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wlfkssd · 3 years

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Midnight Caller

based on the prompt ‘hvithelred + midnight / early morning hugs’ sent in by @issadoragreen <3

summary : after a rough week, and with hvitserk not answering his calls, aethelred (thel) visits the lothbrok house at midnight to see him.

warnings : smoking, brief mention of ragnar yelling at hvitserk, mentions of divorce and a bad impression of gimli from lotr. a little bit of angst, not much though.

pairing : hvitserk x aethelred. small appearances from alfred, rollo, ubbe. as well as a tiny flirtation between ubbe and thel.

words : 2,380.

notes : aethelred is referred to as thel a lot in this fic. just because it’s a little more modern.

The dial tone continues in its monotony and Thel shakes his head, lowering the phone from his ear before he hangs it up again. He stares at the screen and his brows instinctively pull close and tight.

Why aren't you picking up, Hvitserk?

"Any luck?" Alfred, his younger brother, stands in the doorway. He looks anxious; hands buried so deep into the single, long pocket of the oversized, borrowed hoodie to keep him from picking at his fingers in worry.

"No. It just keeps ringing." Thel's defeated and to pretend otherwise would be idiotic. Perhaps Hvitserk doesn't want to talk to him. Perhaps he doesn't want to see him anymore. "I should go over there and see if he's alright."

"At this time of night? What would mum say?"

That's hardly a threat and they both know it. Life at home hasn't always been plain sailing, especially with Alfred's illness and the fact that it's clear he's the favourite. But Thel doesn't mind. Quite the contrary; sometimes that leaves him free to do just about whatever he likes without much fear of repercussions.

Still, this? Maybe his brother is right. It's no time to be showing up unannounced.

"You're right, Alfie." That garners a smile from Alfred - nickname having been with him, practically since birth - and he turns to leave for his own room just as the dial tone strikes back into life.

Some seconds pass, long and unnecessary in Thel's opinion. He can only imagine what the excuse will be.

"Hello?" Ubbe's voice is quiet, softer even than usual and something about it sends a tingling jolt straight up Thel's spine. They're best friends - more like brothers, really - but some things just can't be denied.

"Is Hvitserk alright? He's not answering his phone."

There's a silence and Thel hears the heavy sigh come through loud and clear. In fact, it's far too close to the receiver for comfort.

"Our father came home." Four short words that set the scene for the whole conversation and the coming night. So easily let out and yet their weight now holds itself in the space between the two boys. "He has a way of speaking that isn't always what you would call nice."

And that's putting it lightly. In truth, Ragnar had come home after three long years of globe-trotting and demanded to know which of his sons intended to take over their family business. It was sudden and off-putting and had ruined the last of everyone's Sunday night.

He'd barely spoken to Ivar, choosing instead to focus on Ubbe and Bjørn as his successors. And why not? They are the oldest of his sons. Why wouldn't they want to inherit his empire, his wealth, his standing in Scandinavian society?

Because, for one, Ubbe had told him, he was still in school and wanted very much to become something other than what had come before him. Bjørn had said much the same; giving details that he was going into business with their uncle Floki for a while.

That left Hvitserk and Sigurd and being faced with a father he hadn't seen for years, yelling into his face and asking if he's man enough, wasn't the ideal reunion.

It also explains exactly why none of the brothers have been at school for the past two days. Now Thel understands and his heart eases off its hammering just a little.

"Do you think Hvitserk would see me, if I came over there?"

For the first time in the conversation, Ubbe seems to relax. The sigh slips into something more amused and he hums, lowly. "I think so, yes. It's a shame you like him so much. I could use someone like you right now. Calling at midnight and asking to come over, just to see me."

Shame indeed. Were it not for the fact of Ubbe's younger brother's charm, Thel might have eventually fallen out of friendship and into love with him, instead. But both know it's not to be and there's a moment of comfortable silence.

"I'm on my way, then."

They hang up and Thel takes a deep breath, relieved that the sudden silence isn't anything he's done.

Dressing warmly, Thel makes his way down the stairs and out into the night with a single thought; how can he cheer up his boyfriend?

Several different ideas run through his mind as he walks the short distance from one house to the other. He could pick a flower from each of the gardens on the way and present them to Hvitserk. He could jog to the 24-hour corner shop and buy him some sweets or a large bag of popcorn. Or he could just bring himself and the space between his waiting arms that so perfectly encompasses the one he's chosen to show and give his heart to.

That sounds about right. Sappy as it is.

Coming to the Lothbrok house, Thel slows and considers his ways of entrance.

Knocking on the front door is definitely out. That's far too obvious, isn't it? Plus, he doesn't know who might be sleeping. There is a light on in the living room but the windows blinds are all the way down and disturbing whoever is inside might not end well. Especially if it's Ragnar.

As he's standing there, looking at the house, a throat clears and sends him almost out of his skin.

"Staring won't get you anywhere." Flame of a lighter flickers into life and, for a few seconds, the identity of the voice shows itself. Then it's gone. Thel stands his ground, though, relief filling his veins now instead of fear.

"And scaring the shit out of teenagers won't get you anywhere, either."

Tongue kisses teeth in a gesture of disappointment at the language and Rollo stands up, causing the lamp above the side door to come on, illuminating him. The sterile shade reminds Thel of a hospital.

"What are you doing here, Aethelred?" Rollo asks on the exhale of his cigarette, smoke blown in a steady stream as his eyes focus on the boy before him. "It's a little late for studying, isn't it?" His expression holds so much knowing.

"I'm here to see Hvitserk." And that's all the explanation he's going to give.

"So it's true then? The two of you-" Rollo cuts himself off as he takes another drag on the cigarette, which now looks as though it's due to be snubbed out any moment. He holds in the smoke to delay but lets it out as he comes closer, towering over Thel the way one does when he should be feared.

Flicking away the cigarette gives a single notion.

Threat.

Instead though, it's an embrace that passes between them. A hefty one in which Thel is lifted quite literally off of his feet. And a hearty laugh bellows uncaring from Rollo's chest, still rumbling as he lets go and claps both hands to the teen's shoulders, looking him over.

"You're both terrible at hiding things, you know. Anyone with eyes can see your affection for each other." Maybe in the dark it's easier for him to say things like this; the veil of night covering all manner of distress at discussing affairs of the heart. Lagertha and Siggy have both torn him apart in their own ways but love spreads just as much as anything else. "Now," he sniffs and clears his throat, squeezing one of Thel's shoulders. "Do you need help getting into his window?"

"What?" What, indeed. Thel blinks up at Rollo, brows coming together as they had earlier over the screen of his mobile phone. "I was going to use the front door." He lies and hopes it's convincing.

It isn't.

"Nonsense. You English need to have more adventure." Rollo observes, all the while leading Thel towards the overhang beneath Hvitserk's bedroom window.

They come to stand, looking up at it together. From on the ground, it doesn't seem too daunting but Thel isn't keen on breaking a bone when he's got a big game at the end of the week.

"You expect me to climb up there?" Thel shakes his head, wishing he had asked Ubbe to wait up and let him in. Better than risking life and limb for the sake of adventure. In fact, he's sure Hvitserk would prefer he arrive in once piece and upset Ragnar than show up and immediately have to spend the next day and a half in the hospital with him because he fell.

