Читать книгу Petals - Marti Eicholz - Страница 11

Not All is Perfect

Now that Scotty was ready for first grade, Mary thought having him was a beautiful thing. He was a wonderful gift. Even though having children was never a priority of hers. Scotty was a bright little boy, inquisitive, adventurous with an inquiring mind and curious how everything worked.

Mary felt he would do well in school. He loved to learn, never stopped thinking and turning things over in his head.

Mary knew growing up in a healthy environment was a particularly important factor in determining how children function as adults in society. She knew children blessed with both a loving mother and a caring father was lucky. She also knew mothers have the biggest impact on their children’s lives. That thought frightened her.

Mary in psychotherapy, reliving her past realized that not all parents are perfect no matter how much they try they can easily end up being a failure. There is no such thing as a perfect family.

All families have their faults and sometimes it is enough to tear a family apart, but if all the members of the family care for one another and will go the extra mile to help each other, then it is good enough.

It was a school holiday, so Scotty was home and sleeping late. Mary poured a cup of coffee and stood admiring from the oval window the beauty of this hillside place. She loved sitting down on the rock near the cluster of large oak trees especially, the one near the ancient maple tree with a huge trunk. There were wildflowers, many kinds, white, yellow, purple, and blue sprinkled around. It was a quiet place with reminders of her childhood and where she grew up.

Mary stood in awe thinking this place on the knoll belongs to The Millers, Adam, Scotty, and me. It is beautiful and peaceful. These kinds of places are meaningful because they are natural and you can be alone, away from your everyday cares.

Mary took her coffee and headed for the rock. She sat with her eyes open admiring the blue sky and the wispy clouds. Lying down on the grass, she listened to the wind, kissed the flowers, and watched the leaves move. Feeling a sense of contentment, she closed her eyes.

When she awakened, propped up against the big maple tree was Scotty still clothed in his pajamas reading. With admiration Mary thought he loves books. In six weeks, he went from level 1 reading books to level 3 books and reads with confidence.

Picking up the coffee cup, he started running toward the house. Mary yelled, “What are you doing?”

With a quick yell back, “The bugs and ants are drinking your coffee. I’ll bring you a fresh cup.” Mary smiled, smelled the fresh air, and leaned back staring at the sky, feeling the wind on her face. Her thoughts turned to Scotty he notices everything, and he takes good care of me.

Whenever Mary felt like her world was against her and her life just was not going how she wanted it to, she knew that she could always lean on Adam for support. Now that Scotty was getting older, she had Scotty as a buddy.

Mary and her buddy spent the day grooming the rose garden. Late afternoon, they sat idly under an enormous oak tree eating chocolate ice cream and watching a whirlwind whisked across the rolling hill of the meadow. As it passed by them, the whirlwind scooped up a pile of rose petals they left lying next to the oak tree. The petals appeared to come alive, twisting, turning, and dancing about the meadow.

Scotty giggled, “The petals are having a party.”

As the party moved and scattered out of sight, Mary began to think about the petals of her life, the memories were vivid thoughts motivated by the images, scents, and sounds of her past and her present.

She recalled a month ago today she had a doctor’s appointment for a routine checkup. I was alone with the doctor when I found out I was pregnant. The first thing the doctor said was “Mary, congratulations are in order. You are having a baby.” I sat in shock. I did not understand. What was he happy about? A person with a mental illness bringing another child into the world when she can barely cope with one makes no sense. But I did understand. Most would be elated.

The nurse brought me a cup of water and said “Congratulations” again to me as I sobbed and sobbed. I called Adam. He heard my cries and consoled me. Finally, saying, “We will tell Scotty together. I love you.”

The next few days I murdered daylilies that propagated all over the damn backyard. I hacked away at their extensive underground root system and pulled up lily after lily. I was sweaty and tired, but I really wanted those lilies gone, so I kept digging and pulling. A vague worry crept over me about the baby, but I did not think too much about it. The sky was gunmetal gray, but it never did rain. I was in a bad mood and enjoyed hacking at the roots.

Ten plus weeks later a deep, pulling ache spread across my abdomen. I noticed the tiniest of smears on my toilet paper, a light brown smudge. There had been no problems before this. It was my second pregnancy. I knew that strange fluids and sensations were the order of the day. I called the doctor and said, “I’m sure it’s nothing. I am sure I am being silly. I should just calm down, right?”

