Meeting Cheryl Strayed on a Snowy Day

FRIDAY, yesterday, was a day of flurries. I was stuck at home in the morning reading research method books, thinking evil thoughts about a professor who is quite clueless about what she/he is teaching, and keeping the little plump kitten off my laptop keyboard. I look up from my mountain of books and notes and journal articles and see that there is a snowstorm outside. I can barely see the trees out my window. Everything is flurry-ious white and moving and swirling.

I made a split-second decision to junk to school work +(for the moment) and drive to the library where a favorite author of mine is going to read from her new book. But alas, I have to snovel (shovel snow) my way to the drive way to dig out the truck. Can't have it getting stuck in the snowbank. It's a four-wheel drive, but better safe than frozen.

When I get there, a plump woman in glasses, with graying hair and a heavy Scandinavian accent is introducing Cheryl Strayed. Cheryl Strayed who has such a magnificant name. An interesting name. A name that has echoes in her prose. If you want to know what I mean, hunt down a copy of The Best American Essays 2003, and look for the essay "The Love of My Life." Quite an excellent piece of prose. Her mother--who was a mature student here at UMD--dies of cancer and Cheryl grieves by being a slut. You know I can't quite do justice to the essay by writing a summary here. Let's just say, it's a well-written piece of work. And I was quite happy that UMD was part of her book tour.

Anyhow, there was Cheryl Strayed, reading a few pages from her book "Torch" and I feel I know the book intimately even if I hadn't read it yet. That's because novel is an extension/expansion of her essay "The Love of My Life".

Here is the first paragraph of the essay:

The first time I cheated on my husband, my mother had been dead for exactly one week. I was in a cafe in Minneapolis watching a man. He watched me back. He was slightly pudgy, with jet black hair and skin so white it looked as if he'd powdered it. He stood and walked to my table and sat down without asking. He wanted to know if I had a cat. I folded my hands on the table, steadying myself; I was shaking, nervous at what I would do. I was raw, fragile, vicious with grief. I would do anything.

I am a big fan of excellent beginnings and this is a good example. The paragraph sets the tone for the entire essay. Its language is simple, but the sentiment it conveys is thick with humanity. It is the sort of scene that you can't quite lay out, baroque-style. This type of grief is a raw ball of sadness and hurt. The paragraph tells the story the way the Cheryl's hands were folded on the table: trying to keep composure but on the brink of topppling into uncontrollable loss of self.