Tag Archives: forgiveness

THE STILL OF THE NIGHT WHEN THE MOON FLOWER BLOOMS

1 Reply

Late one night I received a call from my mother’s next-door neighbor, Amanda Cummings. I remember it so well it was late, nearly eleven o’clock on a Tuesday night. I was just getting out of the bathtub when I heard the phone ringing. I let it ring. I mean who wants to talk to anyone at 11:00 PM. I don’t. It’s either a wrong number or bad news. Let’s face it no one wants to hear bad news right before they go to bed.

NIGHT GARDEN

I figure after the phone rang four or five times most people would give up. But not this late-night call. They let it ring ten times because that is when I picked up the phone. I didn’t recognize the number on the caller ID. And I said out loud to no one in particular. “this better be good because it’s 11:00 and I was just getting ready for bed.” I pick up the phone, “Hello?”

“I apologize for calling so late, this is Amanda Cummings.”

“I’m sorry I don’t know any Amanda Cummings. I’m tired can you please tell me why you’re calling. I have to go to work in the morning.”

“I’m your mother’s next-door neighbor and a good friend of hers. I’ve been trying to get in touch with you but I couldn’t find a recent phone number. I finally got in touch with an old school friend of yours, Sara Rice. Luckily, she has kept in contact with you and had your home phone number.”

“OK, so what’s the problem, does my mother need to be bailed out of jail? If so, you called the wrong person I’m not doing that anymore. I can’t handle her drinking and self-destructive lifestyle anymore. I made that clear the last time I spoke to her over ten years ago. I told her not to contact me ever again. I meant it.”

NIGHT GARDEN

There was a moment of silence and I could hear her take a deep breath. “No, it’s nothing like that. I have some difficult news for you. She took another deep breath and then sighed. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but your mother passed away several days ago, unexpectantly.”

“She passed away, what are you talking about she wasn’t even sixty years old yet?”

“It appears as if she had a stroke, apparently she had high blood pressure. Anyway, we held off holding the funereal and the services until we could get ahold of you. And as I said that took several days. Do you believe you’ll be able to make it to the services in two days?”

“No, I mean yes. Of course, I will make it home. I will have to speak to my boss in the morning and take leave for a few days. She is my mother after all, even though we haven’t seen each other in a long time.”

“Do you know of any other relatives that would want to attend the services?”

“Honestly, I don’t. My mother was an only child. So, there were no cousins I knew of. My grandparents passed away years ago. And as I said, she had a drinking problem and if she had any relatives, they lost contact a long, long time ago. I guess I’m the only family. I suppose it will be a small service considering my mother’s addiction issues.”

“Actually, your mother has or had a large group of friends, she was involved in many community services and she volunteered at the grade school as an aide. She ran a kitchen that fed the needy in our community lunch and dinner for the last eight years. And then, of course, there was the community garden. She started it and trained all the volunteers and that is where the kitchen got all the fruits and vegetables. And then of course there was her personal garden. Oh, how she loved to work in her garden. Every year people took tours of the town’s most beautiful gardens. And hers was always on the list of most requested.”

“Wait a minute are you sure you are talking about my mother, friends, community services, and volunteer with kids? And also gardening, you must be mistaken?”

“No, I’m not mistaken. After your mother stopped drinking, she became well, a whole new person. Or perhaps the person she was always meant to be. She is, I mean was one of the kindest, most generous women, I ever met. I can’t tell you how much she will be missed. Not just by me, but everyone in town.”

“Well, that doesn’t even sound like the woman I knew or the mother I had. I don’t know if I should laugh or cry. I wish that woman was around for all the years I grew up alone, afraid, and often hungry. But as I said I will be there for the services. I will call you back tomorrow after I speak to my boss. Can you give me your cell phone number? Oh, this is your cell phone number. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

MOON LILY

Two days later I was in my car and on my way home to attend my mother’s funereal services. I felt numb, it all just seemed unreal. I stopped thinking about my mother ten years ago the last time I saw her. I bailed her out of jail and yet another drunken-driving accident, where a passenger in her car was seriously injured. I told her to lose my phone number I never wanted to hear from her or see her again. My whole life growing up was one catastrophe after another. Having my mother in my life was an invitation to a life of chaos and stress.

