Chapter 1 Fallen Woman
If you had not fallen
Then I would not have found you
Angel flying too close to the ground
- Willie Nelson, "Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground"
Age 30, Mom age 50
I braced myself before I answered. Since the merciful new technology of the caller ID had shown me the unknown Houston number, I wasn’t completely ambushed. “Hello?’ I flinched in that suspended second before the speaker’s response sprayed shrapnel through the silence.
He had found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth remained. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I thought I might fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could picture her there, lying on her side in the gravel.
It was summer. She probably wore shorts, and wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head? Was she there for an hour? A day?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, and then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now. Of course I was still distraught, and even though I had lived it, been with her, been her daughter, one question in particular consumed me. How had my own mother come to this?
Monday, December 30, 2013
Tuesday, November 26, 2013
No Woman is an Island: the effects of alcoholism on mom and daughter: Two Days After Amazing Grace part 1
No Woman is an Island: the effects of alcoholism on mom and daughter: Two Days After Amazing Grace part 1: Chapter 1 Two Days After Amazing Grace Age 30, Mom age 50 In that suspended second before the response, I flinched, attempting not to fe...
Two Days After Amazing Grace part 1
Chapter 1 Two Days After Amazing Grace
Age 30, Mom age 50
In that suspended second before the response, I flinched. The merciful new technology of the caller ID showed me the unknown number from the Houston area, so I braced myself. “Hello?” His voice sent shrapnel into the silence.
He found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth didn’t go away. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I wanted to fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could see her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, probably she wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Was she there for an hour? A day? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head?
How is this what had come to my own mother?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now.
Age 30, Mom age 50
In that suspended second before the response, I flinched. The merciful new technology of the caller ID showed me the unknown number from the Houston area, so I braced myself. “Hello?” His voice sent shrapnel into the silence.
He found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth didn’t go away. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I wanted to fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could see her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, probably she wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Was she there for an hour? A day? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head?
How is this what had come to my own mother?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now.
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Gospel Music, Mom, and Me
Gospel Music
Mom had a beautiful soprano voice. She sang “I’ll Fly Away” and other gospel hymns often.
When Whitney Houston got popular as a pop icon in the eighties, Mom identified and referred to her as “Cissy Houston’s girl” because Cissy Houston had been a gospel singer whose music my mom knew well.
We watched Dionne Warwick on her show every Sunday evening as long as she had it. One of her regular guests was Gladys Knight, sometimes with the Pips, and Mom taught me the song “Midnight Train to Georgia,” which she sang with true passion.
We watched Barbara Mandrell and her sisters, who also had roots in gospel music.
Mom got to see Elvis when she was ten, I remember her telling me. She only understood later in her life what a momentous occasion that was. At the time, she had fun but did not fall in love or think Elvis was anything to lose sleep or scream over.
Crystal Gayle was another favorite Mom would easily belt out, especially her version of Blue Bayou and Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue, as her eyes were brown.
I’ve spent a lot of years trying to get away from my gospel and country roots. I thought it was the part of our family that was backward, unhealthy. Now as I sit on my Texas porch this evening, listening to the crickets and cicadas, feeling the warm summer breeze, I feel it is the part of us that was sweet, and simple in a good, easy and humble way. I thought in order to be worldly and sophisticated – which I also thought was where it was at – I needed to denounce this past, to literally move away from it, and to show much disdain for it. Certainly that would mean I had arrived and understood the ways of the real world.
I still love and appreciate – and remain indebted to - the creative, employment, spiritual, and educational, as well as medical and technological opportunities a city brings. I also love the great number of people one can meet from all walks of life.
But I no longer believe it is better, and I miss and even love my country roots.
I had attached too much of the hurt, given the country in us too much responsibility for what had gone wrong. I had felt so isolated there, so like no one would hear me, and there was much truth to that. Getting to places that were more populated was a relief beyond measure at that time because I found so many resources for help and healing. I found people who would listen. I also found plenty of people in the country who would not listen and who wanted to perpetuate the family problems.
To be fair, I have also found those who would help in the country, and those who would harm in the city. I guess it was pretty simplistic of me to think I wouldn’t, to think it was that pat.
For a bunch of years, I had it good and really the best of both worlds living in Austin. But now the city is booming and seems to be set on proving itself as world class. Since living in a “world class” city about a year ago, I have lost all taste for that.
I have been two stepping a bunch lately, and eating farm fresh watermelon and peaches, drinking iced tea, going fishing, and wearing my cowgirl boots. I am moving to a smaller town just outside Austin.
I have also been reading intellectually challenging books, participating in political protests, going to the symphony, and meeting folks from all walks of life.
I feel magnificently about the whole kit and caboodle that makes up Texas and me, y’all.
Mom had a beautiful soprano voice. She sang “I’ll Fly Away” and other gospel hymns often.
