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The Bezdan

2011-01-23T04:04:00Z

Survival

The former Yugoslavia is filled with natural phenomena known as “bezdans”, which are gaping sinkholes in the ground where the earth just opened up as if to release its spirit up towards the skies. There are thousands of them all over the farms and outside the villages, and they were traditionally viewed as bad luck. If someone lost their hat to the wind while peering over the edge into the bottomless abyss, they would immediately cross themselves and ask God to bless them.

Over the years, these funnel-shaped bezdans filled in with trees, small shrubs and tall grass, peppered with exposed rocks where the earth lay naked. At the bottom, although you couldn’t see that far down, there was always a body of water that had collected from the rains and the natural seepage of the land. Some of these sinkholes were only about six feet wide…others were gigantic.

During World War II, the bezdans became a graveyard for the victims of Hitler’s troops.

As they cut a path through Europe, the Nazis decimated the native population. They showed no mercy for men, women or children. Any and all resisters were slated to die. Those who weren’t shot on the spot were brought to the edge of the closest bezdan where they were executed haphazardly and then pushed over the side into the deep precipice. Not all of them were lucky enough to catch the first bullet.

Some of them fell straight down to the bottom, their screams diminishing as their bodies hurled faster and faster towards the water until the silence signaled their disappearance forever. Some of the unluckier ones fell onto the branches of trees and shrubs, where they were impaled , helplessly waiting for the next round.

Some of them were able to break their falls by hanging on to tree limbs and then they quickly scrambled to hide themselves in the narrow crevices along the sides of the bezdan. Some of these openings were only two feet high and the unfortunate souls who found themselves scrunched in these little caves had to witness what happened next.

The Nazis would shoot another …and yet another… round of bullets into the gaping hole,indiscriminately killing more of the surviving victims. As if that weren’t enough, the Nazis gathered up huge racks from the fields…racks that the peasants had used for centuries to dry grass for cattle feed. They were wooden and sharpened at one end to sink deeply into the earth. They looked like crosses. These were hurled into the bezdan where they caught speed and ripped into the bodies of the remaining victims.

It was a blood fest; a display of hatred, an emotion only humans possess.

One day, a young woman of 17 was caught along with her neighbors…people she had grown up with, faces that were as familiar to her as her own. As she was thrown screaming into the bezdan , she found herself miraculously wedged in between two heavily leafed branches of a sturdy tree so that her fall was cushioned. She was about forty feet into the hole and very close to the side. Her eyes darted about in fear and the panic beating in her young heart propelled her to grasp at straws. Panic stricken and with only the thought of survival raging in her mind, she scrambled into a crevice that seemed to open up right in front of her. Once inside, curled into a fetal position, she allowed herself to take a couple of quiet breaths. Forcing herself not to sob loudly, she pinched her arm as hard as she could, focusing on the pain and not on the terror. She knew it wasn’t over. The Nazis were regrouping. She had heard the stories.

Then she heard the soft mewing of a little animal close by. Deathly afraid to move, she lay still, straining to hear the sound. Was she delusional or was it the whimpering of a baby? She had to look. As she slowly turned her face around so that she was facing towards the bottom of the canyon, there she saw an infant, about a month old, unharmed but crying softly, nestled in the arms of a shrub only a few feet beneath her. Its mother was long-gone, perhaps one of the lucky ones that had died in the very beginning.

The woman knew she had to grab the baby. If they were to die, they would die together. The baby couldn’t perish alone.

She moved slowly. She inched her right arm towards the infant…closer and closer…she couldn’t draw attention to movement. Oh God, how could she get to this child? Her arm stretched and her fingers grew until the tips felt the top of the soiled blanket. Too short. She shifted her body slightly to give her leverage. An extra inch. Just enough to grab the blanket and slowly pull the bundle into her sanctuary. She managed to tuck the baby into her arms just before the shots rang out. The drying racks came hurling down and the bloodcurdling screams and shrieks from dying neighbors filled the air. But the young woman and child were still alive.

An eerie silence followed. It was deafening. Hours passed and not a sound but the soft whimpering of the infant. Even that was not to be trusted. She had been holding her breath for so long she wasn’t sure she was still alive. But then as she strained her mind, she felt the infant’s soft hair under her chin. With quiet tears streaming down her stricken face, she knew they had survived the brutal assault.

Darkness settled in. She instinctively knew the Nazis were gone for awhile because she could hear the frogs and crickets begin crooning in the early spring evening. It was bitterly cold there in the dark, in the wet earth but she didn’t care. They were still breathing, the two of them. Her mind couldn’t begin to fathom the coming days. Just for tonight, they were safe.

She didn’t sleep. She thought of her young life, her dreams, her desires. She thought of the baby. Who did it belong to? Was it a boy or a girl? She played games in her mind to discover who the mother was. Maria or Dara? No, it must have been Sofia because wasn’t she the one with child not too long ago? Minutes stretched into eternity and slowly the blackness lifted. Tthe glow of dawn crept into her little cave and illuminated her surroundings…and sharpen her senses.

Then she heard another sound. It was a voice coming from somewhere close to her, the sound of a man. He was praying. Another survivor? Impossible. But yes, it was another human voice, the sound of prayer, impossible to ignore.

“Who’s there?” she softly breathed into the morning air.

Silence.

“Is someone there?” she quietly repeated, hoping beyond hope there was another soul with her in this God-forsaken cavern.

After what seemed like hours, a voice whispered, “Yes, I am here. It is Branko…who are you?”

Oh,God, Branko. He’s my father’s friend. I know him.

“Yes, yes, Branko. It’s me, Jelena,” she greeted him with joy tinged with sorrow. “What are we to do?”

“Pray, Jelena. Just pray,” he sadly replied.

And they did. They prayed and they talked. And another day passed. They couldn’t see each other but their voices kept then alive. They talked of people they knew, they talked about the war, they talked about the future. And another day passed.

By now, the baby was wailing loudly most of the time. It knew nothing of bravery or despair. It was thirsty and hungry. The drops of dew the woman had collected from the surrounding leaves weren't enough for either of them. She was desperately praying because without food or water, the baby would perish. They would perish. The baby cried and another day passed. The stench of rotting flesh all around them was becoming unbearable.

On the fourth day, Branko asked “Do you believe in God?”

“Yes, yes I do, “the woman replied. “But where is God now? Why does He allow this?” She started sobbing uncontrollably, weakened with fear, loss of hope and no food and water. The Nazis’ bullets would have been a secret blessing, she thought. At least they could have died as martyrs not like the beaten animals they were now: dirty, hungry and desperate.

“I am going to God,” said Branko. “There is only this way. I am going home. You must believe in heaven; it will save you.”

Then she heard a rustling sound, like a body creeping through dry leaves and then nothing until a small plop at the end. In horror, she realized he had thrown himself into the abyss, perishing in the water below.

“Noooo,” she screamed out, her desperation echoing on the empty walls of the hole. No one was there to hear her. No one was there to take her out of her misery.No one was there to save her. Now she was totally alone, just her and the baby.

