June 18: Divine Inheritance, Mother's Surgery, "Ave"

Thomas Merton attends his father's funeral . . .

Tom got an obituary in the Times, and he saw to it that the funeral went off more or less decently:  but it was still another one of those cremations.  This time it was at Golders Green.  The only difference was that the minister said more prayers, and the chapel looked a little more like a chapel, and Tom had got them to hide the coffin under a very beautiful shroud of silk from the Orient somewhere, China or Bali or India.

But in the end they took the shroud off and rolled the coffin through one of those sliding doors and then, in the sinister secrecy of the big, intricate crematory, out of our sight, the body was burned, and we went away.

Nevertheless, all that is of no importance, and it can be forgotten.  For I hope that, in the living Christ, I shall one day see my father again:  that is, I believe that Christ, Who is the Son of God, and Who is God, has power to raise up all those who have died in His grace, to the glory of His own Resurrection, and to share, body and soul, in the glory of His Divine inheritance, at the last day.

I'm sure that, as a young man, Merton thought nothing about dying in grace or the glory of resurrection.  That came much later in Merton's life.  He probably knew nothing about "Divine inheritance" and the body and soul.  He didn't yet have any religious faith that would have provided some kind of consolation to him as a parentless boy.

My mother had her hip replacement surgery this afternoon, and everything went as well as could be expected.  When she woke up in her room after the procedure, she was quite confused and in a lot of pain.  It took a while for them to get that under control.  My sister was able to get her to eat some mashed potatoes and Jell-O.

As a Christian, I do believe all that stuff about salvation Merton alludes to in the above passage.  My faith certainly gave me some hope these last couple days.  I know my mother really was surrounded by positive energy and a butt-load of prayers.  They surrounded her like armor.  And, if today hadn't gone well, my mother would have ridden all those prayers straight to heaven.

Now, of course, some difficult choices need to be made regarding rehabilitation.  But that's the subject for another post, another time.  For tonight, I hold on to the fact that my mother is safe and on the mend.  That, to me, is enough of a miracle for tonight.

And Saint Marty says "hallelujah!" to that.

Ave

by:  Martin Achatz

I was 18 the first time I saw
my mother cry.  Arthritis invaded
her spine, stiffened her vertebrae
until, on that morning, she couldn't
cough or lift a coffee cup without
feeling whipped, scourged.
She'd given birth to nine children,
her youngest daughter with Down's,
a baby the doctors told her to forget,
put in an institution, walk away,
erase, like a hurricane after waters recede.
But Mother brought my sister
home, began the hard work of mothering.
Feeding,  Diapers.  Teaching.  Colors.
Letters.  Numbers.  Watched my sister
laugh, walk, speak, do all the things
doctors said she would never do.
My sister flourished like an orchid
in the hothouse of my mother's love,
became exotic and beautiful, healthy.
If my mother cried when the doctors
used the words "mongoloid," "retarded,"
she never said.  If she cried
when my sister took her first impossible
step, she never said.  If she cried
when my sister first called her "mommy,"
she never said.  The day I saw my mother
Cry, she felt helpless, old, reduced.
Like Mary, she realized she couldn't
carry every cross for her baby.  

June 17: Admiration and Reverence, Broken Hip, "For My Mother"

Thomas Merton responds to his father's death . . .

The sorry business was all over.  And my mind made nothing of it.  There was nothing I seemed to be able to grasp.  Here was a man with a wonderful mind and a great talent and a great heart: and, what was more, he was the man who had brought me into the world, and had nourished me and cared for me and had shaped my soul and to whom I was bound by every possible kind of bond of affection and attachment and admiration and reverence:  killed by a growth on his brain.

Young Merton seems at a loss in this short passage.  I would have thought he would have gone on for several paragraphs, if not pages, when writing about the passing of his father.  But he sums up his reaction in the space of a few lines, as if even, so much later in his life, he is still unable to express the true measure of his loss.

Woke up again this morning to find a text message from my sister on my phone.  After her Monday middle-of-the-night voicemail about the death of my uncle, I was really anxious about reading the text.  But I did.  She was at the ER with my mother, who fell out of bed last night and was transported by ambulance there.  My mother fractured her hip trying to get out of bed.

My mother is 88 years old.  She'll be 89 on June 25.  She's been struggling with Alzheimer's for the last several years.  Always a force to be reckoned with, my mother's decline has been difficult to watch.  I imagine Thomas Merton felt the same watching his artist father fade away due to a brain tumor.  The mother I remember still emerges at moments, calls me by name, remembers I'm her son.  Those times now are fewer and fewer.  More often than not, I'm just that "nice man" who stops by to talk to her every once in a while.

I visited my mother's hospital room after I was done working this afternoon.  She was sleeping in her bed, curled up peacefully under her blankets.  I didn't wake her.  She'd been agitated and combative all last night and most of the day, according to my sister.  It was good to see that she was comfortable.  Not in pain.

Tomorrow afternoon, she will get a hip replacement.  The bone fractured right at the socket, which, if there is such a thing as a "good" broken hip, is a good one.  Easy to replace, although recovery will be long and hard.  I imagine she will have to go to a nursing home for rehabilitation, which, in the time of Covid-19, will mean there won't be any family allowed to see her.  All of the nursing homes in the area are locked down with visitor restrictions.

So, tonight, I am celebrating my mother's life.  Her strength and determination and love.  She was married to the same man for almost 70 years.  Raised nine children, one with Down's syndrome.  She buried two of those children.  All her life, she suffered with severe rheumatoid arthritis.  Every day she was in pain.  Yet, I never saw her complain.  She has a beautiful soprano voice and forced me to take piano lessons to calm my ADHD brain.  She was in the front row at every play, musical, and poetry reading that I was ever a part of. To me, she is, quite simply, a miracle.

And Saint Marty gives thanks that he's her son.

A poem for my mother . . .

For My Mother

by:  May Sarton

Once more
I summon you
Out of the past
With poignant love,
You who nourished the poet
And the lover.
I see your gray eyes
Looking out to sea
In those Rockport summers,
Keeping a distance
Within the closeness
Which was never intrusive
Opening out
Into the world.
And what I remember
Is how we laughed
Till we cried
Swept into merriment
Especially when times were hard.
And what I remember
Is how you never stopped creating
And how people sent me
Dresses you had designed
With rich embroidery
In brilliant colors
Because they could not bear
To give them away
Or cast them aside.
I summon you now
Not to think of
The ceaseless battle
With pain and ill health,
The frailty and the anguish.
No, today I remember
The creator,
The lion-hearted.