My last memory of her is of her in a
hospital bed.
I don’t remember much, except for the
warm yellow fluorescent lighting and that she was smiling. I don’t remember my
three year-old self feeling fear or apprehension from the medical instruments
and monitors. I just remember the happiness of my beautiful mother looking at
me and smiling. It was the last time I would see her alive, though we didn’t
know it at the time.
Linda Diane Fralick Wilcox died on Thanksgiving,
November 23rd, 2000 of a cerebral hemorrhage. After a lifetime of
suffering from multiple kidney transplants, dozens of surgeries, hypertension,
and a couple of near death experiences she was finally gone. She died at only
34, leaving behind a 48 year-old husband to care for their three year-old girl
and two-year old boy, her miracle babies.
My first memory is of getting a
computer for my 3rd birthday (one of the benefits of having a father
in the computer industry). I remember sitting outside my bedroom door, hearing the
unknown noises coming from my room of my dad setting it up. I remember my mom
sitting down by me, hugging me and laughing.
“What do you think Daddy is doing in
there?” she asked.
With a shy but excited smile, I
answered, “I don’t know” with an added shrug.
We waited until he was finished,
then I was introduced to a whole new world of Microsoft Word and a plethora of
Sesame Street games.
My second to last memory of her is
on the way to Utah, a day or two before she died. We were about two hours away
from our destination when two whining children wanted their mom.
“Mommy!” Kevin wailed.
“Mommy, please come sit back here
with us! Please,” I pleaded.
She finally relented, unbuckled, and
precariously climbed into the back seat between us. That may have not seemed
like a major act of love, but in that case, in that instant, it was everything.
I don’t remember the funeral. And
I’m glad. I’m well; I guess happy probably isn’t the right word to choose while
talking about death. I’m suppose I’m thankful
that my last memory of her isn’t of a cold, pale dead body, dressed in white
clothes in a casket. This may sound demented but I have always been intrigued
with dead bodies. From examining a dead mouse with my play doctor
kit as a child to touching the waxy hands of the deceased at viewings and
funerals, I’ve always found it fascinating. I know random facts, such as how decomposition
starts the moment of death, though of course it’s not noticeable for another while.
I want to know what makes a dead
body so different from a living one. What is it about the moment of death, the
absence of the spirit that causes such effects? Energy cannot be destroyed,
only transformed. Where did the part of my mother that made her her go? I also wonder if someone this day,
this second, is walking around with my mother’s corneas, her liver, hear heart.
Definitely not her kidneys, because no one would want a malfunctioning,
twice-used body part. I found out that she was an organ donor, that her body
was kept alive just long enough to be eligible for organ donation. While her
brain was… a dead, useless piece of body tissue.
Because of my religious beliefs, I
know that I will see her again. But that is not enough. I need her now. I found a hope chest of her things
at my grandparent’s house. I sleep with her beautiful red dress she wore to see
“Phantom of the Opera”, clutching it like a child’s security blanket, inhaling
the musty but oh so wonderful scent of being in a wooden chest for 11 years. Sometimes
by morning it ends up above the covers, and I know that my parents have seen
it, though they never say anything. They never say anything at all.
A month ago, I found a large box of
her old things in the attic. I found a journal from when she was a teenager to
her twenties, from which I found out her exact medical issues, that she didn’t
even go on a date until she was 25, and that she considered suicide on a number
of occasions. I found her old, huge make-up box filled with Amway makeup over
13 years old. I even found her glasses, those clunky, unattractive “coke
bottle” glasses. I put them on and try to see what she saw. Maybe it would
bring her back.
My dad had already endured a divorce
from his first wife in the 80’s, and now he was stuck again by himself but this
time with two little children. I remember how night after night I would wake up
in the middle of the night and run to his room, knock, and ask if I could sleep
with him because I had a bad dream. I have to admit that I lied pretty much
every night about those dreams. In reality, I was just lonely. In the mornings
my dad would get my brother and I breakfast, do my hair in one or two little
braids, and we would be off to the kind lady who babysat us every day. After over
a year of shuffling my brother and me to the babysitter during the day, my dad
finally found a permanent caregiver: my stepmother.
My stepmom was divorced by her
alcoholic husband who came home with his new girlfriend and told her she had
three weeks to move out. I didn’t care at the time that she was my stepmom, she
was someone who was there to love me and take care of me. She was my new mother.
She is a good woman and has done a wonderful job of raising my brother and me.