"Come on. I'll help you."

Bending at the knees, Rollo widens his stance and lays his hands palms up in front of him, interlocking his fingers. He gestures for Thel to come closer with a jerk of his chin. Silently his eyes say he'll never forgive Thel if he doesn't find the courage to at least try it.

"Oh, fine. Fine." Thel huffs and, putting one hand firmly on Rollo's shoulder, he lifts a foot and places it into the waiting hands. One swift motion sees him launched up and onto the overhang. No problem whatsoever.

Rollo gives him a thumbs up for good luck and disappears, presumably to smoke some more.

Then it's just a glass pane that separates him from the one he loves. It feels strange to think, let alone to say, especially given that each of them is so young but, apparently, when you know, you know. And he knows.

Crawling on his hands and knees, uncaring as to the scuff to his black jeans, Thel gets close enough to see his own breath fog up the window and he pauses to peer inside. One hand cups over his eyes, blocking out the light of a nearby streetlamp.

Hvitserk is on his bed, curled around his blanket. One leg on top, one beneath. He wears only a pair of bottoms - Thel's, he notices. They're a loose fit and black and the pull strings are frayed from years of play and fretting. They're old but, somehow, Hvitserk makes them new. He makes everything new; vibrant.

The catch is unlocked so he doesn't even have to struggle with it before he's pushing up the window and slipping through. Hvitserk would say he's like Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible but that's difficult to believe.

Cool air moves the curtains and breathes life into what is otherwise a morbidly still room. Hvitserk's mobile phone lays dormant on his bed, placed in the concave created by his rounded position. As though he just watched Thel calling and calling and chose to ignore it.

No.

Maybe he couldn't bring himself to answer. Shock does strange things to people. Aethelred's own parents almost divorced when his father found out Alfred wasn't his. But they worked through things, eventually. So he's all-too-aware of just how debilitating that emotion can be.

"Hvitserk?" Thel whispers into the dark. It's the softest he's ever spoken and thinks, perhaps, he didn't actually make any sound at all. So, he tries again, not wanting to startle Hvitserk too much if he wakes.

"Mmm?" The noise is an obvious sign of exhaustion and Hvitserk doesn't turn over, immediately. He clearly thinks it's one of his brothers; come to disturb what little sleep he's managed these past few days. "What is it, Ubbe?"

Chancing the gesture, Thel sits on the side of the bed and tentatively lowers a hand onto Hvitserk's exposed shoulder. "It isn't Ubbe. It's me."

"Hello... me." For the first time in days, Hvitserk smiles. His eyes are still closed but that simple touch to his shoulder - naked skin prickling at it - is enough to lift his spirits from even the deepest of depths. "How did you-?"

"Your window was unhooked. I've told you about leaving it that way. Strangers could get in." The hand moves from bare skin to sandy braids and Thel's long fingers gently sweep through, earning him a contented sigh.

A contented sigh that precedes Hvitserk's eyes opening heavily. He blinks, adjusting to the light. "Did you climb up here?" His brows furrow at the thought and he turns over fully now, onto his back. The side of Thel's face that is visible looks to be smiling but it's hard to tell.

"Your uncle tossed me." Doing his best impression of Gimli, Thel ducks his face and laughs. It's almost silent but the moment is one of utter closeness, despite the humour, and after a minute, even that dies away, leaving nothing but the gaze of a sad boy looking into the face of the one he knows can rescue him.

Abruptly, Hvitserk embraces Aethelred's waist; not sitting fully but no longer laying as still and placid as he had been.

"I'm sorry I didn't answer you before. My father-" The very fact that Hvitserk buries his face tells them both all they need to know about the life of that conversation. It needs to be cut short.

"Ubbe told me everything. So you don't have to explain."

It isn't made clear exactly what it is Hvitserk has to do but by the way Thel directs him steadily with a hand at the back of his neck, the other having moved now from soft hair to rubbing at the space between his shoulder blades, and kisses him, it doesn't appear to be anything too taxing. Just be kissed. Even he can manage that now.

For a long moment, there's nothing in the world but them and it's blissful. All the heavy decisions in their futures and all the things they've done wrong in the past just melt into nothing. They're living for the moment.

Lips leave their tender mark on one another as Thel pulls away, briefly, nose bumping Hvitserk's, along with a touch of their foreheads to bring about the signal of parting. Not that it lasts long. Tiredly, Hvitserk shuffles further towards the wall, letting the blanket tangle itself even tighter into his legs and Thel kicks off his shoes and strips down to his shorts.

As they get comfortable, skin presses against bed-warmed skin; the soft, downy hair of Thel's soft tummy tickling the small of Hvitserk's back. Naturally, a groping hand reaches and finds an arm to pull over and a hand to hold in the darkness. The same lips, too, now part and breathe as one, chests rising and falling together.

"Will you stay until I fall asleep?" The question comes around a yawn and Hvitserk hugs Thel closer to him, looking back briefly and offering himself up for another kiss. Aethelred gives it, freely, leaning in for a series of small, affectionate pecks. Each brings about a satisfied sigh.

"I will stay until you fall asleep."

#hvitserk #aethelred #hvithelred #vikings fic #issadoragreen #requests #/ finally posting this !!!!!!#ubbe #rollo #alfred

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timeless-hollywood-classics · 4 years

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Maila Elizabeth Syrjäniemi (December 11, 1922 – January 10, 2008), known professionally as Maila Nurmi, was a Finnish-American actress and television personality who created the campy 1950s character Vampira.

The daughter of a Finnish immigrant, Nurmi was raised in Oregon and relocated to Los Angeles in 1940 with hopes of being an actress. After several minor film roles, she found success in the Vampira character, television's first horror host. Nurmi hosted her own series, The Vampira Show, from 1954–55 on KABC-TV.

After the show's cancellation, she appeared in the 1959 cult film Plan 9 from Outer Space, directed by Ed Wood. She is also billed as Vampira in the 1959 film The Beat Generation, where she appears out of character and instead plays a beatnik poet. Nurmi also appeared in the 1959 crime film The Big Operator. She was portrayed by Lisa Marie in Tim Burton's 1994 biopic Ed Wood.

Maila Nurmi was born Maila Elizabeth Syrjäniemi in 1922 to Onni Syrjäniemi, a Finnish immigrant, and Sophia Peterson, an American of Finnish descent. Her place of birth is disputed: according to biographer W. Scott Poole in Vampira: Dark Goddess of Horror (2014), Nurmi was born in Gloucester, Massachusetts. However, during her career, Nurmi claimed to have been born in Petsamo, Finland, claiming she was the niece of Finnish athlete Paavo Nurmi, who began setting long-distance running world records in 1921, the year before her birth. Public U.S. immigration records show her father's immigration at Ellis Island in 1910. Additionally, Dana Gould claimed in a 2014 public interview that he had seen Nurmi's birth certificate, which listed her birthplace as Gloucester, Massachusetts.

During her childhood, Nurmi relocated with her family from Massachusetts to Ashtabula, Ohio, before settling in Astoria, Oregon, a city on the Oregon Coast with a large Finnish community. Her father worked as a lecturer and editor, and her mother also worked as a part-time journalist and translator to support the family. She graduated from Astoria High School in 1940.