Another day passed. The baby had stopped crying but she knew it was still alive because she could feel its warm breath on her breast. But the breath was feeble, like a whisper to her heart and she began to panic. If she lost the baby, she would be totally alone. And if she lost the baby, what was the point in living anyway? An innocent lost…no wisdom gained. Nothing made sense.

Her muscles strained to move. The cramps were excruciating. The hunger and the thirst were driving her mad. Should she follow Branko? It wasn’t suicide, but it wasn’t glory. It was nothing but death, still inconceivable to her. But what to lose? If she tried to escape but died anyway, what to lose? If she plummeted to her death in the cold water below, what to lose? The baby had no choice but she did.

In her weakness, her mind became stronger.

On the sixth day, she moved out of her cave, gently cradling the baby in her numb arms. She slowly moved onto the same branch that had cradled her fall which seemed like centuries ago to her. Precariously perched on a tree branch that miraculously held, she wrapped the baby into her scarf and hung it from her neck, close to her heart. She waited for the tingling in her legs to subside.

She sat there for hours, listening for sounds. Waiting for bravery. Counting the moments. The tree branch held.

She noticed the tall weeds along the sides of the crevices, probably growing for eons, thickening and lengthening and growing towards the sun above.

Cautiously, she grabbed a weed and yanked. It held. Right above it was a drying rack, the instrument of death, impaled deeply into the ground. While it had killed some of her neighbors, it now gave her path to another meter, to the next shrub. Slowly she crawled, hand upon weeds and branches and racks, a maze to the top of the hole. Her sweat poured down her face, down upon the child. Her belabored breath swooshed in and out of her tortured lungs as she touched the next blade of grass and the next shrub and upward she climbed.

The light was filtered and made shadows on her path. She stopped moments to catch her breath and then she passed on, one hand over the over, one hand touching the baby, one hand reaching towards the next weed. It still held, its roots engrained in the earth of her ancestors carrying her and the child onward, towards life…towards destiny.

Her strength about to fail, riddled with hunger and doubt, her fingers stretched out for the next blade of grass. She felt nothing. She saw nothing. The darkness swooped upon her while the backside of her arms felt the edge. Nowhere more to climb. Nothing more to reach. After hours of clawing the terrain and praying to all the saints, she had reached the top. The weeds disappeared and the land was level.

The fresh night air twirled upon her senses and when she pulled herself over the edge onto the meadow, she lay there and cried. She bellowed into the night while the owls watched. The cave closed up in the darkness and the crickets began to sing their eternal song. The baby breathed weakly, and then pursed its mouth for milk.

A Kiss From Baka (an excerpt from a family journal, written to Luka)

2010-09-23T17:19:00Z

Jelena Bruich October 27, 1928 -

Your great-grandmother is a dragon at the moat, ready to kill if anyone threatens to harm any one of her family. Inarguably the strongest character in our clan, she raised us with equal parts of fire and velvet. Even to this day, at the age of 81, the vigor of her heart and spirit make up for the legs that can’t carry her as far as they used to. She continues to be the strong one, the one we come to with all of our joys and sorrows just like we did when we were small children.

If our father was our heart, then your great-grandmother is our soul. I always compared the two of them as air and earth…your great-grandfather was the air we breathed, the visions we dreamed of and the romance we wove around our lives, while your great-grandmother was the earth we walked on, the reality we lived and the strength we fanned from her flames. Together they presented an omnipotent presence to us kids. They could not be separated nor cajoled...we could never play one against the other to get what we wanted. Although we constantly waited for the changing of the guard, alas, there were never any cracks in their armor, so joined were they in their quest to raise us in their vision of what was right.

Your great-grandmother was born in 1928 on her family's farm in Lika, a few kilometers from where your great-grandfather was born. Yet while they lived so close to one another in Yugoslavia, the distance was oceans apart at that time and they didn’t actually meet until the end of World War II. They did however briefly see each other from afar when your great-grandfather passed by her farm just before the close of the war. Neither could have imagined their destinies in that brief encounter although stories told later hinted at subtle sparks of interest on your great-grandfather's part.

Your great-grandmother was the second youngest of 4 living siblings; two other children had died as babies, one from pneumonia and the other by what probably was crib-death. Her mother and father were a bit atypical for those days with your great-great-grandfather leaving the family farm to live and work in Paris for months on end. He would return home to help with the harvest but the rest of the time, he worked at whatever jobs he could find in Paris to help supplement the family’s livelihood. As a child, while I thought this separation was strange when comparing it to my own family’s dynamics, I did however find it fascinating that someone in our family had the courage to venture out of the farm and into a cultural city of the world. It must have taken a lot of bravery on his part, and only now at my ripe age of 61 do I appreciate my grandfather’s courage and his will to progress.

But I digress. Your great-grandmother was only 13 years old when the war came to her homeland. As a child, she endured many horrors she couldn’t comprehend at that age, if indeed horrors can ever be comprehended. She roamed from forest to village, earth to sky, seeking safety from the war. Perhaps her own words describe the times best….

"I couldn't see my father or brother. They were all I had left. We were separated miles back when captured by a small company of German soldiers. They thought we were guerrilla fighters - part of the Resistance.
In truth, we were just a small band of pathetic, weary peasants trying to leave our country on foot. We were all sick of the war.

Everything was lost: our cows, sheep, corn, wheat, land. My mother, older sister and younger brother were left behind as my father and I left home on foot, seeking safety. . Our land was filled with enemies from within and without - the king's men from the north, Nazis from the east, and Communists everywhere.

Each party tempted the people of this miserable time with their own propaganda of a better life, yet everywhere around me, death leered from its empty skull, whitened into eternity by the dead souls before us.

Gone were the toys and animals of my childhood, replaced with the routine, frantic scrambling up to the hills and forests behind our home. Whenever the shooting sounded too close, we grabbed whatever food was on the table, whatever amounts of water we could carry, and we ran, like deer, for cover. Sometimes we spent days up there, praying we wouldn't freeze to death with just the clothes on our backs.

After a horrific battle where my father and I got caught up in the middle, we were separated from the rest of our family. That time marked the end of my family as I knew it. Part of them returned to the farm while my father, brother and I set off for an unknown destiny.

We roamed the countrywide and teamed with the Chetniks who were having an equally difficult time surviving the political landscape. I can’t explain to you exactly how complicated things were…no one knew exactly who was drinking and who was paying. All I know is that I ended up in an execution line as a traitor. I didn’t even know the meaning of the word, all I wanted was my mother and the life I knew. I was just a child.

The soldiers were getting into position. I knew the people in the execution line. They were neighbors and friends, comfortable faces I grew up with.

Like most of the girls of my time, the girls who learned to milk cows before they learned to read, I looked older. I looked like a woman. Yet, the child I really was sobbed uncontrollably in fear.

