and Words
Standing by the window
Eyes upon the moon
Hoping that the memory
Will leave her spirit soon
She shuts the doors and lights
And lays her body on the bed
Where images and words are running deep
She has too much pride to pull
The sheets above her head
So quietly she lays and waits for sleep
Lyric excerpts from Musixmatch.
Nearly two decades ago, I called Peg at home on a weekend day. We exchanged polite greetings, but I immediately asked her to put her husband on the phone as well. Once they were both on the phone together, I asked them a question. No, I asked them that question. I told them that I had honorable intentions toward their daughter and that I was going to propose. I wanted their blessing.
Years ago, I watched a scene from the movie Fiddler on the Roof with Paul Michael Glaser. I noted a very clever conversation where he informs a father about his intent to marry his daughter. However, he does not ask for permission to marry his daughter; instead, he asks for his blessing. I learned a lesson from that scene and asked for their blessing, not their permission.
In that moment, I thought I was clever. I showed them that I valued their opinion of me, but it ultimately won’t deter me from proposing. I had spent my bonus on that ring already. However, the joke was on me. I quietly hoped for a response like, “Welcome to the family.” Though that never came. It wasn’t an abject objection either. Their response is best described as ‘squishy’. Her dad did explicitly say, “I appreciate the call, Frank.” That was as close as I got.
Shortly after, I did propose. She rented an apartment, and I owned a modest condo. We really didn’t have enough room to build a life together in either place, so we started looking at homes. We were lucky. The real estate market turned in favor of buyers, and we teamed up with an exceptional real estate agent. In less than six months, we went from two single, though committed, people into a couple with a house. We celebrated getting the keys to our new home by playing, Our House from our new kitchen.
We celebrated that which was both unfamiliar and exciting. The prospect of joining our lives together felt like an inevitability, a step towards completion, much like high school graduation. Every miscommunication was simply an opportunity to learn more about this wonderful woman.
Her parents came to visit shortly after we moved into the house. It was a predictable visit under the guise of ‘helping you get settled’ in your new place. Though this time it was different. All preceding visits prepared her to manage life on her own. This time, she had a partner. Simple gestures from dad, like putting hooks behind the doors, were no longer necessary. The task of caring for their youngest daughter now fell upon me, which I took with utmost seriousness.
To this day, we still regularly exchange the words, “I’ll always take care of you.” And on occasion, we’ll even say to each other (with a quiet smile), “I appreciate the call, Frank.”
In recent months, Peg struggled to get restful sleep. She wakes absurdly early, which I’d consider the ‘middle of the night’. Meanwhile, she continues to lie in bed until the staff in her assisted living facility enters to prepare her for her day. However, she may use the buzzer to call them if she wants to start her day early. I don’t believe she ever used it. Perhaps she hopes that her weariness will be enough to lull her back asleep, but it rarely does.
It’s a condition that continues to gnaw at her, though she chooses not to mention it to the staff. While I don’t tabulate it, it pains me to hear her struggle. As I suffered from sleep apnea, I understand the value of restful sleep. A poor night’s sleep leads to navigating each day with an incessant fog to every thought.
One day, the song ‘Wait for Sleep’ comes on while I’m listening to my music, and it reminds me of this dear woman. I wonder if she struggles to sleep the way the song describes, tormented by thoughts that race in her mind that she can’t suppress or even dampen. Even this possibility breaks my heart for her, since I can’t begin to comprehend 100 years of life and the burden that it imposes.
I never mention it to her, fearing that I would tempt fate.
We all sit in a hospital room surrounding Peg’s bed. Two children live in the area, each with their spouses. My wife and I flew in to be by her side. In modest moments, one of us sits with her. In busier times, there are as many as seven people in the room. On the first day, tubes and cables extrude from her tiny frame as they administer liquids from hanging bags or report status to machines with digital displays. On subsequent days, they move her to another room and remove many of those. She now looks more comfortable and peaceful.
We now know that it’s inevitable, like a car eventually coasting to a stop. We just don’t know when. We fill the room with stories that reach far into a past before I knew any of them. These stories are filled with nostalgia and laughter, and yes, even love. There are never enough chairs in the room to accommodate the people at her side. When the occasional nurse asks us, “Is there anything that I can get for you?”, the most frequent answer is, “May we trouble you for another chair?”
Even away from her beloved hometown of Saint Joseph, Michigan, people gather in a room barely enough to contain us. She mostly lies in bed, finally getting that sleep that she often yearned for weeks before. We gathered to face the reality that is to come. We gathered to express our love for her, should she wake.
On the fourth day, she wakes long enough to see us. Her blue eyes follow familiar faces as she struggles to articulate even single words. We repeat words that are filled with our love for this woman, understanding that they may be the last words that she hears. That day was the last day that I saw her as she transitioned to eternal life to be reunited with her dear husband.
All that said, I barely knew her. I only witnessed a tiny portion of her life. I got to see fragments of paper from an amazing novel. None of us ever got to read all the words; we only know the words in our chapter. However, I don’t need to know every second of every moment to know the profound impact that she’s had on people’s lives. I see it in the effect she’s had on others; I can see it in the way in which others treat her with such reverence.
It’d be easy to only see the woman with the razor-sharp wit, who is set in her ways. One may conclude that it is the sum of the parts. I choose to see the subtle signs that point to more than the sum of the parts. Even if you can’t see a building, you may gauge its size by the length of the shadow it casts, and Peg cast a shadow that was greater than what you may initially see or even imagine
As we went through her things, I only asked for two items. First, I had constructed a Lego minifigure in her likeness, complete with hair, sweater, and a saxophone. Initially, I thought something as trivial as a toy would’ve gone in the estate sale (or even the garbage on the subsequent move); I was surprised to learn that she kept it. If it meant something to her, it means something to me. Second, for a while, I texted her fortunes from the fortune cookies I opened from Panda Express. Eventually, I collected enough of these to put them on a picture frame. I kept that too.
These serve to remind me of this amazing woman. I miss you, Peg; I know that you’re in a better place.