In 1940, Nurmi relocated to Los Angeles, California to pursue an acting career, and later in New York City. She modeled for Alberto Vargas, Bernard of Hollywood, and Man Ray, gaining a foothold in the film industry with an uncredited role in Victor Saville's 1947 film, If Winter Comes.

She was reportedly fired in 1944 by Mae West from the cast of West's Broadway play, Catherine Was Great, because West feared she was being upstaged.

On Broadway, she gained much attention after appearing in the horror-themed midnight show Spook Scandals, in which she screamed, fainted, lay in a coffin, and seductively lurked about a mock cemetery. She also worked as a showgirl for the Earl Carroll Theatre and as a high-kicking chorus line dancer at the Florentine Gardens along with stripper Lili St. Cyr. In the 1950s, she supported herself mainly by posing for pin-up photos in men's magazines such as Famous Models, Gala and Glamorous Models. Before landing her role as 'Vampira', she was working as a hat-check girl in a cloakroom on Hollywood's Sunset Strip.

The idea for the Vampira character was born in 1953 when Nurmi attended choreographer Lester Horton's annual Bal Caribe Masquerade in a costume inspired by Morticia Addams in The New Yorker cartoons of Charles Addams. Her appearance with pale white skin and tight black dress caught the attention of television producer Hunt Stromberg, Jr., who wanted to hire her to host horror movies on the Los Angeles television station KABC-TV, but Stromberg had no idea how to contact her. He finally got her phone number from Rudi Gernreich, later the designer of the topless swimsuit. The name Vampira was the invention of Nurmi's husband, Dean Riesner. Nurmi's characterization was influenced by the Dragon Lady from the comic strip Terry and the Pirates and the evil queen from Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

On April 30, 1954, KABC-TV aired a preview, Dig Me Later, Vampira, at 11:00 p.m. The Vampira Show premiered on the following night, May 1, 1954. For the first four weeks, the show aired at midnight, moving to 11:00 p.m. on May 29. Ten months later, the series aired at 10:30 p.m., beginning March 5, 1955. Each show opened with Vampira gliding down a dark corridor flooded with dry-ice fog. At the end of her trance-like walk, the camera zoomed in on her face as she let out a piercing scream. She would then introduce (and mock) that evening's film while reclining barefoot on a skull-encrusted Victorian couch. Her horror-related comedy antics included ghoulish puns such as encouraging viewers to write for epitaphs instead of autographs and talking to her pet spider Rollo.

She also ran as a candidate for Night Mayor of Hollywood with a platform of "dead issues". In another publicity stunt, KABC had her cruise around Hollywood in the back of a chauffeur-driven 1932 Packard touring car with the top down, where she sat, as Vampira, holding a black parasol. The show was an immediate hit, and in June 1954 she appeared as Vampira in a horror-themed comedy skit on The Red Skelton Show along with Béla Lugosi, and Lon Chaney, Jr.. That same week Life magazine ran an article on her, including a photo-spread of her show-opening entrance and scream. A kinescope of her The Red Skelton Show appearance was discovered in 2014. It is available as part of the Shout Factory DVD box set Red Skelton: The Early Years.

When her KABC series was cancelled in 1955, Nurmi retained rights to the character of Vampira and took the show to a competing Los Angeles television station, KHJ-TV. Several episode scripts and a single promotional kinescope of Nurmi re-creating some of her macabre comedy segments are held by private collectors. Several clips from the rare kinescope are included in the documentaries American Scary and Vampira: The Movie. The entire KABC kinescope, plus selections of the KABC pitchman who introduced the clips, is available in the 2012 documentary Vampira and Me.

Vampira and Me also features extensive clips from two previously unknown 16mm kinescopes of Nurmi as Vampira on national TV shows, including her starring guest spot on the April 2, 1955 episode of The George Gobel Show, a top 10 hit. The Vampira and Me restoration of the Gobel kinescope was documented in a 2013 short film entitled Restoring Vampira.

Examination of Nurmi's diaries in 2014 by filmmaker and journalist R. H. Greene verify longtime rumors that in 1956 she was the model for Maleficent, the evil witch in the Disney conception of the classic fairy tale "Sleeping Beauty." The Disney archivist subsequently confirmed these findings.

In 2007, the kinescope film of Nurmi in character was restored by Rerunmedia, whose restorations include The Ed Sullivan Show and Dark Shadows. The restoration utilized the groundbreaking LiveFeed Video Imaging process developed exclusively for the restoration of kinescopes. The restoration was funded by Spectropia Wunderhaus and Coffin Case.

A reconstructed episode of The Vampira Show was released on DVD by the Vampira's Attic web site in October 2007. The release imitated a complete episode by using existing footage of the show combined with vintage commercials believed to have been directed by Ed Wood[citation needed] and the full-length 1932 feature film The Thirteenth Guest.

Nurmi made television history as the first horror movie hostess. In 1957, Screen Gems released a syndicated package of 52 horror movies, mostly from Universal Pictures, under the program title Shock Theater. Independent stations in major cities all over the U.S. began showing these films, adding their own ghoulish host or hostess (including Vampira II and other lookalikes) to attract more viewers.

Nominated for a Los Angeles area Emmy Award as 'Most Outstanding Female Personality' in 1954, she returned to films with Too Much, Too Soon in 1958, followed by The Big Operator and The Beat Generation. Her best known film appearance was in Ed Wood's camp classic, Plan 9 from Outer Space, as a Vampira-like zombie (filmed in 1956, but released in 1959). In 1960 she appeared in I Passed for White and Sex Kittens Go to College, followed by 1962's The Magic Sword. The classic clip from Plan 9 from Outer Space featuring Vampira walking out of the woods with her hands pointing straight out was used to start the original opening sequence of WPIX Channel 11 New York's Chiller Theatre in the 1960s.

By 1962, Nurmi was making a living installing linoleum flooring. "And if things are slow in linoleum, I can also do carpentry, make drapes or refinish furniture", she told the Los Angeles Times.

In the early 1960s, Nurmi opened Vampira's Attic, an antiques boutique on Melrose Avenue. She also sold handmade jewelry and clothing. She made items for several celebrities, including Grace Slick of the music group Jefferson Airplane and the Zappa family.

In 1981, Nurmi was asked by KHJ-TV to revive her Vampira character for television. She worked closely with the producers of the new show and was to get an executive producer credit, but Nurmi eventually left the project over creative differences. According to Nurmi, this was because the station cast comedic actress Cassandra Peterson in the part without consulting her. "They eventually called me in to sign a contract and she was there", Nurmi told Bizarre magazine in 2005. "They had hired her without asking me."

Nurmi worked on the project for a short time, but quit when the producers would not hire Lola Falana to play Vampira. The station sent out a casting call, and Peterson auditioned and won the role.

Unable to continue using the name Vampira, the show was abruptly renamed Elvira's Movie Macabre with Peterson playing the titular host. Nurmi soon filed a lawsuit against Peterson. The court eventually ruled in favor of Peterson, holding that "likeness means actual representation of another person's appearance, and not simply close resemblance." Peterson claimed that Elvira was nothing like Vampira aside from the basic design of the black dress and black hair. Nurmi claimed that the entire Elvira persona, which included comedic dialogue and intentionally bad graveyard puns, infringed on her creation's "distinctive dark dress, horror movie props, and...special personality." Nurmi herself claimed that Vampira's image was in part based on the Charles Addams The New Yorker cartoon character Morticia Addams, though she told Boxoffice magazine in 1994 that she had intentionally deviated from Addams' mute and flat-chested creation, making her own TV character "campier and sexier" to avoid plagiarizing Addams' idea.

