Diary - Entry 22
I am tired tonight, been when am I not these days? I am listening to Meatloaf, drinking vodka and remembering times when life was so much simpler and the worst thing that I was concerned about was my cheerleading uniform being clean and oiling my clarinet.
My mother at this point in time, had remarried a man 10 years her junior and only 8 years older than me (why anybody would be stupid enough to do that is beyond me. . .), which certainly made for interesting conversation.
For a while, things were somewhat normal. That is when my brother Michael was born. It was 1975 and that summer, my entire life changed. I fell deeply and irrevocably inlove with a local boy, who was several years older. They say you never forget your first love. I believe that. The imprint that our relation, which spanned. . .(as lovers) over a 15 year period, left me with certain standards which were hard for anyone else to compete with. He was my first boyfriend, first real companion, first kiss, first lover and first to break me into a million pieces that never really got glued back together. Even when he married his first wife, we continued to be lovers.
The raw intensity of what we felt for one another was unlike anything I or he for that matter, had or have ever known. We could not stand to be away from one another, one touch set each of us on fire. We tried desperately to get inside one another's skin when making love, because we could not get close enough
as our bodies would become one. When we babysat his siblings or mine, we did not care, we would sneak off to the bathroom, the closet, it did not matter. . . At school, we would go down into the basement and in the corner of the boiler room, we would spend our lunch time screwing our brains out and clinging to one another till the bell rang. During basketball season, as I was a cheerleader, we would ride the bus to away games and sit all the way in the back with his letterman jacket draped over us while I sat astride him, letting the motion of the bus, do the work.
My brother Todd adored him. Because of his speech problem, Todd had adopted the name for him that his own siblings called him, which was much easier for Todd to pronounce and that was 'Toy'. He was always kind, loving and considerate of Todd. He never rushed ahead of him to try and finish his senstenses as so many other people in his daily life did. You see, Todd kept all my secrets, just as I kept his. When my mother found out that Todd had been helping me sneak out to see 'Toy' and watching the kids when we were together, she beat both of us, but he got the brunt of it.
It was after that last beating that Todd called our father, whom we had not seen in many years, and asked him to come get him. I was lost when Todd went to Arkansas. My mother divorced her second husband and we moved back into town. She also broke us up. She sat up dates with other boys and told me that if I ever had any hopes of getting back with 'Toy', then I must widen my dating circles to include the local gentry. I felt like I was being pimped out. Each date was disatrous and each time, 'Toy' had been watching and would come to my window and I would cry, sometimes, so did he. The pain of seperation that I felt from him, was like a hot knife splitting me in two.
He and I were so attuned to one another that you did not know where one started and the other stopped. He had picked me up from school one afternoon early (he had already graduated), we talked, made love for the first time in a long time and he took me to work. He said, "I love you" and I said, "not as much as I love you", I went in to work, grabbed my apron and I thought. . .'we are going to be ok'. Five minutes later, my heart was beating wildly in my chest and I saw him flash in my mind. I screamed and dropped the glass coffee pot I had been holding. Everyone starred at me, then I fainted. I had seen, in my minds eye that he had been in a very bad wreck just moments after dropping me off. I went to the hospital. Waiting in the corner of the hallway, not speaking. The other girl that he had started dating was there along with members of his family and our friends. When he came out of the exam room, he searched for me, came to me, hugged me and through his tears and mine, we were whispering 'I love you'. . as we clung to one another.
We stood there for what seemed like hours, but was, in reality, only minutes. Once again, my life was altered in a inescapable way. Once again, I fought with my mother, once again, I not only lost the battle, but the war as well. Several days after the accident, he came to me and said that he did not want to see me anymore, and that he was moving on and that I should too.
The trouble with moving on is that paths cross, passion re-ignites and the silence of three decades has not dimmed the height of what we experienced together.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Here's To This Year's Hellish Holiday. . .
Diary - Entry 21
I am not in a good mood today. I have been sleep deprived for sometime now, not getting my normal, unbroken hours. . .really messes with your mood.
I realize that while I only did 60 hours over 10 days and I will work 3 doubles this week in addition to preparing for inventory on January 8th, by the time Christmas eve came. . .I was filled with disgust for mankind's cheapness, sense of humor and the fact that they are alive and don't appreciate it but want to give their 'baby mamas' sterling silver engagement rings. . .my job, truly sucked this year!
With the impending New Year, I find that I am filled with dread, anxiety and wishing I could claw my way out of my own skin. If I am not forced to go to work, I don't go out at all. I just cannot be bothered being polite to strangers and having to carry on inane conversations just for the sake of good manners. We were supposed to go out for New Years Eve, but I cannot muster the 'git-r-done' (as Todd would say) to do so.
Maybe by the time the Burns Night Ball arrives I will be in better shape.
As patrons of the Memphis Scottish Society, we have a dinner dance/ball to celebrate the life of Robert Burns. I look forward to this from a heritage standpoint, but when I think about the Haggis and pudding, the only thing that comes to mind is Todd vomitting black blood and bile. I just cannot wait. . .ughhh!
Since I cut off all my hair after Todd died, I won't have to fool with my usual hours spent doing my hair and although I had planned on wearing a red ballgown this year with my Clan plaid, I will wear my black silk faille ballgown instead. . .if I even end up attending.
I am beginning to babble so, I think it is time to sign off for today.
I am not in a good mood today. I have been sleep deprived for sometime now, not getting my normal, unbroken hours. . .really messes with your mood.
I realize that while I only did 60 hours over 10 days and I will work 3 doubles this week in addition to preparing for inventory on January 8th, by the time Christmas eve came. . .I was filled with disgust for mankind's cheapness, sense of humor and the fact that they are alive and don't appreciate it but want to give their 'baby mamas' sterling silver engagement rings. . .my job, truly sucked this year!
With the impending New Year, I find that I am filled with dread, anxiety and wishing I could claw my way out of my own skin. If I am not forced to go to work, I don't go out at all. I just cannot be bothered being polite to strangers and having to carry on inane conversations just for the sake of good manners. We were supposed to go out for New Years Eve, but I cannot muster the 'git-r-done' (as Todd would say) to do so.
Maybe by the time the Burns Night Ball arrives I will be in better shape.
As patrons of the Memphis Scottish Society, we have a dinner dance/ball to celebrate the life of Robert Burns. I look forward to this from a heritage standpoint, but when I think about the Haggis and pudding, the only thing that comes to mind is Todd vomitting black blood and bile. I just cannot wait. . .ughhh!
Since I cut off all my hair after Todd died, I won't have to fool with my usual hours spent doing my hair and although I had planned on wearing a red ballgown this year with my Clan plaid, I will wear my black silk faille ballgown instead. . .if I even end up attending.
I am beginning to babble so, I think it is time to sign off for today.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Christmas In the Land Of "Make-Believe"
Diary - Entry 20
It has been a while since I have journaled, because of work, company and such, but tonight, I have no interruptions and I thought it would be a good time to get caught up.
Over the last several years, my Christnas tree has not consisted of the latest ornaments, tinsel, or crowned with the most expensive topper. I don't follow the trends and fads at Walmart or Target in decorating and I could give two shits abouts proper ornament placement, from Home and Garden. . .
The only thing I am doing this year differently than any other, is putting tiny white lites on the tree (which is the celebratory color of a loved one that has died) rather than tiny clear ones, the original topper from when Rich and I spent our first christmas together, which is "Father Time"and I have, consistently bought small silver frames, which are filled with photographs of all the things that have happened over the years. This year, the frames are filled mostly with remembrances of Todd.
My husband came home today, to find me sitting in front of the fireplace, cutting up pictures of my brother that would fit in the tiny frames. . . I was sitting by the fire, crying, remembering Christmases past, when we were young, and care free. My husband asked no questions. . .but went into the powder room, grabbed some tissue and sat down beside me.
Some days, I try really hard not to think about him being gone, other days, I realize that my visits to the farm will not include a visit with him. . .
Will there be a time when I am able to let go and not miss him?
It has been a while since I have journaled, because of work, company and such, but tonight, I have no interruptions and I thought it would be a good time to get caught up.
Over the last several years, my Christnas tree has not consisted of the latest ornaments, tinsel, or crowned with the most expensive topper. I don't follow the trends and fads at Walmart or Target in decorating and I could give two shits abouts proper ornament placement, from Home and Garden. . .
The only thing I am doing this year differently than any other, is putting tiny white lites on the tree (which is the celebratory color of a loved one that has died) rather than tiny clear ones, the original topper from when Rich and I spent our first christmas together, which is "Father Time"and I have, consistently bought small silver frames, which are filled with photographs of all the things that have happened over the years. This year, the frames are filled mostly with remembrances of Todd.
My husband came home today, to find me sitting in front of the fireplace, cutting up pictures of my brother that would fit in the tiny frames. . . I was sitting by the fire, crying, remembering Christmases past, when we were young, and care free. My husband asked no questions. . .but went into the powder room, grabbed some tissue and sat down beside me.
Some days, I try really hard not to think about him being gone, other days, I realize that my visits to the farm will not include a visit with him. . .
Will there be a time when I am able to let go and not miss him?
Monday, December 14, 2009
Anniversary. . . Cometh and Goeth
Diary - Entry 19
One month ago, at four o'clock in the moring, my brother died, yet, in some respects, it seems like only yesterday. Does anyone realize or care. . .other than me, that is?
You know, it is amazing to me that when you are a kid, with your first serious boyfirend. . .you think one month is a long time for a relationship. Then you make the one year mark and time has flown by. That One year becomes 5 and before you know it you are celebrating a 25th anniversary, maybe longer. . . but the realationship that you share with a sibling. . .no matter the time span, is unequivicable to that of any other.
I use the word, "celebrating" because that is what this should have been. . .a celebration of Todds life, not hiding him away like some dirty, shameful secret. I loved my brother and I will continue to love him and honor his memory by continuing to write about our lives together and apart.
One month ago, at four o'clock in the moring, my brother died, yet, in some respects, it seems like only yesterday. Does anyone realize or care. . .other than me, that is?
You know, it is amazing to me that when you are a kid, with your first serious boyfirend. . .you think one month is a long time for a relationship. Then you make the one year mark and time has flown by. That One year becomes 5 and before you know it you are celebrating a 25th anniversary, maybe longer. . . but the realationship that you share with a sibling. . .no matter the time span, is unequivicable to that of any other.
I use the word, "celebrating" because that is what this should have been. . .a celebration of Todds life, not hiding him away like some dirty, shameful secret. I loved my brother and I will continue to love him and honor his memory by continuing to write about our lives together and apart.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
The Trouble With Moods. . .
Diary - Entry 18
Well, by now I am sure that most of you realize that between the stress, anxiety, depression, and screaming about what is wrong with people and why cannot everyone do the right thing by each other, our partners, our children and our friends.
You know, I am pretty certain that The Ten Commandments really do exsist. I am also pretty sure that my family has broken all of them in some way, shape or form.
