My Man, My Son, My Life

Someone pointed him out to me across the bar on a 4th of July afternoon bender after a day at the Lake and a night prior of coking and joking, “That guy over there is Michael, he could give you guitar lessons.” I was 21. It was 1984.

I took one look, and as God as my witness gasped and said, “Oh my God, that man is going to be my best friend or worst enemy.” He had presence, in a way most people cannot even fathom unless you met him. Intensity, intelligence, awareness, all with a touch of dangerousness that kept many at a distance.

I had someone introduce us. He took me home that night, and played a bit of guitar for me. We talked like I’d never been able to talk to anyone in my entire life until sleep took us. He was a gentleman, and I was a Catholic girl. The second night? I molested him, unable to refrain from his lure. He didn’t object a bit. I have been with him ever since.

He alone saved me from the self-loathing my childhood wrought, but was somehow unable to overcome his own, inflicting new damage at times far worse. It was a turbulent and complex relationship, but one which I shall never regret.

He made me me.

I could recount the horrors of finding him gone, the 6 hour ordeal of dealing with EMS, the ME, the funeral home…. but most of it? I went into “I’ve got this” mode and dealt fine. My breakdown was Saturday with my girls: Jill, Linda and Kate had me and Jake. I let Jake leave later Saturday to go to his friend’s house and find a moments respite from dealing, and have his own friend to vent to.

But I guess I’m trying to tell you how we are, not what we were then. There’s time for that with distance.

I covered Mike and lead Jake to my bedroom. He went back later and wanted to see him with me… we had BOTH tried to close his eyes, but the goddamned things wouldn’t stay shut.

Jake was angry when I told him his Dad died, feeling lied to. His Dad, the day after his terminal prognosis had somehow told him 4 years. When I learned of that, I pulled him aside and told him 3, maybe 6 months with a miracle. After last Tuesday when I spent 11 straight hours trying to help him breathe, the next morning I told him probably less than a month. “Dad said 4 years, Mom 3-6 months, then a month and I got two more fucking days??!!??”

But by morning, he was past that. He understood neither one of us saw this coming like that. We both get we can be angry, sad, or anything we want to right now. In fact, after spending the day arranging the cremation, then going to beg help paying for that from the State? We both lit out of the house to our respective friends for an hour or two, meeting home at the same time, and found we both had actual fun.

“Well, Jaker, its probably because its the first time we’ve been able to leave without feeling guilty or afraid in a LONG time.” I told him.

“Afraid he was dead, afraid he would be mad at us or play the guilt card if we left even for an hour. Yeah, Mom, it was kind of freeing in a way,” He replied.

So, we talked about that for a minute, and my little man said, “OK, lets just choose not to feel bad about feeling good. We deserve it. We need it sometimes, and even Dad said he didn’t want us to mope around all the time.”

We moved on that night, but today was sadness again. We know its going to be a rollercoaster like that for a while.

It probably helps that Mike left us totally fucked. For the moment, irritated is easier than sad. He just didn’t take care of his shit. I called Michigan Works myself a week ago, and got them to say he was there… all he had to do to get his back pay? Update the website, and he never did. Even when he felt good. We were back 2 house payments and he refused to get the 2 grand they owned him from weeks prior.

He also refused to let me apply for SSDI for him up until the week before he died – something I asked him to do back in August when he was diagnosed. Nope. He would rather let his widow and son be royally screwed than lift a finger.

Of course, the same inability to deal let him let his Mom’s house go into foreclosure when we had 3 years to deal with that and get a renter. “Later. In a minute. Not today. I don’t feel like it.”

Jake and I spent the better part of today dealing with Grandma’s paperwork – the boxes and boxes of it I was not allowed to touch that have cluttered my house for 2 years now. I made a nice bonfire out of it. I don’t even want to admit, that without friends and loved ones donating? I couldn’t have even had him cremated. I don’t get the ashes until I pay that in full.

Yeah, I’m venting, but thats not all I’m feeling, and I understand fully the emotional damage his Mother did to him, as well as the depression and dementia that he started to show these past 5 years or so left him crippled and unable to face obstacles in a way I will never understand. I forgive him, but I still have a really fucking hard row to hoe in front of me.

