Day 36 - Day 49
February 24 - March 9
Two weeks go by…
…starting with a Sunday ride to Bristol Harbour for lunch. Not much interest in eating. Instead, I move out to a sunny patio seat near the edge of the snow covered lawn--the edge of winter, the edge of a grand hill overlooking the lake, the edge of my emotions. They spill over as I say goodbye. I cry for the words I forgot to say at the end, I cry for memories of impatience, I cry because I didn’t open father’s last jar of canned sweet cherries to share with him after the Superbowl. He suggested we do just that, to celebrate, and I said, “Oh no, I don’t want to eat the last of your favorite cherries.”
He called me in Chicago last year to inquire how to can cherries. A friend had given him several quarts. I researched "fruit canning" on the internet and called him back with instructions. Though he didn’t have official canning equipment, he made do with a large pot and old jars he had saved. I don’t know where he found the strength to lift each jar out of the boiling water with a pair of tongs. Father successfully canned about a dozen small jars of the most delicious, dark cherries. He refused to open a jar until late fall, preferring first to look at them proudly and anticipate the pleasure for a few months.
When finally opening one, the taste met all his expectations. He returned to an open jar over and over, usually finishing it off in one evening. On two of my visits he shared this treat with me.
After the Superbowl game he said, “Cher, how about we open the last jar of cherries to celebrate,” but my mind played tricks on me. I thought I should not eat half of his last prized jar, but rather I should leave it there for him to enjoy the whole jar by himself some day when I’m back in Chicago. I declined his offer.
Now I sit overlooking Naples Valley, Canandaigua Lake, and our times together--and realize I should have opened that last jar and savored every bite sharing the experience with him. He only had a few days to live. I didn’t let myself believe it, and missed the opportunity. Worse, I wonder, in my ignorance, how I could have denied him that pleasure.
This is the most difficult, of all of it.
I pull myself together and walk to the car, so my tears won't fill up the valley.
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Days pass, routine sets in…
…I sort, pack, give away, throw away. Tine delivers car-loads to the shop in Bloomfield, Sarah sends students to take van-loads to a dumpster, Brian and Ruth drive away truck after truck-load of furniture. Sarah and I clean. June and I clean. I have lunch with an old high school friend.
As I finish the two kitchen cabinets, I look down at the empty shelf and there sitting proudly in the middle of it, is mother’s ring--the one I lost days ago. I think she is reminding me this is her kitchen! I slip it back on my little finger next to my ring, which is next to father’s.
Melinda arrives the next weekend to help, and happily performs all the duties I left undone. She makes sure I haven’t missed anything. At one point while packing a box, I hear mother’s ring fall off my finger again. Though I can’t find it, I’m not alarmed because I know it has to be there somewhere on the rug--I’ll find it later.
We meet Steven and Leslie for lunch and learn about western New York “Garbage Plates.” Each restaurant has a different name for it, like “Messy Plate” or “Sloppy Plate.” The plate starts with a covering of macaroni salad, on top of the salad is a layer of fried potatoes, then a choice of either two hot dogs, two hamburgers, or two cheeseburgers on top of the potatoes. A squirt of horseradish mustard, then finally it's bathed with a spicy meat sauce, similar to a meat chili, but not quite. I try a plate, and over the next three days track one down in each of three more restaurants. Talk about grief looking for comfort!
I decide to tell Steven the story about losing mother’s ring, then finding it again in her cabinets, then losing it once again. I’m looking for symbolism, or messages, when Melinda settles the discussion reminding us the ring was simply too big for my finger.
Steven picks up two more boxes from father’s--I saved mother’s old music books for him. He and Leslie sing “Old Time” music, which makes up a lot of mother's collection. In the evening Leslie calls to say, as she was putting one of the boxes away, something shiny caught her eye. She looked closer and there was mother’s ring nestled in the music books! Steven and I conclude simultaneously, mother must want her ring to be at Steven’s! She got out in the last box of her belongings!
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Good homes are found for father’s special pieces of furniture. Friends who cherish his memory now have his piano, grandfather clock, and display cases. I visit many of his friends, leaving mementos, memories and farewells.
Unsure about two crystal decanters, Melinda suggests leaving them on the counter and sooner or later I’ll know what to do with them. On the last Friday, long-time friends of the family offer to take me to Red Lobster. When I remember the restaurant is right around the corner from the dialysis unit, I finally know what to do. Before lunch I ask them to turn at Jay’s Diner, into the complex with the Big 10 theater, and I visit father’s dialysis unit one last time. I hug father’s partners in the chairs next to his and we talk about our families. I leave one decanter with Ionie and one with Mrs. Boyd.
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Though I've been sleeping at David and Marie’s every night, I still leave my suitcases in father’s back room. Now everything is gone, the apartment is empty. It’s time to take the suitcases down the hall to my guest room next door, for the last two nights.
But they don’t move easily. They stay in position as I back against the wall, sliding down to the carpet into a gulf of emptiness where father’s life has been. I understand the words “gut-wrenching” for the first time in my life. Wrenched, I gasp and gasp for what I have lost.
When able to stand, I make my way to the door, by way of the kitchen. Though not there, I see his medicine on the counter in a red plastic box, I see the canister set full of ingredients for his cookies and pies, I see the toaster next to Razzelberry jam, his midnight treats by the mixer, the day's fruit ripening on a crystal tray--all in this empty space, that should not be empty.
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Marie takes me in.
Later we work together, rearranging her complete collection of china tea cups--half into father’s display case now in her living room, and half into her family’s antique cabinet. We laugh and delight in the beauty and story of each cup and saucer. Mother also had a collection of English Bone China teacups like Marie's. Only to look at, we never touched them.
I have the mother I need this evening, to get me through.
One more day.
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