Meeting her

It isn't the baby's fault. It isn't Corinne's fault. I've bought a ticket. I'll get out to Florida and meet her, and bond with this little soul. Sooner is better. If I wait, the pain worsens, will settle into me and become part of the story. Part of the sorrow.

I bought books and toys and clothes to bring with me. I won't think about it until I have to. I won't think about the name. I don't have to call her by name. I can call her nicknames and she doesn't ever have to know. And when she's there, in my arms, I have to believe that the love for this particular small person will win out against the pain.

Tired and working

It was Sunday. I had a decision to make: do I spend the day relaxing and enjoying life or do I work all day (and into the night) writing an entire proposal for a USAID project?

You can guess which option I chose. I've been working for nearly sixteen hours without much of a reprieve. I'm not finished. The damned thing is due at 1100 tomorrow. I've munched too much, and sat on my bum at the desk all day. I feel nasty and sore and tired.

Big companies pay big groups of professionals to research and draft proposals. And I thought I could do this bloody thing in one day? I'm an idiot. But I'm an idiot that isn't ready throw in the towel yet. I'm about 72% finished. My hope is that the rest of the work is less invention, more rote.

Grrr.

In a name

Corinne had her baby on March 11. I called several times when she was in the hospital - before, and after the baby was born. A little girl. I heard the little mewling noises that a newborn makes. It filled me with so much joy.
On March 12, I called again for what must have been the fifteenth time. And in a moment of openness and loving and wanting to give Corinne everything, I gave away something I should not have given: I gave her Zadie.
Zadie was Sjors' child. And mine. She didn't get born. She wasn't even conceived. But I felt that she was waiting. I wanted so badly to have her. And when I lost Sjors, I lost her, too.
Eve told me that I hadn't lost her yet. That I might be able to have her some day. So I've been waiting until I was strong enough, recovered enough, could guarantee I could fight the blackness enough and not walk into the ocean. And waiting until I could have joy, not sorrow, when I had Zadie without Sjors.
Two years ago, I told Corinne about Zadie. She forgot the story, but the name must have stuck, so when her baby was born, she wanted the name. and because I would give Corinne anything, I gave her Zadie.
I knew within moments that this was a very bad thing for me, but I thought, "maybe she won't do it. Maybe she won't choose my baby's name." And I hoped that she wouldn't.
Corinne texted me on March 13. She asked, "Would you be offended if we named her Zadie Corinne?" I didn't respond. I wasn't offended. I was feeling overwhelmed with a pain that I couldn't understand and I thought it wasn't fair to influence her decision.
On March 14, she texted the chosen name to the family, "her name is Zadie Marie."
I've been horrified by the amount of pain that this has generated. It takes my breath away. When I wake up in the morning, I start sobbing and I can't stop. I've tried to address the pain and I've tried to ignore it. I keep hoping that it will change - that it will dissipate and I can come to terms with it.
Sometimes I think that, if I can identify the reasons for the pain itself, then I can combat it. But it is too powerful for me. It says to me, "Maybe I've fucked up too badly. Maybe god gave Zadie to Corinne instead of me." It is full of all that grief and sorrow and loss that is enmeshed and enshrined in the loss of Sjors and our future that was lost, and his betrayal. It is full of so much sadness.
It isn't reasonable, but it's stronger than something I can make a choice about, and it has poisoned my ability to be in a relationship with Corinne. I can't call her, and I feel sick when I see her name on the caller ID. She has gone someplace that I can't follow. There is this wall of pain that stands between us and I don't know how to penetrate it. I don't think that I can. I am shut out. I can't reach out to this new little child because she is tethered to this pain.

I had no idea that I would feel so intensely about this. If I had known, I never would have done it. I don't know what to do now.

Rendering

Corinne's second child is due any day now. We call her "Pa-two-li", but I don't know what her name will actually be when she emerges. Mom has flown to Florida to watch after Papouli when Corinne goes into labor. Corinne isn't focused on her own situation; she's concerned about her husband's stress and so she's ghost-writing many of his grant proposals. I looked over one this morning for the DoD about NMR research for modeling explosives, and did some background research for her.

It's getting warmer, and the time has changed over. I went walking about this weekend, in spite of a nasty cold that settled around my vocal chords this week, turning me into a bass and allowing me to reach the deeper resonances of "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" in the shower. A meandering pace of 19 min/mile winds me.

