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Monday, Oct. 04, 2004 / 6:43 p.m. ~Veronica~ It is a strange feeling indeed to finally get what one has wanted all along. To witness the downfall of someone who appears deserving of all that might head her way, someone who has seemed to have �had it coming� for a long while. It is not sweet at all, nor is it bitter, nor even bittersweet, in fact it is rather sad. So it is that Veronica�s absence today, the HR Manager gathering Veronica�s things, people entering Veronica�s cubicle, people passing it slowly as if it were the sight of her wake, were all strange occurrences indeed. And I found myself missing her constant throat clearing, her calls of �Baby� when referring to anyone and everyone, her shouts of �Girl!�, and the sound of her on the phone, the sound of her chewing, the sound of her singing in her odd gospel-y warble, the sound of her, her large presence larger than life. It seemed she had died. Yet I knew. She told me last Thursday, �Come here, let me tell you something, I feel like walking away from here and never coming back. I can�t do all this, this is just too much�, and I�d tried to comfort, �You�re just not used to it, you will get used to it, you will, we all did, you had it easy for too long, but this is what we�ve all been doing, this is the amount of work we�ve all had, it�s just new to you, you�ll be okay, just take your time with it.� And I felt compassionate, I surprised myself the way I cared, the way I felt, with how badly I felt for her, and I found myself wanting to help her, wanting to sit with her and help her, but all along, for years, I�d wanted her to go, I�d wanted it to be like this, I�d wanted her to be discovered, I�d wanted it known that she never pulled her weight, that she used her cubicle as an office, a personal office, that she spent her days calling her friends and talking for hours, that she always ate there, snacking and chomping and chawing, and smacking all day long. She had an oral fixation, always doing something with her mouth, singing, talking, chewing, sighing, yawning loudly, it was going all the time, gums flapping, smacking and moving, throughout every day. In the other department we�d sat three cubicles distant, and now we�d been placed closer, a mere two, she was louder, I heard her more, I acquired her cold virus, I tried to tune her out, all summer hearing her on the phone with her children who stayed home, as she told them to clean the house, and read books and write papers on the books they read, and all summer I thought that I had had quite a different, more carefree series of childhood summers. Yet when I was feeling magnanimous I wanted to be friends, I wanted to share with her, I wanted to offer ideas for activities she and her family could do together, things going on in town, movies, events, and I�d copy articles, clippings from the newspaper and the free weekly for her. I wanted to like her, I knew she was my age, I knew we�d led different lives, but we�d lived through the same generation, we had the same references. Even if we couldn�t have been more different. She is slow, tall, big, from the deep South, near the Mississippi River, she speaks in a distinct regional dialect, one which was a source for great amusement on many occasions when it was just the �girls� in the other department. We�d get her to say certain words just so we could all laugh, and she laughed too. She was good natured, but she was slothful and greedy, lazy, sloppy, and selfish, cheap, all the while quoting from the Bible, going to Bible classes, and invoking the name of her personal savior again and again, during our work hours, which irked me to no end. We�d ironed out differences, I�d refused to take part in group prayers before department celebratory food sharing, we�d talked candidly and we�d found mutual respect, mutual ground, and though she was still akin to a mosquito buzzing about my head, she was who she was, and she still is, but it does feel like she�s died. And there were no people even talking about her today, just the passing, the looking, the wondering, the knowing glances, and finally I called Penelope to talk, to tell her how strange it all feels, how quiet it is now, and how I feel I�ve lost something. We�ll see her soon, we know we will, and maybe outside of work it will be easier to appreciate her as a woman and a friend, but I can�t forget her pulling me aside again, on Friday, to tell me, �I did something maybe I shouldn�t have, and I might not be here anymore after today, so I want to tell you I love you�. She started to cry when I said all I could think to say, �Aw, I love you too�, thinking no one has told me she loves me in years, and I think Veronica really means it. And, despite it all, I do love her too, and I�ll miss all her annoying idiosyncrasies. She worked there for 8 years. And I will have been there 7 in February. I hope Veronica finds some happiness somewhere. Cost of the War in Iraq
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