When Whitney Houston got popular as a pop icon in the eighties, Mom identified and referred to her as “Cissy Houston’s girl” because Cissy Houston had been a gospel singer whose music my mom knew well.
We watched Dionne Warwick on her show every Sunday evening as long as she had it. One of her regular guests was Gladys Knight, sometimes with the Pips, and Mom taught me the song “Midnight Train to Georgia,” which she sang with true passion.
We watched Barbara Mandrell and her sisters, who also had roots in gospel music.
Mom got to see Elvis when she was ten, I remember her telling me. She only understood later in her life what a momentous occasion that was. At the time, she had fun but did not fall in love or think Elvis was anything to lose sleep or scream over.
Crystal Gayle was another favorite Mom would easily belt out, especially her version of Blue Bayou and Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue, as her eyes were brown.
I’ve spent a lot of years trying to get away from my gospel and country roots. I thought it was the part of our family that was backward, unhealthy. Now as I sit on my Texas porch this evening, listening to the crickets and cicadas, feeling the warm summer breeze, I feel it is the part of us that was sweet, and simple in a good, easy and humble way. I thought in order to be worldly and sophisticated – which I also thought was where it was at – I needed to denounce this past, to literally move away from it, and to show much disdain for it. Certainly that would mean I had arrived and understood the ways of the real world.
I still love and appreciate – and remain indebted to - the creative, employment, spiritual, and educational, as well as medical and technological opportunities a city brings. I also love the great number of people one can meet from all walks of life.
But I no longer believe it is better, and I miss and even love my country roots.
I had attached too much of the hurt, given the country in us too much responsibility for what had gone wrong. I had felt so isolated there, so like no one would hear me, and there was much truth to that. Getting to places that were more populated was a relief beyond measure at that time because I found so many resources for help and healing. I found people who would listen. I also found plenty of people in the country who would not listen and who wanted to perpetuate the family problems.
To be fair, I have also found those who would help in the country, and those who would harm in the city. I guess it was pretty simplistic of me to think I wouldn’t, to think it was that pat.
For a bunch of years, I had it good and really the best of both worlds living in Austin. But now the city is booming and seems to be set on proving itself as world class. Since living in a “world class” city about a year ago, I have lost all taste for that.
I have been two stepping a bunch lately, and eating farm fresh watermelon and peaches, drinking iced tea, going fishing, and wearing my cowgirl boots. I am moving to a smaller town just outside Austin.
I have also been reading intellectually challenging books, participating in political protests, going to the symphony, and meeting folks from all walks of life.
I feel magnificently about the whole kit and caboodle that makes up Texas and me, y’all.
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Where There's Smoke revised 4_14
Where there’s smoke…
Age 8, Mom 28
While the kids across the pond in London were winding down their last few shows seeing the Sex Pistols, my Baptist family shielded me from the evils of punk rock in the year 1978. In America, Thin Lizzy may have been a household name for some, but for ours Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton reigned. Sadly for my mother, Eddie Van Halen – who was just debuting – would enter my repertoire a few years later.
We were, however, keenly aware of the Dallas Cowboys making it to the Superbowl as were most of the rest of Houston, Dallas, Cut n’ Shoot, Paris, and all other Texas towns in between – not to mention the nation.
The tragic story of Jonestown made its way to the headlines, but my traditional family and church were nothing like them, so not to worry.
For the time being, the center of my world was my church and family. For a portion of each summer, I would spend a few weeks with my East Texas loved ones.
During this summer, Papa bought Granny a great, big ole Pontiac with power windows. When I told her it was nice, she told me she had wanted a Trans Am. My cousins and I sat on the back porch with her and shelled purple hulled peas straight from the garden daily for dinner.
Although my cousins and a few neighborhood friends had a few things to do, I guess we got bored soon enough. One afternoon, we hatched a plan.
We lay in wait for Granny to neglect her square, vanilla, leather box of a purse then lifted three Marlboro Red cigarettes from her matching cigarette case – one for each of us.
In the heat of the East Texas summer, in the scorched grass we crouched like barn cats behind the old, wooden shed. We had stolen some matches, too. We choked and laughed. My friend with her stringy, blonde hair, tiny, sturdy body and hard, worn face that already looked middle aged even though she was only seven, showed us how the tar from the cigarette stained a white Kleenex when she blew a smoky breath into it. It made a nasty orangey brownish spot right in the center. Her lime green shorts were dirty, too short and too worn in the seat, her sleeveless yellow and white striped cotton top fit just barely, but it wasn’t cute. It wasn’t fresh or something a mom who wanted her daughter to have darling clothes would buy.
So we smoked the cigarettes, and that was exciting. But, as B.B. King said, soon enough “the thrill [was] gone.”
Now Granny and Papa smoked so much that the whole “living room” smelled like smoke, and I such good memories combined with the smell of all that smoke that for many years whenever I smelled smoke I felt sentimental about it. Not only that, but Granny chewed tobacco. Beechnut, to be exact.
