I get to the best place, stop and everybody jumps out. Over the years, each person’s found a favorite spot to pick. Bess and Liz head out to the skimpy elder where they always find theirs. I like to pick along the road, they get ripe first and have the most sugar. I always eat the first ten myself, after that take every twentieth one. For some reason, I count berries while picking. Every once in a while, somebody will find a particularly good patch and we’ll all go over to join in the luck.
We pick till the sun’s just past overhead. That rain last night was what we needed, enough to sink in but not enough to slow down growing. It probably set up enough little fresh water puddles and ponds to grow us up a whole new batch of mosquitoes, too. I’ve got to mend those screens before the real mosquito season comes on us.
When we get home, Johnny, Joan and Hank are already there. Joan’s set the table and Johnny’s on the back porch churning butter. Hank’s upstairs, probably fooling with his butterflies.
Bess’s had a pot roast with cabbage, onions and carrots on back of the stove while we’ve been picking, so it goes straight onto the table. Joan bought bread at the baker in town on the way home from school. We wipe out the loaf and the roast in fifteen minutes of concentrated eating. The pot juices soaked in that bread are delicious.
For dessert Johnny fetches a pint of cold fresh cream from the spring. We sprinkle our wild berries on top of that. The berries are still warm from the sun and sink into the cream. I think we eat up almost a quarter of the berries we picked all morning; but that’s what they’re for.
After Johnny, Hank and Joan head back to school, Bess puts Lizbet down in the back room for her nap and the two of us go upstairs and take about an hour in bed ourselves. It sounds downright lazy to get in bed in the middle of the day like that but we’ve been doing it for years, whenever we get the chance. It’s the nicest time when you’re not too tired, and you only have one life. After all, that’s one of the reasons people get married.
It’s almost three o’clock when I get out to the tomatoes. That rain drove some of them right back down to the ground. I must say I’ve sure got some beautiful tomatoes this year. Some of them are big as tennis balls already. I know I’m at least a month ahead of everybody. Don Ambrogi in the central market tells me if I bring in sun-ripened tomatoes before the middle of June he’ll get me top dollar.
I greenhouse-started these tomatoes back in early March. That’s the greenhouse I made from windows salvaged when they tore down the old Seaside Hotel in Cape May. There were big windows along the porch facing the ocean and they tore it all down. I’ve got over five hundred square feet under glass from those windows. I keep my plants warm in cold nights, or days without sun, with a little fire in a hut beside the greenhouse. By the end of April I had eight-inch-high leggy sprouts all ready to transplant.
I moved them into the fields on the first of May and prayed. Thank God there was no late freeze. Now I have beautiful, hearty bushes loaded with these new kind of almost seedless Beefsteak tomatoes. I’ll bet I get a couple hundred bushels this year and I’ll be out of that work in time for my big job with the corn. I’ll have two good cash crops, one after the other.
I carry out some string and two bundles of straight cut sticks. There isn’t much damage but there will be if I don’t tie them now. The weight of the fruit, plus the extra weight from the rain, is too much. Ground-spotted tomatoes are worthless except for the canning factory.
The green smell of tomato surrounds me as I wrestle those devils up. It’s easy to break off a branch because they’re stiff with water and the fruit’s so heavy. My hands are turning green from rubbing across stalks and leaves. I wonder why they have the light white-green hairs; maybe it’s to protect from insects. Tomatoes have always been sexy plants to me, even as a kid back in Wisconsin. Tomatoes look almost too good for ordinary people, like something from the Garden of Eden.
I keep my legs straight and bend over from the waist. This is something Dad taught Ed and me when we were picking our cucumber patch. If you have to get down further, then squat, really squat, with your heels flat in the dirt. That way you never get a stiff back. Dad has a straight posture to this day and he’s almost seventy years old. When he carpenters, he bends or squats the same way he used to in those fields up in Wisconsin.
The sun’s well down when I tie up the last bush. I’m practically drunk with the green smell of tomatoes. When I put the cutters and the last of my sticks back in the shed, I can smell the dry wood and sawdust in there. There’s definitely something in tomato smell which sharpens other smells. I know I’ll smell all kinds of things as I walk up to the house, even the dirt path and rocks.
