I often wake up with a song in my head. Our psychology major son tells me it’s a form of mental illness but not to worry, we all have a drop of most illnesses. The other morning Paul Simon’s 1977 song, “Slip sliding away” woke me up. It’s taken me a while to understand why that song knocked at my door, but I have finally gotten the message.

In October of last year, I lost a friend/sister who I had known for 50 plus years. Her death wasn’t unexpected, but that doesn’t matter when it comes to grief. She and I had gone from early marriage to grandchildren and even if we didn’t talk every day, it didn’t matter. Of course I cried, I spoke at her Life Celebration, but my subconscious, which has a sneaky way of making you face something you’d rather not face, kept knocking at my door, delivering a message I knew but refused to recognize.

Saying something, recognizing something, isn’t the same thing as owning it. I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine? Unwittingly, I was disappearing down a rabbit hole. I’ve had the low-grade blues for a while. I dismissed it. Taking a leaf from the poet friend Deborah wrote for my sister’s wedding, “I am a grown a _ _ woman who makes her own decisions and guides her own life.”

I’m smart enough to handle this, I said to myself. The weather is perfect, nothing is wrong in my family, life is good. What on earth do I have to be blue about? I just need to get busier, work more on the farm, in other words, get my act together. I can do that, surely?

Singing the chorus to Paul Simon’s words, I stoutly said to myself, I’m not “Slip, slidin’ away/ You know the nearer your destination/ The more you’re slip slidin’ away.” I became busy: busyness would surely take my mind off myself.  So, I became busy, so busy that I fell asleep any time I sat down.

Then Pope Francis died. Jimmy Carter had died.  Such. Good. Men. Now gone. The rabbit hole I was digging became deeper and I was close to the point where I wouldn’t be able to crawl out.

A few days later, I drove to North Carolina to attend the annual Hiker Chick Retreat. I’ve written about this retreat before; smart, interesting, strong women gathering to do something they all love, hiking. Through the years our conversations have gone from remembered hysterically funny stories from our past to dear stories about our grandchildren. As we’ve aged, many of our stories are about health or perhaps terrifying looming issues.

It is three days of socialization, and reaffirming friendships. Three days of making more stories. We take long hikes which, as the physicality of the hike releases good endorphins, result in conversations filled with heartfelt comments, or life issues or laughter.

As the days progress, one realizes that one is not alone; we are, as that trite expression says, in it all together. Can we cope with whatever challenges we face? Often that is yet to be discerned, but after affirmation of our friendships, of our lives, we know that we don’t have to face the future alone. Others are there, we don’t have to “slide away.” The first two lines of the last verse of Paul Simon’s song says: “God only knows/ God makes his plan/ The information’s unavailable/ To the mortal man.” We may not have the information, but now I know I am not alone. God has His plan, and I have support for my portion of His plan. I quietly rise out of my rabbit hole.

 Cindy Arp, teacher/librarian, retired from Knox County Schools. She and husband Dan live in Heiskell.

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