With that in mind, I sought the help of my family doctor (who is without a doubt, the most incredible fdoctor I have ever had) put me on meds that have stabilized my moods, helped with the deep depression, and anxiety.
If you are to the point where you need medical intervention, as I had gotten because the pain and grief is so intense, please do so. While everyone is different. .we are all children of the origal Ten Comandments.
Well, by now I am sure that most of you realize that between the stress, anxiety, depression, and screaming about what is wrong with people and why cannot everyone do the right thing by each other, our partners, our children and our friends.
You know, I am pretty certain that The Ten Commandments really do exsist. I am also pretty sure that my family has broken all of them in some way, shape or form.
With that in mind, I sought the help of my family doctor (who is without a doubt, the most incredible fdoctor I have ever had) put me on meds that have stabilized my moods, helped with the deep depression, and anxiety.
If you are to the point where you need medical intervention, as I had gotten because the pain and grief is so intense, please do so. While everyone is different. .we are all children of the origal Ten Comandments.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
From Cradle To Coffin. . .
Diary - Entry 17
My charm came in yesterday for my Tiffany bracelet. The coffin was so real. It even opens. Guess what, inside is a skeleton. . . so I had it sent to the shop, and soldered on. They are engraving his birth and death date on the bottom. Next time we go to Arkansas, I will take a sample of the earth that lays on top of his grave and sprinkle it over the skeleton, then have it solder shut.
My charm came in yesterday for my Tiffany bracelet. The coffin was so real. It even opens. Guess what, inside is a skeleton. . . so I had it sent to the shop, and soldered on. They are engraving his birth and death date on the bottom. Next time we go to Arkansas, I will take a sample of the earth that lays on top of his grave and sprinkle it over the skeleton, then have it solder shut.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Angels and Demons or Devils and Spawn. . .Is one really worse than the other?
Diary - Entry 16
My husband is mad at me because I am not going out to the farm for Christmas. I am only putting up a tree the night before, for our son and I will be working over time so I do not have to face the first Christmas without Todd.
I had a customer come in to by a ring for his girlfriend who lived in Peru. When we got to the register, and I asked him all the information. . .name, address (you know, the usual bullshit that nobody really wants to mailed crap from) . Anyway, when he said his name was Todd, I was not only taken aback, but I had to excuse myself and have my boss finish ringing up the sale. In the four years I have been with Kays, I have never had a customer by that name. . .so naturally, I started crying (although technically I am on enough Prozac to dry out the state of Washington) and had to pull myself together to go back on the floor.
While people say "he's in a better place". . .how do they know that? What makes them an authority on where his soul landed? When they say "I am so sorry for your loss" . . .how truly sorry are they? Did they really know him or what he was like underneath it all or how much I loved him?
I and religion have never seen eye to eye. My grandparents baptised me Assembly of God, my mother baptised me Baptist, my first longterm relation made me a Jehovah Witness, and my husband is Protestant although, he is a Jew by birth.
All of these religions are lead by "men of God'. . .supposedly. Does a man of God beat his grandchildren, allow sexual abuse by the greatgrandfather, and inflict mental cruelty? I think not. Hence, my own course of religious interrogation has lead me to look down the road to that of a Messianic Jew. To me, they are the closet thing to what and how the Bible is meant to be interpreted. Currently we attend Advent where our son plays sports and attends summer camps.
But I do not attend service because they shout, sing and raise their hands and say 'hallalujah'. . .only in a milder form. They have a folk singing trio (why I am not sure) and the service is somewhat not really specific, so I would rather sleep in on my day off. I think everyone needs a spiritual core, I just don't think that mine is as readily identifiable as others.
Obviously, people who have conviction of faith, attend services and accept the jargan that is pumped into them each Sunday. Yet, how do you know for sure that you are not like a bunch of drones in a bee-hive, being told what to do by the Queen (preacher).
Don't get me wrong, I believe in God and Jesus, but the interpretations of every religion leaves something missing, it isn't whole, too many unanswered questions.
Yes, my mood is dark tonight and I am somewhat in a thinking mood. But I worked 14 hours today and it will only get worse, so I will write, when I can.
My husband is mad at me because I am not going out to the farm for Christmas. I am only putting up a tree the night before, for our son and I will be working over time so I do not have to face the first Christmas without Todd.
I had a customer come in to by a ring for his girlfriend who lived in Peru. When we got to the register, and I asked him all the information. . .name, address (you know, the usual bullshit that nobody really wants to mailed crap from) . Anyway, when he said his name was Todd, I was not only taken aback, but I had to excuse myself and have my boss finish ringing up the sale. In the four years I have been with Kays, I have never had a customer by that name. . .so naturally, I started crying (although technically I am on enough Prozac to dry out the state of Washington) and had to pull myself together to go back on the floor.
While people say "he's in a better place". . .how do they know that? What makes them an authority on where his soul landed? When they say "I am so sorry for your loss" . . .how truly sorry are they? Did they really know him or what he was like underneath it all or how much I loved him?
I and religion have never seen eye to eye. My grandparents baptised me Assembly of God, my mother baptised me Baptist, my first longterm relation made me a Jehovah Witness, and my husband is Protestant although, he is a Jew by birth.
All of these religions are lead by "men of God'. . .supposedly. Does a man of God beat his grandchildren, allow sexual abuse by the greatgrandfather, and inflict mental cruelty? I think not. Hence, my own course of religious interrogation has lead me to look down the road to that of a Messianic Jew. To me, they are the closet thing to what and how the Bible is meant to be interpreted. Currently we attend Advent where our son plays sports and attends summer camps.
But I do not attend service because they shout, sing and raise their hands and say 'hallalujah'. . .only in a milder form. They have a folk singing trio (why I am not sure) and the service is somewhat not really specific, so I would rather sleep in on my day off. I think everyone needs a spiritual core, I just don't think that mine is as readily identifiable as others.
Obviously, people who have conviction of faith, attend services and accept the jargan that is pumped into them each Sunday. Yet, how do you know for sure that you are not like a bunch of drones in a bee-hive, being told what to do by the Queen (preacher).
Don't get me wrong, I believe in God and Jesus, but the interpretations of every religion leaves something missing, it isn't whole, too many unanswered questions.
Yes, my mood is dark tonight and I am somewhat in a thinking mood. But I worked 14 hours today and it will only get worse, so I will write, when I can.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
When The Circle Fails To Completes Itself. . .
Diary - Entry 15
Someone once said that "you can never go home again', unfortunately, having experienced the statement, I can say that it is true, especially when your entire family is completely and utterly dysfunctional. . .
I thought that in the twenty years I was gone, the changing climate in New Jersey and wanting our son to know his 'family' was a good idea. I thought he would like visiting the farm, since now, it was a realatively safe place. Spending more time with his grammy and grandpa so forth and so on. Although it is convient to so many destinations with an easy airport (Memphis International), I feel in my heart of hearts, we should have stayed either up North, where our real family is or someplace that did not have such heartache and misery associated with it.
My step mother and I are not speaking at the moment, for reasons that she fails to comprehend. She is very good at making one feel stupid, enept and she has a very bad habit of rushing ahead and not letting you get you thought process out before she has jumped to the wrong forgone conclusion. I think in some weird way, after being married to my father for so long, she thinks it is her due to become the matriarch of the family, when my grandmother is still very much alive. Apparently, nobody cares.
My grandmother told me while I was growing up, that one day all her jewelry would be mine, but I must take good care of it and hand it down at the proper time. . .mysteriously . . .I think the cuboard is bare.
Both my grandparents offered me $150,000.00 in cash , if we would move back down south. Yeah, that materialized as well. . .(somehow the farm is in financial difficulty, which I find odd, because my grandparents had always been conservative. . .)
Jewelry, money and promises aside, the bitterness, anger, hurt and resentment I feel toward my father, step-mother and ex-sister-in-law is unparalled to any thing that I have ever known and it sickens me to realize that they could probably care less, because to them I am a constant reminder of my fathers love for my mother, my step-mothers admitted jealousy and the fact that I knew my brother better than his wife did.
Someone once said that "you can never go home again', unfortunately, having experienced the statement, I can say that it is true, especially when your entire family is completely and utterly dysfunctional. . .
I thought that in the twenty years I was gone, the changing climate in New Jersey and wanting our son to know his 'family' was a good idea. I thought he would like visiting the farm, since now, it was a realatively safe place. Spending more time with his grammy and grandpa so forth and so on. Although it is convient to so many destinations with an easy airport (Memphis International), I feel in my heart of hearts, we should have stayed either up North, where our real family is or someplace that did not have such heartache and misery associated with it.
My step mother and I are not speaking at the moment, for reasons that she fails to comprehend. She is very good at making one feel stupid, enept and she has a very bad habit of rushing ahead and not letting you get you thought process out before she has jumped to the wrong forgone conclusion. I think in some weird way, after being married to my father for so long, she thinks it is her due to become the matriarch of the family, when my grandmother is still very much alive. Apparently, nobody cares.
My grandmother told me while I was growing up, that one day all her jewelry would be mine, but I must take good care of it and hand it down at the proper time. . .mysteriously . . .I think the cuboard is bare.
Both my grandparents offered me $150,000.00 in cash , if we would move back down south. Yeah, that materialized as well. . .(somehow the farm is in financial difficulty, which I find odd, because my grandparents had always been conservative. . .)
Jewelry, money and promises aside, the bitterness, anger, hurt and resentment I feel toward my father, step-mother and ex-sister-in-law is unparalled to any thing that I have ever known and it sickens me to realize that they could probably care less, because to them I am a constant reminder of my fathers love for my mother, my step-mothers admitted jealousy and the fact that I knew my brother better than his wife did.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Memories Are Made Of This
Diary - Entry14
Many people have critized the way that I have lived my life, raise my son and so forth. Every human being on the planet makes mistakes, I have spent the last 20 years making up for mine, but they never seem to be forgiven or forgetten. I have learned that I forgave myself, and if others cannot, oh well!!!
While I have touched on this subject before, It is most prevelent in my mind at the moment, because my husband is away and at some point, our son crawled into bed, snuggled up and said "bad dream, can I stay here?" Yes, I replied So I wrapped my arms around him and he fell back asleep..
When my great grand-father started making me take naps with him, he was in his seventies at the time, he had the weirdest smell. Old tobacco, days without bathing and some kind of alcohol. I hated him and that pink house, but loved my great-gandmother dearly, as she made most of my clothes, and made my life bearable in a sense. Saturdays were my favorite, we would unbound her hair which was down to her waist and she would let it dry while we hung clothes on the line. When it was almost dry, she would let me braid it again and we would re-wrap it around her head for church the next day.
Arkansas winters can be quite cold and bitter. In those days, because I was Assembly of God, I could only wear dresses. I would walk to the end of the gravel road, I would be shivering and have to go to the bathroom, but the thought of going to the pink house,where he lived, and was closest, so I wouldn't miss the bus, filled me with such dread and anxiety that I would I would just pee my pants, and go to school smelling like that.
