You know how it is when something happens, and a lot of times you hear the immortal cliched phrase, "I didn't know whether to write about this or not..." and you think, "Great, this is about someone writing about their inner conflict. Just get to the point already!" It's a valid criticism--you don't want to read about a writer's inner agony, you want them to tell a good story. Writing about inner agony is a great way for a writer to vent, but on the whole it's not particularly compelling. Still, even knowing all this, I'm going to say I didn't know whether to write about this or not. It's not exactly something neat about northeast Iowa. If anything, it's the polar opposite--something depressing not in northeast Iowa. It's also more about me mourning than anything else. Still, the nature of writing is to be flexible and know when to break some rules, and this feels like a rule that needs breaking.
I knew Anne because I knew Lee, and I knew Lee because I wanted to be in on his superhero role-playing game. Lee's a good forty some-odd years older than I am, and can tell you stories about his life that will have you wondering what exactly you've been doing with yours. He was a navigator on spy planes during the Cold War, he's written several articles, studied all different types of weaponry, has a degree from Harvard, been a member of the Coast Guard, given several lectures about airplanes and flying, and that's just the stuff I can recall off the top of my head. Oh, and he's also been running a superhero role-playing game, Victims of the X-Virus, for a good thirty years now. That was how I met him. Lee's memory is that I just showed up after his demo game at the University of Michigan's U-Con had finished and just joined. There's some backstory there, but that's mostly what happened. I rolled up a character, Psychotron, and played my heart out with him and the constantly-shifting group for years and years. Eventually, I realized the focus of the game was not really superheroes as much as explorers of the unknown, and that performing superheroics at all was a good way to make things go haywire, but by then I was having way too much fun to quit.
Anne was married to Lee. Her role in the game was to bring up some supper for Lee. Lee would scold her for being fifteen seconds late, and Anne would witheringly reply that she had a pot of hot tea and it was right over Lee's crotch. Sometimes Anne would vary the responses, but that was the routine. In the mad combination of a warehouse and library that was the Carroll's household, Anne was definitely the support. You could tell--she was quiet, but always there if you needed something, and just there to get a book or a miniature for Lee right when he needed it.
Another thing about Anne--she was a great listener. That's a skill that's like being a good catcher on a baseball team. If someone is a good listener, you probably won't realize it because you're busy talking to them. If someone isn't a good listener, though, you'll notice right away. Anne listened. Lee offered advice. Sometimes I wonder if their minds were connected telepathically.
I remember one Christmas I dragged my family to the Carroll's house for their day after Christmas party. My mom was really into identifying antiques at the time, and I remember she and Anne talked a lot about some pieces Anne had. As it turned out, Anne really knew her stuff.
What I remember most, though, is how welcoming Anne was. In early 2010 I showed up on their doorstep on Sunday afternoon. I was passing through Ann Arbor and I wanted to visit, because I hadn't seen them in years. I'd heard Lee had been through a few medical problems, and I just wanted to touch base. I went up to the door, knocked on it, and there was Anne, surprised to see me standing out in the snow but still welcoming me in, getting Lee, and then we talked for hours. Literally hours. I had intended to get back to northeast Iowa by 10 or 11 pm, and instead I rolled in at about 3 am. It was so worth it.
The end came swiftly for Anne, and I think I'd prefer not to touch on many details. Suffice it to say that if it had happened in a movie, no one in the audience would buy it. They'd think the writer had destroyed all suspension of disbelief. That's what really gets me about this whole thing. I'll be a bit selfish here and say I wanted to say goodbye. It really would have been nice.
This comes a couple months after another friend, Tara, died of cancer. Tara was younger than I am, and she was also one of the nicest people you could hope to meet. I don't know how she was so sunny and cheerful all the time. You may think I'm exaggerating, but every single time I saw her she was smiling, if not out and out beaming. Even when the cancer had confined her to a wheelchair, she wrote on Facebook how happy she was to be alive. I know she meant it, too. I heard on a Friday that she was being moved into a hospice for the remainder of her days, and then on Monday I'd heard she had died.
I have to be honest, I feel a bit angry at God for them dying. I know the rain falls on the just and the unjust, and I accept that we're all going to die eventually, but the two of them? That was pretty mean, God. There are terrorists, criminals, corrupt politicians and crooked businessmen out there who I'm sure would have been missed much much less than these two.
Mostly, though, I'm sad. I really want, one last time, to visit the Carroll's house, to go up to the door, knock, have Anne open it, and talk with the two of them for hours again.
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