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When my father died two years ago
I knew what to do. I grieved, and I got back to work. I didn’t fall apart. I
had my mom to think about. My brothers and I focused on her. There was a sense
of relief at his passing because Alzheimer’s is a pitiless bully – death by a
thousand cuts. The night he died it felt like a weight was lifted off of us. Now
he was free from the betrayal of his brain and body.
But this was different.
My mom was diagnosed and eleven
days later was gone. And now the home we all grew up in is empty. No one lives
there anymore. It’s just a place we’re from.
The death of a loved one comes in
waves – the initial, irreversible news, then the disbelief. You forget and
remember and forget over and over again. It takes time for your brain to catch
up with the truth. A holiday comes and you reach for the phone to call them. A
scrap of paper brushes your hand in a drawer releasing a flood of memories. The
smell of celery or the sound of a spoon stirring a cup of tea and bam, your
throat catches and you excuse yourself to cry in another room. The wound stays
fresh for a long, long time. You tell everyone you’re alright, but you aren’t.
In times like these you go back
and sift through memories. You wish you had more. You can’t believe how much is
gone. And the little that’s left takes on the burnished glow of treasure.
We lived a few blocks from my
elementary school and sometimes I’d walk home for lunch. A cheese sandwich,
maybe curried fried rice (my favorite), with Sheriff John on TV if she was in a
good mood.
Always sewing. The crinkle of
thin paper dress patterns from Vogue, Simplicity, and McCalls pined to large
swaths of fabric on the dining room table. Her bending over and carefully
cutting the cloth with special scissors I was never allowed to use. The sound
of a sewing machine from the other room while I played with my toys on the
floor. The clients who came by for a fitting.
The whine of my dad’s Honda 50
coming down the street right after I got home from school. Him coming through
the door, the whole energy of the house shifting. They were always happier
together than apart. My mom and dad having tea, talking in low tones about the
mysterious things married people talk about.
The smell of dinner. Mom showing
me how to cut up a cauliflower, core a cabbage, or mince onions. Stirring a pot
of tomato soup. How to make roux and béchamel for the turnips. The darkening
sky outside. The ritual of food and fire and the family table.
My two brothers were eight and
ten years older so it was usually just me and my mom. She’d take me everywhere
– grocery shopping, the department store, and in the early years before we got
our own washer and dryer, the laundromat. She’d let me put the dimes in the
slots. She showed me the right way to fold a shirt. She understood these
things, and they seemed important, so I paid attention.
My mother was fearless in a way
that I was not. I was passive, withdrawn, and contemplative. She had to muster
assertiveness for two.
She made me take piano lessons. I
was not consulted. It was mildly amusing at first, and then it got difficult.
My weeks were filled with dread knowing that the next piano lesson was coming and
I had not yet perfected this week’s scales. Sometimes the pressure motivated me
to work harder. Other times it drained me of resolve and I resigned myself to
my piano teacher’s withering glance and disappointed sigh. Outwardly I
conformed as best I could, but inwardly I had some serious questions about the
adult world. Why were they always taking on difficult tasks and setting
themselves up for failure? Why didn’t they just sit back and enjoy life as it
was? Why were they always trying to change and grow and learn and create?
Then it happened. My fingers
obeyed. I heard music where once there was only embarrassment and inadequacy.
And I realized I was doing it – those were my fingers making the music, my
hands, my arms, my mind, my heart, and I was overwhelmed by all the
possibilities that unfolded from this realization. I suddenly understood that I
was unlimited, that I was capable of anything, and that discipline, will, and
conviction nurture and cultivate the seeds within us. We do not become who we
really are until we struggle up through the soil of our indifference, our
sloth, our fear of failure. On the other side of the pain is an unspeakable
beauty, a beauty unobtainable by those who love only comfort, only easy, only
staying the same.
My mom got me a surfboard and
wetsuit and drove me to the beach. She knew her introspective, day dreaming son
needed an adventure. My friends and I loved the beach, but surfing was a
quantum leap away from the Styrofoam belly boards and inflatable rafts we rode as
boys on those long summer afternoons. Surfing is what men did. Out in deep
water. And with her encouragement I began. Surfing became the center of my life
throughout my teens and twenties. I learned a lot on the water. But mostly,
again, I learned that fear is an obstacle to joy. Once I made the ocean my
friend and learned to navigate, even celebrate her powers, my fear lifted and
all that remained was beauty. The ocean taught me that it was safe to fall in
love. Even with all of the tumbles and breathless disorientation, you always
come up for air. And under the wide California sky you know that you are home
wherever you are, and that everything always changes, and people die, but the
big show never ends. Again and again we are affirmed in our love. The ocean
never leaves us. And the final revelation – we are loved only as much as we
surrender to it. Love is not controlled or calculated. There are no pro and con
lists. There is only acceptance and surrender.
My mom brought me into the world.
But that was only half of it. More importantly, she taught me how to live in
it. I miss her, even though she’s right here in every cell of my body, in my
discipline, my courage, and my creativity. Her living room is empty now, but
she lives in the fullness of all the lives she shaped.
2 comments:
Peter, thank you.
" I flew through clouds of silver,
I hung on a warm moonbeam
I sailed through purple skies
and I visited every dream
I sparkled in the starlight,
I faded with the dawn
I cried out to every prophet,
I even touched the sun
And I searched the whole world over,
looked into every heart
Searching for a mother who would
let me be a part of her
I skirted over mountains,
I drifted over seas
I went from town to town,
ah were you looking for me
And then I heard you calling
I heard your lullaby
I saw your shining face
and that twinkle in your eye
And I knew my search was over,
I looked into your heart
I knew I found a mother
who would let me be a part of her
Oh mother it's you
Until the end of time,
I'm so glad your mine"
P.B February 11, 2006
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