Summer 89

In the summer of 89, Houston was as hot as ever. I had just completed my freshman year at U.T. Austin and thought I would try to live a semi-normal life like my peers did and return home until fall. Except I didn’t really have a home. The family and the house I had grown up with seemed to have both been sold in the divorce the year before, and since I was not really “at home” anymore neither parent had a true room for me to stay in.

Mom had hooked me up with a temporary job editing engineers’ documents for an oil company. My boss had been her boss in the past. It was a posh job with the exception of the huge signs and warnings as you walked in to work each day, and the clearance you had to have to be on the campus. You see, fueling the entire enterprise was a nuclear reactor. Contained, harnessed, but always a threat. It’s so weird how life can imitate art.

I left the cute, rented townhouse in the mornings in cute outfits. I made friends with my co-workers, went to lunch with them, and read interesting documents all day.

Then one day came when I thought to call my mom at work from my little desk. The person who answered let me know that she was no longer employed.

The day before she had been.

The confirmation that something was horribly wrong was extremely cold comfort. The fear and despair was rising up and I couldn’t keep it down. Maybe you’ve seen a drama where there’s a nuclear emergency and the lights go down and a huge drone sound warns and then an alarm, and a computerized voice calmly announces “this building will self destruct,” that’s was happening in my head.

I stood up in my cubicle with the phone receiver pressed to my ear. The tears came and I choked, “this is because of her drinking isn’t it?!” A pause of silence and a small “Ah-“
“This is her daughter. Answer me!” I demanded.
“I’m sorry, I can’t discuss that.” Click.
Me. Left with me to figure it out.

The tragic truth is that this was the first major step toward my mom not being able to support herself at all. She would not hold another job for any length of time. She would eventually only have temporary positions, and then none. She would move to a less expensive place, then begin hocking our family heirlooms including the piano she used to play on, and then have no place at all.

That fall, I took my last drink of alcohol to date.

I asked my mom about stopping, too. Once, after she had moved into the smaller apartment, she told me that she really needed to drink because of all the pain she was in. Who am I to judge?

Believe me, I used to and sometimes still can. I was so angry that I hated her at times. I desperately wanted her to be what I thought I needed. And then I would alternate at being angry with myself. I wanted to rescue her. But it turned out that most of my attempts either enabled her to keep hurting herself or sabotaged myself, as others had to teach me. The rest had little to no effect.

I know alcohol comforted me. I know I didn’t live through half what she did. I know that I was blessed with a way to stop drinking. For whatever reason, my mom did not find that. Maybe she could have.

But it seems to me to be splitting hairs sometimes. I don’t think that people with or without cancer, for instance, are more or less blessed than each other because people are blessed in different ways. Maybe someone with cancer could have stopped smoking sooner, or eaten more vegetables, or gone to the doctor sooner. Maybe. Sometimes the chances are greater than others that things could have been different if only… Then, at some point, “if only” doesn’t seem to matter so much anymore.

I do know I wish she could have found the comfort I found in sobriety. I do know that, even though she caused plenty of hurt, many of her actions spared me the kind of pain she had to live through.

So, I will never know if I could have done things differently than she did. I only know I can do my life differently than I did before. For that, I am responsible.

Today, I’d rather not and don’t work at a nuclear facility. I also am committed to doing my part to stop the cycle that has been going on in my family for farther back and sideways than I can determine. Most of the time that involves just trying to be all I can be today, make sure I stay sober, show up for my kid and my husband, for work, and for my friends and other family – but not to the extent that it would hurt me. It takes almost all my energy just to make me the best I can be.