It wasn't something I expected that overcast morning. I harbored some hopes that with Dad feeling better and accompanying me to see her, she might notice and feel better herself. That’s why I woke him up at 9–much earlier than he was accustomed to.
But there were already signs that all was not going well as we headed to the hospital. Midway, the doctor phoned to say that we'd have to make a decision on Mom real soon—that is, if she was going to be hooked up to a ventilator since her breathing was getting shallow and her blood pressure had spiked up. Sure enough, when we arrived that's what we had found. Mom was breathing more audibly; possibly because of this, she also looked more alert as if she were going to wake up.
Around 11:20 am, a doctor came to check. Mom's pressure continued to rise as her oxygen diminished. It was now coming down to a final decision. Did we want them to make an effort to resuscitate her? At this moment, a group of technicians, nurses, and doctors were summoned in: it was almost frightening. Up till now, I have NO idea why they needed 20-some people. (I even wonder if this scared Mom into having her third and final stroke if she was at all sentient.) Dad and I went out in the hallway with another doctor to discuss this. I recall feeling so ambivalent; I desperately wanted to keep Mom alive—but also recalled her telling us that she did not want to live on unnecessarily, remaining comatose for years.
Suddenly, Mom’s primary physician who was in her room called out to say she had passed away. It was almost as if she had made her decision for us. For a brief moment, there was almost a feeling of relief on our part as we reentered.
There she was—with her head turned to the right.
There were a few hugs with the doctors. One told me he had gone through the same when his mother died of breast cancer. A few of the techs gave us condolences on their way out. Mom had probably expired prior to 11:40, but the certificate records that she was pronounced dead at 11:45.
This was it. There was an incredible silence of shock. Then it started to pour--and pour hard. It hadn't rained like this for some time; there were a few very minor misty sprinkles over the past week, but nothing like this. Finally, I broke down and cried. It seemed as if all—as if Mother Nature herself were mourning her death. Pathetic fallacy, I thought to myself: literally and figuratively. After a Catholic priest came to visit and stay for half an hour, Dad and I reached out to a friend who was acquainted with several monks at a local Buddhist temple; they were to arrive this afternoon at 2. I started calling my cousin and aunt who were on the train from Illinois; it turned out they were delayed by 10 hours and would not arrive until late at night. I then rang Mom’s younger sister—the one who visited back in June—before writing to a friend to tell her as well.
For a moment, I wanted to kill myself. What point was there in eking out a lonely existence without Mom? Dad was there but I had long resented him—both for what he did to me and Mom. A horrible father and worse husband, even if Mom refused to acknowledge it. What was the point of accomplishing anything—especially since I failed so miserably in keeping her alive? I knew that the worse effects of grief were yet to come—I was still in a state of shock even though her decline over the last three months should have given me ample warning. Was I up to writing a lecture for my class tonight and writing an entirely new one for a one-hour talk on Thomas Paine for another college which was to be completed by the following evening? Would I be able to focus when the event that I dreaded not only this past year, but my entire life, had just transpired?
In the meantime, Dad had me buy lunch. I was normally a hearty eater but had just completely lost my appetite even though it was much later than our previous midday meals. I wondered how on earth he could even contemplate eating right after Mom's passing.
We waited and waited for the monks to arrive: no answer except that "they were on the way." By 3:30 pm, the nurse was already trying to rush us out—which annoyed me despite her politeness. As it was, Mom was never that well taken cared of by the hospital during her entire illness—and now that she died, they were forcing us out. When 4:30 came and went, we told the monks not to come (WHY THE FUCK WERE THEY SO IRRESPONSIBLE?) Anyway, it was really too late to chant for her spirit—which supposedly has to happen when she is still alive and we were planning to have some sort of Buddhist ceremony at her funeral or memorial service anyway.
Although at this point, I had to wonder why. Neither Dad nor I were practicing Buddhists anyway—and Mom herself was a lapsed Catholic. I suppose it is human instinct to turn to ritual when a loved one dies, regardless of religious instincts.
The most heartbreaking moments came as we were about to leave--sometime around 5 ish. I began taking some pictures when the nurse reentered and offered to do so: this went on for some 10 minutes. I temporarily removed Mom’s ring from my finger and put it on hers for one of the pics.
