Keeping Up with Alcestis

Eating in bed is frowned upon- it leaves crumbs. Reading in bed also leaves crumbs in your subconscious, but you never hear spouses complaining about that. When pregnant, I develop the habit of reading in bed. I devour a book in a night or two because I just read until my eyes become too heavy and I fall asleep with the lights on.

This past week I have been reading through my old college textbooks, mainly the classical and ancient materials. Recently I read the play Alcestis by the Greek tragedian Euripides.

To make a short play even shorter, the jest of the story is about a hospitable king who is rewarded by the god Apollo the eligibility to escape death provided that he can find a replacement for his demise. Sadly, the king can find no one- not even his feeble parents- to volunteer for the task. Finally, his devoted wife, Alcestis, assists her husband by offering to sacrifice herself in his stead.

The play has left a morsel in my mind that I have gnawed on since I read it. The time has come for Alcestis to depart and her son clings to her and says,

“Mother, now without you/ Our home is over.”

…

Throughout the play Alcestis is cited as “virtuous” and a wife above all others which is fair and good but I can’t help but wonder…. was this reputation the result of this solitary action or was it preliminary to her decision to forfeit her life?

I think every woman has a bit of Alcestis in her, I think we are willing to kill ourselves over tasks because we think it’s the “virtuous” thing to do. We try to do everything while comparing ourselves to everyone. When really we should be saying…

It is easy to lose ourselves through marriage, motherhood and everyday notions and motions. Partly this is due to the concept of becoming less selfish through being selfless, but I think we can overdo it. I, personally, need to get back in touch with who I am. I have become so consumed with being there for my family and making our home that I have forgotten WHO I AM. I don’t want to kill myself over ordinary tasks. I don’t want to sacrifice my own progression for temporal attainments.

Back to the original tidbit that started this banquet of realization, the line:

“Mother, now without you/Our home is over.”

It is not “Clean dishes/swept floors/sparkling bathrooms/made beds/painted walls/delish- nutritious-under-one-dollar-per-serving-meals/ supplementary church functions/et cetera, now without you /Our home is over.”

It’s Mother. A mother is what makes and keeps a home. Just don’t let the home make and keep you.

Now, I’m not going to tell you the ending of Alcestis. You can borrow the play from me if you want or even look up the summary on Wikipedia.

Isn’t Wikipedia great? Whenever I am clueless on a subject I can always skim Wikipedia.

Here is Clue #4, my favorite clue and possibly the hardest.

Ignore the the missing 'e' in Genealogy but don't discard the post.