It was quiet, except for my horrible screams and pathetic baying. But I didn't care. I was too young to be proud. Not understanding God's nature, nor seeking His miracle, I cried out to my mother instead, beseeching her to part the clouds and carry me away in her arms, far away from this place.

The captain of the German squad sauntered up to direct his chosen murderers to begin the slaughter. Ice flowed in my veins.

I darted wildly out of the line. The young are brave in their ignorance. Falling at the captain's feet and grabbing his legs like a crazed animal, I screamed and begged for my life.

I didn't understand German, nor he my language, but the world stood still for a moment in time. Perhaps he was a father...an uncle...a brother. Whatever his inspiration was for compassion that day, I'll never know. He looked into my innocent face and proclaimed, “But this is just a child, not the enemy.”

He lifted me to my feet and walked me away from the execution line. A minute later, the shots rang out. My life was spared for another day and truth be known, I never thought to look back or wonder why I was saved.

War is funny like that…I didn't think about salvation or the reasoning behind anything.…I was just glad to be alive."

Your great-grandmother survived World War II but after many years of struggle, she wasn’t any closer to home than she was earlier. Now 17, she was placed in a displaced person camp in Italy along with thousands of her countrymen who had lost the war to communism. They couldn’t go back to their homeland for fear of reprisals and their only choice was to face an uncertain future. She didn't know it then but she was to stay in the refugee camp for six, long years with her father and oldest brother...the rest of her family were left behind on the ravaged farm.

It was in the camp in Italy that your great-grandmother and great-grandfather met. If you were to hear her tell the story of their courtship, you would think that it was a one-sided proposition with him the adamant pursuer and she the consummate averter, until she tells you in vivid detail the clothes he was wearing and the blueness of his eyes which she remembers to this very day. In truth, it appeared to be a remarkable love story that all of her three children aspired to experience. I have never doubted why we grew up to be such hopeless romantics.

Your great-grandmother has always held most of her cards close to her chest when talking about her past, but her actions define her better than anything she could have told us. She was only 17 years old when she defied her own father and married your great-grandfather, she raised one child in the refugee camp, gave birth to another only a month after she landed on American soil, and her last daughter was born years later when she had finally acclimated to her new life. In addition to raising a family and learning a new culture, she also worked full-time most of the years I can remember. The major events in her lifetime were not shared with a mother or sister; it was only her immediate family that witnessed all of the strength this woman mustered to not only survive, but to thrive in a foreign land.

Our houses were many, and each bore her mastery for turning them into a home. Somewhere from deep within her well of innate talents and never-ending resevoir of love, she became the consummate interior decorator...the fabulous cook...the marvelous baker whose tidbits would tempt the entire neighborhood with the aroma of freshly baked bread and pastries. My mother could host kings and while we didn't entertain royalty, our home was always filled to the rafters with neighbors, friends and other relatives joining us for dinners, drinks and laughter. She was the proverbial "set another plate" kind of person who always had enough to share with another.

Then there were the clothes for us children. You'd think she spent her shopping sprees in Paris with the way she dressed us. My mother thought nothing of spending $10 for an outfit for one of us when a loaf of bread, at that time, cost
.15 cents. We grew up with a sense of style that was far beyond our peasant roots, and right in line with the rest of America. While we may have been immigrants, she was damned if we were going to look like ones!  We children didn't know she was working graveyard shifts at the steel mill until much later. All we knew was we lived without skipping a heartbeat in America, and we were loved beyond measure.

In the Tarot Deck of Cards, your great-grandmother is a cross between the Empress and the Queen of Swords...immeasurable strength and true to her family and purpose.  She is the rock we built our lives upon. I hope she remembers the person she was when she looks into the mirror today as lines and furrows cross her pretty face.

Perhaps most importantly, I hope she knows we remember.

To Luka

2010-09-22T23:03:30Z

   Nikola Bruich    Dec. 19, 1922 - Oct. 30, 2005

If your great-grandfather would have been alive to hold you in his arms, you never would have imagined that he was once a guerrilla fighter in World War II…a man who travelled what we believed to be fearlessly not only through the trials of the war, but throughout his life. He was a man who cherished his family beyond everything else and in the end; he was a man who died as bravely as he had lived honorably. He was, no doubt, the most beloved character in the cast of our family.

What you would have seen, had he lived long enough to witness your birth, was the kindness in his eyes and the warmth in his touch. He was a man who believed his word was his vow, and that his life was a testament to honor. Never ashamed to lavish kisses and affection upon his own children, he was as capable of giving love as he was of receiving it. A soft-spoken man of few words, boasting was not in his nature and the legend that will forever surround him is a creation of his own family and not from the man himself.   At 5’ 11” with eyes the color of Caribbean waters, he was the tallest man in our forest.

Your great-grandfather was born on a farm in Yugoslavia on December 19, 1922. He was the oldest of nine siblings, a position that planted a sense of responsibility in his young heart and which drove him throughout his life. The family homestead was a plot of 1,500 acres accumulated through the ages from one marriage to another, one inheritance to another. While life on the land may seem idyllic to those of us here who live on lots the size of postage stamps, working the farm was anything but easy. Your great-great grandparents, Milan & Sava Bruich, must have worked from sun-up to sun-down planting and hoeing the crops, baking bread, making cheese, and feeding the livestock. And as summer turned to fall, there was the harvest to contend with, storing the bounty, slaughtering and curing the meat, and preparing for the coming, cold winter months.

Back in the late 1930’s, the Bruich clan lived a simple life where pride blossomed from self-sufficiency. All of that changed when World War II slowly crept upon the lands of Yugoslavia as the Nazi’s plummeted through the gateway of the Balkans and the communists eroded the monarchy which had ruled for decades.

Your great-grandfather was 18 years old when he first joined the Chetniks, a band of guerrilla fighters loyal to the monarchy and the nationalism of Serbian people. It’s hard to explain the war arena at the time because while there was a known enemy in the Nazi’s, it was harder to decipher and recognize the internal enemies in the communist movement…these were friends and neighbors who chose different sides. All together, it was a boiling mess of humanity where yesterday’s allegiances became tomorrow’s threats.
What perhaps drove your great-grandfather towards the Chetniks was the swift and incomprehensible death of his younger brother, Pajo. One day a group of soldiers came to the house to recruit Pajo, and just a few short days later, the same band returned to the doorstep with news of his death. His body was never returned and the only explanations given to the shocked family were recantations of a lost battle. The war swooped in on wings of sorrow for the Bruichs.

While he didn’t talk about it much, your great-grandfather did tell us the story of his reaction to Pajo’s death. I remember as children how fascinated we were by his words, by his vow of revenge upon those who had harmed his beloved brother. What he told those soldiers was, “By taking Pajo, you numbered the days of his life and now, I will be counting the days that remain of yours.”

The words were chilling and we were lost in our own, childish imaginations. As he spoke to us of avenging the death of his brother, we began to paint our father’s portrait in glorious colors resembling the knights of old. While many stories followed later, they were always swirled in secrecy and we never did confirm if he had indeed carried out his threat. Perhaps it was in the telling of this very story that as children, we decided long ago that our father was noble in spirit, swift to defend, and the consummate romantic hero in the book of our lives.

