The 8th Nerve

For better or for worse, it seems Silver bay people and experiences have branded themselves forever in my psyche. It takes approximately three days to recover from a visit with everyone. I gradually return back to my life and re-adjust, as if I was carried far downstream and have to swim my way back. The past three days had a feeling of persistent sadness and I kept checking my email repeatedly like something’s missing. Just when I thought I was going to have to resort to eating chocolates on the couch while watching The Big Chill, I begin to feel normal again. I emailed my girlfriends and asked if this was happening to them too. I received responses in record time from all of them, agreeing that recovering from a Silver bay get-together is hard.

I’m not sure what it is. It is not a wish to be younger again, because I am happy to be where I am and would not want to be 18 or 19 again, ever, even if you paid me a million bucks. It is not a wish for another summer at Silver Bay, because I love Steve and Vermont and our house here.

It feels as if it was that particular time in our lives and the place we were all in. Something about it heightened the creation of bonds and attachment between people. Similar to when we were infants forming attachments with our caregivers, perhaps it can happen again nearly as intensely when we first leave home. Or maybe it is a phenomenon that happens when neural synapses are fusing just as fast as they are dying off due to all the alcohol consumption of teens delirious with their newfound freedom. Something like that. It seems that when you form bonds like that, a piece of you is lost when everyone scatters by time and distance.

When everyone comes back together, it is a feeling of powerful, whole energy. Sometimes it is wonderful energy, sometimes it is anxious energy. The complexity of these bonds and what happened in them and to them over the last decade could fill a bookshelf (complexity can fill a bookshelf?).

Yeah, is that healthy? Is this a case of experiencing sensations in a phantom limb that was cut off long ago or is it something real? If I had it my way, I would prefer not to have so much investment that it takes me two or three days to recover from it.. But I simply cannot imagine life without these friends.

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Jul 27th 2005Friends & Silver Bay & the Past

Silver Bay wedding number six was at Penn State. (You can see Silver Bay wedding #3 and#5here). Since we now live further north, Steve and I took the ferry to Plattsburgh from Grand Isle. We hadn’t eaten breakfast yet, so we figured we would get something to eat at the snackbar while we waited at the ferry dock.

MURPHY’S LAW of FERRIES: The only time the ferry will IMMEDIATELY embark as soon as you arrive is when you actually WANT to wait for the ferry.

So we immediately got on the boat and immediately chugged across Lake Champlain. There were ominous skies on the New York side, and pretty soon we were in the middle of the most torrential thunderstorm I have ever driven in, forcing us to a slow crawl, as we tried to find a place to grab some breakfast. We eventually drove out of it as we headed south and then west.

Steve’s aunt and uncle, and their big collie, George, kindly hosted us on Friday. I mention George because I know he would be upset if he was not included in this entry. As we drove toward their neighborhood, we passed a car pulled over by a couple cops on the side of the road. The cops were searching the trunk of the car. The owner of the car was currently experiencing

MURPHY’S LAW of T-SHIRTS which states: If you so choose to don a t-shirt with a bold statement that is ASKING for it, you’re gonna GET IT.

While the cops searched his car, he stood morosely on the side of the road sporting black t-shirt with big bold white capital letters that read: FUCK YOUR POWER TRIP.

I’m still laughing about that one. I guess you had to be there.

Steve’s aunt and uncle took us out to dinner and a tour of Steve’s father’s boyhood hometown. This was really interesting and I was amazed at all the similarities between Steve’s and my own father’s family and childhood. Can the stories of our parents, told and untold, be passed down to the next generation? I feel that in some ways it does shape us profoundly, and is part of why Steve and I felt so familiar and comfortable with each other from the beginning.

We arrived at Penn State at midday on Saturday, and Steve, the good sport that he is, was swirled into the Silver Bay vortex for the next 24 hours. We watched as the last of the boys of summer bit the bullet, then it was dinner, drinks and dancing.

There is a fine line between holding on and letting go, and for me at times this is an area of vulnerability and intensity that is out of proportion. I either hold on too tightly or I numbly let go or shut down. With Silver Bay in particular I went through both extremes. I am finally recognizing that fine line and am learning how to find it each time. I wonder at what a difference it would have made for my anxiety if I had always had that line and the comfort and self-assurance that comes with it. Some of the most important lessons we must learn the hard way.

It was a ten hour drive back to Vermont on Sunday, but fortunately we were able to stop and visit my friend Christina on the way back. I couldn’t wait because it means I would get to hold a baby- a craving that I hardly ever get to satisfy. She is my age and had her third child just a few weeks ago. This fact never ceases to amaze me. It is like trying conceptualize how subatomic particles are both everywhere and nowhere. My age. Has three kids. All objects are mostly space and would pass through each other if not for positive and negative charge. Does.. not.. compute.

However, they are an adorable family. And I got my baby fix!

A couple hours later Steve and I hit the road again. I was anxious to get back and get to sleep as soon as possible as I had work early in the morning.

MURPHY’S LAW of FERRIES: If you are anxious to get home ASAP, the ferry will leave TWO SECONDS before you arrive, forcing you to wait in Lane Number 1 and watch it fade away into the night.

Of course!

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Jul 25th 2005Friends & Pictures & Silver Bay

On Saturday we traveled to another Silver Bay wedding, this time in Williamstown, MA just over the Vermont border. I have never been to this area of northern MA before and it is a quaint place with big green hills that probably technically belong to Vermont. But you may have a little bit of our hills, Massachusetts, if you know what to do with them.

It was great to see everyone and catch up. Occasionally there is the dose of surreality, when I realize that I have known these guys for nearly ten years. After the summer of ‘96 (a two month span of time marked by summer flings and shaving cream every which way), here we all are with our spouses, fiancees and calling our long term boyfriends on the cell. Here we are talking about work and houses and life, and it’s all normal and no one is doubled over laughing at how we are all here with our spouses, fiancees and long term boyfriends on the cell.

What I would love is an exercise in time travel. I would like to transport all of us directly from the campfire at Jabes in ‘96 and we will stand with our arms around each other, in our flannel shirts and baseball caps and cups of lukewarm keg beer, and watch our future selves at the reception at the MASS Moca. I think we would be stunned into permanent sobriety. Someday, other things will matter more than who hooked up with who. Someday we grew up.

Steve and I had to head back at 11pm, as he had the Diabetes Association bike ride early the next morning. We were 45 minutes up VT route 7 when we got pulled over. First of all, you CANNOT travel on VT route 7 and NOT SPEED. To protect privacy, I will just say that it was ONE of us driving, the ONE of us who did not have 3.5 glasses of wine (courtesy of hot wineboy) and two glasses of Seven and Seven. The cop gave us a warning and suggested we keep it at 65 the rest of the way. Apparently it is okay to go 65, not 72.

To my relief, I have had the time and distance needed to do the work within myself that needed to be done. All is right with Silver Bay.

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May 15th 2005Friends & Silver Bay