My last date with Ellan

Drift

I’ve been drifting away from some people. 

The reason for my drift is simple. I am not able to share my thoughts with some people. When I try, I either get scolded that my thoughts (and feelings) are not valid, or I simply can’t get a word in edgewise. Sometimes I get in a few disjointed fragments. Bad idea. In extreme cases, I am accused of saying and thinking things I’ve never said or thought, with no opportunity for clarification. The real me is excluded from the conversation.

Here is the devil’s explanation of the above paragraph:

• I lack social skills. 
• I lack communication skills.

Here is the truth:

• I am only excluded from the conversation with certain people.
• My thoughts are valid.
• More people agree with me than disagree with me.
• Outright lies are embraced by humans every day, and we need God to referee.

In a desperate attempt to salvage my sanity, I started keeping evidence of truth. I prefer to communicate in writing, or on audio recording.

Regardless of facts and details, a one-way conversation is not an honest dialog. Nor is it an honest relationship. I’m finally learning to avoid these conversations. I drift away until the person actually wants to include me. If ever.

Invitations ignored

My relationship with Ellan had become predominantly one-way. I drifted away. Finally, she wanted to understand. After hearing “no thank you” about six times in a row, she asked why I was drifting. By now, the reason had expanded well beyond my relationship with her. It was a personal mandate to maintain clarity. 

Ellan texted, “Would you like to celebrate Mom’s birthday with me?”

More one-way superficial ‘good-times’ social time? “No thank you.”

“Why not?”

I took a day to figure out the most direct and concise way to explain my choice of social interactions. Instead, I proposed something I would actually enjoy with her.

“Would you like to seek truth with me?”

I expected to hear, What do you mean? Or har har whatever weirdo yeah let’s do it.

I guess my response wasn’t a simple answer, or a simple question. And she did not give a simple answer. She responded with a dissertation about truth. It did not mention us getting together, for either of our proposed activities. I waited for an answer that never came.

Invitations accepted

In the past few years, I have praised and thanked Ellan several times for persisting in the face of rejection, even from me. It reminded me of Jesus: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.” She glowed and said thank you. So you can partly thank me when Ellan wouldn’t take no for an answer.

True to form, she tried again. On a Thursday when she was in my area for her BNI meeting, Ellan asked if we could meet at 9:30. That was in the middle of my Torah class. I said I could do 10-11 at the library across from the synagogue, and invited her to join my ladies lunch group afterward, which included a teacher from Ellan’s high school during the 70s and 80s. Ellan agreed to the library but declined the luncheon.

At 10:00, we met under the library’s lovely arbors. Of course, Ellan had a book for me that promised to heal whatever was ailing my spirit. Of course, she had a lot to say, but not about seeking truth. I had concentrated so long and hard to find the right words to express my thoughts clearly, and once again, my carefully chosen words were ignored. It felt like my words didn’t matter, which was exactly the type of meeting I had declined. She exhibited no apparent curiosity about my thoughts. 

Cling to clarity

I understand now that Ellan was indeed curious about my thoughts. And I’ve always known that she truly loved me, despite her habit of excluding my thoughts from our conversations. She simply resorted to autopilot when things weren’t clear to her. Her autopilot was an endless flow of words.

Social norms pressured me to respond politely to Ellan’s words. But I wanted to exercise my muscle of sticking to my guns about honest communication, which required me to be honest that I did not enjoy being left out of the conversation. It was the honest reason I was declining her invitations. I stayed silent. 

Soon, she was prompting me for responses. I still stayed silent. I knew she didn’t want to hear what was really on my mind. I knew if I tried, she would disagree and I would end up defending stuff that didn’t matter enough to debate. It was more of the same, just as I had tried to avoid.  I didn’t want to be there.

So, that’s what came out.

“What’s on your mind?” or something like that, she asked.

“I don’t want to be here.”

“Why?”

“Because I feel ignored.”

“About what?”

Twenty misunderstandings between us came to mind. Twenty past conversations she had shut down or redirected. “A lot”

“Like what?”

I decided to start with the most recent. “Well, like my question that was the reason we are here.”

“What question?”

I pulled out my phone and showed her the text. “Would you like to seek truth with me?”

“I don’t even know what that means.”

“Then why didn’t you just say that? I belong to the World Affairs Council, which meets specifically to seek the truth on polarized subjects. There’s a whole subculture of people who seek truth as a pastime and a lifestyle. I asked if you wanted to do that with me. You could have answered me, “What do you mean?” Or even just said yes or no. You invited me to celebrate a dead person’s birthday. I don’t know what that means. You still deserved an answer, and so do I. Why couldn’t you just answer the question?”

“Fine. Let’s seek truth. I have no idea what that looks like, but I’m game. What do you want to seek truth about?”

That was tempting. It’s what I wanted to do. But why wasn’t that her original response? Why did it have to go through a pressure chamber to get here? There was that dissertation on truth and then some silence and then a new invitation for an old-style meetup that mentioned nothing about seeking truth, and me having to pull out documentation and ask again. Was my request inappropriate? Was there something I was supposed to do differently?

“I want to understand why you didn’t answer my question. Don’t my questions deserve answers? Don’t my thoughts matter? The same thing is happening with Chelsea right now. I pose a request or question, and it gets ignored and replaced with other stuff. Now, I am asking you a question, and you won’t answer me. Honestly, I feel like a kicked dog with a few of our family members.”