With my parents ledgendary battles, moving around and such, I eventually went to Missouri to my mothers grandparents.
Many years later, after I had taken all the craziness I could from my mentally ill mother. . . I too, went down to join my brother Todd and live with my father. It wasnt' long before he had a new girlfriend and made her his wife.
One day, I went to my step-mother Barb, and complained that Papa (my grandfather) would shove his tongue down my throat, while grabbing my ass and pinching my boobs. The sage advice that she gave me: "We'll if you didn't go around dressed like a slut, he wouldn't be tempeted". I was mortified. As a teenager, in the summer, I did not think that shorts, sandals, tank tops and tee shirts was a justafiable cause to make not only such a statement, but to put in in such a manner that it felt as if she had slapped me across the face and filled with such bitterness you could feel it in the air. I never talked to her about anything important while under their roof, again.
I never had a childhood, not in the real sense of the word, I had not planned on every having children. I wanted to live in New York, be a writer and never go back to the person I turned out to be. I had children, loved them dearly,tried to make the best of a bad marriage the first go round and then waited 17 years before tying the knot and starting another family. I have tried to be the mother to Hugh, that I , at the age of 19, was not able to be for my son, Hayden, who through no fault of his own, had parents that were desperately still in-love with other people. Although we tried to make it work, the was just to many things and people involved in our marriage.
Hugh has a childhood, it is painfree, full of life, travel, collecting everything from coins for Cub Scouts to rescuing homeless pets from shelters and things. He is tender of heart, loving and most of the time, very polite (although he does have his moments. . .unfortunately he is both McFarland and McDaniel and is prone to boughts of anger and tantrums, when he does not get his way. . .which, trust me, isn't very often).
I never spanked him unless he truly did something wrong, because I just had been beaten so often, that I could not bear to inflict that on him, so I chose time outs, removal of favorite toys and the like. Because of the abuse in my family, I guarded his person and his personal space with a zealousness of a mother bear protecting her cub. Most people think, that at ten years old he should be allowed to walk to his friends house, alone. Most people don't understand why I make my husband go the the rest room with him. Or why he cannot spend the night at his friends, but they are welcome here.
I really don't care about most peoples opinions, especially in an age of prevelent pedophilia, child pornograhy, rape and murder of young children. It is easy to stand on the outside of a family, looking through the window; make comments, judgements and assumptions, but is it really your business?
The bond between a parent and a child can be, should be and would be unbreakable, if it were a perfect world. In that world, children are loved, cherished and put first, no matter what the personal sacrifice because the child had no choice in his/her parentage and should never be punished because of it.
However, we do not live in a perfect world. Yet, as a parent it is our examples that light the way for change.
Many people have critized the way that I have lived my life, raise my son and so forth. Every human being on the planet makes mistakes, I have spent the last 20 years making up for mine, but they never seem to be forgiven or forgetten. I have learned that I forgave myself, and if others cannot, oh well!!!
While I have touched on this subject before, It is most prevelent in my mind at the moment, because my husband is away and at some point, our son crawled into bed, snuggled up and said "bad dream, can I stay here?" Yes, I replied So I wrapped my arms around him and he fell back asleep..
When my great grand-father started making me take naps with him, he was in his seventies at the time, he had the weirdest smell. Old tobacco, days without bathing and some kind of alcohol. I hated him and that pink house, but loved my great-gandmother dearly, as she made most of my clothes, and made my life bearable in a sense. Saturdays were my favorite, we would unbound her hair which was down to her waist and she would let it dry while we hung clothes on the line. When it was almost dry, she would let me braid it again and we would re-wrap it around her head for church the next day.
Arkansas winters can be quite cold and bitter. In those days, because I was Assembly of God, I could only wear dresses. I would walk to the end of the gravel road, I would be shivering and have to go to the bathroom, but the thought of going to the pink house,where he lived, and was closest, so I wouldn't miss the bus, filled me with such dread and anxiety that I would I would just pee my pants, and go to school smelling like that.
With my parents ledgendary battles, moving around and such, I eventually went to Missouri to my mothers grandparents.
Many years later, after I had taken all the craziness I could from my mentally ill mother. . . I too, went down to join my brother Todd and live with my father. It wasnt' long before he had a new girlfriend and made her his wife.
One day, I went to my step-mother Barb, and complained that Papa (my grandfather) would shove his tongue down my throat, while grabbing my ass and pinching my boobs. The sage advice that she gave me: "We'll if you didn't go around dressed like a slut, he wouldn't be tempeted". I was mortified. As a teenager, in the summer, I did not think that shorts, sandals, tank tops and tee shirts was a justafiable cause to make not only such a statement, but to put in in such a manner that it felt as if she had slapped me across the face and filled with such bitterness you could feel it in the air. I never talked to her about anything important while under their roof, again.
I never had a childhood, not in the real sense of the word, I had not planned on every having children. I wanted to live in New York, be a writer and never go back to the person I turned out to be. I had children, loved them dearly,tried to make the best of a bad marriage the first go round and then waited 17 years before tying the knot and starting another family. I have tried to be the mother to Hugh, that I , at the age of 19, was not able to be for my son, Hayden, who through no fault of his own, had parents that were desperately still in-love with other people. Although we tried to make it work, the was just to many things and people involved in our marriage.
Hugh has a childhood, it is painfree, full of life, travel, collecting everything from coins for Cub Scouts to rescuing homeless pets from shelters and things. He is tender of heart, loving and most of the time, very polite (although he does have his moments. . .unfortunately he is both McFarland and McDaniel and is prone to boughts of anger and tantrums, when he does not get his way. . .which, trust me, isn't very often).
I never spanked him unless he truly did something wrong, because I just had been beaten so often, that I could not bear to inflict that on him, so I chose time outs, removal of favorite toys and the like. Because of the abuse in my family, I guarded his person and his personal space with a zealousness of a mother bear protecting her cub. Most people think, that at ten years old he should be allowed to walk to his friends house, alone. Most people don't understand why I make my husband go the the rest room with him. Or why he cannot spend the night at his friends, but they are welcome here.
I really don't care about most peoples opinions, especially in an age of prevelent pedophilia, child pornograhy, rape and murder of young children. It is easy to stand on the outside of a family, looking through the window; make comments, judgements and assumptions, but is it really your business?
The bond between a parent and a child can be, should be and would be unbreakable, if it were a perfect world. In that world, children are loved, cherished and put first, no matter what the personal sacrifice because the child had no choice in his/her parentage and should never be punished because of it.
However, we do not live in a perfect world. Yet, as a parent it is our examples that light the way for change.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
When The Past Meets The Present
Diary - Entry 13
Yes, once again it is the middle of the night or should I say, morning. . .I am sleepless again, even though the pills work for a few hours, I enevitabley end up. The puppy, Knox, is sitting in my lap. Wanting to play, but I do not, as I am not in the mood.
This journal entry is not so much about our childhood, but about step-parenting. My mother had the uncanny ability to pick the wrong men for herself, as well as my father did for himself. Case in point: My fathers girlfriend at the time, Carolyn, had three children from a previous marriage, as did my father.
While they were in the 'dating phase' everthing was great. Then dad decided to marry her and build her a house at the the family 'compound' (which is what I refer to it as everyone that lived there was related). Anyway, on one of my last visits to the farm, my father had my brothers and I going throught the space where the house was to be built and remove any big rocks and things. Carolyn and her kids, did nothing. Once the house was built, they did not include rooms for myself and my brothers. . .only rooms for her three children. Terry had the largest bedroom with her own private bath.
I came down once more. Carolyn was having her friends over for lunch and we were never allowed to eat in my fathers house, she would send us down the gravel road to my grandparents, yet, her own kids, could stay and have lunch with her friends. Slowly the marriage deteriorated and my father came home to find the house stripped bare. Carolyn thought she would get everything including the house, but my family has set things up that nobody, other than a blood McFarland can reside and own property within the family. At least that is what my grandmother told me.
My mother, well, she married a man 10 years her junior. So Randy, in theory, was only 9 years older than me. They had a baby, my brother Michael, whom I adored. Life with my mother was not easy. She expected me to get my brothers ready for school, daycare, cook the meals, do the laundry and keep the house clean (and I mean toothbrush clean), maintain my grades and still be on the cheerleading squad and do gymnastics. I was 12 but felt like 40. I had bleeding ulcers by the time I was 14. Eventually my brother Todd could not take the pressure of living with her constant abuse for the smallest infraction and went to live with my dad, whom I had, at that point, not seen in several years.
Randy, my mothers husband, had no real parenting skills. . .he was barely out of high school and old enough to drink. So, I continued. I missed Todd terribly, Vic was 4 years younger and Michael was just a baby.
It was about this time when things changed for me as well. I have always been an "old soul", so when I met 'him', I knew that we were two halves of the same whole. When my mother tired of being married, she left the house, with us in tow and I suspect, it somehow devestated Randy for he was her first real love and he continued to love her till the day she died, just as my father had done. Which is why he brought my mothers body back here to be buried, 'where she belonged' and where I suspect he could see her every day, although my father, by this time had been married to his third wife, Barb for nearly 30 years.
Time dragged on and with that passage, it brought changes that still effect me to day. It is sometimes hard letting go of the past, when the present is staring you in the face as a daily reminder of what should of, could of and never will be.
I became a step-mother myself and tried desperatly to not make the mistakes that had warped my sense of what a parents responsibilties are, no matter when and where they come from. Children do not get to choose their parents. . .
Yes, once again it is the middle of the night or should I say, morning. . .I am sleepless again, even though the pills work for a few hours, I enevitabley end up. The puppy, Knox, is sitting in my lap. Wanting to play, but I do not, as I am not in the mood.
This journal entry is not so much about our childhood, but about step-parenting. My mother had the uncanny ability to pick the wrong men for herself, as well as my father did for himself. Case in point: My fathers girlfriend at the time, Carolyn, had three children from a previous marriage, as did my father.
While they were in the 'dating phase' everthing was great. Then dad decided to marry her and build her a house at the the family 'compound' (which is what I refer to it as everyone that lived there was related). Anyway, on one of my last visits to the farm, my father had my brothers and I going throught the space where the house was to be built and remove any big rocks and things. Carolyn and her kids, did nothing. Once the house was built, they did not include rooms for myself and my brothers. . .only rooms for her three children. Terry had the largest bedroom with her own private bath.
I came down once more. Carolyn was having her friends over for lunch and we were never allowed to eat in my fathers house, she would send us down the gravel road to my grandparents, yet, her own kids, could stay and have lunch with her friends. Slowly the marriage deteriorated and my father came home to find the house stripped bare. Carolyn thought she would get everything including the house, but my family has set things up that nobody, other than a blood McFarland can reside and own property within the family. At least that is what my grandmother told me.
