motionless and passive, or may occasionally rock themselves to and fro. The circulation becomes languid; the face pale; the muscles flaccid; the eyelids droop; the head hangs on the contracted chest; the lips, cheeks, and lower jaw all sink downwards from their own weight. Hence all the features are lengthened; and the face of a person who hears bad news is said to fall.… After prolonged suffering the eyes become dull and lack expression, and are often slightly suffused with tears. The eyebrows not rarely are rendered oblique, which is due to their inner ends being raised. This produces peculiarly-formed wrinkles on the forehead.…
But the most conspicuous result of the opposed contraction of the [eyebrow] muscles, is exhibited by the peculiar furrows formed on the forehead. These muscles, when thus in conjoint yet opposed action, may be called, for the sake of brevity, the grief-muscles.”
—Charles Darwin
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals
You never sleep the night someone dumps you.
There is too much pain.
Too much confusion.
Too much wrestling with your New-Cow suit, trying to keep it on while it is trying to come off
.
Probably you will sleep in your clothes, too afraid to remove them because then you’ll be confronted with your naked body—
the body that was left for countless imperfections; the body that will remain untouched, celibate, unmated for the rest of your natural life
.
You might lie on top of the covers because it is easier that way. Or, if you do muster the will to pull them down and crawl under them, you will have to be very careful not to suffocate or strangle yourself with them, though you will desperately want to.
Whatever you do with the sheets, you will curl up in the fetal position with a handful of Kleenex. You will sob and weep and roll over to no avail, since comfort and peace will elude you.
The words
Why? Why? Why?
will play in your head like an endless tape. After a few hours the words might become altered slightly, to
Why me?
or even
What will become of me?
These are transformational rhetorical questions and you should not try to answer them; they are simply part of the metamorphosis from New back to Old, and you must endure them.
At around five or six in the morning you will drift off momentarily from sheer exhaustion into a light and very brief REM sleep, from which you will awaken in tears. You will stareintently into space with your mouth open, then roll over again and sob into your pillow, because what you just dreamed was that he had come back, and for those few surreal semiconscious moments before you opened your eyes, you thought it was true.
The morning after, I got up and stared into the closet. Somehow I had the presence of mind to know that I needed to pick my clothes carefully to face Ray, something dark and impenetrable, something that could not, in any way, resemble a bathrobe and slippers.
But since I didn’t own a suit, I put together something that looked like one: a mourning suit—black jacket, black skirt, black tights—and after I showered and dressed, I went into the bathroom and shut the door.
I don’t know how long I stayed in there, sitting on the toilet seat cover, weeping, but I do know that it must have been a long time, because when I finally stood up and looked in the mirror, I almost didn’t recognize myself. Staring back at me from the mirror was not the New Cow I had come to know and love the past few months but something else entirely:
A big, fat, sad, pathetic Old Cow with Kleenex sticking out of her nose
.
All my efforts to prepare myself for seeing Ray dissolved when I actually saw him, in the greenroom, getting coffee. Our greenroom, unlike most television greenrooms, actually was green, a color long ago believed to have a calming effect on actors. As I stood there waiting for it to take effect on my nervous system, I was determined not to let him see how devastated, panicked, and suddenly furious I was.
“Hi,”
But the most conspicuous result of the opposed contraction of the [eyebrow] muscles, is exhibited by the peculiar furrows formed on the forehead. These muscles, when thus in conjoint yet opposed action, may be called, for the sake of brevity, the grief-muscles.”
—Charles Darwin
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals
You never sleep the night someone dumps you.
There is too much pain.
Too much confusion.
Too much wrestling with your New-Cow suit, trying to keep it on while it is trying to come off
.
Probably you will sleep in your clothes, too afraid to remove them because then you’ll be confronted with your naked body—
the body that was left for countless imperfections; the body that will remain untouched, celibate, unmated for the rest of your natural life
.
You might lie on top of the covers because it is easier that way. Or, if you do muster the will to pull them down and crawl under them, you will have to be very careful not to suffocate or strangle yourself with them, though you will desperately want to.
Whatever you do with the sheets, you will curl up in the fetal position with a handful of Kleenex. You will sob and weep and roll over to no avail, since comfort and peace will elude you.
The words
Why? Why? Why?
will play in your head like an endless tape. After a few hours the words might become altered slightly, to
Why me?
or even
What will become of me?
These are transformational rhetorical questions and you should not try to answer them; they are simply part of the metamorphosis from New back to Old, and you must endure them.
At around five or six in the morning you will drift off momentarily from sheer exhaustion into a light and very brief REM sleep, from which you will awaken in tears. You will stareintently into space with your mouth open, then roll over again and sob into your pillow, because what you just dreamed was that he had come back, and for those few surreal semiconscious moments before you opened your eyes, you thought it was true.
The morning after, I got up and stared into the closet. Somehow I had the presence of mind to know that I needed to pick my clothes carefully to face Ray, something dark and impenetrable, something that could not, in any way, resemble a bathrobe and slippers.
But since I didn’t own a suit, I put together something that looked like one: a mourning suit—black jacket, black skirt, black tights—and after I showered and dressed, I went into the bathroom and shut the door.
I don’t know how long I stayed in there, sitting on the toilet seat cover, weeping, but I do know that it must have been a long time, because when I finally stood up and looked in the mirror, I almost didn’t recognize myself. Staring back at me from the mirror was not the New Cow I had come to know and love the past few months but something else entirely:
A big, fat, sad, pathetic Old Cow with Kleenex sticking out of her nose
.
All my efforts to prepare myself for seeing Ray dissolved when I actually saw him, in the greenroom, getting coffee. Our greenroom, unlike most television greenrooms, actually was green, a color long ago believed to have a calming effect on actors. As I stood there waiting for it to take effect on my nervous system, I was determined not to let him see how devastated, panicked, and suddenly furious I was.
“Hi,”
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