We got a good idea. We would steal some of Granny’s chewing tobacco, dry it out for about 24 hours, and then smoke it. We snaked some of the tobacco and some paper towels, found a proper spot in the back bedroom, and spread it out the way little girls dry out flowers to save. We checked on it every few hours to see that it was drying properly and how close we were to being able to smoke it.
About four in the next afternoon it was ready and so were we! But wait! What would we roll it in to smoke? We needed some kind of paper. Granny wasn’t too concerned about having a lot of art supplies on hand for us kids, but we had a lot of chicken liver dressing and shelled a bunch of purple hulled peas on the back porch. Well, anyway for heaven’s sake, there was no paper in the entire dang house except for Granny’s Redbook magazine. It would have to do.
I was a long way from being the coolest one in the bunch so they had to show me how to roll. And by God, we smoked that dried chewing tobacco in chemically- and ink-treated magazine paper. My friend could really blow some dark tar stains without a filter. Something in me shifted. This time, it felt dirtier. Planned out. More dangerous.
I returned home to Momma. I was sure she would figure me out. I was wracked with guilt and could not believe we had gotten away with it that long, but I tried to tell myself to keep it together.
One day passed. I held it in, but I was sure that my guilt could actually be seen. It was somehow seeping out like black sludge from under my feet. I managed to fall asleep. Another day began.
My smiling mom glided into my room, beautiful brown hair, cute shorts outfit, and asked me with her sweet face if I had fun at Granny’s, and I could not keep holding the guilt in. It was too much against her glory. I let the words sink into my mire.
I hoped she wouldn’t hate me or punish me but I was ready regardless.
What she did was sit with me, listened fully, took me seriously, looked at me full in the face and said, “You did the right thing by telling the truth. And since you did, I will not punish you for this. Last, you must not do this again.”
Indelible. From that moment on I knew I would tell my story, tell the truth – regardless of the consequences – and hope for the best.
Age 8, Mom 28
While the kids across the pond in London were winding down their last few shows seeing the Sex Pistols, my Baptist family shielded me from the evils of punk rock in the year 1978. In America, Thin Lizzy may have been a household name for some, but for ours Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton reigned. Sadly for my mother, Eddie Van Halen – who was just debuting – would enter my repertoire a few years later.
We were, however, keenly aware of the Dallas Cowboys making it to the Superbowl as were most of the rest of Houston, Dallas, Cut n’ Shoot, Paris, and all other Texas towns in between – not to mention the nation.
The tragic story of Jonestown made its way to the headlines, but my traditional family and church were nothing like them, so not to worry.
For the time being, the center of my world was my church and family. For a portion of each summer, I would spend a few weeks with my East Texas loved ones.
During this summer, Papa bought Granny a great, big ole Pontiac with power windows. When I told her it was nice, she told me she had wanted a Trans Am. My cousins and I sat on the back porch with her and shelled purple hulled peas straight from the garden daily for dinner.
Although my cousins and a few neighborhood friends had a few things to do, I guess we got bored soon enough. One afternoon, we hatched a plan.
We lay in wait for Granny to neglect her square, vanilla, leather box of a purse then lifted three Marlboro Red cigarettes from her matching cigarette case – one for each of us.
In the heat of the East Texas summer, in the scorched grass we crouched like barn cats behind the old, wooden shed. We had stolen some matches, too. We choked and laughed. My friend with her stringy, blonde hair, tiny, sturdy body and hard, worn face that already looked middle aged even though she was only seven, showed us how the tar from the cigarette stained a white Kleenex when she blew a smoky breath into it. It made a nasty orangey brownish spot right in the center. Her lime green shorts were dirty, too short and too worn in the seat, her sleeveless yellow and white striped cotton top fit just barely, but it wasn’t cute. It wasn’t fresh or something a mom who wanted her daughter to have darling clothes would buy.
So we smoked the cigarettes, and that was exciting. But, as B.B. King said, soon enough “the thrill [was] gone.”
Now Granny and Papa smoked so much that the whole “living room” smelled like smoke, and I such good memories combined with the smell of all that smoke that for many years whenever I smelled smoke I felt sentimental about it. Not only that, but Granny chewed tobacco. Beechnut, to be exact.
We got a good idea. We would steal some of Granny’s chewing tobacco, dry it out for about 24 hours, and then smoke it. We snaked some of the tobacco and some paper towels, found a proper spot in the back bedroom, and spread it out the way little girls dry out flowers to save. We checked on it every few hours to see that it was drying properly and how close we were to being able to smoke it.
About four in the next afternoon it was ready and so were we! But wait! What would we roll it in to smoke? We needed some kind of paper. Granny wasn’t too concerned about having a lot of art supplies on hand for us kids, but we had a lot of chicken liver dressing and shelled a bunch of purple hulled peas on the back porch. Well, anyway for heaven’s sake, there was no paper in the entire dang house except for Granny’s Redbook magazine. It would have to do.
