5 Days in April - Day 3

April 11, 1998

I remember the day my daddy died.

At least parts of it. He had been in the hospital for some time, and I was staying with various friends of the family while mom stayed with him. On the day he died, November 14, 1968, I was staying with the Jeters. Their son, Jeff, was in the fourth grade. I was in the third. I liked staying with the Jeters OK, but not as much as I liked staying with the Eutslers. The Eutslers lived on a big farm out by brock's mill. They had a big old house with lots of places to explore and two fishing ponds. Bill or Annie would take me fishing about as often as I wanted to go. And I wanted to go a lot. It was fun out there. Not as good as being at home, but good enough. I learned at an early age that enough was the most important word in the English language. Things didn't have to be perfect. Just good enough. You didn't need a lot. Just enough. I eventually rejected the good enough philosophy and became a perfectionist of sorts. It wore me out at times but at least I made good grades and was able to find gainful employment. The more I thought about it as I got older, the more I thought the enough philosophy was the correct one. I was easier and things were going to end up screwed up anyway. So why bother. It was a constant internal debate that caused me a good deal of conflict.

One morning Mrs. Jeter came into the room where I was getting ready for school and told me I wouldn't be going to school that day. Another example of bad news masquerading as good news. At the time, I had a cat named Courtney and she was with kittens. All I could figure out was that Courtney had had her kittens and I needed to stay home to help care for them. I think I even asked her as we drove towards my house if that was the case. I'm sure that made her day. When we got to our house there were several cars parked in front. I didn't know what to make of that, but it seemed unlikely that a bunch of my parents' friends would take time off from work to come see a bunch of kittens, even if they were Courtney's. I walked through the door and someone, I have no idea who, escorted me to up to my room. In a few seconds my mom came through the door, closing it behind her. "You better sit down" were her first words. "No, I want to stand," I replied. Even at eight years of age, I knew some situations called for quick action and you could move faster on your feet than on your ass. I wasn't sure what was going on, but I was starting to sense that it wasn't good. Surely Courtney didn't get run over, I thought. "Daddy is no longer with us," mom said finally. I don't remember if I cried, screamed or just stood there. But I knew that my dad was dead. Gone in a puff of smoke. The next few days are a blur of images and partial memories. Lots of friends and family in and out of the house. My mom's family, who always treated us well and whom I loved deeply. My dad's family who didn't and whom I didn't either. But the one constant was mom. From that day forward, she had been the one constant thing in my life. Working hard to be both mother and father to me. Seeing Ruby and me through college and graduate school. Like a rock she was always there. Years later, I learned that she wasn't really a rock. That she was horribly depressed for years after daddy's death. But I didn't know it then. She protected me from all of that. She was my mother and that she took care of me. She took good care of me. She was a great mother.

Mom got out of bed at 7:30 a.m. She wobbled into the bathroom, brushed her teeth and put on her eye patch. She shuffled out of her bedroom and I carried her walker down the stairs. Her mornings were getting worse and worse. Her depression deepening like shadows at the end of a hard day. She was in pain and, try as she did, she couldn't hide it. I gave her an anxiety pill, we called it her happy pill, 60 mg of Morphine and two supplemental pain pills. The big white ones that she said worked the fastest. She wanted oatmeal for breakfast, which I hurriedly fixed after reading the directions on the side of the box. As I cooked, she sat at the kitchen table, her head down, groaning ever so slightly ever now and then. She only smoked one cigarette, but the windows were closed and the smoke hung about the room like a cloud. Another gray morning.

When her breakfast was ready, she ate a few bites of it. Then she slowly got up and made her way to the couch. "I've got to take a little nap," she mumbled as I helped her lie on the couch and covered her with a blanket. she was asleep in no time. Thankfully, her breathing was smoother, less difficult. I hoped she would feel better when she awoke. Mornings are scary times for dying people. You never know if it your last one.

I walked into the living room and stretched out on the couch. I am a light sleeper and knew I'd hear mom if she got up. It was 8:30. I figured I could nap for 45 minutes to an hour. At 11:00 I awoke to a quiet house. I listened for a few minutes and heard mom snoring softly. She was still asleep. I knew this would reinforce her desire not to sleep during the day, but I figured if she was sleeping this long, she must need to. A few minutes later she awoke and began struggling to get up. I helped her up, and she shuffled off to the bathroom. A few minutes later she was back in the kitchen, smoking and feeling a little bit better. "What time is it?" she asked. "Take a guess," I said. "10:30," she answered without looking at the clock. "That's close. 11:30." "Wow, " she said, "I slept a long time." She had begun smoking in earnest now, lighting up her third since her nap and fourth of the day. "Mom, you were really coughing last night in your sleep. You sounded very congested." "Yeah, I'm a little congested today…I don't know why." "I think," I replied, "that is has something to do with all those cigarettes you're smoking. I'm not fussing at you, but you scared me last night, and I know it will scare Ruby when she gets back. I just want you to cut down." "OK," she said, with watery sadness in her voice. Dying may be sad to her. But the thought of cutting down on cigarettes was absolutely heartbreaking. "Just see what you can do," I ended the conversation just this side of a meltdown- her because she was afraid we would hide her cigs again, and me because I couldn't believe she was chain smoking in this condition. "Can I have a happy pill?" she asked, obviously very willing to change the subject. "Sure," I said as I took one from the bottle and handed it to her, "be happy, mom. That's all I want."

