Rage Against The Dying Of The Light-With Dylan Thomas’ Poem "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Goodnight" In Mind

By Fritz Taylor

Richard Roche, normally for public consumption an easy-going, laid back and kindly man, was angry, no better, in a rage. (Somehow the anger of his wickedly harsh childhood had gotten dissipated over the years for let’s say when he was in his late teens or early twenties he was as likely to throw fire and water as to seek to reason with anybody. So much for a little backdrop to fill the reader in on where he had come from to earn that easy-going demeanor.) That rage came with a name Lila Crawford, his long, long time companion who had recently given him his walking papers. That “recently” was well over two months before the time in question so his anger, his rage needs some explanation. No question that Richard (not Rich or Rick) and Lila had had their share of problems in their relationship which had spanned three decades. Somehow, some way, Lila a few months before had decided that whatever ailed the relationship could no longer to fixed, except by separation, a final separation.            

Who knows what might have sparked her anguish, maybe it was that since her retirement Lila was at wits end about what to do with the rest of her life. A big theme when she gave Richard his walking papers had been that she had to find herself, had to figure out who she was and that the journey had to be alone. Richard tried to reason, argue really, that he did not understand why her angst and alienation could not be addressed in the context of the relationship like it had been on several previous occasions. Lila had said that this was different, this was deeper. Closer to the nut was what Lila had sensed were dramatic changes in Richard’s demeanor which had created what she called, and he agreed when it was pointed out, undue tensions in the household. He admitted that his health issues over the previous several months had made him cranky, irritable and a pain in the ass.

He had been poked and prodded some many times by doctors and their cohorts that he was sick unto death, well almost unto death, of the whole thing. And then there were the medications, plural on that word, which were making him crazy (and one of them was doing some damage that way as he later found out, too late later found out). That, the diagnosis of bladder cancer which he had been battling (which he had been in denial about for a period), and his turning sixty had unwound his usual public consumption easy-going ways. From her perspective, from her own considerable health issues point of view she had cut him to the quick when she said that a major cause of her recent illness problems could be laid to the tensions created in the household by him, that he was causing her illnesses to rage unabated. That was the final sting that told him that whatever had happened over the recent past they needed what in his mind was a separation. That like in many interpersonal relationship matters between them she was miles ahead of him.         

After finding a temporary place along the seacoast in Maine for a month through the good offices of Air B ‘n’ B Richard moved him small bundle of precious and necessary goods (okay, clothes, books, a few utensils and the mandatory computer complex complete with printer). The place was to be rented for a month (the limit of the stay in any case since the owners were closing up for the cold weather Mainer winter) at which time Richard had figured that Lila would have come to her senses and be welcoming him back into her embraces again. Even before that month was up Lila made it clear that the separation in her mind, at least the living together part, was final if not irrevocable and they had argued over that since, as usual Richard had assumed that they had agreed on the month and that was that. Naturally he was dead-ass wrong about how serious she was about the break, about the need for the break. She cut him to the quick again by telling him that her health had improved with the lack of tensions around the house in his absence (they had agreed that she would stay in their long time residence since he was more of a rolling stone in his ability to move and then there were the cats who knew no other abode but that place, and incidentally were a separate cause stress for her since they were young and full of pent-up energy.    

Although Lila had gone up to the place Richard had in Maine to signify in her mind that her earlier idea that they would never see each other again had been premature and not well thought out she nevertheless insisted that she need an undisclosed amount of time to get her own life in order (her term had been the diplomatic wishy-wash “for the foreseeable future”). The net effect, no the gross effect, remember Richard had been angry, no again, in a rage over this latest set-back but he had to go along with it-what else was he to do when she didn’t want to  live with him. He then took a place, a winter rental in a seacoast town in New Hampshire under loose tenant at will conditions (meaning that with thirty days’ notice either party could break the lease). His idea was if the Empress recalled him he could get out from under without too much financial damage (moreover he wanted to be by the ocean for reflection and an occasional run to keep in shape so there was a certain method to his madness). And so he moved south closer to Boston where all his connections to the known world were.     

Richard had made some changes though during the separation, which Lila had commented on positively although without giving in an inch. He had under her initial guidance taken up meditation daily in order to get some peace within himself, to calm down and to accept the idea that he had both cancer and had slowed down with age both ideas repugnant to his psyche but there it was. The meditation, something he had laughed at in previous suggestions by Lila had actually helped. When Richard got into something he believed in he was “all in” and he was in that kind of mood (‘all in” a term he had used a couple of years previously when they had been under Lila’s suggestion again in couples counselling and once he got his head around the idea he actually like it, certainly thought it was useful). 

Moreover having been cut to the quick by Lila’s remarks about how he was affecting her health something that had plagued her as long as he had known her he started reflecting on where things had gone some badly, where their early love had drifted to a very bad place. He was determined to “win” her back.      

Now all of these Richard insights were well and good but it takes two to work this kind of thing out even though he now had gotten “religion” but her continual rebuffs of his attempts to reconcile had, well, left him with feelings of rage, with a sense that he was lost. This rage had no place to go, had to break or it would put more fire in his head than he could he use (the “put out fire in his head” a phrase he picked up from a song by Patty Griffin where her lover was in his own problematic world). That rage in his head had initially driven him to seek another companion via a senior citizen on-line dating service which proved fruitless to quell his angst.

The thing finally blew up in his head around Thanksgiving, around the season where family and community come into play. He had had, and Lila had as well which is where they “saved” each other during this holiday season, horrible times around holidays when they were kids and even sixty years later Richard could feel the sting of the past coming on with nobody to help him get through the thing-his Lila a distant memory for that purpose. He determined that he was through with her, decided to let her have the house, having nothing more to do with her, to drift to California and start anew, maybe some find somebody out there so that his morbid fear that he would die “alone” would not come true. So filled with rage for several days which even multiple daily meditations would not curb he was about to call her. Before he could do so she called him, said she had been depressed around the holidays and could she come up and see him. Yeah, sure. That is what their thing had always been, why he always liked the pleasure of her company. “Yeah, sure come on up.” Sometimes raging against the fading of the light is the only course though.             

[Although Lila was adamant for the “foreseeable future” about not living together they did agree to see each other on occasion as a result of that meeting but who knows where that will lead if anywhere. F.T.]