Moving is akin to divorce or death. It’s apparently just as stressful and painful. Most people abhor even the thought, much less the act. But I was basking in all its glory. I had never been so excited to move and unpack. It was incomprehensible to me that I had allowed myself to accept such poor living conditions in a rental property. Hawaii is paradise, but only when you are not breathing toxic rat shit or mold. As my lungs wheezed to block the inhaled noxious irritants, my heart prayed for a peaceful, clean home. My daughter made the same wish to Santa, whom she now referred to as Santa Mama. Three weeks later, on Christmas Eve, we signed the paperwork to become homeowners in Hawaii. We abandoned the Rat Dome with glee and fled to our new haven. It was too easy. Believing I wanted and deserved more, all I did was ask with gratitude and it appeared.
The journey has not always been that quick and easy, but it has been magical. As I unpacked the next box, an unexpected reminder crashed onto the floor as my beloved jewelry box spilled reflective treasures. Bending down to gather the forgotten pieces, I picked up a pair of old earrings. Her face flashed before me in an instant. The wailing of her sorrow as she sang that deep soulful spiritual for her husband blasted in my ears as I touched my earlobes with the earrings we both had in common.
It had been at least six years since I met her in the emergency department and although her memory had faded, her lesson had not. The buzz of my phone brought me back from the past, only to plunge me deeper into her message. It was a request for help. A dear woman was being asked to remove her beloved husband from life support and somehow this person on the phone thought my stories on my blog might help. If only I could direct her to the blog, she was certain her friend may find comfort in the unthinkable. Holding the earrings in one hand and her request for help in the other, I knew what this woman needed, and it wasn’t my blog. It was this story, which had never been published. I didn’t know if I even still had it. A tedious search produced results. The story was intimate and had been written for one person in particular. It was unedited and raw. My beloved Cathy had just died when I wrote this love letter to him. Six years had passed. Now her birthday was nearing. In extraordinary Cathy fashion, she came through like she always does around her birthday and death day, to remind me of what we all deserve, and that’s unconditional, real love.
(6 years earlier)
I’ve been putting off writing this but damn if it doesn’t seem like Cathy keeps pushing me to do it so here goes….
She taught me a lot about this life. She gave me a sense of purpose outside my job and personal life. She taught me to really live, not just exist, and so I write this because I have to face the truth about us.
When Cathy died, I had lots of emotions. Mostly I was just devastated, sad and distraught. I was pissed too because I thought I had my shit together. I thought of all people, I was the best prepared. For god’s sake, I knew her prognosis. It was inevitable. And I deal with death on a daily basis. I knew all that extra time she got because of her amazing attitude was a miracle. I knew she had outlived her prognosis. When she died, I thought I would mourn and move on. I really wish my mind could have explained all this to my heart.
The third day after her death seemed to be the worst. Instead of waking up thinking about you, I woke up crying and couldn’t stop for almost 2 hours. I’m really good at rationalizing things but it just wouldn’t work. Giving up, I sat on my meditation stool hoping it would somehow help.
Overcome by grief, I screamed and yelled and breathed. I’m sure a real Buddhist would have knocked me off my stool, if it was in his nature. And I kept getting this image in my head of Cathy’s husband, holding her hand, watching her take her last breath. Throwing myself off my stool and into my bed, I just cried some more.
It felt like she was speaking to me, telling me that she wanted me to have that same beautifully painful love that she had had with him. I brushed off that feeling and instead opened her obituary, which I hadn’t yet read. When I saw my name in her obituary, I knew she was not just my friend, but she truly did have a great purpose in my life. I knew what I wanted, even if it meant letting you go.
And just to make sure I got the lesson right, she sent me Mrs. Davenport. She knew it would take a couple of tries to really get me to believe anything spiritual, so she once again showed me.
Mr. Davenport was a cardiac arrest who came in on the same night I’d thought I just about couldn’t take much more pain from Cathy’s loss. The other doc heard the in-code and said he would take it. I made some smart-ass comment and was glad he wanted to deal. I had had enough of death. But It’s hard to ignore an intubated patient that EMS is performing CPR on in the hallway. I looked around and the other doc was gone. “Damn it! I’ll take it!” I heard myself say.
