Dispatches from below
By: Margaret Kramer
Tags: Mothers And Daughters, Memories, Loss Of A Parent, Trump Administration

(a conversation with my mom, who passed away in 2014)

Hi Mom,

Well thought I’d check in, it’s been almost four years since you left. And I have to wonder if you didn’t time it just right. Not that I’m not grateful to be carrying on living, I am. I love so many aspects of this life, my very precious life, and every day I wake up and have a positive encounter or drink a good cup of coffee or laugh with my family or snuggle with one of the pets, or feel the warmth of the sun I am so glad to be here.

But mom, things have gone to shit since you died. I’m not talking about for me personally, I’m one of the fortunate and privileged people, I’m talking about things in general. You died clutching your copy of People Magazine, when Kate and William were just getting married. The update is, they have three lovely children and seem to be doing well all things considered. Kate can manage the pressure. And the roguish Prince Harry, he married a modern American woman and had a gorgeous multi-cultural wedding that Aunt Sue would have endorsed. So all is okay on the English royals count. And Queen Elizabeth still presides!

But over here, on this side of the water it has been a shit show.

Mom, you fell into your morphine hospice slumber when the Obamas were still around. There was some comfort in that, you were leaving a world which seemed to be getting better, where common sense and intellect and compassion were still valued and where Keep Hope Alive was the mantra. Oh mom, it’s been a precipitous fall into ignorance and hatred since then. You wouldn’t believe it, Hillary was vilified and pilloried and who do you think won in 2016? That horrible rude Cheeto Trump. He was a big joke to all of us before, but it got serious really quick when the election was over.

First of all we liberals went into a national clinical depression for months. Everyone drank and sheet caked in between protesting and crying. Anti-depressant and anxiety med prescriptions went through the roof. Since #45 became the President, each day brings a new horror. People have become more divided and hateful and bigotry and racism are the brands of this current administration. And many people are threatened and beaten and separated from their families all sanctioned through abhorrent new policies or so they are called.

Mom, you thought people were getting rude with their iPhones. That is the least of it. Can you believe there is a term now called “pussy grabber”? Your poor ears would have turned crimson and fallen off had they heard that. And this term is used routinely in the headlines and public discourse. People from your beloved Mexico, where you visited fourteen times, are called murderers and rapists by the president. We Americans are used to it now, a daily cavalcade of hideous headlines, threats, tweets and overturning civil liberties, dismantling environmental protections, chipping away at health care, continued school shootings, threats to women’s rights, deportations, imprisoning children, police brutality and so much more. Things that may have seemed absolutely unthinkable when you were still here. It is truly a horrible dystopia, the new normal, like pre-war Germany. Goons are wearing shirts that say “I’d rather be Russian than a Democrat”, KKK rallies are held openly, Nazis have made a resurgence. Now mom, I tell you, as someone who grew up during the Cold War and survived the cuban missile crisis and the arms race, how does that make any sense? It is a come to life horror show.

Aside from the political climate, I thought you should know, you did die “feet first”. Literally. You always said you wanted to go out of the house and this world that way, and you did. Feet first. The funeral home staff came and transported you out gently through the front door on a frozen November day. You died peacefully, at home in your bed. Pretty much the way we all hope it will be for ourselves.

And Buddy, your cat, he has done a magnificent job since you left, and risen to the occasion. He was pining for you of course, but he has now turned into a wonderful service animal for dad. He has adjusted to dad’s more brusque and teasing ways and he sleeps at his feet every night and watches the news with him. I am not even sure how old Buddy is but he is living his nine lives in the most generous way possible. You would be very touched by his valor. Sir Buddy, such a good fellow.

You might be shocked, but dad started cooking fish in the house. Approximately two days after you died. I think he held off cooking fish for fifty years while he lived with you. He knew you hated the smell. But once you were gone he started eating fish with wild abandon. All kinds of seafood from scallops to shrimp, his consolation. He also stopped buying the better quality softer toilet paper, which I think you had ensured in the past, so when I use the bathroom in the house now I too must contend with the cheap stuff. You aren’t there anymore to turn up the thermostat so it is often cold when I visit. He moves a space heater from room to room even though he can easily afford the gas bill. Things are a little more disheveled and dustier.

Before you faded into a dream state and unconsciousness, Will and I told you we would take care of Dad. And we have, as best we can withstanding our many obligations which pull us in different directions. We love dad dearly. Even though he refuses to move out of the house, we made sure he has kind and competent caregivers so he may remain there. I visit as much as I can to take care of him, mom. I remember how you said people should never move to be closer to their children, they’ll be lonely and depressed and their children have their own lives and won’t have time for them. So he stayed on in Brookline, at 63 Griggs Road, right where he was with you, all those years. He feels reassured by the familiarity not only of the house but of the neighborhood even if he rarely takes walks through the park anymore.

I know the two of you bickered and got petty and irritated with one another sometimes, the way all couples do when they are together for so long. But dad loved you so much. He talks about you as the most beautiful, intelligent, caring and witty woman he ever knew, how he had the happiest marriage, how much he cared for you and what a wonderful wife and mother you were. The memories of your happy times give him comfort, though he will never not miss you. That is why he stays in the house that you shared together, you are there with him, he has you still.

I keep you near me too. This world is very overwhelming and cruel and nonsensical at times, more so now than ever. As a friend of mine said after her beloved mother died, “It’s foundational” — in other words, the bottom falls out. I must be brave and help my children and my community and all people who are targets of hatred. So I keep your spirit close. I turn on the radio to classical music in every room, and the gentle strains remind me of you. Calm, order, kindness, beauty. Mozart, you doll, you used to say. Jeff asks why I do this, leave all the radios on when no one is there. The music is on even when I go to work, so when I come home and open the door to my little room, I am greeted by sanity and the feeling of you. That is why.

I think of you all the time mom, and I pretend I can talk to you silently and in writing. I just wanted to give you some updates from down here. You are in some form of Heaven, of course, having sherry and discussing poetry with the others. Up there no one knows about Trump and all the sickening things happening here because then it wouldn’t be Heaven. You departed in these last four years, along with Gwen Ifill and David Bowie and countless decent and remarkable people, not to mention my cat Victor — it’s been a hard run. We are trying to carry on below remembering people like you who inspire us not to give up, and to keep hope alive, and to be kind.

Mom, I’ll put some fall flowers on your grave when I go visit next time. I know the orange and yellow mums are your favorites.

Love,

Your daughter

(2018)