The Mo(u)rning of (A work in progress)

**Note: I lost my mom in a car accident on December 9th 2005. Sometimes when I think back to that morning I envision how all of the different people in my family went about their mornings that day, before the first phone call informing us that she has been lost. I know what my morning consisted of, and there is a little of that here, but what I find intriguing is wondering how that morning played out for different people. Below is one of these stories, focused on my little brother Matthew, who is now 9 and what his last morning with Mom was like. I warn you it may be sad to read, but in writing I find a weird sense of solace, so here it goes…**

The Mo(u)rning of

I wasn’t there. I had never been there. This exists only in my mind. A recreation of something I had never seen. And yet in my imagination I conjure up more sadness then I ever thought possible. I see innocence as I have never seen before. With that I will begin.

I picture it vividly. The cold December air, the darkness that hangs over the early morning, as if night is refusing to give up, that latent darkness that hangs on ever longer in those cold New York winters. I see his face waking up to her cool coaxing.

“Its time to wake up Matthew she says”

Little does she know he is already awake. I know he was already awake because in our conversations he told me how he thought it was funny that mom always used to wake him up because he actually woke up to the sound of her alarm. Maybe she knew too, but still needed the ritual of giving him a smile, a kiss and a nudge to wake up in the morning. Maybe he knew he could wake up, but laid in bed that cold December morning, like other mornings anticipating her bright smile, anticipating the good morning nudge. Anticipating her soothing voice that gave no indication of the rush she was in, to prepare breakfast, get dressed, pack his bags, get him on the bus and rush to work (hopefully) in time. None of that was apparent in her voice. Instead it was a calm affirmation of morning as if they had all day to get ready. That gentleness awoke him.

The time between. How do we look back? I don’t know how he looks back on those moments prior to the bus. The problem is we don’t realize whats coming. We are not prepared. I picture then not a little boy who paid close attention to every moment, knowing that these would be the last with his mother. No, instead I picture a little boy happily eating breakfast. No conception of death. No conception of ends. No conception of the pain of abandonment. A boy filled with the hopes of a 7 year old. A boy eating cereal with the unconscious assumption that his mother would be there in that very kitchen, watching him eat breakfast before his last day of high school. No sense of temporality. No sense of time. There was no rush to cram anything into these moments. Moments thought to be trivial and everyday that would turn out to be “last” moments. Those moments we don’t anticipate being the last, but are.


What I see next. Gathered from pieces of conversation with my grandmother and Matt scare me, haunt me and sadden me even though they only exist in my imagination. I see them walking out the door, Mom in her work clothes, Matt wearing his not so warm Yankees jacket, insisting “its not that cold mom.” She acknowledges him only with a smile that says, I love you even when you’re stubborn. As they wait for the bus they chatter, Matt with his friends, Mom with the neighbors. In every ones actions, words thoughts today is a day just like any other. How do we look back on those moments? How do we reflect? If only they had all known what was to come, would things have been different? Would they have savored the morning conversation? Savored last good byes?

All I see at that bus stop now is a little boy who has no idea the world that awaits him. I picture his smile, carefree and innocent. His funny laugh, his smirk, the ease with which he interacts with people. If only I could save him from this moment. As I play it back in my head I see it all happening but with that horrible feeling that I know the outcome. In my head I want to go back and tell him, hold on to that hug Matthew, get every ounce of goodbye from her for this is it, after this moment your life will never be the same. But it is like one of those horrible dreams where you try to speak but somehow you have lost all ability to make sound. So it goes, I play it over and over in my head. I envision the bus pulling up, the good bye hug she gives him.

From my conversations with Matt I do know what happened next. As he got on the bus she gave him a kiss goodbye, and told him they would go bowling that night. I can picture it now, the smile on his face at the prospect of a fun Friday night bowling with his mom, and the smile on her face, the joy she felt when ever he felt so happy. And that was it. Those last few seconds of normality for everyone. Its hard to picture this all because it seems like a dream, as I re create the scene over and over in my head I want to make it stop, change the outcome, or do something but instead it plays on.

In my head I see the bus pull away. Mom, taking a long deep gasp of the cold December air rushes to her car in order to make it to work on time. No time to wait, no time to ponder, just as quick as the bus moves out of view she is into the care and off to work. It is at this very moment that I want the world to halt. I want that little boy filled with the anticipation of Friday night bowling to return home to the warm arms of his mom. I want my mom filled with anxiety to simply be able to make it to work on time, and return home to do what she does best, deliver happiness to the lives of others. But just like a bad dream, I have no control over this scene. The bus pulls away, Matt gives one last wave and smile, Mom beams back blows him a kiss and that is it. At that very moment little did anyone know what was to come.

In a rush Mom hastily pulls out of the driveway, and on this cold December morning heads off to work. When I think this scene over I wonder what was she thinking? In those three short miles from the house to the scene of the accident what was going through her head. In my head I see the car moving, but I also see the last seconds of her life ticking away. I guess this is the problem with memory. Mom had no idea what awaited around that bend, though in my head I see her approaching that turn and want to intervene, save her, save us all. But time moves on. I like to think that in her last moments, as she was rushing to work, she was filled with thoughts of happiness and not worry. Knowing my Mom she was already plotting the day. Her mind raced always at speeds that most would find hard to comprehend. She was probably planning her first meeting, lunch, when she would get Matt, what she would cook for dinner, when they would go bowling. I wonder what was her last thought? As the car slid over that center median, and the van fast approached did she have time to think one last happy thought? Did all her worry disappear? Did she know this was it? Those moments somehow replay in my head more often then I would like. Those last few moments of life, somewhere in between 908 and 909 am on that morning she was here with us, rushing to work, going about the everyday, and then just like that she was not.