On Friday, I submitted a proposal for work in Africa and the Pacific. I have no sense of whether it will result in actual paid work because the project I wish to support is a hot issue in DoS right now, with no resolution in sight. I've begun to craft a proposal for another job in Dakar, which I'll submit next week.

My work is still unpaid. But it seems to be gaining momentum and attention. We briefed again at the Pentagon last week and Eve is working to create work for us on the Continent within discrete country teams. Strangely, my humble situation does not seem to deter many of my previous contacts who valued the quality of my work, rather than my affiliations.  Even those who understand the full spectrum of what has happened to me (I do not feel shy about discussing MIVD and their nasty tactics) continue to reach out and engage, and want my analytical support. This is validating and important, because I want to do relevant and timely work. I want my ideas to live after I've gone.

It's difficult to continue to think of myself as a professional when I'm not able to attend the meetings and receive a regular paycheck for my services. Family and friends still express amazement that this reversal of fortune has not destroyed my spirits. But the truth is: I was ready to give up everything in order to be with Sjors. He was more precious to me than anything I could own or do, and it was awful to go on living after I lost him. MIVD took the most important thing in my life first, and every loss since then has counted very little by comparison.

Just as I look forward, I continue to look behind me. I've continued to write out what happened, and this allows me to take out each memory sequentially, look at it, and place it where it belongs. I have so many notes and e-mails from that time, and records of text-messages and phone calls, and these give fidelity in the rendering. I feel it is important to be truthful and as accurate as possible.

Now I consider the irony that Sjors was so fascinated and compelled by historical tomes. By reading history, you learn the truth of events, and avoid making the mistakes of the past. Does it strike Sjors as at all strange and wrong that he had to agree to a corruption of his personal history to continue with MIVD?

Marie asked me what I was accomplishing by writing what happened between Sjors and me. I think it feels important to restore the truth of these events. To create an accurate retelling of our history. Certainly, I do not have his side of events, but I do have my own.

May 23, 2013

Outside the window on the second story of the Navy Officer’s Mess, a tree with dark branches and new foliage was moving in the wind.

I sat with my back to the room, and listened to the sounds of the lunch crowd behind me and in the rooms below.

Johan and I had made our introductions: yesterday on the phone when we agreed on the time and place, and now, shaking hands, commenting on the weather, and finding a quiet corner to talk.

He was a big man with broad, expansive movements and an equally expressive apple shaped face. I still wasn’t certain how much I would tell him. How much can you convey in a single meeting? Also, I’d grown accustomed to secrecy, and it was difficult to parse out the quanta of truth.

“We received your message,” he told me. “Thank you for sending it. Please forgive my English. I do not use it very often.”

“Het is geen probleem,” I replied. The words were thick on my tongue. “Omdat Ik niet goede Nederlands spreekt. Your English is better than my Dutch.”

His eyes widened slightly in surprise. Every child in the Netherlands is taught English so there is rarely a need for foreigners to learn the vocabulary of this small European nation. It was a private language, therefore, and I’d noticed a peculiar exclusivity when I used it. Hand stamp to a special club. My knowledge of Dutch was not good, but the pronunciation was passable. Johan got the message: I spoke the language; I was an invited guest on their military base. I was an insider.

He looked nothing like the sort of person I would have expected for this. More sympathetic bartender than military investigator, his belly tugged at the buttons of his uniform. He needed a shave. My instinct was to like him but I couldn’t help but wonder whether this was the cover. Whose side was he on?

Johan had a loose leaf notebook, and he shuffled through the pages with their blotchy notes.

“You said that your privacy was violated by two of our officers,” he continued. “We were very surprised to receive this. Can you tell me more?”

 I have always been uncomfortable discussing personal matters with people. I can scan the emotions and identify the motivations of others, but find my own emotions deeply private and difficult to express. I can rarely meet someone’s eyes when I talk of personal matters.

I began with the most sterile facts.

“I’m a civilian researcher for the U.S. Navy,” I said. “I work on an international mission called Africa Partnership Station - APS. Your Navy is also involved in this mission. I’ve been working with your military. I just made a presentation at your planning conference for African Winds. This is why I’m here on your base now – and why I was late to meet you. I was giving a presentation to a group of African and American and British and Dutch navy and marine corps officers.”

