Cecilia: A Memoir of Lesbian Love and Loss
By Astrid Lindstrom
Heliotrope Press

 

Astrid Lindstrom’s memoir, “Cecilia,” about the loss of her wife following a difficult battle with cancer, is at times a painful read. But it’s also a memorial to her late partner and a testament to how Cecilia enriched Lindstrom’s life and gave her memories to hold on to.

It’s a story as well of how two middle-aged women met and fell in love, building new lives after earlier ones with other partners had not held up.

Lindstrom, a retired public school English teacher who lives in Northampton — she also plays violin in the Five College Early Music program in western Massachusetts — had been married to a man when she was younger and had two children with him.

But the marriage ended in divorce, and Lindstrom eventually realized she was attracted to women. Then living in central Massachusetts, she met and fell in love with another woman, Tjalda, who also had left a marriage with a man.

But Lindstrom’s relationship with Tjalda ultimately didn’t work. Then through a friendship with an old classmate from Mount Holyoke College, Lindstrom met an older woman, Cecilia, or “Cece,” as she was known, in Northampton in 2003. From a friendship that blossomed into love, the two came to live together in Northampton.

Lindstrom weaves this background into her memoir, but much of her book chronicles the difficult period that began in 2011 when Cece, a therapist, was diagnosed with breast cancer. Later she would be diagnosed with ovarian cancer, which ultimately spread to other parts of her body.

Lindstrom is frank about what the disease did both emotionally and physically to her wife. For one thing, Cece turned away from real physical intimacy: “Cece hated to disappoint me, but we hardly ever made love again.”

As Cece’s symptoms worsened, Lindstrom became her main caretaker, and she had to reckon with her wife’s impending death, even as she drew support from her two adult children, Cece’s adult children, and the couple’s grandchildren. How she comes through this period is one the memoir’s strongest points.

“It’s rare to be given the honor of bearing witness to the day-to-day life of a kind, courageous, and devoted caregiver who knows that despite all her efforts, she is going to lose her beloved wife all too soon,” Holyoke author Lesléa Newman says of the book.

Reading Lindstrom’s memoir, Newman adds, “reminded me that it also takes a village to support both patient and caregiver through a cancer journey … Though there is a lot of sorrow in this book, there is also tremendous joy.”

And Lindstrom, in sketching how her life has unfolded since Cece’s death in 2017, writes that her memories of her wife are always with her, as when she glances at their wedding picture on her living room sideboard.

“I remember how I used to trot to keep up with her long stride on walks, how she teased me about being a shorty when she had to reach the grater on the top shelf of the kitchen cupboard for me … I’ll always have Cece’s company. I’ll always love her, even as I move on.”

Lindstrom will read from her memoir April 26 at 10 a.m. at the Northampton Senior Center.

 Go Play in Traffic: A Writer’s Life
By Michelle A. Gabow
Archway Publishing

 

A 74-year-old lesbian who’s dealing with a terrible case of writer’s block. A younger woman who feels she’s invisible since so few people seem to notice her. A grey parrot that’s supposed to talk but doesn’t — until it does.

How these three odd characters interact with each other is at the heart of an off-beat novel by Michelle A. Gabow that mulls the past, present and future, even as it goes back and forth between reality and fantasy and examines the struggle to realize one’s creativity.

“Go Play in Traffic: A Writer’s Life,” set in Boston on the cusp of the arrival of COVID-19, is built around Reba, an aging lesbian who’s lost some important people in her life, including a longtime partner she’s broken up with. Now that’s she’s retired from teaching and has plenty of free time, Reba is trying to write.

But as she sits in a cafe day after day with a cup of coffee and an open journal in front of her, her mind seems blank: “She visualized stories, like rushing water, breaking through each and every morning. A wildness that could not be contained. But no such luck.”

In the same neighborhood, a younger woman, Sarah, who gets low-level jobs through a temp agency, buys a parrot, Fred, for company, after hearing it talk in a pet store. But Fred isn’t talking in her apartment, at least at first, and Sarah begins to wonder if she’s imagining things.

“Go Play in Traffic” will eventually bring Reba, Sarah, and Fred (and some other characters) together in odd circumstances, and Reba will make an unexpected connection with Fred that will change her life in surprising ways.

Gabow, a retired college professor and playwright who lives in Boston, is also the author of a previous novel and a collection of short stories. Her eight produced plays led Roxbury Repertory Theatre to honor her as a playwright laureate.

In an interview last fall, she said her new novel is designed to offer “a unique perspective on surviving the pandemic during the tenure of former President Donald Trump, seen through the eyes of a Buddhist, socialist, surrealistic, and lesbian elder … change and boundless possibilities can emerge at any stage of life.”

Gabow will read from “Go Play in Traffic” on April 27 at 1 p.m. at Forbes Library in Northampton.

Steve Pfarrer can be reached at spfarrer@gazettenet.com.