I go down to the settling pool and scoop water to wash up. I drink ice cold water straight from my hands. I dry them in my hair. Hair’s getting long; tonight’s probably haircutting night; the whole family’s needing it. Nobody minds since I built us a barber chair from an old automobile seat and a broken swivel chair I found in the dump outside town. I cut everybody else’s, including Bess’s, and she cuts mine while I hold a mirror and help her along.
In our house we eat French-style, the way we did at home. That means a big meal at lunch, then soup and bread in the evening. Bess makes some of the best soups in the world and it’s never the same.
I look around for Hank. He’s probably butterfly-collecting again. He has all his drawers filled and the walls covered with mounted butterflies in the boys’ room. Johnny says it looks spooky at night, especially when there’s a moon, but he hasn’t actually complained. John’s good with his brother and Hank is a strange one. He’s been collecting things since he was old enough to walk around. But this butterfly business goes on and on; it’s been more than three years now. Bess tells me he’s hatching cocoons in boxes in the clothes closet. All he wanted for Christmas this year was more butterfly identification books plus more of the little pins, tools, chemicals and pieces of glass he mounts the things with. He can talk your ear off on moths alone if you give him half a chance. You never know with kids, but Hank is something I’d never’ve expected.
Lizbet sees me and comes dashing down. I catch her as she throws herself with arms out. Either I’m getting older or she’s getting bigger, probably both, but I’m going to miss her one of these times. I boost her on my shoulder and walk the last part up to the porch. I ease her down on the porch step.
Bess gives the call to supper. Hank comes down from upstairs and Johnny from around back. There isn’t much talking, everybody’s hungry. I wait till they’re all settled in and Bess comes from the stove with the bowl steaming hot. I bow my head and say grace. I’m a bit Protestant here. I don’t say the usual “Bless us, O Lord.” Tonight I just say, “Thank God for tomatoes, Amen.”
Mario comes back with the mashed pills in a paste. He holds Dad’s head and I use a spoon to open Dad’s lips enough so I can force the mash through the space in his teeth. It’s like feeding a baby bird when it’s almost dead, when the neck is bent and the food won’t go down. I hold Dad’s nose so he has to swallow. I’m fairly sure I get most of it in.
“Mario, I’ll stay here; you fix up the camper with the bed and we’ll take him in that.”
Mario goes and I sit beside Dad. I watch as he gradually relaxes. He uncurls, takes his hands from his eyes, sinks into a normal sitting position. But his eyes are empty, his face a blank. He stares at nothing. His lips work once in a while, his fingers twist and twiddle with the fly on his pants.
When Mario comes back, I ask him to get fresh underpants and trousers. We change him; there’s no trouble, he goes along with us, not fighting. But then Joan peeks in the door. When he sees her, Dad puts his hands back over his face and pulls his knees up. I wave Joan away. I gently pet him on his bald head till he opens one eye, then the other, looking slowly toward the direction where Joan’d been standing. He takes his hands carefully from his face and lowers his knees.
I leave Dad with Mario and ask Joan, John and Maryellen to stay in the kitchen w
hile we put Dad in the camper. I go back. Together Mario and I stand him up but he doesn’t take any of his weight. As we go down the hall, his feet drag so we’re hauling him along, dead weight. Each of us has one of his arms over a shoulder. When we get him to the camper, we lift him into the bed. Dad’s eyes stare at the top of the camper; I cover him with a blanket. John hands me a paper bag with Dad’s pajamas. Mario gets in front and we take off. I’ve asked Joan to call the hospital and tell them we’ve left. I sit beside Dad all the way over the pass. He doesn’t mope. He’s gone, totally, completely gone.
As we get closer to the hospital, the Valium begins wearing off. First his lips quiver, then he starts swinging his arms and struggling to get off the bed.
By the time we get on the San Diego Freeway, I’m lying across him, hugging him, trying to hold him down.
