Waves

The very air around me takes a breath
and hushing holds it.
Soft seeds of salt slide down my cheeks.
It’s dark.
So very dark.

I know there is sound in the world.
Somewhere
people hear words, music, laughter.
Thoughts find a voice.

Not here.
Syllables stick in my throat and cut my tongue.
Telling truth is torture.
Asking, sharing,  explanation: all is exhausting.

The world shifts under my feet.
That which was stable reveals itself sand.
What was sweet seems suddenly sour.
There is no satisfaction in taste or touch.

It’s coming.
I feel its rush and rumble
the rough and rapid tumult rising and roaring.
I cannot move although my silent self sends warnings
through my traitorous body.

My eyes closed; I brace for it.
The spray is first,
running on ahead to kiss my tight-closed lips.
The cold touches my toes and slides over my ankles.

I am consumed.
Cold, freezing, pummeling, overwhelming, ravenous.
There is no me.
Gone.
I am erased and now adrift under the charging tossing weight of it.

My mind remembers help.
My memories say: warmth, sun, the calm caress of confidence.
Fingers relax, unfurl, leading the hands then arms to drift upwards.
My heart opens ready for the touch of grace.

-Judey Kalchik, April 2020

(Image from @cargocollective.com )

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the Dotted Line

Within the past two months three members of my extended family have died.
First my cousin; just a year younger than me, she died much too quickly after being diagnosed with an invasive tumor.
Then my aunt, dying unexpectedly just a week after I sat next to her during my cousin’s memorial service.
Then my uncle, a largely remote presence in my life who never woke from surgery.

That leaves two uncles from the seven siblings that made up my grandparents brood.

Both of them live far from me.
And since my family has as many twists and turns as a necklace at the bottom of my gym bag, I am not much in contact with either of them.
Oh, I do watch for the goings-on of one uncle’s family.
I see the cousins on Facebook and  am surprised and pleased by their posts.
And even as I am tickled by the family resemblance- I don’t really know them.
I don’t know their favorite color,
if it is Netflix or Disney+, or Hulu.
I don’t know if they are allergic to peanuts,
or if their favorite season is Spring.
Don’t know if they have memories of Gramma’s chocolate layer cake,
or if they collected moss from the hillside behind the family homestead and created an elf bowl for the fairies to visit.
(Maybe that was just me- it does seem a bit specific for us to all have done.)

And- if they missed the bit about the moss they probably won’t get a chance to do it now.
The family homestead,
crammed with a hoarder’s trove of memories,
will likely be sold as is and demolished.

My aunt was funny,
loved sweets,
and retained almost duel devotion to the Pittsburgh Steelers, St Mary’s Catholic Church… and God.
I am not sure, honestly, of the order of that devotion, but I am passing no judgments.
She loved them all.
She was not passionate about housekeeping, order, finances, money management, planning, or personal responsibility.
At five years my senior I grew up considering her as almost a little sister.
Maybe it was me ( a firstborn) never understanding her (as the family baby) viewpoint on life.
She always seemed to expect to be taken care of,
and I have always waited for people to break their promises and walk away,
so I’ve focused on plans to take care of myself or do without.

My Aunt stayed at home, living with my Grandfather until he died in 2009.
Even while he was alive the house was in truly alarming (although operable) condition.
Offers to help,
to clean,
to sanitize, sort, or discard: all were refused.
After he died the rebuffs grew softer, more vague, but no less determined.
Things were the way she wanted them.
No help wanted or needed.

She regularly kept up with her Pittsburgh teams: Steelers of course, but gave some love to the Penguins and Pirates, too.
Facebook posts kept coming.
Recipes were shared,
heavy on the sweets even though diabetes runs through our family and has taken several.
Birthday wishes were exchanged.
Holiday posts.
Singing memes- the usual stuff.
Until they slowed down.
And then she was in crisis.
Very very ill.
Ill enough to be hospitalized.
Taken in an ambulance.
And then we learned just how bad the house was.

It became obvious that it wouldn’t be a quick clean out.
Major work was needed both in cleaning and infrastructure.
Wiring probably.
Pipes.
Connections.
Since it was her house and home, it was her call.
And she refused.