“It’s probably nothing,” the nurse on call had said, “but come in, just for your peace of mind.”

The doctor — she was not my regular doctor, just the one on call the day I rushed in for my peace-of-mind ultrasound — said that nothing I had done could have caused this miscarriage. That was the first thing she said after she had told me the baby was gone. It had not even occurred to me that it might have been something I had done, so my mind raced with the possibilities. Had I done something wrong? How many ways could I blame myself for this?

The doctor gave me the news while the ultrasound wand was still inside me. That alone was traumatic. You are not supposed to be given bad news while you are being penetrated. To all doctors: remove the well-lubricated instrument before you tell the patient her baby is dead.

The life inside me had ended, and I did not even know it. It took a doctor to tell me. I wondered how long I was conversing with someone who was not even there. It is like being on the phone, and the call gets cut off, but you are still gabbing away like an idiot. It is the sort of thing you should notice that there is something dead inside you. Your body really should let you in on that information.

I had no suspicions, no premonitory dreams — just a pain as I attempted to garden, and then the most insignificant spotting you could ever imagine.

Right after the doctor removed the dead fetus, while I was still loopy from painkillers, I asked if it had been a boy or a girl — as if a tiny, complete baby had come out of me and not something that resembled a shrimp. How much more pathetic can you get?

There is so much I am grateful for. I am grateful that I already have a child, a beautiful boy named Scotty. I am grateful that I did not have a stillbirth. I am grateful that Scotty did not know about the pregnancy, that we did not have to deal with his heartbreak on top of ours. I do not want anyone to give me reasons to be grateful, if you do try to remind me, I will punch you right in your head. I was not sure I wanted another child.

As the months went by, the thrilling highs were less frequent. Mary needed a lift. There was not much to do on any night of the week after Scotty went to bed, so many nights Mary walked around town with friends. After walking an hour, they would often become tired and need a rest.

At first it seemed a little strange, but their favorite place in town was this beautiful church. Its frightened Mary to enter such a place, so imposing. To keep a promise to her friends, she saw herself forced to enter. It took courage to pass through the old oak door, but the moment she stepped in, she found it enchanting and breathtaking. Sometimes they would end up staying there for hours just talking. These friendships made her feel warm and cozy. She felt no harm. And Scotty was safe, home asleep.

The nights that Mary and her friends spent time in the church left Mary wondering a lot about the soul of the dead fetus. Does its soul need to return to earth in another body?

Mary enjoyed her nighttime outings. The best times were in the park near the lake and the woods. The stars would come as if to welcome this gang of friends back to their hours of comfort and relaxation. They would sit, heads tilted toward the sky, observing the constellations and the patina of the moon. Their chatter and drink went on until the small hours, always with a backdrop of crickets in the long grasses.

The lack of sleep took its toll. Over time, the thrilling highs were less frequent, replaced by longer bouts of dull depression.

Exhausted and frantic after years of suffering, Mary reached a limit. Over vodka a friend one evening gently directed her to some stimulants she had available in sample form. The result was perfect. She began using the pills, rather innocently, along with her medications for her disorder and her consumption of alcohol whenever she needed an extra boost. To her, it was better than a cup of coffee.

Mary’s workload grew exponentially, and she had trouble keeping pace. She could not juggle Scotty’s school activities, keeping up the property, creating wedding gowns, and managing her moods. She took more and more pills just to keep up, and then even more pills to get to sleep again. She gave little thought to this drug use. She and her friends were no street junkies making covert deals in dark alleys.

As she waited on the corner for her friends to show up, she thought I am successfully making my life smoother.

The gang of friends arrived. Mary climbed into their pickup. The pickup lurched as it turned onto a dirt road. The ruckus from the bottom of the truck was unbearable, because of the noise and excessive shaking. They slowly climbed. It seemed impossible to reach the lovely cabin at the top. The rocks and deep potholes shook the truck and everyone in it, like a paint mixer. They rolled down every window in the truck so they could have some leverage to hold on and not lose their grip. When the fresh clean mountain air entered the truck, they knew they were nowhere close to home. The cabin set deep in the heart of the mountains. Overhead, the woods closed in, shutting out the moonlight. The woods were silent. No eyes and ears. They were free. They chatted, laughed, drank alcohol, tried marijuana, got high and started all over….