Mario keeps looking back and his face is blue-white again with fear and shock. He has a heavy beard, one of those guys who gets his five-o’clock shadow at about one-thirty in the afternoon. Right now, he looks like a hit man. I’d hate trying to explain what we’re doing if some cop stops us.
We roll up to the emergency door. When the attendants look in and see me struggling with Dad, they run for a stretcher with restrainers. The four of us maneuver Dad onto the stretcher and get him strapped down.
Delibro is there and he’s staring, not believing what he’s seeing. Chad’s there too. It’s after ten o’clock by now and it’s damned nice of Chad; or maybe he was on duty. Maybe Joan called him directly; I know she has his number.
They roll Dad into one of the emergency rooms; Chad starts all the tests, blood, urine, saliva, the works. They put an IV on him. Dad’s settled down some; at least he’s not fighting. Delibro motions me aside.
“Holy hell! What happened? He seemed so fine when I last saw him. What could’ve happened?”
I try to tell Delibro about the past week, with Mom at Joan’s, the “kidnapping,” then Dad at Joan’s, the 2 a.m. phone call, everything. He listens. Some of it he already knows, some not. It’s like bringing somebody up to date on a soap opera; it seems just about that real to me now.
He’s looking at me carefully to see if I’m telling the truth. Maybe that’s only in my own mind. I’m feeling guilty at least ten different ways. I’m feeling guilty mostly about what I know I’m going to do. My feet are wanting to run. They’re tugging at my heart, my mind; the rest of my body. I don’t want to be here with all this anymore.
“He’s apparently had a severe reaction to the pressures your mother’s been putting on him. He seems to have reverted, regressed to his earlier state. He’s probably involving the greater part of his neocortex in his fantasy now.”
“But what can be done, Doctor? How can we stop this from happening?”
“With more metabolic support he might come back, then rest and calm. But it’s hard to tell with someone his age. He’s too old for radical treatment. I can’t recommend any of the stronger chemical or electrical approaches. Mr. Tremont, I think we need to wait and be patient.”
Chad comes out just then. He looks as discouraged as I feel.
“He’s asleep now. His BUN is up again. His blood count is down, too. But there’s no sign of heart failure or stroke; it must be a combination of psychological factors and metabolism; it’s hard to know which one triggers the other.”
Basically, they don’t know what’s wrong with him and they’re not sure what to do.
They’re going to keep him in the hospital for observation and further testing. I walk into his room quietly and kiss Dad on the forehead. He’s sleeping deeply, snoring; there’s a thin scum of perspiration across his face and head.
Inside myself, I know he’s gone. We had him with us for a short while but it wasn’t good enough. He’s gone back to his better life, away from all the problems of trying to live here. Also, I know if he leaves here again the way he did last time, he’ll die.
What happens to his other life then?
Mario and I drive back to their place so I can pick up the car. It’s after midnight. Joan and Mario fix some coffee to keep me awake for my drive back. We decide I’ll only tell Mom how Dad began to feel sick and is in the hospital for tests. We definitely won’t tell her what’s been happening; it’s going to be bad enough.
I get home a bit past one. She’s still dozing in her chair in front of the TV set; colored splashes from the screen are playing across her face like Christmas-tree lights. I sneak in quietly, turn down the sound and manage not to waken her. God, she looks so alone, so vulnerable, so much like an expensive, unwanted Christmas present you’re supposed to pretend you like. I sit in the other chair and try thinking. My mind doesn’t want to think, it wants to disappear. I fall asleep. I wake up with Mom shaking me.
“Jacky! Wake up! Jacky, are you drunk? Do you know what time it is?”
I open my eyes and look at her. The television set is still running, soundless. I peer across at the clock, it’s 3 a.m., the most dangerous hour for human beings. I take hold of Mother’s hands.
“Sit down, Mom, I have something to tell you.”
She backs three steps and sits in the rocker. Just then, I feel enormous sorrow, pity, love for her; for Dad, for all of us, for all human beings who need to go through the business of being born, staying alive, getting dead; the whole wrestle with life, a contest with one inevitable fall.
