July 15, 2006

One year to the day. And where was I...??? Lying in bed with M. It was just after dawn. In my half-sleep I heard Michael come down the stairs, felt him sit on the edge of the bed. That's when I opened my eyes and turned to him. "Is she gone?" I asked. "Yup," he said. I don't remember anything after that. Maybe he does and can fill in the blanks. It's amazing what we forget and how quickly. And what we remember and for how long. Katie always says that I have the most incredible memory, but I can't remember what the rest of what my brother and I talked about was just hours after our mother had died. What's wrong with me? Maybe I'm blocking it, but how stupid is that? Dad wrote about filing his and Mom's last joint tax return and how gross it was to do that. I can imagine. Next, he wrote about how hurtful it was to see Mom's garden blooming without her to attend to it, and that reminded me of a dream I had recently. I woke up - in my dream - knowing that I had to learn how to garden. I started teaching myself about organic gardening because I figured why repeat something someone else did so well? Why not, instead, take what you learned from that person and build on it? What I learned from Mom about gardening was love, detail, patience and science; which flowers/plants work in beds together? Which will nourish each other? Which will make the best mulch, once dead, for new plants for the next season? Anyway, so I began researching vegetables, herbs, food. I wanted what I grew to do something more than just be pretty. Maybe it's my multi-tasking nature, but it made perfect sense in the dream and when I woke up - for real this time - I knew it could all happen. I will learn to grow food. That has a nice ring to it. And as I dig in the earth, till it, weed around my little lettuce and tomato and squash plants, I'll think of her and how she would marvel at what I'm doing. "Organic food..." she'd say, shaking her head in exaggerated awe for emphasis because she wants nothing better than to make me feel special and strong and like I'm doing something great, "organic food. Only you, A'lex. Only you would think of such a thing..."

No, not only me, of course, but in our small circle - the overly-intellectualized one I grew up in and the one my father and his friends still inhabit - no one grows their own food. Can't be bothered. "Why, when there are others to do it for you?" Folks like those don't care to try to understand the beauty of the feeling of making something so simple. They need "a bigger challenge." Maybe what they need is notoriety. Whatever. Either way I always knew that Mom was never like that. She played that. For survival. But it's not what she was. She loved simple things. Simplicity. Like the dreaming up, planning out, and creating of a garden of flowers. What could be simpler than working so hard to create something that does nothing but stay still and look beautiful? That's the way Mom was. She had her complex moments, as do I, but I will remember her for the simple in her. Even at the end, in the hospital, when I wasn't there and don't remember what Michael afterward old me happened, she was simple. What I do remember is that he told me that she died in her sleep. A sleep of sorts. A deliberately-induced drug sleep that allowed her breathing to slow slowly, and eventually stop.

There's this pamphlet you can get from the hospice representative when your loved one is dying. It tells you how to deal with it, how to cope, and, at the beginning of the pamphlet, what signs to look out for that tell you, yes, this person is indeed dying. I read the signs and recognized them. THAT I remember. Two days before she died I remember reading about signs I'd already seen. Signs that came to me too late to actually have time to think of something to say other than the ONE and only thing I did say, which was... "Who's going to be my best friend?" I think it's one of the most sincere things I've ever said. That and the night I screamed at the interns to stop hurting her. I was sitting on the left side of the bed. Her left. It was just the two of us. We were quiet and sort of twiddling our thumbs as if teenagers on a first date. We kept eye-ing each other as if to say, nervously: "how ya doin'?," except Mom's nervousness was nervousness about dying. Anyway, I was sitting there, my hands wringing themselves, when all of a sudden I felt a tear. Then two. Then felt my nose running. I wiped it - a giveaway - and looked up. She looked at me. I was caught. I thought she was thinking: "why are you crying nina? (pronounced in the Spanish 'neen-ya,' for 'Little One')," but she wasn't. More on that in a second... I looked up at her and thought that that was what she was thinking and so I said: "Who's going to be my best friend?" She looked at me, a little annoyed at why I would be thinking such a selfish thing WHEN SHE WAS THERE DYING, and said: "It'll be alright." It came out as a scold, as if she'd said: "You should know better," and instantly I felt ashamed. Maybe that's why I gave Michael that last night. I didn't and still don't know if he knew it was her last night, but I knew it, and knew I had the strength to "give" it to him, to step aside for the last moment I could ever have with my beloved, perfect, incredible, unmatchable mother.

"It'll be alright."

It isn't. Not yet, but I imagine it will be, if for no other reason than it will change. I will change and will perhaps learn to feel less ashamed, although, ashamed or not, I will always miss her and no one will ever be such a best friend.

So, today, one year after, exactly - what do I choose to remember? Her exploding smile. The kind of smile that let's you know you ARE, and will never be alone or unloved or unremembered.

I love you, Mommy. And I miss you.

Your best friend,
a`lex

PS. The "signs" that you read about at the beginning of the hospice pamphlet tell you of certain behaviors that a dying person will exhibit that will let you know, beyond a doubt, that they were dying. They will worry their clothes, tug at them like a nervous tick, but won't be aware of it. Mom did that and I didn't know what it meant. They will hallucinate. Mom did that a lot and I thought it was the effects of the drugs, until I knew it wasn't and by then it was too late. I found all these things out after they would have made a difference to me. But by the time I read them I already knew she was dying. We'd alreday had the Family Meeting. So, word to the wise, if your loved one is dying, as for the hospice pamphlet as early as you can...