I was a long way from being the coolest one in the bunch so they had to show me how to roll. And by God, we smoked that dried chewing tobacco in chemically- and ink-treated magazine paper. My friend could really blow some dark tar stains without a filter. Something in me shifted. This time, it felt dirtier. Planned out. More dangerous.
I returned home to Momma. I was sure she would figure me out. I was wracked with guilt and could not believe we had gotten away with it that long, but I tried to tell myself to keep it together.
One day passed. I held it in, but I was sure that my guilt could actually be seen. It was somehow seeping out like black sludge from under my feet. I managed to fall asleep. Another day began.
My smiling mom glided into my room, beautiful brown hair, cute shorts outfit, and asked me with her sweet face if I had fun at Granny’s, and I could not keep holding the guilt in. It was too much against her glory. I let the words sink into my mire.
I hoped she wouldn’t hate me or punish me but I was ready regardless.
What she did was sit with me, listened fully, took me seriously, looked at me full in the face and said, “You did the right thing by telling the truth. And since you did, I will not punish you for this. Last, you must not do this again.”
Indelible. From that moment on I knew I would tell my story, tell the truth – regardless of the consequences – and hope for the best.
Friday, March 15, 2013
Disability and Powerlessness revised
Disability and Powerlessness
Age 30, Mom age 52
They wanted to release her. Release her? Where? This trip to the hospital – this time because she had been assaulted – had also resulted in the only home she had - her car - being impounded for having no registration.
She was just a little bit better off than dead. Release her?
Two nights before in her hospital room my only thought had been “tie her down with the straps. Please. She is weak. She shouldn’t move.” She was detoxing so violently that she was out of touch with reality. Hallucinating. Just strong enough to move and fall out of the bed in her flailing attempts to get me to “bring [her] a brewsky!”
She reached and clawed. The worst mixture of love, sympathy, empathy, disgust, sorrow, nausea.
That’s what I felt. It actually swallowed me. I was bound by it as sure as the canvas straps of her hospital bed bound my mother.
Her skin looked like some kind of leather dyed yellow; she was dying of alcohol-related cirrhosis. Her stomach was actually eating itself and she was found unconscious, hemorrhaging from mouth and anus in an abandoned gas station parking lot. The male voice that called the ambulance called to let me know, and remained anonymous.
Nothing soothed her. Not the Ativan, nor the pain killers. She was wild and virtually psychotic. I was completely helpless; I could not help her. To watch her was torture. So, I did the only thing that I could imagine. I began to sing a prayer that she used to sing to me. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. Immediately she looked up at me, mouth agape. Her eyes attempted to focus. I kept singing: that saved a wretch like me. She began to sing with me, “I once was lost…” I smiled at her, and she at me, “but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
I tried to picture this woman who the doctor said should have been dead by now being discharged onto the Houston streets, right outside the Ben Taub County Hospital.
I demanded that they keep her. They told me I could take it up with the social workers on staff.
What would have happened to her if I hadn’t been there? Would she have been put out already?
I made my way to the social workers’ office where I found the concrete bricks for walls were painted a dingy yellow, and the offices behind the door window dark. Clearly, hardly anyone was there. Someone tentatively stepped out, “Can I help you?”
“Yes, I need to speak to a social worker. The hospital wants to release my mother but she has nowhere to go. She’s homeless and extremely ill, on the verge of death. She’s also an addict and in a state of detox, and not safe to keep with me.”
She was not just homeless; she was not just an alcoholic. She was violently, incurably ill. She needed round the clock medical care. But to society, and to this hospital, she was a throw away.
Certainly she had a part in that. Some part of her had the guts and the defiance to turn her back on regular rules and tell it all to fuck off. Her choice. I never expected any other individual or society or even myself to make her better or to save her from her own consequences when she ostensibly could have made another choice. This was different. She was now physically, medically, mentally in every way unable to care for herself.
When this happens to your mother or grandmother, you call in a nurse, or put her in a nursing home, or assisted living. Well, when your parents are divorced, your mom never could get sober, her family is all dead or worse off than she is, and you are a single parent and teacher, calling in a nurse is not an option. Extended care at a hospital or other facility is not, either.
“Well, the social workers aren’t here, but you can fill out this paperwork to try to get her some disability insurance from Social Security. That usually takes a long time, though, and lots of folks die before the paperwork ever goes through.”
She delivered this mean fact like I had on a suit of armor that the terrible news could not penetrate. I got educated the way getting struck by lightning educates someone to come in out of the rain. Or the way getting bitten by a shark educates someone not to swim by the Farrallon Islands. I was mortally wounded and at the same time trying to navigate a solution, completely unprepared and unequipped to handle my mother’s disease or her imminent death emotionally. This was the sea and I was drowning in it. I was also unprepared practically and financially, as was she, even though I was a hardworking, tax paying citizen. But the state would put her out on the streets. The lack of care and the dangers on the street were sharks in the sea where I was drowning.
