But the problem with resilience is that it's not always there. Sometimes there's a tiny crack that can be infiltrated, like bacteria slipping into a cell, and the whole organism is damaged. And that's what happened for a few hours yesterday.
"I'm giving myself the afternoon off," I called to my mother as I packed a backpack with a towel, sunscreen, headphones, and my biology textbook.
"Good, enjoy it!"
Ed had been a mess all morning. One of the side effects from both TBIs and end-stage Parkinson's is inappropriate sexual conduct. Every so often, he'll have an hour of tongue-wagging and awkward pick-up lines, and we laugh it off. I always head to laughter and clever one-liners, because the sadness of the reality is just too much for anyone.
But yesterday, he was relentless in his desire to bang out somebody, anybody. And it was very difficult to see someone who used to be so modest be so crude with his language and gestures. And the tiny cracks in my well-preserved facade began to open, so I GTFO and went to the beach.
(For the non-texters: GTFO means "Got The Fuck Out".)
In the early recovery days, when we thought he might come back, even a little.
I thought that when I came back, my adventure-related endorphins would carry me through anything. And apparently, Ed was well-behaved for the few hours I was gone. But somewhere between his afternoon and early evening meds, something kicked into him and there he was, inappropriate as ever.
And there I was, bottling everything.
And later, there our aide was, this sweet older lady, who didn't even have a chance to take off her shoes before I was in front of her, warning her, using the last fraction of composure I had to tell her that these horrible things were not indicative of who he was or how he ever behaved, that this man was a decent human being who was not..who was just not there anymore. And how I was reacting to my own abusive childhood, one he wasn't a part of, and had no way to stop.
And then, like a radically conservative preacher getting invited to a gay wedding, I lost it. I went to my mother's room, and just exploded emotion everywhere.
While feeling and observing at the same time, I knew what I was saying, how I was reacting to my mother's attempt to soothe me was hurting her as well as myself. I knew this outburst didn't help her recovery. But it was there, and she was, not a patient or cancer survivor, but a mother, trying to bandage my hurt.
Sometimes, the only solution is wine and laying outside in the grass. And more wine.
The challenging childhood I had has made me a ridiculously strong person. And I realized last night that to be ridiculously strong, you have to be able to make yourself ridiculously human.
"I don't want kind robots in my life," she said.
"Not unless they can do other things, like cuddle and make omelets."
"...Give me your wine."
Half a liver makes her a cheap date!
It's not (just) the things he said. It's the continuous decline. As my mother's health ascends, his seems to be plummeting. And as tragic as Alison's accident was, at least it was over in an instant. I went from having a sister to not having a sister on impact. I am slowly watching my father die, and it's one of the most inhumane things I've ever experienced.
How do you grieve for someone that's still breathing and conscious?
UGHHHHH THE FEELS MAKE THEM STOP
OK, to make sure we're not all going to be miserable, let's play a game: in the comments, write your best memory of your people. They don't have to be your parents. I'll start.
Ed used to play Santa Claus (I mean, just look at him in that wedding picture). He would be the talk of the town the entire month of December. One year, he went to a salon and had his beard bleached. It was whiter than you could believe, but he almost choked on the fumes. Still, any time we went anywhere, kids would stare at him, slack-jawed that Santa was shopping at Publix. And he'd wink, tap his nose, and sometimes - if it was later in the month and he had worn the same pants to work - he'd pull a mini candy cane from his pocket, and literally make this kid's life. It was fun being Santa's kid.
In my house, we have been "opening" our Christmas stockings after all the gift exchanging is done. Historically, my mom would pack our stockings with a new toothbrush, hand cream, chapstick, a few packets of hot cocoa and maybe some hair clips. You know, toiletries. So we saved them till last because toiletries aren't the "fun" gifts.
ReplyDeleteAbout 5 years ago, when I was pulling stuff out of my stocking, I felt a strange shape. It was like this 4 inch oblong lightweight hard plastic shape that didn't feel like a toiletry. And I pulled out a piece of fake bread. Like, bread roll. With sesame seeds on it. Made of plastic. I was like ???????? "What is this?"
And my dad pipes up and goes "It's a fake bread!"
And I'm like "uhhuh... and.."
And my dad says, beaming, "Well, I was at the dollar store grabbing the stocking stuffers and I saw the fake bread and thought, Amy would love that haha. Isn't it awesome?"
And I stared at it and realized that yes, he was right. I fucking loved that fake bread. Looking at that piece of plastic made me realize that my parents/family really do truly get me. They get my humor, they know me like nobody else.
I still have my fake bread and tell people that it's my favorite gift of all time. A dollar store piece of plastic... The funny thing is, I told my parents it was my favorite gift this past Christmas and my dad didn't remember getting it. It was such a passing spur of the moment little thing for him that it wasn't imprinted into his brain as a memory. I'm not sad that he doesn't remember though, because it really is just a small thing. I have a projected a lot of emotion onto the damn thing though. That fake bread means family, it means love, and it represents the ridiculous things that you do for the people you love.
<3
DeleteWhen I was in 3rd grade I really, really wanted a Unicorn birthday. A RAINBOW UNICORN birthday. My mother, who had a full-time job, a husband who worked also worked full-time AND was attending graduate school part-time (and was therefore not super available to help many times, despite a wonderful heart) AND a two-year old, somehow found the time to decorate at least 2 dozen cupcakes with rainbow unicorn hearts. They were beautiful. I was thrilled to the depths of my now-eight-year-old heart. My mother and I had a complicated relationship in the years of her life before she passed in a car accident in 1997, but when I think of her, I always remember her opening the box in my classroom to hand out these beautiful cupcakes that she made just for me, and I am eight years old again, and I love my mommy more than anything else in the whole world, and am the luckiest girl ever. =)
ReplyDeleteI don't dwell on memories much. But I'll tell you this one about my father. We're coming up on a year since he died, written on the day of his funeral:
ReplyDeleteWhen my father was a boy, "Superman" starring George Reeves was all the rage on that newfangled invention called television. The show looks simple now, but back then it made little boys and girls believe they could fly.
My father believed. He tied a towel around his neck, climbed to the roof of the garage, and dove off. Gravity is a harsh mistress, and her lesson resulted in a broken arm.
Lying in a hospital bed with a new cast, his mother told him she was ready to whup him senseless the day that cast came off. So of course he delayed as long as possible. The cast came off, and he got that beating. I'm sure it hurt, a lot.
It was one of many beatings she gave to her youngest child, the one she called stupid. The one people said was just like his father, who was stabbed to death on the streets of Philadelphia in 1945, my father but 2 years old -- a case still unsolved. The boy who stayed defiant.
My father took all those lumps, and more, from her. Today we'd call all that a crime. Rightfully so. Somehow, he would laugh while telling my brother and me about his childhood. But he wasn't joking.
He'd also tell us about Howdy Doody and Looney Tunes, Gene Autry and Roy Rogers, Rocketman and Our Gang, Amos 'n' Andy and Chief Halftown.
And Superman.
Every other year, I would find a Superman card for Father's Day. We'd always joke about it. Dad always said he was an alien, too, and that one day his people would come for him. He said that because people were knuckleheads, so he didn't want to be one of them.
When he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a cancer racking the insides of his bones, Dad kept saying someone slipped Kryptonite into his body.
This past Father's Day, I found another Superman card. I wrote inside, "To my unbreakable father."
Today my family and I will lay our Superman to rest. It matters not whether I am ready. It only matters that I will be there.
My hero is gone. My hero lives.
For what happens when a hero dies?
He becomes a legend.