For the past year she has been in assisted living.
The youngest inhabitant, she told me a few weeks before she died; she kept them all young.
I heard her answer a question about the house with ‘ My whole life is still in that house.’
And so it was.
And so it still is.

One of my uncles,
the older of the two that are still alive,
is taking on her affairs.
She died as far as anyone can possibly tell without a will.
The ‘estate’ is likely non-existent, and the costs of dealing with… well… everything will take at least whatever it may contain.
Envelopes of bills, notices, and announcements are all currently being considered for action.

Everything else?
All of the rest that was ‘her life’?
All of the remainders of my grandparent’s lives?
All that remains of the things my mother loved, touched?
Photos of the family?
Collections and boxes and bags and clothing?
Books and paintings and heirlooms?
Recordings from the big reel to reel
(including one of a two-year-old me singing ‘baa baa black sheep’ that was played every time I visited and that I would love to hear again)?
All are covered with mold.
Toxic.
Lost.

God bless my uncle for taking this on.
I wish we could have done it sooner,
could have restored what was restorable and saved what was savable.
I wish she could have lived there safely and comfortably.
I wish that we were the type of family that freely shared things like photos.
I wish that I was the type of relative that insisted when I was told ‘no’.
I wish I had stayed closer to home.
I wish that our family hadn’t been torn apart so many years ago, and that forgiveness was a banquet we shared with everyone.
I wish my mother hadn’t died all of those many years ago.
I wish everyone was nice to each other.
I wish I was there for all of those memories.

As I hugged my aunt goodbye after my cousin’s memorial service she whispered to me ‘You know, I’m the matriarch now.”
‘Uh Huh’ was what I murmured,
‘WHAT?!’ was what I thought.
Never in my wildest reaching imaginings would I have called her that.
But it was true: she was at the time the oldest female on that side of the family.
Now that is my role.
The oldest female granddaughter in a family now fresh out of stand-alone daughters.

So about the dotted line.
In my role as matriarch I renounced any right I had to act on behalf of the family in settling my aunt’s estate.
This includes the family homestead.
And all of the moldering contents thereof.
Including, as my uncle informed me,
a photo of my mother as a young girl, which he could see through a window.
It was, he said, covered in mold but he knew which photo it was.
The house will likely be sold as is
to a flipper or someone that will junk the contents as they wade through in a hazmat suit.
That is, if I agreed to allow him to act on behalf of my line of the family.
Me, the matriarch now.

There is no material worth to the estate,
unless Grampap had valuables hidden in there somewhere.
And if he did, I hope my aunt found it all and enjoyed it.
I am not going to move back to that state.
My children can’t take on the massive job of whatever it could mean to save anything.
The town is small, small, small… with homes falling down and abandoned.
Get whatever you can, do whatever seems best was what I told my uncle.
And ‘You seem like such a nice man, I wish I would have gotten to know you better,’ is the rest of what I told him.

So last night I had the paperwork notarized and mailed it to him.
I gave up all claim to anything that could be saved in that place.
I will never know what photo is still on a side table in that house.
Never again hear my voice as a child reciting words that my grandfather recorded.
Never see the giant fork and spoon that are probably still hanging on the wall above the kitchen table.
Never take the scraps of their lives and pack it into boxes to be stored among other memories in my basement.

I wish my aunt could have done it.
I wish that it hadn’t been my decision.
I wish I knew if that was what my mother would have done.

I wish the notary didn’t have to see me cry as I signed the paper on that dotted line.

 

 

Holly Jolly?

As a young parent I had to be the one to go to my parents in order for my children to build a relationship with their grandparents.

Now as a grandparent I must go to my children in order to see my grandsons.

I have a full time job as does my husband, and my children live over 200 miles away, both from me and each other.

(Most weeks if I can keep up with laundry and we have coffee and eggs in the house I feel like a winner.
Making those drives takes me several days to catch up and physically recover.
I spend almost every day at the edge of exhaustion: this is on me.)

My children also have full time jobs, and the grandkids are heavily involved in team sports and music.

