ERNIE AND ERNESTINA: The Writer, His Wife, and their Afterlife

Book One, Part Two, Chapter 36: Family Happiness

Still at the art fair, I go up to a tent with sterling-silver jewelry. I talk to the jeweler. I realize I’m drawn to older men. Maybe they make me feel safe.

This man talks of his children.

‘My daughter and I are very close. She’s an art-education major and does beautiful weavings and silk screenings. Soon she’ll leave for six months in Florence on a summer scholarship. I’m excited for her, but I’ll miss her.”

“Where is your son?” I ask.

“In Tokyo. Five years ago, he announced that he’d accepted a job teaching English to Japanese students in Tokyo. I was stunned. ‘It’s only for a year,’ he said, but that was five years ago. I’ve bitten my tongue many times to stop myself from asking him to come home, but he’d fallen in love with a Tokyo woman, and she and he have a daughter. Last Christmas, they visited us. It was the happiest of my sixty-one Christmases. Now, he’s concluded that he’s gone as far as he can in Japan. He’s coming home, with his wife and daughter, and I continue to be happy.”

Until I lost Ernie, I didn’t know how important family is. It seems so obvious to me now. Ernie was the one I lived with. He’s the one I professed to love. Ernie was my family. Without Ernie, I’m alone because Joshua lives in L. A. But I’m not just alone. I’m without Ernie.

I didn’t know how that would feel.

I look at the other fair-goers. So many of them are couples. Some of them hold hands. I am glad for them.

I want to hold Ernie’s hand as we wander the fair. I want to sit on the bench under the weepy spruce with him. I want us to kiss. I want us to be in love.

I want to feel happy.