A little while later, I made her some eggs and toast for lunch. She ate little of either. It was obvious that she was having a blue day, even though she tried as hard as she could to be pleasant. "What's the matter, mammy?" I asked. "I don't…I don't know," she answered. "Overall, do you feel better or worse than you did two or three weeks ago?" "Probably worse," she replied, her one good eye looking up at me intently. "Is it worse because of physical pain or emotional pain?" I asked. "Probably emotional," she said, "I'm sick of this." "Of being sick, you mean?" "Yes. Sick of it. Tired of it." "I know mammy," I said, rubbing her stiff back with my palm. "I know it's hard for you. I know it's hell. If I had one wish in the world it would be that this hadn't happened to you." She didn't answer. The doorbell rang and it was her friend Ruth Tillman, a lovely flower in hand. I took the flower and showed it to mom. She said it was beautiful and thanked Ruth for it. I went to put it on the back porch with the rest of the plants while mom and Ruth visited in the kitchen. Ruth lived just down the street and she always had a picnic on Easter Sunday for her family and some of her close friends. Mom had been there every Easter for as long as either could remember. I heard Ruth telling mom to come down if she felt up to it. Mom thanked her, but told her that mornings were the worst time for her. "They are hell, mom said, "pure hell. But after a couple of hours I start feeling better." Ruth hugged mom, then me, and asked if there was anything she could do for us. "No, you've done so much already," I said, "and we really appreciate it." Ruth left, inviting me to come down to the picnic and promising to bring some food over if we didn't make it.

When I got back to the kitchen, mom was making a list. "What's that?" I asked. "A grocery list. I want to make Ruth some jalapeno cornbread for her picnic. She is so sweet to me." "OK, mom. We can do that." I went upstairs and took a quick shower while mom smoked and worked on her list. When I came back, showered and dressed, she was ready to go so we hit the road. First we stopped by Teal's Seafood and ordered up some fried shrimp and oysters for supper. Teal's is in an old beat up looking place down by the river. But it has good food and half the town eats there regularly. It doesn't have tables to speak of; you order your plate to go and take it home or down the road to the park where you can eat on picnic tables and watch the river flow by. I ordered two shrimp and oyster plates and told Mr. Teal I'd be back to get them in 45 minutes. We left Teal's, took a right on Second Street and drove through the middle of town to the hardware store. Mom had wanted a can of white spray paint to paint a little wicker Easter tree white. I went in and picked it up. The store has changed a lot since my youth. When I was growing up, it was a family hardware run by the Duvalls. There was an old man that worked there who was certain that any kid that came in was planning on stealing them blind. So he would follow us around, watching us like a hawk. It pissed us off so bad, we made up a game to taunt him. We'd walk down an aisle as a group and then on cue we would scatter like dropped marbles, everyone going down a different aisle. It made him so nervous we were afraid he might keel over right there. So we only did it when he was especially annoying. Or when he followed two feet behind us instead of three. We never stole a thing from them. But we could have. It was now a sterile, warehouse-type building supply, owned by a big chain. As I walked down the aisles looking for spray paint, I missed that old guy so much I remembered his name. Way. George Way.

After I collected the paint, we drove towards the Winn-Dixie. Mom was still pretty down in the dumps, but she was trying not to show it. "How about just the pain?", I asked, hoping the current radiation treatments were helping some, "is it the same, better or worse?" "I can't say it's any worse," she answered, "maybe just more frequent." I ran into the store while mom waited, dozing, in the car. I picked up some buttermilk, some baking soda and baking powder, since I wasn't sure which one she wanted and they were side by side, and some grated cheese. When I got back to the car, mom was awake. We drove back to Teal's to pick up our supper. Mom was once again quiet. I knew that meant she was feeling poorly. She has a huge threshold for pain and will almost never admit she's hurting, but I'd learned some of the signs. On an impulse, I swung back by the house and ran in and got a morphine pill and a cup of water. At the last minute I grabbed a appetite pill and went back out to the car. Mom took both without complaint, pausing only to ask what they were. We went back to Teal's and picked up our supper. As I was waiting to pay, Mr. Teal, a big friendly man with a black pompadour, was telling another customer that he had had five bypass operations and still had blockage in his arteries. "The doctor told me not to come anywhere near this place, but I can't do that. I have to work." When I got up to the counter he looked at me and said "you still in the grocery business?" "No sir," I said, sure he had me confused with someone else. "I thought you worked for Floyd McBride." "Yessir, I did, a long time ago when I was in high school. But I live in Texas now. I'm back visiting my mother." I thought you used to work for Floyd," he said. "And you're right. That was a while ago." As I was waiting for my change, I noticed a bunch of photographs arranged under a plastic sheet on the counter. A high school aged boy in a CHS football jersey. A lovely girl in a prom dress. I hoped for their sake that Mr. Teal listened to the doctor and slowed down a little. But I doubted he would.

