In Christianity, an anchoress is a woman who chooses to withdraw from the world to live a solitary life of prayer and mortification. Julian of Norwich was an anchoress whose writings tell of her life and spiritual journey. The word anchoress comes from the Greek “anachoreo” meaning to withdraw. Whilst anchoresses are frequently considered to be a type of religious hermit, unlike hermits they were required to take a vow of stability of place, opting instead for permanent enclosure in cells often attached to churches.
Robin Cadwallader, “Anchoresses: 10 Facts About the Life of Solitude”
Remember how much you loved beads? I whispered as I stroked her arms and small hands. It’s strange to no longer worry about seizures but to worry about breath. You would put your hands into a shoebox full of them, long strands of beads that rustled and crunched in piles of color. We both lie on our left sides, facing the window. It is Sophie’s nest, this bed, the pillows arranged just so, a soft border to keep her in. Sometimes you’d pull them out and pull them long, in both your hands, run your teeth along them. Her eyes move and meet mine. They are pools and she is grave. The room is dark. Oliver has helped me to lift her up tonight, to put her there in place, safe. I am less strong, weakened by the goddamn pain. I don’t know why the beads came to mind. I think of the motel room in La Jolla, the weeks we spent there alone. El Nino made the ocean rage outside, rain on the planked walkways, the palms bend. I’d make a pile of beads on the carpet for her to play with as we waited for appointments with Dr. Frymann, the beloved osteopath now dead. We did so much together, I whispered. Nearly thirty years ago. Her hands do nothing now but clasp themselves, no longer functional as they say and we don’t know why. We will never know why, I guess, as we continue to live like this, the questions unanswered. Unraveled. I feel sometimes as if I’ve lost the thread, lost the thread.
This is beautiful , each word a bead in a greek komboloi, a prayer to love maybe, it moves me beyond words.
I really have no words for the beauty of this post.