To have listened to your great-grandfather speak of the war, you’d know that it wasn’t all just dismal talk about death and politics. There were fun times as well, times that began to define the young man from the youth of the farm. Once, long after he had joined the Chetnik army with many of his young friends, now his commrades in arms, he decided to play a prank on his father…publically. In those days, growing a handlebar mustache was symbolic of wisdom and manhood. To pluck a hair from your mustache and throw it on the bargaining table was akin to signing a contract, pledging a sacred vow to deliver your end of the bargain. Well, your great-great-grandfather had worn just such a mustache for many years and he was quite proud of it, ritually combing and waxing the magnificent adornment to his face. In fact, my father had never seen his father without his mustache and he was musing dangerously about what he would look like without it.

One night when his father was asleep in the army camp, your great-grandfather enlisted the help of some of his closest friends and off they went to steal the mustache. Carefully so as not to awaken the slumbering man, they carefully slathered one end of it and with the silky strokes of a cat, the young rebels shaved off one side of the magnificent mustache. They quietly skittered away, all the time snickering under their breaths. Why they didn’t shave the other side of the mustache is a mystery to all of us and the only conclusion we came up with is that the entire act was, perhaps, a demonstration of rebellion. As is with most generations, it is not that they scorn the ways of the past, it’s just that they want to create their own, new inroads to the future.   This may have been one of the ways your great-grandfather separated himself from his own father and the ways of old.

We’ll never really know what his true intent was, but the aftermath was not a pretty sight according to your great-grandfather. His father woke up the next morning and as was his ritual, he yawned, stretched his limbs to the sky to get his blood flowing, and then he went to swirl the ends of his mustache. Lo and behold, there was nothing to grab onto. As the young culprits quietly watched and laughed to themselves off to the side, the old man looked puzzled when one hand felt a mustache and the other hand came up against nothing. Very quickly the old man’s expression went from amazement to a deathly-still anger. Just as quickly, your great-grandfather stopped snickering.
Throughout that morning, and through their meager breakfast meal in the militarty camp, your great-great grandfather never acknowledged the missing half of his mustache. He went on with his business as usual, not even pausing to explain to the others who looked in bewilderment at one-half of what used to be a magnificent patch of hair.

It was only when all the soldiers lined up to begin their military assignments did he land his stroke of retaliation. He calmly walked up to my father who stood in procession, officially announced that his son was a scroundrel of the lowest kind, a son who stole honor from his father…and with that, he slapped him full in the face in front of the entire squad of men. To have punched him would have been to have given him the honor of manood…to slap him was to punish a child that has not yet reached the wisdom of men.

The war continued until 1944, taking the lives of thousands of young men, women and children. Most of those left standing, those were loyal to the monarchy, left their country on foot into the unknown corners of the universe. While the rest of his family remained on the farm throughout their lives, your great-grandfather left home, never to return again. Transported from one refugee camp to another, he finally got the opportunity to come to America in 1951. By the time he left the last camp in Germany at the age of 28, he was a husband and a young father. With five dollars in his pocket and a family in tow, he stepped out of the prop plane in Idlewild New York and began the next journey of his life.

The Slut Machine

2009-04-08T21:48:00Z

Chapter One (warning: explicit language)

With a slight tremble in my hand only others with the same affliction would recognize, I am hopelessly addicted to the pretty one standing at the end of the line. She is very unassuming and only a few of us connoisseurs recognize the perfection of her tease.

As I have done every day for an hour for the past two years, I swagger up to her confidently, hoping my bravado is not Saran-wrap transparent. I try to still the anxiety that quickly twists itself around my heart and groin while I insert the first, one hundred dollar bill into her well-worn slot. I light my first cigarette of the evening, order a glass of heavy-blood merlot and say a humble prayer for mercy.

She is a patriot; a purveyor of red, white and blue stars sprinkled with triple charms that parlay a loot of anything between twelve-hundred to eighty-thousand dollars ... the sweet stuff lies in between. That's where she's a master of promise and deception. You don't necessarily want the lowest pot and you don't dare dream of the biggest. In my humility, I desire what's in between ... over and over again.

I can't wait to begin the thrill.

My peripheral vision disappears as I bear into her heart and soul, eyes only for the constant twirling of the red, white and blue sevens as they spin randomly. Will she be gracious tonight or will she make me grovel as I push her buttons relentlessly?

Here they come. The first two rolls come up empty; the third spin lands on two double bars and a triple star. Wow! My darling seems to be cooperative tonight as I win my first jackpot of the evening ... and on my first one-hundred dollars no less. But I don't trust her because I've had experience with her fickle favors in the past.

As the attendant scurries to get my winnings, I hear the usual comments from the gallery clowns, the same lovers I see day after day in this Indian casino that hired my whore.

"What did you win?"

"Man, you're lucky. I just put $5,000 into her and nothing."

"Are you up? Are you down?"

"Nice to see you winning for a change."

I mumble the same niceties in return, all the while hoping they would all just disappear so I can focus more perfectly on my girl here. Regardless of what they tell you, gambling on slot machines takes extraordinary concentration. A break in the flow can cost you big time.

"Congratulations! That's a good start," says Mike the change guy who seems to know his stuff around here. "The next time is a big one. I know it!"

The smallest of comments looms as an omen in this place.

The deck is cleared and another hundred starts the roll again. Nothing. Nothing again. The third time is the charm but the sevens are elusive as hell.

My right foot seems to jerk in rhythm to each empty roll and my eyes glaze over like a slot junkie. This whole casino thing is an acquired experience. The lights, the sounds, the colors...it's all foreplay before the elements align in place like the planets in the dawning of Aquarius. I know it's just a matter of time. I know I will win.

Shit. There goes my whole jackpot. I'm back to my original one-hundred dollar bet. Oh well, things could be worse.

This time, I put three hundred dollars in the slot, symbolic of the Holy Trinity. Can't lose now, pal, I've got God on my side. Another three hundred dollars gone in a flash. Now I'm praying my dead father is watching over me, and enlisting the support of all the saints, to make the triple stars and red seven stop in the same fucking row.

Nothing.

Okay. Time to change tactics.

Woo the whore. C'mon baby, give it to me. Love you, babe ... yours forever. Just you and me ... give it to me! Now!

That ain't working either.

You bitch. Give it up! I've poured my whole life into you, you ungrateful whore!

My serene face offers no hint at my internal screaming. I am well-liked at this casino because of my generosity to all those around me. They have no idea of the desperation locked behind the facade.

"Hi, Jade," I exclaim to the cocktail waitress, jumping up to hug her. I've tipped her a year's salary in the throes of my winning streaks.

She asks if I need anything and this time I want, besides the progressive jackpot, another glass of merlot...Beringer's, not the house brand. I'm moving on up, spreading the wealth around like a big shot with nothing in the barrel.