I put the food in the back seat and we drove home. When we got there I helped mom inside, and went back out for the paint, groceries and food. Mom sat on the back porch reading the mail while I painted her Easter Tree on the back steps. When I came back inside, she was asleep at the kitchen table, her head down, snoring softly. A few minutes later, her friend Etah Fields came by. I woke mom up and they visited for a while. Plato went in to greet Etah. I heard her say "you like me, you really like me." I couldn't tell if she was making a witty Marilyn Monroe reference or not. If so, it was wonderfully subtle. As I sat in the den listening to them talk, I could almost imagine that mom was OK. That she was sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee and visiting with her friend the way she had done a thousand times before. I could almost pretend that she would be a part of my daughter's life. Maybe even see her graduate from college. It was a wonderful feeling for just an instant. But I couldn't hold it. Reality came nudging back into focus and I knew that none of that were true. I was over half way through my five-day visit. It was a great sadness to me.

After Etah left, mom went out on the back porch to rock and smoke. I fixed two plates of shrimp, oysters, fries, hush puppies and cole slaw. A small plate for mom, about the size of a child's plate at a family restaurant, and a regular one for me. I went out on the porch and found mom sleeping in the rocking chair. It was hard for her to stay awake for long periods of time. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't help falling asleep. I watched my sweet, sick, brave mother for a little while and thought about all the wonderful things we had done together. I thought about the time she took up golf, just so she could play with me the way daddy would have if he'd lived. I thought about the times we played tennis, her game that she always won easily. I thought about the trips she had made to Texas, as recently as last Thanksgiving. I thought about all the games we loved to play. trivial pursuit, rummikub, spite and malice and countless others. I decided that I would never play any of those games again after she was gone. It would be too sad. I thought about how much fun we had had over the years watching basketball together. Wake Forest games, Houston Rockets games. Even when we were apart, we'd call each other at half time and at the end of a game. I remembered the shot Randolph Childress hit to beat UNC in the 1996 ACC Tournament. I remembered how happy we both were. I wondered if I would be able to ever watch another Wake Forest basketball game. I was overcome with sadness. So I silently shed a tear for all the times we wouldn't have. I hoped there were TVs in heaven. And tennis courts. I hoped daddy would take care of her when she got there the way he was unable to on earth. Mostly I hoped there was a heaven so mom would be surrounded by her loved ones. Her mother and father, her brothers. My father, the only man she ever gave her heart to. Countless friends and relations who had preceded her on this final journey. I would have died right that second just to know if my sweet mother was really going to a better place. And not just to Chatham Hill to lie beneath the cold, hard ground.

I woke her up and we ambled into the kitchen. She ate a couple of shrimp, commenting correctly that they were a little tough, and several oysters. After we finished I put the dishes away and mom said it was time to make the cornbread. She got out her recipe and her magnifying glass and went to work. She made two batches, one for Ruth Tillman and one for Joyce and Ernie Jansen, other good friends and neighbors. She would work a while and rest awhile and before too long the cornbread was in the oven. While mom went upstairs to the bathroom I cleaned up the kitchen, washing the big pots and pans by hand and putting the others in the dishwasher. Mom came back downstairs and we decided to play spite and malice. I won the first game handily, mom not missing too many plays but having bad cards. After the game was over mom said "I can't play anymore." "Why not?", I asked, "what's wrong?" She looked up at me with that one, sad eye. "I know my neck is going to start hurting and I dread going to bed because then I wake up and the mornings are so horrible." That was a tough one. If you dreaded waking up, you had only had two choices. Deal with it or just not wake up. I wasn't ready for that. "Maybe we'll give you some pain pills in the middle of the night and a happy pill as soon as you wake up," I suggested, "maybe that will help you get a better start." "OK," said mom, "let's play one more game" I dealt the cards and we began a new game. Mom started out behind but rallied at the end and beat me by a good margin. "What time is it?", she asked, after we put the cards away. "It's just after 11:00. You can have another morphine pill at midnight." "I think I'll try to stay up 'till then," she said, walking onto the back porch and sitting at the glass table. "OK," I said, "I'll bring you the pill in a little while." Five minutes later she was dozing in her chair. I read the paper for a bit, watched a little TV and stared at the clock. I never thought much about the passage of time before, but suddenly I was amazed at how fast time was flying by. Almost like time was speeding up at the worst possible time. It was midnight in about ten minutes. I took mom her pill, which she took easily, and helped her upstairs. While she got ready for bed, I played with Plato who had taken his usual spot in the bed and was waiting for her. As I was helping mom into bed, she looked up and said "I've enjoyed spending the last few days with you. It's been fun." I've enjoyed it too, mom," I said, "I love spending time with you and I love you very much." "I love you, too," she said as she settled into the bed. As I turned out the light, Plato was curling up beside her, ready to watch over his master and friend while she slept. After mom was asleep, I checked my email, watched part of a western on AMC, and went to my cot and fell sound asleep.




© 1998 Kent Newsome