What is most odd to me is that although it was at 9:09 am that my Mom passed we all went about our daily lives. Matt was off to school anticipating his run Friday evening, Michelle was off to class, my alarm would be going off in 2 hours and I would be out the door to give a presentation at school. Up until some one realized Mom was not where she was suppose to be we were all living. All living with the assumption that our lives would remain the carefree, happy ones that they were at that very moment. Even while she was no longer with us, we went about the day as if she was, assuming she had made it to work, assuming today was a day just like every other. It is those moments that truly mess with my sense of time. I look back and see myself walking into class, thinking that this presentation was the most important thing of the day, nervous beyond belief. As I gave that presentation I had no idea of the phone call I would receive when I finished class and turned on my phone. We all have no idea when that moment is coming. In a way we have to live the lie that everything is normal until proven otherwise, if we did not we would go insane.

It feels odd to be writing this. At this point I must come to grips with how the story really ends. As I type these words I am forced to confront the fact that there is no going back. I will never be able to be at the bus stop urging Matthew to giver he one more hug, I will never be able to prevent her from rushing off to work, I will never be able to know her last thoughts. Instead I must relate the final moments as they occurred, not how I want them to be. This is how it happened….

Matthew returned home late that afternoon. Again, I was not there, and my imagination runs rampant but this is how I envision it. As the bus pulls up I wonder at which point he notices, something is wrong, someone is missing. Slowly the bus door opens up and instead of my Mom being there to greet him with a hug and take him bowling, he instead sees me grandmother, my aunts and his dad. As innocent as 7 year olds are I would venture to say some part of him knew something was certainly wrong. Could he tell on their faces the new they were about to deliver? Did he know that there would be no bowling and no hugs? Did he notice her car was not there? Just as I contemplate those last moments of my mother’s life, I also contemplate the last moments of my brother’s innocence. I see his each and every step as approaching that loss of innocence, and again I want to intervene to prevent his world from being crushed. I can not though. Just as I can not prevent myself from picking up that phone call, and hearing my father’s voice on the other line trembling like I have never heard it before. Just as I imagine my brother knew what had happened the moment he saw my mom was not at the bus stop, I somehow knew at the quaking of my father’s voice that I had lost my mom. He didn’t have to speak, he didn’t have to utter those words. It is akin to what Freud calls the uncanny, when you just know something, you become aware before you are told. I was aware I had lost my mom as my dad trembled out the words, “Bill, I don’t know how to tell you this…” And that is how it occurred, or at least what I remember about the morning of.

time keeps on slipping slipping....

into the future. name that tune. even if you don't know it you can probably hum the tune and you know those words and all too well that time, despite out best attempts, keeps on slipping into the future. somehow 2 weeks has just blown by. from letting out a huge scream of joy as i flew down the face of a great run in Whistler with some great friends, to nervously giving the best man speech at my good friends wedding. I feel like these past 2 weeks I accumulated so many experiences and smiles that it is somehow ok to be back at school, reading theory and dreaming over the next moments of escape. I also realized why the time went to quick, I was too busy living that I wasn't doing much thinking. And I need those moments, I think we all do for our mental sanity. Those "flow" moments where you are not aware of before or after but without knowing it you are simply immersed in now, with only the big grin on your face to show for it. Those moments where we are in it, living it, and sucking every last drop out of this gift of life are those moments we look back on with fondness. For some crazy reason it seems lots of us are hell bent on accumulating money. Money has become the thing that defines a person, the thing which we always want more, at the expense our our hopes, our dreams and sometimes even our morals. But what about experience? Why do we need to measure a person by the size of the bank account but the total of dollar bills accumulated? What about an experience account? What about heading out there and accumulating moments of joy, happiness and ecstasy? Instead of envying someones new ride, there new clothes or there high paying job why not ask them when was the last time you let out a scream of joy, had a laugh with old friends, had a smile on your face so big that it hurt the next day, felt stoked to be alive? Jobs and money are obviously vital to accumulating experience but money may not be the be all and end all. I guess that might be the anthropologist in me. I am curious what makes people get up every day? What makes all of the other crap worthwhile? What are those things that get people inspired? What brings a smile of excitement to peoples faces? I am curious about all of this and I want to know how people achieve it in their own unique ways. There is no one way to happiness, despite what the self help section at Borders may lead you to believe. Somehow happiness has become a business where to find out how to be happy you need to work a lot to afford to buy all the books on happiness. I think its bullshit. Now I will admit I have read these books and even enjoyed some of them. But I think that the real secret lies in our greatest resource...other people. Try it and I think you may seem that there are may ways to live a life. The next time you meet some one in the street or catch up with an old friend, ask them: When was the last time you felt really alive? What do you love to do? What makes you get out bed every day in the face of seemingly endless obstacles, confusion and work? What moments when remembered put a smile on your face? And after a few of these questions you'll see it, as the person talks about those experience suddenly something will ignite a memory and that spark, that smile will appear on their face. So head out put those dollars to work and accumulate some of those other things..experience, fun, and memories that make you laugh so hard it hurts.