Dancing With My Demons

“I loved her not for the way she dances with my angels, but for the way the sound of her name could silence my demons.” Christopher Poindexter

To tell you the truth, I loved Evelyn for both.

I didn’t celebrate life well before I met her, nor did I fully acknowledge my negative side. Deny and deflect were my modes of coping. I was dependable and dull. I got work done. I was disconnected from emotional highs and lows, both positive and negative, as well as from the energy that each one brings.

            I floated in the middle, which is like living in the neutral zone in Star Trek between the Romulans and the Federation, watching life go on around me. Evelyn worked to get me in touch with both sides, although it took her death to crack the negative one open. 

            She handled her demons. For her last ten years, she struggled with various ailments and seldom felt physically good, seldom slept long enough, but she would not give up her fight to regain her health. She tutored children with learning problems when she had the energy, and continued to care for people who were suffering.

            Then she died and I had new demons to fight. In my first year of grief, I doubted everything good, and doubted my ability to handle the emotional tsunami of grief. 

            My demons? One that haunted me was that I didn’t save Evelyn from dying, because I didn’t think her dizziness the night before her heart attack was anything to worry. Because we had just been to the doctor that afternoon. Because Ev felt good enough that evening to go to her theater rehearsal. Because no doctor had ever said anything about her heart being a problem. Because she was in her 40s, and who dies in their 40s? Saving her was my responsibility, and I failed.

            Another demon was that I did not get to say my last words to her, or to hear her say what she wished for me in the future. Now she was gone with all her insights and I could only guess what she might have said. We didn’t have any parting messages prepared because we expected to be together for 40 more years. This demon is called the “What if.”

            Besides the personal failings, there were all the demons packed inside grief — Guilt, Anger, Sorrow, Depression, Loneliness and more. To other people, they may just be emotions. To me they were hammers. I worried that I’d revert to my introvert and shut everything down. 

            Although she wasn’t here to guide me, Evelyn had taught me that demons don’t have control unless I let them. So I invited my demons to dance.