Saturday. 7:05 and I’m grading papers. (Actually, I’m typing this entry. I needed to take a break from the essays). What a life. No it’s not all work and no play. It’s just I’d rather get them out of the way now (I don’t mean it to sound so harsh - I’m actually enjoying reading the essays) rather than devote a majority of my Sunday to them.
It’s the end of the third week and I’m only grading the first theme of my advanced writing class. According to the syllabus their second theme should be due on Tuesday. So I guess I’m not so far behind. But I knew this would happen. I never quite accomplish all that I plan, though I’m trying to stick to the syllabus as much as possible. But each class has a way of coming alive and going their own way. So I tend to let them rather than strangle that life out of them to keep to the syllabus. Perhaps this is why I loathe curriculum mapping and crap like that.
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Last week I shared my latest idea for an essay with my advanced comp class. My mother died from lung cancer some time ago. I’ve been writing about it off and on ever since. But this idea hit me hard on the way back from the cities not too long ago. I told my class that every once in awhile - maybe once a month - I’ll see someone who for an instance reminds me of my mother. One of the first instances was in a Culver’s in Rogers, MN. I was waiting for our order when I turned around to see a husband and wife walk in. They held the door open for an older lady, I presume their mother or mother in law, who came in with a typical grandmother sweater (stitched to the front were kittens playing with yarn). She shuffled in carrying an oxygen tank. Her hair was shaved and pale gray - just like mom’s had been. The tubes ran from behind her ears, encircled her face, before snaking into her nostrils - just as mom’s had. When I finally got our order and I passed them, I heard the hiss and clank of the oxygen tank as it hissed oxygen into her lungs every few moments - just as mom’s had. And for just a split second, I felt like she was indeed Mom. Part of it was her appearance. Part of it was the sound. Part of it was me. But all those things met in the line at Culvers and for a split second they fooled my brain into believing Mom was still alive. Even though that moment was infinitesimally brief, I felt its authenticity resonate in my very bones. It was like I had Mom with me again.
This has happened a few times since then. Last week at one of my football games, a horn blared after we scored. Even though I’m not a varsity coach, Mom loved football and went to all our games, regardless of how far they were. One thing she loved to do was honk the horn whenever we scored. So on that cold wet day when I heard that horn, I felt that sensation of Mom again resonate through me.
So what to make of this, I asked my advanced writing class. They weren’t sure. I guess that what the writing is for.
But now I have a new direction to go with the essay. Or maybe I have another essay brewing entirely. For this morning I was having breakfast at a local cafe with my fiancé and her daughter. In walked a man whom I used to work with as part of my summer job. He was kind and funny. However, his wife was a complete bitch. She was rude and vicious whenever I had to ask her for something. As the man sat down, his wife hobbled in and plopped down on the seat next to him, looking as pittbullish as always. Then this thought hit me like a ball pin hammer, “Why is this bitch alive while Mom is dead?” The brutality of that thought shocked me. But to be honest it isn’t the first time that such a thought crossed my mine. Three or four years ago the father of a friend had a massive stroke. He was a great man, but the stroke left him just a teetering, mumbling fraction of that man. One day I was taking the recycling to the bins when I saw him stumbling out in his yard. Then the thought struck me, “Why does he get to live out the rest of his days like that when Mom was seemingly healthy one day and gone 16 months later, gone from me way too young and way too soon.” That was the first time I’d ever had a thought like that.
That confession leads me to this -- sometimes too, though it makes me feel wicked to admit it, when I hear that a friend or colleague has a mom or dad who is ill, I have this thought strike, “Now they’ll know how it feels.” That thought terrifies me. Will I really feel better knowing that I’m not alone in my grief? Will I really feel better knowing that I’m not the only one I know my age who has lost their mother? And I don’t believe that. I don’t believe I really think that. I don’t even think that thought originates in my brain. It has to come from somewhere else. Somewhere wrong. Somewhere evil. But that thought has hit me more than once. And I’m ashamed of it. Maybe admitting that will help me get it out and get rid of it.
So those are the thoughts and images swirling in my mind as I begin to put together an essay to help me see what I think of all of that.
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