My mother, well, she married a man 10 years her junior. So Randy, in theory, was only 9 years older than me. They had a baby, my brother Michael, whom I adored. Life with my mother was not easy. She expected me to get my brothers ready for school, daycare, cook the meals, do the laundry and keep the house clean (and I mean toothbrush clean), maintain my grades and still be on the cheerleading squad and do gymnastics. I was 12 but felt like 40. I had bleeding ulcers by the time I was 14. Eventually my brother Todd could not take the pressure of living with her constant abuse for the smallest infraction and went to live with my dad, whom I had, at that point, not seen in several years.
Randy, my mothers husband, had no real parenting skills. . .he was barely out of high school and old enough to drink. So, I continued. I missed Todd terribly, Vic was 4 years younger and Michael was just a baby.
It was about this time when things changed for me as well. I have always been an "old soul", so when I met 'him', I knew that we were two halves of the same whole. When my mother tired of being married, she left the house, with us in tow and I suspect, it somehow devestated Randy for he was her first real love and he continued to love her till the day she died, just as my father had done. Which is why he brought my mothers body back here to be buried, 'where she belonged' and where I suspect he could see her every day, although my father, by this time had been married to his third wife, Barb for nearly 30 years.
Time dragged on and with that passage, it brought changes that still effect me to day. It is sometimes hard letting go of the past, when the present is staring you in the face as a daily reminder of what should of, could of and never will be.
I became a step-mother myself and tried desperatly to not make the mistakes that had warped my sense of what a parents responsibilties are, no matter when and where they come from. Children do not get to choose their parents. . .
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Cold
Diary - Entry 12
I lay awake last night (till my sleeping pills took effect) thinking about the coming winter, how cold it was and how cold Todd's body must be by now. . . I kept seeing him, laying there so still, quiet and probably at peace for the first time since his youth.
I have a sterling silver bracelet that Rich bought me for Christmas from Tiffanys the year Hugh was born, I have added only charms over the years that had special meaning to my life as a wife, mother, friend and so on. Yesterday, I took out the Rembrant Charm book at work (lest we forget that I am still employed by Kay Jewelers) and I thumbed through the charms looking for something that I thought would represent him to me in the present tense, as that is where he is. . . so I ordered a small coffin, engraved with his monogram on the front, his birth and death dates on the back. The coffin opens, so when it arrives, I will fill it with dirt from his gravesite.
Everyone at work, thought it was morbid. . . but I said, it is either the coffin or a can of beer - both represented death to me.
With the impending holidays, I just dread the fact that I won't see his face, listen to him complain about his NASCAR winners and loosers all the while desperatly trying to communicate with me without stuttering so bad.
It's funny, when our mother died last summer from cancer at the age of 62, I did not really feel anything for her passing. We had not been close for many years since we tried to reconcile when Hugh was a baby.
Two days in my house and she got drunk and attacked me, ripping my shirt off, she hit the baby and tried shoving me down the stairs. She would not respect the fact that Hugh was born with many medical issues and therefore, smoking anything in the house was forbidden. As a guest in my home, she ignored the few requests I made. I left the house that night of the fight with Hugh and went to our new house, where I pulled out sleeping bags and lit a fire in the fireplace. Hugh was sleeping beside me... She was put back on the bus, the next day
Yet the grief and sadness I feel at Todd's death (I had a customer come in yesterday and his name was Todd) I cannot seem to get a handle on. It is much like the weather outside. . .icy wind, blowing hollow through me and leaving me unable to shake the chill.
I lay awake last night (till my sleeping pills took effect) thinking about the coming winter, how cold it was and how cold Todd's body must be by now. . . I kept seeing him, laying there so still, quiet and probably at peace for the first time since his youth.
I have a sterling silver bracelet that Rich bought me for Christmas from Tiffanys the year Hugh was born, I have added only charms over the years that had special meaning to my life as a wife, mother, friend and so on. Yesterday, I took out the Rembrant Charm book at work (lest we forget that I am still employed by Kay Jewelers) and I thumbed through the charms looking for something that I thought would represent him to me in the present tense, as that is where he is. . . so I ordered a small coffin, engraved with his monogram on the front, his birth and death dates on the back. The coffin opens, so when it arrives, I will fill it with dirt from his gravesite.
Everyone at work, thought it was morbid. . . but I said, it is either the coffin or a can of beer - both represented death to me.
With the impending holidays, I just dread the fact that I won't see his face, listen to him complain about his NASCAR winners and loosers all the while desperatly trying to communicate with me without stuttering so bad.
It's funny, when our mother died last summer from cancer at the age of 62, I did not really feel anything for her passing. We had not been close for many years since we tried to reconcile when Hugh was a baby.
Two days in my house and she got drunk and attacked me, ripping my shirt off, she hit the baby and tried shoving me down the stairs. She would not respect the fact that Hugh was born with many medical issues and therefore, smoking anything in the house was forbidden. As a guest in my home, she ignored the few requests I made. I left the house that night of the fight with Hugh and went to our new house, where I pulled out sleeping bags and lit a fire in the fireplace. Hugh was sleeping beside me... She was put back on the bus, the next day
Yet the grief and sadness I feel at Todd's death (I had a customer come in yesterday and his name was Todd) I cannot seem to get a handle on. It is much like the weather outside. . .icy wind, blowing hollow through me and leaving me unable to shake the chill.
Friday, December 4, 2009
War Of The McFarlands
Diary - Entry 11
Back and forth they would go, sometimes my mother would leave, sometimes my father would leave. At some point in time, someone has to say "STOP". That someone was my grandparents on my mothers side. They were realativly normal, when you consider all that we had been through up to this point. We went to live with them and attended Lamar Elementary in Lamar, Missouri. Those were some of the best times.
We went to school on a regular basis, but Todd found it increasingly difficult to socialize because he stuttered so badly by this time and he was painfully shy. He did not stutter with me, when we were alone, only when the outside world interferred. My mother was rarely 'home', as she had taken a job at the local country club as a bartender and her social like was such that she sometimes didn't bother coming home at all. She was always done up in her mini skirts, boots and hairpieces piled high. Things ran much smoother when she was not in the picture.
Papaw was a rancher in Missouri. He had cattle, pigs, a stocked fishing pond, chickens and gardens. He taught me to heard and cut cattle, slaughter pigs and catch fish. Todd, bless his heart, did not share my enthusiasm for such sports. We took him fishing and when he would catch something, he would turn to Papaw and beg him to put the fish back, when we killed, drained and gutted a pig. . .he would vomit. He just could not stand to be cruel to anything. My own son, who is now ten, reminds me alot of Todd in those ways. He won't eat meat, he cannot stand any kind of cruelty (he even makes me catch bugs and put them out of harms way!) and has a bleeding heart for anything homeless or in need of adoption.
Papaw understood Todd as well and never made fun of him, never undermined his sensitivity and he was always there with a hug. He was a big man over 6'2 and looked like the rest of his brothers and sisters. . .a large family of 10 that had called Kosciusco, Mississippi home. Mamaw was a hairdresser and nurse. She, like my grandfather put us first for a change. Those were some of the happiest times, but they were not to last. . .because my mother, as usual. . .had to screw everything up.
Back and forth they would go, sometimes my mother would leave, sometimes my father would leave. At some point in time, someone has to say "STOP". That someone was my grandparents on my mothers side. They were realativly normal, when you consider all that we had been through up to this point. We went to live with them and attended Lamar Elementary in Lamar, Missouri. Those were some of the best times.
We went to school on a regular basis, but Todd found it increasingly difficult to socialize because he stuttered so badly by this time and he was painfully shy. He did not stutter with me, when we were alone, only when the outside world interferred. My mother was rarely 'home', as she had taken a job at the local country club as a bartender and her social like was such that she sometimes didn't bother coming home at all. She was always done up in her mini skirts, boots and hairpieces piled high. Things ran much smoother when she was not in the picture.
Papaw was a rancher in Missouri. He had cattle, pigs, a stocked fishing pond, chickens and gardens. He taught me to heard and cut cattle, slaughter pigs and catch fish. Todd, bless his heart, did not share my enthusiasm for such sports. We took him fishing and when he would catch something, he would turn to Papaw and beg him to put the fish back, when we killed, drained and gutted a pig. . .he would vomit. He just could not stand to be cruel to anything. My own son, who is now ten, reminds me alot of Todd in those ways. He won't eat meat, he cannot stand any kind of cruelty (he even makes me catch bugs and put them out of harms way!) and has a bleeding heart for anything homeless or in need of adoption.
Papaw understood Todd as well and never made fun of him, never undermined his sensitivity and he was always there with a hug. He was a big man over 6'2 and looked like the rest of his brothers and sisters. . .a large family of 10 that had called Kosciusco, Mississippi home. Mamaw was a hairdresser and nurse. She, like my grandfather put us first for a change. Those were some of the happiest times, but they were not to last. . .because my mother, as usual. . .had to screw everything up.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Your Cheating Heart. . .
Diary - Entry 10
When one nightmare is not enough, why not have two or three and involve the other side of the family.
Another memory of the less than stellar performance of my parents, included the fact that my mother had taken (supposedly) a job at night at the local hospital as a receptionist (oh she received alright). There were some nights when she did not come home, but then, there were nights when my father failed to show up, as well.
Anyway, this particular night, was like many others. . . rather than have the common sense to leave us asleep and have someone come over, he bundled us, into the car and we all went looking for her in the middle of the night, with us in the back seat. My father deposited us at the Coachman Inn and called Mamaw McDaniel. She came and stayed with us. She was so mad at my dad, and she didn't take crap off of anyone!
The next time I saw my mother, she had a black eye. . .it didn't keep her home long. Eventually my father made her quit and stay home at night with us . . .where she belonged.
Their fighting became worse, to the point that furniture was broken, they tried to stab each other, and so on.
When one nightmare is not enough, why not have two or three and involve the other side of the family.
Another memory of the less than stellar performance of my parents, included the fact that my mother had taken (supposedly) a job at night at the local hospital as a receptionist (oh she received alright). There were some nights when she did not come home, but then, there were nights when my father failed to show up, as well.
Anyway, this particular night, was like many others. . . rather than have the common sense to leave us asleep and have someone come over, he bundled us, into the car and we all went looking for her in the middle of the night, with us in the back seat. My father deposited us at the Coachman Inn and called Mamaw McDaniel. She came and stayed with us. She was so mad at my dad, and she didn't take crap off of anyone!
The next time I saw my mother, she had a black eye. . .it didn't keep her home long. Eventually my father made her quit and stay home at night with us . . .where she belonged.
Their fighting became worse, to the point that furniture was broken, they tried to stab each other, and so on.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
The Lords House - As We Lived It. . .!
Diary - Entry 9
My mood is very dark (when is it not these days), with all the commercials on the television it brought to mind one christmas that as usual, I will never forget. It was during one of the times we stayed with Memoo and Papaw. I got a "Kerry" doll, (remember, the one that you pushed in her belly button and her hair grew, then turned the knob on the back and it got short again), you and Vic got tractors with tiny discs. We were sitting in the livingroom playing on the floor, when you said you missed mommy, then Vic said it and I said be quiet.
