Page one of a writing assignment in 1988.
This was how my 17-year old brain thought when given a writing assignment in English class. The assignment was to describe a room using as many adjectives as possible, but without making it sound like shit. I chose my bedroom, though the bits about the drum set were in my mind. It was turned in on March 4, 1988. I thought I was edgy and cool then because no one seemed to understand what I was writing. I got an A. That’s all that mattered at the time.
Irene, left, and Lori celebrate Christmas c. 1973 or 1974.
On Saturday, while I was making myself a chicken chimichanga, my nephew texted to let me know my sister had passed away.
I thought I’d change things up for this month. There is a lot of talk about how YouTube is full of garbage and not worth watching. While this can be true, there are still a lot of really cool, educational videos I watch in a way to educate myself on a variety of topics. Here is a selection of some of my favorites, all of which are less than 30 minutes in length. If the videos don’t show, their titles are also a link to where you can find it on YouTube.
The blanket Mom made me and Paul.
Today would have been Mom’s 78th birthday. Even though she is gone, there are many things that remind me of her and make me smile.
I created the video above, including the music, which was shown at my mother’s funeral. I spoke the following words to all the people who came to say goodbye to Mom on April 15. Today is the one-year anniversary of Mom’s head-on collision. I’d like to remember this day with the positives Mom contributed to the world. I hope you can forgive any typos that remain.
Asparagus for sale at Walmart.
Note: This is an extended version of the 771-word column I wrote for the Star-Herald on February 17, 2016. My columns at the newspaper were limited to 800 words. I didn’t have the chance to write exactly what I wanted at the time and each time I tell the story, people want more details. This is the full version I wanted to write then and finally had the time to sit down and complete.
It has been a harrowing nine months since my mother was in a head-on collision. Our lives were forever changed on July 15, 2024. Today, her suffering is over.
Mom and Gram, sometime in the early 1980s.
She was asleep when I walked in. The nurse said they were purposely keeping her unconscious. Still, as I looked at the broken body that was my mother, I could see her wincing in pain. No one knew if she would ever wake up again.
My home is 1,725 miles from hers. I sent an email to family of my arrival, only realizing then, I had no contact information for my nephew. We hadn’t spoken since shortly after my grandmother’s funeral 13 years ago.
My mother raised David after my sister abandoned him at 16 months old. He was my little brother and nothing else mattered right now. The head-on collision had erased the chasm between us. We texted briefly after my cousin gave me his number. He offered to pick me up at Newark Airport.
I climbed into his monstrous pickup and wondered how much silence would dominate the 90-minute drive to my hometown. He was worried I hated him. I wondered if he was still racist and bigoted. We found our answers before we even exited Newark Airport. In between catching up, there were lots of “you stupid bastard, learn how to drive” and “come on, what the fuck are you doing?” because, of course, we are the only ones who truly know the proper way to drive.
We spoke until just before sunrise. He cried. “You used to take me everywhere and we’d do all sorts of fun shit and I didn’t appreciate it and I’m sorry.” I refrained from correcting his run-on sentence. Eventually, the words, “David. Stop. Stop apologizing. We’re good,” tumbled from my brain and out of my mouth.
We were no longer those struggling people of a decade ago. I was diagnosed with PTSD, a result of severe childhood trauma. He was, understandably, an angry young man. His parents abandoned him and refused to admit his existence. We shared our common experience of being abandoned by our fathers and how that shaped a part of who we are. Mom did her best to teach us to be honest and good.
The first time I saw her after the accident, silence controlled the room. Her eyes fluttered. She tried to focus. Was she awake? No, well, maybe. There was no way to tell if she comprehended anything we said. Aunt Elaine and Uncle Dick, her brother and sister, had been there every day since the accident. They sat in silence. They spoke to her. They worried.
Bruises – red, blue, black, and purple – littered themselves across her body. The broken bones are too numerous to list. A special surgeon repaired all the tiny bones in her right wrist. We all worried whether she would be able to crochet again. I thought of the blue and pink and white blanket she made me, which has been on my bed the better part of three decades.
As I stood there looking at my mother, who at once appeared peaceful and wincing in pain, David leaned in to me and softly said, “Just so you know, I’m ready to go when you are.”
His tone was understood. Neither of us were handling the situation well. This is our mother. She spent her career helping others and, now, lies still in a hospital bed, relying on a machine to mechanically inflate her lungs so she can breathe. I choke back tears, but, later, alone, the salty liquid flows like the stream we always drank from in the Shawangunk Mountains.
I leaned in to David and spoke quietly. “I’ve been ready to go for a while, but I’m waiting for everyone else to leave so I can talk to Mom alone.”
David nodded and unfurled his arms. With a booming voice he said, “All right, y’all need to get the fuck out so Irene can talk to Grandma alone.”
Everyone nodded. There were, “oh, okays” and “of courses,” uttered. They left me alone with the beeps and boops from the machines now surrounding her.
My life is 25 hours away from hers. It is impossible to stay, so I made my goodbyes. I am short and couldn’t reach to kiss her on the forehead in the single place without bruises. I gently caressed her left cheek and thought of the times David and I had been bruised and beaten down by the world. She never gave up and always had her hand outstretched to lift us back up. I leaned in as far as I could and, holding back all the tears that wanted to fall out, whispered in her left ear, “it’s okay, Mom. You worry about getting better. I’ll take care of everything else. David is helping. It’s our turn to take care of you.”
Sewing room at Gram’s house.
A drawing of T-Rex by Wyatt and me. I drew the head and teeth. Wyatt didn’t like my horns and said they needed to be “more pointy.”
A notification popped up on my phone. It was from my friend, Jina. I rarely read emails on my phone, save for things that are emergencies, and this was no different. When I returned home a few hours later, I read my email, nodded my head and spoke to my monitor. Yeah, that’s right. Now you know why it takes me so long to reply to emails. I tend to talk right back at you and forget to actually type out the damned response.
I don’t think this is anything related to my trauma. It’s just how my brain works. It’s also why I have written about a dozen awesome posts in my head over the past month, but never actually typed them. Sometimes, I type them in dreams and forget to do it in the real world. Today, I’m going to start typing them out and share them here.
Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén