Catbird

I bought one of these hats. Nope. 

That is definitely a Busch Light. 

My dad was funny, entertaining, and crass, but he was also patient, hardworking, and loving. To many he was The man. The myth. The legend. That's what he was to me, anyway. The man who never raised his voice at me, or at anyone that I remember. He made stern remarks on occasion, but never a shout in anger. I know he could yell because he always cheered for me at every sporting event I ever played in, from Boys Club soccer to high school soccer, no matter how bad we were! He even came to watch me cheer on Friday nights, not just at competitions. He would embarrass me to no end..."Get the ball, Keeley!" I don't know why his cheering bothered me, maybe because it was so loud (or more likely because I was a teenager). Either way, I regret being embarrassed. I regret it because I should have embraced it, not taken it for granted. He was there. He was ALWAYS there. And he was so proud. SO, SO proud of me when I was the only girl playing soccer with the boys at the Boys Club. He was so proud when I started as a freshman on the high school soccer team. He made me trophies and plaques for my accomplishments. "First Female Soccer player at Boys and Girls Club" and "Daddy's Terrific Kid." I don't know if that was an 80's thing or a cool dad thing, but I liked it. I remember being proud of myself for winning a bowling trophy with my dad in the "Bowl for Beverly" tournament. Man, I miss bowling.  

He was also super excited about all of my Red Cross swimming accomplishments. 

One of my favorite Daddy memories could be a Hallmark movie. It was my college graduation from UNC and the Boyers (Daddy, Jill, and Beau) had come up to Chapel Hill for it. They stayed in a hotel in Raleigh for the evening, probably because that was the closest one available. At any rate, I had to be at Kenan Stadium by like 7am or some such nonsensical early hour for a college grad. So, Mom and I, with Brooks, Aunt Debby, and my roommate Tammany headed to the stadium. This was before texting or smart phones so there was no way to relay a message to me that SHOCKING (not shocking) the Boyers were lost. From Raleigh...to Chapel Hill...yep. So, I go to the stadium tired, irritated because I had to go, and sat with my friend Leigh. I had no idea that my dad had finally arrived at the stadium and that he and my little brother Beau were climbing up and around every single bleacher, combing through thousands of seats, calling for me for the entire graduation. Ohhhh, the days before cell phones were HARSH!! I told Mom that when graduation was over, I would meet her back at the car. So I walked alone back across campus to Mom's car. I randomly decided to walk past Morrison Dorm (Motown) on my way back for a little nostalgia. It was a little farther trek, but it was my LAST trek, so...what the hell? As I walked past my freshman dorm and began to journey down the sidewalk towards Mom, I saw them. The Boyers. On the other side of the road. I yelled for them. Daddy! Beau! Jill! And it was seriously like a slow motion reunion. Tears were shed. They thought they had failed. My dad thought he had made it all the way to Chapel Hill only to miss giving his little girl a kiss and hugging her in her Carolina Blue graduation robe. But there we were. Reunited on Manning Drive! Sadly, these were also the days before I had a cell phone OR a digital camera, and ALL of the FILM I took that day was ruined. Couldn't be developed. I called shenanigans and raised MY voice at the woman behind the counter when she told me this bit of information, but the film is gone forever. But no amount of digital film can really do that moment justice anyway. It deserves high definition. Like most of my Daddy memories are. High Definition.

At least Rameses had his picture developed. That's what's really important. 

The Grief Window

I am not a grief expert. I never read any of those grief books my friends gave me. I know I should have. I did pick them up and smell them, if that counts. I didn't seek out a psychiatrist or a mental health professional to guide me through my grief. Yet again, I probably should have. I did not even attempt to call or even smell one of those. So, I am unsure of what the grief window is in which a person has carte blanche to ugly cry whenever they want to, lay in bed in the dark for days and cry more when they want to, or scream belligerently at loved ones and be understood in their anger whenever they want to. Because of this ignorance, I do not know if I have missed my grief window to do such things or not, as I have not found the time to do them over the past year and it may be high time to do so. Or maybe not.

Truth be told, I do not like to cry, not in front of people or by myself, really. Maybe I come by that honest. I can count on one hand the amount of times I saw my parents cry. Now, I mean a real cry, not like a misty-eyed Forrest Gump "You died on a Saturday morning and I had you placed under our tree" you-are-heartless-if-you-don't-tear-up-kinda-cry. But a real gusher. I can only assume they didn't like to heart wail because they didn't want to lose control. I know that is why I don't like to. I also think it makes people feel uncomfortable. I  much prefer making people laugh if I'm going to make them uncomfortable anyway. But once Mom got sick, and while Daddy was going downhill, I wouldn't let myself hold tight to them. I deeply regret that. I knew that if I hugged them as tight as they were hugging me, I would lose control and I would start crying and I would not be able to stop. Maybe that is the fear, the fear of what will come of the grief wave.

So...sometimes, I cry in the car. Just enough not to push myself into the ugly cry or make it so anyone knows I've been crying. I never let myself full out wail over Daddy. And so far, I have quiet-tear cried a lot in front of my children and husband this past year, but not past that threshold. Never to the point of no return. I sometimes tear up while I'm reading to the kids (and Charlotte and Sadie call me on it) but then I stop. I don't go lie down on the bed and stay there for a few days. And this is not to say I am not utterly gut-punchingly sad every single day without my parents. I am. I just don't want to let Grief win. We were just never a sad people. We like the funnies. 

I guess I just wonder at what point you just can't do the carte blanche grief anymore. Have there been some studies? Is it in one of my books? I think I may be able to do more than just sniff them now. I mean, at some point, if it sneaks up on me and Grief just Book Thief's me off into that abyss, can I go crawl into the bed and stay a few days?

Seven and Sevens

My seventh birthday. The 80's gave us many great fashion pieces, these sweaters among them.

Charlotte turned seven Friday. It's odd how this particular number affects me. When I actually considered it for awhile, I realized that it hits me so hard because in 1987, during my seventh year,  my life really changed. My hairstyle-not so much. That mullet lasted well into adolescence. But I started thinking about how every subsequent seven (ages 17, 27, & 37) also brought me people who would change me forever.

That's my dad in the background watching the worst softball team
 ever assembled play without a mercy rule.
Also, note the hair.

At seven, my parents divorced. Now, that is probably a life-altering shitshow for most kids, but my parents could've written the book on divorced co-parenting. They loved each other until the day they died. I only remember being upset about it once. My dad moved out and lived in a trailer initially and that bothered me enough that I remember sitting in the backseat of Mom's car and crying when I left him. Mom asked if I wanted to go back in for longer. But I didn't. He didn't belong there. So he moved back into his home and I moved with Mom to Griffin Street. 

It was on Griffin Street that my defining moment happened.  Across the street and behind a house and down a little path was Amy's house. I don't remember the exact moment we met, but I do know she became my first real friend, my best friend.  She challenged me, read with me, acted on stage with me, played with me, created with me, and argued with me. I adored her.  She was the coolest kid in school and told me all the hard truths about life. Oh, Santa, your secret was not safe with Amy Simpson.  Our lives have ebbed and flowed. She is the ocean. I, the beach. We have always been connected, but sometimes drift apart only to be brought back together. As it has always been and always will be. Childhood walks home from school to adulthood table talks. She knows me. She knows it all. To this day, we may not agree on everything, but she has held my heart and my hand through my happiest and most gut-wrenching moments. Marriage, divorce, Crazytown, death. She was my right hand at my grandmother's funeral, Francine's, my father's, and my mother's. I will never stop needing her hand to hold.

Charlotte has many friends, but no Amy yet, no 24/7 BFALATSAMSE friend with their own language (icabali...), but one day.

I'm pretty sure one or both of us was entering or leaving Crazytown
when this picture was taken.

Ten years later, at 17, I went to Governor's School. I remember being truly upset when I wasn't chosen to go the year before. But I was most definitely meant to go the summer of 1997. For there, I met my soulmate, Andrea Sarubbi. We too, have our own language (Uney Guavey) and many, many, many secret stories that are just tooooo funny. We instantly clicked. We were both insanely loud, comical, and driven. We both loved the English language and wanted to write the next great American Novel at 17 (although we were thwarted by our teacher). Instead we wrote an epic about Biggie and Tupac and called it a day. 

Chocolate ice cream fight in Motown freshman year!

At UNC, we roomed together. We borrowed each other's clothes, heard distinct clinks and held funeral dirges for hamsters. Motown, Frathouses, Rugby parties, The Bugle Brothel, we did it. I am thankful that social media was not a reality then... 

Our new yearly Girls Getaway Retreat, Ocean City, baby!

She is my sounding board, another person in crazy mother guilt land with me. She's the one who calls to check on me or just to check in. How's the whole family?  Her sister and son both have my middle name (Byrne). It was meant to be!

Charlotte will find her ride or die soulmate one day. If not, we know she and Andrea's son Markie will probably end up at UNC around the same time anyway...

We've been dating for three months. Wanna go to Vegas?
Hells yes! 