I sat and did the only things I could. I held the old, brown clipboard on my lap and filled out the paperwork that had the ever-so-slight chance of getting Mom a place to stay once she was discharged from the hospital. In that state, it was hard to think of my name and address. It was hard to think of Mom’s. Well, the address was easy. But what should I write? How would I ever find her social security number? She didn’t even know where head was. Besides, there was no home in which to search through file cabinets with any files at all! It was impossible. It couldn’t be done. I thought I should just give up.
I argued with myself. I fought my own will and got through that God forsaken document one damned blank at a time. Mother's Maiden Name: done. Mother's Father: deceased. Check.
I handed it to the un-social worker, knowing that the chances that my mom would get to see any benefits from it before she died were slim to nil.
Then I prayed. This is the definition of powerlessness.
Age 30, Mom age 52
They wanted to release her. Release her? Where? This trip to the hospital – this time because she had been assaulted – had also resulted in the only home she had - her car - being impounded for having no registration.
She was just a little bit better off than dead. Release her?
Two nights before in her hospital room my only thought had been “tie her down with the straps. Please. She is weak. She shouldn’t move.” She was detoxing so violently that she was out of touch with reality. Hallucinating. Just strong enough to move and fall out of the bed in her flailing attempts to get me to “bring [her] a brewsky!”
She reached and clawed. The worst mixture of love, sympathy, empathy, disgust, sorrow, nausea.
That’s what I felt. It actually swallowed me. I was bound by it as sure as the canvas straps of her hospital bed bound my mother.
Her skin looked like some kind of leather dyed yellow; she was dying of alcohol-related cirrhosis. Her stomach was actually eating itself and she was found unconscious, hemorrhaging from mouth and anus in an abandoned gas station parking lot. The male voice that called the ambulance called to let me know, and remained anonymous.
Nothing soothed her. Not the Ativan, nor the pain killers. She was wild and virtually psychotic. I was completely helpless; I could not help her. To watch her was torture. So, I did the only thing that I could imagine. I began to sing a prayer that she used to sing to me. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. Immediately she looked up at me, mouth agape. Her eyes attempted to focus. I kept singing: that saved a wretch like me. She began to sing with me, “I once was lost…” I smiled at her, and she at me, “but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
I tried to picture this woman who the doctor said should have been dead by now being discharged onto the Houston streets, right outside the Ben Taub County Hospital.
I demanded that they keep her. They told me I could take it up with the social workers on staff.
What would have happened to her if I hadn’t been there? Would she have been put out already?
I made my way to the social workers’ office where I found the concrete bricks for walls were painted a dingy yellow, and the offices behind the door window dark. Clearly, hardly anyone was there. Someone tentatively stepped out, “Can I help you?”
“Yes, I need to speak to a social worker. The hospital wants to release my mother but she has nowhere to go. She’s homeless and extremely ill, on the verge of death. She’s also an addict and in a state of detox, and not safe to keep with me.”
She was not just homeless; she was not just an alcoholic. She was violently, incurably ill. She needed round the clock medical care. But to society, and to this hospital, she was a throw away.
Certainly she had a part in that. Some part of her had the guts and the defiance to turn her back on regular rules and tell it all to fuck off. Her choice. I never expected any other individual or society or even myself to make her better or to save her from her own consequences when she ostensibly could have made another choice. This was different. She was now physically, medically, mentally in every way unable to care for herself.
When this happens to your mother or grandmother, you call in a nurse, or put her in a nursing home, or assisted living. Well, when your parents are divorced, your mom never could get sober, her family is all dead or worse off than she is, and you are a single parent and teacher, calling in a nurse is not an option. Extended care at a hospital or other facility is not, either.
“Well, the social workers aren’t here, but you can fill out this paperwork to try to get her some disability insurance from Social Security. That usually takes a long time, though, and lots of folks die before the paperwork ever goes through.”
She delivered this mean fact like I had on a suit of armor that the terrible news could not penetrate. I got educated the way getting struck by lightning educates someone to come in out of the rain. Or the way getting bitten by a shark educates someone not to swim by the Farrallon Islands. I was mortally wounded and at the same time trying to navigate a solution, completely unprepared and unequipped to handle my mother’s disease or her imminent death emotionally. This was the sea and I was drowning in it. I was also unprepared practically and financially, as was she, even though I was a hardworking, tax paying citizen. But the state would put her out on the streets. The lack of care and the dangers on the street were sharks in the sea where I was drowning.
I sat and did the only things I could. I held the old, brown clipboard on my lap and filled out the paperwork that had the ever-so-slight chance of getting Mom a place to stay once she was discharged from the hospital. In that state, it was hard to think of my name and address. It was hard to think of Mom’s. Well, the address was easy. But what should I write? How would I ever find her social security number? She didn’t even know where head was. Besides, there was no home in which to search through file cabinets with any files at all! It was impossible. It couldn’t be done. I thought I should just give up.