Especially this time of year I struggle with the situation.

–What is it about me that leads to this?

– How long can I maintain the juggling of where to go when?

– This must be my fault: a divorce, the turmoil in our home when they were young, I was so angry and sad all of the time- I broke our bond so I must deserve this.

I’ve stopped asking them to come here, inviting them to visit; it’s too hard to deal with ‘we can’t’.
(Again, especially this time of year I struggle not to hear it as ‘we won’t’ or ‘we don’t want to’ or ‘you aren’t worth it’)

And when I do ask them I can hear the edge of desperation in my voice and wince. I don’t want to guilt them into coming- I know what that feels like; I was there once.
And I do understand their lives, too,; it’s hard, so very hard, to pack up young children and drive somewhere for a short time.
I get it.

Much of the year I feel emotionally healthy enough to deal with this.

During the holidays I don’t.

Pretty sure I’m not alone in this.

If you feel the same way please don’t keep it locked inside; share how you feel with a friend.

Reach out to the people around you for community and support.

Don’t wait to recreate the feelings of close family you ( like me) are reaching for; they may never happen.

Be available to new connections.

Tie a firm knot in the cords of fraying family ties, and hold on to what you do have.

💕 

It Takes A Village

Summer holidays meant a 90-minute trip to Gramma and Grandpap’s house.
There WAS an ‘over the river’ aspect to it,
since we lived in Pittsburgh,
where distance is seldom calculated by miles
and more often described as the number of bridges you would cross.
Getting to their home was a four-bridger for us.

My grandparents once lived in my Gramma’s childhood home,
which was in turn sold to my parents.
Who eventually sold it out of the family during my father’s search-for-meaning phase.
Gramma and Grandpap first lived close by, just a few miles away.
Eventually they moved closer to her sister, my Great Aunt,
and they bought a trailer in a spacious park that had lots only for senior citizens.
Grandpap, I’m sure, chose their lot;
it backed onto a field that was never planted in all the years they lived there.

Plenty of run around space for all of the ‘kiddos’,
and there was a regular parade of visiting children.
Trailer it may be, but Gramma had first her pump organ and then her piano in the living room;
the choir members would practice at their place,
and the family would sing after holiday dinners.
It wasn’t all hymns- the first time I heard Sound of Silence was when Gramma played it in her living room.

There was a two-seater porch swing behind the trailer, it sat three small children or two adults.
Grandpap had the small charcoal grill back there, too.
He had it there to keep it away from the little ones, because they seldom made it that far.
There was too much to see on the front porch.
First an awning, and eventually a fiberglass roof, covered the patio.
A collection of folding chairs and a glider were always there,
and when there was a big gathering we pulled out the dining chairs to accommodate the grown ups.
Kids usually got the front and side steps when the chairs were full.
Big brothers and sisters looked out for the smaller ones,
and a walk around the loop of the park was always a good distraction after dinner.

Moms and aunts did the dishes and filled the collection of containers,
there was always a paper shopping bag to take home with leftovers.
Usually there was someone that smoked, and smoking was always done outside.
I remember when Grandpap stopped smoking:
first his cigarettes, then his ‘stogies’ and last his pipe.
It wasn’t unusual to have at least one grown woman wash her hair after dinner and have it set in pin curls.
Usually it was Gramma, but other female relatives took advantage of the skills of the aunts to have their hair done, too.
The littler girls had the job of unsnapping the curlers from their clips and handing them, with the solemnity of an OR nurse when asked.

I remember when my daughter broke a music box, china and in the shape of a dove.
It was just a little too low for her, and I was sure I had baby-proofed things out of her reach.
Gramma came over and her first thought was that her great granddaughter wasn’t hurt.
I said that I would try to fix it, maybe I could glue it- I knew that Gramma loved it.
She kissed me and said- ‘It’s just a thing, it’s not important.’
And then she kissed Jenn, and smiled.