"How ya doin', honey? Did my lucky chip work?" she asked.

She was referring to the time she gave me an old, clay, casino chip for good luck. I stuck the chip in my hip pocket, thinking she knew her stuff. Another omen gone awry. When I lost well over ten thousand dollars in my fancy pants girl, I threw that chip over my shoulder farther than I could spit. I'm not superstitious but I'm not stupid either. I recognize the spirits in charge.

"Not bad, sweetie," I reply. "How's your family?"

I didn't give a shit about her family at this point. Please, dear God, don't have her give me another lucky charm.
I don't recall what she said as she comp'd me the drink and I returned to courting my slot machine.

The sevens rolled on. The triple stars fell in the bottom row; they landed on the top row. They cajoled me with the promise of riches and release.

I lost my stash. Time to call in my marker. Whew. Five thousand dollars I don't have to pay back for thirty days. Cheap credit.

Ding. Ding. That can only mean someone is about to win the big one. My head whipped around at the sound coming from another machine, but I didn't hear the blessed, third ding. It's my soul mate, Riley, camped out behind me. His eyes, too, have that familiar glaze but he stops a moment to speak to me.

"You've got casino ears," he says. "This bitch is ready to pop." But I know he's only dreaming. I've watched him lose thousands of dreams over the past two years.

Intelligence takes over and I decide to abandon my girl in favor of another one across the aisle. I've had a casual flirtation with this one. I only have five hundred dollars left and I sure as hell better make my wager count.

Once again, three hundred dollars in the slot. Another two. It's inarguably as good as a donation onto the church plate on a Sunday morning service, one that I'm usually too wiped out to attend. But God knows my soul. Given the opportunity, He knows I'd share my wealth.

The sevens just won't align and all the triple stars are streaking across the universe but certainly not landing in a row on my new machine. God forbid, perhaps this is not my night after all.

A newcomer walks up to my abandoned slot machine and checks her out.

"Do you mind if I try this one?" he politely asks me.

"Not at all," I reply.

He sees my jacket still draped over the back of the chair.

"Do you want your jacket?"

"That's okay," I say. "Just leave it there. May it be lucky for you."

My heart is now heavy with the realization my seed money is gone. I'm tapped out and I can't play anymore. My favorite machine is taken and my new love is uncooperative. I have no chance to win my money back, or make my new fortune.

I'm fucked. But tomorrow is another day.

I've smoked my last cigarette of the evening.

My casino ears perk up as I hear Ding, Ding, Ding. Somebody won the big one.

"God, can you believe it? Wow!" says the newcomer, firmly in love with my red, white and blue whore. His affair has just begun. "Isn't that forty thousand dollars?"

Yes, indeed, pal. Your name is George? Great...no sour grapes here, George. Wasn't meant for me. God bless you and your good fortune.

I licked my wounds for the evening. As I headed out the door, I passed by George and his new-found love.

I swear I saw her wink. Or was it just my imagination?

Or was it an omen?

Chapter Two

George dumped my girl immediately after the payoff. Apparently satiated, he disengaged himself with not so much as a backward glance, smirking all the way out of the high-limit lounge of the casino. I saw him tap his pocket, feeling for the forty-thousand dollar check folded neatly inside. That check was almost a sure thing. In any case, it was a stronger antidote to temptation than a squirming stack of hundred dollar bills squeezed together with rubber bands.

I slowly walked away with longing as my favorite slut leered at me knowingly out of the corner of her triple-star eyes. She knows I can't quit her.

Just before I got to the double exit doors close to valet parking, the premonition hit me like a wave of money-scented perfume; the allure was intoxicating. It twirled up through my nostrils and exploded inside my brain. I shook my head, took a deep breath and opened my mind to new possibilities.

"Come back," the voice whispered. "I'll be good to you."

Before my sense of survival had a chance to filter the danger, my body was turning, my legs were walking and I just followed myself back to the bitch.

With renewed hope, I began to calculate the resources I had left. Let's see, the marker's gone ... the cash is gone ... one credit card filled to the brim. On the plus side, I still had some savings left and a lone, empty credit card stashed away for just such emergencies. Bingo. I'm back in.

I sauntered up to the cashier's cage and plopped down my magic card. It only took them about five minutes to verify the cash advance and pay out my stake, but to me it felt like an eternity. My left palm was itching, another good sign.

"Hey, thought you were leaving?" greeted Carl as I walked back into the winners' circle. He's the other change guy on shift tonight, the one who's usually lucky for me. My optimism grew.

"Nah, just taking a break," I said with panache, hoping no one witnessed my near exodus, thereby exposing me as a liar to boot. I can't afford any more vices.

"Did you leave like I told you to last night? Man, you just kept hittin' 'em. What was that last one, twelve thousand?"

"Can you believe it?" My heart started to purr just thinking about last night's roll. I didn't elaborate more about my balance sheet. Like false advertising, I only talk about my winnings, never my losses.

Pleasantries said and quickly set aside, I head towards my red, white and blue whore. I almost sat down, thrilled to continue the chase. Before I could pop some money into her, something caught my eye; some peculiar force pulled my attention the other way.

My eyes follow the space between the two rows of slot machines where I usually play and I see a new, solitary harlot standing there in all of her glory ... right in the center of the room. Funny, I never noticed her before.

A strange glow swirls around the top of her head in some kind of hazy, green light. Just beneath the light, a plaque reads the progressive jackpot amount. It's $3,333,333.33.

That can't be. I shake my head imperceptibly, close my eyes for a second and refocus. There it is it again. Three million, three hundred and thirty-three thousand, three hundred and thirty-three dollars and thirty-three cents.

My hands start to get clammy as my memory takes a stroll on the interior contours of my skull. I remember my dad as he lay dying, hovering in the temporary space between his living family and the spirits beyond.

After a fitful night, when I knew he finally recognized the futility of his struggle, my dad woke peacefully. He was so calm. I was at his side when he looked up towards the skylight in my family room and said, "Look, thirty-three horses and thirty-three wagons are coming to get me."

That comment has haunted me for the last two years. I've spent months trying to decipher his last words, hoping beyond hope they were a sign, a hint of where he was going. At times, I think it was only the morphine and yet, there's a corner of my soul that insists it was a message.

Whenever I look at a clock and it reads 3:33, or when the gas pump stops at exactly $33.33, I know it's my dad talking to me.

Play this one, daughter. Right here. Right now. It's time. So, that's what he was talking about. Wow. I'm overwhelmed with gratitude. This one's for you, Daddy-o.

With reverence, I twist the chair around, ready to embrace my destiny when I notice an old woman playing the machine. How the hell did she get there so fast? I looked closer and struggled to breathe.

It was my mother - my frail, white-haired, eighty-year old mother, dressed in black from head to toe.

That was impossible. She doesn't drive; my dad drove her around for fifty-five years, the entire time they were married. I looked around for my sister. Maybe she drove her here but no, my mom was completely alone. She played that slot machine with a fervor matched only by her incessant smoking and drinking. She downed more wine in those few seconds than I could have done in a whole evening.

