“Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road. Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go. So make the best of this test, and don’t ask why. It’s not a question, but a lesson learned in time. It’s something unpredictable, but in the end is right. I hope you had the time of your life”. I would like to revisit something if you don’t mind. Something tragic, dark and unforgiving. And looking back now, something that if it were possible for me to go back in time and correct, I absolutely would with no hesitation. Not necessarily to change what would eventually happen to me and my own life, but to correct an unforgiveable error on my part. I hope anyone who reads these blogs of mine doesn’t come to a conclusion after reading them that there is a villain in this story of me, because truthfully there’s not. Well, let me take that back for a second, maybe there is? And if there is, then it’s me. Yes, you read that right, I’m the villain. Let me explain – and this may be the longest page that I will ever write, so bear with me here.
I’ve already alluded to that morning of July 6th, 2018 when the phone rang and everyone’s lives changed in an instant. But first let me go to another phone ringing 45 years earlier, on a Friday afternoon on April 20, 1973. I was staying at my grandparents’ house and that phone call was from my own mother. It was time she said, the doctors had said the end is imminent. My 7 year old sister who had been battling leukemia for the past few years was getting closer to drawing her last breath. And we all needed to get there to say our personal goodbyes. As a typical immature little boy who had trouble expressing his own emotions at that time (and hell, maybe still do?), I didn’t really get it, didn’t understand it, I was almost like in a fog. I just remember it was only a few days till my 10th birthday, and that’s what was really on my mind. I was of no help to my parents those next several days, or weeks, or who knows maybe ever? I didn’t want to talk about death, dying or anything close to that. And even many years later when my mom would bring up my sister’s death, I always felt uncomfortable and would try to quickly change the subject. For that, I am truly ashamed.
And I still feel that way now when that other phone rang 45 years later, not from a rotary phone hanging on the kitchen wall, but from a cell phone. When the woman that I was deeply in love with, just found out that she had lost her very own child as well. Not a child at the age of 7, but at 29 years of age. But still a child, still someone who hadn’t really begun living his own life yet. And someone who was leaving behind two very young children of his own. And truthfully, does it really matter to a parent at what age a child leaves this earth? A parent should never lose a child, that’s not how it’s supposed to work. That’s not in the instruction manual. Goddamn the rule is we go before them. But like my own mother, I also let this woman down (starting to become a common theme of my life I now see). And by “down”, I mean tremendously, unforgivably, causing hurt and pain, DOWN!!
I was supposed to be her ‘rock’ right?, the one she should be able to always count on during difficult times, to lean on when she needed support. And comfort her when times got dark. And of course you can’t get any darker than the death of your own child. But looking back, I wasn’t there for her when she really needed me more than at any other time in her life. I took her own personal strength for granted, and I took the love from all her family members for granted. I figured I’m there for whatever she needed, she was surrounded by so many people over that next week, and I didn’t want to get in the way. Throughout the week, there were so many people there at her parent’s house constantly with support, food and love. Relatives, friends, neighbors, church members, ex-husbands, and yes I even remember seeing “Ray” there sitting in her parents’ living room. Many of these people I did not know and had never met. That feeling of uncomfortable, immature awkwardness once again set in, just as it did in 1973. From that Friday morning thru Monday night I was there, sheepishly, awkwardly, trying to be at some worth of comfort to her. But by Tuesday morning, I needed to get out, go into work for a few hours just to escape. What the hell did I need to escape from?, she’s the one that’s suffering, struggling to even breathe her next breath through it all. And I went thru that same routine over the next couple of days as well. Go into the office in the morning, make sure I’m caught up with everything, then go back home. Hang around her parents’ house with everyone else for a while, not say much, sort of hide in the background, then go to the house, feed and water the dogs along with her chickens (what?, I didn’t tell you, yea we lived out in the country), and clean and vacuum the pool. Anything, any chores that I could come up with to escape, but what the hell did I need to escape from? She needed me to be there with her, and I wasn’t. Case closed, I was a fucking clueless moron, and it would later cost me dearly.
So instead, I left the job of comfort and support to others, mainly to her daughter-in-law, who was there for her around the clock that week. I should have been there at her side no questions asked, I should have been her crutch, but no, I was missing in action, I had escaped. I wasn’t there for her on those many breakdowns and dark places that I’m sure she went thru without a doubt. And to think, she kept all this inside her over the next two years before finally having enough and letting it all out.
Maybe now, nine months later after letting it all out to me, she has finally rediscovered her very own happiness once again? I truly hope so, no one else I can think of deserves to be happy more than her. So I say this to everyone reading this, please don’t make the same mistakes that I have made (and there are many). When time grabs you by the wrist and directs you where to go, please make the best of that test, and don’t ask why. Because it really is not a question, but a lesson learned in time. Yes something unpredictable, but in the end is right. So you ask is there a villain in my life story? Yes there is, and it will always be – me.