A decade hence, at 27, I met David. He checked all the boxes. Cute, college educated (I can live with UVA), good job, and family oriented. We talked all night on the phone and very soon spent every moment we could together even though we lived an hour apart. Because of him, I took a chance at my dream job (Jostens) and we moved to Virginia Beach together. Come to find out, sales are not my thing. But I tried. And I wouldn't have tried had it not been for him.  I also never would have known how much I love teaching without taking that chance and leaving it for a few years.

Accurate.

After successfully raising a beautiful Lab, we figured children would be a breeze. Not so much. We do have two beautiful children. But come to find out, they cannot be Dog Whispered quite as easily as our dog. They are a special kind of crazy. They fight and scream and don't listen. We love them and we're happy we have them, but good LAWD!  There is no break from the insanity. But the craziness is so much easier together with him.

He cooks and cleans. He sings while he cleans...love... 

He brushes the girls' hair. His ponytails are ten times better than mine. He keeps me sane. I know that no matter what we bicker about, when the hard stuff goes down, he is there to pick me up. And I love that he does all the messy things like this morning when my tires were flat and he came out and filled them right back up. I need this in my life. 

We have been through dark times, but "the best way out is always through" and we made it to the light. Without him, I would not have gotten through losing both my parents.

He is my person. We also have our own language...

Smiling through the pain.

At 37, I met myself. I had always had my mother to tell me what to do. Or how to do it. Or help me do it. Or just do it for me. Now, she "guides my sword" but not physically. She can't come get the kids if they're sick. She can't take them for a few days when I am at my wits' end. She can't give me day to day advice.  I have had to buck up and do it myself. I have a wonderful husband and great friends, but a lot of things, I just have to do myself. I realize that is a foreign concept to me whereas many people have been doing this forever, but it's scary to be drifting around in the universe without an anchor. 

So, I created rope ladders.

I have finally embraced a freedom of sorts. I am becoming less stressed. I'm trying to do things that fill the void within ME.  I discovered Jazzercise. I have NEVER, ever enjoyed working out or going to therapy. But Jazzercise is my therapy. I can dance, workout, have an hour to myself, and get healthy. I also have new friends. Other than my wonderful work friends, it's really hard to just make new good friends when you're old...well...I found them. They do the crazy dance with me. They watch me work out like Phoebe running on "Friends" and still like me, so I can get behind that! 

Jazzercise loves me. They really love me.

I am thankful for all of the friendships that have given me my voice in the past year. I am thankful for Table Talks. I am thankful for Voxer. I am thankful that I can hear Leigh's voice and Andrea's voice on a mommy timeline-when we have two minutes without children yelling our name.  And these are the words keeping me sane, helping me find me. I'm also closer to my children because of the fact that I am always with them. I don't think we ever would have been this close without the smothering that comes with summer.

Seven is an archetypal number. It's actually the perfect number, bringing together the trinity of three and the four earthly elements.  It is the symbolic number of perfection, security, safety, and rest. I think this is why Charlotte turning 7 resonates within me as I hope it does within her too.

Chucks and a pretty dress.
My Charlotte turns 7.

Angels Among Us

People who are crazy tell crazy stories. That doesn't make them false, just unreliable, I suppose. But I have heard of some strange "happenings" from people who are not crazy. Ghost stories, whispers from angels stories, past lives stories. I had my share of incidental "happenings" too, but on June 26, 2016, I met an angel. 

At CHKD after waking up. She is still a little droopy on one side. 

Driving back from Suffolk, the highway was at a standstill. My GPS told me taking Military Highway was the quicker route off of 64, so I headed to the exit ramp. As soon as I got onto the unfamiliar road home, I looked into my rear view mirror at Charlotte. She was just staring at me, eyes desperately trying to say something. I turned off the radio. All I could hear was what sounded like ice. Chewing ice. Gargling. 

"Charlotte!" I yelled. "Charlotte. Spit it out!"

I knew there was no ice in her mouth. At least my brain did. I knew the symptoms she was exhibiting were eerily similar to the ones my mother had described almost a year before. But my brain and mouth were not communicating at the time. Luckily my brain took the wheel and pulled over on the side of the highway.

As I frantically unhooked Charlotte from the car seat, I called 911. 

Charlotte's left arm would not stop jerking uncontrollably. 

The 911 operator calmly asked me what was wrong and where I was. I had no idea. 

"Somewhere off of Military Highway." 

"Ma'am, I need you to look around at street signs." 

With Charlotte's arms jerking, mouth gurgling, eyes screaming to speak, I pulled my five-year old out of the car. 

"Help me," were my only words.

"Ma'am, calm down and look around. You have to let us know where you are." 

"Please, help me..."

