Sweet old luscious life.

Am I a fatalist? I've never been entirely sure. I strive to be an optimist and I always hold out hope, even in the darkest moments. And if you asked me if I believed that my life was predetermined, I would likely chuckle and assure you I didn't. Why then do I sometimes have such overpowering feelings of dread when certain situations present themselves? Why am I sometimes so sure that the very act of thinking up unpleasant scenarios will bring about disaster? As if the very act of thinking a horrible thought sets in motion its inevitable realization, and I'm just a helpless bystander unable to stop the churning procession; every action, conscious or unconscious, furthering the manifestation of my worst nightmare. Perhaps it's not a belief in fate and bad omens at all, but simply a fear of self-fulfilled prophecy. And if that's the case, maybe I'm more superstitious than fatalistic. Either way, it's enough to drive me batty.


We were on our way to Peter's parents' yesterday for lunch when Patrick Watson's Luscious Life began to play on the truck's stereo. It's a fantastic song and a favourite of Peter's and mine. I wasn't entirely surprised when Peter mentioned that Luscious Life is on his list of songs to be played at his funeral, since I have a mental list of my own of songs to be played when I die. It's something people do. But suddenly I had tears under my sunglasses and was struggling to keep my chin from quivering, giving me away. I stopped myself from blurting out what my heart was begging me to say: "Don't talk about your funeral. Ever."


I've always had a tough time when Peter travels. I cannot seem to stop my mind from imagining the worst. I've imagined the midnight telephone calls from the police, the TV newscast of a highway pileup featuring his totalled truck front and centre, the radio newsman telling of a plane gone down. And worse. Apparently my mind takes great pleasure in torturing me.


When I was pregnant with Sonja, I was waiting for Peter to pick me up from work one evening and he was taking a very long time to show up. It was a warm, summer night, still light out and I was waiting outside the store for what felt like forever. I was getting a bit peeved, but then I started to worry. I had been calling him on my cell phone and he wasn't answering. What if something had happened to him on the way to pick me up? What if he had been in an accident? As if on cue, I started to hear sirens. They seemed to be coming from everywhere and they were all headed to an area that lay between our house and my work. By this point, I was panicking. I started to walk in the direction of home, toward the sound of the sirens. I was openly crying; I was convinced those sirens had to do with Peter.


In the end, there had been a miscommunication, or Peter had lost track of time, or something equally innocent. He was fine. And after years of being together, Peter knows that I worry incessantly about his safety when he's away from home, so he was very understanding and apologetic that lovely summer evening when I was pregnant and convinced I was about to become a single parent to a child who would never know her father. For the record, I don't consider myself too much of a drama queen and I attribute a lot of that panic to being pregnant (because I can and no one will argue). But in all honesty, my reaction that day was a visible display of what I quite often feel inside but keep under wraps: I am terrified of losing Peter, of having our life together cut short, of not being able to tell or show him how much I love him, because there aren't enough days or words. I am terrified that there will never be enough days, that once this is all over my only wish will be for just one more day, just one more moment, just one more word, My Love.

So at the end of the day, I know I'm not a fatalist. I've spent too many hours pondering the road not taken to believe in one possible ending, one path. I'm far too pragmatic and skeptical to rely solely on fate or God or anything else, but I'm not above indulging in a little superstition here and there to help wish myself out of a sticky situation. I'm that most aggravating of non-believers: the flip-a-coin, kiss-a-toad, cross-my-fingers, get-my-ass-out-of-this-mess, rainy-day believer, who will call on God, Buddha, Yahweh and any other spiritual, moony whatever-you've-got if it will keep Peter safe on the road, keep my kids happy and healthy and allow me to be around to see it all. If there were a guarantee of that, I would sign up for just about anything.