My grandfather, the Reverand Lonnie McFarland. . . closed his bible, got up from his recliner and said "your mother is a whore and a slut, I have told you never to speak her name in this house, which is dedicated to the Lord!"
He layed his bible down gently, reached over and grabbed Todd and Vic up by there arms, stripped both of them naked and threw them outside into the snow, all the time I was clutching my doll, screaming and crying for him to stop . . . "that they didn't mean it". He slapped me so hard with the bible he had picked back up, I cut my lip open and he made me stand and watch them shivering in the snow. They started wetting themselves and shaking.
At some point, my grandmother said, "Lonnie, that's enough" and she brought the boys back inside, put them in pajamas and we all went to bed.
Under normal circumstances, people would think this is some type of horror story, but when you lived it daily, it some how became routine and you learned to keep your thoughts to yourself, we spoke only to one another about our parents, when we were sure that we were completely alone, then we would talk, hug and whisper our secrets.
Church was the order of the day. We had no television, we listened to the Wynne News everyday and "christian" music the rest of the time. Every day the door was open, we were in it. Wednesdays and twice on Sundays. This doesn't seem like alot of time, but when you are brought up Pentacostel and you see people speaking in tungs, running up and down the aisle taking there clothes off. . .and the service would get to be 4 and 5 hours long. . . it was exhausting, scary and as there was no 'Sunday school', us McFarland kids where right up in the front pew. . . witnessing it all. I hated it, every time we walked through that door I was filled with terror, dread and a prayer that nothing crazy would scare Todd and Vic.
His Revivals were worse. . .they were the epitome of all his sermons, laying on hands, speaking in tungs, twisting about, people simply could not get enough of him. That is one of the reasons I never saw the movie
"The Apostle", my grandfather could have been its role model. As pius as he was on the pulpit, his gross
impropriety was blatant at home.
My mood is very dark (when is it not these days), with all the commercials on the television it brought to mind one christmas that as usual, I will never forget. It was during one of the times we stayed with Memoo and Papaw. I got a "Kerry" doll, (remember, the one that you pushed in her belly button and her hair grew, then turned the knob on the back and it got short again), you and Vic got tractors with tiny discs. We were sitting in the livingroom playing on the floor, when you said you missed mommy, then Vic said it and I said be quiet.
My grandfather, the Reverand Lonnie McFarland. . . closed his bible, got up from his recliner and said "your mother is a whore and a slut, I have told you never to speak her name in this house, which is dedicated to the Lord!"
He layed his bible down gently, reached over and grabbed Todd and Vic up by there arms, stripped both of them naked and threw them outside into the snow, all the time I was clutching my doll, screaming and crying for him to stop . . . "that they didn't mean it". He slapped me so hard with the bible he had picked back up, I cut my lip open and he made me stand and watch them shivering in the snow. They started wetting themselves and shaking.
At some point, my grandmother said, "Lonnie, that's enough" and she brought the boys back inside, put them in pajamas and we all went to bed.
Under normal circumstances, people would think this is some type of horror story, but when you lived it daily, it some how became routine and you learned to keep your thoughts to yourself, we spoke only to one another about our parents, when we were sure that we were completely alone, then we would talk, hug and whisper our secrets.
Church was the order of the day. We had no television, we listened to the Wynne News everyday and "christian" music the rest of the time. Every day the door was open, we were in it. Wednesdays and twice on Sundays. This doesn't seem like alot of time, but when you are brought up Pentacostel and you see people speaking in tungs, running up and down the aisle taking there clothes off. . .and the service would get to be 4 and 5 hours long. . . it was exhausting, scary and as there was no 'Sunday school', us McFarland kids where right up in the front pew. . . witnessing it all. I hated it, every time we walked through that door I was filled with terror, dread and a prayer that nothing crazy would scare Todd and Vic.
His Revivals were worse. . .they were the epitome of all his sermons, laying on hands, speaking in tungs, twisting about, people simply could not get enough of him. That is one of the reasons I never saw the movie
"The Apostle", my grandfather could have been its role model. As pius as he was on the pulpit, his gross
impropriety was blatant at home.
Monday, November 30, 2009
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead. . .
Diary - Entry 8
I think that is a line from a country music song, but apparently it applies to the current situation as I am, once again, up in the middle of the night when the rest of the house is quite.
I was laying in bed, thinking about when we where young. Little really. Before Vic was born, when it was just you and me, before the stuttering began. I spent the better part of 30 years trying to forget those nights when they would fight, like wild dogs. I always see you face, frozen. When you didn't come back from the bathroom and I went to get you, you just stared. They did not even know we were there. You had wet yourself. I brought you back to the bedroom, changed you clothes and put you into my bed. You were shaking, crying and I sang you to sleep.
Then it reminded me of the time we at the Memphis airport. When dad caught up with mom and us trying to leave. . . they slugged it out until he knocked her out and I just started screaming. Dad picked up you under one arm and Vic under the other and took off down the escalator. A young man in the AirForce and his mother had witnessed it, they stayed with me until mother came around. Every time I fly out of the airport, I see that scene.
I think out of all the memories I have, the worst was the night in Michigan. We had been riding out in the street, it was cold, there was snow on the ground. We did not know that dad had rented a house down the street, he had been watching us and when the moment presented itself, he snatched us all off our bikes and we went down to his house. It did not take long for mother to figure it out, because dad called her. They were always tormenting one another like that. She came walking up the sidewalk, while dad hid behind the bushes with a giant shovel. She never saw it coming. He hit her in the back of the head with such force, it knocked her wig off (this was the seventies afterall) and all we could see was her lying on the ground bleeding and her wig off to the side in the snow. Dad turned off all the lights in the house and we all went to the back of the house, laying on the bed as we listened for the police.
It is these precious moments, that make life worth living and childhood a nightmare.
I think that is a line from a country music song, but apparently it applies to the current situation as I am, once again, up in the middle of the night when the rest of the house is quite.
I was laying in bed, thinking about when we where young. Little really. Before Vic was born, when it was just you and me, before the stuttering began. I spent the better part of 30 years trying to forget those nights when they would fight, like wild dogs. I always see you face, frozen. When you didn't come back from the bathroom and I went to get you, you just stared. They did not even know we were there. You had wet yourself. I brought you back to the bedroom, changed you clothes and put you into my bed. You were shaking, crying and I sang you to sleep.
Then it reminded me of the time we at the Memphis airport. When dad caught up with mom and us trying to leave. . . they slugged it out until he knocked her out and I just started screaming. Dad picked up you under one arm and Vic under the other and took off down the escalator. A young man in the AirForce and his mother had witnessed it, they stayed with me until mother came around. Every time I fly out of the airport, I see that scene.
I think out of all the memories I have, the worst was the night in Michigan. We had been riding out in the street, it was cold, there was snow on the ground. We did not know that dad had rented a house down the street, he had been watching us and when the moment presented itself, he snatched us all off our bikes and we went down to his house. It did not take long for mother to figure it out, because dad called her. They were always tormenting one another like that. She came walking up the sidewalk, while dad hid behind the bushes with a giant shovel. She never saw it coming. He hit her in the back of the head with such force, it knocked her wig off (this was the seventies afterall) and all we could see was her lying on the ground bleeding and her wig off to the side in the snow. Dad turned off all the lights in the house and we all went to the back of the house, laying on the bed as we listened for the police.
It is these precious moments, that make life worth living and childhood a nightmare.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
When People Say "And One To Grow On"
Diary - Entry 7
Happy Birthday, little man! I miss you. I was going to lay the wreath today, but it is pouring down rain, cold and I felt you would understand about the two hour drive. I don't know what you headstone will look like when it is finished, I was not privy to that information either. I am sure it will be just as big and grotesque as our mothers. . .afterall, it's the McFarland way to have everything the big and best.
It has been a strange few days. . . it was my first birthday and Thanksgiving without you. It was my first day back to work Friday after being gone for nearly nearly 3 weeks. Everyone was very sweet, thay gave me cards, my boss gave me my birthday presents (she went overboard) and she gave me one for you as well, which I thought was particularly befitting the occassion, it was from the Willow Tree collection of wood carvings. It was a woman, holding some things and it was titled "Remember Me".
Several of my clients came in to see me, they gave me hugs, prayers and one of them left a bouquet of flowers tied to my car and a note that said "I are so very sorry for your loss" it was unsigned. So apparently my boss had told everyone about you. . .I thankfully was spared any details that she might have shared about our "odd and very off" family.
It is hard for me to reconcile the fact that you are not here. The constant being that you have always been, the protectiveness that we have always shared, the secrets that we kept for one another. Some days, I cannot get out of bed and all I do is stare at the wall or ceiling, watching the fan go round and round, seemingly devoid of emotion, other days, the tears don't stop the reality that your gone and the void that was left by your passing slid into and shares the one left by "him" all those years ago. Now it's just that much bigger, deeper and painful. I don't believe that time heals all wounds, grief will lessen in time and all that other bullshit that people say.
I don't know which is worse, the pain of the living as we are left behind to pick up the pieces of a broken portion of our life (which you and I have done so many times), or the agony of waiting for it all to be over so that the life you should have had will be waiting for you on the otherside. I have to believe that for our sake, growing up the way we did, the things we saw, the things that were done to us. . . Fate, Karma, Past Life Regression. . .whatever you choose to call it, the end result is the same. The lives of our souls are played out over and over again, until we get it right. The voids of grief and longing do not coincide with one another any longer and we are, who we were meant to be, not what we where made into and our souls are completed by those that were made for us.
Happy Birthday, little man! I miss you. I was going to lay the wreath today, but it is pouring down rain, cold and I felt you would understand about the two hour drive. I don't know what you headstone will look like when it is finished, I was not privy to that information either. I am sure it will be just as big and grotesque as our mothers. . .afterall, it's the McFarland way to have everything the big and best.
It has been a strange few days. . . it was my first birthday and Thanksgiving without you. It was my first day back to work Friday after being gone for nearly nearly 3 weeks. Everyone was very sweet, thay gave me cards, my boss gave me my birthday presents (she went overboard) and she gave me one for you as well, which I thought was particularly befitting the occassion, it was from the Willow Tree collection of wood carvings. It was a woman, holding some things and it was titled "Remember Me".
Several of my clients came in to see me, they gave me hugs, prayers and one of them left a bouquet of flowers tied to my car and a note that said "I are so very sorry for your loss" it was unsigned. So apparently my boss had told everyone about you. . .I thankfully was spared any details that she might have shared about our "odd and very off" family.
It is hard for me to reconcile the fact that you are not here. The constant being that you have always been, the protectiveness that we have always shared, the secrets that we kept for one another. Some days, I cannot get out of bed and all I do is stare at the wall or ceiling, watching the fan go round and round, seemingly devoid of emotion, other days, the tears don't stop the reality that your gone and the void that was left by your passing slid into and shares the one left by "him" all those years ago. Now it's just that much bigger, deeper and painful. I don't believe that time heals all wounds, grief will lessen in time and all that other bullshit that people say.