In 1986, she appeared alongside Tomata du Plenty of The Screamers in Rene Daalder's punk rock musical Population: 1, which was released on DVD in October 2008. According to a Daalder interview on the 2 disc special edition of Population: 1, "There was a wild lady living out in back in a shed. Tomata befriended her and found out she had played Vampira".

In 1987, she recorded two seven-inch singles on Living Eye records with the band Satan's Cheerleaders. The singles, entitled "I Am Damned" and "Genocide Utopia," were both released on colored vinyl, the second one with a swastika on the label, and are extremely rare collector's items.

In 2001, Nurmi opened an official website and began selling autographed memorabilia and original pieces of art on eBay. Until her death, Nurmi lived in a small North Hollywood apartment.

Unlike Elvira, Nurmi authorized very few merchandising contracts for her Vampira character, though the name and likeness have been used unofficially by various companies since the 1950s. In 1994, Nurmi authorized a Vampira model kit for Artomic Creations, and a pre-painted figurine from Bowen Designs in 2001, both sculpted by Thomas Kuntz. In 2004, she authorized merchandising of the Vampira character by Coffin Case, for the limited purpose of selling skate boards and guitar cases.

In the early 1950s, Nurmi was close friends with James Dean, and they spent time together at Googie's coffee shop on the corner of Crescent Heights and Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. She explained their friendship by saying, "We have the same neuroses."

As Hedda Hopper related in a 1962 memoir that included a chapter on Dean: "We discussed the thin-cheeked actress who calls herself Vampira on television (and cashed in, after Jimmy died, on the publicity she got from knowing him and claimed she could talk to him 'through the veil'). He said: 'I had studied The Golden Bough and the Marquis de Sade, and I was interested in finding out if this girl was obsessed by a satanic force. She knew absolutely nothing. I found her void of any true interest except her Vampira make-up. She has no absolute.'"

The 2010 public radio documentary Vampira and Me by author/director R. H. Greene took issue with Hopper's depiction of the Nurmi/Dean relationship, pointing to an extant photo of Dean and Vampira sidekick Jack Simmons in full Boris Karloff Frankenstein make-up as evidence of Nurmi and Dean's friendship. The documentary also described a production memo in the Warner Bros. archive citing a set visit from "Vampira" while Dean was making Rebel Without a Cause.

The Warner Bros memo was first mentioned in the 2006 book Live Fast, Die Young: The Making of Rebel Without a Cause by Lawrence Frascella and Al Weisel, who were given access to the Rebel production files. An interview Frascella and Weisel conducted with actress Shelley Winters also uncovered an instance where Dean interrupted an argument with director Nicholas Ray and Winters so he could watch The Vampira Show on TV.

In Vampira and Me, Nurmi can be heard telling Greene that Dean once appeared in a live bit on The Vampira Show in which Vampira, dressed as a librarian, rapped his knuckles with a ruler because "he was a very naughty boy."

The English Punk rock band The Damned wrote a song about their relationship entitled ‘Plan 9, Channel 7’ and can be found on the 1979 album ‘Machine Gun Etiquette ‘ ( Chiswick Records )

On June 20, 1955, Nurmi was the target of an attempted murder when a man forced his way into her apartment and proceeded to terrorize her for close to four hours. Nurmi eventually escaped and managed to call the police, with assistance from a local shop owner.

She married her first husband, Dean Riesner, in 1949, a former child actor in silent films and later the screenwriter of Dirty Harry, Charley Varrick, Play Misty for Me, and numerous other movies and TV episodes.

She married her second husband, younger actor John Brinkley, on March 10, 1958.

She married actor Fabrizio Mioni on June 20, 1961 in Orange County, California.

On January 10, 2008, Nurmi died of natural causes at her home in Hollywood, aged 85. She was buried in the Griffith Lawn section of the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.

#maila nurmi #vampira #classic stars #classic horror #classic hollywood #1950s hollywood #1950s women

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we-are-only-halfway-home93 · 4 years

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Come and Lay the Roses 25- Shadow of the Evening Sun- [Ivar x OC]

Summary: Ragnar makes a move on Aelle.

Characters: Ivar x OC, Bjorn x Torvi, Ubbe x Margrethe, Hvitserk x Thora, Sigurd x OC, Ragnar, Lagertha

Warnings: Arranged marriage, language, violence, torture, sex, mentions of sexual assault/rape.

Word Count: 3942

Ch. 24

AN: I’m so sorry for the wait. I had some family stuff come up and I’m getting ready to move and my school still doesn’t have a solid plan in place for the fall so I’ve had other things on my mind but I am here now and we have chapter 25 of Come and Lay the Roses. I wasn’t too terribly happy with how the end came out but it is what it is. Enjoy!

“Revenge, the sweetest morsel to the mouth that ever was cooked in hell.”

~Walter Scott

“They’ve been attacking our docks regularly since Sigurd’s death. First they took Ritland then they took Nyland. Floki and Rollo are at Kattegat right now making sure it’s not overrun. Father,” Björn leaned forward setting his hands flat on Ragnar’s desk. “We need to make a move.”

Ivar tsked. “As much as I love disagreeing with Björn he’s right. We can’t just sit back and let the Saxon kings make fools of us.” Björn shot Ivar a scathing look but kept his mouth shut.

“Sigurd has just died. We haven’t even buried him yet and you want to talk about retribution? Priorities, brothers. I think you should reevaluate them.” Ubbe chimed from his position by the fire. Ivar snorted and shook his head.

“The longer we wait to retaliate the bolder they will become. First, our brother, then the docks. What’s next? A home invasion massacre? No thanks. We need to strike while the iron is hot.” Ivar insisted. Ubbe rolled his eyes and sat back, his melancholy mood thickening the air.

Hvitserk sat forward, silent until now. “We should kill one of their brothers. It’s only fair. That’s what they’ve taken from us.” Ivar shook his head and stood.

“We did that already, Hvitserk. Remember? Aethelwulf was what started this whole mess anyway.” He turned his back to the room and stared out the large picture window overlooking the back garden. He could see Aaline and Thora walking a shaky Sibylle around the grounds. They made it a point to get her outside at least once a day.

“No, if anything this started when you married Aaline.” Björn accused. Ivar whirled around to face his oldest brother whose face had turned a wicked shade of puce.

“And what, exactly, is that supposed to mean? You’re saying this is her fault?” Ivar exclaimed. He pointed a stiff finger at his brother and rounded the couch. Hvitserk stood up and pushed his hands against Ivar’s chest, stopping him. Ubbe stepped in front of Björn, a barrier if needed.

“No. You were out of control. Killing anyone who annoyed you or even got in your way. You married Aaline because it was the only way father could control you. Aelle and Ecbert formed an alliance that night and they’ve been working against us ever since. It’s your fault all this has started.” Ivar snorted and tried to move around Hvitserk but Ubbe was there, creating too much resistance.

