Things We Shared

Today, my mother would have been - ah, well - she never confessed her age to me in the many years we shared - so why start now?

When I hear about someone's parent dying, I feel a twinge and my heart goes out to them. It helps to write about it, I find, and several years ago I wrote a two-part column about her and me that was published in The View. I called it "Things We Shared."

Here is part II, in which I'm forced to admit she's dying, as a result of a simple, thoughtful thing she often did for me, in which we switched roles and I knew things had permanently changed.

Happy birthday, Mom. I miss you.

Toward the end, my visits with her were timed to coincide with major golf tournaments. I would arrive Thursday evening at the airport, greet her with a big hug around the tiny, increasingly fragile frame, and she would drive us in the tiny white Saturn to Applebee’s for a snack. I sometimes would succeed in picking up the tab, but more often she insisted I take the proferred cash for her share.

I believe our golf tournament viewing habit began when Tiger Woods first won the Masters in 1997. The timing of my visit then was a coincidence, but we were thrilled to see him win. He was one of her heroes.

At the same time, I began to realize our time together was growing shorter – she wouldn’t be here forever.

And so I began to visit more often, timing my visits with the Masters Golf Tornament (my personal favorite – I will never again view those beautiful vistas on TV without thinking of her), the British Open, the U.S. Open and the P.G.A. Championship.

 She had her dislikes among golfers, too. She detested Fred Couples, because she heard that he had cheated on his wife. Remember, there were rules to live by. I didn’t bother checking whether he had in fact cheated – she was sometimes wrong about these things – because even if the man was truly a saint, I couldn’t have convinced her.

She loathed Phil Mickelson, but that antipathy wasn’t based on his behavior or a bad reputation; in fact, it was quite unfair. She disliked Mickelson because he competed with Woods so effectively during that time. She admitted to me once that she would whisper “Miss It” as Mickelson attempted a key putt.

Of course, we didn’t spend all our time watching golf. She had home improvement projects planned, projects that required my help, living alone as she did. In fact, she would prepare a list before my arrival.

But she wasn’t a stern taskmaster. I have little talent or inclination for complex home improvement projects involving carpentry, plumbing or wiring, but I’ve a learned a few things over the years, and I can do the simple stuff.

I’ve also learned, however, that I have little patience when such projects go wrong, as they invariably will. The right tool isn’t available, the instructions aren’t clear, or you drop the screw below you on the floor and can’t find it.

 It was then that she shone. She encouraged me to postpone the project, relax, and maybe watch a little golf. There was no hurry – we could get back to it tomorrow. In fact, there were some visits that ended with my having completed very little, although we tried. What I viewed as failure didn’t bother her a bit – we’d get to it next time.

 Late in 2001 and into 2002, her health deteriorated. She had lung cancer and heart disease, and was hospitalized for a while. I visited a half-dozen times in 2002, at times hopeful, despairing at other times.

Ironically, the woman who did so much for me was toward the end reduced to asking me for help. I will never forget making a lunch of grilled cheese for her on my last visit – it was such a pathetic little offering for someone who had done so much for me. I felt puny and ineffectual. I wished I could have made her one of those rare roast beef sandwiches on thick, hand-cut Italian bread, generously layered with sweet salad dressing.

I believe with bedrock certainty that the measure of a good mother’s love is infinite. It’s an article of faith for me, one of the eternal verities.

It’s reaffirmed as I live my own life, by seeing my wife’s actions toward our children. I joked this week with my son about the embarrassing portions of food my wife jams into the storage container for his lunch – the effort to do this simple act is animated by love. My daughter received similar attention earlier this week. OK, I admit I get the same treatment.

This love is evidenced in acts, often small acts, not words, acts whose recompense for the giver is as simple as a little time together with the receiver. I was fortunate to have been the recipient of this love for so long, and have learned much from it, about others and myself.

I hope you dance

The boat was rocking in the wind and the waves, although the sun was shining. Most passengers had elected to don snorkeling gear and enter the ocean, to look at the colorful fish below the surface.

I was indecisive. I wanted to get in the water and snorkel; I had come on the boat excursion partly for that reason. But I've snorkeled in choppy waters before, and it's not much fun, unless - unless - you see some great fish swimming about.

But you won't know that until you get in the water, right?

I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean
Whenever one door closes I hope one more opens
Promise me that you'll give faith a fighting chance
And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance

Dance


In the end, I decided not to do it. I felt a bit better when another passenger emerged from the ocean and said that it wasn't worth it - too much work for too few fish. But I'd passed on an opportunity to have some fun, and I had some regrets.

Country singer Lee Ann Womack performed a song in 2000 called "I hope you dance." I was impressed with the writing and with the sentiment.

I've passed on a few chances to dance, literally and figuratively, in my past, largely to my regret. But I admire those who do choose to dance, as it were. I am surrounded by such people, in fact, by my wife Jan and my two children, Matthew and Kelly.

There are a few things my wife passes on - think stuff like skydiving -, but when it is time to screw up her courage and be responsible, there is no one like her. And she's a gamer in most situations.

We taught our kids to dance from the beginning. They were allowed to change activities like swimming, dance, soccer or basketball if they wished, but if you made a commitment to participate, you played through the season.

We introduced our kids to swimming when they were six months old. Matthew took to it, but Kelly, after enjoying the first swim session, decided she didn't like it at all. Tears and loud protestations followed before, during and after each swim.

What should we do as her parents? We wondered.  We decided to tough it out, and the word is apropos. It was tough. But, in the last session, something surprising happened: She liked it! She had fun! And the swim lessons continued for both our kids, who eventually swam competitively on the Belleville Tigers Swim Club.

They danced. They still do, in fact.

My grandson Noah dances often, and I love watching the enthusiasm, the excitement. When I first see him on a visit, it's "Pa, come see this," or "Pa, come see that." And we immediately launch into an activity lasting a few or many minutes, and move on to something else when it makes sense to both of us.

Jan said of Noah and his parents the other day, "They're going to make that kid's life one long series of adventures." Jan said it in a highly positive way. I could see immediately whet she was talking about, and I heartily agreed.

On the last leg of our recent flight to the Caribbean, I was not able to arrange seats next to anyone in the family. So, I sat alone in a window seat. I was not able to read because my Kindle ran out of battery, and I was bored. And hungry.

Noah and Matthew were seated two rows behind me. Matthew offered me some food, but I declined. And then I hear the little voice, stunningly clear and articulate for a two-year-old, asking me, "Pa, you want some chicken?"

I laughed alone in my seat, hard, and it was one of the those incidents, where, if you think about what just happened, you laugh again, and again.

My heart melted, and I was once again happy. "No thank you, Noah," I replied to the little voice a couple rows behind me in the airplane. And I laughed again. What a kid.

Later on the boat journey in the Caribbean, I jumped in the water and snorkeled. The view below the surface was a bit disappointing, but I was glad I did it. And better still, we climbed into and through a cave that had been a hideout for real pirates in the late 18th century.

The climb was a bit dangerous, but it was bracing to emerge though the hole at the top of their lair, to stand maybe 50 feet above the ocean on a rocky promontory surrounded by sand, water and wind. In the surface of the stone at the peak, the pirates had carved their names and other information, a lasting reminder of a different time, a different world. Ah, history.

(Tell me who wants to look back on their years and wonder, where those years have gone?).

Dance.