Goodbyes were said first in the dining room,
then just inside the front door,
then on the top step,
then on the porch.
When I was a child and we left for home,
five kids in the backseat with the bigger holding the smaller,
and two parents in the front seat of the sedan, 
we’d beep the horn as we turned the bend in the road- sure that they were waiting to hear it.
Later, when I was the mom and a trip home meant car seats/blankies/pacifiers,
pack the umbrella stroller,
did you grab the diaper bag,
and WAIT! WHAT ABOUT MONKEY? Who had MONKEY?!-
Gramma and Grandpap would wait patiently at the edge of the walkway until we were all tucked into the car.
I can still see in my minds eye Gramma waving then blowing a kiss.
We would wave back, then beep the horn as we went around the bend in the road.

We had our own village.
Each person knew their role,
knew who would wash, who would dry.
Knew who would bring the barbequed lima bean casserole (sounds horrible, but Aunt Ruth made it magic),
who would bring out and take down the chairs,
who would bring out the TV trays when the number of grandkids,
then the great grandkids, boomed.
We knew why we were there.
We knew everyone there.
Most importantly, we all knew we were loved.

(This post is part of the #31DaysOfWritingChallege2019. The photo shows my stepmother, my Gramma, and my cousin.)

 

 

 

Brain in a Box

Bob was a legend.
He had worn so many hats with the company: Operations, seasonal businesses, auditor.
He knew what happened,
why it happened.
how it happened,
why it broke,
how to fix it.

He relocated when the company moved the corporate offices.
He took his turn ‘on call’ during the holidays.
And retail holiday time is no picnic for the support teams.
He hid when it was Take Your Child to Work Day,
and managed not to lose his temper
when he learned I’d labeled his closed door ‘Harry Potter Lived Here!’

He enthusiastically took part in Frosty Fridays, when we would splurge for the frozen treats for everyone.
He went to the regional DM and Store meetings,
and would be both the first and the last person on the dance floor after dinner.

He’d come and remind me that it was time to take a break when everyone got together for lunch.
For one of his work anniversaries we made dozens of copies of his headshot from an old corporate directory and hid them EVERYWHERE.
We’d find them for weeks and weeks; open a drawer for a pen and there was Bob.
Need the whiteboard?
Open the cover and there was Bob.

Bob was honored with a Core Values award.
During the ceremony, the department head reads the reasons why the person is being recognized.
The name comes last- the suspense was always fun as we tried to guess who it is.
The Operations honoree was described in many ways,
but once we heard
‘He’s a Brain in a Box’, we knew it was Bob.

He was the go-to.
He’d help answer the questions.
He was invaluable.
He was legendary.
Within two years his job was eliminated.
The company was floundering,
Jobs were ‘consolidated’.
Overhead was cut.
It wasn’t personal.
It felt personal.
Not just its Brain left the building that day; part of our heart walked out with him.

I thought about Bob last month,
during a manager meeting at the company where I now work.
My boss referred to me several time over those couple of days.
He said I ‘knew everything’.
(Want to wake up my imposter syndrome? Say that I know everything.)

I know a bunch of things.
What I don’t know I can usually either figure out or get help from the correct person.
I don’t mind telling the truth when I don’t know something.
I like learning new things.
(We used to have Learn New Thing Day back when I worked with Bob…)
I’m glad to help when I can.
Part of my goal each day is to answer questions before the people I support ever think of them.
One of my more share-able nicknames is The Oracle, but I’m looking to pass that one along.
(Another is the Store Whisperer.. I kinda like that one.)

But, I’m no Bob.
I’m no Brain in a Box.
And even if I was,
even if I had the knowledge and heart that he had,
it only goes so far.

I crave security.
After the last rocket ship days of Borders, I crave stability.
But there is no real sure-thing.
As that great sage,
that speaker of wisdom Heidi Klum says
‘One day you’re in, and one day you’re out.’
I know this.
Let’s just say I’ve been working a long time and I’ve seen things.

So I do my best.
And then I try to get better.
Try to bring other along, too.
I learn, and question, and keep on keeping on.

And I’ll keep smiling if you say I know everything.
We both know I have a lot to learn… and I have every intention of doing just that.

(This post is part of the #31DaysofWritingChallenge2019… and dedicated to Bob Childs.)