Over time I just stopped talking to her. I have no good memories to reminisce about. All my memories were painful to contemplate. All of them, I didn’t have a single good memory. And now I never would. I wish she had contacted me after she got sober. Maybe she was afraid she would relapse, I don’t know. But I can’t go back in time. It’s a two-and-a-half-hour drive to my mother’s house. I got a late start because I had to go to my office and tie up some loose ends. It was dark when I arrived.

When I pulled up to the curb in front of her house, I saw a light in the kitchen but the rest of the house was dark. As I opened the car door and step out, I took a deep breath. My memories of this house and the years that I spent there were not good ones. An absentee father and my mother who was there physically but her mind and her spirit were absent.

I was a lonely child. I was afraid to ask friends to come to my house. I couldn’t let them see the condition my mother was in or the downright filth we lived in. The kids and the adults would point at me when they saw me and shake their heads. No one ever reached out to me. No one tried to help me or ask me if I was hungry. Not even my teachers and they must have known something bad was happening in my home. My clothes and hair were always dirty. There were winters when I didn’t have a coat that fit me. I never had lunch money. I was often hungry. No one ever asks me if I was alright.

I pull into the driveway. I left my suitcase in the car. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to stay in the house. I steeled myself for the possible nightmare I was about to enter. As I walk up the sidewalk, I notice that the sidewalk is spotless. The grass looks as if had been cut recently. There weren’t piles of unread newspapers strewn across the yard. There was a light shining next to the front door which wasn’t decorated by spiderwebs that I remembered as a child. I took a deep breath.

I knock at the door. No answer. I take my cell phone out of my purse and called Amanda Cummings. She answers on the first ring. “Hello Rebecca, where are you?”

“I’m at my mother’s door as we speak. Can you come over?”

“Alright, I’ll be right there. I just have to throw my robe and slippers on.”

“I’ll be waiting.”

I look up at the sky as I wait for Amanda. It’s a clear night and the night sky is generously sprinkled with luminous stars. The night sky always had a calming effect on me. As a child, I used to sneak out of my room at night and sit in the back yard and say “twinkle, twinkle, little star How I wonder what you are? Up above the world so high Like a diamond in the sky. Twinkle, Twinkle little star, How I wonder what you are.” Every night I wished that my mother would be like all my friend’s mothers and that I had a father that would tuck me into bed at night and tell me, I love you, Becky. I’m so lucky to have such a wonderful daughter.

But my wish never came true. My mother never became the perfect mother that I dreamed she should be and my father. Well, my father never appeared at my bed and told me I was such a wonderful daughter and how much he loved me.

I felt even more alone now, an orphan at thirty-five. And at that moment, I heard a voice behind me say, “Rebecca, it’s me Amanda I didn’t want to startle you. Would you like to go to the house? Are you planning on staying here? “

“Staying here, oh I don’t think so. I made a reservation at a nearby hotel.”

“Oh, well I understand, I just wanted to meet you and give you the information about the funereal and the wake. I hope this doesn’t further upset you but your mother left instructions in her will that she wanted the wake to be held here at the house the day of the funeral after dark in the back yard.”

“At night in the backyard? Well, isn’t that out of the ordinary? I thought most people have the wake after the funeral at a restaurant or a close friend’s house?”

“That’s true Rebecca but as I said this was a special request by your mother and I promised I would fulfill her final wish. I think you will better understand why at the time of the wake. I’m not trying to mysterious, but as I said I’m trying to fulfill her final wish.”

“OK, no problem I’ll text you the name of my hotel. If there is anything I’m supposed to do before then?”

“No, but your mother did ask if you would speak at the funeral.”

“What? No way. I can’t possibly do that. What would I say, I had a terrible childhood? And I have no good memories. She was the worst kind of mother.”

“Well, no, of course not. But don’t you have even one good memory of her that you would like to share?”

“I’ll try and think of one, but if I have any good memories, they are few and far between them. I’ll let you know if any come to mind.”

“OK, I’ll give you a call tomorrow afternoon with any updates. If I can do anything for you, please let me know. I know I’m a stranger to you, but I would like to say something to you.

