Christi Wood

3 Oct. 2009

A Stroll through the Park

The glistening morning dew began to drip from the colorful fall leaves as her size nine Nike’s crunched through the unlucky ones that had already fallen to the ground. Crunch, scrunch, crunch, scrunch. The morning stroller’s pace quickened as rays slowly presented themselves through the clouds.

The morning routine passed through her mind, a routine that had been going on since she began her therapy two years ago. Jennifer still remembers the day she walked into Dr. Thermon’s office on Sealy Street. The doctor had been recommended by a friend, and Jennifer knew that it was time to talk to someone about the repressed feelings she had been having towards her recently deceased husband.

The smell of fresh lilies rafted through the small building as Jennifer signed her name onto the sheet. At the nurse’s command she walked down the hall and sat down in a comfortable armchair in a quite oversized room that could have used more furniture or decoration. A couch was present, but she did not feel ready for that comfortable level of therapy.

It took about ten sessions with the psychologist for Jennifer to reveal her true feelings about her late husband. The relationship had been abusive, but Jennifer always believed in her vows. The truth was that she felt relieved that her husband had passed because a huge burden had been lifted from her shoulders. As she revealed this to Dr. Thurman she felt sad and happy at the same time. She was sad that she sounded like such a mean person, but happy to finally get it off her chest.

This began the first day of her long, strenuous healing process.

Dr. Therman reassured to her confused patient that this was a normal reaction and recommend that she take up some activity every day to begin healing her heart.

Getting up early was not something that Jennifer liked to do, but she felt that she needed a change to heal herself. Thus began her morning strolls. Today marked the two year anniversary of her first stroll through the park.

            This day was different from all the others. Jennifer decided that she would try a different approach, so she didn’t begin her stroll until after nine in the morning. Jennifer processed each image as she went from spot to spot wondering just how different things would be at this hour of the day.

            There was a couple in their late twenties. The man was walking a vicious looking Doberman with slobber sloshing around on his chin and teeth flared while his partner rollerbladed beside him. As they passed Jennifer she noticed a rose tattoo of many different colors tattooed on the girl’s left arm. Jennifer pondered what it could represent as she walked on to the next thing that caught her eye.

            It was an elderly couple sitting on a park bench. The grey haired man had his arm around his wife and they both sat with legs crossed towards each other. Jennifer imagined that they were probably just as in love this morning as they were the day they got married. In her mind she thought how wonderful it would be to have a lifelong love like that.

            Crunching along Jennifer had to almost dive to the ground as a frisbee nearly decapitated her. “Sorry,” yelled a man as he ran and grabbed the blue disc of death and threw it back to his buddy. She laughed a little at the thought of death by frisbee and imagined the headlines in the morning paper.

            A family of four sat on a blanket breaking bread into small pieces to give to the ducks. A duck waddled up to a child of about three, snatched the bread from her hands, and scurried off. The child began to cry and her mother swaddled her easing the terrified baby’s sobs. Her big brother began chasing the duck, but stopped when his dad yelled that he was getting too close to the edge of the lake. The boy returned, a little saddened, but cheered up when his dad pulled a baseball and glove out of a duffle bag by his side. The game of catch began as the first pitch flew through the air.

            The playground at the nearby school began to fill up, and Jennifer could hear the joy of the children as they began their morning P.E. class. She stopped and admired the teachers who showed a miraculous amount of patience for the young children who were running around totally out of control. At the sound of a whistle, they all began to quiet down and turned to listen to the coach’s instructions. After a few minutes a mad dash began as the kids started their warm-up run around the soccer field. Jennifer was briefly taken back to her school days, running with the wind through her long blonde hair because she would never allow her mom to pull it into a pony tail. How life was so much easier then, when all she had to worry about was brushing the tangles out when she returned to the classroom.

A smile crossed her face as she felt a calming begin to come over her body. This was it she thought. Just a little longer and she would have that peace that she had been longing for. Continuing along she thought back to the session where her therapist told her that she needed to forget about all the bad memories and focus on the future. Forgetting was a way to heal, and she needed to let it go so that she could move on. The biggest part was forgetting him. She was almost there. Of course she would never completely forget, but to be able to go days without having painful memories was the goal. And Jennifer was almost to that point.

As she came close to the foulest part of her stroll she could already smell the rank stench as it rafted through the doors as a little boy pushed through the doorway. “Did you wash your hands young man?” a woman in her thirties asked. “Yes mom.” Why did they have to put the public restrooms along the walking path? That was something Jennifer asked herself every day.

The ringing of the bell pronounced the ice cream truck had pulled into the parking lot. It sure seemed to be a little early to be selling that sugar infested legal drug. Poor parents must either upset their child by not buying the tempting treat or ruin the little one’s lunch.

As Jennifer bit into her newly purchased nutty cone, she congratulated herself for losing those extra ten pounds over the last two weeks and thought about how her dietician had told her that she could have one splurge day a week. Ice cream in place of lunch was definitely the best splurge she could think of. A small drop of vanilla trickled down her chin and she tried to lick it with her tongue. The peach body part not being long enough, she wiped the sticky mess with the outside of her hand and thought about doing that as a child and getting in trouble. Her mom was always a little strict when it came to getting messy.

As a teenager she always had to be prim and proper. Jennifer thought about how she never really felt like she was good enough. How could a parent do that to their child? Maybe that’s why she had to get away. Would things be different if she had felt more loved at home? Jennifer began the pushing out process that Dr. Thermon had shown her to release those negative thoughts from her mind as she continued along the path.

The leaves were falling, swirling all around her forming beautiful heaps of red, yellow, and orange. She looked at the nearest tree and saw a small blue balloon swaying back and forth, stuck in a branch. There must have been a sad, balloonless little kid going home last night after the midweek evening festivities.

She had an appointment next week with her doctor. She was on a monthly basis now because she had been doing so well and was coping with her thoughts and memories much better. Jennifer planned to tell the doctor that she felt healed and wanted to stop the sessions. She had so much going on in her life that she did not like taking the hour out of the day, even if it was only once a month, to sit on the couch and tell the doc all the good things that were going on. If everything they talked about was positive, then there was no point in going. Plus the therapy was putting a pretty big dent into her pocketbook. She needed the money for more important things. Christmas was coming and there are always added expenses once the cold hits and brings the snow. Her winter coat from last year was wearing out and she knew she needed other winter clothes.

            With their tummies full, the ducks were beginning to make their way back to the lake. They had a few hours of napping and swimming to take care of before the lunch crowd showed up. One, two, three, four, five, six little ducklings Jennifer counted quickly following their mother into the lake. Plop, plop, plop, plop, plop! Uh-oh Jennifer thought. What happened to the sixth baby? Plop! Oh there it goes. There is always one tittle tattling along she thought. She guessed she laughed a little louder than she planned because a man walking passed her looked her direction with a puzzled face. She just smiled and he walked on.

A slow drizzle began to fall and Jennifer knew that she must be ending her stroll. She had today off, but she still needed to go into the office and try to finish up a few projects before next week. She was looking at a huge promotion within the next few months, and the extra money could really help.

As she finished her stroll, she commended herself on making it this far through her therapy. She knew that she would soon be able to forget almost all about her past and move into her anticipated future. She smiled as the most important thing in her life began to turn around.

            Jennifer stared into the deep blue eyes, his deep blue eyes, of her fourteen month old daughter  as the girl fumbled along towards her while muttering out her first word. “Dada.”