Searching for Perspective

There it was, Tuesday at 6:41pm. Unenthusiastically, Patricia looked around the room, searching for the… what? Courage to move? She had already timed the maximum amount of time she could stay home before she had to leave, drive, park and find her way to the art class at the high school she had not set foot at in 15 years. But here she was, faced with a wall of inertia.

In the 45 minutes prior, she had giddily pushed for dinner in front of another episode of Nolly in her wife’s company. She’d also pulled away from the TV to corral old drawing pencils, a sketchbook, eraser and sharpener which now sat expectantly at the side table by her arm chair. It was 6:41pm and she had everything she needed. But where was the excitement for the class?

Maybe if I have a drink, she thought. She imagined the steps she needed to take: pull a hibiscus tea from the fridge to sweeten the deal, swipe a pair of her wife’s glasses from the counter and make for the door. Reassured, she limped over in that direction. After she pulled the tea from the fridge, she looked across the open floor plan of the kitchen back at her wife who was casually swiping through videos on her phone in the living room. Patricia felt the gloom closing in.

“Jess,” she ventured in a slight murmur, heaviness in her voice. Jess continued scrolling, unaware of her wife’s bid for attention, Pat’s voice barely audible over the cacophony of sounds spewing from Jess’ phone. Patricia called for her again, the clumsy attempt at raising her voice coming off more forceful than she intended.

Jess looked up, startled, and her contented expression slipped at the sight of her wife’s hesitant face. Wasn’t this a happy outing? She let her phone drop into her lap. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“What if I can’t do it,” Pat blurted. “What if…” she started, looking for the words. Images of the jokes of sinners lighting up on fire from stepping into church coming to mind, which she knew was ridiculous. But the fear of the deep sadness she might meet at the threshold of the high school, was not. “What if it triggers a panic attack?” she said, unable to gaze upon her wife. That wasn’t quite right. “What if it just makes me so sad?” she tried again, and knew she had struck the right chord. Her voice starting to trail off again, the acknowledged fear suddenly sharp. She could feel her wife looking on at her with concern in her gaze. Patricia braced herself, expecting her wife to give her a careful, but forceful push out the door, reiterating the importance of doing something Patricia enjoyed. But the sadness in Patricia’s face must have been too raw. 

“If you don’t want to do it honey, don’t go,” Jess said, reassuringly. “It’s ok. You absolutely don’t have to.”

“But I do have to,” Pat protested. How could she explain that it was bitter sweet, that it awoke the possibility of resilience, and inspired defiance in the face of so much illness. A return to the scene of the crime, where her mind first began to unravel. She liked to draw, and intellectually, she knew it would be good for her depression even if her mind was on tenterhooks about the possibility of another failed attempt at finding joy. “Maybe it’ll be ok,” she murmured, as much to herself as to her wife. She felt the warmth of the track lighting just above her, suddenly feeling overexposed from its otherwise perfectly tolerable glare. She gingerly placed the supplies on the dark black granite counter stretched before her. Still, the fear of it all started to wane, as it always does, once it is named.

“You know,” Patricia started, unscrewing the top of her tea. “I’ve never set foot in the art class? I don’t really know where it is. Hopefully there will be signs about the class in the lobby.”

She took a drag from the glass bottle, enjoying the blend of tart and sweet, soothed as much by the chill of the bottle against her palm as the liquid down her throat. She kept drinking.

“But you love art,” Jess protested. “You didn’t take it in high school?”

“High school wasn’t about fun,” she responded matter-of-factly, a sardonic grin slightly grazing the corners of her mouth. Patricia took another sip. Jess gave her a jokey disapproving look.

“I didn’t do anything for fun,” Patricia protested, with a dry laugh. “Who had time for that!” she added, her voice finding a bit of levity. She mentally waived away the thought that shortly after she left, her school had gotten a certain notoriety of kids dying by suicide.

This was another one of those differences between them. Patricia was raised in Northern Virginia where academic competition began early, and she had bought into its myth of salvation, seeking a ticket to a better life through achievement of entry into a good school. Jess went through high school in southern California and had just as sunny of a temperament and high school experience. She easily made friends, never over-exerting herself academically and became the captain of her golf team because she, surprise, enjoyed the game. That isn’t to say Jess wasn’t smart – from their discussions, Jess had had the better advanced placement scores, and she just naturally didn’t have to study as hard. But Patricia had steadily and unyieldingly dedicated more in her search for that je ne sais quoi that would get her into a good college, and then a good life. Fast forwarding 15 years, while Patricia went to the more prestigious university, Jess went on to have the more lucrative career and balanced life. And now, Patricia was trying to glean from her golden retriever wife what ingredients to pull together for a richer life.

“Well, honey--” Jess began, exasperated.

“It’s ok,” Patricia said quickly, interrupting Jess. Then, a bit more measuredly, she added, “I want to do this, and I need to try. Who knows? Maybe it could be healing.” She took another glance at her phone, realizing that sliver of time available before she had to set out was shrinking. 6:47pm. She looked up at her wife who was now shrugging her shoulders.

