Not one word did I say in reply to her
request for suggestions for her syllabus. Each letter of that previous sentence humiliates me. Was I truly so
self-absorbed in 2001? I was fifty-seven years old.
Betty didn’t reply—unlike her, but I can’t say that I
blame her, either. Early in December I sent her a little note—with an article
I’d found online. How are you doing?
I asked in my three-sentence email.
On December 2 she wrote to say that she’d seen the fairly
recent New York Times review of
Miranda Seymour’s biography of Mary Shelley (October 7, 2001) and had a couple
of comments about reviewers (I was a
reviewer!) who don’t really know much about what they’re reviewing. (If she
only knew!)
And then she dropped this tasty little appetizer on my
plate: I am already thinking in terms of
what extremely loyal friends will be willing to read through the very (& I
mean rough) draft (after I have done some sandpapering first & spackling
first) …
She didn’t really ask
me, did she? But I leaped at the bait like a starving rainbow trout. A couple
of days later I wrote: I hope your remark
about “extremely loyal friends” looking at your early MWS draft includes me! I
would be honored …. But if I’ve overstepped … let me know that, too. I have a
pretty rough-bark ego and will understand. (Actually, I have a fragile ego, but
I will STILL understand!) I went on and wrote a bit about her point
concerning ignorant reviewers—then told her about some travel plans: another
trip out to Oregon and a planned visit to Massachusetts to visit family.
Then … nearly six months of silence.
On May 31, 2002, Betty wrote this: It has been so long since we were last in
touch. My reasons: I had a biopsy that was positive [lung cancer]. I am doing
very well indeed—chemo plus lots of alternative treatments just about daily—to
get the intruder out! And it is vanishing!! … I hope and trust your silence was
not caused by any event similar …
No, Betty, my silence was caused not by a cancer
diagnosis but by pure inattentiveness—perhaps even selfishness. And, of course,
just about three years after Betty’s note I would have my own cancer diagnosis,
would undergo my own surgery, radiation, chemical treatment. But that was in
the future, and I was continuing to live and act as if I were immortal.
Oh, and Betty never did reply to my offer to read her
draft. As I would learn, she had her reasons, and they were dark ones.
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