Your mother and I have been close friends for many years. She was a woman who struggled to gain her sobriety. And once she did, she talked about you every time I saw her. She told me she was a terrible mother and you had every right not to ever want to see her again. But she loved you very much and she wanted to reach out to you. But kept her promise to you to leave you alone. And the reason was that she had broken every other promise she made to you and didn’t want to break the last promise she made.”

Rebecca tried not to allow any emotion to show. She promised herself she would not shed one tear for her mother. “Oh, alright I’ll talk to you tomorrow. It’s been a long day and I want to go to the hotel to get something to eat, take a bath and go to bed. Tomorrow is going to be another long day.”

“Yes, of course, I’ll talk to you tomorrow. But if you change your mind, or I can help you in any way, let me know.”
Rebecca said, “alright good night I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Thank you for all that you are doing. You have obviously been a faithful friend to my mother.”

“Good night then, drive carefully.”

When Rebecca arrives at the hotel, she checks in and brings her suitcase up to the room. And she freshens up and takes the elevator down to the dining room and orders a hamburger and fries. It’s her go-to meal when she was stressed out. She knows it’s unhealthy but it’s the one unhealthy thing she eats. And it calms her down for some reason.

As she was sitting there eating her last fry, she had a sudden rush of memory. She was young perhaps six or seven and she was in a Mcdonald’s eating a hamburger and French fries and her smiling mother was sitting across from her eating the adult version of burger and fries. Her mother used to take her out on Friday night and they would eat at McDonald’s. How could she have forgotten that? A tear slowly descended her face down her cheek. She didn’t wipe it away.

It was the first time in years that she thought of her mother in any other way than a negligent alcoholic mother. What else had she forgotten about her?

The next morning, she texted Amanda and told her she changed her mind and wanted to say a few words about her mother after all. Amanda was surprised but pleased.  “Oh, that is good news I know your mother would love that. She lived with such guilt about you and your childhood.”

The service at the church was short. The minister spoke about her mother in glowing terms saying how she had fought so hard to get sober and stay sober and of all the people who she had helped to stop drinking. And the years following when she worked tirelessly at the school, within the community, and in the community garden. How later in life she became a model citizen and an example to all that is possible to turn your life around if you make a commitment to do so. Even though it continued to be a struggle throughout your life.

Many people came up to speak about their experiences with her mother. Each of them explained how they had struggled with addiction and how she supported them and helped them go into recovery. She was always willing to come out and help them no matter the time of day or if she had previous plans.

Amanda wished that she had the opportunity to get to know the woman that her mother had ultimately become. She knew it was too late now but still she felt proud of her mother for overcoming adversity and moving to the other side. She was glad she had made the decision to come here to her funeral. She felt it was a deeply healing experience for her.

After the service, many people came up to her and shook her hand, and told her how wonderful her mother was to them. How kind and generous with her time and energy. Amanda came over to her and hugged her. “Please Rebecca come to your mother’s house this evening at about 7:45. Go to the back yard I promise you that you will not regret it. “

“Alright, I will I’ll be leaving early tomorrow morning so I can’t stay late. I’ll see you then.”

When it was almost time to go to her mother’s house Rebecca started to have cold feet. It had been so long since she had been inside her childhood home. There were so many bad memories there. At the last moment, she decided that she needed to let go of those bad memories and replace them with good memories she didn’t know what she would see in her mother’s garden at night. But she wanted to go see it.

Perhaps she would be able to find some peace now if she let go of her anger at her mother and forgave her. And try to accept that her mother had flaws and made some big mistakes but she had turned her life around and apparently did a great deal of good in the last years of her life. And so, she changed her clothes and drove to her mother’s house. She expected to see a lot of cars and many people but the only person she saw was Amanda.

“Oh, Rebecca I’m so happy you came. Let’s go over to the back gate I want to turn on some lights so you can see all the beauty that your mother created, not just in growing fruits and vegetables for all the hungry people in the area. But it creating a peaceful place for people to come and relax and enjoy the quiet and the beauty. Come on I know that you will just love it.”

“Alright, I can’t imagine what there is to see in the dark in her backyard. But I’m curious that is for sure. Let’s go.” Rebecca followed Amanda to the back gate. It was pitch black. She couldn’t even see her hand in front of her. And then Amanda opens the gate and switched on some small twinkling lights and they walked through the gate and into something magical.

