Divorce is rampant among my friends’ parents, and although I knew that it was inevitable that we three would soon join the group, this was one club I did not want to be a member of.
Then out of nowhere, he was sharing this loaded “secret” with me—a secret I never wanted to hear. He was telling me that he’d be leaving my mother next week, all the while assuring me that he’d always be there for me. I found myself nodding my head as if I understood, when all along I really didn’t. He told me they hadn’t been happy for a very long time, and I’m thinking, If you’re both not happy, why the big secret? Why isn’t Mom here sharing this awful moment?
He hugged me in an awkward kind of bear hug, and I got all stiff to his touch. Scratching his nose, he informed me that he wasn’t ready to tell my mom he was leaving just yet. I asked him when he was going to tell her, and he closed his eyes while sighing, “When the moment’s right.”
So for two weeks now, I have stared into my mom’s eyes, while never revealing the secret. I am betraying her just like my dad is. I try to convince myself that the conversation at McDonald’s never really happened at all.
Now, as I lie in bed listening to my mom’s muffled cries, I realize that the moment has arrived. Although my mom and I have not always seen eye-to-eye on a lot of things, such as dating, driving, school, friends, life . . . right now my stomach is aching for her. Each of her sobs shoots through me like a dart piercing my chest. The agony is so great that I finally understand what a broken heart must feel like.
I shuffle out of bed and quietly make my way down the long hallway towards the garage from where the voices seem to be coming. Slowly, I open the door wide enough to see but not be seen.
The scene being played out by my parents makes me want to vomit. My mom is holding on to the bottom of my dad’s leather jacket. She is straining to hold him back, so that he won’t leave her. This is not the proud woman who once refused to accept my grandmother’s financial help back when my dad first lost his job. Her face is red, awash in tears, and her nose runs while she howls in pain. She has no pride; he is taking it with him.
He grabs his coat from her and pushes her back with one hand. He tells her it’s over. “. . . It’s been over for a very long time, and we both know it.”
She howls again, and through her wailing I hear her moaning, “No, no, no, no,” like some strange hypnotic chant. And then suddenly her tone changes to one of anger as she screams, “You were just going to sneak out in the night . . . weren’t you? . . . You’re a child. . . . You have no backbone, you coward. . . . I hate you, you pig!” She’s still not letting go of her grip on his jacket.
He pulls away from her, and she’s left holding only his jacket in her hands. He kneels down, tossing his packed valise into the open door of our family van. Then he gets behind the wheel and, without another word, he backs up out of the driveway and out of our lives forever.
Now all that’s left is the echo of her tortured cries. I’m not worried about the neighbors hearing what went on. They’re used to the sound of my parents’ war; each gave up their dignity a long time ago. We don’t know what shame feels like anymore.
As my mom leans against the wall wailing in spasms of anguish, all I can think of is what I might have done to cause this. Was it because I talked back to my mother that time, when we were out having a nice family dinner? She got so angry with me, and I remember my dad told her not to lose her cool and that I was right. Her frozen glance across the table suggested that she did not at all like this friendly alliance my dad and I had formed. There was screaming and yelling and people were staring, but my parents didn’t seem to care. Next thing I knew, my dad stormed out of the restaurant for the refuge of the car.
That was always the pattern: a knockdown fight followed by my dad retreating to some remote corner. My mother turned to me that night as we sat alone at our table for three and said, “Please don’t destroy my marriage. I don’t think I can live without him.”
I felt sorry for her now and wondered whether I was the driving wedge between my parents. I was always Daddy’s little girl, and she was my rival for his affection. My mom described our relationship as black and white. If she said up, I said down; if she said fat, I said thin. It was not something I could stop myself from doing.
I pulled the door to the garage closed and headed back to my room. Once inside, I pressed my forehead against the cool windowpane, hoping his car would be coming back. Maybe it was all a bad dream and soon I’d wake up.
Then I felt her hand touch my shoulder. My rival, my sparring partner, took my head in her hands and turned it towards her. She wasn’t crying anymore as she pressed my cheek to hers, yet I could still feel the wetness of her tears. There were no words spoken between us that morning. For once, we both felt the same thing. We were in agreement in our grief. And now we were left with one chair painfully empty at our table for three.
Isabel Philley
As told to C. S. Dweck
A Most Precious Gift
Divorce. The word alone sends chills down some people’s backs, but not mine. It may sound unusual, but my parents’ divorce was, in a way, the best thing that ever happened to our family. You see, I can hardly recollect what it was like for my parents to be married. It all seems like a very distant memory, like a story from another lifetime.
It was the New Year’s Eve right after my sixth birthday when my father moved out. All I remember was being in my family room and receiving a good-bye hug from him. My brother, who was four, consoled my mom and me. My dad left us all crying miserably. I thought I was never going to see my beloved daddy again. But the following Monday night, there he was. And our weekly dinner ritual was born.
He came to pick my brother and me up for dinner every Monday and Thursday night. And every other weekend he would take us to his new apartment where we would spend the night. For some reason, I learned to love my new life. I knew that every week I couldn’t make other plans on our dinner nights; it was our precious time to spend with our dad. I learned how to pack a bag for the weekend trips to the apartment, trying hard not to miss a thing. Over the years our dinner ritual had to work around dance, basketball, tennis, art classes and golf leagues. But it always came first.
Three years after my parents got divorced, when I was nine, my mother got remarried to Marty. He’s wonderful and has been making me giggle ever since with his brilliant sense of humor. Adding another man to his children’s lives may have angered some fathers, but not mine. My dad took our new stepfather out and befriended him.
With our new stepfather came an older stepbrother and an enormous extended family. Three years later, my dad finally found the love of his life, and my brother and I were blessed with a not-at-all-wicked stepmother, Suzi. Suzi’s son and daughter quickly became part of the family as well.
Now that my mom and Marty have been married for over nine years and my dad and Suzi for six, it has become impossible for me to even imagine my parents married to each other. Over the years, when people have been introduced to all of my parents and observe their relationships with each other, they tell me that my family is a prime example of how life should be after a divorce.
When I meet new people and they find out that my parents are divorced, they always apologize and sympathize. But to me, my parents’ divorce is not something to be sorry about. A divorce in itself is sad, an ending, but the outcome in our case has been great for all of us. For our birthdays we all go out to dinner, the six of us. My parents have remained friends, and my mom and Suzi have even golfed together.
I wouldn’t change anything about my life. I have eight grandparents, four parents, four siblings, too many aunts and uncles to count, and an endless amount of cousins. Love and support surround me no matter what or whose FAMILY MATTERS 83 house I happen to be at. With the help of my family I have learned to cope during the hard times. But above all, I have learned that love is immeasurable and, when shared, the most precious gift of all.
Jessica Colma
n
Memories of My Mother
I still miss those I loved who are no longer with me but I find I am grateful for having loved them. The gratitude has finally conquered the loss.
Rita Mae Brown
In January of 1998, I got the kind of call all actresses hope for: I had won the role of Julie Emrick on a new TV drama called Felicity. It should have been one of the most exciting moments of my life, but three months earlier something had happened that would forever put things in perspective. In October 1997, my mom, Christine Johnson, was diagnosed with cancer. Ten months later, she died at age fifty-three, and my life would never be the same.
My mom was my best friend. She taught me to appreciate every day. I think that is the key to life. I try to keep remembering that, to kind of make it a habit. And when I get all caught up in everything, I just stop and think about her.
I was like her sidekick growing up in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. My brother, Greig Jr., now thirty-three, and my sister, Julie, now thirty-two, were both older than me (I’m twenty-nine), so when they started school, it was just me and my mom together all day, running errands or just hanging out.
We even remained close through my rebellious period. In high school, I was staying out too late, doing the normal teenage stuff, so my parents sent me to a private boarding school in New Hampshire. I got kicked out after eight months for getting caught in the boys’ dorm. Oops! My punishment was having to go to a small local church school. When I did something wrong, if I tried to deny it or hide it, my mom would get angry. But if I admitted and apologized, she’d be totally cool. She was really fair.
She was also super-supportive. Ever since I was a kid, I knew I wanted to perform. She was always my biggest fan. She wasn’t a pushy stage mom at all, but she was definitely in my corner. She was really into personal growth (a longtime clothing store manager, she opened a self-help bookstore at one point) and encouraged the people around her to follow their dreams.
When I decided to move to New York City at nineteen to pursue an acting career, my mom and my dad, Greig Johnson, a car salesman, never said, “That’s risky,” or, “Don’t do that.” Two years later, in 1993, I moved to Los Angeles and got my first TV role as Kimberly, the Pink Power Ranger on Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.
Everything was going smoothly until the fall of 1997, when my life came to a screeching halt. My mom’s doctors thought she had cysts on her uterus that had grown and needed to be removed. But what should have been a simple hysterectomy turned into something far worse. Mom already kind of suspected. A couple of days before her surgery, she called me up really frightened and said, “Amy Jo, what if I have cancer?” and I was like, “Mom, you can’t say that. No. No. No.” So she went in for the operation. They didn’t expect to find cancer, but it was everywhere. A rare type of cancer, it had started in her appendix, and by the time the doctors found it, it had spread all over her body.
I’ll never forget the moment when my dad called and told me the news. It was Halloween. In shock, I flew back East to be with my family. I remember sitting up one night with my dad, probably two days after we found out. He told me he knew she was going to die, he just knew it. I was like, “No, we’ve got to have hope.”
Mymomhandled the news—and her terminal prognosis —with incredible bravery. That Christmas, which she knew would probably be her last, she bought us all tickets to see The Lion King on Broadway in New York. It was really emotional because the story is about the circle of life and dying and coming back again. I looked over at my mom during the scene where Simba sees his father’s ghost. She had tears in her eyes. But she never broke down in front of any of us kids or her friends. I think my dad’s the only one who saw how frightened she must have been.
