My Wild Heart

July 6, 2012
archived

My wild heart would not lay still or ignore its longing for more than the tar streets of the Bronx. My wild heart’s beat scared me because it promised to give me away, because it did not want to play by anyone else’s rules.

I tried to do as my parents asked but inside I was subversive. I dreamed when I was supposed to be listening. I read books that led my mind down dark alleys and fed me thoughts no one could control. Even while looking normal, my wild heart led me to disobey or get in the last word even when I knew I’d be punished.

My wild heart was filled with passion, railed against injustice, was spontaneous, untamed. Willful was what I was called, willful and abrasive. My wild heart loved parakeets and falcons, black-eyed susans and the magnolia tree in full bloom. It raged when nature was abused. It hated dumb people and teachers who were bullies.

My wild heart didn’t trust authority, my parents or anyone who said they had my best interests in mind but didn’t. It fought whoever tried to control me. It took me down New York City streets where I met danger and had to find a way out——quick. It forced me to say no when I meant it even if the price I paid was heavy. I didn’t play by the rules; I avoided the ones I didn’t believe in.

My wild heart taught me to fight, taught me to be defiant, to use my anger to motivate me. My wild heart searched for years to find a place to come to rest.

My wild heart gave itself only to those it trusted.

GETTING TO KNOW WHO I HAD BECOME

April 5, 2012
archived

The sun rose slowly, one infinitesimal inch at a time. I stared at the horizon imagining light, imagining the faintest glow, wondering if it was all in my mind. Was I making it up? I turned away and turned back. No, there was a faint light, a slight easing of the dark. Gradually the sun rose. It was hard to see its movement but by measuring it against a stationary object, I could see it rise.

My healing happened in this manner also—hardly noticed in my daily existence but edging ever onward.

Clouds formed in the sky and temporarily blotted out the sun, yet it still rose behind the mist.

In my life, there were setbacks—anniversaries, birthdays, seeing a healthy young man who reminded me of Jeremy or a freckle-faced young boy. Then I retreated and mourned as if his death had happened yesterday—my breath taken away with the power of it. But I rose again, back to the present.

I remembered a jazz concert. I was riveted, listening to the saxophone answer the guitar, so soft, almost a whisper…it pulled me down into my heart. How could I be here, because I was at the hospital taking care of Jeremy. No one in the theater knew my son had died. I sat like everyone else, listening. But I had a secret—I had come from another world, the world of children who weren’t home safe in bed. The guitar understood, the sax blew; yes we understand. Yes, yes, let us take you up, up, let us rock you. Yes, you are here. He is not, not, so sorry, sorry.

The tears came silent and hot, running down my cheeks in the darkened theater.

Like the sun, I continued to climb past the dark clouds and the storms. A deep part of me moved forward. Living it, I couldn’t see where I had come to. Only when I stepped back from my life did I have a glimpse of the grieving mother and realized I had survived. One day I passed a cash machine near 34th Street where a younger me, mother of a dying child, had sobbed, unable to press the buttons of the ATM machine.

I still grieved but now there were small periods of time where the great weight lifted. Maybe later that day it happened again—small holes in the dark clouds enclosing me, letting in light. I began to believe I might actually come back to life. How could I have survived when he didn’t?

I wasn’t the old me; I was different. Part of this process was getting to know who I had become, to meet the one who walked through the dark. A phrase from Albert Camus, “In the midst of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer” gave me hope.
 

Visit to Sloan-Kettering

March 5, 2012
archived

I left the hotel shortly after I arrived in New York. I left my luggage, wrapped a purple scarf around my neck and headed out to find coffee. I was on York Avenue, walking north against traffic, strolling with purpose, but what purpose?

The thought crossed my mind, I’m heading for Sloan-Kettering, and then I knew. I had to go, before anything else. Eighteen years had passed since I left there the night Jeremy died, carrying bags of his clothes, while he lay pale and quiet; his struggle over.

I walked up to the doors as a woman wheeled out her bald daughter. I took a deep breath and went in.

The same escalator moved ever upward. I stepped on and was whisked into the lobby. A woman slept on a chair; a man nearby ate lunch. The usual.

I felt like a sleepwalker in another world. Why was I here?

The elevators were in the same place. I pushed the button and waited. A group of white-clothed doctors got on as I pressed the eighth floor button. They talked about someone’s case. When I used to come here, I didn’t pay attention. I was intent on getting to Jeremy. Now I had nothing but time.

At the eighth floor, I followed the others onto the floor. “Excuse me, is this Pediatrics?”

“No,” the nurse said, “that’s one floor up on nine.”

When I got off, I saw glass doors barring my way and a colorful mural of animals and kids playing. Right floor, but I couldn’t open the door. I fumbled around looking for a way in. I wanted to turn away. Why was I even here? Someone came by and pushed a button I hadn’t seen and the doors slid open. I was assaulted with the familiar hospital smells of chemicals and ammonia. Nothing looked as I remembered it. I stood there, not sure of what to do. I wanted to see the room he left from but that was on the floor below.

I headed down the white hall past the nurses station. They looked busy; maybe they wouldn’t notice me.

“Excuse me, where are you going?” I turned and confronted a young nurse leaning over the counter.

I walked up to her. “My son was a patient here. I wanted to come back.” I came closer. “He died here.”

“What was his name,” she asked. I told her. “Just a minute.” She walked back to the nurses’ room. I could see them sitting around having lunch.

A nurse came out and walked over to me. “I remember your son. Was he around nineteen?”

“Yes,” I said.

“My name is Shelley,” she said. “Ann, will you take her on a tour of the floor?”

I had thought of this place for years. Now it seemed smaller and more crowded. We passed a series of closed doors with signs that said Bone Marrow Transplant.  Even the other rooms had closed doors. Other dramas were taking place here. Mine was long over. I realized that I couldn’t linger here so I thanked Ann and let myself out into the elevator bay.

I had visited the scene of Jeremy’s last day, a place I feared and dreamed about. I remembered well how it felt to be tethered to that life, those final hopes. Did I expect to find myself still wandering the halls going to fetch food from the communal refrigerator?

I had come back from another life in a southern city so I could stop pivoting around this memory and move on like my son had.