I try to keep the personal lives of my friends and family out of my blog, but sometimes my life gets tangled up in theirs too.
My best friend lost her mother when she was 14 years old. I barely knew her at the time; we were in the same grade, but we never hung out. I watched the events unfold from a distance, I didn’t even visit her at the funeral home. I knew her mother had some rare cancer, the kind that made her stomach blow up like a balloon.
Years later, she started telling me the details of that time with perfect accuracy. We were laying in bed one night, and she described how her little 70 lb mother became so weak, my best friend would blink her eyelids for her. She told me with this with perfect calmness and clarity, like she was describing what she had for supper. I cried like a baby. These stories continued, for months and years later, background information to her life being filled in.
After that, my best friend dealt with an abusive stepmother and boyfriend. She still cries for her mother. Then finally, her father found a new woman who became a part of their family and completed the picture, perfectly. The new woman had grandchildren who spent all their time with my best friend’s family. Then this new woman became engaged to my best friend’s father.
Shortly after, she was diagnosed with lung cancer.
My best friend drove back to Newfoundland a few weeks ago to be with her father’s fiance on her deathbed. Just after I returned from my brother’s graduation, I woke up the next morning to a text message from her that read, “She’s gone.”
She told me if you think it gets any easier the second time around, you’re wrong.
When I took the bus back to St. John’s on my last trip home, I sat with an elderly lady in her 70s or 80s. In front of us was a younger woman, sprawled out in the seat with her legs poking into the aisle. At first I thought she was rude for taking up the whole seat, until I realized she was wearing a medic alert bracelet and the elderly lady kept talking to her in a soothing voice.
When we drew nearer to St. John’s, the lady turned to me and said, “I’m taking her to a senior care home, she has Huntington’s Disease.”
“That’s terrible,” I replied. “Is she your sister?”
“No,” she said. “She’s 52. She’s my daughter. My husband was killed by the same disease.”
I watched the lady guide her daughter off the bus, and then i called them a cab. I don’t think she ever imagined she’d play the mothering role again.
(Photo by kevin dooley.)
Beautifully shared. No matter how old you get or how near or far your children are you are always mothering, it’s just how it works.
Dying…those sorts of diseases…it’s a fear that follows me. I think it follows us all, because it seems to require superhuman strength.
Beautifully observed.
I’m speechless.
I cannot even begin to imagine how hard that must be, for your friend, that lady on the bus…. Three years ago I spent two weeks in a hospice with my then boyfriend watching his dad die, and it is still one of the hardest things I have ever done.
You did an amazing job capturing this heartfelt story.
I think the title of this summarises the article you’ve written beautifully. Losing someone is never easy.
I realise I’m pretty much excessively depressed these days and prone to uncalled for emotional breakdowns….
…but this entry totally made me cry. Seriously. I’m sitting here crying. I hate you just a little bit.
i won’t relay my own issues with death and family, but you did a very lovely job with this post. that is all.
My thoughts are with your friend. Tragic. Sometime life sucks.
I lost my mother. Five years later I still cry for her occasionally. Five hundred years later I probably still would. My mother lost a child. I would rather lose a hundred mothers than a single child. That pain is unbearable even to imagine.
Oh wowsa that is deep. I’m sorry that your friend has been through so much. I doubt that even if you lost a 1000 mothers it would ever get easier. I feel so lucky that i haven’t ever directly had to deal with death, but sure the time will come and I fear how I will handle it…
thank you for all your sweet comments, folks! i appreciate it. certainly didn’t mean to make anyone cry.
it’s weird having little experiences like the ones i described. just puts everything more into focus. appreciate life, i guess.
Like you said, life experiences like that help put things in focus for the rest of us. Well said.
Candice,
I find myself gravitating to your blog whenever I need a good dose of reality, or semi-reality. Anyway that’s just my way of sayin you’re awesome that way; it’s hard to keep writing engaging and thoughtful, mixed in with the fun.
Great job with this post; it really is hard to tread quieter, intimate moments like those. A number of us can certainly relate. If it’s not been said, thank you as always for sharing!