Oughtta, don't wanna

 A long-time but not intimate friend (K) died a couple of years ago.  She had been a best friend in junior high, but once I moved from where she lived, our friendship became more desultory.  We liked one another, but our paths seldom crossed.

I knew her husband, although not very well.  I liked him fine but I don't think he and I ever had a one-on-one conversation while K was alive.  After her death, I called him just to express my sympathy and concern.  The call seemed to mean a lot to him; they had moved not long before K died, and he hadn't made friends in their new town.

After that, I called a few more times, but every call was the same.  He would talk for more than an hour and I would listen and murmur "uh huh" in the right places.  He was never grim nor complaining; he had a dry wit and made a lot of puns, told jokes, just talked and talked.  He never asked me about myself, and didn't introduce topics of wider interest. I got absolutely nothing out of those calls except the thinly rewarding feeling that I was doing something kind.  My calls became less frequent and eventually I stopped calling altogether.

I have a friend (N) here in Seattle who is part of a gang I hang out with sometimes, most of us actors, all of us aging.  N has aged the most drastically.  He now lives in senior housing, and although his mind is still pretty good, his body is terribly, terribly fragile, and to have a meal with him means spending 2 hours watching him try to get food into his mouth.  I am one of only two of the gang who has ever visited him, and now the other one doesn't drive any more so it's just me.  N lives about 40 minutes north of me, so when the gang gets together, I'm expected to pick N up and bring him, which turns what would be a 2 hour outing into about 5 1/2 hours, what with getting to N's, getting him and his walker into the car, the drive, the gathering, the drive back.

So here is where I'm torn.  On the one hand, I have many, many blessings in my life, and can certainly afford to be generous with my friendship.  Being a friend to people who don't have friends is the right thing, the kind thing to do.  On the other hand, I'm older myself now, and more aware of how precious my time is.  I want to spend it doing things that are rewarding and interesting and stimulating.  I don't really want to spend an hour on the phone listening to the maundering of someone I didn't know all that well to begin with, and it's a pain in my ass to be N's driver and only friend.  I didn't have a friendship with N separate from the gang gatherings.  I like him well enough, but I just don't feel I like him well enough to give so much of myself for his sake.

I think I have the right to say "I want to do this, I don't want to do that."  I think we all do, at any stage in life, but certainly by our 70's, when there is so much more past than future for us.  For close friends, for family, for Bill, I would do anything and everything.  But for these peripheral acquaintances, I just don't know how much of myself I want to spend.  And yet I feel as though I must be awfully selfish not to be willing to make a boring phone call now and then, or clear my schedule so I can be a taxi.

I just don't want to.  Why do I feel I have to?  Why don't these men have other people showing up for them?  Why does it fall to me to make up for the fact that they didn't make friends?  I'm sure I could be more generous, but, sadly, I sometimes end up feeling impatient and resentful, although I do my best to stay attentive and kind.  I don't feel good about giving these men my shoulder, but I also don't feel good about denying it to them.  As I said - torn.

Panic

Eons ago, in another life, I was driving up winding, unlit Highway 1 along the Big Sur coast at midnight on a Christmas Eve, headed north  from Los Angeles to spend the holiday with my sister, whose then-husband was a ranger in a coastal park.

I hadn't seen another car in several hours, which was actually rather nice as I could take my time and not have to navigate around slower cars.  Finally another car passed me heading south.  When I looked in my rearview mirror, I saw that car turn around; it was now behind me, following me, although it hadn't had a chance to catch up to me yet.

All I could think was that the driver(s) had seen a young woman alone and wanted to - well, I hardly dared visualize what might be on their minds/his mind.  It didn't seem possible that the U-turn was a coincidence.

Until recently, I had never been as scared as I was right then.  I stepped on the gas, taking the dangerous curves as a dangerous speed.  There was no place to turn off the road, nowhere to hide.  I was so full of adrenaline that I had no say in what I was doing; I felt as though I were running for my life.  The good news is that eventually I lost sight of their headlights; perhaps they knew I was on to them and they gave up.  Maybe they crashed.  I'll never know what would have happened if they had caught up to me, and I will always be thankful that I didn't find out.

That was the first time I remember feeling pure panic.  The second time happened quite recently.  Sweet Hubby and I were on the couch eating salad, settling in to watch a movie.  I realized SH was coughing very strangely and that he was clearly in distress.  "Do you need me Heimlich you?" I said, or maybe shouted.  He turned his back to me so I stood him up, wrapped my arms around him from behind, and punched. 

I know the basics of the Heimlich, of course, as we probably all do.  But knowing the theory is as different from actually performing it as reading sheet music is from singing.  Oh my god oh my god what if I try to save him and I can't and he dies in front of me and it's my fault?  What if I'm doing it wrong?  What if this doesn't work?

The second punch got the slippery bit of lettuce off of SH's windpipe and he was all right.  I, however, was a gloppy mess.  I don't think of myself as a hysterical person, but I was as close to hysteria as I've ever been, even including that terrible midnight drive.  It took quite a while for me to stop sobbing.  Even now, a couple of days later, I get a sensation of hot water running from my stomach down my legs when I revisit the memory of that terrible moment.  What if the Heimlich hadn't worked?  I will always be thankful that I didn't find out.