“They were attacking us long before my marriage. Who’s to say they wouldn’t have done it anyway?” Ivar yelled.

A loud crash silenced the room. All four men turned to look at their father.

In an uncharacteristic display of emotion, Ragnar had swept the contents of his desk onto the floor. Several glass ornaments shattered and littered the hardwood. Papers floated serenely to the ground. Pens rolled softly across the floor and came to rest under the chairs in front of his desk.

Ragnar looked up. His fingers were steepled in front of him. He had been sitting in quiet contemplation, taking in all the arguments his sons presented. Once they began to turn on each other, he had had enough. He took a deep breath and pressed his hands to his desk, standing.

His sons backed up, distancing themselves from each other, creating space in the already cramped room.

“As compelling as all of your arguments are, only one thing matters. Retribution. Aelle needs to pay for what he has done to us.” He came out from behind his desk and crossed the room, taking Ivar’s place in front of the window.

“He needs to feel my pain. This is the second child I have lost. No parent should have to outlive their children. It is worse than death. Aelle needs to feel what he has done to me.” He turned and faced his sons. “To all of us.”

“Are we going to kill his son?” Hvitserk asked. Ragnar smiled and shook his head.

“No. I would not deprive a father of his children.” He looked at each of his sons, studying them. “But I will deprive a child of his father.” The brother’s exchanged apprehensive glances but remained silent. Ragnar had turned back to the window and settled his hands in his pockets.

“Do you remember the story of Jarl Borg?” Ragnar asked. He kept his back to his sons. Björn was the one to step forward.

“He was an ally. He betrayed you. Took Kattegat, tried to kill Aslaug and Hvitserk and Ubbe and Sigurd. Killed many of your men. Tried to kill you.” Ragnar nodded and Björn took this as encouragement to continue.

“You overtook him. Took back your land and your people. Captured him.” Björn spoke softly in the tense room. He could feel his brothers’ eyes on his back. He was the only one old enough to remember the events of that night. His brothers had all been too young. Ivar hadn’t even been born.

“What did I do to him, my son?” Ragnar drawled, his voice low. Björn glanced at Ubbe whose gaze was laser focused on their father.

It was moments like this where Björn was reminded of his father’s power. These tense, quiet moments where all Ragnar had to do was lower his voice and speak softly and the whole world would stop to listen.

“You blood eagled him.” Björn whispered. Ragnar nodded slowly.

“Yes.” Ragnar breathed. “A fitting punishment, don’t you think?”

“Sir, there is someone here who’d like an audience.” Ecbert looked up from his paper, cursing internally at the stupidity of his companion. Sigurd Lothbrok was dead in a drive-by shooting, his body undergoing an autopsy but Ecbert only needed one guess to figure out who was behind it.

He’d told Aelle to be patient. The fool just couldn’t do it.

“Tell them I’m not seeing anyone at the moment.” He waved carelessly. He looked up when he didn’t hear the door close. His attendant was still standing in the doorway, his body tense with nerves. Ecbert sat back. “Well, what do they want?”

His attendant cleared his throat. “She says she has information about Ragnar Lothbrok that might interest you.” Ecbert arched a perfectly shaped brow before waving his hand forward.

“Send her in then.”

The woman who entered was tall and thin with flowing blonde hair that reached her waist. She carried herself with a dignity seen in the upper class but dressed in a way that implied she was more middle or lower class. Her hands were clasped in a loose knot in front of her and her face betrayed little. It was her eyes that stopped Ecbert short. Her eyes gave away her sanity or lack thereof.

“What can I do for you, Miss…” He tapered off, waiting for her to offer her name.

She didn’t.

“I know how you can stop Ragnar Lothbrok.” The confidence in her voice was astounding. Ecbert snorted and shook his head.

“Pray tell, how exactly can I stop Ragnar Lothbrok? He is already the richest man on this side of the country and he has powerful allies in all areas of the government. Tell me, what do you know that I do not that will help me get rid of Ragnar Lothbrok?”

If she heard the sarcasm and skepticism in his voice, she didn’t show it.

“His children are his weakness. He does everything for them and with them in mind. Get rid of the children and he’ll have nothing.” She did show emotion then. Ecbert laughed at her and she looked affronted.

“I am well aware of Ragnar’s attachment to his children. But I will not kill them. Not so soon after the death of their brother. Now please, William will show you out.”

As if called, the door opened and the attendant appeared, his arm outstretched behind him, waiting for the woman to leave. She made no move to do so.

“You don’t have to kill them all in one fell swoop. Just one at a time. As one falls, Ragnar will grow weaker with grief and the rest will be easy.” She insisted, a hint of desperation behind her words.

Ecbert stood, his anger pulsating through the room. “Do you take me for a fool? Hm? I know that Ragnar’s weakness is children. But I have enough respect for the man to let him grieve one son before depriving him of the next. Or are you just trying to get me killed? Killing them all at once would be worlds easier than one at a time. I’m more likely to survive that way.

“Now, you’ve said your piece. Be gone from my sight before I feel you’ve overstayed your welcome.” He looked towards William at the door who moved forward and took the woman by the arm. She jerked against him, causing them to stumble. She took the chance to pull herself from William’s grasp and slam her hands on Ecbert’s desk.

“You’re a coward.” She snarled. Ecbert reared back like he’d been slapped. Never had anyone, let alone a woman dared to speak so to his face.

“Madam, you have overstayed your welcome here. Be grateful that I do not strangle you here and now for your insolence. I have killed stronger men for less. Remove yourself from my sight.” He hissed.

“You’re afraid of the retribution that will rain down if you act now. That makes you a coward.”

“I would be an idiot not to fear Ragnar’s retribution. You must be desperate if you’ve come to me with so little. I’ll not ask again. Leave. Now.”

“Ivar is the problem.” She said with confidence she had no business feeling.

Ecbert sighed and rubbed his forehead. “Ivar has always been the problem. This is not news to me.” His voice was clipped and short.

The woman straightened and crossed her arms over her chest. “I know how to get rid of him.”

Ecbert opened his eyes and stared at the woman with trepidation. She continued. “Once Ivar falls, the rest will soon follow.” Ecbert shook his head. He couldn’t believe he was about to listen to her. He was either stupid or desperate. Maybe it was a little of both.

“What did you have in mind exactly?”

The grin that overtook her face was just this side of insane.

Aaline leaned against the door jamb, watching Ivar dress. It was late in the evening and he was preparing for his raid on Aelle.

He had spent the better part of the last two days holed up in his father’s office discussing what needed to be done to avenge Sigurd. She could see the lines of anger and grief in his face every night when he came to their bed. He struggled to keep his eyes open long enough to kiss her goodnight before he was passed out.

He was gone by the time she woke and she knew that he was busy plotting.

It seemed they had finally devised a plan.

“How long will you be?” She asked, feigning casualty.

Ivar stopped lacing his boots and glanced up at her.

Her arms were crossed over her chest and she was looking down at her feet.

She was just as exhausted as he was if not more so. She had come to their bed every night physically and emotionally drained. She had taken the lead in Sibylle’s care and had spent the last two days tending to her.

