Which stories get remembered? Which ones outlive the rememberers? I’ve been contemplating this, as my brother approached and then crossed the threshold of death.
Death in the family feels like this to me. I imagine sitting in a theatre with your loved ones, and when it’s your time to die you go up onto the stage, in the spotlight, and everyone you love, everyone who loves you, bears witness to the vanishing, your mysterious disappearance. The older you are, the closer to the front row you sit.
Everyone in my grandparent’s generation are long, long gone and with them, most of their stories. Everyone in my parent’s generation is decidedly gone and some of their stories are carried by their living children. My sister Judy passed on in 2015. My brother died today, July 24, 2022. My sister Aisha, 10 years older than I am is getting older and more frail. She, the oldest and I, the youngest of the four, are in the front row.
Three years and nine months ago Gerry was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer, the same cancer that took my father’s life. He was told, like my father, that he likely had 3-6 months to live. Because of the family history, they did genetic testing, and it turns out he has a mutation called the ATM mutation. Too bad it doesn’t make cash come out of your backside. I have it too. I get no less than three screening procedures and 5 medical appointments a year, to monitor what might never surface, or just might.
When he called me to tell me, I was driving the car, somewhere on a highway, I have no idea where. I started scream swearing, “God dammit all. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” It was just so wrong, and I knew it was a killer, and I was pissed, because of our four siblings, he had somehow managed to create a great life and loving family, and I wanted his story to go on past mine. I suppose it’s a sort of selfishness to not want to be the last one living, which I most certainly will be, unless my ATM mutation kicks in and I get the dreaded disease.
I’m sorry I didn’t have more grace, I’m sorry I didn’t say, “Oh, my god, Gerry, I’m so sorry. This is terrible. I love you. What can I do?” I’m sure my cussing made him squirm. I’m pretty sure he didn’t like drama. Sorry Gerry.
Since then he and his wife and three daughters, two son-in-laws, and two grandchildren have done a lot of bucket list stuff, Yellowstone in winter, Alaska in winter, Argentina. He and his wife sold their house in the DC area and moved to be close to two of his daughters in Yakima and Seattle Washington. They bought a cabin in Cle Elum, a small town on the Eastern slopes of the Cascades. Elk and turkeys wander through their yard. There is a gigantic swing for the grandkids. There is joy. He loves it there, and they were gathered there in his final days, while he received hospice treatment.
I hope he got the best drugs, if they even exist, but the ones that take away the pain and anxiety, but leave you clear and cogent, able to feel the love that surrounds you. I don’t know if those drugs even exist. I’d hate to think he’s lost in a blizzard, snow so thick you can’t see ten feet in front of you, and with the spotlight on him, creating the inside the snow globe effect of driving in heavy snow at night on a country road. Where the fuck am I? Where am I going? Where is everybody?
As a young man, he was confident and capable of handling that situation. I know, because I was with him, Judy and Beverly, walking three miles home from a friends house, after dark, in a freak blizzard, with freakish thunder and lightening. I was probably 5 years old. He would have been 13. This is a story about him, that I want to live on with his daughters.
It was a free ranging childhood for all of us. And it was no big deal on a snow day, to walk to Sherry’s house. We didn’t have snow boots back then. Oh god, this is starting to ring notes of a really old person’s story. Yup, snow boots didn’t exist yet. We wore cotton socks, sneakers, and over them, plastic bags (which had thankfully been just recently invented) and then over them galoshes, made out of black rubber, with a flap and a snap at the ankle. The plastic bags were to help with the fact that the galoshes were always too small, and otherwise you’d never get them on or off. None of this kept your feet warm or dry, because the snow just pilled in the neck of the rubbers, melted and soaked the cotton socks, which if it was cold enough, then also froze.
We did not live in a hole in the ground. We lived in a split level ranch suburban neighborhood right up against a forest, and terrific sledding hills. But for whatever reason, we went to visit Sherry. I don’t remember Sherry, but I do remember taking off the foot wear, somebody grabbing my arms, somebody else tugging at the boot. Her mom put the wet socks on the radiator and gave us all hot chocolate with marshmallows. They had a little white poodle who had pink and gunky eyes. I didn’t like the dog. I suppose we played a board games — Monopoly or Parcheesi.
Being kids, when we heard the thunder and saw that it was snowing, we did not want to go out, so we waited for it to ease off. And the storm got worse. And the thunder got closer. And by the time we decided we had to go, or Sherries mother decided we had to go, the sun was setting the sky was roiling with gray clouds that at the horizon went dark violet, and lit up from within when the lightning flashed. Being kids, free range kids, it did not occur to us to call our mother.
We started out and it was OK for the first mile, but then when the sun finally set and it got really dark, and the blizzard was bombing us with white flakes and if we didn’t stay close, we had to yell out to figure out where the other’s were, and it finally dawned on us all, that we might be in trouble. It was Gerry who inserted some sense into our situation.
He told us that he would lead, and Judy would hold his waist, I would hold her waist and Beverly, the oldest would follow up behind, making sure that all four of us stuck together. We kept this up for another mile. I’m sure I started whining about my freezing feet. I never complained about them if I was having fun, but this was not fun. Or was it? Was it an adventure? Sure, that’s what it was. That’s what Gerry told me. He said, imagine we are pioneers going through Donner’s Pass. Fortunately I didn’t know the details of that story. And we kept going.
My father must have gotten home from work, must have immediately been alarmed that the children were not at home. Did he have words with my mother? Or had he given up on trying to influence her? I’m sure he tried to sort things out, figure out where we might be, called Sherry’s mother, and set out in the car.
I’m sure that Gerry and Beverly must have felt an intense sense of relief, the unburdening of responsibility for Judy and I, who were just kids when my Dad showed. I was certainly happy to see my Dad, because I had never walked that far before. let alone in the snow. And I know I bundled under the blanket in the back seat. There always was a blanket there, because back then, the car we drove didn’t have heat. The old days.
providenceferal 