It was a garden of night-blooming plants lit up by twinkling lights with paths that ran from one end of the garden to another with connecting paths. It was so beautiful it was truly something breathtaking. Rebecca was overwhelmed by what she saw. The aroma was amazing. Tears ran down her cheeks and Rebecca was smiling and crying at the same time. In front of her was a sign that said, REBECCA’S NIGHT GARDEN. Created with love.

To read more, enter your email address to Subscribe to my Blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

THE DAY WILL COME

4 Replies

Fortune Teller from Sheroes Entertainment.com

Once every couple of years, my siblings and I get together, and we hire a psychic to predict our futures. I know it sounds ridiculous. I’m a skeptic of the group, but still, I go along with them every time. We rarely get together, so I prefer to think of it as a family outing.

And however slim, there’s a chance we might actually find a real psychic to tell us our futures. My sisters truly believe if they find the “right psychic,” they will hear whatever it is that they need to hear.

Personally, I would like to hear good news for once, even if it is fictitious. The psychics in the past have told me I will develop a nerve issue and even that I will get Lupus. Thank god those two things never came to pass. They told me my daughter would eventually decide to have children and have twins, a  boy and a girl. My daughter is now past childbearing years and never wanted children. So, I take everything they say with a grain of salt.

Not that I believe in a god any more than I believe in psychics. But I do understand why people want to believe in god. It’s reassuring to believe that there’s this Supreme Being up there watching over us and keeping us safe. And he’s offering us an eternity of happiness after we pass away and that we will see all our loved ones that have passed again.

I do not try to talk anyone out of their beliefs because what is the point? For one, they won’t believe me, and two, who am I to take away their hope? Even if it is false hope.

The day finally arrives when we’re all going to see the psychic. It’s being held at my oldest sister Irene’s house in her living room. The rest of us sit in the kitchen, awaiting our turn. And even though I do not doubt she is a fraud, I know that no one has psychic ability. I still sit there waiting my turn to talk to her somewhat anxiously. And in addition to that, I believe if anyone were going to have any psychic ability, it would be me. Yes, I know that is a ridiculous statement to make,  considering I have said there are no “psychics.”  But even I have my moments of being illogical.

I’m a  sensitive person. My feelings are easily hurt. In addition, I am sensitive to how other people are “feeling” even if they don’t say anything. I can tell when people are not truthful. Yes, I’m able to read body language,  but it’s  I feel what they’re feeling. That is the ability I think these psychics have, the ability to sense what others are feeling. They don’t have the ability to foresee the future. And I think people give “psychic” hints by the questions they ask. And if all the participants are related, they will tell the psychic things, and she or he can put all this information together and make predictions, not unlike creating a quilt from different patches.

The psychic arrives as we all patiently sit in Irene’s kitchen. We share pleasantries and drink coffee or tea and eat homemade cake. It’s my favorite yellow cake with white icing and shredded coconut. I could eat a couple more pieces, but I stop at one.

She walks gracefully into the living room. It almost seems like she is floating. She’s an attractive thirty-something. Her hair is long and wavy, halfway down her back, and light brown with blond highlights. She has the palest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. It’s hard not to stare at her. Her eyes are mesmerizing. And her smile could light up the darkest room. She stands in the middle of the living room and introduces herself, “Good afternoon, my name is Aislee.  I’m from County Down Patrick in Northern Ireland. I’m from a family with a history of psychics going back over hundreds of years. A gift that was inherited from my great, great, great, great grandmother. All the women in my family have this gift.

She has a beautiful voice with an Irish lilt to it. It’s wonderful to hear. I could listen to her all day even if everything she said were full of malarky, as my mother used to say. She scans the room and makes eye contact with each one of us. I have the urge to look away from her, irrationally feeling she might look deep into my psyche and read my deepest thoughts. I know I’m being illogical, given the fact that I don’t believe in psychics. She is convinced I give her that.

My older sister, Irene, is the first person she “reads.” All of us bring paper and a pen with us to write down her “predictions.” We never discuss what the “psychic says until after she leaves, and not everyone wants to tell others what was told to them. I have recorded all the predictions told to me over the years. And not one of them came true. I can’t speak to my sister’s experiences.

