Room For Air

I don’t think it’s meaningless, the story that says God sculpted us from clay. Of all the things He made, humankind was the first that He touched. The first breath we tasted was His exhale. I don’t think it’s meaningless that the first time humanity looked up at the eyes of God, His hands were dirty and He was close.

Maybe we missed it—what God showed us when He first introduced Himself: that He will crawl into the dirt to be near us, and He will fill our lungs with air when we don’t know how to breathe.

Most people never think about breathing, but I think about it a lot. There was a time when there were too many tumors in my lungs for the doctors to count. Knowing the number wouldn’t have changed the outcome—I was running out of room for air. Even as the tumors shrunk, I found myself breathing shallow, and sometimes not breathing at all. The tumors were getting smaller, but the grief was sprawling out.

I’ve been to the desert only a few times in my life, but every time it changed me. It’s hard to explain the desert to someone who has never been, but I can tell you that the silence lasts for miles. The desert never interrupts. The desert never rushes.

After a mental collapse that left me on the bathroom floor for months, I drove from Ohio to Los Angeles with my brother. I had traveled from east to west coast several times, but always by plane. I love that planes let you skip over time and space. I can close my eyes in one place and open them in another. But this time I took the long way. 

We set out from the midwest, where the shadows stretch as far as they want to because there is plenty of room for it. We came through the snow globe world of the Rockies, then through Utah’s purple skies and powder blue mountains, where the loose amber sand stained the bottom of my shoes. We came through New Mexico and Arizona, where crispy desert flowers close their eyes and lean towards the sun.

It was a pilgrimage, this trip. A symbol of my willingness to walk the long road of healing with my own two feet, get my hands dirty, and maybe even let God breathe for me. It was my solemn “yes,” to go through instead of trying to go over or under or around. It was a resolution that I wouldn’t cheat the system anymore. I shook hands with pain and agreed to play fair. I would walk the path. I would see it through. 

What I wanted more than anything was a different past, but my face was telling stories that I could not erase. My body would not lie. There was an ache that I couldn’t shake off, no matter how much I bullied myself. I spent a long time believing that if I wanted it badly enough, I could be scar-free; that if I made myself tall enough, I could intimidate the pain into turning away. But my soul wouldn’t rest until I finally admitted I was wrong.

I was a universe of swollen questions, slouching in the passenger seat. I stared out the window through the flatlands, and the tunnels under mountains, through the snow and the hills and the rain and the heat. I let it all pass through me. Grief can take so many forms. 

When we were almost to the end, we pulled off onto a dirt road in Arizona to have a funeral for my marriage. 

We found an ice scraper under the seat and dug a grave in the sand. I crouched down and pulled my marriage certificate out of a clear plastic sleeve. It was as cool and smooth as the day it was handed to me. I saw my signature in blue ink, a broken oath in my own handwriting. His signature was there too, and I didn’t fight it when I felt sentimental. When he signed it, he really believed that he loved me. I knew that. The complicated truth sagged in my gut.

I put the two wedding bands and the papers in the sand, and lit a corner. Fire and wind pulled it all apart, one fleck of feathery ash at a time. I pressed my lips together and hummed quietly. It was the melody that played when I wore the white dress and made the promise. I wanted to end it the same way it started—with sincerity and finality and a song.

I pushed the sand back over the ashes and set a smooth white stone on top. My brother left for the car, and I stood silently with the cacti. I didn’t want the old life or the promises or the rings back. Still it was a difficult goodbye. But the desert didn’t rush me; the desert didn’t interrupt.

I breathed deep. Breathing is holy for me. My hands were dirty, and God’s too. I closed my eyes and leaned into the sun, this time with a little more room for air.