Dear Eleanor

Dear Eleanor Rigby,

I understand completely. Truly, I do. However, I might have told you that waiting at the window is not nearly as lonely as sharing a table with no one who cares. You are a well read individual and so no doubt familiar with the quote “How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is / To have a thankless child! Away, away!”

King Lear cries this out to the heavens having just cursed his daughter. The irony in my own life is that I have for a very long time thought of myself as Cordelia; unable to utter my feelings “heave my heart into my mouth.”

I have never cursed my children and, in this case, am not even thinking of my daughter but rather my son. Yet, I long for just a bit of conversation over the meal that I have bought and cooked. Though I’ve no kingdom to divide amongst my progeny. The best they can hope is that I don’t end up a medical burden wanting their attention or a public embarrassment. I can’t guarantee them that either outcome is unlikely.

Eleanor, perhaps had we met earlier, we might have gone to walk through the museum together or to dance with the salsa dancers. We might have learned calligraphy or to tie knots. Perhaps we would have played "Old Mary Mack Mack Mack, All dressed in black, black, black." Instead, it seems we sit in our little spaces, seeing a bit of one another’s lives online. You are better gone.

Tonight I will post a line about you on my Facebook page. Most likely, I will hear from a few recent people who hardly know me, people who don’t know enough to know, well-meaning people who care but would not miss work if I died as you did Eleanor.

Eleanor, go back and do it over. You are but an imaginary being; if you live in a dream then make the dream as wild or whimsical as you desire. Do not stand at the window and look for his car or wait for a call. Get rid of all the things that will bury you. Dissolve them. Things mean nothing. And it seems people mean just a slight bit more. So perhaps you should let go of them as well. Leave your flat and move to the states; perhaps to a ranch in the southwest. Offer to walk and brush the horses for a bed and meals. Find a small child in need of a guardian in exchange for room and board. But do not stand still – do not turn into Lot’s wife; do not stand at the window, watching and waiting. Do not wait. Stop smiling politely. Stop asking questions about other people’s lives.

Live selfishly. Do marvelous things. Make art. Shut the door. Shut out the other voices and listen to your own. Paint everything with your favorite color. What is your favorite color, Eleanor? Plum – figgy brown – sage green – mercury silver? Paint the toaster and the door frame; move on and paint your desk, the kitchen cabinets; mark it all. Play your favorite song as many times as you like. Play it loudly; sing it to wake the dead.

Trust me, Eleanor. This is your only hope – to live as if you were the center of the universe. Otherwise you will expire as you did, at the hands of the vampires, the longing and wanting for things you cannot fulfill, cannot give enough or be enough. Turn on the lights, open the windows, and stay up all night singing and dancing. Choose you.

Don’t worry too much. No one will notice very much anyway.

Sincerely,

A friend