I argued with myself. I fought my own will and got through that God forsaken document one damned blank at a time. Mother's Maiden Name: done. Mother's Father: deceased. Check.
I handed it to the un-social worker, knowing that the chances that my mom would get to see any benefits from it before she died were slim to nil.
Then I prayed. This is the definition of powerlessness.
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Refugee
"Somewhere, somehow somebody
Must have kicked you around some
Tell me why you want to lay there
And revel in your abandon
Listen it don't make no difference to me baby
Everybody's had to fight to be free
You see you don't have to live like a refugee
Now baby you don't have to live like a refugee." - Tom Petty, Refugee
It was Mama who dragged it out of me. I lay on my pastel green checked cotton and polyester bedspread, under my canopy of the same fabric. My feet were hanging over the side of the bed, almost touching the floor. Wranglers, bare feet, bony ankles, green carpet.
Mama was standing at the end of my knees, waving her arms, close to gnashing her teeth and wailing.
She had known something was wrong. She knew it was more than that stupid boy I had a stupid crush on. I hadn't said a word except asking Momma to come get me early from my aunt's house that summer. I hadn't realized it, but according to Mom I had been "moping around" since then for the past few days.
"Did George hurt you?" she finally let her fear punch the words out. I sat and waited, unsure of the answer but knowing the truth. That's when I flopped back onto my bed, put my hand to my frowning forehead and nodded. That moment forever changed the course of my life.
"I knew it! I knew it!" She was in obvious pain. Grimacing, starting to cry, taking a step, then taking it back.
"How did you know, Mama?"
"Because he used to hurt me."
"What?!?"
As my story unfolded, so did hers. And what my mother had convinced herself of, in order to cope and to limp somehow along in this life, was that George - her sister's husband - and she, Mama - a three year old girl (age when the abuse started that she could remember) had "had an affair." She convinced herself that it was just between them.
But the pain I was in broke through her denial. She was my champion, my hero, my savior.
My Granny had raised five kids on her own. She lost one of them in a drunk driving accident when he was 14. She lost her husband when she was in her thirties. So when George wanted to marry my aunt who was only thirteen, she agreed.
On one hand I guess their family situation could look kind of normal. George and my aunt had a regular house on a good bit of land. His daughter and her family lived in a trailer on one portion of the land, his son and family lived in another trailer on another portion of that land. There was a garden. My aunt had a small beauty shop just outside the back door which made it convenient for her to work there. It looked good.
Another way it could be seen, once some of the gritty truth started to emerge, is more like a compound. During those summer visits when I played with other kids in the area - which I wasn't allowed to do much - they would tell me that everyone knew George beat my aunt. There was always a lot of drinking. Two cases a night for George was not out of the norm. Add the sons in to that and any of George's "friends." The dark and off limits bedroom where George would "get you" if you entered. A dozen cars torn apart and rusting around the property. Then to find out that my aunt was not actually "allowed" to go to work outside the home, that even a niece who came to visit occasionally didn't escape the abuse, and you can see how the fact that my mom ever escaped is nothing short of a miracle.
That she ever spent time behaving like anything other than a refugee is miraculous, as well. There is no doubt in my mind that that's exactly what she was.
Must have kicked you around some
Tell me why you want to lay there
And revel in your abandon
Listen it don't make no difference to me baby
Everybody's had to fight to be free
You see you don't have to live like a refugee
Now baby you don't have to live like a refugee." - Tom Petty, Refugee
It was Mama who dragged it out of me. I lay on my pastel green checked cotton and polyester bedspread, under my canopy of the same fabric. My feet were hanging over the side of the bed, almost touching the floor. Wranglers, bare feet, bony ankles, green carpet.
Mama was standing at the end of my knees, waving her arms, close to gnashing her teeth and wailing.
She had known something was wrong. She knew it was more than that stupid boy I had a stupid crush on. I hadn't said a word except asking Momma to come get me early from my aunt's house that summer. I hadn't realized it, but according to Mom I had been "moping around" since then for the past few days.
"Did George hurt you?" she finally let her fear punch the words out. I sat and waited, unsure of the answer but knowing the truth. That's when I flopped back onto my bed, put my hand to my frowning forehead and nodded. That moment forever changed the course of my life.
"I knew it! I knew it!" She was in obvious pain. Grimacing, starting to cry, taking a step, then taking it back.
"How did you know, Mama?"
"Because he used to hurt me."
"What?!?"
As my story unfolded, so did hers. And what my mother had convinced herself of, in order to cope and to limp somehow along in this life, was that George - her sister's husband - and she, Mama - a three year old girl (age when the abuse started that she could remember) had "had an affair." She convinced herself that it was just between them.