I’m the last one to go into the living room to sit for the reading. I say, “Hello.” And she says, “Good afternoon, Kathleen. How are you feeling today?” No, she didn’t miraculously know my name. She has a list of our names. And since I was the last one, it was just a matter of elimination of who she already spoke to.

“I’m fine, thanks for asking.”

“So, Kathleen, you’re the youngest in the family?” Again, she knew that ahead of time.

“Yes, yes, I am.”

“Do you have any issues that you would like to ask about or anyone who has passed over that you would like to ask a question?”

I stare at her for a moment and wonder what I should ask her. I know it seems disingenuous to speak to these mediums or psychics, anticipating that everything they do or say is some trick. Maybe I want them to have this ability on some level. Maybe, I would like to know the future. I have many experiences in the past that could have turned out better if I had known in advance how I could avoid them or mitigate the problem before it happened.

“Well, I don’t know if you can answer this question,  but I often think about my older sibling that disappeared when I was relatively young. Can you tell me what happened to her? Do you know if she is still alive somewhere? Or if she suffered before she died?

Aislee closes her eyes and becomes quiet, almost too quiet. It seems as if she has gone to sleep. And after a couple of minutes, she opens up her eyes as if she’s waking up from a dream. You know when you begin to wake up from an afternoon nap. And you’re not sure where you are or what day it is, like that. She keeps blinking her eyes as if the light is too bright. And then her eyes open really wide as if she’s surprised by something unexpected.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes, but I have something to tell you. Your sister, Carol,  ran away from home with some boy. When she was in high school, she was no longer alive now,  but she passed away recently from an illness of some kind. I’m sorry. That’s all I can tell you right now.”

“You’re kidding? Did any one of my sisters tell you her name? Tell me the truth.”

“No, no one told me her name.”

“Can you tell me where she was living after she ran away? Or who she ran away with? Was she still with the same person until she passed away?”

“No, she was alone when she passed away. That’s all I can tell you right now. Maybe I will be able to tell you something more at another time.”

“Alright, I guess that’s all for now. I walk out of the room in shock. And when I return to the kitchen, I grab a glass and fill it with cold water from the tap and gulp it down. I rinse the glass out, walk over to the kitchen table and flop down in the nearest seat.

My sister, Terri, stares at me for a moment and says, “You look like you saw a ghost. What happened?”

“I’m not ready to talk about it right now.”

“OK, but now I’m really curious.  I thought you didn’t believe in psychics. What have you so spooked?”

“I said, I don’t want to talk about it right now. I have to think about it for a while. I know there has to be some trick to it.”

After Aislee left, my sisters and I sat at the kitchen table. I still hadn’t said anything about what Aislee said to me. And then my sister, Irene, said, “Spill Kathleen, what did she say to you? You’re not leaving here until you do. And in unison,  my sisters said, “spill.”

“OK, OK. Aisling asked me if there were any questions I wanted to ask or anyone I wanted to contact that had passed. And I said no, but I would like to know what happened to my older sister, who disappeared when she was a teenager. We never heard from her again. And then I asked if she was still alive. Aisling said, your sister Carol ran away from home with a boy. But she’s no longer alive. She passed away recently from an illness. And then I point-blank asked her how she knew my missing sister’s name. I asked her if one of you had talked about her. And she said, no.”

“She also said it was possible she would be able to tell me more sometime in the future. And now I want to know if any of you told her about Carol, or did any of you even mention Carol’s name?”

They all sit at the kitchen table with their mouths hanging open and say in unison, “I didn’t mention Carol or another sister.”

“Irene, you are the oldest. Do you remember anything about Carol’s disappearance? Or do you remember anything that our parents believed happened to her?”

“Honestly, Kathleen,  I don’t remember many details. That was a long time ago”, said Irene. And Mom and Dad didn’t talk to any of us about it. I do remember Dad seemed angry for a long time, and Mom cried and cried. Even years later,  I recall hearing her cry in their room at night. After a year or so, neither of them mentioned the disappearance or Carol at all, for that matter. I don’t think either one of them ever got over it. That’s probably why they were so overprotective and controlling of all of us when we were teenagers.

