The Love of My Life - Cheryl Strayed

     Reflecting upon the essay “The Love of My Life” by Cheryl Strayed, I liked it, Much more so than the last essay we had to read. I found myself flying through the essay; I thought it was a very well written essay, and I also venture to say that she is a good author. According to Tracy Clark-Flory at salon.com, a book written by Strayed even inspired Oprah to restart her book club! The highlights in my mind while reading this story were the characters and their names, her thought about the imaginary boat and her gruesome nightmares.  The language used in the essay surprised me; I don’t mind it, because personally, I curse like a sailor. But this article was originally published in The Sun, no. 321 (September 2002). What a risky move to have an article published in such a public place, where not everyone ‘curses like a sailor’. There are several people reading magazines that do not use, or appreciate people using foul language. It was a gutsy move, but it works, it makes Strayed memorable, makes this essay memorable.

     I think it is interesting, how in the article, the author only actually gives names to one of her characters, her husband, Mark; otherwise she gave her characters names like ‘Actually Pretty Famous Drummer Guy’. I think that she is not naming them, so that she is not connected to them. If they don’t have names, they don’t exist in her mind or memory. She even states “The people I messed around with didn’t have names; they had titles” (p 502). Her relationship with Mark seems to be a great, picture-perfect one. He loves her, selflessly, he “just made me want to feel good, better. He loved me, but he loved my mother” (p 501). That was the one and only nail in the coffin of their relationship. I think that she couldn’t handle that connection. He is not only her husband, but he is a person who also loved her mother. He is that one constant, living reminder of her mother. They seem to have lots of love for each other, even through the cheating and lying. After Cheryl admits to cheating on Mark, they get separated and both started dating other people. Being the faithful and selfless husband he is written to be, Mark goes all the way to Portland, after Cheryl is living with a man who is ‘a Punk Rocker Soon to Be Hopelessly Held Under the Thumb of Heroin’, drags her home, and lets her stay at his house. And they end up hooking up again; and they both cheat on the people they are dating. But instead of being the young and in love couple, they turn into the ‘Insanely Young, Insanely Sad, and Insanely Messed-up Married Couple’.  Their relationship finally ends.

     Another thing I find interesting is how she says she has an idea of an imaginary boat of life. Where she wishes she could exchange the fate of her mother, for someone else. She wishes that she could just point her finger and make that person dead and her mother alive. She also wishes that she could take 4 people on a boat…those 4 people would be alive and with you, but only those 4 people, everyone else is gone, forever.  She states “it would be painful, but how quickly you would decide: you and you and you, get in. The rest of you, good-bye.” (p.504). That made me think, who would I take on my boat, she is right, what a hard decision. But at the same time, very easy, I know who I love so much and who I could live without.

     Lastly, I find it fascinating that she mentions that she had nightmares for months and years. Nightmares where she killed her mother. Multiple different scenarios, including how she tied her to a tree, and lit her on fire, how she buried her alive.  I, as a reader, wonder if all of these places and things in her murderous scenarios are something or someplace that was significant in her life. Something that reminded her of her mother, a memory in her life, branded in her subconscious, coming out in her dreams.

     Strayed wore her mother’s wedding ring, until one day, while swimming in an ice-cold river, she lost it. It fell off, and she was unable to find it. She then realizes that she was ‘married’ to her mother. And when she lost that wedding ring, she realizes that she was no longer married to her mother, and her grieving process ends.  In the essay she writes “I did not deny, I did not get angry. I didn’t bargain, become depressed or accept. I fucked, I sucked.”  (p 502) This whole long, grieving process is, not typical, but it still follows all of the phases of grievance. The 5 stages of grievance according to Julie Axelrod at psychcentral.com are, Denial and Isolation, Depression, Anger, Bargaining and Acceptance, not necessarily in that order. Strayed went through all 5 phases, all in her own unique way.  Denial and Isolation: where not even the author’s husband can comfort her, she just wants to be alone. Depression: where she is having sex with a lot of people, for the sole purpose to make herself feel good, and happy. Bargaining: her imaginary boat, and how she wishes she could switch her mother’s death for her some one else’s. Anger: both her nightmares and her sleeping around, to forget everything else but that one thing in that one moment. And finally Acceptance: where she loses her mother’s ring, and finally she accepts the fact that her mother is dead, and simply “drove away from a part of my mother” (p 513).

References

Axelrod, J. (2010). The 5 Stages of Loss and Greif. Psych Central. Retrieved from:
     http://psychcentral.com/lib/2006/the-5-stages-of-loss-and-grief/

Clark-Flory, T. (2012).  Cheryl Strayed: “Tackle love”. Salon. Retrieved from:
     http://salon.com/2012/07/08/cheryl_strayed_tackle_love/

Strayed, C. (2002). The Love of My Life. In Williford, L and Martrone, M (Eds.), Touchstone anthology
     of contemporary and creative nonfiction: Work from 1970 to present (pp.28-42).  New York, NY:
     Simon & Schuster, Inc.