 

 

Wash Your Face

There is a book phenomenon making the rounds.
Sells lots of copies.
Has a sequel out now.
She’s a speaker, a CEO, a ‘mogul’.
There are over 11,000 reviews of the book on Amazon.
(WOW!)

I have not read the book.

Maybe I would like it.
I don’t know.

I do know I like the title.
I have no idea,
really,
what it means to her and her readers.
Her work of improving your life,
being a success,
change the way you think,
believe in yourself;
It sounds good, but not good enough to make me read it to understand the title.
But that won’t stop me from writing about it.

To me- wash your face means taking off the artificial.
Removing the stuff that stops you/others from seeing you, warts and all.

To me- wash your face means getting prepared.
Cleansing yourself.
Focusing on the essential.

To me- wash your face, is doing just the essential.
Maybe it’s part of what my gramma called a ‘sponge bath’.
A hasty dab and go.
Out the door and getting things done.

To me- wash your face is  removing the film that clouds your own perception of the truth.

Maybe it is also about removing the log in your own eye before pointing out the speck in your neighbors.
Better to wash your face in preparation to get to work  than wash your hands in denial.

There was another Christian author that I recall from the 70s.
Sheila Walsh, maybe?
No, I don’t think so.
Joyce something?
I can’ t remember.

But I do recall that it was very controversial in the strict conservative circles that she said it was a good thing for women to wear makeup.
She said (paraphrase because: the 70s have been a minute ago)
If the barn needs painting you paint it.
(The 70s minced no words, y’all)
Artifice!
Deceit!
Man, wouldn’t the 70s have been blown away by Ulta?
By Sephora?

Buy I found comfort in that.
You do what you do.
Make yourself feel better.
Confident.
Go on and use the primer/foundation/concealer/blush.
Hit up the eye shadow/contouring/bronzer.

But when you go to sleep.
When you prepare to take on a new day.
When you want to kick back and be YOU: wash your face.

Those that love you won’t run away.

(This post is part of the #31DaysOfWritingChallenge2019 )

 

Snap Judgment

Ellen DeGeneres  went to a sports thing.
She and her wife sat next to former President Bush and his wife.
They did not yell, hit, or tweet at each other.
Someone won the game.

I remember when this would not have been news.
We have changed.

There are people that view the scene I described as horrible.
It must be evidence that neither Ellen or former Pres Bush have any deep-seated beliefs.
If they did they would have duked it out during the game.
Or maybe scowled at each other.
Stalked away in high dudgeon
(High dudgeon. I’ve wanted to use that since I first read Little Women!)
Or something.

Other people see this as a watershed moment of brotherhood… or at least tolerance.
People can sit and watch a sports thing companionably
even if they think the other person is deeply flawed.
Okay.

Ellen has used the monologue on her TV show to explain that being kind to each other means being kind to each other….
even if you don’t agree with everything the other person believes.
There was much clapping and head nods.
Sincerity and straightforwardness is shown and we come to our senses.
Blake Shelton (The Voice)
and Dean Cain (the cute TV Superman from 1993)
are among the celebrities that support her level-headed tolerance in being kind to Bush.
(Y’know, even Michelle Obama accepts candy from the man. I mean….)

But The Hulk isn’t happy.
He can’t even.

Mark Ruffalo wants Bush to be brought to justice for the crimes of the Iraq War.
Vanity Fair
(the magazine, not a Marvel superhero)
wonders if Ellen is out of touch with reality.
Actress Jameela Jamil,
formerly a clapper and nodder for Ellen,
has flipped and now stands with Ruffalo.
Jamil didn’t learn of the monstrous President in school,
and now educated,  is understanding of the Bush rage.
(I don’t know that American students are versed on the Prime Ministers, so British-born Jamil has a point.)

So, maybe it’s a slow week.
Maybe we have run out of indignation due to,
I dunno,
anything that is happening politically right now.
Turks and Kurds.
Syria.
Tariffs.
Ukraine.
The revolving staffer’s door of the White House.
Poverty.
Illiteracy.
Maybe people righteously angry at Bush
are only upset enough to hit Twitter when he is seen with Ellen?
Maybe.
Maybe Ruffalo et.al. have been waiting for THE perfect time to emote.
Man, I don’t know.

