Hurricane Life

 

     On August 31, 2006, I sat in the living room of an oceanfront beach house with my mom, my

two daughters, my Aunt Betty and my mom’s best friend, Margaret. We were watching the

weather channel’s rain-soaked, wind-blown forecaster explain that Hurricane Ernesto would

charge ashore somewhere around our couch and kitchen table.

     The prediction was off a bit. It was a lot worse on the second floor in the bedrooms. We

survived the storm. We just rode it out. The sun came up the next morning and we found some

rockin’ shells along the waterline among the pier and house debris.

     Nine short days later, my mom died. As my friend Chris Lewis says, “Sometimes, facts trump

feelings.” Shit happens.

     I would like to wax all philosophic here with a profound message of understanding and

growth. I have made peace with my mom’s passing, but it still totally bites in a major way.

     I was not ready to lose my mom. I need her here to give me advice on raising my daughters,

to remind me how long to fry chicken on each side, to mix a special blend of voodoo plant herbs

and dried bananas to help my struggling rose bushes. Of course, other people have stepped in

to be kind and motherly to me. I appreciate the intentions of these people. The cold, hard,

selfish fact is that they don’t love me like she did.

     My dad died four months before my mom. I loved my father. His death didn’t really shock

me because he had been old since I was born. He stopped living sometime in the early 80s. On

the brink of death, fixin’ to pass in that southern, old man way, that was just his style.

     My mom l-i-v-e-d. She traveled her last summer. Equipped with a compass and a pain pump,

that chick was on the move. She went to the beach with her family during a hurricane the last

weekend of her life.  She was transported home from that trip in an ambulance.

     She talked her last days about a cruise she had booked to travel the Panama Canal. She had a

will to live that kept her alive, not just in body, but in mind and spirit.

     Finally, the cancer raged, shutting her systems down. Her physical body was done. She said

near the end, “I have lived a good life. It hasn’t always been easy, but it has been good. I am

ready to go meet my Maker. I am at peace. I just hate not to get to see my grandbabies grow

up.” Facts trumping feelings.

     In her last hours, I found myself struggling to come up with something to say. She was in and

out of awareness. Hospice had released her to the all-you-can-eat morphine buffet. There were

several times that we talked briefly. I told her, “You have always been such a great mom to me.

I can’t believe I don’t have anything better to say right now.” “Shug,” she said. “We’ve been

saying it all along.”

     Losing her totally shook up my world. I went straight from the denial phase to anger and

paused there hovering in my bad luck. My rage was white hot and blazing. My hands hurt from

me clenching my fists all the time. I yelled. I cried. I am glad that God is big enough for me to be

mad at him, because we had words, he and I. It did not change that she was gone. Rock, paper,

scissors, facts, feelings. Facts.

     There are still times when I dial her number, times when I select a greeting card that she

might like, times when I print out extra copies of pictures to mail to her. There are times when I

ache to tell her things that her granddaughters said or did. Times when the distance from this

world to the other side seems too far and long to bear.

     After my mom’s systems began to shut down, I called her oncologist and pounded her with

questions about my mom’s status, “Was the medication wrong? Why didn’t we know that the

end was coming? Why was she in so much pain? PLEASE SOMEBODY DO SOMETHING!”

     The oncologist said to me, “Miss, your mom has known for some time that there isn’t

anything else we can do. She has had all the treatment her body can tolerate. She knew that

this was coming.”

      When I asked my mom about this, she answered, “I thought they would get me on a trial

drug. I thought something would turn up. I didn’t want to give up.”

     In the end, she didn’t give up, not really. The pain took her. It was just a few days that it was

unbearable. I am grateful for that. I know that there are some people who suffer for months,

even years, in terrible pain. At the very end, she went quickly.

     Her final breath was holding the hand of her sister. My aunt launched into a rallying pep talk

for my mom to pull through, that she was going to be okay. My brother, Andy, quietly stopped

her. “No, Aunt Margie, tell her she can go on,” he said. My aunt then calmly said, “Go on Jean.

It’s okay. We will see you again soon.” And, with that, she did. She went on. Facts suck.

     My mom ate well, exercised, and read her Bible daily. She is the only person I have ever

known, including my dentist, who flossed twice a day. She married my dad when she was 21.

She raised five kids. She taught Sunday school. She sang in the choir. She could grow anything.

She was an introvert. She was funny. She was smart. She was the 2nd daughter in a family of

nine. She buried her parents, two brothers, nephews, lots of friends. She was particular about

things. She could hold a grudge. She could love without end. She loved to read. She loved to go

out to eat. She loved to go shopping. Her favorite color was pink. It all reads so simple for

someone whose absence is so great.

     Her biography cannot even touch the reality of who she was to me. I hope Riley and Ryann

feel her with them. I hope there is a special window in heaven where my mom can look down

and watch her girls shine. My mom was a fortress for our family. No wonder her death made

me so angry. I miss her without ceasing. I miss her all the time.

     There is a difference between being alive and really living. You can blame your family, your

work, your boss, your ex, your in-laws, your childhood, your alma mater, but the choice to live

is ultimately yours while here in human form. Stop shoulda, coulda, woulda. Wake up and live;

the earth clock is ticking. Fact: we are all taking up a space that could have been my mom’s.