I... I don't know if this counts as a confession, really. I’m 78 now and Arthur has been gone for three years, but I’m sitting here in the dark and I just keep thinking about the linens. I think maybe I’ve been living in a sort of... I believe the term might be *depersonalization*. I spent fifty-two years as the wife of the County Commissioner. Everyone in this town says what a pillar he was. And I suppose he was. But I’m looking at my hands right now by the light of my phone and they don’t feel like they belong to me. They feel like gloves that someone else put on a long time ago. When we were young, I had this little studio in the attic of my parents' barn. I didn't have any money—I remember once I had to choose between buying a new tube of Prussian Blue or eating lunch for three days. I chose the paint. I think I had a bit of a... manic streak back then, or maybe just a very high level of *artistic preoccupation*. But then Arthur came along. He was so solid. So respected. My mother told me I’d end up a "pauper" if I didn't marry someone with a future, and she wasn't wrong. We were very poor. So I let the paint dry in the tubes and I said yes. I remember the first big gala at the Grange Hall after we got married. I had to wear this dress that felt like a cage—silk, but heavy, with a corset that made it hard to take a full breath. Arthur was standing at the head of the table talking about land zoning and the "moral fiber" of our youth. I wanted to scream. I had read these books—I don't know if they're considered "subversive" now—but I had so many thoughts about the collective unconscious and how we were all just performing roles. I remember leaning over to the Mayor’s wife and almost saying, "Don't you feel like we're just echoes of things that died a century ago?" But I didn't. I just asked her for the recipe for her lemon squares. I think that was the day the *atrophy* started. It’s been a long time of doing that. Asking for recipes. Smiling when the men talked over me. I think I’ve developed a chronic case of... well, maybe it's just a prolonged *melancholia*. I’d sit at those long tables, the candlelight reflecting in the silver, and I’d feel this terrible, cold space opening up in my chest. A void. I’d watch Arthur hold court, and I’d realize that nobody in that room had ever heard me speak a single truth. Not one. I was just an ornamental fixture, like the centerpieces. I felt so... invisible. Even when I was the center of attention. I tried to paint again, about fifteen years ago. I bought the supplies in secret and hid them in the basement. But when I sat down, my hands shook so badly. I think it’s called *psychosomatic inhibition*. I couldn't make the brush move the way I wanted. I just kept thinking about what the ladies at the Garden Club would say if they saw me painting things that weren't flowers or landscapes. I wanted to paint the way a scream looks. I wanted to paint the... the *stagnation* of the air in our living room. I ended up just putting the brushes away. It felt like a betrayal of the life I’d worked so hard to pretend I loved. There was this one night, maybe in 1984. We were at the Governor’s ball. It was so LOUD, the band was playing something upbeat, but the silence inside me was louder. I went out onto the balcony and looked at the moon and had this sudden, terrifying thought—a sort of *existential crisis*, I suppose—that if I jumped, I’d just float away because there was nothing heavy or real left inside me. I was just lace and hairspray. Arthur came out and asked if I was "catching a chill." I said yes. I always said yes. I think he liked me better when I was cold. I’m looking at his portrait now. It’s over the fireplace. He looks so... certain. I think I envy that certainty, even now. I don't know if I'm being ungrateful or if I'm just... broken. He was a good man, in the way the world defines "good." He provided. He never raised his voice. But every time I had to nod and agree that the new library shouldn't carry "those types of books," I felt a piece of my brain... just die. I think the clinical term is *cognitive dissonance*. I was living a lie so large it became my only truth. I feel like a ghost in my own house. It’s 2:15 AM and I’m wondering if anyone else feels this... this hollowness. This feeling that you’ve reached the end of the book and realized you were just a footnote in someone else's biography. I had so many ideas. I wanted to talk about Jung, and the shadow self, and why the light in the valley looks different in October. But instead, I talked about the price of corn and the church bake sale. I’m 78 years old and I think I might have missed the entire point of being alive. I think I traded my soul for a "respected" seat at a dinner table. I wonder if it’s too late to be real. My joints ache—I think it’s just the usual *degenerative* stuff—but my heart feels... heavy. Like a stone at the bottom of a well. I sometimes imagine what would happen if I went to the local coffee shop tomorrow and just started telling people what I actually think about... well, everything. About God, and art, and the way this town feels like a beautiful, well-maintained cemetery. But I won't. I'll just go to my bridge club and I'll smile and I'll talk about the weather. I don’t know. Maybe this is just what happens when you get old. You look back and you see all the versions of yourself that you smothered to death for the sake of... of *decorum*. It’s a very quiet sort of tragedy. I just... I wish I hadn't been so afraid of being "difficult." I think I would have rather been a difficult woman with a full soul than a respected one with an empty one. I'm just so TIRED. I think I'll try to sleep now. If I can... but the house is so quiet. It's too quiet.