Emily Mayfield, part 13: Stuart McGregor

Emily and Stuart know that they will spend the rest of their lives together. When not in class or labs, they are together -- at his apartment, at her house, at the library, at the student union cafeteria.

Everyone who knows Stuart and Emily knows that they will be married after graduation. Suzanna and Robert find the whole affair perfectly understandable and fine, though Suzanna, practically, realizes that Emily and Stuart will have some challenges that other couples won’t face. She also knows that they can handle it.

Stuart was raised by an aunt who is and always has been a fervent Roman Catholic. And so, of course, is Stuart. He and Emily don’t have religious discussions because Emily isn’t interested enough to make a discussion of it. They don’t see each other for breakfast on Sundays because Stuart is at mass and Emily is studying.

The beginning of their senior year, Stuart changes his major from history to philosophy. When Emily questions him about it, he says that history wasn’t giving him what he needed. This answer spawns dis-ease in Emily as she realizes that Stuart has some need that she can’t fill, either. Through the year, Stuart becomes more self-absorbed as he is engrossed in inner dialogue. There are long silences between Emily and Stuart, until that night when he says, “Emily, we have to talk.”

Stuart tells Emily that he feels called by God to become a priest. He assures her that he will always love her, but his love for Emily has to come second. He has applied for acceptance to a Catholic seminary. When Emily leaves for vet school, Stuart will leave for seminary. He will enter the priesthood.

Emily is grief-stricken and furious. She blames herself, she blames Stuart’s aunt, and goes back to blaming herself again. Finally, she blames Stuart, big time, mostly for not being honest with her. Though Stuart tries to explain that he could tell her what he didn’t know himself, she does not understand. Why didn’t he share with her the realizations and wonderings along the way? He cannot make her understand that his process was more of an agonized discomfort until the moment of epiphany.

Emily breaks all contact with Stuart. Graduation is a bittersweet event. Emily leaves home the week after graduation, to take a job as a groomer’s assistant in Atlanta in preparation for her entrance in vet school at the University of Georgia.

(continued)