They thought they were fireworks in the velvet dark, the blaze that dares to light up the night.

It was morning when Mary arrived home as golden bars of sunlight shined through the majestic oaks. Fractured images of sights and sounds and smells flashed with haunting echoes of the night were present.

Scotty dressed for school stood macho asking, “Where have you been? You look awful.”

Mary lashed out and slapped Scotty, “That’s enough! You don’t talk to your mother like that.”

Scotty rushed out of the house to catch the school bus.

Scotty struggled through feelings of sadness, confusion, and anger as he rehearsed for the town’s storytelling festival coming up on the weekend. His dad would be home and hopefully the family would attend this significant event, drawing people from all over the region. This year festival programmers scheduled local, regional, and nationally known oral storytellers but also featured a student, Scotty Miller.

Visitors roamed the streets, checking out the many interesting shops and securing a seat for the storytelling sessions.

Adam and Mary seated along with a large group of children eager for fright by Scotty’s collection of haunting tales. Through his spoken word and song, he started with a scary story about a student’s first day at a new school and not finding his classroom. The school was a maze. Scotty walked his audience through this winding maze of spooky adventures.

The audience rewarded Scotty with claps and yells for more, realizing there is no substitute for the power, simplicity, and basic truth of a well-told story. Everyone saw the proud smiles that lit up the community. What they could not see was that Scotty lit up his mother, Mary on the inside so completely that at that moment her darkness disappeared. She felt whole and happy.

Scotty thought today was full of sunshine and happiness. I cannot tell my dad about Mom. My dad needs his weekend to relax and prepare for his next week of work. Mom and I will work this out.

And that was the way it was: Scotty kept quiet. Scotty buried his anger. And Mary never said a word. Life continued.

Mary had a never-ending search for comfort and her friends came to her aid. Her drug use escalated. She moved to street drugs. She dabbled in crystal meth. Her addiction progressed to opiates in the form of heroin. Throughout this time, she still felt on top.

She needed her next fix to feel real natural joy. Her addiction became such that she cared for nothing else. She pursued an addictive life.

She lived in disbelief. She told herself, “I am no druggie engaged in covert activities, and I am no criminal. My customers admire my work. If Scotty misunderstands, I clear it up with a smile and an apology and all is well.”

Mary could not have been more wrong.

One evening all alone Scotty wrote in his diary, 'Life is unpredictable. Mom is emotionally and physically abusive, slapping me, telling me I am garbage and imposing all kinds of arbitrary rules. My mom is someone else. She is someone I once loved but now, I fear. I am ashamed to say that all I love is the memory of who she was. She manipulates me and sweet-talks and then without conscience she deceives me, extinguishing any hope. Sometimes, on my blackest days, I wonder what I would feel if the police came to tell me she was dead. I do not know. I pray I do not find out. I often stay home from school because she is too fragile to be home by herself. When I am in school, instead of paying attention to my teachers, I spend all day worrying about how my mom is doing---plus, I am weighed down with keeping the secret that I have a “crazy” mother. It is tough for me to be sympathetic. Instead, I feel angry. I am getting a job soon to have an excuse to spend time away from home.'

Scotty kept the lawn and the rose garden manicured and healthy. By cutting the grass shorter it took a far longer time to grow back so, he had more time to work on his other projects. There was always so much he wanted to do. First, he needed to tackle the dandelion.

The dandelion had a boldness that Scotty just did not care for. It was too tall, too yellow and in the wrong place. He stopped and thought this is my lawn and what on earth does that flower think it is doing there? I want green. I plan for green and I will get it perfect, even uniform green.

Adam was home surveying the perfect lawn with a smile as his son faster than a speeding bullet bent over the brash little flower and plucked it. Adam giggled.

The sound of laughter caused Scotty to be straightened up and with a smile, “Hi, Dad. It’s good to have you home.”

“Job well done, this will make your mother happy,” Adam was not noticing Scotty’s silence.

They stood back, admiring nature at its finest. Scotty felt deeply satisfied with his work. Adam swelled with pride, what a great young man and he is my son!