Snapshots- the third draft

    The phone call from home at 6:58 a.m. on a Monday morning rang with the intensity of an emergency. My help was needed and it was agreed that I would leave the following morning to go and give my assistance to daddy. The really sad part was that I hadn’t been home in over four years, what with starting college at the age of 47, raising my grandson, and coping with a failed 20 year marriage…I just hadn’t been able to squeeze the time out of my hectic schedule. Add to that, the fact that my poor old trusty truck is carrying 343,000 plus miles on her teal green body! Now, I was needed, not merely wanted but desperately needed. Daddy’s shaking voice had belied that feeling. Even though I had seen my family many times since I left, this was different.

            I was calm as I backed out of my driveway and drove the half mile to highway 69, easing out into traffic; I started the two hour trek down south. This road held many memories for me that always pointed back to happier times in my life and marriage. The first 20 miles were smooth; I had never traveled them when my marriage was good. After them, the memories started their attacks on me. It felt like I was holding a snapshot in my hand as vivid color pictures rained down over my body. There on the left is where a poor dog ran out in front of my truck. I was traveling at 70 miles an hour, headed to the lake (and my husband) for the weekend. Sarina, my 12 year old daughter, was with me and she collapsed in tears at the impact; I steered the truck to the side of the road and a safe stop. The once black and white dog was now covered in sticky red blood. We wrapped it in a towel that I had and pulled it out of the road, not wanting anyone else to desecrate what was left of someone else’s pet. We went from house to house looking for the owners, finally we found them and more tears erupted.           

A few miles further into my trip, on the right hand side of the road, was a business that sells wood carvings. They are done with a chainsaw, intricate pieces that actually seem to come to life. Totem poles, busts of Indian chiefs, you name it, they have it. Our son, Patrick, loved these things and one day my husband and I stopped to shop for one for a Christmas present. Clearly etched in my mind was the shot of us holding hands so lovingly as we searched for the perfect piece, we finally agreed on a small totem pole. The two of them, my husband and son, don’t even speak to each other any longer. My pain was intense, like a fire raging in my brain with the flames trying to lick at the memory and burn the picture away. My tears were ample enough to keep the flames at bay and save the picture in my mind.

            As I continued on my drive, another picture came to mind, one from my childhood. A young man so full of life as he taught me to shoot a bb gun and I, in my haste, shot him in the foot while trying my best to cock the damn thing. He still loved me though and he still continued to teach me many things. I felt so unbearably bad. Now he needed my help, things were backward. This wasn’t right, it didn’t make sense, and the tears flooded me…

            I finally managed to make it to my destination, Grayburg, Texas, home at last…and I cried when I saw all the damage that had been wrought by the vindictive hurricane that tore up everything it could touch. My old home place looked like a foreign land, my beloved oak and sycamore trees where gone, only their bases were left and even at that, they were laying on their sides in my front yard…bereft of all life. Some how, this was fitting with the reason that was bringing me home…life changes whether we want it to or not, it continues on like a fate that has no choice. Life changes and we must roll with the punches that are blown our way.

            I pulled into the driveway of my daddy’s house and climbed down out of my tired old truck. Knocking on the door brought both anticipation and pain at the same time. Going into the house where I grew up intensified my anxiety yet there was joy there also. With no time to spare, my family and I got in the car and went to the doctor’s appointment; as I gazed into the back seat more memories and snapshots blew through my mind. He was bent and grayhaired now, it just didn’t seem possible but it was true. When we got to the doctor’s office I went in with him, he needed me to make sure the doctor understood the gravity of this situation. As they x-rayed his curved back and bent legs, I stood there holding his hand and reassuring him that all would be fine; he squeezed my hand back and looked at me with love in his faded brown eyes. My tears now fell only on the inside so that I wouldn’t upset him any more than he already was. His independence was gone, his glory days of youths dreams passed, and it was almost more than I could stand.

            Back home, as we tucked his twisted body into bed, I was still wondering where all his life went. I kissed the top of his balding head and caressed his fears into sleep, he rested then. I turned to my daddy, who was standing behind me, and asked, “how does one accept this, Kenneth (my baby brother) looks older than you daddy…”. Daddy, who boasts excellent health, looked so worried but he was so thankful that I knew what to do for his youngest child. We are still not sure why his once strong body now looks like a question mark when he walks, why his once agile mind seems to wander, or why his muscles are cramped with such pain, the answers will lie in the tests that were run today. I told daddy that I would be here for the return visit to the doctor in two weeks, and to call me anytime. I also told daddy that if need be, I could and would move Kenneth in with me, I didn’t want my 74 year old daddy worrying about how to take care of his son, he had already watched his wife of 35 years be eaten alive by leukemia in  1987. I took care of him then too. I would ease as much of his pain as I could, his and Kenneth’s. I would love to have my brother with me. Then we could make new memories to file in mind for a later date.

            On the way back to my home, black and white snapshots of the two of us playing as children played in my head, we didn’t have color film back then. I remember each one of them as they were taken, us playing baseball in the yard with friends and Kenneth teaching me to bat. There in the back yard he taught me to climb an ancient oak tree that seemed to reach the clouds and then had to help me down. Riding our bikes late into the night with only a full moon and a sky full of stars to light our way, all its promise of more tomorrows as our voices trailed giggles into the trees, so full of promise, so full of life,…so full, now so empty. My tears bled into the pictures and blended them into what I saw today, a collage of memories, of pain, of sadness, and yet, a minute piece of hope as the black and white snapshots turned to the color of today. I will find the best doctors for him, the best care…and I will go home more often now.