She resented having lunch with a friend she had erased from her life some time ago. When Lana, the older woman she ran into at the grocery store, invited her out to eat that day, Isabel accepted begrudgingly because she was shocked to run into Lana unexpectedly, and because she had long ago determined that Lana was well-intended but exhausting in her insistence that they spend endless hours and days eating and chatting about the differences between America’s upper and lower classes, the Russian propaganda that drove her out of her birthplace and hometown in Moscow in the 1980s, and the importance of practicing aristocratic manners when eating five course meals or drinking wine and tea.
When the two women met at the museum two years ago, they started a heady friendship that included hours of driving around town to second-hand stores, where Lana searched for bargains on homeware and clothes she deemed classy yet appropriate for her odd-shaped figure with the “pregnant-looking belly” like she called it; and to Scarborough, including drives by the homes of the wealthy on Proust Neck, where Lana once worked as a chef for the wealthy who summered on the peninsula.
Since Isabel didn’t drive, Lana drove them around in her used Honda hatchback, making stops at her preferred places in town. Their outings had always concluded with the seafood bouillabaisse, roasted dill chicken salad with avocado dressing, or any of the fine dishes that Lana had prepared and packed for them in Tupperware or fancy glass jars she cleaned and collected from gourmet stores where she occasionally bought fine foods. The meals were usually eaten at Isabel’s 250 square foot studio apartment in Portland because Lana’s retired husband stayed home most of the day, and because she said he made her nervous.
Isabel bought the expensive French wines, Italian chestnuts, Middle Eastern dates, and Scandinavian cheeses she knew her friend preferred. Yet, all the time, effort, and money that she put into the friendship weren’t enough for Lana, who insisted they meet every day, or every other day, and have daily conversations on the phone, so that six months into their friendship Isabel gained 40 pounds, stopped painting, and became lethargic. Her pleas to her friend to taper off their outings to once a week or every other week, because she had daily responsibilities as an adjunct instructor in her online American History courses and personal projects to complete, went unheeded; instead, Lana stopped by her apartment more often and called more frequently until Isabel stopped answering her phone and doorbell.
Now Isabel sat across from her former friend at the Chinese buffet as if there had not been a rift of more than a year-and-a-half between them.
“Honey, where have you been? I missed you,” the older woman said while sucking on the salty pink shell of a jumbo shrimp she peeled before devouring, while her large blue eyes filled with tears.
“Working and visiting my sick mother in New York City,” Isabel replied, smiling away fears that the conversation would veer in the direction of the reasons for their rift. She knew Lana would never want to hear her side of the story in an incident she would have deemed disagreeable.
“You know, honey, you shouldn’t get noodles at a place like this. If you pay the high price of a buffet get the duck, beef, and seafood instead,” the older woman said while wiping away her tears.
“I like my sides,” Isabel said as she picked at the cold noodles and greasy food on her plate while wondering how Lana, an excellent chef and purveyor of fine foods, stuffed herself with relish while confirming her restaurant choice by saying that many friends had eaten there and recommended it.
“You are wasting money, honey, eating a side here,” the older woman repeated.
When the check arrived, Isabel paid the bill. There was an unspoken understanding between the women that Lana was retired and could never afford such an outing as she had again implied to Isabel on the drive to the buffet.
After leaving the restaurant, Lana stopped at her favorite higher-end women’s clothing store where she walked around showing Isabel her favorite pieces, which she emphasized were discounted a whopping 50% off. “Maybe, if we did not spend money at the restaurant, we could shop here instead,” Lana said, implying of her wish that Isabel buy her something, like she had done in the past when they stopped at gourmet stores, and Lana stared longingly at artisan chocolates or stuffed olives she said she could not afford, making Isabel feel guilty enough to purchase the items for her friend even though her budget didn’t allow such an expense that week.
More than ever, the younger woman was angry at herself for agreeing to that day’s outing, and she was further infuriated by Lana’s insistence that she be permitted to stop by her apartment the next day with food she said she would prepare for them that night, even though Isabel made it clear that she was busy and didn’t have the time. “It won’t take long, honey. I will make us a nice lunch and then you can be on your way,” Lana insisted before driving away after dropping her off at her apartment.
Isabel couldn’t sleep that night from indigestion. She hadn’t eaten greasy foods in over a year. Her daily diet was now geared towards mental clarity and included enriched calcium almond milk, black tea, grainy cereals, vegetable smoothies, fruits, lean meats, and salads. She had long ago learned that her love of overdoing it in long-winded, gossipy conversations, drinking too much alcohol, smoking cigars, and eating rich or greasy foods were a body-mind-and-soul- crushing blow to her being productive, even though she still got a bit distracted and did not complete all the items on her daily to-do list. Like she once told a friend, she had been raised on the toxic concoction of dysfunction and violence, and in adulthood her negative impulses had been cleverly disguised as the pursuit of decadent and wasteful activities, which her life of silence and solitude in Maine, over the last seven years, had made abundantly clear.
