Part I - In exitu Isræl de Ægypto

In remembrance of last year's events and because of my relative silence on this subject and all the rest of them as well, I'm writing some vignettes for you, and if they aren't welcome here, well then I suppose they just don't belong in the conscious world.

Everthing I've tried to forget for the past 365 days.

As background, my mom was rediagnosed with advanced stage cancer in the fall of 2007. At the time I was at this school retreat, which I had left for after hearing the words, "I'm going to the hospital." When I called and found out she was sick again, I left my principal and colleagues playing wii bolwing and went back down the hill. The next morning, my grandfather suffered three massive heart attacks on a day that I fondly refer to as "The Worst Day of my Life." I hel d his hand as one by one his elderly friends bid him farewell despite his comatose state.

My mom called us all over and told us she was going to fight it, but, "we only live as long as god wants us to live." One of the cruelest parts of this ordeal was never knowing what to expect. She was "OK" for a long time. She never talked about being sick and no one said the word "dying." I would later find out that every single doctor she saw in search of hope told her that she had not a chance in hell.

I'd seen her go through the chemo bit before, but it wasn't any easier the second time around. She'd be sick as hell every time and there was just nothing you could do.

January 12, 2008 for my dad's birthday we all went out to the backyard and took a family picture. General consensus was that it would be the last one. The next day, she lost all of her hair.

She ketp getting sicker and skinnier and it was hard on all of us. My sister ran away multiple times and I always went to collect her. It was so hard on me to drag her away from a different scumbag's house every weekend -- I have never felt such desperation and even these guys could tell I was not a man in any state of mind to be trifled with. She left for a long stretch without leaving any clue to her whereabouts, so after beating my head against the wall for a few hours, I realized I could do nothing. A few weeks later, one of my mom's students went and picked her up late at night. I remember going into my mom's room and she said to Joy, "Aren't you going to say hello to your brother?" I screamed at her. I regret it so much as it was the last time I was with them both alive.

It was May, I guess, when everything started sliding downhill at an alarming rate. I have memories of trying to help push my mom upstairs and slipping in what I would realize was diarrhea; I remember when my dad tried to take her downstairs as she was collapsed onto his shoulder. Finally, in sobs of desperation it was acknowledged that she could no longer stand up or leave the house.

What you have to understand is that she had been teaching this whole time. She had to carry around these oxygen tanks fo months, and I would leave school early to drive her to APU and wheel her into her class. Two weeks before she died, she was given an honorary doctorate in a modest but moving ceremony. She looked like death-- almost unrecognizable and I hate to even see pictures from that day. Afterward, they would give her a tree and a plaque on cougar walk. I remember her saying that the ceremony was like attending her own funeral, and indeed, the vast majority of the people that attended the real one were her former students.

Ah, the last week. That fucking last week.
I would get in my truck and drive and just fucking scream into the windshield.
One night I burst some capillaries in my eyes and they were blood-red for a couple of days.

She just slipped further and further away. The hospice people left some pamphlets so we'd know what to expect, and I read through her signed documents detailing what she wanted done with her body, etc., the DNR order, which seemed so cold, cruel, and disgusting.
I listened to Julai Throwback every morning on repeat on the way to school and on the way back.
She would be huddled in blankets with various friends and family around.
I'd feed her lemon sorbet or frozen Gatorade while she had enough strength to swallow, and after that she just stopped eating.
Or I'd hold her hand until she started tossing and turning and calling for my father.

Every morning before school I would hug her and tell her that I loved her. She just groaned.

Finally, she was in a coma. Yeah, I had one last conversation with her, but I'll keep that to myself.

FIrst, it was the wheezing. I could hear it even when I wasn't with her and it kept me from sleeping. It sounded like a dying animal, which I suppose was not far from the truth.
Then, her heyes were permanently half open. It was so disturbing. Sometimes she would sign or gurgle as if trying to communicate. It was so fucking awful. I've heard people talk about their relatives peacefully passing, but there was nothing peaceful about this. It was brutal - the embodiment of sin, corruption, and suffering attacking and overcoming a person that sure as hell didn't deserve it.

I had a hard time spending time with her which in turn led to incredible guilt. Stupid people asked me questions like, "Do you want to be there when she draws her last breath?" How the fuck is one supposed to respond to a question of that type? It didn't matter, though. There is nothing right to say in situations like that.

Finally, it was Sunday morning, June 1, 2008. My dad had gone to church, something I'd given up on, not because of any lack of "faith," if I'd had any in the first place, but because I didn't want to be around anyone.
Someone had put on one of her Christian worship music CDs and I just held my mom's hand as she wheezed, stopped wheezing, and took these long painful, watery breaths. Totally unconscious, no connection to this world. I remember the songs that were playing and I hope that I never hear them again.
My dad came home to take over; as I let go of her hand which I had been holding under her blankets, I looked at it and realized it was turning black. I absolutely fucking lost it.

I left, and just drove -- I headed over to Jim's house, because that's where I always went to escape, I got the call from my older brother that it was over.
I walked into Matt's house in a daze where he and Hannah were having lunch and said "My mom just died." What a callous and ridiculous thing to say.
Jim drove me home. I had to walk past so many looky-loos who were smart enough not to say anything to me, but dumb enough not to get the hell away from me.

She was covered in my great-grandmother's quilt and someone had placed white flowers on her body. I didn't want to, but had to pull it back and look. She was cold and gray - her eyes and mouth still slightly open. I put my palm on her forehead and almost immediately withdrew it. This was a body which was utterly defeated and ravaged and dead. "My poor, poor, mom," was all I could say, as I embraced my dad for the first time in years. To which he responded, "she's not poor anymore."

So many relatives and people from church. I really resented what in my mind amounted to voyeurism. They took her away on this blue stretcher and I will never forget how that looked and sounded as it clanked down the stairs and was gone.

Per correr miglior acque alza le vele
ornai la navicella del mio ingegno,
che lascia dietro a sé mar sì crudele.

(As a postscript, I didn't think the funeral would help, but it did. While I resented being approached by so many people, I will never forget those people that showed up to support me. I swear I will never forget.)

Simon Roland Goeth