Who will I read my essays aloud to every morning? Thats what I did for years and years now. He would be driving his truck waiting for me to call, and turn off his radio and wait for my daily writing. It was such a coup if I made him laugh, exclaim over a turn of phrase or say he loved it in general. Its how I found my typos, which I never can find without reading it aloud. Who will pet my hair when I’m worried, my head on their lap, or trace their fingernails up and down my back until I squirm from goosebumps to make me giggle? That was our thing, our rhythms something no one will ever replace. Oh, and when he looked over his glasses at us with the “look,” Jake and I knew we had him. That was his play-angry, or his “are you fucking kidding me, here” look.

There were times too, I had to run interference so much; had to walk on eggshells. The only thing that finally got him on his anti-depressants is when he went after Jake and I kicked him out. Perhaps it is a good thing that he left us before he got worse that way, went the way of his Mom…. that could have put years more damage on my son.

Do you know, the first thing Jake asked me when I gave him the 3-6 month prognosis was whether or not I would remarry? I told him that when he was little they found a bump on the base of my skull they thought was brain cancer, and that I had TOLD his Dad to remarry. That while no one would be Me to him, that the more people that truly love you in your life, the better your life would be… but then I told him it would be a LONG time before I would even consider a date. That I would need to find just-me again. You know what my amazing kid said? “I hope you do Mom, II have to grow up and leave some day, and I never want you to be lonely or bitter. You are too full of love and life to be alone. I want you to be happy.”

Fucking wow, right?

Jake will be fine, he gets that death doesn’t make someone a saint or a sinner, that we are all flawed beings. He gets that life includes loss. He knows when he needs to talk, and talk he does, when to cry, when to laugh, and MOST importantly? Despite the “Man of the House” speech Dad gave him, I told him that while I would rely on him for some things he has already been doing anyway, like taking the garbage up the hill and helping me mow? That its not his job to be the grown up, and that I’ve got this, got him. He is safe. And, if I ever lean on him too heavy, to tell me to back off and let him be a kid. Because I refuse to make him a Momma’s boy, and I refuse to let him take on a roll thrust on him not of his own life and choosing.

We are just OVERWHELMED by the LOVE and help people are offering; the donations and words and calls. People love us, and that makes us able to love even more. Jake was all, “Mom, its incredible how much love you generate in people, and its because you just love them too. Think about it, Mom, you make them feel loved too, that’s why they do all this.”

My kid is amazing.

I must have a grain of amazing too, to have raised a son like that under all these circumstances. I have to believe that, in order to stay strong and keep doing this right, you know? Not give up or panic or hide behind internal walls.

God, I miss my husband so much at times its unfathomable.

But he gave me Jake, and that is the gift of a lifetime dig? My miracle boy, the one they said I couldn’t have.

This is our lives now, and I will make it good again, I will fill it with laughter and light. I will play music again, something Michael lost through the years – it was Neil Young’s “guitar fighting the tv” so I just gave it up too not to irritate him.

Mike was a beautiful part of my life, heck the longest part of my life, and without him I will feel rudderless for a long time.

But I’ve got this. My boy has the tools to “have” this in a way even his father didn’t have it.

We are going to be okay.

********************************************

Mike wanted no funeral. Come Summer Jill & I (w/ Jake & her husband Donny) are taking him to Black Lake to leave his ashes there as he wished.

HOWEVER, while I was forbidden to have a service or funeral home event? There was already a Fundraiser planned to help us with the medical bills and shut offs and foreclosure, yadda yadda…. SO, if that turns into a celebration of his life, and his friends drink and tell G-man stories? He cannot haunt me for that.

I mean, everyone who loves him will be there anyway, so why the fuck not just let them feel like its his memorial, dig?

Of course, whoever heard of a 10 bucks to get in & have a plate of spaghetti memorial? Jeeeez. I know, I know, its crass when I put it that way. Fucking Mike. Only Mike. Heh.

Its next month, and you are all welcome if you wanna come. Those of you who have already donated? I’ll make sure your spaghetti is free.