Finally, I called one of the Taiwanese folks to give us a ride back. I naturally had to go downstairs first to wait for her before calling up my dad since he required a wheelchair for the long distance between the cancer ward and the entrance: but not before I kissed Mom over and over, telling her I loved her and was so, so sorry. As I left, I practically walked backwards to take a final look at her as if leaving a queen. Because Mom was my queen.
I can only wonder what Dad thought when he was left alone. This was his wife for some 55 years. However their marriage wound up, he had been with her and known her far longer than I had--probably close to 70 years. What must it be like to see your high school sweetheart die? Did he feel guilty at all for cheating on her? Did he realize how much she sacrificed for him? Did he ever reprimand himself for stressing her out throughout their life together—and wonder if it shortened her life? I was still angry that Dad brought Mom to Taiwan the previous year. Maybe, just maybe, if she hadn’t gone and eaten their unsanitary Fukushima-tainted food, she might still be alive.
As I went downstairs, switching elevators, I heard the mechanical piano playing Schubert's Ave Maria. What a bizarre and poignant coincidence: the sounds of the piano had already struck me on that first visit to Mom in the hospital when it played a piece from Schumann’s Kinderszenen. I had always wanted to play Disney’s Fantasia for Mom, especially the simultaneously beautiful and sublime pilgrimage scene, but now I would never have the chance. And now the Ave Maria was tolling her death, marking her exit from the world.
The rain had stopped as we entered our house. For a minute, as I unlocked the door, the idea of visiting Mom tomorrow fleetingly ran through my head before I realized a split second later that it was not to be.
I still felt so numb. I felt I could barely muster the strength to tell my students that my mother had died--and that I would not be responding to any posts over the weekend. How was I going to prepare a 45-minute presentation for a college on behalf of one of my organizations: since I knew I was not going to be there, I had to complete it by the following night in order to give it to a fellow member to read aloud for me.
As I made my way through the rooms, I was quickly besieged by memories…I can only compare it to the lonely cat in the “Valse Triste”* segment of the cartoon Allegro non Troppo where it wanders through a burned house, recalling all of its happy memories there.
Passing through the dining room, I saw my own cats resting blissfully on the chairs. Poor Charlie is going to miss his favorite person, Mom. Ascending the main staircase, as if retracing Mom’s steps, I couldn’t help but remember how she was carried down by the paramedics, protesting all the way. Strange to think it was less than two weeks ago. Then I went to the cats’ nursery (where they rarely ever stayed except to use their litter box) and looked at the sofa where Mom always sat when I gave her her Lovenox shots. She would always thank me, even after an argument. I was always happy to bring her yogurt and chat there after spending a good portion of my time working downstairs; she’d always kiss me, telling me how much she loved and appreciated me. Then I went and stood at the windows, thinking of all the times I had stood there looking out, seeing her enter the family room after a stint of gardening in her white eyelet overshirt and blue visor.
I headed to Mom’s room to change the sheets. Never will I see her again, folding laundry. Or see her with one leg tucked under her, humming. “You wouldn’t believe who just called. Remember the lady with the four daughters we visited in New York?” “ I need to go to the mall to pick up my watch. Do you want to come?” “How is your article coming along?” “You’re going to be very happy tonight—I’m making your favorite tonkatsu (Japanese-style fried pork cutlets)…”
Images of Mom were no less vivid in the study. As I went into the bathroom, I recalled all the times I bathed her there….and before that all of our little chats. “You have enough makeup for a small shop,” she’d joke. “Can I borrow your coral lipstick?” She’d ask. “Or do you think the lighter pink is better?” “That flower blush is just too pretty to use.”