I don't know which is worse, the pain of the living as we are left behind to pick up the pieces of a broken portion of our life (which you and I have done so many times), or the agony of waiting for it all to be over so that the life you should have had will be waiting for you on the otherside. I have to believe that for our sake, growing up the way we did, the things we saw, the things that were done to us. . . Fate, Karma, Past Life Regression. . .whatever you choose to call it, the end result is the same. The lives of our souls are played out over and over again, until we get it right. The voids of grief and longing do not coincide with one another any longer and we are, who we were meant to be, not what we where made into and our souls are completed by those that were made for us.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
UnHappy Thanksgiving. . .
Diary - Entry 6
Because I have been sleep deprived for more than two weeks, catching 2 hours here, 4 hours there, mostly stuggling with the memories that flood my mind when I do close my eyes, I feel addled, like I got through into the middle of a scene that I have no idea whats goint on. I keep looking around for some kind of reality check, that does not exsist.
I fell asleep yesterday morning around 4am, only to dream of Todd vomitting all that blood and bile, while looking helpless and scared. Somewhere, in the back of my mind, I could here Todds voice. . .it was like he was when he was young and didn't stutter. He said "Sis, you have got to pull yourself together, this is not good for you. I will always be with you, just not in the same way anymore. I am not in pain, look at me", he sounded so close, I rolled over in the bed, and there sat my 10 week old pit bull terrier, by my face, with his head cocked to one side, just watching me. He is never allowed on the bed, and he is always crated at night.
So, now, I am fairly certain, that I have lost what was left of my mind. I stared at Knox and said "Todd?" , then the puppy jumped off the bed and ran downstairs.
I will go to the cemetary on Sunday, which would have been his 46th birthday, lay the wreath I made and light his candles.
Although from an analytical sense I know that the only thing that is in the ground is a body that once housed a
terribly misunderstodd loving heart and endless soul, it does not make the pain of seperation any less, no matter how temporary that may be.
Because I have been sleep deprived for more than two weeks, catching 2 hours here, 4 hours there, mostly stuggling with the memories that flood my mind when I do close my eyes, I feel addled, like I got through into the middle of a scene that I have no idea whats goint on. I keep looking around for some kind of reality check, that does not exsist.
I fell asleep yesterday morning around 4am, only to dream of Todd vomitting all that blood and bile, while looking helpless and scared. Somewhere, in the back of my mind, I could here Todds voice. . .it was like he was when he was young and didn't stutter. He said "Sis, you have got to pull yourself together, this is not good for you. I will always be with you, just not in the same way anymore. I am not in pain, look at me", he sounded so close, I rolled over in the bed, and there sat my 10 week old pit bull terrier, by my face, with his head cocked to one side, just watching me. He is never allowed on the bed, and he is always crated at night.
So, now, I am fairly certain, that I have lost what was left of my mind. I stared at Knox and said "Todd?" , then the puppy jumped off the bed and ran downstairs.
I will go to the cemetary on Sunday, which would have been his 46th birthday, lay the wreath I made and light his candles.
Although from an analytical sense I know that the only thing that is in the ground is a body that once housed a
terribly misunderstodd loving heart and endless soul, it does not make the pain of seperation any less, no matter how temporary that may be.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Diary - Entry 5
Tomorrow is my birthday. . . yes, it is Thanksgiving. It will be my first in 47 years without my brother. He would have celebrated his 46th birthday on Sunday, but when we were little, we always shared the day and always celebrated it together, complete with brown frosting, turnkey and pumpkins in icing on the cake. There will be no cake this year. . .
Tomorrow is my birthday. . . yes, it is Thanksgiving. It will be my first in 47 years without my brother. He would have celebrated his 46th birthday on Sunday, but when we were little, we always shared the day and always celebrated it together, complete with brown frosting, turnkey and pumpkins in icing on the cake. There will be no cake this year. . .
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
When Time Is Not An Option. . .
Diary - Entry 4
"Will you be able to come tomorrow?". . . that was what I was asked on Saturday morning in regards to Todd's funeral arrangements, by my stepmother. Yes, I responded. . .what else was I going to say. Then I got the run down!
While I have tried, time and again to leave this particular entry alone, I simply can't. I close my eyes and my hands fly through the keyboard. I just cannot justify a 45 minute ceremony, front to back, for 45 years worth of humanity, kindness, illness, courage, loving, responsibility, regret,and wishing that Todd had my strength and steelness, with Victors dream factory and Michaels tenacity to hold on to life.
There would be a 15minute (can you believe that crap) "family viewing" following graveside services. There was no Obituary listed for the Kernodle Funeral Home in Wynne, his "memorial cards" were a joke! To add insult to injury. . .(which I have mentioned before) they buried him the next day (on Sunday the 15th), which was our mothers birthday. My father later complained to those around us (including my boss who had come out of respect for me). . .that "who knew it cost an extra $550.00 to bury on Sunday. . . Little did my father realize that he probably (even though it was from the grave). . .paid for my mothers crossbow that she had wanted for years. . . She would actually call my father in the middle of the night in her insane, drunken, drug induced stooper and demand that he send her money for a new crossbow. . .it mattered not that my mother, by this time, was fucking blind as a bat!!!!!!!!!!
They picked a lavender colored coffin (Todd would have hated that - now pick a NASCAR color along with his favorite number, and he would have been fine!) and the only thing on top (as I have said before), was ferns with fake wheat stalks and a recycled John Deere tractor. Aunt Delore (Uncle Johnny's wife) and Aunt Doris (her sister), arrived, I had sent Rich on ahead with my boss, Dianne, because I knew that she would wanted to speak to me. . .Aunt Delore said to me. . "You and I are here for Todd because we loved him the way he was, not for anything or anyone else and I helped raise you and I know the ugly things that got said, but you pay no attention. . .I don't won't you disappointing me! What they done too, did too or didn't do don't matter anymore, he left early yesterday and we both know that. I love you."
I, dressed in black dress, with my head covered out of respect for Todd . . .as did my husband and my boss. I met with Billy Kernodle and I said, " I am here to see my brother". . . Uncle Johnny was the only one in the room, other than Karen (my grandmothers assistant who came to take family pictures. . .yes, I know, they always have and always will take pictures of the dead in their coffins. . . yes, they keep a photo file of the dead. . ) and I could tell that he was terribly upset, he had been crying, maybe remembering not so long ago that my cousin lay in much the same position. I touched him on the shoulder, he turned and hugged. He was the only person I hugged at that disgusting dispay of a "family veiwing", I don't even think my father was there.
I looked down at my brother, whose beard was trimmed back, no traces of the blood and bile that had been in there only a couple of days before, and although he was stiff with embalming and his hands rested on his chest, his overalls seemed new, so did his shirt. . .and even his farmers cap for that matter. . . I leaned down, kissed him on the forehead, as I had done so often when we where growing up, I slid my hand under his, held his hand and completely lost it.
The first thought that I had that came to my mind. . .Todd looked like the Cook side of the family. His resemblence to Grandaddy Cook (our great-grandfather) was uncanny. I momentairyly flashed back to his funeral in 1979 and how thankful I had been that he was dead (I was only a teenager, but I even then, (as I have always loved hats. . .) wore a white hat, in celebration . . .(which, the rest of the family had no idea what was behind the white, but they just figured it was part of my eccentricity.) . . I had spent many years, as the 'object of his affection', for like my grandfather the good preacher, he too, was a pedopheliac. . .shall we say, because after a certain age, or your ability to fight off the advances, you would be left alone. I shuddered. . . and brought myself back too the face before me.
The little man that I had loved, had worried over, sent secret money too, bought clothes for, sent Christmas gifts that I new he would actually eat (summer saugage. . .) no matter how he reguritated afterwards, was lying still, cold, and as if a bad cosmetology student had spunge painted him. . .(yes, I realize he was jaundiced, but come on now. . .) and he looked 'over-embalmed', if there is such a thing.
There is something among siblings, born so close together, they are considered and are considered amoung many to be "Irish Twins" that I cannot explain. Especially when part of that sibling responsibility is forced upon you in a more adult manner at a very early age. In many ways, I was his sister, his mother, his friend and most of all his keeper of secrets and the voice that he used to listen to at night to drown out the monsters.
I felt as if it wasn't real somehow, like it was something out of a really bad dream. I kept waiting for him to open his eyes and sit up. He had always been good at gags and games when we were little. He once told me that he was really Peter Pan and that I was Mary Poppins. . . yet he was the one that got me to climb the tree, open the umbrella to see if I could fly. . . when I jumped out of it, he started laughing. Only with me and only in the early days when we where alone, did he not stutter. I took a whack at him with my Tinkerbelle umbrella, which was now broken, and he ran up on the porch and as I chased him to the end and he fell off. . . we both got a beating, simply for being kids with an imagination. This was our time at the Jones Place, that my family owned.
Although he had no formal Obituary, we had 75 people that came to say goodbye. . .why? Because people loved Todd, he was unique, some felt sorry for him. . .maybe because of his drinking. . .his stuttering (which, as I said before, was not as bad when he drank. . .it embarrassed him) and his lack of education, but overall, they came out of respect for him, which was never acknowledged.
While I personally believe in creamation, as did Todd,(contrary to what others might think), as well as our mother. . . it was turned into a burial in the family cemetary.
When you are young, you think that you have forever. One day you are two, the next day you are 46. Time flies. . .they say. Yet, if you could turn back time and reverse the effects of decisions that others had made for you, as well as your own choices. . .would you, could you. . .forever changing the course of not just your fate, but those that enteracted with you? Cremation or burial, does it really matter when our bodies are only on loan to house the souls that we are given at birth? Does not that soul return to the sender when you take your last human breath and how many of you know when that breath will be?
"Will you be able to come tomorrow?". . . that was what I was asked on Saturday morning in regards to Todd's funeral arrangements, by my stepmother. Yes, I responded. . .what else was I going to say. Then I got the run down!
While I have tried, time and again to leave this particular entry alone, I simply can't. I close my eyes and my hands fly through the keyboard. I just cannot justify a 45 minute ceremony, front to back, for 45 years worth of humanity, kindness, illness, courage, loving, responsibility, regret,and wishing that Todd had my strength and steelness, with Victors dream factory and Michaels tenacity to hold on to life.
There would be a 15minute (can you believe that crap) "family viewing" following graveside services. There was no Obituary listed for the Kernodle Funeral Home in Wynne, his "memorial cards" were a joke! To add insult to injury. . .(which I have mentioned before) they buried him the next day (on Sunday the 15th), which was our mothers birthday. My father later complained to those around us (including my boss who had come out of respect for me). . .that "who knew it cost an extra $550.00 to bury on Sunday. . . Little did my father realize that he probably (even though it was from the grave). . .paid for my mothers crossbow that she had wanted for years. . . She would actually call my father in the middle of the night in her insane, drunken, drug induced stooper and demand that he send her money for a new crossbow. . .it mattered not that my mother, by this time, was fucking blind as a bat!!!!!!!!!!