Making sure she ate, making sure she bathed, consoling her and helping Lagertha. Lagertha had taken it upon herself to plan the funeral. Sibylle was in no position to do so. She struggled daily to get out of bed and Torvi and Aaline had to drag her out of bed and to the back garden just to make sure she got some exercise.

She was in no place to plan her husband’s funeral.

Lagertha had planned a day long celebration of life with a massive feast. There would be wine, food, music, and dancing. Of course this would all take place after Sigurd’s funeral pyre. Sigurd’s body would be burned on a pyre that Ivar and his brother’s would build. Offerings and ornaments would be placed on the Pyre so that Sigurd would have things to take with him into Valhalla.

Ivar had the utmost faith in Lagertha, though he felt that the funeral should take place after their vengeance on Aelle.

He sat up and sighed.

“It is hard to say. Our timing depends on Aelle and what he’ll do.” She nodded and looked up, meeting his eyes with watery ones of her own.

He drew his eyebrows together and took a deep breath, letting the air fill his chest, feeling the strain in his lungs, before he exhaled. “Why are you crying?” His voice was soft in the space between them.

She laughed once and pressed her hand against her mouth, afraid it would turn into a sob if she continued. She shook her head, unable to look at him for fear of breaking down. He said her name and she sighed, resigned. “Because I am afraid.” She could not speak louder than a whisper for she knew her voice would break.

“What are you afraid of?”

“I’m afraid you won’t return.”

Ivar stood up and approached her slowly. He stopped in front of her and, with tender hands, took her face between his palms. “Aaline…” He searched her eyes, looking for what, she didn’t know. He seemed to find it because the next minute his lips were on hers, hard.

She moaned and brought her hands up to his shoulders, clenching her fists in his shirt, pulling it tight. Ivar sucked in a sharp breath and pulled away, locking eyes with her again.

“I will never leave you.” He whispered against her parted lips. She sobbed once, tears streaming down her face, and pressed forward, molding herself to his body.

Ivar crouched low behind the bushes in Aelle’s backyard. His hips protested the position but he ignored them in favor of watching Aelle’s bedroom window. The light was still on. He cursed when Hvitserk came up behind him.

“Nothing yet?” Ivar glared at his brother before shaking his head and turning back to the window.

“What are they doing anyway? It’s after midnight.” Hvitserk looked at his wrist for a watch that he wasn’t wearing. “I bet they're getting freaky. You think Aelle’s wife still lets him stick it in her every night? Can he even find it? I mean, he’s so…”

“I know what you mean.” Ivar cut his brother off. “His wife is a night owl. She reads.” Hvitserk side eyed Ivar before snorting.

“If I was her, I wouldn’t let him anywhere near me. I bet it’s like a shriveled old pickle.” Ivar rolled his eyes as Hvitserk laughed at his brilliance.

“Tell me the plan again.” Ivar demanded. He needed to get Hvitserk back on track.

Hvitserk huffed but relented. “You and I watch the back and wait for the light to go out. When it does, we text Ubbe and Björn who will wait 20 minutes and then they’ll use the French doors on the side patio to enter through the kitchen.”

“Security cameras?” Ivar asked only half listening.

“Disabled. Björn’s got the jammer in the car. It’s good for ten miles.”

“Security system?”

“Ubbe called the company. Said that the area has been experiencing connection problems and that they’re working post haste but some systems may go off unexpectedly. He’s got the decoder in his bag.”

“Guard dogs?”

“Unconscious.”

Ivar looked over at Hvitserk who didn’t look at him. “I stole some of Margrethe’s Xanax and stuffed it in some ground beef. They’ll be out for hours.” Hvitserk elaborated.

Ivar snorted. “If they wake up.”

He waited only a few minutes before he spoke again. “What happens after 20 minutes?”

Hvitserk groaned and hung his head. “Must we go over this again? Björn made me recite it until I didn’t leave anything out.”

Ivar ignored him. “What happens after 20 minutes?” He spoke through clenched teeth.

“Björn and Ubbe enter through the French doors and disable the silent alarm. They have 30 seconds before it’s not silent anymore. If it goes off, we take off and hope they make it out. When it doesn’t go off, we wait for Ubbe’s text and we break in through the back door.

“We sneak upstairs, inject Aelle with a horse tranquilizer and haul him out of the house like used furniture.”

He turned to Ivar as if he was expecting some kind of commendation but Ivar just slapped his shoulder and pointed to the bedroom window. Hvitserk turned and saw that the light had gone out.

“Text Ubbe.” Ivar hissed.

Hvitserk rolled his eyes but did as he was told. Ivar kept his eyes on the window for any movement. He could feel Hvitserk shifting beside him. He was building up to something so he left his brother off the hook. “Was there something else, Hvitty?”

Hvitserk opened his mouth to answer but no words came out. Ivar turned to look at him and smirked. “Cat got your tongue?” Hvitserk narrowed his eyes and landed a solid punch to Ivar’s shoulder. Ivar chuckled and looked back at the bedroom window.

Hvitserk finally found his courage and asked, “So, you and Aaline, huh?”

Ivar slowly turned to face his brother who had no shame. “Well, she is my wife, Hvitserk. It comes with the territory.”

“No… well, yes, but… what I meant was…”

“I know what you meant. And yes, me and Aaline.”

Hvitserk grinned and he was trying so hard not to show his teeth that his face was tight with tension and his eyes nearly clenched shut.

“I knew it. It was only a matter of time. No one believed me. They all thought you would run her off. Said she was too smart for you but I knew you’d make it work. I knew it the minute I saw her. You can’t resist a challenge.”

Ivar had turned back to his brother and stared at him through narrowed eyes. “They all thought I’d run her off?”

“Well, yeah, but you didn’t.” Hvitserk stated like it was obvious.

“What else did they think?” Hvitserk looked over at Ivar and seemed to sense the danger he was in because he suddenly looked down at his nonexistent watch and hummed.

“Oh, look, it’s been 20 minutes.” Ivar watched Hvitserk stand and head towards the backdoor on tiptoes. He growled and followed swiftly behind.

They pressed back against the siding and waited.

Ivar glanced around the backyard, his adrenaline pumping. Hvitserk nudged him and jerked his head inside, indicating Ubbe’s signal. Ivar turned to the door and, with quick hands that won him Ragnar’s praise, he unlocked the door and shoved Hvitserk inside.

His brother cursed but otherwise did not react. Ubbe and Björn were in the kitchen.

“Everything’s set. We do this quick, we do this perfect. We’re in, we’re out. No one gets hurt.” Björn said.

“Except Aelle.” Hvitserk snorted. Ubbe slapped his arm and Hvitserk shrugged.

“Last bedroom on the left end of the hall.” Ivar said, leading the charge. The rest of his brothers followed behind on quiet feet. Ivar kept close to walls to limit the noise on the floorboards. As soon as he reached the landing, he took out his gun and attached his silencer. Björn glared as he passed him down the hall but Ivar ignored him. Hvitserk stopped beside him and took out the tranquilizers. He had three full syringes in his hand. Ivar gave him a look and he just shrugged.

“Better to be safe than sorry.” Ivar rolled his eyes and followed Ubbe.

Björn jerked his head towards the door and Ubbe nodded, wrapping his hand around the knob and turning. The door eked open and Ivar was the first inside.