Wait a minute. Just wait one hell minute there, buddy. That's not my mom. She doesn't gamble ... or smoke ... or drink. Son of a bitch. I must be hallucinating.

What on God's green earth is she doing here? And why doesn't she see me?

I slowly get up from my chair and as I begin to walk towards her, the outline of her bent form starts to get fuzzy. I scrunch up my eyes and rub them with my fingers, swearing at the quality of my contact lenses. They're always going out of focus, and always when I need them most.

It's not my contact lenses this time as I watch the density of my mother go lighter, lighter, then translucent and then ... she just disappeared.

Something's wrong. There's something very wrong going on here. Maybe I'm losing my friggin' mind.

For the second time this evening, I prepare to leave the casino. Even the promise of a few, extra thousand dollars isn't worth a trip to the loony bin. Well, on second thought ... no, time to get out of here.

"What's your hurry, hon?" asks Carl. "You haven't played your machine at all. In fact, you haven't moved a muscle. Is everything all right?"

I can't tell him I just saw my little, old mother banging away at that machine in the center of the aisle. He'd call security in a flash and I'll never play in this place again.

"I just lost the feeling. You know how it goes. Catch you tomorrow, Carl."

Dazed, I walk through the casino towards the exit doors once again. I look like a loser from the outside, but inside, I'm worried. Maybe there's something wrong with my mother; maybe she needs help and can't get to the phone. Maybe her apparition was an omen.

My dread at losing my sanity competes with my fear of losing my mother and I continue to stumble like a drunken sailor towards the door. The lure of all the minor whores on slot boulevard doesn't detract me this time. But just as I am ready to bolt through the doors, like a bad curse, I spot 'ole George, the guy with a forty -thousand dollar check in his pocket. He was standing next to a machine that was lit up like a firecracker in the fourth of July sky.

He sees me and starts waving wildly. "Hey, you! Can you believe this? I'm on fire!"

Dismayed that my curiosity over-powered my self-disgust, I walk towards him to see the amount of his win. When I get there, I see triple ... literally. He just landed triple stars straight across her pretty, little face, making it a progressive hit for eighty-thousand dollars. Lady luck certainly did French-kiss this guy tonight.

"So, how'd you do on that new machine?" lucky George asks.

"What machine?" I reply cautiously.

"You know, that one in the middle. The one with all those green lights and all."

"I wasn't playing that machine, George." I'm thinking all that green stuff has gotten to his brain.

"Hey, lady, I saw you with my own, two eyes. That was you pushing those buttons."

Then he licked his lips and I noticed the tip of his little, forked tongue.

Dreams About Dad

2009-04-08T18:09:00Z

When my Dad died, I saw him in my dreams...

About two days after my dad’s death, everyone was gone except my sister, who stayed with me for a week, and my mom, who has been with me since. It was about seven in the morning. I had just made a fresh pot of coffee and the three of us were cuddled up
on the two couches in my family room, the same room my dad had died in.

Autumn’s early morning light was filtering through my windows and I was wrapped up in my blanket, the one my daughter-in-law made for me last Christmas. It was warm and I was comforted with my mom and sister there beside me.

We were drinking coffee, talking about dad and reminiscing. It was quiet and the hum of their voices must have lulled me to sleep for a split second. But no one was aware of this, not even me.

I had this strange dream in this short span of time…so short that our conversation seemed to just continue. But I must have been dreaming because I certainly couldn’t have been awake. My father and I were in the foyer of our church. My father had two suitcases with him. And as the doors opened to the body of the church, my dad turned to me and said, “Will you help me carry my suitcases in?”

And I woke up.

When I told my sister and mom about my dream, they said, “When did you dream? When were you asleep? You were right here talking with us.” It was a split second in time. I know it was dad touching me.

Another one….

Immediately after my dad died, I had a terrifying dream. I was in an elevator and the elevator started falling slowly. It then picked up speed….it picked up so much speed that I couldn’t keep my feet on the ground. It went faster and faster until I was off the ground and up towards the ceiling of the elevator. The force of the elevator dropping propelled me out of the top of the elevator and now completely in the shaft, I grabbed a pipe that was sticking out of the wall. As the elevator fell down way beyond my sight, I remained suspended in the space of that desolate shaft, hanging on to that pipe with no where to go…no one to save me. And I felt the most terrifying feeling of finality.

I’ve only had three dreams of my father since he died. The last dream was about a month ago. We were having a party in my house and my dad came to me with two of my white, lawn chairs in his hand. He was about 50 years old…he looked young and vibrant and so happy. He said to me, “Come on, Scarlett, let’s take these chairs out in the back and just sit and talk for awhile.” And I woke up. I started crying because I know I will never talk with him ever again.

Just a Bump in the Road

2009-04-08T17:56:00Z

...the perils of drinking and driving

Hell found me. I wasn't looking for it, that black night, but Hell with bat wings scanned the universe, the earth, the state, the city, the street and finally honed in on me. Heaven must have blinked away a tear and, in that miniscule fragment that hovered in time, Hell found me and changed my life.

I am an honorable man. I am a loyal friend, a loving son and a protective brother. I am my sister's knight, my mother's blessing and my father's hope. I am the life of the party and the antidote to anyone's depression. I am a drunk-in-training.

That night in December, the gears of fate cranked into position. All the possible, unsuccessful combinations locked in and paved the path when I left the party. Someone should have stopped me. Well, they did try to stop me but of course, liquor, like delirious happiness, is unstoppable.

I drove slowly with the windows open to release the loaded fumes of my breath. The scent of mints played with Jack Daniels and Coke on the inside of my mouth. Focus on the road. Only two more miles to go. I'm in the neighborhood. No other cars on the road. Piece of cake.

The muscles in my face twitched with the intensity of my focus. False bravado made me look normal. Yeah. I'm cool.

I was two blocks away from my apartment when I felt the bump in the road. Nothing dramatic, just a bit of a thump, and then a subdued dragging sound that I still hear in the silence before I fall asleep.

Someone must have thrown a garbage bag out in the street. On a pristine avenue in an upper-scale neighborhood, people were dumping garbage out on New Year's Eve. Right. Alcohol reigns as the monarch of a ridiculous kingdom, but it was enough to keep me going. I didn't stop. Somewhere between Jack and a plea to God, I muttered a few prayers under my booze-laden breath and snuck home. In my heart, which was still somewhat intact, I instinctively knew the lump was trouble.

My choice was simple at the time: a driving-while-intoxicated charge, complete with jail, numerous fines and a loss of face...or a dead bag of garbage buried in the anonymous graveyard of my own memory. The choice was easy.

I felt blessed when I hit my warm bed, thinking God the Merciful had recognized the goodness in my heart and spared me. My life would continue as it was, after all. Just a bump in the road.

