My Mother (L)

December 1, 2008

My mother passed away last night at 6:43 p.m. The time clings in my mind like I'm storing it for a birth announcement, except for death, which no one does. But it is surprising how parallel the events are. Like the pain of labor with my children, I never could catch up to the rolling ball of her death. It should have been no surprise, as a baby being born from you after hours of labor should not be, we had pulled the plugs from her life support after all. The sepsis in her blood had staked it's claim and was not leaving. But I never really believed it would actually happen, I didn't. And as I stroked her hair as she labored for breath, I remembered Chris stroking my hair when I was laboring our children and how it calmed me. I wanted to calm her, but in my head I was shouting "come back, come back" and was running to try and catch that that moment could be real. A priest came, and like in a movie after he gave her the sacraments, her body began giving undeniable evidence that she was leaving and the moment hit, crashed and wailed.

Later I asked the nurse what time we we shut off the ventilator, and I found some inexplicable pride in my mother that she had only struggled for a very short time. Like the pride of a short push during labor. It did help to believe that we had made the right decision, that she did not suffer for long.

But what the moment gave us, we had to leave behind, unlike birth. And I find myself, not just an hour after getting home from the hospital, not wanting to wash my hair that brushed her shoulders, or brush my teeth that breathed the air around her. I want to cling to her traces.

I always believed I would be instantly shattered when I lost my mother, but it's more like I'm slowly melting and grief is dripping from my pores.

My Aunt Edith (L)

My Great Aunt Edith died last week, whe was 100. I never thought I'd use the term "beloved" with sincerity, but she was much beloved by me and my family. Here are some of the words I spoke at her funeral.

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Aunt Edith is finally with Uncle Charlie, it took her body being 100 to finally agree with what her heart wanted for 20 years. We can only be happy that she is where she wants to be. Aunt Edith was the last of her siblings, the last of many of our grandmother and mother's generation. For us, left behind, it is truly the end of an era. A time when tea was a social event, when “muffin day” was a designated day of the week, when unannounced guests were greeted as the welcome highlight to a day, hugged ferociously and dutifully waved goodbye to as they drove away. When if you didn't have anything nice to say, you truly said nothing at all. Aunt Edith kept her house clean in many ways.

What I remember most about Aunt Edith was her sense of fun and adventure, her strength, and independence; her greeting me each time at the door with a “Whyyyyy” as if she couldn’t believe I had come, whether I was visiting from New Jersey, or just down the road and had seen her the day before. I loved the twinkle in her eyes, and the tight squeeze of her hugs.

As a child, she was my great aunt who was always willing to play a game of tether ball or frisbee with any of us, who always had muffins and cookies waiting in case you stopped by, who'd spread on an amazing 4th of july bbq and then stay up in the dark summer night to serve us watermelon on the way home from the fireworks. She was always willing to join us for Walker Park or Islesboro or even the grocery store with a quick” I'll just get my purse”. I learned my childhood love of Aunt Edith from my mother. It was a woman's world at Aunt Edith full of tradition, estrogen, and tea. But as an adult, I discovered a new love and friendship in Aunt Edith. Over the years, she has been to me an aunt, a grandmother, a mother, a best friend, a companion, a co-pilot in many adventures, a grandmother to my children, and a soul friend to me. She was always there when I needed her with welcome arms, a hug for my children, time to spend with me, and hot cup of tea.

I worried when Gwenyvere was born and Aunt Edith was 90, that I was doing something selfish to foster such a close relationship with someone that I knew she would be young when she lost. But I am so grateful for the years my children had to love Aunt Edith. I look at my girls and I see Aunt Edith in them in their poise and manners and love for company and tradition. I see her in sensitivity and stubbornness of my six year old son, who told me this morning (the morning of her funeral), “I’m coming! I want to see her one more time even if she’s not alive anymore”.

Money, money, money (Alessandra)

Just got off the phone with a woman from my high school class to remind me about the significant reunion happening this summer.  All laughs and cheers and fun fun fun and then a solicitation for money.  God I hate that.  My high school is famous for its multimillion-dollar endowment.  I told her with a smile, that I wasn't giving anything. Nothing.  And then I felt like a fraud because I expressed interest in going, yadda yadda yadda.  Not realizing these reunion nostalgia trips are basically fundraising events. I've never gone to a reunion because I basically communiate with everyone I had ever wanted to, everything else is just morbid curiosity, like rubbernecking a traffic accident.   