They picked a lavender colored coffin (Todd would have hated that - now pick a NASCAR color along with his favorite number, and he would have been fine!) and the only thing on top (as I have said before), was ferns with fake wheat stalks and a recycled John Deere tractor. Aunt Delore (Uncle Johnny's wife) and Aunt Doris (her sister), arrived, I had sent Rich on ahead with my boss, Dianne, because I knew that she would wanted to speak to me. . .Aunt Delore said to me. . "You and I are here for Todd because we loved him the way he was, not for anything or anyone else and I helped raise you and I know the ugly things that got said, but you pay no attention. . .I don't won't you disappointing me! What they done too, did too or didn't do don't matter anymore, he left early yesterday and we both know that. I love you."
I, dressed in black dress, with my head covered out of respect for Todd . . .as did my husband and my boss. I met with Billy Kernodle and I said, " I am here to see my brother". . . Uncle Johnny was the only one in the room, other than Karen (my grandmothers assistant who came to take family pictures. . .yes, I know, they always have and always will take pictures of the dead in their coffins. . . yes, they keep a photo file of the dead. . ) and I could tell that he was terribly upset, he had been crying, maybe remembering not so long ago that my cousin lay in much the same position. I touched him on the shoulder, he turned and hugged. He was the only person I hugged at that disgusting dispay of a "family veiwing", I don't even think my father was there.
I looked down at my brother, whose beard was trimmed back, no traces of the blood and bile that had been in there only a couple of days before, and although he was stiff with embalming and his hands rested on his chest, his overalls seemed new, so did his shirt. . .and even his farmers cap for that matter. . . I leaned down, kissed him on the forehead, as I had done so often when we where growing up, I slid my hand under his, held his hand and completely lost it.
The first thought that I had that came to my mind. . .Todd looked like the Cook side of the family. His resemblence to Grandaddy Cook (our great-grandfather) was uncanny. I momentairyly flashed back to his funeral in 1979 and how thankful I had been that he was dead (I was only a teenager, but I even then, (as I have always loved hats. . .) wore a white hat, in celebration . . .(which, the rest of the family had no idea what was behind the white, but they just figured it was part of my eccentricity.) . . I had spent many years, as the 'object of his affection', for like my grandfather the good preacher, he too, was a pedopheliac. . .shall we say, because after a certain age, or your ability to fight off the advances, you would be left alone. I shuddered. . . and brought myself back too the face before me.
The little man that I had loved, had worried over, sent secret money too, bought clothes for, sent Christmas gifts that I new he would actually eat (summer saugage. . .) no matter how he reguritated afterwards, was lying still, cold, and as if a bad cosmetology student had spunge painted him. . .(yes, I realize he was jaundiced, but come on now. . .) and he looked 'over-embalmed', if there is such a thing.
There is something among siblings, born so close together, they are considered and are considered amoung many to be "Irish Twins" that I cannot explain. Especially when part of that sibling responsibility is forced upon you in a more adult manner at a very early age. In many ways, I was his sister, his mother, his friend and most of all his keeper of secrets and the voice that he used to listen to at night to drown out the monsters.
I felt as if it wasn't real somehow, like it was something out of a really bad dream. I kept waiting for him to open his eyes and sit up. He had always been good at gags and games when we were little. He once told me that he was really Peter Pan and that I was Mary Poppins. . . yet he was the one that got me to climb the tree, open the umbrella to see if I could fly. . . when I jumped out of it, he started laughing. Only with me and only in the early days when we where alone, did he not stutter. I took a whack at him with my Tinkerbelle umbrella, which was now broken, and he ran up on the porch and as I chased him to the end and he fell off. . . we both got a beating, simply for being kids with an imagination. This was our time at the Jones Place, that my family owned.
Although he had no formal Obituary, we had 75 people that came to say goodbye. . .why? Because people loved Todd, he was unique, some felt sorry for him. . .maybe because of his drinking. . .his stuttering (which, as I said before, was not as bad when he drank. . .it embarrassed him) and his lack of education, but overall, they came out of respect for him, which was never acknowledged.
While I personally believe in creamation, as did Todd,(contrary to what others might think), as well as our mother. . . it was turned into a burial in the family cemetary.
When you are young, you think that you have forever. One day you are two, the next day you are 46. Time flies. . .they say. Yet, if you could turn back time and reverse the effects of decisions that others had made for you, as well as your own choices. . .would you, could you. . .forever changing the course of not just your fate, but those that enteracted with you? Cremation or burial, does it really matter when our bodies are only on loan to house the souls that we are given at birth? Does not that soul return to the sender when you take your last human breath and how many of you know when that breath will be?
Sunday, November 22, 2009
The Worst Of People. . .
Diary - Entry 3
My wonderful friend, Catherine, who's constant rocks we have been for many years and without whom I could not have gotten through the last couple of days had this to say:
" We all know that death either brings out the best in people or the worst in people and that grief is a slave master,unlike any other. How we each choose to grieve is different from one person to another, as the day is to night."
Another friend said " I hate the bulshit platitudes and sympathies that are common place when someone dies. "Sorry for you loss", "Had he be ill long", "He is in a better place. . ." and the list goes on. So, he left me a verse from one of his favorite songs.
Others have sent cards and flowers. Mostly, out of duty I think, but while it is appreciated now, while the pain and anguish is still so fresh. . .but will he be remembered in six months? Six years? . . .
In addition to the fact that Todds death has brought out the worst in me (because I remember every ugly thing that was ever said about him , how he was made fun of in school and by our own family members).
I remember how my family could not stand his wife, they thought she was trash. How my step-mother, on the occassion of my birthday (which was being celebrated at the Peabody Hotel with drinks in the lobby) started saying horrible things about Todd to the point that she reduced me to tears. Another time she said he "creeped her out and never wanted to be alone with him". Yet, these were the two that made all of Todds medical choices and his wife 'fixed it (her words, not mine) " to keeep me from talking to the nurses, getting information from the doctors and finally from not letting me be with him in his final hours.
The odd thing was, I had never said anything unkind to her, been unkind to her and I supported Todds choice when others didn't. When she was in a severe car accident two years ago, I sat by her in ICU, when my brother had a seizure because of alcohol withdrawls and was in the same hospital, I went and set with him, brought clean clothes and I even went to my sister-in-laws mothers funeral to represent our family. I did not understand her sudden animosity towards me, her screaming at me, calling me names and other horrible things in front of hospital auxillary members.
My only reaction at the time was that I broke down in tears. I told my stepmother what she had said, and that she said she would talk to Jaye, but whether Jaye told the truth was another matter. She did not, she denied saying any of those things to me. That just added fuel to the fire. It took me 2 1/2 hours to get home, crying all the way.
I had not been able to sleep most of the night and lain awake thinking about him as a child, I did not go back the next day, but stayed in bed, crying, and shortly before 4am, I felt a gnawing deep within me and a brief rush of panic. . . I knew he was gone. They did not call me till a 8:45am with all of the arrangments already made.
My wonderful friend, Catherine, who's constant rocks we have been for many years and without whom I could not have gotten through the last couple of days had this to say:
" We all know that death either brings out the best in people or the worst in people and that grief is a slave master,unlike any other. How we each choose to grieve is different from one person to another, as the day is to night."
Another friend said " I hate the bulshit platitudes and sympathies that are common place when someone dies. "Sorry for you loss", "Had he be ill long", "He is in a better place. . ." and the list goes on. So, he left me a verse from one of his favorite songs.
Others have sent cards and flowers. Mostly, out of duty I think, but while it is appreciated now, while the pain and anguish is still so fresh. . .but will he be remembered in six months? Six years? . . .
In addition to the fact that Todds death has brought out the worst in me (because I remember every ugly thing that was ever said about him , how he was made fun of in school and by our own family members).
I remember how my family could not stand his wife, they thought she was trash. How my step-mother, on the occassion of my birthday (which was being celebrated at the Peabody Hotel with drinks in the lobby) started saying horrible things about Todd to the point that she reduced me to tears. Another time she said he "creeped her out and never wanted to be alone with him". Yet, these were the two that made all of Todds medical choices and his wife 'fixed it (her words, not mine) " to keeep me from talking to the nurses, getting information from the doctors and finally from not letting me be with him in his final hours.
The odd thing was, I had never said anything unkind to her, been unkind to her and I supported Todds choice when others didn't. When she was in a severe car accident two years ago, I sat by her in ICU, when my brother had a seizure because of alcohol withdrawls and was in the same hospital, I went and set with him, brought clean clothes and I even went to my sister-in-laws mothers funeral to represent our family. I did not understand her sudden animosity towards me, her screaming at me, calling me names and other horrible things in front of hospital auxillary members.
My only reaction at the time was that I broke down in tears. I told my stepmother what she had said, and that she said she would talk to Jaye, but whether Jaye told the truth was another matter. She did not, she denied saying any of those things to me. That just added fuel to the fire. It took me 2 1/2 hours to get home, crying all the way.
I had not been able to sleep most of the night and lain awake thinking about him as a child, I did not go back the next day, but stayed in bed, crying, and shortly before 4am, I felt a gnawing deep within me and a brief rush of panic. . . I knew he was gone. They did not call me till a 8:45am with all of the arrangments already made.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
To Start At The Begining. . .Is To Start At The End
Diary - Entry 2
I have chosen to start with the end because if anyone reads this, perhaps they will be spared the grief, pain and nightmares (when I do manage to close my eyes) that comes from the place within myself where I currently reside.
When I got the call Wednesday night, that he had been transferred to the hospital in Jonesboro in ISICU, I did not even know that he was in the hospital. I said I would be there as soon as possible. I live in Tennessee, my husband was traveling and at midnight when he got home, I jumped in the car and headed to be with Todd. I arrived at 2:30 in the morning. Because I had come in the middle of the night, they let me see him while everyone else was made to leave. His nurse Consuela, told me that he was very, very ill but that they were doing everything they could to make him comfortable.
I went into his room and what lay before me, was not the brother that I had seen on my last visit to the farm.
The jaundiced man in this bed had a dark red face, bulging yellow eyes where his whites used to be, very pale blue irises that were once, as vivid as my own. He was malnurished, dehydrated, skeltetal and the biggest thing on him was his bloated belly. He was agitated, he could not get comfortable (as he also suffered from severe curvature of the spine) and the pain medication did not work because he could not process it through the liver and kidney. I tried to soothe him as he ran hot and cold with fever and chills, and used his suction tube to rid his mouth of the foam that ran continually from his dry lips.
