Posted in Comedy, Tragedy and What the F...?

A Hallway Full of Doors

Posted on by Stephanie Raffelock

iStock_000023278171XSmallA shrill whistle from the teakettle pierces the morning fog. Boiling water into a cup, measured teaspoons of honey and Earl Grey, a jolt of caffeine providing passage into the day. A laptop and resolve to practice writing complete the ritual that plays out for its own sake, sunrise after sunrise. I have grown comfortable with the unrelenting boundaries that I construct around my life to give some semblance of making it work.

Aldous Huxley, “The Doors of Perception”—I read it when I was seventeen– stories of a consciousness expanded with a psychedelic –the possibilities of a higher self that spoke to the longing of a generation. Those ideal years seem far away now, an experience of becoming great that slipped through our fingers as our generation, like every generation is worn down by life. Still, passage through that doorway defined me. It stripped away something polite and exposed edges that were painful, but interesting. The desire to conform became disdainful and my life would forever be passionate and overly emotional. I am a pair of animated hands diving deeply into the rich red and black earth of creativity hoping for gold.

Riding in a car on Santa Monica Boulevard in 1969, I was always headed toward the beach. That was when I heard “Riders on the Storm,” a sing-song kind of chant that allowed the listener to get lost in a trance of the rock n’ roll experience. It wasn’t just about the music. It was about the attitude, the recklessness and abandon that gave the finger to conformity with its ache to explode the norms.

We were so young and so arrogant as not to see how our parents had sacrificed pieces of their bodies and their heart to fight in a World War that was the battle for the soul of man. It left fathers sitting alone in over stuffed chairs, relegated to corners of dark garages, lit only by the tip of a glowing cigarette; and housewives who knew better than to ask “what” or “why” and instead honored the space needed by warriors to lick wounds that constantly broke open. Conformity for them was the band-aide and my generation could not possibly understand. Our fathers passed through the doors of hell at Normandy and Iomega, a wretched memory now past, but constantly present, while The Doors blared from small radios in their children’s rooms and copies of Aldous Huxley were read late into the night, all a kind of Holden Caulfield story unfolding in millions of homes across America.

When my mother died, I began to struggle with a sense of relevance. Sixty is the threshold of old age. You can dress it up. Tighten your face with surgery, but eventually everything sags and puddles at your feet as life slips from your grasp and the music of your youth has no meaning for twenty-something’s who look at you with the same imperviousness with which you once viewed your elders. I eye the door cautiously, heartened by nieces and nephews who discover Aldous Huxley and Alan Watts and want to discuss them late into the night. The desire to get bigger in your heart and mind may be eternal, whereas the music of your youth is just a temporary soundtrack for the experience.

My mother sat at the doorway of death and waited, numbed by drugs that pulled her toward the entrance. The good daughter said the rosary and I just watched. You always knew that it would happen, but somehow you are never prepared. “Riders on the Storm.” Something sing-song to rock back and forth to. Close my eyes and understand that the doorways and the passages are what make it exciting. What’s on the other side? I don’t want anyone to say a rosary for me. It’s too conforming. Instead scatter my ashes on the beach and dance on them, pounding them into the sand, then pour a cup of Earl Grey over the whole mess and read from the last passages of Prufrock—“I grow old. I grow old. I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.”

It’s all just a long hallway of doors. I grow old, I grow old. . .a non-conforming wordsmith who writes her way into  each day with a cup of black tea and hopes to write her way out, telling as many stories as possible until the last breath when the last door slams shut.

Author:

Novelist, essayist, blogger, wife, dog-mommy, dancer, dreamer, grateful.

59 thoughts on “A Hallway Full of Doors”

  5. Woah, very profound. Mother’s Day marks the 2nd year of my mother’s passing. Thank you for sharing.
    -and-
    “I am a pair of animated hands diving deeply into the rich red and black earth of creativity hoping for gold.” We share a common thread of our existence. Carry on. Carry on.

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  6. Stephanie, just read your blog, LOVED it. Have you considered submitting your writing to the New York Times Opinionator/anxiety. I have read many of them and they are excellent, your writing quality and thoughts would fit right in. Check it out, I would love to see you in the Times. Jette

    Sent from my iPad

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  7. My…your words are woven so beautifully together…I have been sixty for three years now…lol…yes…you are so correct in all that you expressed! Beautifully written!

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  29. Interesting that you mentioned the quiet and often unspoken stories of some of men who survived WWII, yet really never recovered from it. They were here, yet not all here. I can relate to how it was.

    I was living outside Washington D.C. for a year in the late 50s. We lived in a community of duplexes and since our yards were connected, everyone knew each other. It was just the way things were.

    M brother used to go to a neighbor’s home and come home to tell us how wonderful their ketchup sandwiches were. As children we didn’t understand, that seemed normal. Later, when we grew up and moved back to the mid-west we learned the truth. The family had little money because the father had been injured in the war, couldn’t work or leave home. He drank and was always in pain.

    Those sandwiches were a gift to my brother and a sacrifice for his friend’s family.

    We finally understood, why our neighborhood playmates had an invisible father and why we were told just not to talk about it. That was just the way things were.

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  30. You express such profound and difficult truths in exquisite prose here; both joy and sorrow fought in my heart as I followed your words into a remembered past. Beautiful.

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  32. When you have a tear and a smile and even some shared time with a cup of black tea in reading your post, the message hits home. Doors have thresholds so when we leave one room, we know another awaits us. How we step over the threshold is what truly defines us.

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  35. Wonderful morning rituals.My cup of tea once l open my eyes in the morning.Beautiful thoughts smooth like silk.Jalal

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  37. I love your style of writing, very wise and profound. Extremely thought provoking, I typically don’t read entire posts because I tend to get ADHD but, I loved this post! Keep up the great work and thanks for sharing!

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  40. Stephanie, Cindy really encouraged me to read it, so I did. I liked it very much. Certainly speaks to my journey.

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  41. Stephanie, I really enjoyed it and it spoke to my heart. We all think we have so much time to do the things in life we want to do and realize in our sixties that time is racing by. You put this in such beautiful perspective.

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  43. I’m glad your “animated hands” are diving deep for I truly enjoyed your craftsmanship with words! Creative and beautiful! Continue diving deep!

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  44. Fast approaching the ‘threshold of old age’ and could relate to every word. Brilliant post Stephanie! Congratulations on being Freshly Pressed 🙂

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