He came around the left side of the bed, the side that Aelle’s wife, Ealhswith, slept. He watched as Ubbe and Björn came in, one standing at the foot of the bed and the other standing on Aelle’s side. Hvitserk was the last in.

He stepped up and knelt beside Aelle, removing the plastic covering from the first syringe. He smirked down at Aelle before plunging the needle into the side of his neck. “Sleep well, Aelle. It will be your last.”

As if his words were a trigger, Aelle’s eyes snapped open and his hand wrapped around Hvitserk’s throat.

Hvitserk spluttered and choked, his own hands coming up around Aelle’s wrist. Björn and Ubbe jumped forward, Ubbe helping Hvitserk tug against Aelle while Björn latched himself to Aelle’s back.

Aelle jerked forward, knocking the contents of his nightstand to the floor, waking his wife. She jerked up but was quickly met with the business end of Ivar’s gun. She didn’t even have time to scream before Ivar spoke.

“Scream and I’ll shoot you.” She snapped her jaw shut and stared at Ivar, tears streaming down her face. Ivar did not look away.

Aelle roared and yanked Hvitserk closer, spittle flying from his mouth. Hvitserk was turning a dangerous shade of purple.

“Hvitserk, the needles.” Björn grunted.

With help from Ubbe, Hvitserk plunged the two remaining syringes into Aelle’s neck. The Saxon flagged just a bit but his hold on Hvitserk didn’t lessen.

“Ivar! Help us!” Ubbe cried.

“Aelle.” Ivar called, his voice calm and soft.

The Saxon king turned his head and saw Ivar with his gun pointed at Ealhswith’s head. “Let him go or I’ll kill your wife.”

Aelle narrowed his eyes and pulled Hvitserk closer to him, his fingers flexing around his neck. Ivar watched the hand tighten around his brother’s throat before he turned cool, empty eyes to the weakened king. “You don’t believe me?”

With no preamble, Ivar fired a single shot between Ealhswith’s eyes.

The other men stopped, frozen as her body collapsed back onto the bed. A pool of blood leaked out onto the bed. A splatter pattern decorate the wall behind the headboard.

Aelle roared and released Hvitserk. He lunged toward the bed but Björn kept his hold tight and, with three horse tranquilizers in his system, Aelle was out in no time.

Hvitserk heaved and gasped in the corner, Ubbe hovering over him. Ivar glanced once to the body of Aelle’s wife before he stowed his gun.

“Ivar, we said…”

“I know what we said.” Ivar looked up at his oldest brother. Björn liked to stick to plans and it frustrated him when Ivar uphending these plans.

“We didn’t agree to kill his wife.” Björn hissed, his teeth clenched and his eyes hard.

“I know what we agreed but plans change. We didn’t plan on him waking up. We didn’t plan on him fighting as hard as he did. Frankly, I think this works in our favor.”

“A dead woman works in our favor?”

“Yes, he saw her die. He knows what we’re here for. He’ll beg for death in no time now that he knows what we’re willing to do.”

Ivar kept his gaze on Björn for a few more seconds before turning to Hvitserk who was standing now but with a ring of thick bruises already forming around his neck. “Alright, Hvitty?”

Hvitserk nodded, coughing, and clasped Ivar’s shoulder.

Ivar looked back at Björn before jerking his head towards Aelle’s body. “Let’s move. It’ll take time to drag him down the stairs and we don’t want anyone to see us leave.”

Tags: @dreamlesswonder @youbloodymadgenius @inforapound @bcarolinablr @funmadnessandbadassvikings @jay-bel @reyrearcheron44 @londongal2810 @khiraeth @didiintheblog @jeremyrennerfanxxxx123 @xbellaxcarolinax @shannygoatgruff

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soupinely · 3 years

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listen. you live in a neoliberal society. you will always be a liberal. you are an active participant in this society. you are not some fucking fringe radicalist because you spout ideology on the internet. to be so obsessed with materialism to the point you’re denying it. the system works perfectly. it has been working perfectly. it’s just the wrong system. and guess what, you ain’t doing shit about it. you have no real objectives. your political views are all for the fancy of yourself and your reality. it’s called garden variety narcissism. people aren’t allowed to be or do shit anymore without being expatriated. there’s this idea by Rollo May, in his 69’ novel “Love and Will” that when a society has liberated itself to all it’s whims and freedoms, it has nothing to defy anymore, it tenses up in the face of such a novel freedom. nobody wanted this. the 60’s was the closest this country came. the black panthers and all that shit. and then they were all murdered or paid off. the world is a cruel fucking place; it’s not getting any better. I hate to do it. It’s laughable to see how contemptible and misanthropic most liberal types are of actual people. I don’t think most of y’all actually want shit for anybody. politics for yourself. go to a third world country. tell them how much they wouldn’t wanna be in the States. tell them it’s bad because you got misgendered. tell me how much you hate the States. I sound like a con, but this is how I have felt for awhile. We live in a country where our issues are fucking luxuries. and they teach you that you are the best and unique. and it could be true, but nobody acts on it. we all just gild through the aisles hoping it happens. I’ve learned the worst thing you can do is be a forever victim, where is the fortitude and return? Do I think everybody should have a place to live, food to eat, and health care, yes? Have I provided myself with shit because I had no fucking choice, yes? Take some agency over your life. Say shit you fucking mean without being a dick. Quit hiding. Quit fearing. Live in the world.

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nancygduarteus · 7 years

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How to Die

One morning in May, the existential psychotherapist Irvin Yalom was recuperating in a sunny room on the first floor of a Palo Alto convalescent hospital. He was dressed in white pants and a green sweater, not a hospital gown, and was quick to point out that he is not normally confined to a medical facility. “I don’t want [this article] to scare my patients,” he said, laughing. Until a knee surgery the previous month, he had been seeing two or three patients a day, some at his office in San Francisco and others in Palo Alto, where he lives. Following the procedure, however, he felt dizzy and had difficulty concentrating. “They think it’s a brain issue, but they don’t know exactly what it is,” he told me in a soft, gravelly voice. He was nonetheless hopeful that he would soon head home; he would be turning 86 in June and was looking forward to the release of his memoir, Becoming Myself, in October.

Issues of The Times Literary Supplement and The New York Times Book Review sat on the bed, alongside an iPad. Yalom had been spending his stay watching Woody Allen movies and reading novels by the Canadian writer Robertson Davies. For someone who helped introduce to American psychological circles the idea that a person’s conflicts can result from unresolvable dilemmas of human existence, among them the dread of dying, he spoke easily about his own mortality.

“I haven’t been overwhelmed by fear,” he said of his unfolding health scare. Another of Yalom’s signature ideas, expressed in books such as Staring at the Sun and Creatures of a Day, is that we can lessen our fear of dying by living a regret-free life, meditating on our effect on subsequent generations, and confiding in loved ones about our death anxiety. When I asked whether his lifelong preoccupation with death eases the prospect that he might pass away soon, he replied, “I think it probably makes things easier.”

The hope that our existential fears can be diminished inspires people around the world to email Yalom daily. In a Gmail folder labeled “Fans,” he had saved 4,197 messages from admirers in places ranging from Iran to Croatia to South Korea, which he invited me to look at. Some were simply thank-you notes, expressions of gratitude for the insights delivered by his books. In addition to textbooks and other works of nonfiction, he has written several novels and story collections. Some, such as Love’s Executioner & Other Tales of Psychotherapy and When Nietzsche Wept, have been best sellers.

