ANGELA SPEAKS

Angela J. King with Noël King

After our sister Angela died in April 2001, three of us spent several days gathering the physical remnants of Angela’s life from her cramped attic apartment. I could focus only on one thing—gathering all the words she had left behind.

The hardest thing to do, in selecting which words to include here, is to allow Angela’s grandness to sweep through. Angela lived her life BIG, and her words include it all: biting wit, joy, hell, pain, despair, beauty, hope, God, death.

In the excerpts below, it seems no matter what’s happening in her life, Angela returns time and again to try to express her experience and its meaning on paper, only to lament that words are never enough.

Now we have those words, Angela, and no, they are not enough. But I am grateful for every one.

I feel her here. I hope you do too.

Angela J. King,
July 31, 1961 – April 29, 2001

Isort of think that each person is his/her own gem. We do not sit around expressing others’ beauty, do we? Do we not express our own?

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When I was in my teens I once read a book about the Most Beautiful Woman in the world. I don’t even remember her name: she was a legend in her time, which was before mine. But I thought, what if one could be the most beautiful . . . ? Facial beauty is meaningless, but a combination of features and spirit. . . . Well I haven’t got the features, but my energy . . . well, it has been stamped out and reformed and burned so many times that, on occasion, I have glimpsed a beauty unearthly. Because it is so large, it smacks of greatness. It smacks of beauty come to comfort the earth.

You see, when I am well, I see everyone as in a mirror. People are filled with transcendent beauty. My own beauty. My own deep yearning comes to rest. In bringing the message of greatness to all I meet. When a person knows he or she is special (or read “great”), what more meaning is there? That would be, if I have one, my mission. To affirm the divinity of every human being.

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It has been a long time since I really felt I was beautiful. But at times, I catch a glimpse of shocking beauty and I think, There is such a thing as happiness.

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Dear ___,

The problem is that I find myself (September a year ago) and then lose it for the next two years. I have these big spaces of dead time. And then when I set out to write to persons such as yourself, I feel like I’m appearing obnoxiously out of the dead.

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P.S. It is 4:20 a.m. I am fighting one of my biggest battles—courage. I am afraid of the dark. I imagine things. I hear little sounds and get scared. And “God” won’t allow me to sleep. Because I’ve got to face that fear. I sense if I went to bed denying myself the pain of the biggest fear of my life, I’d wake up abandoned by God. Well, I have another proof that this is God. I spent the entire night violently disputing the fact that I’d have to see “him.” Satan. The most horrible something in my life. (Which is probably myself.) I kept saying, “This is psychotic. I will not, dammit.” Besides which, I had an equal fear that it was real. Satan in my living room, I mean.

Well, I finally tried my damndest to see something. I tried to scare myself to death and the more I tried the less I could. I finally gave up, because it was light, 6:00 a.m., and I was exhausted and besides the light is not frightened.

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Dear ___,

I don’t know if I can send something, for fear it will be tiresome, heavy, and tedious. I guess my letters are like my life.

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I have a friend who says I need a computer program to regulate my letters. First, a greeting and inquiry about the other. Then, all references to God taken out. And lastly, another inquiry about the other and closing.

Well, this letter probably sounds like I have come down off the Empire State Building. I have, but I am halfway up another one.

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Dear ___,

Thank you very much for your letter. I told myself (having “woken up” to my letter shortly after its writing) that it would be my last. I just mean I realized it was psychotic (or arrogant—to me the same thing); and thought, I give up. I am psychotic,just stop torturing people around the country by writing them letters.

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Maybe not mathematically, but maybe tears do turn the eyes to sweetness. I want my smile to be as deeply sweet as my tears were deeply lost. That’s really all I want in my eyes—is an outpouring of love. I want to love the world to bits. I want every single tear I’ve ever lost to be beamed out in comforting, solacing love. I want to solace all the solacing I’ve ever horrifiedly cried out for. Maybe, just maybe, I have the impulse to love.

Because you see, I almost know at bottom that I’m an affectless psychopath [double underlined]. That seems to be a permanent marring of my deep depression—the fear that I have no love.

But I want the most I can be, and I want it in love. I guess that’s why beauty is always an associated word, because I firmly believe love is the most beautiful thing there is. I also believe love is God. No, I am not saying I want to be God. I am saying I want to express God.