But still it is not the same. I want the mother who thought she would be
childless all her life. I want the mother who miraculously conceived and went
through a risky pregnancy, but thought that her 3 lbs 7 oz daughter was perfect
and completely worth it. I want the mother who would wake up in the middle of
the night just to turn on the camcorder and record me, so that those moments
could be captured forever. I want the mother who… loved me before she even knew
me.
On my dad and stepmother’s wedding
day in January 2002, I was wearing a pretty puffy blue dress. I thought I
looked just like Cinderella. No, I was
Cinderella, and the temple with its beautiful fountain and landscaping was my
castle. My new aunt was arranging all of my new cousins and aunts and uncles
into cute picture-taking poses. Walking up to “Mommy”, I asked excitedly, “Can I
be in a picture? Please?”
“No, honey,” she replied. “Only the
cousins are going to be in this one.” My little five year-old mind was
confused. Wasn't I part of this new family too? “But Mama, I am a cousin now
too!” I could tell she was busy and didn’t want to worry about me at the
moment. “Kelsey. These pictures are just for the people born or married into my
family.”
“But… but Hannah and Abby were adopted,
though—” She just looked at me. I could feel the implication. They count. You don’t.
I
was heartbroken. I wanted to be in a picture, any picture so terribly bad. I felt left out, like everyone got to
have fun and be a part of everything while my maternal grandparents stood there
watching Kevin and I the whole time. I wasn’t a part of that family. I didn’t
count. I was an outsider.
Sometimes now, when I put on her
glasses and favorite lipstick (Amway color “Ember”) and squint reeeaaally hard
while looking in the mirror, I can almost see her face. I can almost see the
face I don’t remember but have memorized from looking at countless pictures.
But when I open my eyes all the way again, I see no resemblance.
There are dozens of photographs from
that wedding day, and I pass many of them in a collage frame in the hallway
many times a day. I am in only one picture, the group picture, where my little
body is standing in front of my new mom, face stained with dried tears, with red
eyes and a half-hearted, attempted smile.
Here's a poem I found online a couple of years ago that I really love and I'm thinking about adding it to the the printed copy:
“Memories”
By “AmbRawr”
And I remember she wouldn’t wake up.
Her lips were mushed together in a
Horrible shade of red
They buried my mother in a white dress
And red lips.
And she couldn’t see.
Where are your glasses, Mommy?
And still at sixteen I bring them to my face
And peer through the distorted murky lenses
To see what she saw
Maybe one day …
And I remember it hitting me
Like it does every day
When I hear them all talk and complain about their
“Horrible” mothers
What’s it like to have a mother
I’d give anything to know,
Or at least for them to know how lucky they are.
They know.
And I remember she wouldn’t sit up
And I dreamed of a stuffing machine because
Someone whispered by my ear she was
Cut in half and stuffed
And it made no sense
And still at sixteen I wonder
What happened to my mother?
And I remember her faintly
She doesn’t even smile in my dreams anymore
And I wonder if she’ll ever be proud of me
If she’d ever approve of me
And who I’ve become
The things I’ve seen
The things I’ve done
And I remember her singing
Though I can’t hear her voice
The only happy Christmas I hold on to
Every year
Maybe one day it’ll come back
I used to think
Maybe one day she’d come back
And still at sixteen I hope
Maybe one day she’ll come back …
And I remember she wouldn’t wake up
Not even to say good-bye.
Her lips were mushed together in a
Horrible shade of red
They buried my mother in a white dress
And red lips.
And she couldn’t see.
Where are your glasses, Mommy?
And still at sixteen I bring them to my face
And peer through the distorted murky lenses
To see what she saw
Maybe one day …
And I remember it hitting me
Like it does every day
When I hear them all talk and complain about their
“Horrible” mothers
What’s it like to have a mother
I’d give anything to know,
Or at least for them to know how lucky they are.
They know.
And I remember she wouldn’t sit up
And I dreamed of a stuffing machine because
Someone whispered by my ear she was
Cut in half and stuffed
And it made no sense
And still at sixteen I wonder
What happened to my mother?
And I remember her faintly
She doesn’t even smile in my dreams anymore
And I wonder if she’ll ever be proud of me
If she’d ever approve of me
And who I’ve become
The things I’ve seen
The things I’ve done
And I remember her singing
Though I can’t hear her voice
The only happy Christmas I hold on to
Every year
Maybe one day it’ll come back
I used to think
Maybe one day she’d come back
And still at sixteen I hope
Maybe one day she’ll come back …
And I remember she wouldn’t wake up
Not even to say good-bye.
Haha, are you depressed yet from reading this? Sorry.