How about you guys? Kathleen looks at her remaining sister. Terri looked at Kathleen and said, “No, I don’t really remember much at all. Maybe I blanked it out. And you’re right. Kathleen, Mom, and Dad were never the same again. And they were extremely controlling with us as we got older.”

“I’d like to know how come the three of us never talked about this before. Did either of you ever ask the other psychics about Carol?”

Both Irene and Terri shook their heads no.

“Wow, that is really weird. We all acted like Carol never existed. We are really messed up. And I think we started this psychic thing because of Carol. At some subconscious level, we all wanted to know what happened to her. But none of us said it out loud.

“But at the time, did you two talk about it at all? Were the police involved, was her disappearance publicized? Did the neighbors or the townspeople look for her at all?”

“Honestly, the only thing I remember is one night Carol didn’t come home, but I didn’t hear about it until sometime the next day. Which was a Saturday, and I used to sleep- in since it wasn’t a school day. I heard a loud knocking at the front door, and then Mom and Dad let them in, and I heard them talking to the person at the door. I got up and looked down the steps, and there was a cop and a guy in a suit standing in the vestibule. I tried to hear what they were saying, but it was kind of muffled. And then I heard what sounded like Mom crying, and Dad sounded angry. “

“What about you, Terri?” I had my radio on pretty loud, and I didn’t hear anything. When the cops left, one of them slammed the door hard, and that’s when I came down to find out what was going on. Mom and Dad looked really upset., Mom was crying. Irene was in there with them,  and tears were running down her face. She looked over at me, and I started crying even though I didn’t know what was going on.”

“Yeah, I remember that because that’s when Dad said Carol didn’t come home last night. We called her boyfriend’s house, and he didn’t come home either. I guess they ran off together. We called all of Carol’s friends, and they all said they didn’t see them last night and don’t know anything that could help us. That’s when we called the police. The police just told us that they would put an All-Points Bulletin out. And they suggested we start posting pictures of Carol around town to see if anyone had talked to her or her boyfriend and might know where they planned to go. I guess the police are going over to the boy’s house now to talk to the parents.”

Mom and Dad kept calling the police every couple of weeks, but the police never found them, Nor did they have any idea where they went. The officer contacted all the police in the state, and then later, the FBI got involved, but as far as I know, they never found any trace of them.

We didn’t talk about it anymore because Mom got so upset. And Dad would be angry for days when we did. So, after a while, we all stop talking about Carol. As if she never existed. Every once in a while, one of the kids at school would say, “Hey, did you ever hear from Carol?” We never did, and after a few years, no one asked anymore.

“So, life just went on as if Carol never existed. And now we hear from Aislee that up until recently, Carol was alive. Why the hell wouldn’t she contact us? What happened to her? I can’t believe this. On the other hand, I’m glad I finally talked to you guys about it. Sometimes I used to think Carol was a figment of my imagination since no one ever talked about her. Even when Mom and Dad grew old, they never mentioned her. And I couldn’t find any pictures of Carol in our photo album.”

“Oh, Dad got rid of all the pictures because Mom would spend whole days staring at the pictures of Carol and crying. After Dad died five years ago, when I went through his personal items, I found a picture of you, me, Irene, and Carol when we were young in Dad’s wallet. I still have it.”

“You have it. Do you have it with you?”

“Yes, it’s in my wallet in my purse. Hold on; I’ll go get it.”

“Here, Kathleen, here it is. That’s Carol holding you in her lap.”

I took one look, and tears started streaming down my face. “Yes, yes, that’s her. She looked just like Mom. Then we all started crying and hugging each other. Kathleen said, you know, we could post this picture on the internet and see if anyone recognizes her. I don’t know how helpful it would be since she was just a kid in this picture. I could post a picture with the story of her disappearance and see if anyone knew her. It couldn’t hurt.”

“You know, it feels better to talk about Carol out loud. I thought of her so much over the years. And I wondered what happened to her. Why didn’t she try and contact any of us in all these years since she only died recently? It doesn’t make sense.”

“I agree, Terri. It doesn’t make sense. But we were all really young back then, and we didn’t really know what was going on with her. Maybe she got pregnant or something, or she was doing drugs. Let’s try and see if we can find someone that might have to know her. And you know what else? I bet some of her old high school friends might have pictures of her in high school, and then we can post them. What do you say?”