In her hermit-like existence, in a minimalist 250 square foot studio apartment with only a couch, area rug, and bed for furniture, she had found God, not the hair-raising evangelical one of the protestant schools she had attended as a child who focused only on her wrong-doings and meting out the perfect punishments for them, but a patient, adventurous guide to dark soul travels who illuminated impediments to her becoming a clear-minded individual who looked more like a creative, productive, and introspective Mainer with a look of woods and wonder shiny brightly in her eyes--not an easy feat after years of raising two children on her own and living in big cities, the chaos and noise of her past lives constantly calling with their allure of drama and gossip; shopping for fine shoes, perfume, dresses, and furnishings she could never really afford; eating at fancy restaurants she had always charged on credit cards; and cravings for bigger and better adventures, mostly in Europe, and far and away from her present life, expenses which had once driven her into bankruptcy. However, the impulses of her past had subsided over the last couple of years.
Running into Lana, though, had rattled her. At first, she was angry at her friend for bullying her, but then she remembered what Ram Dass, a Harvard instructor turned spiritual leader of the counter-cultural movement in 60s America had said: “When someone’s a stinker to you that’s their karma, but blaming them for being a stinker to you is your karma.”
Isabel had changed since she last saw Lana. At 47, she was grounded and content with life, feelings she had never felt worthy of before. Solitude, meditation, hiking, and reiki had given her a sense of self-acceptance: She came to terms with her strong, athletic figure, occasionally giving her thighs, arms, and upper body hugs while asking them forgiveness for her years of mental bashing; she reduced to an hour a day the telephone chats with a favorite cousin, which in the past lasted more than four hours a day and cut short her painting, hiking, and reading projects; and she stopped wasting an inordinate amount of time napping and watching movies, activities that now felt like taking scissors to cut and discard precious hours from her day. The weeks, months and years no longer ran away and disappeared in a puff of smoke, leaving her wondering where the time had gone. Years of self-reflection had also given her the discipline and courage to lasso the hours and place each one by its rightful project-- and it all felt like resurrection to her.
As she now paced around her studio after drinking another Alka-Seltzer, she felt discomfort in her soul and in her stomach. At 2:00 a.m., the first full wolf moon of the year shone outside her window as she searched YouTube videos online for its meaning. On her channel, the astrologer Sarah Vrba explained that this particular lunar eclipse and full moon were about our shadow sides, about realizing the oldest, scariest stories we told ourselves about ourselves, and about letting those stories go.
The oldest scariest story Isabel had ever told herself was the one about her relationship with her mother, who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and who she had visited every two weeks for the last two years at a nursing home in New York City. Since the doctor had increased her mother’s dosage of the painkiller Fentanyl six months ago, Isabel had experienced a spacious new sense of peace of mind after there were no more calls from, or confrontations when she visited her mother, who had always accused her of being selfish, irresponsible, ungrateful, hateful, stupid, unloving … accusations that trailed after her entire life, leaving behind a subconscious allegiance to her victimhood, imposed by self or others.
In loving her mother, she became her victim and the unwitting victim of anyone who mimicked her bullying, narcissistic behaviors in intimately familiar ways. She had spent the last seven years in Maine hunting down self -destructive patterns and letting them go. Recently, her mother’s drugged but content view of the world--and her daughter--put Isabel on the home stretch of her quest for personal freedom, so that running into Lana the day before sent her back to an emotional battlefield where her dead had not been properly grieved or buried.
As she stood up from the window seat, she walked away from the computer, sensing a slow-moving epiphany making its way to her. All she knew was that she had to stop Lana from coming over to her apartment that day by calling her at daybreak and cancelling their lunch date, even though she didn’t know what she would say (in the past she had refused to hurt Lana’s feelings because she was elderly, depressed, lonely, and highly emotional, always crying about something or other) But, for the first time in the history of her dealings with other people, Isabel valued her feelings more than the other person’s.
She paced the floor, checking the time on her cellphone every so often, and she didn’t allow confusion as to how she would handle the call with Lana to diminish her excitement about taking in hand an experience she refused be a part off. She stopped herself from calling Lana at the 7:00 a.m. daybreak and waited another hour, mentally noting that she had run into Lana at the grocery store exactly 24 hours ago.
“Don’t come over today,” Isabel said on the phone, unevenly and without a greeting, the adrenaline of a child-like tantrum building up in her mind and body so that her heart raced, her left eye twitched, and her voice cracked.
“Is that you, honey? What’s wrong? Is everything okay?” Lana whined, half asleep.
“I have fallen in love,” Isabel said, shocked by what she said.
“With who, honey. With who?” Lana asked, changing her tone to one of concern or inquisitiveness.
“Do you have a man at your house now, honey?” she continued.
“Not that! You cannot come over today. Do you understand me?”
“Is everything okay, honey?”
“Yes, but I will not open my door if you stop by.”
“Why, honey, why? You are hurting my feelings. Why can’t I go to your house today? I cooked all night for us. You do not make sense. Who did you fall in love with, honey?” Lana insisted, angrily.
“Myself,” the younger woman said before clicking the disconnect button on her cellphone.
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