That’s all Mom’s been doing, struggling with life as she sees it, on her terms. I must be one of the world’s biggest horse’s asses not to know this. I get up and go over; I take her in my arms; she leans into me.
“He’s dead. He died, didn’t he? That’s where you’ve been. Oh, Mother of heaven, what’ll I do?”
“No, Mom, Dad’s not dead, but he’s in the hospital. Something happened, not even the doctors know what it is yet, and he’s the same as he was before. They’re keeping him in the hospital for observation and testing.”
I hold her. She squeezes tight and her whole body is twisting with sobs. It must be terrible to love deeply and have no way to show it. Mom is a diesel engine built into a canoe.
We stay like that, not talking, holding tight. It’s astounding how soft her body is compared to how she seems.
“I knew it would happen! Nobody knows him the way I do. Nobody can take care of him the way I can.”
It’s what she has to think. God, what do you do if you aren’t cut out to be a wife, a mother, and you’re stuck with the job for life? What do you do? She deserves a hell of a lot of credit for staying with it; some people don’t; they cut out. Christ, it isn’t her fault; it’s a simple matter of miscasting.
I hold close and let her go through the whole thing. For the first time in my life, I can listen without blocking; I can listen as someone who loves her, I can listen the way Dad always listened. Her scenario makes sense if you take her part. She’s got plenty to back it up. In a certain way, Dad is an incompetent; he doesn’t know how to cope with this world, with the people of this world; he couldn’t get along without her. Joan and I, all the grandchildren, don’t show enough respect or love for her. That’s one of Mom’s problems, she doesn’t know how to gain people’s love, just as she can’t show her own love easily. She really has nothing to live for; only Dad does care if she lives or dies.
It’s awful; there’s no arguing these things. I listen and she talks. We stay like that until she runs down. I’m watching the TV as color patterns, movement, not seeing what I’m supposed to be seeing, trying to hear what I should have heard a long time ago.
It’s after four o’clock when I tuck Mom in bed and dose her with ten milligrams. I sit beside the bed holding her hand until she goes to sleep. Then I go to the middle room, climb into the crib.
The next weeks are hellish. The hospital says Dad is custodial after he’s in there four days. I know they’re right; I’m not fighting it anymore. I’ve played custodian to him and I can’t do it again. Joan and I agree we’ll put him in a good nursing home. Neither of us wan
ts to, but there’s no other solution. He can’t stay in the hospital and he can’t stay with Mother.
Mom is relatively passive. She makes some noises about the “poorhouse,” how we’re abandoning our own father—all the old story—but I don’t think she even believes it herself.
I’m feeling deeply guilty. I know I am abandoning him. Maybe with another tremendous effort he could be brought back. But I’m not sure what we’d do with him if, or when, he would come back. He’s become superfluous to everyone’s life. There’s no room in this world for him anymore.
We try Cottage Villa again, but they can’t keep him fed and he’s back in the hospital after five days. Even Alicia can’t help.
When he comes out the second time, we have the good luck to find a room in the convalescent home just down the street from Mom’s house. It’s a small place with only thirty beds and more direct supervision than Cottage Villa. Mom feels better having him close. She can visit by walking there when she feels up to it.
Dr. Chad agrees to look in once a week and regulate Dad’s metabolism. It’s as good an arrangement as we’re ever going to make. Joan is pressing me to go home, get out while the getting’s good; go back to Paris, Vron, Jacky. I’m not fighting anymore. Joan also finds a nurse to visit Mom twice a week, and Joan will come over twice. It’s the best we can arrange.
Dad shows no signs of recovering. He’s a total blank, not recognizing any of us since the trauma at Joan’s house. He’s erratically continent with his bowels and bladder both; he needs to be hand-fed. He has the same animal look in his eyes. He’s gone, probably for good. I’m only hoping he’s happy there in Cape May, or wherever.
Billy’s a big help over this part. He spends a lot of time with Mom and tries to do all he can; but visiting Dad is too much for him.