As I sat there, I looked at him and I realized that it wasn't just himself that was responsible for this death sentence, it was all of us. I began to wonder how can a wife, not see the physical deteroration of her husband on a daily basis (claiming that she is in control of his drinking and that he only has two beers a day!). Especially one as grotesquely obvious Todds. He had been pissing blood and having such severe diarreah that his ass was bleeding, do you think you could see that? How could the medical personal at Crossroads hospital in Wynne say he was just dehydrated. How could his wife have left him there at 7:30am so she could go to work and he was not seen till 2pm, then at 5:30 it was suddenly annouced that he was in full liver and renal failure. . . I just did not understand. . .at all. The more I thought about it, the angrier I became.
I tried not to show him my feelings, so I just smiled and leaned down to him. He looked at me as I held his hand and I spoke low in his ear. I whispered " we can beat this but you have to help me fight, I cannot fight this battle for you alone, I will give you my kidney and a healthy portion of my liver, I will be there with you, but you need to be willing to help yourself too. If you don't want to fight anymore, thats ok too, because God will be waiting and there will be no more pain or suffering and you will see Perry, Mamaw, Roy Dale, Papaw, Uncle Taylor and all those that went before us. I have always loved you and I will always love you no matter what you choose."
He calmed down for a few minutes. I stepped into the doorway to talk to his nurse, then, out of nowhere, he projectile vomited blood and bile that was so black, it looked like tar. His nurse was afraid that I was going to get upset, but I said "blood does not turn red until it is oxegenated, I am not afraid of the color or the amount." It was everywhere, down in his beard, arms, chest, and in a deep pool on the pillow next to his IV. He got upset again. Consuela said she would call for help to get him cleaned up, and I said, no. "Just get what we need and I will do it for him." She just smiled and left the room. He kept looking at me and I said, "it's alright, it needed to come out." We cleaned him up, I rinsed his mouth out and I washed his face, beard, neck, arms, chest. . .everywhere that I could see where the blood had gone. When we went to put a clean gown on him, I saw how distended his belly was and the bruising on his ribs.
I thought again, how does someone who is surrounded by family, has been to the hospital several times within the last few months. . . get to this state? I went to the ladies room and threw up.
I stayed beside him, holding his hand, stroking his forhead and singing to him like I used to, when he was a child . As we shared a bedroom, he would often climbed into my bed crying, because of what we heard or had seen going on between our parents. He finally fell asleep. It was nearly 6am. I found his wife, her children and my step mother in the waiting room. I looked at his wife and my step-mother and I said, "how did he get this way, in such a short time?" They shrugged their sholders.
I went to the cafeteria and sat for a long time thinking about his life, my life, Victors life, the choices we had made and how each of us had coped with our traumatic upbringing. It was then, that I realized Todd had never had a chance at what should have been a full and happy life. His sensitivity should have been shared as a Professor of Literature or something as equally gratifying to his tender soul and gentle spirit. He should have had a wife that cherished and loved him, he should have had normal parents that did not try to kill each other, every other day. He should have been a whole person instead of the shell that was left after our parents got through with us.
One week ago, at 4am he left all the pain and suffering behind. . . I love you.
I have chosen to start with the end because if anyone reads this, perhaps they will be spared the grief, pain and nightmares (when I do manage to close my eyes) that comes from the place within myself where I currently reside.
When I got the call Wednesday night, that he had been transferred to the hospital in Jonesboro in ISICU, I did not even know that he was in the hospital. I said I would be there as soon as possible. I live in Tennessee, my husband was traveling and at midnight when he got home, I jumped in the car and headed to be with Todd. I arrived at 2:30 in the morning. Because I had come in the middle of the night, they let me see him while everyone else was made to leave. His nurse Consuela, told me that he was very, very ill but that they were doing everything they could to make him comfortable.
I went into his room and what lay before me, was not the brother that I had seen on my last visit to the farm.
The jaundiced man in this bed had a dark red face, bulging yellow eyes where his whites used to be, very pale blue irises that were once, as vivid as my own. He was malnurished, dehydrated, skeltetal and the biggest thing on him was his bloated belly. He was agitated, he could not get comfortable (as he also suffered from severe curvature of the spine) and the pain medication did not work because he could not process it through the liver and kidney. I tried to soothe him as he ran hot and cold with fever and chills, and used his suction tube to rid his mouth of the foam that ran continually from his dry lips.
As I sat there, I looked at him and I realized that it wasn't just himself that was responsible for this death sentence, it was all of us. I began to wonder how can a wife, not see the physical deteroration of her husband on a daily basis (claiming that she is in control of his drinking and that he only has two beers a day!). Especially one as grotesquely obvious Todds. He had been pissing blood and having such severe diarreah that his ass was bleeding, do you think you could see that? How could the medical personal at Crossroads hospital in Wynne say he was just dehydrated. How could his wife have left him there at 7:30am so she could go to work and he was not seen till 2pm, then at 5:30 it was suddenly annouced that he was in full liver and renal failure. . . I just did not understand. . .at all. The more I thought about it, the angrier I became.
I tried not to show him my feelings, so I just smiled and leaned down to him. He looked at me as I held his hand and I spoke low in his ear. I whispered " we can beat this but you have to help me fight, I cannot fight this battle for you alone, I will give you my kidney and a healthy portion of my liver, I will be there with you, but you need to be willing to help yourself too. If you don't want to fight anymore, thats ok too, because God will be waiting and there will be no more pain or suffering and you will see Perry, Mamaw, Roy Dale, Papaw, Uncle Taylor and all those that went before us. I have always loved you and I will always love you no matter what you choose."
He calmed down for a few minutes. I stepped into the doorway to talk to his nurse, then, out of nowhere, he projectile vomited blood and bile that was so black, it looked like tar. His nurse was afraid that I was going to get upset, but I said "blood does not turn red until it is oxegenated, I am not afraid of the color or the amount." It was everywhere, down in his beard, arms, chest, and in a deep pool on the pillow next to his IV. He got upset again. Consuela said she would call for help to get him cleaned up, and I said, no. "Just get what we need and I will do it for him." She just smiled and left the room. He kept looking at me and I said, "it's alright, it needed to come out." We cleaned him up, I rinsed his mouth out and I washed his face, beard, neck, arms, chest. . .everywhere that I could see where the blood had gone. When we went to put a clean gown on him, I saw how distended his belly was and the bruising on his ribs.
I thought again, how does someone who is surrounded by family, has been to the hospital several times within the last few months. . . get to this state? I went to the ladies room and threw up.
I stayed beside him, holding his hand, stroking his forhead and singing to him like I used to, when he was a child . As we shared a bedroom, he would often climbed into my bed crying, because of what we heard or had seen going on between our parents. He finally fell asleep. It was nearly 6am. I found his wife, her children and my step mother in the waiting room. I looked at his wife and my step-mother and I said, "how did he get this way, in such a short time?" They shrugged their sholders.
I went to the cafeteria and sat for a long time thinking about his life, my life, Victors life, the choices we had made and how each of us had coped with our traumatic upbringing. It was then, that I realized Todd had never had a chance at what should have been a full and happy life. His sensitivity should have been shared as a Professor of Literature or something as equally gratifying to his tender soul and gentle spirit. He should have had a wife that cherished and loved him, he should have had normal parents that did not try to kill each other, every other day. He should have been a whole person instead of the shell that was left after our parents got through with us.
One week ago, at 4am he left all the pain and suffering behind. . . I love you.
Friday, November 20, 2009
My Brothers Death
Diary - Entry 1
I have started this site in honor of my brother,Todd, who passed away on Saturday, November 14th, at 4am, two weeks shy of his 46th birthday and disrepectfully buried next to my mother, the next day, on her birthday. . .November 15th, with no obituary notice of any kind. . .one ugly plastic wheat wreath around a toy John Deere tractor, that they had recycled from my fathers 60th birthday party.
As a child, he was so much more than what the outside world saw. He was tender of heart and spirit, almost ghostly in appearance and always smiled. As an adult, his life, was full of pain, sorrow, sometimes homelessness, and always overshadowed by alcoholism . . . which I knew, he used as a coping mechanism. I believe it is the fault of my parents, step-parents, his poor choice in a mate, and lastly, the visual trauma we so often witnessed at home, that left him a stuttering, deformed and wizened old man before his time. He was made fun of, whispered about and surrounded by hypocrites, and those were just family members.
Our childhood was difficult at best, but not because of our love for one another, but because of the lack of maturity and framework within our parents, who never should have been parents in the first place and compounded the problems of marrying to young by, jealousy, rage, drinking,and physical fighting so vicious that one gave as good as the other got. They were like oil and water together. Divorcing, remarrying, divorcing and remarrying and having another child. They could not leave one another alone. Todd, Vic and I got lost in the shuffle and got passed from relative to relative within our small familial enclave.
Why do I say these things? To lay the foundation of what will be written here and because, like many others, we come from a well respected southern family whose patriarch was not only a large cotton and rice farmer, but he was a pastor in the Assembly of God churches (and I use that term loosley). His revivals were as ledgendary as his ego. Therefore, to the outside world and our neighbors, we looked normal. . .and like many a southern family, our skeltons run as deep and wide as the century and a half that we have lived here.
In the end, all the dirty laundry will be washed and hung up for the world to see. . .
I have started this site in honor of my brother,Todd, who passed away on Saturday, November 14th, at 4am, two weeks shy of his 46th birthday and disrepectfully buried next to my mother, the next day, on her birthday. . .November 15th, with no obituary notice of any kind. . .one ugly plastic wheat wreath around a toy John Deere tractor, that they had recycled from my fathers 60th birthday party.
As a child, he was so much more than what the outside world saw. He was tender of heart and spirit, almost ghostly in appearance and always smiled. As an adult, his life, was full of pain, sorrow, sometimes homelessness, and always overshadowed by alcoholism . . . which I knew, he used as a coping mechanism. I believe it is the fault of my parents, step-parents, his poor choice in a mate, and lastly, the visual trauma we so often witnessed at home, that left him a stuttering, deformed and wizened old man before his time. He was made fun of, whispered about and surrounded by hypocrites, and those were just family members.
Our childhood was difficult at best, but not because of our love for one another, but because of the lack of maturity and framework within our parents, who never should have been parents in the first place and compounded the problems of marrying to young by, jealousy, rage, drinking,and physical fighting so vicious that one gave as good as the other got. They were like oil and water together. Divorcing, remarrying, divorcing and remarrying and having another child. They could not leave one another alone. Todd, Vic and I got lost in the shuffle and got passed from relative to relative within our small familial enclave.
Why do I say these things? To lay the foundation of what will be written here and because, like many others, we come from a well respected southern family whose patriarch was not only a large cotton and rice farmer, but he was a pastor in the Assembly of God churches (and I use that term loosley). His revivals were as ledgendary as his ego. Therefore, to the outside world and our neighbors, we looked normal. . .and like many a southern family, our skeltons run as deep and wide as the century and a half that we have lived here.
In the end, all the dirty laundry will be washed and hung up for the world to see. . .
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