But the pain I was in broke through her denial. She was my champion, my hero, my savior.
My Granny had raised five kids on her own. She lost one of them in a drunk driving accident when he was 14. She lost her husband when she was in her thirties. So when George wanted to marry my aunt who was only thirteen, she agreed.
On one hand I guess their family situation could look kind of normal. George and my aunt had a regular house on a good bit of land. His daughter and her family lived in a trailer on one portion of the land, his son and family lived in another trailer on another portion of that land. There was a garden. My aunt had a small beauty shop just outside the back door which made it convenient for her to work there. It looked good.
Another way it could be seen, once some of the gritty truth started to emerge, is more like a compound. During those summer visits when I played with other kids in the area - which I wasn't allowed to do much - they would tell me that everyone knew George beat my aunt. There was always a lot of drinking. Two cases a night for George was not out of the norm. Add the sons in to that and any of George's "friends." The dark and off limits bedroom where George would "get you" if you entered. A dozen cars torn apart and rusting around the property. Then to find out that my aunt was not actually "allowed" to go to work outside the home, that even a niece who came to visit occasionally didn't escape the abuse, and you can see how the fact that my mom ever escaped is nothing short of a miracle.
That she ever spent time behaving like anything other than a refugee is miraculous, as well. There is no doubt in my mind that that's exactly what she was.
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Our Own Private Ceremony
Every time I look at the ocean I am reminded of Mom. Standing on some of the most beautiful beaches in the world, the ocean is divine in its beauty. It is the very essence of life for many creatures. The waves lapping the shore and even crashing into it can lull one into a serene sleep from far enough away.
But to be in the water is another story entirely. It can be refreshing - warm and soothing or cool and thrilling. But there is no mistaking the power of the currents, the tides, of rogue waves...to say nothing of her in a storm or a hurricane. And chances are pretty good I'd catch her in all her glory, secure in all her vitality. Still, somewhere way back behind my laughter as I turned my back on the glistening water, I would remember the last storm and how she looked then. Terrible.
And no one would know that my laughter was cut just a little bit short, and that I pursed my lips together just a little bit more than needed while I folded the towel, and that the frown I wore wasn't just to protect my eyes from the sun, for just a moment.
Still, I am drawn to her. I get peace like little else from sitting on her shores, meditating on her waves. How I do love her.
I'm like the tide, myself. I retreat, recede. Then move closer, come in. I can't stay out or away for long. Part of me is always washing up and in just as some of me mixes with the sand and whirls it around, back out and on.
So, it seemed fitting to release the three pearls into the bay.
The sun was setting. We were at the State Park in Galveston where we had spent many days as a family. Pink and orange lit up the horizon between Texas and Mexico. My dad had gotten that pearl necklace, matching earrings, and cocktail ring for mom, had brought it all the way from Vietnam when he was so distraught and when there was no money. They were 20 and 23. They had already lived through a tour of duty, the birth of their first child, and uprooting their small town Texas lives to live worlds apart in Alaska and Vietnam.
For some reason, pearls are always depicted as feminine. I guess it's because they use their own bodies to create and protect that beautiful little gem. So, I took three pearls from the ones Dad had given Mom. One for her first child, one for her second, and one for her grandchild. I simply walked up to the gentle and warm receding tide, and returned what the ocean had freely given to us.
But to be in the water is another story entirely. It can be refreshing - warm and soothing or cool and thrilling. But there is no mistaking the power of the currents, the tides, of rogue waves...to say nothing of her in a storm or a hurricane. And chances are pretty good I'd catch her in all her glory, secure in all her vitality. Still, somewhere way back behind my laughter as I turned my back on the glistening water, I would remember the last storm and how she looked then. Terrible.
And no one would know that my laughter was cut just a little bit short, and that I pursed my lips together just a little bit more than needed while I folded the towel, and that the frown I wore wasn't just to protect my eyes from the sun, for just a moment.
Still, I am drawn to her. I get peace like little else from sitting on her shores, meditating on her waves. How I do love her.
I'm like the tide, myself. I retreat, recede. Then move closer, come in. I can't stay out or away for long. Part of me is always washing up and in just as some of me mixes with the sand and whirls it around, back out and on.
So, it seemed fitting to release the three pearls into the bay.
The sun was setting. We were at the State Park in Galveston where we had spent many days as a family. Pink and orange lit up the horizon between Texas and Mexico. My dad had gotten that pearl necklace, matching earrings, and cocktail ring for mom, had brought it all the way from Vietnam when he was so distraught and when there was no money. They were 20 and 23. They had already lived through a tour of duty, the birth of their first child, and uprooting their small town Texas lives to live worlds apart in Alaska and Vietnam.
For some reason, pearls are always depicted as feminine. I guess it's because they use their own bodies to create and protect that beautiful little gem. So, I took three pearls from the ones Dad had given Mom. One for her first child, one for her second, and one for her grandchild. I simply walked up to the gentle and warm receding tide, and returned what the ocean had freely given to us.