As I scrolled through the emails, Yalom used his cane to tap a button that alerted the nurses’ station. A voice came through the intercom, and he explained that he needed some ice for his knee. It was the third time he’d called; he told me his pain was making it difficult to concentrate on anything else, though he was trying. Throughout his stay, his wife of more than 60 years, Marilyn, had been stopping by regularly to refresh his reading material. The day before, he’d had a visit from Georgia May, the widow of the existential psychotherapist Rollo May, who was a colleague and friend of Yalom’s. When he runs out of other things to do, he plays on his iPad or his computer, using them with the dexterity of someone half his age.

Many of Yalom’s fan letters are searing meditations on death. Some correspondents hope he will offer relief from deep-seated problems. Most of the time he suggests that they find a local therapist, but if one isn’t available and the issue seems solvable in a swift period—at this point in his career, he won’t work with patients for longer than a year—he may take someone on remotely. He is currently working with people in Turkey, South Africa, and Australia via the internet. Obvious cultural distinctions aside, he says his foreign patients are not that different from the patients he treats in person. “If we live a life full of regret, full of things we haven’t done, if we’ve lived an unfulfilled life,” he says, “when death comes along, it’s a lot worse. I think it’s true for all of us.”

Becoming Myself is clearly the memoir of a psychiatrist. “I awake from my dream at 3 a.m., weeping into my pillow,” reads the opening line. Yalom’s nightmare involves a childhood incident in which he insulted a girl. Much of the book is about the influence that his youth—particularly his relationship with his mother—has had on his life. He writes, quoting Charles Dickens, “For, as I draw closer and closer to the end, I travel in the circle, nearer and nearer to the beginning.”

Yalom first gained fame among psychotherapists for The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy. The book, published in 1970, argues that the dynamic in group therapy is a microcosm of everyday life, and that addressing relationships within a therapy group could have profound therapeutic benefits outside of it. “I’ll do the sixth revision next year,” he told me, as nurses came in and out of the room. He was sitting in a chair by the window, fidgeting. Without his signature panama hat, his sideburns, which skate away from his ears, looked especially long.

Although he gave up teaching years ago, Yalom says that until he is no longer capable, he’ll continue seeing patients in the cottage in his backyard. It is a shrink’s version of a man cave, lined with books by Friedrich Nietzsche and the Stoic philosophers. The garden outside features Japanese bonsai trees; deer, rabbits, and foxes make occasional appearances nearby. “When I feel restless, I step outside and putter over the bonsai, pruning, watering, and admiring their graceful shapes,” he writes in Becoming Myself.

Yalom sees each problem encountered in therapy as something of a puzzle, one he and his patient must work together to solve. He described this dynamic in Love’s Executioner, which consists of 10 stories of patients undergoing therapy—true tales from Yalom’s work, with names changed but few other details altered. The stories concentrate not only on Yalom’s suffering patients but also on his own feelings and thoughts as a therapist. “I wanted to rehumanize therapy, to show the therapist as a real person,” he told me.

That might not sound like the stuff of potboilers, but the book, which came out in 1989, was a commercial hit, and continues to sell briskly today. In 2003, the critic Laura Miller credited it with inaugurating a new genre. Love’s Executioner, she wrote in The New York Times, had shown “that the psychological case study could give readers what the short fiction of the time increasingly refused to deliver: the pursuit of secrets, intrigue, big emotions, plot.”

Today, the people around the world who email Yalom know him mostly from his writing, which has been translated into dozens of languages. Like David Hasselhoff, he may well be more of a star outside the United States than at home. This likely reflects American readers’ religiosity and insistence on happy endings. Mondays with Yalom are not Tuesdays With Morrie. Yalom can be morbid, and he doesn’t believe in an afterlife; he says his anxiety about death is soothed somewhat by the belief that what follows life will be the same as what preceded it. Not surprisingly, he told me, highly religious readers don’t tend to gravitate toward his books.

Yalom is candid, both in his memoir and in person, about the difficulties of aging. When two of his close friends died recently, he realized that his cherished memory of their friendship is all that remains. “It dawned on me that that reality doesn’t exist anymore,” he said sadly. “When I die, it will be gone.” The thought of leaving Marilyn behind is agonizing. But he also dreads further physical deterioration. He now uses a walker with tennis balls on the bottoms of the legs, and he has recently lost weight. He coughed frequently during our meeting; when I emailed him a month later, he was feeling better, but said of his health scare, “I consider those few weeks as among the very worst of my life.” He can no longer play tennis or go scuba diving, and he fears he might have to stop bicycling. “Getting old,” he writes in Becoming Myself, “is giving up one damn thing after another.”

In his books, Yalom emphasizes that love can reduce death anxiety, both by providing a space for people to share their fears and by contributing to a well-lived life. Marilyn, an accomplished feminist literary scholar with whom he has a close intellectual partnership, inspires him to keep living every bit as much as she makes the idea of dying excruciating. “My wife matches me book for book,” he told me at one point. But although Yalom’s email account has a folder titled “Ideas for Writing,” he said he may finally be out of book ideas. Meanwhile, Marilyn told me that she had recently helped someone write an obituary for Irvin. “This is the reality of where we are in life,” she said.

Early in Yalom’s existential-psychotherapy practice, he was struck by how much comfort people derived from exploring their existential fears. “Dying,” he wrote in Staring at the Sun, “is lonely, the loneliest event of life.” Yet empathy and connectedness can go a long way toward reducing our anxieties about mortality. When, in the 1970s, Yalom began working with patients diagnosed with untreatable cancer, he found they were sometimes heartened by the idea that, by dying with dignity, they could be an example to others.

Death terror can occur in anyone at any time, and can have life-changing effects, both negative and positive. “Even for those with a deeply ingrained block against openness—those who have always avoided deep friendships—the idea of death may be an awakening experience, catalyzing an enormous shift in their desire for intimacy,” Yalom has written. Those who haven’t yet lived the life they wanted to can still shift their priorities late in life. “The same thing was true with Ebenezer Scrooge,” he told me, as a nurse brought him three pills.

For all the morbidity of existential psychotherapy, it is deeply life-affirming. Change is always possible. Intimacy can be freeing. Existence is precious. “I hate the idea of leaving this world, this wonderful life,” Yalom said, praising a metaphor devised by the scientist Richard Dawkins to illustrate the fleeting nature of existence. Imagine that the present moment is a spotlight moving its way across a ruler that shows the billions of years the universe has been around. Everything to the left of the area lit by the spotlight is over; to the right is the uncertain future. The chances of us being in the spotlight at this particular moment—of being alive—are minuscule. And yet here we are.

Yalom’s apprehension about death is allayed by his sense that he has lived well. “As I look back at my life, I have been an overachiever, and I have few regrets,” he said quietly. Still, he continued, people have “an inbuilt impulse to want to survive, to live.” He paused. “I hate to see life go.”

from Health News And Updates https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/10/how-to-die/537906/?utm_source=feed

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ionecoffman · 7 years

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How to Die

Article source here:The Atlantic

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