I described the mission. This was comfortable territory for me. I’d been involved in Africa since 2009 when the U.S. sent a 500-person ship down the west coast of Africa, stopping off in Senegal, Liberia, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon and Gabon. Since then, I’d assessed and supported the mission. My involvement and expertise had become attractive to the European participants and, by invitation, I traveled to different naval bases to bring these European navies up to speed. As part of my job, I’d supported the Italian and Royal Danish navies, and the Royal Netherlands Navy.

“The privacy violation was not related to my job,” I said. “But my job meant that I was working on the U.S. Naval base in Naples Italy. That was where I met covert agents from your military intelligence service, MIVD.  I should tell you that I consider these events to be personal, and not work related. There were considerable personal implications for me.”

It was so sanitized this way. Clean. I was pleased that I had tidied it up neatly.

“Can you describe what happened?” he asked.

I paused for a moment, weighing my words. My mind kept returning to a single thought: Sjors in the cold entrance of the red brick train station last night, dark blue scarf at his neck, his head bare, and the wind blowing an icy rain outside behind him. I thought of what he told me:  “You never gave my name. You never gave them anything to use against me.”

There was a strange curiosity in his dark demeanor when he spoke these words as though he could not understand why I would still protect him after everything that had passed between us. What Sjors did not know, what this investigator would not know, was that I protected him because I still loved Sjors more than my own soul. I could not bear to let them harm him. I would give them Mac. I would give Johan what he needed to investigate. But I would not give him Sjors. Even if it continued to cost me.

“It started in October 2010,” I told Johan.

Dreams and demons

Eve left at 0640 yesterday morning. I'd meant to get up and say goodbye and go to the gym when she left, but she didn't wake me. She left me a note: "Glad you're sleeping. I noticed you were very restless last night - even after you went to bed: a lot of MOVING and TALKING! Hope you were able to get a nice rest?"

 Last night, I dreamed of Sjors. In the dream, I was on a bus and Sjors was in the seat behind me. I heard him talking to his colleagues about some mission they had finished, and laughing. They were headed back to a hotel. I ached to turn and speak with him, to feel his gaze on me once more, to hear his voice speaking my name. But there were so many months of cruel words. And the last time I saw him, he looked on me so hatefully, and I was terrified of feeling that again. Somehow, miraculously, in my dream, he spoke civilly to me, if not kindly. And I lay in bed with him again, my head on his chest, his heartbeat in my ears. And the pain, which I feel every second of his absence, receded.
I think that I may have awakened a demon and it haunts me, even when I sleep.

In less than a month I've written 28,000 words. And I've only scratched the surface. The words pour out of me, these memories of Sjors. Recollections of Hans. The programs I built in Africa while I fought the pain.

When I'm not running hard, trying to build this business from scratch, writing proposals and meeting with people and answering e-mails, fighting the slander, and trying to reconnect with friends to put some balance in my life, I spend my days looking backwards, resurrecting Sjors and putting him to paper. And the more I remember, the more the pain, which has never left me, surfaces.

Maybe I was right to bury the poison. Is it like 'G's cancer, dormant, waiting to come back to finish the job?

I'm terrified of writing the next part of the story. There are some demons we weaken with neglect: don't pay them attention and they loosen their grip over time. The most powerful demon I have known, the demon that has haunted me for years was born in April 2011 when I first found Isa's Facebook page. I saw that she had posted a profile picture of herself and Sjors together. At the time, I didn't understand then the mentality of someone who desires marriage because they wish to own another person and retain social status. I earnestly believed that marriage was the natural evolution of mutual love and passion and respect, so it was impossible for me to connect with Sjors' description of his marriage to Isa as a business arrangement. I saw Isa's posting as a symbol of love, not ownership and branding, and so I believed that my love for Sjors would harm this other person. This was anathema to me: that my deep love and need for the man I loved would injure someone else. Already, I had deeply hurt Hans. How could I do this thing? How could I ask Sjors to do it? But to turn from my love of Sjors or to deny it was an act of self-negation. I could not live without loving him. The demon roared to life, the cold and comforting promise to end the pain.

He is the most powerful demon I have known. So familiar now, he has haunted me for years. He is a ruthless companion and lurks in corners, follows me down the street when I run in the sunlight, always at my shoulder, and into churches. He sits in my living room while I work and he talks to me, wraps his arms around me at night. He nearly defeated me in August and September 2011 and I can't say with confidence why he did not. I worry that my description of the brute will get his foot in the door, and I don't know that I can get him to quiet a second time.