“I say, let’s go for it. Tomorrow I will call the High School office and see if they have records going that far back and get a list of the kids in her class. And then I’ll check out the internet and see if any of them are still living in the area or maybe some of their relatives still live in town, and I can talk to them. What do you say?”

“Let’s go for it, Kathleen, do it. I’ll help. Once you get the list, I’ll take half and start making calls.”

“Hey, me too, you guys, we’ll all do it.”

And that is how we began our search for our long-lost sister, and in the end, that was what brought us all together more than once a year. We realize that we were a family, and we needed one another through thick and thin. So, our sister, Carol, was the reason we are now a more loving and caring family.

To read more, enter your email address to Subscribe to my Blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Fate Steps in One More Time

1 Reply

You aren’t supposed to have conversations through the walls that separate the toilets in a lady’s room—especially the upscale ones or the down and out ones on a turnpike rest stop. And here I am on my way to visit my great Aunt Betty, who is possibly on her death bed. And suddenly I have the urge to go to the toilet five miles from my exit.

I know I can’t wait until I arrive at Aunt Betty’s house. I have to go now, right now. I realize that I shouldn’t have stopped on the way to get a breakfast burrito. That was my first mistake. And then, my second mistake was when I said, “Yes.” When the waitress asks,” would you like to add the Carolina Reaper on your burrito?” The Carolina Reaper has the reputation of being the hottest pepper available.  Photo by Openicons-Pixabay

About two miles from my Aunt Betty’s exit, my stomach starts churning, and I begin to feel kind of queasy. And then stomach cramps start. Not to mention that both my tongue and my lips are still burning from that Reaper. I breakout out into a cold sweat. “Oh, dear god,” I say to myself.

The cramps are so bad that I’m having difficulty concentrating on the road. I see an exit sign for the last rest stop. I’m trying to decide if I should stop or not when my stomach cramps into a knot. I feel like I might puke at any moment, so I turn onto the ramp and towards the rest stop.

So here I sit, I believe it is a distinct possibility that I might die just from the pain. At some point, I start praying for death. “Just let me die.” And then I just sit there and moan. I reach over to get another wad of toilet paper, and I realize with horror that there is not a single square left on the toilet paper roll. I’m in tears by now. I’m moaning and groaning, tears are running down my face.

And then I see a hand from the next stall handing me a roll of toilet paper at the bottom of the wall that separates the stalls. I grab it hastily and moan, “Thanks, so much.” And then I hear the door of the stall open and slam shut and then the door to the ladies’ room closes. I sit for a few more minutes until I feel my stomach muscles relax, and the pain subsides. I make a promise to myself and to the powers to be that I will never, ever eat a Carolina Reaper again.

I exit the stall and step up to the sink and wash my hands and face. My face looks drawn, and there are bright red blotches on my cheeks. I splash some cold water on my face and then pat it dry with a paper towel so rough it feels like sandpaper. “Holy crap,” I say to no one in particular.

I open the bathroom door and walk towards the exit. I see a petit but heavy-set woman standing at the door, and she is staring in my direction. I notice she has a strange look on her face and then a smile. I look around.  She is looking straight at me.  There is a certain familiarity about her, but I just can’t put my finger on it. Do I know her, or does she just look like someone I used to know?

As I get closer to her, I see a smile of recognition on her face. “Is that you, Dolores?”

I stare at her more intently. “Julie?” What in the world are you doing here? I can’t believe it. I haven’t seen you in years, over a decade.”

I have to step aside because there is a steady flow of people coming through the rest stop door. I didn’t know it was you. I was in the other bathroom stall, and I handed you the toilet paper at the bottom. I was just waiting for you to come out to see if you were alright. Of course, I didn’t know it was you.”

“Are you alright?”

“Yes, I just had a bout of intestinal cramps because I made the mistake of getting a breakfast burrito and get this, I had them put a Carolina Reaper pepper in the burrito. I love hot food, but hot food does not agree with my intestines or anything else for that matter.”

“Yes, I remember that from when we were children. You always had a stomach ache and spent half your time in the bathroom.”

“Yes, I guess it must have seemed that way, but it was only half the time.”

