Habits

It was familiar, this feeling. I’d been feeling it since returning to my room with a steaming cup of tea and closing the door and surrendering, allowing it to wash over me. I hadn’t thought I’d experience it in this place and, up until now, I’d been right. But here it was, groping at my heart and giving me that free- falling-into-a-pit sensation. 

I wasn’t fully aware what had brought it on this time. Our meeting had been as usual, with nothing to indicate a falling-off of interest or commitment. If anything, it had been pretty much a carbon copy of all the other stolen hours over the past few months. The routine, if anything, was reassuring in its constancy; there was nothing to suggest that a rug was being gathered up in order to be pulled from under my insecure feet.  Nothing to hint that our arrangement couldn’t continue indefinitely, even permanently. The horizon stretched itself without impediment in all directions. This should have been reassuring.

At first, I’d felt only wonder that he’d chosen me. After all the failures of the past, here was this shining one who made me his own. I’d felt anointed by his love, drawn into immediate trust that this was utterly right. Utterly good. There was a holiness about our attraction that elevated every word and touch, turning a simple finger’s brush into something sublime.

Dazed. That’s how I’d gone through those early days. Dazed and amazed and filled with an adoration that was surely a spiritual outpouring. How could such a thing not be of God? Though I was no newcomer to infatuations that soon soured, including a marriage that had headed for the shoals with the first real trial, this was beyond anything in my experience. This was like a new calling; who was I but to trust its truth?

Even now, I could find nothing in his words or his manner to cause alarm. No, I thought, this wasn’t a premonition that his love was fading. But if not, where did that leave me? What was my clenching gut telling me? Why had my preternatural serenity suddenly deserted me and left me squirming in anxiety?

I knew the feeling, having danced with paralyzing anxiety many times before, sometimes for years at a stretch.  But I’d worked on all that- damned hard, I might add- and since coming here, I’d been blessed with the ability to overcome its clutches. And since he’d declared his love, I’d been floating along in a fog of bliss. 

I had to get a grip. Nothing was wrong. I would NOT sabotage what I had; I refused to allow this self- destructive emotion to come between me and our great, good love. This had to be my sense of unworthiness trying to insidiously ruin my deepest joy. I would pray and I would conquer.

Sipping my cooling tea, I willed serenity to still my unease. Breathed in the minty aroma. Repeated the Serenity Prayer.

Later that night, when sleep wouldn’t come, I reminded myself that all was in God’s hands. He had given me this new life and He would protect me in it. I only had to trust. Trust- my nemeses. I’d given it away too freely too often, and now it was guarded behind a great wall where I usually couldn’t touch it- until he had declared himself to me. Somehow, my trust had vaulted the wall and rested- in him. And there was absolutely no reason to doubt him now.

Usually, when chewing on some topic that caused anxiety, I knew that once I’d relaxed enough to get to sleep, the issue would usually shrink to a manageable and often trivial size by the morning. As I prayed and practiced surrendering my worries to the loving arms of The Divine, I thought that the same soothing thing would happen. Whatever ominous feelings I was experiencing would be gone- or easily explained away- come the 6:00 wake-up bell. And so, I eventually drifted off.

At 4:00, I started awake, remnants of a heart-pounding dream scattering into wisps of nothingness. As I calmed my breathing, clarity came to me, and I knew. I knew the source of my unsettled, anxious feeling. No, I did not doubt his sincerity. I believed that I was secure in his love.  It was his complacency that loomed before me and I understood its significance at last. Absolutely nothing had changed where he was concerned; it was my own traitorous heart that was rebelling. I reminded myself that I’d been more than willing to follow his parameters, more than grateful for a chance to be the one to add pleasure and intimacy to his austere life. It was such a privilege. I hadn’t minded the secrecy; there was simply no other way we could be together without destroying all that he had worked for, as well as my own new-found place in life. Was I like all the mistresses down through history who had leapt into their lovers’ arms, only to be consumed by jealousy and greed as time went on?

I didn’t think it was simply the secrecy that was troubling me now. I’d remain his under-cover lover forever if necessary, tamping down troublesome shame as it reared its snuffling snout in my mind. I wasn’t exactly young anymore at 44- hadn’t expected to ever be flying high on love again. I didn’t need to flaunt my good fortune by mincing down the street hand in hand with my man. I thought I’d reconciled what we were doing together as the good, natural act that it surely was, despite any proscriptive edicts. What had caused the spike in anxiety, that feeling that something was out of kilter, was his acceptance of the reason behind all the secrecy. He knew as well as I that hypocrisy reigned supreme in the organization to which he’d vowed allegiance; he’d assured me laughingly that many of his colleagues did not restrict themselves to the letter of the proverbial law.

Here is the small realization, unformed and nebulous, I faced as the nightmare faded from my thoughts: He had no real interest in ever challenging the status quo. He was content with the need to hide. And felt no discernable moral tension about our situation. The evidence lurked in his tepid arguments about the need to proceed cautiously, about the danger of destabilizing the institution. He insisted that he wanted to push harder for change but that he needed to pray about it to ensure that he didn’t cause more harm than good.

My warrior’s single heartedness was being replaced by a suspiciously wimpy tendency to argue himself into both external and interior conformity.

I put on my little lamp and grabbed my journal, writing furious notes about what I needed to say to him the next time we met. Somehow, we needed to work against this senseless hegemonic hierarchy that had driven thousands of good men- and women- to drink and despair over their basic human needs. We needed to sow seeds of change somehow, to make our own love matter in the world. We needed to be brave.

I glanced at my meager clothing choices in the door-less closet in the corner.  They dully consisted of run-of-the –mill selections of sensible skirts, slacks, sweaters, blouses and a few sweatshirts and running pants (nothing skin- tight). Still, my eyes fastened on the one outlier among the greens, blues and greys of my wardrobe- the stiff, prim habit that sat on the top shelf of the closet and presided over the whole array, reminding me that modesty was a must at all times. I never had to wear the cumbersome, medieval monstrosity, but I’d metaphorically donned it eighteen months ago when I’d entered this order- the Sisters of Mercy-And look at me now. The habit itself was a gift from the beloved nun who was my mentor. It was a symbol of my decision to forsake the trappings of society for a life of contemplation and service.

And look at me now.

It was time to come back to reality- again- and face the music of my choices. Bliss, I mused, was a lovely form of denial- but it was denial nevertheless.  Could I go through the motions of being true to my vows while continuing to break them? I had no doubt that we could get away with our love-making unless we were extremely unlucky. After all, I lived in a house with only three other sisters and we all had very different schedules. Jim –Father Jim Cooper- had a glebe house all to himself, with only a part-time secretary who came in three days a week. We could carry on unimpeded, unless we were careless, for ages.

I just didn’t know if I continue justify the sneakiness if it was just for the comfort of sex.  I’d thought we were linked by a passion for more than each other, by a conviction that action had to start somewhere and that we may as well step up. What’s more, I couldn’t understand how he could seem so sanguine about our forbidden relationship as a long- term arrangement that might never come out into the light.

I saw my disheveled image in the small dresser mirror. Annie, you are still just a fucking  train wreck after all, I thought, turning my face to the wall. I told myself that I was overreacting, that I knew the score here and had no right to expect anything else than the stolen few hours that we currently enjoyed. I reminded myself that it was Jim’s unshakeable faith, grounded in the belief in unconditional love, that had attracted me to him in the first place. That had not diminished in any way. 

I was falling into the old trap of expectations, I thought. That’s all this was.  Well, that and my basic trouble with trust. Still, sleep would not come. I went downstairs to make another cup of tea.