MY MOTHER'S DEATH
TOM MAZANEC
 
I have vague, dreamlike memories of my mother being healthy, but most of my memories
of her are of her illness, breast cancer. I remember when my father told me not to hug her,
as it would cause her pain. I remember her getting around on a walker, and later,
how she was confined to a couch in the TV room. Once someone called her to the door
and she said she could not come, as she was a cripple. I thought "Mom a cripple?
I know she cannot walk, but I never thought she was a cripple!" She went to hospitals
increasingly often, but never seemed to get better. I figured eventually she would.
 
On the Halloween of my eleventh year, my father came to school to pick me up instead of
my grandmother, who I was living with at the time. All my classmates were happy and
excited, expecting this to mean that my mother was coming home from the hospital.
He took me to his house, and talked to me for awhile. Finally he said "Your mother 
is looking down on you from heaven and is so proud of you." I refused to accept this,
and argued with my dad for awhile. Finally I just shut up, but I just knew she was
still alive. 
 
We went to my grandmother's house that evening, and all the family was there. I remember
praying for a sign that my mother was still alive, that if she was dead that it would
snow that evening. Finally that night it just dawned on me that she was actually dead.
I took a barometer off the wall and smashed it against the floor.
 
The next day I met a classmate and told him my mother was dead. He was shocked. I asked him
to tell the school about my mother. I remember nothing about the funeral.

DRIZZLE DRAZZLE DRUZZLE DROME
TIME FOR THIS ONE TO COME HOME