Somewhere between six and seven the next morning, the pounding assaulted my head, causing it to splinter in a few different directions. There's nothing worse than waking up to a normal day, taking that first breath of consciousness and then remembering a reality with dread, hoping beyond all hope that what you are about to remember is, in fact, nothing more than a dream. Unfortunately, the pounding on my front door was beyond a dream.

Still groggy from all of the booze even hours later, I got out of bed and staggered to open the door. Two policemen greeted me and threw questions at me before I could get my bearings. To this day I don't remember their exact words but I do remember recoiling in horror inwardly at the thrust of their interrogation. Every single, solitary hair from my scalp to my groin and down the front of my legs strained in an effort to fly off my body and disintegrate somewhere in the morning air.

It wasn't a bag of garbage after all. And even worse, it wasn't a neighborhood dog. The police were looking for the person who hit and killed someone's seventeen-year-old son on the road on New Year's Eve.

The mind is a silly thing at times, and at that moment I remembered an old friend of mine who used to cheat on his wife on a regular basis. His words of advice, or a cheater's hymn, were to deny, deny and deny some more. I followed suit that morning and denied all of the allegations the police suggested.

They politely asked me to step outside to take a look at the front of my car. I agreed hesitantly, knowing I had no other choice if I were truly innocent. My t-shirt was billowing in and out with the pumping of my heart and I knew the guilt I was wearing was apparent in the motion.

What are the odds of finding the car that killed the boy who walked the streets on the New Year's Eve when the Devil was waiting? As in a game of spades, Satan pulled the trump card.

There on my license plate, eye-level with a human being on his knees, was the splatter of dried blood and brain matter, smeared in a macabre landscape of a young man's life.

It didn't matter much to me, months later at my trial, when the autopsy revealed drugs in the boy's system. As they restructured the scene, authorities surmised the young victim, on foot, apparently lost consciousness on the road and only woke up for the second or two that it took for me to smash right into his upturned face.

It didn't matter to me that the lawyers jawed on and on about the fact that the young man would have died from an overdose in any case. I had to face the twin set of parents doubled over in grief at my trial...my parents and his parents, each caught up in the loss of a son.

Just a bump in the road and Hell found me.

The Line

2009-04-08T16:50:00Z

...my mother's miracle in World War II

I was a young girl of fourteen, standing in the execution line. The Nazis hadn't even raised their rifles yet when I felt the warm urine drip down the inside of my thighs. Weeks of starvation prevented my body from releasing anything more. Terror replaced the embarrassment.

I couldn't see my father or brother. They were all I had left. We were separated miles back when captured by a small company of German soldiers. They thought we were guerrilla fighters - part of the Resistance. In truth, we were just a small band of pathetic, weary peasants trying to leave our country on foot. We were all sick of the war.

Everything was lost: our cows, sheep, corn, wheat, land. My older sister was killed only months before by soldiers from another village, not the Nazis this time. Our land was filled with enemies from within and without - the king's men from the south, Nazis from the north, and Communists everywhere. Each party tempted the people of this miserable time with their own propaganda for a better life, yet everywhere around me, death leered from its empty skull, whitened into eternity by the dead souls before us.

Gone were the toys and animals of my childhood, replaced with the routine, frantic scrambling up to the hills and forests behind our home. Whenever the shooting sounded too close, we grabbed whatever food was on the table, whatever amounts of water we could carry, and we ran, like deer, for cover. Sometimes we spent days up there, praying we wouldn't freeze to death with just the clothes on our backs.

One day, up in those hills, nestled among our beloved trees and on ground covered with only pine needles for a mattress, my mother died. I think her heart simply broke. I was glad she wasn't here to see me on this day.

The soldiers were getting into position. I knew all of the people in the execution line. They were neighbors and friends, comfortable faces I grew up with.

Like most of the girls of my time, the girls who learned to milk cows before they learned to read, I looked older. I looked like a woman. Yet, the child I really was sobbed uncontrollably in fear.

It was quiet, except for my horrible screams and pathetic baying. But I didn't care. I was too young to be proud. Not understanding God's nature, nor seeking His miracle, I cried out to my dead mother instead, beseeching her to part the clouds and carry me away in her arms, far away from this place. Mama, please save me.

The captain of the German squad sauntered up to direct his chosen murderers to begin the slaughter. Ice flowed in my veins.

I darted wildly out of the line. The young are brave in their ignorance. Falling at the captain's feet and grabbing his legs like a crazed animal, I screamed and begged for my life. I didn't understand German, nor he my language, but the world stood still for a moment in time. Perhaps he was a father...an uncle...a brother. Whatever his inspiration was for compassion that day, I'll never know.

He lifted me to my feet and walked me away from the execution line. A minute later, the shots rang out. My life was spared for another day. From that moment forward, I learned to walk with Hope and Death, hand in hand.

Musings from my journal...

2009-04-03T04:40:00Z

One evening of frivolous musings, surely a case of the impermeable romantic...

Ah, finally. The moon is out, the dog is fed, the gates are closed and I can ramble alone with my thoughts. I've got to get out of this place. The pump won't work because the vandals took the handles. I know where love lives. You can keep your mountains of gold, buddy, because I know where love lives. Don't look back, jump forward into the glorious future. Promises of Spain and warm days in the sun and long, velvety nights under the stars and under the sheets. Catch the passion now. Catch a falling star. See the shooting star. Ride upon a star. Hang your hat on a star; carry moonbeams home in a jar. Whatever.

"I think about you all the time," you say. "From now on, we are 'we'. Don't look back because it will make you dizzy. Trust me. Trust me now. Tomorrow will never come if you don't accept today. Today is me. Tomorrow is me. You are me. You are mine. Please, listen to the words and you will hear me," you say.

"But," I say, "where have you been for so long? I've been waiting for you to save me and you never came. Was that you on that white horse when I was locked up in that tower? When you rode up closer, I didn't realize it was you and so I continued to wait. I think I'm still waiting, but I'm not so sure anymore."

You say, "it really was me on that white horse," but I say, "there have been herds of white horses and legions of knights and now I'm not sure if it's really you...again." I don't know if it matters because the dragons aren't that tough anymore and perhaps all the knights are standing in the unemployment line, or in the wax museum. And for sure, the moat is now filled with alligators.

You say you think of me all the time, since that day when I walked into your life by accident. What's all the time anyway? When you brush your teeth in the morning? When you say your last prayer in the evening? And all time in between? When is it that you think of me all the time? That's a long time, don't you think?" I don't want to think anymore. I coast. I roll. I'm waiting to crash on the shore.

Why on God's green earth do you want to save me? My blue eyes, maybe? Can you see inside of me? Hello! Am I home? I don't think so. I left a long time ago. Lonely Rita, meter maid, where would I be without you?

"I want to be a woman," I say. "But you are a woman," you say, "and I'm a man." (I can see that, really. I can.) "I want to lock the doors for you at night. I want to bolt the windows for you. I want to protect you from invaders," you say.

