The passing of a mother through the eyes of her son
by Paul Watson
The bed held down her body; her body chained down her spirit.
Sitting with Mom in the hospital room. She’s watched the television. Or at least she’s looking at it. I never knew what was received and what just passed by as she waited. Waited for her God to finally unshackle her poor soul.
She never showed it though. She laid in that bed, sometimes talking until we had to leave the room. Sometimes she talked to the children she hallucinated in the corner of her room, cooking breakfast.
The children. She loved the children, whether they were her own or if they were the church nursery rugrats. What she wouldn’t give to be watching over the nursery again. What she wouldn’t give for one last plate of nachos.
What she wouldn’t give to be out of those damned fetters.
And that was weeks before the hospital bed consumed her spirit.
From bed to bed
Reeling back: a few hours before the hospital steals her from our lives. She’s home, feeling weak. Better find some insulin. Who knows what her blood readings are. It doesn’t matter. She needs insulin. Now. The refrigerator is full of crap that isn’t needed or has gone bad. Can’t find this medicine anywhere. Look harder!
Wait. She took insulin a couple of hours ago. Better get her some food. Cats. Everywhere you look. Their beady eyes watching me struggle. It’s like they enjoy it. Now they “meow” for food.
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A wristwatch model’s hand. Photo by Maleigh Watson
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“Sure, let me get you some food. You’re much more important,” I think as I hold back the urge to kick them.
They’re a nuisance, but Dad insists on keeping them. Oh, well. Got some bread. That’s starchy enough. Should be good. She’s still feeling weak. Face looks a bit lopsided; hope it’s not a stroke. Let’s get her to the bed.
But she’s fine. She has to be. She’s a fighter. Nothing stops her from watching her kids at the daycare facility, not even having toes stolen by diabetes.
An old movie line comes back: “It’s but a flesh wound.”
Resilient, even to the day the ambulance EMT nonchalantly presented her as an offering to the gurney. The gurney mocks; it is a mere pageboy of the bed, who is but a messenger of the true ruler of the land.
The wheels of the gurney squeak in delight as it delivers the half-paralyzed offering to the bed, preparing her for the next leg of her journey. Of course, she has no idea what this means. She, her husband and kids are still naive enough to think that this hospital bed is a temporary resting place.
Purple nails
Oh, who needs hospitals anyway? Sure, let’s put her there, she’ll be fine. A few days rest, a couple of antidotes, the paralysis will be gone. No need to worry. See? Look at her. Her nails are as purple as they always were, royal and majestic.
Her hands, maybe a little dry and cracked. But still beautiful in shape, the hands of a wristwatch model. Impeccable in both looks and deeds. Her body, the perfect shape to comfort a hurting child.
And her kisses. Those lips. Thin, regal. The lips of a mother, stern and loving. Her tresses, a beautiful gray crown of splendor; yes, her life was righteous.
But her eyes. One could write a thousand pages on the concern, the tenderness and the fight in her eyes. An inferno dwelled within, ready to incinerate any who would dare harm her babies. Fire of passion towards the loves of her life, even though life and money were thin more than thick.
The cry of souls
But the fire was dwindling. That cursed gown, holding her down, waiting for the doctor, the high priest, to rip the heart from her chest.
Our souls cried out: “Oh, Elohim, have you no words? Uncreated God, have you no power over the created? Pity us, let us keep her. You will have her to walk with you on streets of gold for all eternity; will you not grant us a few more years that she may walk the streets of filth with us?”
Here is the moment etched into my soul. She tells the high priest that it is time for her to go.
“I wish to see where this messenger will take me,” she seems to say as her hospital bed slowly carries her to the cold, ding earth.
Her fire goes out; we scramble to find matches to light. When did we run out? It was him. The high priest took them. He was in on this plan all along. The bed has achieved its mission: he has delivered the human sacrifice to the coffin.
We say our goodbyes to her love, her affections, her reprimands. We bid farewell to her kisses, her long gazes, her proud smiles, ones rivaling those of any the mind or soul can imagine. Never shall her inferno reignite our smoking embers. Never again.
Never again shall she be chained, shackled. The bed is no more. Her smile is lopsided no longer, her skin full and beautiful once more.
And evermore.