In the beginning, we had several disappointments. My mom tried different chemotherapies. She also went to a hospital in Washington, D.C., for a surgery the doctors hoped might give her more time. My sister and I slept on little cots in her hospital room. It was like a slumber party.
But the surgery was a letdown. They opened her up again and said there was nothing they could do. The cancer had spread too much. Everyone was trying to help, recommending holistic medicines and special diets. We searched on the Internet for anything that might cure cancer. There are just a million things out there that people are trying to sell and tell you. Finally, my mom said, “Stop! I don’t want to try anything else. Don’t bring me any more crazy teas!”
That winter and spring, I traveled back and forth constantly between L.A. and Cape Cod. The people at Felicity were incredible. A couple of times, they stopped production or rearranged the schedule so I could go home. And the producers would send my mom hats and T-shirts and letters saying, “We love your daughter.” I think it was a comfort for her to know that I would be taken care of when she was gone.
My mom didn’t want to die in a hospital, so hospice workers came to our home in July of 1998. They were great because they helped my mom accept the fact that she was going to die. That allowed her to say good-bye to everybody. One day, she gathered her favorite jewelry and possessions and had each person she loved come upstairs, and she gave everything away. She gave some people back gifts that she remembered they had given to her, like, twenty years ago.
She kept her sense of humor until she died. Four days after the doctors had predicted she’d pass away, she was sitting in bed and started singing! She looked at my sister and me and jokingly said, “What am I going to do? A woman can’t live without her jewels.”
She wanted me to go back to work, where they were rearranging production for me, but I told her I was staying with her. Finally, she insisted: “This could go on for a month. You have to go.” I said good-bye so many times. I’d hug her, kiss her, run downstairs, get in the car and then run back up. I did that, like, seven times. Finally, she said, “Amy Jo, this is getting ridiculous. Just go.” It was the hardest good-bye I’ve said or will ever have to. Three days after that, on August 19, 1998, she died.
My sister called and told me the news. I cried all over my house. Then, I went to my living room and just sat there, and suddenly, I got the most incredible feeling I’ve ever had. It was like my mom was in the room with me. It was like she came over and gave me peace, and it made me feel ready to go home for the funeral and be strong for my dad and the rest of the family.
Amy Jo Johnson
As told to Linda Friedman
The Last Months
I was happy to be home that night all bundled up in my fleece blanket, so soft, so warm. It was January first of the new millennium, and it was cool and breezy outside. My dad was looking at our Christmas tree, still decorated with a lifetime of memories. Dad had insisted on having the perfect tree, so we did. It was lushly green, and the smell of pine had permeated throughout the entire house since the day it arrived. It was huge—ten feet tall and five feet wide. And now my dad was just staring at it.
Suddenly, I noticed that tears were rolling down his dark cheeks. I didn’t understand this uncharacteristic show of emotion. It confused me, so I decided to leave him alone. I peered out from the kitchen to see what he was doing, but tried not to make it obvious that I was watching him. He touched each ornament and held it tightly. It looked as if he were trying to staunch the flow of dark and consuming thoughts.
That was the month I started to see my dad become weak and frail. Not knowing what was wrong, my mom took him to see the doctor. After undergoing X rays and blood work, they returned home to anxiously await the results. Finally, the doctor called. My dad was in serious danger of having another heart attack, and he had to be checked into the hospital immediately.
I cannot remember a time when my dad was really well. He had already suffered a series of heart attacks, as well as complications from bypass surgery. This time, Dad was in the hospital for two long weeks. He was hooked up to so many I.V. tubes and monitors that it made it hard for him to communicate with us. Eventually, he progressed enough to be able to come home.
; Every couple of days, a nurse would come to the house and help my dad with his rehabilitation. One day, as we waited for her to arrive, I noticed something unusual. My dad wasn’t breathing. My mom ran over to him and shook him.
“What? What’s wrong?” he asked.
“You weren’t breathing,” I told him.
He answered with a simple, “Oh,” then fell back into an uneasy sleep. A few minutes later, I looked over at him.
“Mom . . .” I gasped and pointed at him. She woke him up again.
“Why don’t we keep you up until the nurse gets here?” she asked him, her voice cracking. He slightly nodded his gray head in agreement. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say a word.
The nurse finally arrived. She looked him over and said, “We have to get you to the emergency room.”
My father frowned. He reminded me of a child not wanting to do what he is told. With a forlorn look on his face, he asked, “Do I have to?” The nurse nodded.
There were so many things to say, but no one was sure how to say them. When my dad was about to leave, I gave him a lingering hug and held him tight. I didn’t want to let him go. As he got into the car, I told him I loved him.
He turned and smiled at me and nodded in acknowledgment. I watched as they pulled out of the driveway and down the street. I watched until the car vanished behind a big tree that stood on the side of the road. That was the last time I saw my dad.
Things have changed in my life over the past eight months. There is not as much laughter, and there are times I feel angry and depressed. Going places is not as enjoyable without my dad. When I see a family with their father, I feel envious. Sometimes when I come home, I forget that he is gone and go into his room to talk to him. I always feel empty when I realize he’s not there.