Previous Challenge Entry
Topic: hope (03/29/04)
TITLE: Second Chances? By Lynne Cox 04/01/04 |
LEAVE COMMENT ON ARTICLE SEND A PRIVATE COMMENT SEND ARTICLE TO A FRIEND |
The pictures she wanted to take were off the walls, her books packed into boxes, her undies and socks taken out of her drawers and put in a suitcase, her children raised and gone, so it was time to go. Still, her heart dropped and her stomach spasmed when she thought that, tomorrow night, she would be all alone in an unfamiliar apartment, and her marriage would be over.
She took one last tour of the house, noticing that she had forgotten to pack her clock radio. She took it off the nightstand next to her side of the bed and wound the electric cord around it and carried it under her arm as she walked through the house. She had loved this house so much, but when the children were gone for good, it rejected her like her husband had. Screens tore, toilets plugged up, the disposal broke. Still, it did offer her a sense of security. She knew the house with the intimacy of the person who kept it clean and running. Plus she knew all the neighbors and they knew her. On top of that, her hyacinths were poking up out of the ground and would soon be blossoming. Leaving wasn’t going to be easy.
But she had plans. She was going to finish college and be a teacher. No sense in spending the rest of her life being yoked to a man who was mean to her. It was killing her spirit. Making her depressed. Of no use whatsoever to the Lord.
She blew at the dust on the mantel as she passed by. Her mind turned onto its well-worn groove – she didn’t believe in divorce so would God punish her by not letting her have another chance at a husband because she couldn’t stand the one she had another minute? Depression fell upon her, but she knew now what to do. She plopped the radio on top of one of her suitcases and ran outside and breathed fresh air until the black claws opened and released her mind back into the normalcy of the day.
That night she fed her husband pork chops and reminded him that she was leaving tomorrow. He gave her a look of disgust and didn’t answer.
The next day her son came by and helped her move everything into her apartment. After he left, she cried, but not for too long. She discovered she had brought too much stuff from the house and now she would have to try to figure out where to put it all. And where would she hang the pictures, she only had one unbroken wall in her new living room!
One life was over.
Another began.
She was grateful.