War is bad.
Kindness is good.

I’m holding on to that, OK?

(This post is part of the #31DaysOfWritingChallenge2019.)

 

 

Housework

Working from home is a weekend thing around here.
Although Ken has taken seriously my desire,
voiced last year,
to ‘have more fun’,
there is no question about it: this house won’t clean itself.
I know this for a fact, as I have given it ample opportunity to do so.

There’s nothing for it- we must help it along.
And that must, it seems, happen on the weekends.

It amuses and confounds the cats-that-we-don’t own.
(There are, at times, two or three cats, a mother and her children, living at our house.
They are loosely described as ‘outdoor cats’.
loosely, that is, because they have a cat door to allow them entry to the breezeway.
A winterproofed cat hotel complete with insulation and cushions.
A heated water bowl.
And an elevated eating platform complete with seasonal favorite meals and treats.
But we don’t own them.
I suspect that they own us.)

Sunday was spent on laundry,
changing bed linens,
cleaning the kitchen,
working in the storage shed/workshop,
and the beginnings of the Seasonal Clothing Swap.
Ken did the start of his swap, mine will be this weekend.
I am already exhausted thinking about it.

Right now my dressing/craft/study/dressing room is in that awkward teen stage.
You know; everything dragged about out from where it was comfortably parked.
All of the outgoing stuff is waiting to be packed away and the incoming stuff is cooling its heels:
will this be the year it makes it past the ironing basket, onto a hanger, and then worn in rotation?
Or will it be deemed too labor-intensive
and wait disconsolately over the back of The Chair until it is re-packed in late Spring?
(Interesting: why do the bright colors always need to be ironed?
Is this why I take after Johnny Cash in the winter?)

I have the crockpot and Instant Pot ready to assume their places in the kitchen,
released from their basement banishment.
Freezer bags are ready for the start of hunting season and the anticipated venison heading our way.

I sat in the patio chair, putting my feet up on the table Sunday afternoon.
No longer panicked at the thought of a mosquito due to the cold weather creeping in.
Lifting my face to the sun I wondered why I don’t do this more often.
Why is it that knowing I need to pack this up, too, makes me want to use it?
Why does knowing that it will soon be gone spur me to enjoy it more?

I’ll gather up the seashells and stone we scavenged for on the beach this year,
and place the candles in the living room.
I’ll check the remote for the electric fireplace, perfect to take the chill off a Fall morning while Ken drinks his coffee.
Time to launder the ‘cozy blankets’ we last used when camping and now will drape over our recliners.
Time to plan and feather our nest; our small and cozy home.

(This post is part of the #31DayWritingChallenge2019)

Just Checking In

On Tuesday September 24 I started an email to my cousin.

She was very ill, recently diagnosed with an aggressive cancer that could not be cured.
I’d seen her three weeks earlier and we spent what I am sure was a physically uncomfortable several hours together.
We covered 50 years of family.
Spoke about her memorial service plans.
Talked about our mothers, sisters that are no longer alive, and about being the oldest daughter in the family.
Remembered her being in my wedding, marveling at a photo of the two of us… such babies.
Remembered her helping me make a bouquet for my daughter’s wedding when the mail order flowers arrive frost-bitten.

The email that Tuesday was a breezy  one, with the first line in place as I took a sip of coffee at work, making a quick email to her before the day started.
‘Just checking In’ was the first line.
I remember taking another sip, then the phone rang…. and we were off.
At the end of the day, before I could close down the laptop,
I noticed I had some open files.
Compulsively saving and closing them to attack the next day, I noticed one of them was an email.
‘Just checking in’.
Sighing, I closed it, and promised myself to open my drafts and send if off the next day.

But I didn’t.

I noticed the email again on Thursday, but Thursday was crazy busy.
And was that what I was going to say?
Just checking In, everything is crazy busy.
No, that’s weird.
It isn’t weighty enough.
She’s facing something I try very hard not to think about: what happens when the world goes on without me?
Who’s going to go through all the photos I took and recognize why I have their faces in a shoe box?
What relationships need celebrating and which need mending?
Just checking in… that’s not good enough.

