The protein cookies came out of the oven just now. First time I’d made them in over three years.
Before Marilyn died, I was in great shape. Doing yoga, working out at the gym, eating very healthy. Marilyn was a varsity beach volleyball player at a Southern university, and though she’d lost a lot of weight due to her psychiatric medications, she was still rock solid muscle.
Not long before she died, she asked for my protein cookie recipe. I made cookies with oatmeal, eggs, and pumpkin spice protein powder. She made her own variation. Marilyn never played by someone else’s rules.
After she died, on December 23, 2022, I stopped working out. I tried to drag myself but couldn’t. I still walked, tried to keep up with some yoga, but eventually just cancelled my gym membership.
Life felt like walking through mud. For a brief time I’d get excited about something new. A new job, new boyfriend, even a new religion for a while. But nothing worked. Suicide makes you realize how unique each life is. No one could ever be Marilyn again. The combination of passion, flaws, beauty, anger, brilliance and sadness that she had can’t be replaced. What might’ve been?
The stability I thought I’d won soon before Marilyn died eluded me. I couldn’t settle down, to get all the columns to match up. Things were either out of control or boring. Eventually the chaos itself got boring. I returned to teaching kids as a substitute for grade seven through 12, in all-black schools in the neighborhood where I live. The kids aren’t economically rich, but are vibrant in their energy and love of life. I choose only to teach in schools where the air crackles with life. As both a substitute and a fulltime teacher in urban areas, I’ve been in many schools where it feels more like a warehouse than like a house of learning. The schools where I choose to teach greet the kids every morning with old school R&B, big smiles and a morning routine that’s consistent and comforting: the opposite of the chaos they may face in their homes or neighborhood. I smile at the other teachers and we greet each other by name.
The kids come running to me and scream, “Hi, Sticker Lady!” because I give them stickers when they’re good and do their work. Truth be told, I give them stickers all the time. From seventh-grader to senior, stickers on sweaters, laptops, and even on faces are the rule when Sticker Lady’s there.
I was feeling dead before I went back to teaching. But how could you not feel alive with the hopes and dreams of the next generation are right in front of you every day? In all their loud, energetic and unruly ways, the kids make it clear that life isn’t optional. These aren’t privileged children. They’re kids who’ve lost family members to gun violence and incarceration, substance use disorders and illness. Yet they smile, joke with each other, play basketball and football on the playground at lunch and show me the dances they record on TikTok—even though I remind them they’re not supposed to do that at school.
I finally put in an application for a fulltime teaching job. It’s time to settle down. The kids can’t take the place of Marilyn, but they’re here, and they need me.
Every morning when I sit in meditation, I look up into the sky beyond the powerlines and the tall trees. I can almost see her there. She would be proud. I can’t live the life she should have lived, but I can live my own.
I finally made the protein cookies again today. Marilyn would be happy to see it. I know she’s watching.