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I’ve also decided that physical pain and I are no problem. I once, as I wrote once to you, broke triply my ankle. I felt nothing. The doctor looked at me strangely. I felt like a hero. I was. I really did not feel a thing from what I once was informed was excruciating. What, that? Nothing! You should feel this! The abominable horror. Little broken ankles are literally numb after that. No twinge, mentally. I was trained, mentally.

So, if I am ever a martyr I will feel nothing. What glory! (None.) Another huge hurdle overcome. If I come to be killed, I will be in pleasure. A little fire, please. That’s it. I mean it. I have never felt unendurable pain. I once a couple weeks ago had for the first time menstrual cramps that I took a couple Advil for. They were staggering. I barely noticed anything. But I literally could not stand up. I decided I should sit down. And I contemplated hell. (As usual.) I thought, I could stand this pain forever. (I’m slightly monotonous.) So I have always been terrified of physical pain, because I have never felt it. Typical. I hate roller coasters. They bore me. You likely love them. I have made studies. I don’t need to prove my resistance to death. I moan deathly ill, and resisting a hell (yes!) which does terrify me and not death.

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Aug. 2

I am working on this hollow where “I” should be. I mean the vacancy in my gaze. It seems to be pain. I think I have a vulnerable gaze that seeks out the pain in others. A very serious gaze. Full of love. As much love as I’ve had pain. Which is great.

Aug. 3

My whole life revolves around It, and I think It is that center of my eyes that appears when I am well. I believe the term is “coming home.” It is “that that wants to be loved.”

Aug. 4

Not getting anywhere. There is something ridiculous. Some totally different me somewhere. The meaning of life entirely escapes me. I have been trying to be me. Me! Fill in the hollows in my personality. I listen for It—and I sense only opaque clouds. It even existing seems wildly improbable. I don’t want the meaning of life. The person who does seems light-years beyond me. Perhaps she is. IS THE MEANING OF LIFE PAIN?

I am sitting here willing myself to be all here and I think some of me is.

Aug. 6

Working on pain. My conversation nine years ago with Michael haunts me. I was talking of resignation. He said, “You’re 18 and you’re talking of resignation?!” I stick to my guns.

Yes. I remember telling ______ I had to accept a life devoid of all love. That’s resignation. Some of the blacks of my life seem to be coming back to me. I think I am sometimes hitting The Nerve.

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Dear ___,

I am writing this at 3:38 a.m., because I am obeying a voice (nonliteral, figurative) that could be God, or psychosis, or both. . . .

I sleep to drown my life out. I was high as a kite when I wrote my last letter to you, and I wanted to descend a bit. As it turned out, I couldn’t bear to close my eyes on consciousness, and I drove myself one sleepless night to the hospital. There I came down, but too much. I am now fighting my way to a happy medium, but having once heard what I was sure was the literal voice of God (if a voice can be literal that was not a voice but an impression), I am reluctant ever to disobey what might be that voice returned, however bizarre. I just couldn’t bear the abandonment of heaven that would imply. Because that God is heaven. I am close, I think, to true greatness, and I was trying to sleep because it was too hard to figure it out. That raised an alarm signal. Never sleep to escape yourself. Is finding yourself more important, or sleep?

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Dear ___,

It has been told me once in my life I should perhaps consider one gray, in-between area of my life before I die. I doubt it.

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Well. I have been told once, by someone, that I write intimidating letters. I can’t imagine what could have brought forth that comment. Can you? I only dive into the meaning of life right at paragraph two, that’s all. Well, if you don’t dive into it then, when will you ever get around to it? And if you never get around to it, what is life worth?

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I seem to recall a letter in which I pronounced gaily . . . “I am well for all eternity!!” Well, I wasn’t. I went to the hospital shortly after. Well, this time I am sure. I’m not excited, I’m even depressed. But I’m in touch with my pain. And that is unheard of. But I am cautious. I am so scared to be happy I am shaking. It’s, “What will I do if it goes away?!” But if I dare, my happiness will be infinitely deep. Awe-inspiring. It’s to be happy for the first time in 12 years, with the exception of a few days. Now that’s awe-inspiring.

—Angela J. King, Harrisonburg, Virginia, wrote these excerpts over several decades.

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Dear Angela: I will always remember how we savored words together. You loved them just as much as I do—and you knew so many, not only in English, but also in French, Spanish, German, and even Russian. Languages, you once told me, came to you as easily as breathing.

The biggest gift I can give you now is to return your words back to you—heard. They will color my words for the rest of my life.
—Noël King, Reston, Virginia, seventh of nine siblings (now eight)