“Ok, give it a try,” Jess said. “I’m right here if you need me.”

“Thanks honey,” Pat said, and scooping up all her things, made for the door. She got into the car, backed up out of the driveway, and began the short trek to the school. She wondered about what she would say if the instructor asked her for her goals for the class. What would she say she was looking for? To get through it without crying? To find a harbor for her fleeting sanity? To experience a bit of peace?

Despite the slight rain, she did not meet any significant traffic on the way there. She carefully drove from her house, taking the meandering back roads she preferred, and passing the house her parents had lived in for almost 20 years along the way. The ride was peaceful, and surprisingly expedient. When she stopped at a redlight to turn on to campus, the clock in her car read 6:53pm.

The school campus was large, and before turning onto its main entrance, there was a separate, sprawling field dotted with thick dark green shrubbery and punctuated with old, weeping trees. A chain link fence separated this piece from the broader campus, and from the public sidewalks that surrounded it. The school bus would always swing past this space in the morning, and it was a greenspace that Patricia would regard with joy or melancholy depending on her prevailing mood. A tired looking white, wood paneled house sat upon it, and she still had no idea how it contributed to the broader campus.

As she began the slow roll onto the school campus, she caught a flurry of movement out of the corner of her eye. A young buck, with horns no greater than a foot protruding from its head, easily cleared the fence and materialized at the side of the road. Surprised and grateful for her light speed, Patricia pulled into a stop. She could not recall having met wildlife in this part of the campus during her high school days, and remarked that here was this buck, perhaps feeling safe in quiet of the evening to traverse this green refuge. She tried to put out of her mind that it was likely deer hunting season, and to think instead that maybe she too, could experience some safety in the evenings here. She allowed it cross the road, and watched it blend into more rolling greenery on the other side of the road.

As she pulled into the parking lot in front of the school, she worked hard to focus on the school as it was, not as she had felt during her time there, and doubled down on her observations. Between the school building and the parking spots allotted in front of it, there was a moat of more green lawn. She noticed parts of it were brighter than others, and wondered if the patterns were forever changed by the number of trailers that had been on them during her time there. The school now had a modern, glass atrium jutting out of the predominantly brick building to greet its entrants. During her time there, this entrance did not exist, and this moat of greenery was besotted with tired trailers from the overflow of students and closed off space for the necessary construction.

Next to the atrium there was white lettering indicating the school’s various athletic achievements: Boy’s basketball, ’17, Girls Tennis, ’18, …E-Sports 22. An unexpected chuckle escaped her, and she quickly fished a phone out of her pocket to snag a picture to share with Jess later. Was this a pandemic thing? What were kids doing nowadays anyway? Before she put the phone back in her purse, she sought her cousin’s instructions for how to reach the art room: Enter door 1, make a right, keep going until the hall ends and make another right. Taking a deep breath, she entered the building. She was greeted by warm signs of welcome, which interwove with her trepidation.

The lockers once blue, were now red. The cafeteria was just there, and there was a nook where one of her best friends had passed out in, during the difficult days following her father’s passing. There was the locker she sometimes sat in front of, alone, pretending to be on the phone while she waited for cross country to start or her parents to pick her up.

Looking down that hallway now, she spotted a Hispanic man crooning to his toddler who was bumbling about, smiling and making excited toddler sounds. So unexpected. Perhaps there were evening English lessons, she thought. Next to her was the trolley of a cleaning crew, blocking the entrance to a bathroom, and she gave a slight nod to a woman whose head popped up behind it all. Maybe it was her family.

Patricia kept walking. Thrumming sounds emanated from the hall she was to continue down, luring her in. Suddenly a couple of people with backpacks appeared. Were these teenagers, or other adults taking evening classes at the school? One of them released a long, shrill, “HIIIII!” and lurched forward to greet two other individuals hanging out in the hallway, in front of double doors. Definitely children, Patricia mused, but was heartened by the levity of their approach to one another.

The two back-packed individuals disappeared behind the double doors, leaving the other two outside. Theater! She realized, suddenly. This was the theater hallway. As she approached the two individuals still in the hallway, she realized what she had perceived as animated chatter was the chipper practicing of someone’s solo in a future musical production. Patricia smiled and kept going towards and down bend in the hallway that would take her to the art class.

Having spotted a room labeled as “Art,” and found obvious, graying adults sitting at orderly tables within it, she paused to pull out her phone. 6:58pm. She scanned for an open seat, strolled to it and sat. She put her bag down by chair, and nervously took the room in. To her left were a series of large papier mâché animals of kinds: a deep blue whale, a brown platypus, an anime character. As she took it all in, she was struck by a startling thought: did kids actually have fun in this building? She rearranged herself on the chair, finding comfort in the meeting of the heaviness of her lumbar and the back of the chair. She took slow, deliberate breaths and let her eyes marvel at the intricacy and beauty of the papier mâché creations, their gaiety soothing her.

As she pulled out her sketchbook, she realized what she was looking for from this class: improvements in her grasp of perspective.