We both laughed, and then I started thinking about the last time I saw her. We had been best friends all of our lives. We grew up down the street from each other, and we were inseparable. However, I was about a year a half older than her and two years ahead of her in school. When I was about twenty-two, I moved out of state to live with my boyfriend, and I didn’t move back for seven years. By then, I had married my boyfriend and ultimately had two children.

“Well, I would recognize you anywhere. You look the same, but much older, of course.”

I laugh at her because that sentence, in a nutshell, described Julie. Open mouth, stick your foot down as far as you can get it. She was often blunt and said hurtful things unintentionally. Not realizing how often she hurt my feelings. “Yeah, thanks, Julie, everyone likes to hear how old they look.”

“Oh, you know I don’t mean anything by it. It’s just my way.”

“Yes, your way is perhaps not always the right way. I believe that is the reason why we stopped talking to one another in over a decade. I thought you would have realized that by now?”

“Well, Dolores, you were always so overly sensitive to everything.”

Yes, I’m a sensitive person. You knew that better than anyone. You could have thought about how words can hurt people and consider other people’s feelings.”

“Well, an old dog can’t learn new tricks can it?”

“Yes, actually, it can.”

“I can’t remember what I said to you to set you off, do you?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, I can after I was diagnosed with congestive heart failure. You told me that I should just stop taking all my medication and cross over the great divide. In other words, just die and get it over with already.”

“Oh, I couldn’t have said that to you, Dolores. You know you were my best friend all my life.

“Yes, I remember that quite clearly, and when I ask you how you could say such a heartless thing to me? And you said it was just an old family saying, and your mother said it all the time. Although she didn’t take her own advice since she had congestive heart failure and had stints and a deliberator in twice after the first one malfunctioned.”

“Oh, you always took everything so seriously. “

“And then you never called me back again and didn’t answer my calls. I never heard from you again.”

“I did invite you to my oldest son’s wedding, and you didn’t come. My husband came, and I sent a present. I just could not imagine talking to you after so many years, and you never even apologized. “

“I didn’t think I had done anything wrong.”

“You did, you know how much I needed a friend that first year I was really sick. And you just seemed mad at me for being sick. I often thought it had something to do with your friend Dottie dying of cancer. You were so caring and loving about her during her illness. You spent so much time with her up until the end. I thought you just didn’t have anything left for me.”

“Well, maybe I didn’t, Dolores, maybe I just couldn’t watch my best friend in the world die, after I just lost Dottie. I just couldn’t do it again.”

As I looked at Julie, I saw a tear run down her face, soon followed by another and another. Soon tears were running down my face as well. I reached over and hugged Julie as tightly as I could. “Oh, Julie, I missed you so much. I wish you had just called me and explained how you were feeling. Just once called me.”

“Dolores, I picked up the phone so many times to do just that. But somehow, I just could not imagine watching another friend die and having to go to their funeral.”

“Well, as you can see, I’m alive and standing right in front of you.”

“And Dolores, you look healthy enough, although, as I said, older.”
“Well, Julie, a new heart medication came out about five years ago, and I was one of the first heart patients to take it. And really it was like a miracle. I feel fine. I still have to take care not to overexert and watch my diet and exercise every day. But, overall, I feel fine.”

And that’s when we hugged each other again and promised not to lose touch ever again and exchanged cell phone numbers. “Julie, I have to get going, I promised to arrive at my aunt’s house this afternoon, I promised, and she’s waiting for me. I don’t know how much longer she has to live.”

“Dolores, you have always been the kindest person I ever knew. I’m so glad we met up with each other again, I’m never going to let you go again. I promise. Pinky swear.”

“I promise to Julie, I’ll call you as soon as I return home from my aunts. It might be a couple of weeks.”

We hug each other again and walk out the door together. I watch her as she gets into her car. It’s dirty and streaked with mud. She always thought washing her car was a waste of time. I can’t believe I had run into my oldest, best friend. I smile and wave at her. I believe it’s kismet that we ran into each other after all these years. I wave again and walk over to my car and unlock it. I take a deep breath and head back to the turnpike towards my aunt’s house. I can’t wait to tell her that because of her, I saw my long, lost friend. She’ll be happy for me. I know she will.

To read more, enter your email address to Subscribe to my Blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.