And I say, "Where have you been all those years when I was locking my own doors and bolting my own windows and bravely protecting myself from invaders?" Actually, when I think about it, I've always left milk and cookies out for any intruder who dared. "I think it's too late," I say.

But you won't quit. You tell me it's not too late. "I see you cooking breakfast. I'm messing up your hair. I want to make you laugh. Laughter is you. Love is you," you implore.

I'm exhausted with possibilities. I tell you, "I'm not sure I want to cook you breakfast or have you mess up my hair. I'm. Not. Sure. Of course you don't take no for an answer and what I really think is that you want to ride this roller coaster and dive into these eyes that you think you recognize but you don't because others have tried and failed, and even I have given up the quest to understand the black and white behind the baby blues. Good luck, my friend.

My mother told me to wait for the right man but for the life of me, I'm not sure I understand the fantasy anymore. Was it the white castle with the black knight on the wrong horse? Oh, Alice, we should have been friends...into the looking glass we go.

The land of the white bunnies...

2009-04-03T03:49:00Z

Have you ever tried to describe your home or how you live? Well, my son did that for me...he once told me I lived in the “land of the white bunnies”...and no, not because I was ever delirious on drugs, but rather because I’ve always tried to be disgustingly happy about life and the people in it. Sometimes it doesn’t work, but more often than not, I find the part of that old adage most true…”smile and the world smiles with you.” You only cry alone if you haven’t taken the time to cultivate friends. Or cement your family ties, whatever they may be.

I am the consummate Sagittarian. My world is colored by independence, enthusiasm, loyalty and passion. My son nicknamed my modest little spread, “The White Bunny Ranch,” not because I raise rabbits, but because I, more often than not, see the good in every person, recognize the silver lining in every cloud and see the sparkle behind every tear. While the sign hanging from atop my entryway warns everyone to “Leave your drama at the door,” most everyone ignores it. They end up sharing their joys and fears, which I generally embrace as my own, and we spend some time reminding ourselves that no one gets out of this alive anyway. We may as well enjoy the journey with all of its subsequent smiles and grimaces. A little laughter, a lot of wine and 2 Advils go a long way! I am blessed with family and good friends.

Write your own eulogy...

2009-04-03T03:32:00Z

I had nothing else to do today besides feed this headache with Advil. So, I got to thinking about getting sick, and then death, and then one thought just led to the other like a domino effect...and before I knew it, I was writing my own eulogy. Try it sometime...and then try living with the kind of qualities you’d like people to remember you by!

Scarlett's Eulogy...She died of an enlarged heart.

In medical terms, they say you can die from an enlarged heart. What a way to go!
After all the romantic dreams and illusions throughout a lifetime, this completely enlarged heart can now blow up with as much passion as it can muster to scatter the particles of its love wide into the expanse of the universe. That's what I have to share with you today...thank you, dear ones, for my life...the joy was far greater than the pain. Eternally grateful to the gods in charge for the complex dreams of this heart...no regrets, no sorry-ass laments. This wild bird can now fly home, content in the completion of its fantasy. After an eternity of seeking, I have found my castle where all of you, my loved ones, will polish the stones of my memory long after I have flown away. I love you...simply and sincerely. And if I come to roost upon you occasionally, it is not with the haunting longings of a discontent heart...it is with the joy of my love for you. Besides, I always have to have the last word, remember?

Death Can't Steal Love

2009-04-03T01:55:00Z

My father died alone, surrounded by all of us who loved him. His beloved breath was labored for the last, long, eight hours of his life while we hung on every whisper of air that kept him alive. In the living room, my mother, brother, sister and I talked quietly about the past and a future without him. I'd known him all of my life. He was as familiar to me as my own face in the mirror each morning. His impending death was incomprehensible, even to a Christian soul. Funny, we intellectually expect the arrival of death someday, but emotionally we're never prepared. I didn't know how it would feel to lose anyone I loved. My dad was the first.

In the early hours of that Sunday morning, before the light had a chance to illuminate the room, my father took his last breath. Gently. He just left and for the first time in my life, he didn't take me with him. I touched his face, but his eyes didn't open. I remembered his scent like a cubby bear when I used to crawl into my parents' bed as a child, instinctively lumbering to the side he slept on. It smelled like comfort, like strength. I remembered when he taught me to drive a car. I remembered how his mustache smiled when I showed him my first business card with my name on it. I remembered those treasured Saturday mornings. We all slept in while my dad drove to get freshly baked donuts, dripped in sweetness and still warm from the bakery. As kids, we'd gobble them up and sit and talk for hours around that kitchen table, safe and happy like little chicks in a nest. Now I saw him motionless on the bed we'd prepared lovingly so he wouldn't suspect he was dying.

In the old European fashion, my brother, the only son, washed and prepared my father's body for the final journey. I removed the satin pillow from my dad's head so he could lie straight and proud, the way he lived his life. My mother spoke to him softly about their long life together, their love, and their long-past youth. My tears flowed when she told him how proud he should be of his children who honored him even through death. I hope he heard her.

The wind chime in the backyard was a little church bell. Throughout the last four days of my dad's life, the breeze gently kissed those chimes and they played a melody that will forever surround my home. Whenever we get together now for holidays or family dinners, we hear that melody and we like to think our father is reminding us that he never really left. I suppose we never die as long as someone remembers us.
Someone called the hospice nurse at the end. I don't remember which one of us called or when, but she appeared divinely at the door. I knew she was there before she rang the doorbell. She was so kind. As a family fiercely proud of taking care of its own, we were unable to enter the crevices she filled for us, leaving us with pride intact. Yet, we didn't always think she was an angel. When we first met her, we thought she was a Nazi, dictating realities when we wanted only a new fantasy. Our hearts couldn't comprehend her approach to death; we'd never been here before.

Initially, the nurse refused to lie to my dad about his imminent death, even though my mother could wear down the devil himself with her logic. My mother was adamant about protecting her husband from the truth. She said he inherently knew he was dying; why proclaim it loudly to remove the space in time he, alone, made for his soul. My mother is a dragon who would kill to save you. It only took an hour for her to convince Mary Jo, the nurse, to lie to my father. Mary Jo was God's ambassador. She spared us the coroner and the police, but not the angel of death.

I will always hate the white hearse that drove slowly up the driveway to take my father away forever. As long as he was lying there, even breathless, among us, where our eyes could see him and our hands could touch him, he was just sleeping. The big, white hearse told us exactly what fools we were.
I stayed with my mother when they took my dad away, but my brother and sister escorted that merciless, white crane right up to the backdoor of the mortuary. The processing dock, they call it, where they polish the shell that once held the pearl. I don't envy them their trip that day. The hierarchy of siblings is that the oldest paves the way and the younger ones mop up.

My dad said something to me before he slipped into a coma, something that will always stay with me. He was looking up at the skylight in my ceiling where the light was coming through. He said, "It's so beautiful. I'd like to get up. Look, thirty-three horses and wagons are coming to take me."

My beautiful father. I know God agrees.

Welcome

2009-04-01T02:49:42Z

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