Friday, February 1, 2013
Oil Revenues
The sun blazed in the searing sky over the mid Texas town of Mineral Wells. Dead brown grass crackled under our feet as we walked the perimeter of the small piece of land.
Annoyed as I was in my teenage ire, I rebelled by not paying attention. As much as I loved my mom and wanted to care, the most important thing in the world seemed to be my comfort - or lack thereof. Little matter that she was enduring what I was as well to impart whatever it was she was trying to get across by being out there on that God awfully hot day, I would rather not hear it.
So, I have only a vague recollection of her explaining that she owned some mineral rights to this land, and that someday I would, too. I think Granny bought them.
About twenty five years later, the checks started coming. Nothing hefty or life changing in the sense that I could now retire or anything remotely close, but, enough that it did make a small dent in my tiny budget. Some months it made the difference between a bounced check fee or not, or another trip to the grocery store.
I think when I got my first check Mom had been gone about four years. I am once again humbled by her competence and nurturing. As much as I felt she didn't take care of me in so many ways, she is still taking care of me from beyond.
Annoyed as I was in my teenage ire, I rebelled by not paying attention. As much as I loved my mom and wanted to care, the most important thing in the world seemed to be my comfort - or lack thereof. Little matter that she was enduring what I was as well to impart whatever it was she was trying to get across by being out there on that God awfully hot day, I would rather not hear it.
So, I have only a vague recollection of her explaining that she owned some mineral rights to this land, and that someday I would, too. I think Granny bought them.
About twenty five years later, the checks started coming. Nothing hefty or life changing in the sense that I could now retire or anything remotely close, but, enough that it did make a small dent in my tiny budget. Some months it made the difference between a bounced check fee or not, or another trip to the grocery store.
I think when I got my first check Mom had been gone about four years. I am once again humbled by her competence and nurturing. As much as I felt she didn't take care of me in so many ways, she is still taking care of me from beyond.
Saturday, January 26, 2013
You just don't want me to have fun
Mom had always believed me, always had my back. Mom could and would trust me - rightfully so - and back me up when others couldn't or wouldn't. She believed me when my life was on the line, when my honor was on the line, and when my emotional well-being needed protecting. She had my back when she confronted her own sister when I told that my uncle - her sister's husband - had abused me.
So that Sunday when I told her what she had done the night before - and this time I had a witness there, too: my date to the high school Christmas dance the night before - I just knew she would listen to me and understand.
It was a gray, dismal day. This kind Houston was infamous for. Muggy and warm, even though it was December. She was in her robe in the kitchen, shocked and remorseful that she had said such horrible things and didn't even remember it. She was ready to go to AA. She got out the phone book.
I left, went with my date to return his tux, came back home, and found her drunk.
"Mom, I thought you were going to try A.A.!"
"You just don't want me to have fun!" she hollered back at me. "That's why you want me not to drink!"
It was crushing and sent my mind reeling. Not only had I wanted to trust Mom, have her get better, and have my mom back, but I had also been trusted by Mom. And here she was treating me like some conspiratorial suspect.
So, I was enormously hurt by her accusation. I knew it meant something was heinously wrong.
Also, it was absolutely terrifying, the lengths that she would go to to hang on to her drink. I never forgot it.
I believe it is much of the reason that a couple years later when I had a drink in my hand, and friends who were trying to take it because they thought I'd had enough, that I hollered and screamed and one of them said, "just give it to her" with a defeated tone, it wore on me. One year later I was looking for the number in the phone book for myself to get help.
So that Sunday when I told her what she had done the night before - and this time I had a witness there, too: my date to the high school Christmas dance the night before - I just knew she would listen to me and understand.
It was a gray, dismal day. This kind Houston was infamous for. Muggy and warm, even though it was December. She was in her robe in the kitchen, shocked and remorseful that she had said such horrible things and didn't even remember it. She was ready to go to AA. She got out the phone book.
I left, went with my date to return his tux, came back home, and found her drunk.
"Mom, I thought you were going to try A.A.!"
"You just don't want me to have fun!" she hollered back at me. "That's why you want me not to drink!"
It was crushing and sent my mind reeling. Not only had I wanted to trust Mom, have her get better, and have my mom back, but I had also been trusted by Mom. And here she was treating me like some conspiratorial suspect.
So, I was enormously hurt by her accusation. I knew it meant something was heinously wrong.
Also, it was absolutely terrifying, the lengths that she would go to to hang on to her drink. I never forgot it.
I believe it is much of the reason that a couple years later when I had a drink in my hand, and friends who were trying to take it because they thought I'd had enough, that I hollered and screamed and one of them said, "just give it to her" with a defeated tone, it wore on me. One year later I was looking for the number in the phone book for myself to get help.
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