is it wrong to take pleasure in your brushes with catastrophe because you write so vividly about the experience of having mental processes go haywire?

You have my sympathy and hope that life will return to normal functioning as soon as possible.

[Chris Clarke]

I agree with Rich. "Sorry to wake you up darling but the neighborhood may burn down and which of your possessions do you want saved" is pretty much one of those Get Out Of Marital Jail Free cards.

Complementarily, "STWYUDBTNMBDAWOYPDYWS" is also pretty much a free pass for any momentary panic psychosis on the part of the spouse doing the packing. Especially when sitting down and taking deep breaths is contraindicated, as is usually the case when you're near a large quantity of burning poison oak.

Glad you and the various livestock are okay.

[alkau]

No matter what others say, you were right to think about what your better half would want saved. I am very sure that she would have responded just you and the cat/kid/boys. Anything else is just not that important. You might not be able to replace things lost, but after 36 years with your dad, I would say the only important thing to save is him. We have so much stuff that I can say I would run around as you did putting things in boxes(like the last 2 hurricanes when we had to leave) and leaving stuff behind. All that stuff is just not important. The message to your wife is you love her and miss her and are lost without her. That is the lesson you learned by the task of saving and leaving behind. Hope the rest of the time she is away you only have to deal with normal every day issues.

[Shane In Utah]

The more I read this blog, the more I think you're really a Woody Allen character...

[tina]

And, next, just get through the next five minutes, and when that's done, the five after that. Too much? The next three, then. And so on. Also, seconding Shane and, especially, Rich -- forget not the physiology.

It's not a bad kind of craziness at all. I bet you kinda wouldn't mind the shoe being on the other (i.e., your wife's) foot.

[SEK]

Rich:

I've been married (or monogamously cohabiting, before marriage) with my partner for two decades now, and what lets people do that is communication. The idea that love is supposed to be some mystical state where you never doubt each other or annoy each other is a myth.

Never would I claim I don't annoy her, as most of the time I can't stand myself. (Am Jewish after all.) But there is that other bit that's not explicit communication, borne of countless mornings silently commiserating over the time at which you're rising or the quality of the sleep you did or didn't have, and while that falls under the general aegis of "communication," it's also more specific. It's an accretion---to use the least romantic word ever---of shared history, and it's entirely possible to feel that that accumulation is being threatened by a singular event. Believe you me, this I know.

Nick:

Is it wrong to take pleasure in your brushes with catastrophe because you write so vividly about the experience of having mental processes go haywire?

I wouldn't share my insanity with the world if I thought otherwise. I only ask that you don't take too much pleasure in it, as I suspect the gods tormenting me might too.

Chris:

Complementarily, "STWYUDBTNMBDAWOYPDYWS" is also pretty much a free pass for any momentary panic psychosis on the part of the spouse doing the packing. Especially when sitting down and taking deep breaths is contraindicated, as is usually the case when you're near a large quantity of burning poison oak.

In marriage, there are no free passes in marriage. She's in Italy to get away from all this, and when I drag her and everyone she knows into its blaze, that sort of ruins the effect of the vacation. Not that she doesn't care, or doesn't want know about it ... just that she'd rather life here allow her to enjoy time there, and it very vociferously didn't the other night. I sound like I'm condemning her or something though, there, and I'm not: think of it like a broken mood, with an underlying earnest desire to not have things go to shit while she's gone. She was upset about things going to shit more than the mood being broken.

Mother:

I would say the only important thing to save is him.

For future reference: that first edition of The Crying of Lot 49 is worth way more than you think it is. I recommend saving it ... and Dad, too.

Hope the rest of the time she is away you only have to deal with normal every day issues.

You do remember who I am, right? I only ask because you're talking about me dealing with "normal every day issues," but am the son who, at fifteen, responded to a tympanoplasty by playing Montague and Capulet in a tree outside his girlfriend's window. My issues are rarely everyday, and my response to them, however reasonable, never normal.

Shane:

The more I read this blog, the more I think you're really a Woody Allen character...

I know, I know, everyone likes the old, funny stuff. But yes, as a cultural Jew, I'm entitled by law to not only claim the sky is falling, but actually have a bit of it land on me.

Tina:

And, next, just get through the next five minutes, and when that's done, the five after that.

Easier said than done ... and I don't say to contradict you blithely, but because I kept telling myself again and again, but no matter how much I said it, it didn't get done. The general principle is, however, sound. It's what I'm using to deal with the wife's absence on a daily basis, after all.

I bet you kinda wouldn't mind the shoe being on the other (i.e., your wife's) foot.

I think wishing that night upon her would officially make me a bad person, though. I'm hoping to inspire her into a similar experience via the power of the written word ... and we'll see where that gets me/us.

[Ahistoricality]

I was snarking future, unreasonable employers there, not you. Just wanted that to be clear.

That was entirely clear to me, yes, and well-done, besides. That you felt the need to clarify that, though, suggests that the psychic effects of your Gethsemane are still strong enough that my original suggestion might still have some merit....

[tina]

Well, I hope that at least you've gotten some sleep, then.

[alkau]

Are you sure your comicbooks are not of value to you? They are taking up a great deal of space in a closet. And what about the hundreds of books you left in my care? On a serious note your life has always been an adventure and far from normal, but I again say you have enough stories that you could fill many shelves with books written by you. There are several movies that are just as strange as your life and perhaps you should pitch some stories to Hollywood!

[alkau]

I forgot to add YOUR WIFE IS NOT ON VACATION!!! And your sister said you need to stop talking about LOVE on Facebook and on your Blogg. She thinks Meg will not be happy when she finds out what you are saying.