Quis mortem timet?
Hello again, and welcome back. This is gonna be a short one; for the past few, I was going through one of the most agonizing periods of my life. I would write something, then something would happen that rendered previous words and thoughts and emotions moot, then I’d get together energy and wherewithal to write again on the new stuff, and MORE shit would happen. It never felt right to publish what I had written, only for monumental things to happen three minutes later, so I waited. And waited.
Now that I think I’m done with the huge life events (I hope), here we go. I leave on vacation tomorrow, and it that is a respite from not only the personal but the political, but we shall see. Before I leave, though, I want to sit this in your inbox and start some process of writing with intention against this fascist shit we got going on here now. I want to talk about coping, and moving forward, and goodness, but I couldn’t with the events of the past couple of months lying unaddressed. Even if I can’t post a ton on Facebook and Twitter anymore, this small space lets me work things out, air them out like so much stuffy bedsheets.
Thank you for reading, as always; you are amazing people. I mean that. And you look nice in that shirt; you should wear it more often.
Trials and tribulations.
So, first the heavy stuff. After a couple of months of bad thing after bad thing happening, my mother in law died the second week of January. Watching her decline, from injuries sustained after a fall to being found on the floor of her apartment to being intubated to fading away, it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever experienced as a human being. To see someone I cared about, a veritable iron-willed bundle of energy, go from independent widower to a shell of a human in a hospital bed, barely breathing in two months really smacked me in the face about our mortality and just how tenuous our grip is on this life thing.
To say nothing of the emotional pain I watched my wife go through, as she had lost her dad less than a year ago. The religious people say that God won’t give you more than you can handle, but it’s probably because we all end up dying anyway, so that idea of “handling it” is a bit lacking by definition.
And I cried and wished that I could absorb the hurt and confusion and sadness, and that wasn’t happening. I remember when my stepdad died, and how I felt then; so loathe to be sad that anger came to me with ease. A worng word made me combative, and luckily no relationships were irrevocably harmed then. I watched my wife studiously (she might say annoyingly), trying to help where I can, and she was a different person. She had thrown herself into planning, into the details and minute, but I understood why; can’t think thoughts that make you cry if your brain cycles are busy thinking of the next thing to do, who to call, what to say in the obituary.
But I realized that everything that needed to get done got done. We found resources to give away my mother-in-law’s furniture, sell her car, close her accounts…and all that’s left will be memories and hurt and sadness. I was unprepared for that with Dad, but I learned that grief does not give a shit where you are, or what you’re doing, to pop back up in your mind and for you to go from stoic adult to crying child who would do absolutely anything to have them back, to smile at you one more time, to tell you some forgotten secret. Memories are all you have to go on to power your little engine of this relationship you had, and there will be no more experiences to add to your bank. There won’t be another dinner, or Christmas, or phone call, and it just doesn’t seem like enough.
My mother is still rocking, but she can’t hear very well. Phone service is shit in the boonies where she lives, and sometimes, she can’t hear me on the phone. As a bit of a confession, I have a twitch; I hate repeating myself. I’ve had this since a kid, and it goes back to when I would talk as a kid, I thought not that I couldn’t be heard, but that the people I was talking to didn’t care to listen to what I was saying. So, I’d get angry. I wouldn’t repeat what I had said. I’d repeat it, louder and more forcefully to the point where I was yelling. Needless to say, this had painful ramifications as a kid, but I felt I was in the right because it wasn’t that you didn’t hear me, but you just weren’t listening.
But after my mother-in-law died, I was having a conversation with my mother and I said something, and she she didn’t hear me. I then screamed it into the phone, annoyed and angry.
She stayed silent for maybe ten seconds.
I apologized once, twice, then hung up and called her back to apologize again. Because I don’t want our last conversation to end with me being mad at her. We end every call with a “I love you” and I could not begin to imagine my mental state if I was mad at my mother and something happens to her.
I remember the last conversation I had with my mother in law, and my last words to her was to remind her that she was loved and respected. Sometimes, those memories are what you have to hold on to. It ain’t what you want, but it’ll have to do.
People ask how I’m feeling, and I’m not okay, but, despite what I wanted, the world kept turning when she stopped breathing. As much as I’d have loved it not to, time keeps moving, and I’m trying to formulate the best use of my time while I can.
While my mother-in-law was declining, our life was put on pause. Household work couldn’t be scheduled, our usual winter vacation unplanned, sleep was light, dreading the 2am “guess what happened to your loved one?” phone call. The world stopped spinning for us, as my wife took point on taking care of everything and I tried to be there for her however I could. We went from visiting my MiL once every three weeks to 4-5 times a week.
I’ve written on my personal site about the unfortunate truth of this life event; after her death, it was almost that things cleared up. Of course, I would rather have had her here, but a lot of things got let go; the worry, the preemptive grief, the dreading that the next phone call was bad news, that the next visit would find us just in time to hear her final words. It was torture, and absolutely to worst thing to go through as someone who wants to help, but simply can’t.
Hug on someone, give someone their flowers, receive compliments. Make art, give of yourself, set boundaries. Hide under a blanket, rest, get back to standing on business.
I’ll talk to y’all later. Thank you for reading the word vomit; I promise I will be back on my literary bullshit upon my return.
Words from an Elder
My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.
-Maya Angelou