Listening

Every so often, when my mom and I get time to sit down and let time flow like a neverending stream, she recounts one of our fondest shared memories: amidst the chaos of the divorce, of fighting false accusations and having a million things go wrong at once, she remembers moments when she'd sit there, alone in her room, overwhelmed by it all. And somehow, she says, I'd always know when she was feeling broken. I'd run into the room and give her a big hug, and tell her to forget about Dad, and, without ever saying it out loud, let her know I loved her. It'd give her the strength to push onward, to overcome the obstacles and keep us safe.

I remember it as a single occasion, perhaps because that one time was so vivid. I remember sitting by the TV in the living room, playing with my Legos or my video games or whatnot, and feeling, suddenly, that the house was too quiet. That if Mom walked into her room, it should be lively and active, not silent. And I don't remember if I actually heard the gentle sniffles, or if I just sensed them. But something told me to run into the bedroom and give Mom a hug. And so I did.

Whenever our family ran into hard times, we usually had three ways of handling them. The first was with logic, with thinking through matters and planning out a good, solid, response. Or we'd make up bizarre, dark-as-coal jokes that would be funny only to people who had been in our shoes and could feel the bittersweet absurdity of our predicaments. Or we'd just say nothing and hug each other. A single mom and her three kids. All we could say to each other, really, was that we had each other, and that that would not be taken from us.

* * *

When my grandparents were each in their last days, bedridden, bound to the incessant beeping of monitors of all sorts telling them they were sort of alive, we never knew what to say. Some people would come by and tell them they would be alright and out of there, soon; we didn't know, or worse yet, we knew it wasn't true. We would tend to their needs, spend time just being with them. Sometimes, when we had the courage, we could recount memories of times we'd had with them. I wish I could have done that more.

When I was a kid, my grandfather seemed absolutely fascinating. His forehead had ridges on it. And whenever he picked my 3 year old, yellow jumpsuit wearing self up, I'd scratch those ridges, gently. I laughed. He would, too. We never really had to say much. I remember driving to the airport after being in San Francisco for what seemed like the first time, some 18 years ago. I'd just been introduced to pocket swiss army knives, and I was cutting my nails in preparation for seeing my Gung Gung again, so that I'd be able to scratch his forehead safely. And let him know I loved him.

...Fast forward 11 years. I'm a sophomore in college. Two more years, and he would have seen me graduate.

The Intensive Care Unit of Garfield Medical Center is a weird place. The walls are painted a light tan; under the dimmish florescents, they appear somewhat somber. The fingertip blood pressure monitor keeps coming loose and beeping abnormally. The blood pressure monitor reads about 65, and the food never looks all that appealing, even though it's a full meal of beef and potatoes. We went there almost every day that summer. And most of the time, I would only be able to start by scratching his forehead, and giving him an odd hug, leaning over the bed's guardrails, putting my head right by his chin, which was now whiskered for the first and only time in memory, and never really feeling like it was quite enough of a hug. When I scratched his forehead for the last time on this earth, his wrinkles were taut. It hurt.

* * *

Perhaps there was something subtle in her voice that night that told me things weren't as they appeared. Or maybe it was just one of those instinctive things you do when you find someone fascinating. I was helping friends move. I told her to call me back on my way home. She did. We talked. I heard my voice soften. I remember not knowing much of what to say. I think I shared some times when I felt the same way. I brought in a perspective from a friend, one that I still felt was rather peculiar. And when all had been said and I turned off the phone while lying on my bed in the dark, there was nothing I wanted more than to cheer her up. To heal.

* * *

I realized, later on, that I'm not really all that great at listening; my teacher instincts get in the way, and make me far too eager to share what I learned in my own trials and tribulations. Perhaps it's that part of me that wants to know that what I went through actually has meaning for somebody...that my own wounds can be used to heal someone else's. Too often, I confuse healing with preventing.

...I wish the big fear we tackled hadn't been something I'd walked through twice before. I wish it hadn't been something that had disappointed me. I wish it had been something I knew nothing about, so I couldn't have used the "I'm not worried about you" line I picked up from my Econ teacher so many years ago. It doesn't seem to carry the sort of confident encouragement that I thought it does.

I wish we hadn't traded so many innocent barbs. They didn't start hurting till much later, and I didn't realize they made it harder for me to think of the person I loved as someone who was genuinely scared by some things and needed affirmation. And I didn't realize that they were making me more guarded, too--so eager to be the pillar, but less and less comfortable believing that what we had was love, and not just an eternal series of evaluations.

* * *

On days like today, when I feel like a sack of bones, hungry for things I wish could be true, and drained by things that, I fear, actually are...on days like this, when a sharp, searing pain goes from the bottom of my lungs to the top of my throat and leaves me wondering why things are the way they are, and how they have stayed with me for so long...

...I miss those times when there would be someone to hug, who wouldn't have to tell me that everything would be all right, but whose embrace could let me know that I would never be abandoned.