The other day, noonish, when Ed and I were sitting quietly on our couch, he said, “Your lips are moving and your brow is furrowed. Who are you talking to?”

I flushed, I’m sure, embarrassed, and started to say, “Nobody,” but I knew Ed wouldn’t buy it. I’ve told him about my imaginary conversations, when I internally berate and set straight, say, the speed freak who almost drove me off the road or the rude salesclerk or the writer of a nasty Facebook post. So, a little pink-faced, I told him my current, recurrent fantasy.

I grew up hearing Doris Day singing, “When you’re worried, and you can’t sleep, count your blessings instead of sheep”, on my parents’ radio. Later on, in my wild and crazy thirties, when I finally went to AA, I must have heard “Change your attitude to gratitude,” at least fifty times. Blunt. No nonsense. Change it!

I learned St. Julian of Norwich’s Body Prayer in March, right before Ed got every parent’s worst nightmare of a phone call from our son in law, telling him that Sigrid, Ed’s daughter and my stepdaughter, had been diagnosed with brain cancer. Two days later, we drove to our family in California, where we stayed in the casita next door to their house till early July, held by the seriousness of Sigrid’s condition, the family’s need, and fear of traveling during Covid.

“Surreal”, I told people when they asked how I was doing. “It’s all surreal and then it’s too real and then it’s surreal again.” I said that because it was true and because it was easier than talking about the fears and feelings that collected and competed inside me, so that I could be, at any given moment, heartsick and exhausted and confused and pissed off and grateful and ungrateful and aghast at myself for being such a mess.

I fretted about Ed’s and my upcoming trip, in which we’d fly to Atlanta, pick up a “gift car” from a family member there and drive it cross country to our kids in California, taking a southern route and seeing friends and family along the way. I fretted because I love my life at home and I didn’t know what to expect and I felt guilty about shirking responsibilities for a whole month. But I went. And went. And it all sort of runs together, except for a few things that stuck. Like…

… the sign at the Atlanta airport when I deboarded, that read, “Nobody calls it ‘Hotlanta’. Nobody. You’re welcome.”

… some mushy, tasteless grits in the South and some knocked out trout at Arnaud’s in NOLA and, in Atlanta, at a pub with my friend, Joanne, a plateful of sliders spread with pimiento cheese and topped with fried green tomatoes. Lord. Have. Mercy.

I remember when the urge to write first hit me. I was about forty, and had finally, often painfully, moved through the first four of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. My physical needs were met, I felt safe, was happily married, and felt good about my work as a psychotherapist.

And then—ZAP! WHAP! BANG!  Self-actualization, the fifth need, knocked me upside the head with a message so hard and clear, it blinded me to anything else. I want to write. I need to write. Now.

Every morning, before work, I’d pound the keys, so reticent to stop that Ed practically had to pull me away to see my clients. I wrote about whatever came to mind, with little concern for its worth or use or context. It was joyous fun. And, eventually, the characters for a novel came to me, no shadow of a plot, just a burning yearning to bring those characters to life with words.

“Pride” has been a confusing concept for me. I was taught both not to have too much of it, thus avoid conceit, and to be filled with it, pleased with myself for academic or practical achievements. Pride goes before destruction, the Bible says, “and a haughty spirit before a fall.” Pride is associated with ego, in my mind, worth watching and tempering.

But, when checking dictionary definitions of “pride”, I was happy to see this one:

Pride: “Confidence and self-respect as expressed by members of a group, typically, one that has been socially marginalized on the basis or their shared identity, culture, and experience.”

I could hardly stand it, I was so excited about seeing Emmylou Harris at The Gorge Amphitheater. Not only would I see the woman whose music I’ve adored since I was in my twenties, the concert would, I figured, feed the song in progress in my head, a song that would honor Emmylou and my other musical heartthrob, Jesse Winchester. The few lines I’d written pulsed inside me like the first lines of a novel, followed me around relentlessly. Drunk on wine. My feet were dirty. Been awhile since I’d seen thirty…

I was armed against the notorious Gorge heat with a thin white t shirt, a straw hat, and a cloth to soak with water and wrap around my neck. I’d heard the traffic was bad, but I wasn’t prepared to travel only 6 miles in an hour and a half. When we finally arrived at the Gorge, I was relieved to manage my cumbersome gear while trekking a considerable distance to “The Lawn”, where I would, I figured, enter and remain in a transcendent state, as Emmylou worked her soulful magic.

Every year for about ten years, when I’ve told people I’d be claiming the title of “Queen” on my birthday, wherein Ed does my bidding for an entire weekend, some smart aleck says, “Yeah? So what else is new?” or “And tell me a time you’re not?”

I’ve gotten used to these comments, and, during pre-birthday time this year, I graciously explained to the smart alecks, that, yes, I am generally comfortable stating my desires, and, yes, I do get my way from time to time, but Birthday Queendom is bigger and better than ordinary queendom. It’s ordinary queendom on crack! I mean, I can do whatever I want and I don’t have to lift a finger.

But–And I know this falls under the heading of “Measliest First World Problem Ever”–being Queen for the weekend is not without its challenges.

Like most married couples, Ed and I have our “stock” stories, ones we pull out and tell at parties. One of our favorites is about finding out, after five years of what we thought was married life, that our union wasn’t a legal one. My ex and I had separated in the seventies, and, as a result of a drunken $25 bid he made on a no fault divorce at an ACLU event, and the fact that the attorney failed to file the prize divorce (I know, I know, you get what you pay for), I was, in 1988—Drum roll—a real life, bona fide bigamist.