An August Goodbye
Late August Indian summer teased the all around us. The ocean was especially warm, crystal clear and the tide particularly low. I don’t think it was a moon tide, but the water on Minot Beach was out far, exposing the flats of the sands rarely shown, the ripples and the ridges alive in the afternoon light like a living creature. Life by the ocean is defined by the moon and her tides. All things are interconnected, living on the edge, and we accept that we too are a part of this ebb and flow, as humans have been since the beginning of time.
I was in Minot for a few final summer days before I headed to Africa for three weeks of work. August is so bittersweet, with its perfect golden light and sweetest smells, the shadows trailing long; they are like a sundial marking the passing of time. We bask in the sweet air as it kisses sun warmed skin, knowing it will be gone soon. Like all the best things in life, grasping at it can destroy it. All we can do is revel in the gift of the moment and hold onto the memory in gratitude when the season passes.
Standing at the kitchen sink in the sun washed room, I offhandedly mentioned it was perfect swimming weather, having already gone down to dunk. My mother swam, “once in a blue moon” as she’d say, perhaps twice a decade, so it was just an observation. But I walked into the upstairs hall to find her digging through her walk in closet looking for her rarely used, ruffled one piece navy blue swimsuit.
Wary of her taking off on me, I changed quickly and we walked together, hand in hand. She pointed out the flowers and birds, the same ones as every walk. Her favorite majestic beech tree, the robins, the flowering bushes. I gained my intense love of nature from my parents, but from my mother, the curiosity for deeper knowledge and names. We walked down Grasshopper Lane, every crack and pothole familiar to us. I grew up here, and my mother walked this road with her mother.
Mom always used to say we should “go check to see if the beach was still there,” although this is not an entirely an idle joke in the Northeast. Minot is the infamous landfall of many nor’easters, and our neighborhood beach is beloved by the dramatic weatherman from all the national channels who line up on the seawall like seagulls broadcasting as the waves splash over their flapping raincoats.
Minot has been true north to our family for generations. We ran free, herds of cousins riding bicycles to the ocean, tennis and exhausted, home in time to pass out, windows open, golden light and salty breezes flowing in. Minot was where my mother was happiest, surrounded by family, nature and memories of her parents. Minot’s Light, is one of the most deadly lighthouses on the eastern seaboard, but it flashes a cadence of 1-4-3 which people say signifies “I love you.” The contradiction is apt for New Englanders, and our family.
My mother was a woman of language, she knew proper English, written and spoken, and literature, better than anyone I’ve ever met, and was endlessly demanding in her expectations. She loved reading, the origin of words, or a turn of phrase. Every summer when all we children wanted to do was run wild, she assigned us homework; Math, English, French, and the dreaded Latin-the origin of western language. But as an adult I recognized that she instilled in all of us an intense love of learning and a lifelong sense of curiosity. In a culture careless with words, I miss her knowledge and passion for them.
As Indian summer flickered, Mom and I walked down the steps worn round by decades of winter storms. I held her hand as we crossed the tidal shallows, the golden light of the twilight on our backs. And I think, in that moment I realized that this was goodbye, our last summer together in our most sacred place. I had prepared for our goodbye for years, had gone through the motion so many times my heart had broken into pieces by the constant grieving, but somehow as we walked across the sand hand in hand, I knew in that she would not be coming back to Scituate.
I held her hand tighter, and took her arm with my other, for her sake or mine I’m not sure. And the bitter sweetness overwhelmed me, like the salty water around us. She nervously stepped deeper into the water and dipped to her waist, laughing at the warmth and the sparkles of light on the water, the pure joy of it all. It was so unlike her to let go and live with such joy, free of inhibition, such a gift of a moment. Life was so often just beyond her fingertips, her anxiety and depression held her back. She filled us all up with so much of life, persistent in the demands she made for us, of us, but I often wondered if she missed out on her own.
I didn’t let go of her hand as I dunked under the welcoming waves, the warm salt water washed over me. This would be my last swim of the summer too. We stood there together, the waves lapping around our thighs for a long time looking east, awkwardly out of step on the rippled sand, sharing the pure magic, and loss. The sunset lost its luster as we finally turned towards the west and slowly walked back up the width of the beach. She was laughing, high on the adventure, thrilled as the beauty of the place she loved most enveloped her.
I left for Malawi four days later and my parents moved back to Boston for the winter.
When I returned to the US, my mother’s Alzheimer’s had overtaken her almost completely, and in November we moved her to a memory care unit as we could no longer keep her safe. She could no longer read and she had lost most of her spoken words, the greatest love in her life, outside of her family. And although I say “I love you” as much as I can, she often seems confused about which child I am, or even who I am.
The seasons have changed, and as strange as it still feels, in the last many months as her memory has failed completely, I have grieved her, and released her, as she seems to have been released from her body, and in doing so I have found a sense of gratitude. Gratitude for the precious adult years we spent as friends before the illness took her bit by bit. Even for the awful years, witnessing the cruel illness and her daily loss of pieces of herself, the occasional humor, supporting and loving her through it all. Receiving what she was able to give. It was often awful, and I cried most days, felt broken and alone, but I survived which often felt impossible. And I stayed-I am forever grateful, that I was present for this part of her journey as well.
I think of her more these days than I ever did when she was well, a confusing irony. And I will miss her every day of my life. I know I will grieve her yet again when her body leaves us, as then I will be truly, finally be unmothered. But I am also deeply grateful she is no longer scared and no longer suffering.
Alzheimer’s is a beast which carves a person right out of their body and their life, piece by piece, as they stand before you, helpless and mourning. But I showed up, and there was love, because life is found in the ebb and the flow. We know we cannot change this, but we can choose to experience it as fully as possible; all the hurt, all the horror, all the joy, all the beauty, the bittersweet and the love of this precious fragile thing.
And for all of that I can be nothing but deeply grateful. I love you, Mum.