“Ame, I don’t know what kind of answer you’re looking for.” And then she said a bunch of stuff that didn’t answer the question. I clung to the original question in my mind, refusing to forget it, refusing to engage other subjects. Then came an obvious and derogatory inaccuracy that I felt the need to dispute rather than absorb. I brought it to her attention.

“I didn’t say that.”

I’m accustomed to hearing that from several people in my life. I pulled out my new belt of truth. “Can we record this conversation?”

“What? Why? Am I on trial?” Then we debated that for another five minutes. She eventually quieted down, then turned full-body to face me on the bench. “I didn’t answer because I didn’t understand the question. Plain and simple. Now let’s seek truth together. Where do we start?”

I gazed at her, dazed and confused. Maybe I needed time to process that answer. Is lack of understanding grounds for ignoring someone? Should I not bother apologizing if I ignore someone? Jace left me at a store one time because he thought I ignored him. Was I supposed to just suck it up and get over it? Was there a lesson that could help me in similar situations? She waited, eager to embark on the adventure. I still couldn’t see the map.

“I’m confused now, Ellan. I tried to hold on to my original thought until we were able to discuss it, but you talked about so much other stuff. That’s how it always is. You talk about all your stuff, and my questions and thoughts get put aside until they are forgotten.” I pointed one hand to the bench and the other toward the road. “I’m still here and you’re way down there without me.”

She was quiet. 

Isn’t that beautiful? Isn’t she beautiful in those moments? I reached for that Ellan, verbally.

“Ellan, there are these moments when I have so much love for you.”

She stared. Her eyes softened and grew with a begging question.

She whispered. “When is that?”

It was Ellan. The real Ellan. The one I had on the farm, and some of the ladies retreats and slumber parties. It had been so long since I saw that Ellan.

I tried to explain. “When you’re just you. Not all the stuff you’re doing, or the new things you’re learning, or the family updates. Just you.”

She was speechless. I wanted to freeze frame our relationship right there. I was afraid we’d butcher the moment with more words. Plus, my brain was fried, and I was late for the luncheon. But through the fog, I saw the route to a real relationship, and it would take practice. Just tell her what I love about her. I planned to try it after my head cleared. I stood up and kissed her on the forehead.

“I’m gonna go. I love you.”

I walked to my car. That’s the last time I saw her.

* * *

Is this an accurate account of my last date with Ellan? We’ll never know, I guess. It wasn’t recorded. To me it is accurate. I wonder if she would agree, or if she conveyed her version to someone else. A few days later, I heard she called me toxic and advised someone to avoid the reunion. A few days after that, she left flowers on my doorstep. A few days after that, she offered to help with the reunion. Was she seeing truth, or forgiving me for being toxic?

Zachary’s truth

The night Ellan died, a few family members lingered in her kitchen. It’s like we were waiting to see how to make the world start turning again. One excuse to linger was that two of the Duke boys were flying in from Arizona. In the chatter, I heard that Zach and Ellan had been at odds recently. Someone said they had to unfriend Zach on Facebook because he was so negative. The last straw was when he posted that he had never had an honest conversation with his mother. That night, I went on to Facebook to check it out.

Zach did not say it. He said he’d never had a ‘deep’ conversation with his ‘parents’. That’s a far cry from ‘honest’ and ‘mother’. If you think Facebook publicity is legitimate or reliable, then what Zach posted was the most legitimate and reliable thing I’ve ever seen on there. There was nothing offensive or unfriendable about it. Just his honest perception. A friend would hear it and care.

The suppression of truth didn’t stop there. A long-time friend of Zach’s parents scolded him for expressing his legitimate thoughts and feelings. “Zach, that is not appropriate for Facebook.” Is it appropriate to condemn someone else’s attempt to describe their feelings? In a gallant refusal to argue, Zach replied, “I like what I said.” I liked it, too. I could relate.

Two days after Ellan died, we gathered around the table to record our memories of her. Zach had to bring the mood down a notch just to be honest about his favorite memory. He said we all had these great things to share, all the things she did for everyone, how much she could juggle and still make you feel special, etc. But his favorite was when she wasn’t doing any of that. Zach showed us a picture he took when Ellan stopped the waterfall of words. She was dozing on a rock with her face in the Arizona sun, pure, present, peaceful Ellan.

It was the Ellan I tried to describe to Ellan herself just days before. It was the mother he was craving when he posted that post that got him unfriended and scolded. It was the true Ellan. Rather than let the moment disappear like I did at the library, Zach captured that Ellan.

And guess what? We have proof. Zach has the picture. And we also have proof that he chose that as his memory. It’s on the recording.

The hardest truth

But a greater truth has surfaced even as I write this.

Ellan’s eyes are haunting me. When she asked “When?” When was it that I felt so much love for her? What was the circumstance? The secret recipe?

Just as I wanted to feel like my thoughts mattered, Ellan wanted to feel my love for her. I have known her love my entire life. She apparently did not feel it in return. It was the one thing that silenced her waterfall of words. When did I love her so much? She had asked a question. She was aching to know more.

And I walked away. It was the most important opportunity of our entire relationship, and I missed it.