I'm Just Sayin'

Right around this time last year, I was headed out to Missouri to check on my sister Rhoda, who was fighting metastatic breast cancer, and had just been hospitalized. Little did I realize that I was headed to her death bed, or that I had already had the last conversation I would ever have with her. I have written before how I spent this last week of her life with Rhoda, but will never know if she knew I was there. Her cancer had spread to her brain, and caused her liver to shut down. She was a shell of herself. Her body was barely recognizable, wrecked by chemotherapy -- devoid of hair, muscles and skin slack from malnutrition. Her spirit, normally boisterous, was not in evidence. No husky chortle, not smart ass remarks, no baudy humor.

For a week I begged her to talk to me. Tell me a joke. Give me an order. Just say my name. Smile. Laugh at my stupid jokes. Tell me to shut the hell up. But she didn’t do any of that. She couldn’t – or wouldn’t. Basically, she had nothing left to give.

Toward the end, when we knew it WAS the end, we started calling people. The family rallied, driving in from across Missouri, as well as Alabama, North Carolina, and Texas. And friends arrived. One cleaned out her checking account to buy enough gas to get there from Houston. Two others bought costly last-minute flights from Dallas. Another gave up a badly-needed work assignment and drove in from Tennessee. High school friends streamed in.

I’m not sure what everyone expected. Did they hope for conversation? Or recognition? If so, they must have been devastated. Still, they sat with her, sang to her, read to her, applied moisturizer to her parched skin, rubbed her back and held her hand. They brought flowers and cards, aromatherapy aides, silk butterflies and prayer cards and other talismans. Cousin Larry went to the beauty supply store in search of formaldehyde-free nail polish in the perfect shade of pink so she would die with pretty toes! (I am still unclear if they talked him into the frequent buyer discount card.) All of these people dropped everything just to be with her one more time.

At the time, I was touched. Hell, I was blown away, but I couldn’t have said why. Amidst my haze of emotional exhaustion, I could not have identified exactly what I felt about that bedside vigil. A year later, it’s all a little more clear. I felt wonder, and uncertainty. And now, commitment and resolve.

How wondrous that my sister inspired so much love and devotion, such friendship and generosity! How uncertain about the state of my own life, and loves and friendships. Who would be there at my bedside? What would they bring, and what would they say to me, and how would they feel? In the course of a year, I’ve thought about those questions, and I have a pretty good picture. I know who will be there and what they might bring (pie, baseball memorabilia, wine, stuffed animals, music by James Taylor and Janis Joplin, lavender candles and yellow roses). I think they will tell me stories about the good times, and laugh through their tears, and remember what a pain in the ass I could be. More than one of them will probably say, “Yeah, she really did say that out loud.” Maybe they’ll remember a meal I cooked, or how they helped me move, or beat me in Scrabble, spades, darts or kick-the-can.

Yeah, I know who you are. And I’m grateful. I resolve to be a better friend, or sister, or aunt or cousin or whatever. I’m committed to using my time and talents and energies to pay it forward, serving those who have been here for me through thick and thin (I know, I know, I have never been thin). When you stop to compose that list of who will be there in the end, you get some perspective. Maybe I can forgive the stranger who cut me off in traffic or threw a cigarette butt out of their car window, or even my dumb ass ex-husband, or the stupid bitch who “eliminated my position” at work. Ok, maybe not. But at least I can spend less energy hating them. Maybe I can channel that emotion into affirming what my sister Rhoda taught me, from her death bed, when she couldn’t even say my name. She taught me one more lesson about life and love. She taught me to choose joy and positive abundance. I’m just sayin …