I knelt to the grass on the side of the road and held Charlotte on her side, still convulsing and gurgling and pleading. I still had no idea where we were. 

Here we were, a woman and her child clearly in need of help on the side of the highway. There were cars going by, but only one stopped. A little white sedan pulled up beside us. A twenty something man got out of his car and walked over to us. He had flaming red hair and tattoos covering all visible parts of his body from head to toe. He was also smoking a cigarette. The smoke billowed behind him as he walked toward us. 

"Where are we?" I asked him. He looked around.

"Galberry and Enterprise."

I told the 911 operator. She dispatched the ambulance.

The red-headed man didn't speak again.  He just sat next to us. For support.  Having put the cigarette out sometime before sitting down, he just watched over us while I held Charlotte and waited for the EMTs. I told him thank you. I think I did. A firetruck, police cars and a gray ambulance came. An officer took my keys and moved my car out of the road. An EMT took Charlotte from my arms and put her in the back of the ambulance while I crawled into the front.

Her arm continued to convulse while I sat helpless up front. I called my husband who used light-speed to meet us at CHKD. Luckily Sadie had been with him. 

Once we got to the hospital, one of the EMTs (a Clarence the angel lookalike) asked if I wanted a member of the clergy to come to see me. Now, I have seen a lot of  hospital shows, and the only time they ask if you want a minister is if someone is about to die. Luckily, Clarence could see the hyperventilation showing up on my face and pointed to my shirt. 

It said: "I love Jesus and coffee and naps."  Ok, I understand. 

Charlotte recovered. She went to the neurologist. She has seizures that she should outgrow in puberty. She is on medication. Everything went back to normal.  

About a week after the seizure, driving through Norfolk, Charlotte saw an ambulance through the window of the car. 

She said, "Hey mommy, that ambulance looks like the one I was in." And it did. Whereas most ambulances are pretty standard, this one was quite different because of the gray color. So, she clearly remembered that afternoon.

I asked her what else she remembered because I couldn't believe she remembered anything. I even asked her to make a list. 

She remembered Mr. Tim picking her up and putting her in the ambulance. 

She remembered the police who were at the scene with the ambulance. 

She remembered the fire truck. 

All of this happened on the side of Military Highway. Not at CHKD where her seizure had finally subsided. 

I looked over her list again and thought she had missed something. 

So I asked her, "Do you remember the man who helped us? He sat right next to us while we waited for the ambulance?" Surely she remembered him. He was there next to us much longer than any of the others. 

She simply said, "Mommy, there was no man there."

When people think of angels, they naturally assume they will have halos and wings or look like sweet old men like Clarence, but angels come in all shapes and sizes. Mine just happens to be a red-headed tatted-up smoker. Sounds good to me. 

January 22

Christmas 2015 

One year ago today Mom went to the hospital with what she thought might be a heart attack. It was not. Her lung had collapsed and the X-ray revealed a spot. That damned spot...I think we knew. We knew once they did the biopsy that it was cancer. What we didn't know was that it was the worst kind of spot. Small cell lung cancer, the kind that comes with an hour glass. And the sand was already falling, we just didn't know how fast.

Although in my denial I was adamant that she was not going to die, every important event from that day forward was enveloped in whispers of "the last." This will be the last birthday my mom will call me and say, "You're not born yet. Aleene is still staring at me. I just think I'm hungry, so I sent your daddy to work." This is the last Sadie birthday, Charlotte birthday, beach trip. This is the last Mother's Day I will have a mommy.

So for a year, I have felt like I have been drowning with no hope of ever reaching the surface. I prayed fervently for a cure, a miracle which didn't come. I prayed to wake up and have it all be a horrible nightmare, but it was a live horror show. I hoped beyond hope that when 2017 hit, time would rewind and it would be 2016 again, but 2017 came anyway.

What I finally discovered was that I was never going to reach the surface again. I accepted that I was going to have to learn to live without air. So, in the past few weeks, I opened my eyes, breathed in the salt water, and started to swim. I finally feel alive again, albeit changed, someone different than I was before. And I'm ok. Maybe I was always meant to be a fish...or on particularly good days, a mermaid.

The Truth in the Cover

 

I miss my mom. Sunday is going to be so very hard. Harder than Christmas. Harder than my birthday. The obligatory mother/daughter pictures are going up on Facebook and, for a second, I thought about just updating my profile picture to Carrie and Debbie and calling it a day, but that ignores the fact that I AM still here and I DO have two beautiful little beings I call mine. So, I started looking through last year's Mother's Day pictures. In May of 2016, I feared it would be Mom's last. I was in deep denial, but deep down, I knew what was coming. She felt really well then and I hoped beyond hope, but, still, my heart pumped with fear.

