Gift Time

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what it will be like when voldemort and co. have to live in their adjoining cells in Hell. Giving them their own space is too kind so I’d like to see them in a space, I don’t know, maybe like a detention center. They work so well together that they won’t mind sharing a couple buckets for their personal refuse, and when the measles start going around, well, they are so close that I’m sure they will take good care of each other.

I know these thoughts do not make me a good person, but I am a fair person and like to keep things on an even keel. Balancing this detention center in Hell will be the luxury suites in Heaven that I so dearly hope are reserved for anyone who works with a hospice organization. These people are true angels.

We make plans; the Goddess laughs

My mother and I are not alike in many ways, but we are alike in some significant ways. We need to keep a clean kitchen at all times. We both exercise and even sort of like it. And we both are planners. Perhaps therein lies the difference; I plan in my head knowing I will need to bend and twist in response to the myriad ways schedules change, timing is off, etc.

Mom on the other hand plans things in detail and must have the menu sorted so she can cook ahead of time. She will make four different entrees to accommodate the vegan, the ones who hate mushrooms, the ones who eat only white foods, and yours truly who can’t eat garlic.

Last week she was planning her own shiva and upset that we didn’t have the menu decided yet.

Shivas are the time after a Jewish funeral when friends and family gather to eat, reminisce, be sad while laughing, and tell stories. The person who has died isn’t a part of this of course. Which I’ve always thought is too bad. Think of it: your favorite people all together and enjoying themselves, sharing the parts of you that they know best, recounting funny stories, conjuring the “remember whens,” and reliving a shared history and friendship that has stood the test of time.

Life can change in an instant

Mom is like the energizer bunny, always on the go. Always organizing. Always busy. But she has been laid low by a sudden unexpected cancer diagnosis just six weeks ago. Things are moving fast and they are out of our control. We began home hospice last week.

Before you get too sad, let me explain what a gift this is. In fact, one of the first things the hospice folks shared was that they called this time, “Gift Time.” Not what we may have wanted or planned for, but a true gift nonetheless.

My mother has always had honest conversations with pretty much everyone in her life so this time isn’t about clearing the air or salving old wounds. Instead, it’s about being together. I am selfish and so my favorite times are when she and I are alone in the house when all the visitors and aides have come and gone. We run through her nightime routine speaking in shorthand.

No regrets

I am getting my time, but what about the massive list of friends she has cultivated over her 87 years of her life? They are coming over in ones and twos and there are no tears (for the most part) and instead, a lot of laughing. They tell “remember when” stories, catch up with the details of their lives, brag about their children, share temple gossip, talk about the house on that street that just got sold for more than it’s worth (mom was a real estate agent for 50 years and can’t pass up a good house sale story).

Much of our family is here in Cleveland and everyone has been helping in a 100 big and little ways. The rest are arriving from five states, with partners and girlfriends, and busy lives that mom will love to hear about. Us being us, Chinese food will be involved.

Mom keeps telling everyone she has no regrets, that she has lived a really good life. How many of us can say the same thing?

It would be easy to become maudlin, to rend my sleeve and complain that life will never be the same, this is so unfair, why is it happening to us?

That’s not really the Pollack way.

First comes the gallows humor. Then the practicalities and planning. Next are the quiet conversations where we honestly assess. Lastly, the simple comfort of being in the same room, talking or not talking.

Uncomfortable prose

It’s not all puppy dogs and sunshine for sure. There are so many questions about what the future holds and how we will make decisions individually and collectively. But for once, I am not planning too far ahead.

If you’ve been a reader of Creative Muscle for a while you know I share thoughts and feelings, but rarely do I dig too far into my personal life. I’ve always told my writing students, “you need to be vulnerable on the page,” but like many a teacher, I don’t always practice what I preach.

But this experience has been rather extraordinary so far and worth sharing. I can say with surety, I am all here. I am present.

I am enjoying this Gift Time to the fullest.

Keepin’ the faith,

—Jill