A Box of Darkness - The Story of a Marriage by Sally Ryder Brady (St. Martin's Press, 2011, 240p) is a strange, fascinating, book. And sad.
Sally and Upton have been married for 46 years when Upton suddenly dies. In the aftermath of his death Sally finds gay porn magazines and videos in his belongings... She is transported many years back, when, after 8 years of marriage and four children, one morning, after a night of heavy drinking and spending the night at a friend's place, Upton confessed that he had had sex with his friend, Edward.
After a lot of self-questioning and doubts, Sally ends up putting the incident on account of 'Edward drunken seduction,' and after Upton proclaiming: 'I give you my promise, it will never happen again. Never. I give you my word,' she seems to have forgotten it. Not to say that the marriage went uneventful. Upton, although charming and brilliant, was subject to temper tantrums and was an alcoholic, absorbed in his work, leaving Sally very much in charge of the family.
When she discovers the gay porn material, she writes,
I surrender to a flow of sorrows - first the self-pitying sorrow of a spurned lover; then the sorrow for the sex we'd only rarely shared the last fifteen years; and finally sorrow for Upton and the great burden of his secret. How could I have not known he was gay? Or did I know? What did I know? What did I know that I didn't know I knew until this minute?
But it is not simple. In writing her memoir Sally Ryder Brady tries to understand what her marriage meant. In the end, a futile exercise:
I could spend the rest of my life trying to understand Upton. But who among us can truly know what is in another's heart?
Sad finding, but so true... She nevertheless adds:
What I know is that Upton chose me and that he loved me. I think that is enough.
Isn't that a wise conclusion, after all?