Sitting at the computer and pulling out the files brought its memories too as I glanced at the dates. Oh yes, March 12, 2012…I was in NYC for a conference, but the highlight of the days spent there was calling Mom in the evenings. October 14, 2011…Mom and Dad were just about to head to Taiwan and I was about to deal with that horrific thundersnow that left us without power for 10 days. November 8, 2009…Mom and I had gone to two movies around that time while I was also fretting over a symposium at my university that I was organizing on Paine. August 8, 2008….couldn’t help recall how happy Mom and I were around that time when we picked up 3-month-old Charlie and Georgie at the airport. Georgie was so adorable as she mewed and stretched out her tiny, tufted paws, seemingly excited about the adventure. Mom was proving nothing less than a fond grandmother as she cooed at them, playing with them in the morning and evening, and telling her sisters all about their antics. She was the only one among her siblings who had cats—and I was proud of turning her into a cat person.
I found out some comfort as my students wrote back to me, sending me condolences within 15 minutes of my emailing them. We had just moved onto vampires after discussing family dynamics in Frankenstein and dysfunctional relationships in the Shelley and Godwin families. How ironic.
As if getting a taste of my own increasingly dysfunctional relationship with my father, I was shocked to see him exercising on the treadmill. I suppose he had every right to since he hadn’t exercised there in a while. Yet, who could have the energy to do so after the death of a wife?
My annoyance grew as when a couple from the Taiwanese community brought us soup: Dad ordered me to get a pot. Mom would NEVER have treated me like that, I seethed, screaming HOW DARE YOU TREAT ME LIKE A SLAVE WHEN MOM JUST PASSED AWAY? Only days later, did it hit me with such force and suddenness that Dad never cared for me in the same way—and that Mom was the only person who ever loved me so thoroughly. I was now more or less a orphan since Mom was very much my mother AND father.
It was not until late in the night that my cousin and aunt arrived after a combined 10-hour delay in Ohio and New York. They were my lifesavers, not only by helping me with cleaning a messy kitchen over the weekend, but staying with me so that I didn’t feel utterly alone. And since they were related to Mom anyway, I still had a tiny piece of her by me—so I told myself.
It felt strange finally climbing into bed that night around 4 am. How wrong it was that I would not be seeing Mom later today, conscious or not. I thought about the time I waited anxiously for her (as described in the Prologue). I thought about the time I was overjoyed to see her after she was in the hospital for two weeks back when I was nine, our first real separation. I thought briefly of my childhood evenings in the Bronx as Mom leaned over me and kissed me. I’m only going to be in the next room, she’d say as I begged her to stay. Well, Mom was never going to be in the next room, in any part of the house, or even in Taiwan. She was irretrievably gone. I thought briefly of the bedtime song, “So long, farewell,” from The Sound of Music which, as I mentioned earlier, was a favorite childhood soundtrack—one that I played on a daily basis between the ages of three and five. There was a sad sort of clanging from the clock on the wall, indeed. I had long found it fitting how the main part of the song started merrily, with the children clowning around, before slowing down midway and ending with sleep—as if approximating the progress of life from youth to death. The sun has gone to bed and so must I. And now, the sun had gone down on Mom and she must rest for good. So long, farewell…Auf wiedersehen?
I’m an agnostic—so I don’t know. But I hope so.
*The “Valse Triste” was initially composed by Jean Sibelius for his brother-in-law’s play, Death.
Thanks for writing these pieces. I can really relate to them. I also felt that my mom got really really crappy care in the hospital and continue to go over one thing after another that I or the hospital could have or should have done differently. I also related to how up until very late you were always very hopeful that she was going to come home. It was the same for me. She had gone in for a second round of chemo and the thought that she would not be coming home never even entered my mind.
The other thing that really haunts me is that when my mother was diagnosed with acute leukemia she was fine. The doctors themselves were shocked that she was showing no symptoms. She literally was absolutely fine. Yet she started chemo and six weeks later was gone. Should we have rejected the chemo? I don't know? Anyway you're a great writer. I found the pieces helped me a bit. Thank you.
Again thanks, Frances. I've said it before and I'll say it again. I wouldn't read this sort of personal narrative normally, but you're one hell of a writer. RIP to your mother. Rot in hell to your dad for EVER saying a cruel word to you. No, I'm not a believer, meant the latter figuratively, and I'm a notch or two further out on the anti-theist end of the spectrum than you. I don't believe any of that horse-pucky. WERE there a god, I'd have "words" for him/her/it ... or as I like to say, she/he/it aka SHIT. LOL !!
Your mother should be revered by the world for producing and nurturing you.