Friday was a marathon- lots to do to get ready for The Very Big Meeting  the next week.
I glanced at my drafts and closed down the laptop, heading home finally to pack, cook, clean.
The usual.
Too trivial for a note.

On Monday September 30, trying to get everything in order so I could head out to The Very Big Meeting,  I got a family-group text.
She had died that morning.
And the email I had started a week earlier was still unsent in my drafts folder.
I had not checked in.
And now I never will.

The older I get the more people I know will die.
I am part of a Facebook page that remembers our high school alumni.
Everytime a see that a post has been made I steel myself to see a familiar face, their yearbook picture, forever that age for me now.

But my cousin.
During our conversation last month we both mused on this: there is something wrong in our family.
A flaw.
Something broken.

And I know that this is true.

I long to have a big holiday dinner, overrun with kiddos and aunties,
cookies and pies,
Gramma Foley’s spaghetti sauce and meatballs,
Gramma Smialek’s  chocolate layer cake (always), placed in front of the brother I haven’t seen in years but somehow always about six year’s old in my mind’s eye.
Let’s have Grampap Kennedy calling the kids scamps as he watches the Pirates play ball on the small television in the living room.
Have my dad tickle Gramma Kennedy and hear her say ‘Peter!’ just one more time as she drops the kitchen towel in the sink and laughs.

But that’s not going to happen.
All of those people are gone, now.
And now Debbie is, too.
And the longing I have to be with family is mixed with the fear and hurt of caring too much, of loss and rejection, of the never-being-good-enough.
It is easier to stay away.
easier to push away the memories of what was for the sake of what might not ever happen.

After I could breathe, my hand holding the phone where I had just read the text with the news shaking, fingers numb.
After I could focus my thoughts and swallow the knowledge that the last visit was the very last visit ever.
After my heart stopped galloping and all the pictures in my head stopped shifting,
and the pounding in my ears eased:
I opened my drafts and pressed send.

And wherever emails go;
wherever the dead letter inbox of those that will never read the sent message,
that’s where I sent that message.
That’s when I checked in.

I’m looking at a photo from, best guess, 1963.

It’s taken from inside my grandparent’s house, facing the street.
Two smiling women are looking at the camera.
My aunt is holding Debbie.
My mother stands behind me and my brother.
We are all smiling.
We were all smiling.

Now they are all lost to me.
And as I write this post I am making a note of the people I want to reach out to.
The people I need check in with.
I don’t want to make the mistake of thinking I have the time to waste.
Don’t want to believe that a short note is worse than no note.
That an email is worse than a brief phone call.
Don’t want to miss the connection; I want to catch hold and cling while I can.

(This post is part of the #30DayWritingChallenge2019 .)

 

Come to See Me When I Die

Please.
Come to see me when I die.

Before the flames and heat make it impossible,
come and see me.

While you have the chance to see my face and touch my hand.

Not for my sake, but for yours,
tell my now unhearing ears all the words inside you.
Rage or weep.
Whichever helps.
Tell me your dreams and hopes.
Tell me of the regrets and memories you will share when asked about the visit.

Just ask me no questions
for the time that I could help you will have passed.

Sit awhile with me.
I’ll be quiet company,
and  in your mind place us somewhere bright together.
Feel my  gaze on your face as you tell me of your life.
Can you hear my laugh, still?
Or has it faded into the past?

Don’t let the miles be too far.
Don’t let your schedule make the choice for this visit.
Don’t be too busy for this last journey.
Just come to see me when I die.

Let the visit be the help I’ve always wanted you to have.
The time we spend,
together at last,
heal all hurts.
Perhaps now you are free to hear the words I’ve always longed to say.
Don’t stop yourself;
say whatever you need to say,
or feel free to sit in the silence we created together.

Just,
please.

Don’t let me go still waiting.
It will be the last chance.
Please come to see me when I die.

-judey kalchik (2018)