Packing and Unpacking, Town to Town, Up and Down the Dial
Saturday, October 15, 2011 at 9:17PM Previously on The Sun's In Our Hearts:
- The Ohio State University Marching Band does not get wet. It becomes liquid-covered awesome.
- Paper reverting to wood pulp is not a pretty sight.
- The Band calls this "Monday."
"This screws up your book," my mother said, the dim green lights on her IV mottling the pillowcase.
"No it doesn't. Okay, that is a zebra longwing butterfly. See the wingspan?" I said, and pointed again at the computer screen. The last time the nurse asked her to rate the pain from a scale of one to ten on the incision on her hip, the fourth time it's been split open, she said, "Eight." It's two hours to her next dose of Percocet and about twenty minutes before the The Ohio State Marching Band takes the field in Columbus for the Buckeye Classic. We are having an Everglades slide show on my laptop.
"But you I thought you needed to be up in Columbus all day today. You were supposed to be watching the marching band, and Jason."
"Two baby alligators there. One in the water. He jumped in right as I was taking the picture."
"I'm sorry, Beth."
I dropped both hands in my lap. "You seriously cannot be apologizing for being in the hospital. For surgery. For emergency surgery."
"But you need to--"
"I need to be right here." Click. "Here's a great blue heron. I saw these mostly in the northern part of the park."
Everywhere at once
She resigns herself to the heron. But she reads this site. She knows what I miss when I miss it, that where The Ohio State Marching Band is concerned, the YouTube replay is a weak substitute for reality, the tired tinge left behind on a coffee cup where a strong hot brew once sloshed against the sides. She's heard the "I get one shot at this season for this book" speech, both in conversation from Columbus and overheard while on the phone to my husband in Mobile.
And I know that, having lost one parent one year ago this month, the opportunity to discuss picture after picture of swamp grass and stupid yellow-legged brids with the remaining one is not to be bypassed.
My mother shifts in the bed again; I leap up to rearrange and retuck sheets for absolutely no purpose other than to rearrange and retuck. Out the window, the last swipes of the autumn sun were bending out of the sky. I glanced out at my car, which had faithfully carried me from the shore of Lake Erie to the outer southern edge of Key West and back to the cradle of my home civilization. Today, perhaps aware of the easy availability of antibiotics in these parts, it at last begun to tremble into submission, one tire sinking to the asphalt while the other three bore the load of the clothes, cooking utensils, and books necessary to sustain me from August through December. My sister, dropping me off from the other side of the hospital parking lot, looked on in astonishment.
"How long has it been like that?"
"I... I needed to get to Ohio...."
"You need to get that taken care of! What are you doing?"
At the tire shop down the street from the dim hospital room, a mechanic came walking towards me dusting bits of disintegrated rubber from his hands. "Miss, I'm sorry, but where the hell you been with this car? You got slow leaks happening on three tires here. You pushin' this thing."
I looked up from my laptop, where I'd been grading papers; on the Facebook page minimized to the bottom of the screen, my husband had just written the following on his profile: "I feel like I've had a one-night stand with my own wife. She even left a note on the pillow." Everglades National Park to Mobile, 749 miles; Mobile to Bowling Green, Kentucky, 511 miles; Bowling Green to Cincinnati, 210 miles; Cincinnati to Columbus, infinity.
"How much time you got for the service? You got anyplace to be today?"
On the flatscreen across from us on the wall of the customer lounge, Ohio State intercepts an Illinois pass and assembles its offense; my mother-in-law affixes a like to her son's Facebook status. "Yes. A minimum of three places. At the same time."
The mechanic, meanwhile, well aware that he has interrupted on a creative nonfiction conversation with myself, is fittingly frightened. "What's your call on the tires?"
"Replace them," I said. "I'm gonna be driving."
Today's Tasting Room Musical Note is sponsored by heading up that highway, leaving you behind:
Reader Comments (19)
Ah, crap, MB, I'm sorry. Hope your mom is doing better.
Moms are awesome.
What a bunch of different emotions you must be having.
you got your priorities straight tink
Oh no! Hope she is feeling better real soon!
I will pray for your mom. Your right she can't be replaced and that is exactly were you needed to be.
Oh, I almost forgot, BOOGERS!!!
It is just nonstop for your family right now, Mary Beth! Prayers for a quick recovery and that you weather this well.
What a bunch of different emotions you must be having.
No doubt! Fear, frustration, grief, appreciation, EXHAUSTION.... for some reason you just weren't supposed to see that performance, MB.
She sounds just like my mom. Hope she's on the mend.
That picture is perfectly chosen. Busy busy band all in one place!
I must admit to being jealous of your writing life, Belle, but times like this remind me of the enormous price you pay sometimes. Hope you and your family are well.
I leap up to rearrange and retuck sheets for absolutely no purpose other than to rearrange and tuck.
It's so awful to want to help our loved ones when they're suffering. You just wish you could take the pain away but you can't so just wind up doing stuff like this.
"Oh, I almost forgot, BOOGERS!!!"
Hahahahaha, that show was great. I love Johnny Fever.
BOOGERS!!!
"I thought turkeys could fly...."
Like you always say MB regarding this book, there is no such thing as a coincidence. You were just meant to be in Cincinnati right now.
I know you know this, but it's so tough being pulled in all different directions and sometimes the frustration can be overwhelming.
For those of you not familiar with the BOOGER reference:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKF8YxWWhI4
WKRP was hilarious. True classic.
I understand where you're coming from MB. I lost my mom a couple of years ago. And as an extension of that, I also lost my career because my dad needs me to be here. It's tough when life pulls you in several different directions, and to be perfectly honest, you aren't always happy with what you have to do even when you know you're doing the right thing, the thing you absolutely must do. I'm an only child, my dad needs me. This is where I have to be, where I need to be and where I should be, but that doesn't mean sometimes I don't want to be somewhere else, doing what I want instead of what needs to be done. But I love my dad, and I would do anything for him. And just like your mom when she thinks she's messing things up for you, you have to say, you must be kidding me, this is where I belong. Right here, right now, this is the right thing. Just don't forget to take care of yourself, too. Keeping you in my prayers, and I hope your mom is better soon.
Thanks KD The Reader (what an amazing daughter you are!) and everyone else for the good wishes. As of today my mother is stable, but still in the hospital and in pain. Overall she seems to be handling it pretty well.