8 Two, Two, Two People at Once

I am a film critic. I am the person people loathe when they see a movie they love or hate and then surf over to Rotten Tomatoes to see what the critics thought, and they find a critic who hated the movie they loved or loved the movie they hated, and so this critic, to them, is the Scum of the Earth. I am also the person people adore when they love or hate a movie and surf onto Rotten Tomatoes and find that every critic disagrees with them but me, and so, to them, I am the Best Critic Ever.

Some weeks I am the Scum of the Earth and the Best Critic Ever simultaneously. I am accustomed to that. In addition, I am accustomed to being informed by readers that I’m a woman, and while I’ve never been accused of being a man, I have, at various times, been told that I am: a right-winger (not true); a pinko (sort of true); a Catholic (true); an anti-Catholic (not true); an outraged suburbanite (not true); an amoral urbanite (half true); a Texan (not true); a Yankee (true); and a shill for the movie studios (but where’s the lucre, pardner?). I’ve also been told I’m an oldster, a youngster, a pointy-nosed snob, and a talentless hack who “shouldn’t give up (my) day job.” Which I find amusing, because this is my day job, buster.

And because it’s my day job, this is the work to which I return after two weeks of full-time mourning. Watching a Jack Black/Steve Martin movie in an all-but-empty theater at 10 a.m. on a weekday is strange enough. Watching a Jack Black/Steve Martin movie in an all-but-empty theater at 10 a.m. a whole fourteen days after my husband’s suicide is downright hypnagogic, more so if the Jack Black/Steve Martin movie at issue concerns competitive birders. Before being assigned to this film, I hadn’t known there were such things as competitive birders. It seems ridiculous.

But then, everything seems ridiculous to me now. It’s hard for me to treat anything short of grave illness and death as a pressing or important issue. Nothing beyond the bottom line—being alive and well, and knowing my loved ones are alive and well—means that much to me any longer. I do my job because it’s my job, and I enjoy it. I know I get paid to file clean, lively copy on deadline, and getting paid is an important part of feeding my children. So I watch this gentle, harmless film. I take notes on bird species (buffleheads and grosbeaks!). I enjoy the travel scenery (Aleutians and the Gulf of Mexico!), and I laugh at Martin’s trademark rubbery dance moves.

But not one second of its 100-minute running time passes unmolested by memories of Chris’s death. I am aware of him, it, everything, all of the time. It eats my brain. I feel as though I’m occupying parallel bodies in parallel universes. In the first universe, Amy One is laughing and functional, and possibly even joyous. In the other universe, Amy Two is consumed by grief. Amy One is singing alto in a church choir, playing violin in a community orchestra, or fiddling it up with friends in a neighborhood band; meanwhile, Amy Two is silently howling, her twisted mouth aping the screamer in Edvard Munch’s Der Shrei. Both of these worlds, both of these Amys, are authentic. Both demand my attention. I’m present; my husband is gone. Grieving means honoring both realities at once.

Lo, I am Scum of the Earth. I am the Best Critic Ever.