 I'm not totally cheap: I do give money to charity, but if it's a choice between helping the third world get some medical attention and seeing that political prisoners aren't left to rot in jails or whether the golf team gets new Titleists, the choice seems pretty clear, you know?  I guess I'll never be in that preppy corduroy old boys club that gets your kids into Yale or your husband some Master of the Universe job.  Whatevs.  I just have a really bad taste in my mouth right now.  

Don't Swim Naked

Mommy Drinks (Alessandra)

I'm so fried so all you're going to get is run-on sentences. Run-away sentences. Yes Maine seems like a dream now, but maybe too lucid since bringing a newborn (party foul!) I didn't get absolutely polluted. Shopping spree at the guns ammo wedding dress store. I so wanted to put my Maine Terrorists Hunting Permit bumpersticker next to an Obama 08 bumpersticker but G. won't let me put anything on the car. Beautiful weather cool air piney smells campfire hissing and clicking like a living thing. A big fat moon looming over the lake like a window onto another world. Next year all media devices will be confiscated except for the requisite midnight call to S. Or maybe he could be beamed in via hologram for a guest appearance. Racing wild turkeys (the bird kind not the liquor kind) at 12 mph down a backroad trying to keep baby asleep waiting for Herself to open the door. Swimming in the lake all but the rudimentary brain stem shut down just soaking up the sun like plant life and feeling your heart thump in your chest against the almost-shocking cold of the water. Delicious burritos that were I am ashamed to say pretty healthy. Whose freeking idea was that? At least it was counterbalanced by a lipsmacking pesto eating session in the car in the parking lot of the store. Well hey it's a rental. I love that. I also learned a lot about moisturizer. Seriously, not being facetious. Reality check for the sad sack. Well there i jumped into the blog lake. Little cold, little slimy but not so bad.

Knew a girl named Nikki, I guess you could say she was a (Linda)

There is so much I want to escape from in my real life in the here and now--reading Marty's post was like stepping into a pool of surprisingly warm, burnt orange, sunlit memories that linger in purple twilight. There, the air is steeped thick with alcohol, laughter and song. Alcohol--the Captain's Tattoo, 3 Olives Raspberry Vodka and enough red wine to drown in. Laughter--Cooter Turtle (or was it Turtle Cooter?), Turret's Syndrome Convention (could we have possibly sworn more?), and the many ways I could spank my bottom during "Guesstures" while the two of you shouted out every word in the dictionary but "spank".

Song--here, I must depart from my format because this memory demands. Pulling in the dock from the walkway, like a boat, floating out as far as the rope would go--so separate from the land we were one with the lake. Sitting in the deep dark end of twilight as the fog rose off the water, a sheer mist around us, reeds emerged through it like fragile, slender statues. Our songs graduated with the night, as it turned darker and the full moon rose on us like a spotlight, casting aside the fog while the air grew colder and inched its way into our bones. My favorites were Prince's "Nikki" (Kudos to Marty, the lyrics queen who kept us going all night) and Hotel California. I would have never known I knew every last living word to that song. We all sang it like it was the anthem to our childhood.

I was delighted by Marty's beauty (so radiant in the moonlight!) and her honesty (though I could never wrap my tongue around the cherry chapstick/cherry cheesecake line). I was intimidated and worshipful of Alessandra's intelligence, the politics of the day peeling back the heavy shroud of her motherness, as she spoke her sharp, educated, smarter-than-I'll-ever-be mind, and the dimly lit cottage air cried, "she's baaa-aaack". Her little mini-me slept through the night and seduced us all with her dark perfection. I was pleased that we resisted gunning down the political signs (first time we'd seen Palin on a lawn) as we made our mad pesto dash to Waldoboro for our bread, wine, that addictive pesto, and small town walk. Not to mention the small bar beer. Remember the picture of a cottage on a grass lane with the moon above it? Good, I want it for Christmas, you can go halvsies.

Enough, enough, next year it will be posts about getting into bar brawls with toothless men because you hustled them at pool and used me as horny old biker man bait. I can't wait to wear a trashy denim mini-skirt again, it's been years! So, until then, keep writing--that means you, Bocco. Anything, every scrap, every bit, every run on edit free sentence your little fingers can type.