And I desperately needed pictures of us all. One last time.
 

My children were not cooperating, especially Sadie, who has no time for the camera. I just wanted a picture of the four of us. Just one. I needed it. What if this was the last chance?
 

In looking for a cover picture for Facebook, I found this one. It tells the true story of the four of us. Not of Mom and I because we are, as she said, "connected by a heartstring that wraps the moon and back." But the four of us. There is now a chasm that will divide us into eternity.

Charlotte is Mom's. I make no excuses or qualms about it. Mum and Papa pretty much raised her from the time she was born until she went to Kindergarten. Charlotte stayed in Elizabeth City 4 days a week sometimes. I was a part time mommy. We got to be part time parents with date nights! And Mom wanted it that way. She taught Charlotte ABCs and took her to Preschool while we worked and knew that all was right with the world.

But Sadie. Sadie doesn't get Mum. She doesn't get to be hers. She gets me. I am her play school. I am her sick days. I had to slap back into the real world with most moms and mom. And I am not angry about that fact. I embrace it. 

I am fortunate in that I have a mother-in-law to "grandmaw" Sadie and a babysitter who is beyond wonderful to help us while we are at work. And all that Sadie will know is that she has loving parents, and many grandparents who love her.

But it's what she is missing, what we are all missing. MY mother. HER extraordinary being. I will feel that emptiness every time I pick up the phone to call Mom and tell her Sadie counted to ten or that Charlotte got to say the pledge on the morning announcements.   

And the future. I'm not ready to think too far yet.

But what I fear the most on this Mother's Day, when all is said and done, is that even Charlotte won't remember her enough. Sadie won't at all. They still talk about her fondly and I can only hope they they don't stop. I know I won't stop. And hopefully they will remember how she made them feel. Spoiled.  And loved beyond space and time.

Popcorn with Jesus: Part Two

 

Imagine this sweet child with a hot mess of popcorn massacre all over those perfectly edged bangs.

One of the more prolific memories of my life is the one where I bit my tongue off.

 

I don't know whether I actually remember it or if, because I have heard it a million times, I think I remember  it. I was probably only three or four, but I've heard this story so many times, it's like I was there...

 

My dad always got one of those giant popcorn tins from my Uncle Jack every Christmas. The ones with the three sections: one with caramel covered popcorn, one with cheese covered popcorn, and one with buttered popcorn. I don't know if Grease was on again and I needed to dance like Sandy in painted on black lycra, or if Michael Jackson had just told me it was "Thriller  Night," but I wanted to dance on top of that popcorn tin. Mom, of course, had told Daddy not to let me get on the tin as I was clumsy and it was small, but since she was in the other room and he thought it was hilarious, I, of course, got up on that tin and danced like Michael Jackson at Rydell High.

 

Then I slipped.

Blood went everywhere.

There were blood curdling screams.

 

Maybe it was the curdling (not sure exactly what that is), but Mom came running in, grabbed my face with both her hands, wrenched opened my mouth and gasped. All she saw were pieces of a gnarled up tongue covered in blood. Frantically, she scavenged the floor searching for the other piece of tongue I had bitten off. Scowling at my father, she screamed to get me in the car so they could hurry to the hospital.

 

"But... the tongue!" My dad stood agape, pointing at the floor. 

 

My teenage brother Brooks was in the shower while the popcorn tin dance party was going on, so all he heard was a muffled, "Call Grandma! We have to take Keeley to the hospital!" through the running water.

 

They loaded me up into the Green Bronco and sped toward Albemarle Hospital. It was only about 5 miles from the house, but Daddy was going so fast that the blue lights were soon behind him.
After explaining that his daughter had bitten off her tongue to the very sympathetic cop, we received a police escort to the hospital like we were royalty or the president. It was quite the production up Road Street onto 17 North. 

 

Mom had been holding a rag over my mouth to soak up the blood, and I'm sure I was somewhere between pain and shock, but about the time we pulled into the emergency room loop, I leaned over and looked at my mom and said, "What's going on?"

 

Now, everyone knows you can't talk without a tongue, so I imagine Mom and Daddy were somewhere between relief and embarrassment at this point because they still had to physically get out of the car, thank the cop, and tell the doctor waiting for us with a gurney that those bloody popcorn kernels in my mouth were what appeared to be gnarled tongue bits...so sorry...

 

So, when Sadie said Mum and Grandaddy were in heaven with Jesus eating popcorn the other night, the fact that I had somehow suppressed this memory must have had them throwing angelic popcorn at my head.

This kid is ready to hand jive or moonwalk on a Sit-N-Spin or a popcorn tin!