Even The Best Can Break Down!

This is personal.  So skip this if you always expect moi to maintain her strong-ness working at an optimum level of 110%.  

Firstly, I dedicate this Post to @WriteWendy.  Also her Org and Tumblr .  Entirely because she’s honest and raw with her own Life and I’m taking a page out her book and releasing a moment to do the same simply because she greatly inspires me.  Thanks Wendy with all my muscle fibers, heart and soul.

Yesterday I decided to do the impossible and visit my dying mother in the hospital.  Heading over there all I could feel was a bundle of heightened anxiety in the pit of my stomach that felt just like when I threaten juniors to fight in the cafeteria.  I’ve always been about entertainment in one way or another.  But seeing my mother isn’t delighting in the least.  It’s fucking devastating!  So much so that when I look into her face all I want to do is break down and cry.  There are many many reminders.

I haven’t seen her in a year.  It’s partly punishment.  It’s partly about keeping my entire sanity intact.  I heard my mother gasp in surprise as the nurse told her your daughter is here as she was changing in her personal bathroom.  I don’t know why (except that maybe the nurse was taken aback by my mother’s expression), but I felt compelled to tell the nurse I haven’t seen my mother in a long time.  Naturally she asked, “Do you live far?”  No, it’s just we really don’t get along.

For a moment she changed my loathsome perception of nurses with what she had to say:  We only have one mother.  Sometimes when people act harsh and angry, especially when they’re sick.  It’s because they believe nobody loves them.  They want somebody to take care of them and be there for them.  Don’t you notice when you give them love they are much calmer? Whatever she did to you as a kid, leave it there.  Come by and visit often.

When I finally saw my mom, I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t recognize her face.  I tried my hardest to cover the grimace but she caught it through my stricken eyes, I know I gained a lot of weight, right?  My reply:  A little.  I analyzed her face and it seems like someone stuffed two vineyard tomatoes under her cheeks how they flourish in furious mush.  I was heartbroken. 😦

Then I roamed my eyes to her hair and many of her strands were gray.  And I’m not sure what it was about youth or age or the past to present or what contradictions within me lied with wanting to run out and buy her a black tint so she can cover them?  I’m not used to seeing my mother succumb to weakness or being anything less than what she is now.  She’s a pretty good trooper with a million disguises putting politicians to shame.  And for her not to hide in plain sight just made me feel awful as I wanted to do it for her.  Jeweled travesties.  Make sense?

Mother and I chatted for what seem like a brief moment where when she decided to lay down on her bed she told me:  I missed you so much.  I haven’t seen you in a long time.  During this little time I had to reflect between what she said and what I felt with her asking me where my brother (her favorite) is and why has she never come out with the courage to tell me just how hard her ill existence is?  She grabbed out for my hand, held it and fell right to sleep.  I stuck around for a little while, wrote a note as to not wake her and thanked the nurse for being so welcoming.

But as soon as I left her room, I managed to get lost in the hospital.  I swear it was a metaphor for how I was feeling at that moment.  Before I stepped foot outside I saw a neon flashing sign: FOOD! I looked over the menu, reaching into my pockets to buy anything to shove my fucked up emotions down.  I didn’t.  I had a semi-long walk to the train station and before I made it.  I walked into 3 different food stores (including a pizza shop) just to browse food while each and everyone of them were offering their services.  Fucking gluttons! 😉

Holding back tears, thinking to myself:  How does all the parties, all the drugs, all the fun my entire family has ever had in life come down to letting go of life and losing absolutely everything in return?  How?  But I know the answers.  I know why I’m cynical.  But in the end it’s not the end.  Yet the somewhat happy ending concluded with sucking up the emotional guts to visit my mother and finally make it home successfully with healthy and whole foods from the market.

*smiles*

-Pennington