He had been dead now for 27 minutes despite their best efforts. He was 82 years old. He had little chance of having an intact brain even if we got him back and I had just about resolved myself to letting him go to that great beyond. Then the paramedic walked back into the room to let me know that the family had arrived. He informed me that all the wife could keep saying was that she just wanted to hold his hand. I thought of Cathy having her hand held as she died, and knew I needed to go get his wife.
She was a beautiful old southern black woman with a green daisy in her hair and earlobes that dangled with my same exact earrings. I explained to her that we were still working on her husband, but things didn’t look good and offered for her to be in the resuscitation room.
“Oh yes, please,” she said. “I just want to hold his hand.” Well thank goodness I was holding her, because the damn nurse came running in, yelling “we got a pulse back.” I heard a “thank you Jesus” and she would have hit the floor if I didn’t already have my arms around her.
And then Mrs. Davenport went on to teach me something very powerful about love. I watched her with him as we worked and as she held his hand. It was beautiful to feel so much love in that room. She stepped out while I put in a central line and I heard this angelic music coming from the hallway. I walked out to let her know she could come back in, but I found her belting out an old spiritual, sitting in a wheelchair in the middle of the hallway, not caring who happened to be walking by, just singing for her husband.
And if that wasn’t enough, then I really got to know her. He had, of course, coded again, and the family had been gathered all together so that I could talk to them once more about his wishes. Instead I got a lovely snapshot of their life together. Normally I would have found a way to politely cut things off, but something told me to listen to this woman. Maybe it was that I noticed again that she wore those same pair of earrings that I owned and loved. Or maybe it was that she was from my home state of South Carolina. Whatever it was, I just listened.
They both grew up very poor, picking cotton in Newberry, SC. There really weren’t any doctors around, especially for black folks, she explained, so their medicine came from roots. She was from a large family but described herself as a tomboy who followed her father everywhere. It just so happened he wanted to go to the “juice joint” for a cold beverage. It started to rain, and a young man showed up with a large hat. He shared it with her so that she would not get wet. And they had been together ever since. 62 years to be exact, and 9 children later.
She showed me their photo from their 50th wedding anniversary. Her son got embarrassed when she described him to me as her partner, her lover, and her best friend. They had actually gotten in a fight earlier that day because he had told her that he didn’t think he was going to make it much longer. She told him to shut up and stop talking like that. And then she looked at me with a tear in her eye and said, “He always did try to get in the last word, but I rarely let him.”
Two hours went by and more family showed up and loved on him for the last time. It always amazes me when people hang on. I really do think it is to give those loved ones as much closure as possible. And then he coded again and again and again. Mrs. Davenport kept pleading for me to keep trying, because their son was flying in from New Jersey. I finally looked at her and told her to let him go. And I now really felt how hard that is to do. I selfishly hadn’t wanted to let Cathy go either. She looked at me with these big, wet, sad eyes and asked, “It’s time?” and I said, “Yes ma’am, it is.”
And so, we stopped. And I watched her love him for the last time. She just rubbed his body and told him that he had given her the best life imaginable and to come check in on her from time to time. She draped her body over his and whispered, “You gave me everything that I have ever wanted, even that white picket fence.”
And that’s when it really hit me. You see one of my favorite ZZ Ward songs, entitled “Last Love Song”, speaks of the white picket fence. Every time I hear that song, I get a little emotional because I think of you and what should have been. When I heard Mrs. Davenport say that, I knew I wanted the white picket fence and nothing less. It’s what Cathy had been telling me all along that I just didn’t want to admit to myself.
And so, I write this with so much sadness. I honestly thought I could be happy just holding on to a little piece of you, but that will never be enough. I’m done settling. I will never truly be fulfilled in this lifetime without Cathy’s and Mrs. Davenport’s kind of love. I’ve known that for a while. It just took these two amazing women to fully help me accept it, to believe that it really does exist, and that I deserve it.
Three years later, I would meet my white picket fence. Believing I wanted and deserved a grand, unconditional love from a partner, a lover, and a best friend, all I did was ask with gratitude and that love appeared. During this month of love, I encourage you to remember the Davenports’ and Cathy’s lesson. We are all worthy of love.
Happy Birthday, my Monkey Sister!
To read more about Cathy’s story, click here.
Image: DepositPhotos.com
