Thomas Wolfe once wrote “You Can’t Go Home Again.” A title that seems pretty apt to my situation. In November of 2023, I faced the inevitability that most children face, where my mother lost decisional capacity for herself and had to be placed in a care home. It was a pinnacle turning point in my life as it meant that I would have to pack up her apartment and do away with the majority of the belongings that she had accumulated in the course of her life. While most children would simply bring most heirlooms and belonging to their own home, living clear across the country made this a bit of a difficult prospect for me. While I did pack and ship some choice items, the majority of things had to be sold, donated or given away. It felt like the surrendering of one’s life, and caused me to take pause and reflect on how the later years of my own life would come to pass. I chronicled this trip in a short series of posts titled “Becoming the Patriarch.” If you scroll through my posts, you find them. The point is, when I came home last May to tend to my father, who was intubated and comatose with no expectation of coming out of the hospital, it was my first time coming home without, well… a home! It was a the first time in my life that I didn’t have a “mom and dad’s” to stay at. No pillow to lay my head where I knew my mother was in the next room. The change in my reality that this caused weighed heavily on my soul during that trip. That reality is all the more palpable this time around.
Yesterday, my day started simply, with a visit to the continental breakfast nook of the hotel. Swallowing my pride and ignoring my usual desire for meat, I enjoyed a small bowl of cereal and a yogurt, which provided what I needed for the morning. I grabbed a shower and slipped on some fresh, untraveled clothing and I was off to the races. A couple of errands later, I had stocked my room fridge with energy drinks and some meal replacement shakes that would make for my lunches throughout the week. For a simple 4-pack of shakes that would make four lunches, I paid as much as I would for one full meal. While meal replacement shakes can’t replace your food indefinitely, it’ll certainly save me some money for the week. My morning went by in a flash and I made my way down the coast to Dalhousie, my childhood home. I’ve traveled to many places in the world but they all pale in comparison to the pristine beauty of the Restigouche Bay set against the backdrop of the Appalachian mountains. The view and the scenery are exquisite; a fact I never recognized or appreciated during my childhood. It’s unfortunate that children always only see what’s immediate and can’t draw their focus outward. Perhaps if I had recognized the beauty in front of me, I would have never left. But I wistfully digress…
My father is a tired man. At the end of his rope, I feel that he has very little fight left in him. Essentially paralyzed from the neck down, he’s incapable of moving, save for his neck and head, and some mild movement of his fingers, mercifully allowing him to switch the channels on his television. Otherwise, he lays at the mercy of the nursing home staff. Nursing homes get a bad rap in general, and for good reason. Overworked and understaffed, they rarely have the ability to care for their residents to the level of quality that one truly deserves at the end of their lives. I walked into my father’s room with the thought that I would be facing an angry, redheaded juggernaut who was pissed off at being alive. Instead, I saw a frail, aging man with no strength left in him. He was sleeping soundly and snoring noisily. I sat with him for a few moments, but for once in my life, the words not said and the silence were too much for me. I stepped out. When I walked into to see my mother, she was awake and sitting in her chair with her arms crossed. She had a look on her face that didn’t express serenity but appeared to hold no immediate concern. As I reached her filed of vision, she frowned at me slightly. As I said “Hi, mom,” she responded in kind but didn’t acknowledge the “mom” part. When I indicated that I was her son, her only response was “Oh, okay.” No recognition or familiarity lit up her eyes. I commented that it had been a while and reached in for a hug. Then, I experienced another first that no child should ever have to; she flinched and recoiled from my reach.
She didn’t yell out, object or indicate any issue but the mild action was enough to send ripples of grief through me that echoed down to my very soul. My mother had no recognition of me. The shouldn’t have surprised me, since her siblings had all visited last week and she knew none of them. But it cemented the fact that in a way, my parents were very much gone. When one loses a parent, there’s a grieving process in place. The loved one is no longer with them. They’re just gone forever and one realized they’ll never see them again in this life. There’s a finality. A sense of closure amongst the grief, if you will. But for my parents, there is no such closure. Instead, they linger. Living fleetingly on the border between life and death. My father, trapped in a prison of his own flesh without any finality, despite apparently being lucid and of full mind (I can’t confirm because I haven’t spoken to him yet), and my mother, who’s there but not “there,” know what I mean? There is no finality or sense of grief0stricken closure. They aren’t;t gone; they simply aren’t fully there, either. The reality was more than my solitary soul could handle. I made my way back out to the car and wept silently by myself, recognizing that the chance of having any meaningful conversations with my parents was gone. There would be no making them proud for my accomplishments, no bragging about their grandchildren with them, no sharing of my life with theirs. Because they had reached the end. It was now just a matter of time.
Once my eyes cleared, I made my way out to my Uncle Danny, who has been helping with the overall care of my parents in my absence. On his last day of vacation, he was enjoying his backyard pool. Considering it was 35 degrees yesterday afternoon, I could hardly blame him. We had some good conversation and I discussed my plans for the week until another guest of his showed up; a colleague from his work who had come to enjoy the pool as well. I thanked him for all his help and excused myself. I made my way back to Dalhousie where I did some light banking and sat at the top of the hill, overlooking the bay. Enjoying some afternoon caffeine, I watched blissfully as the waters of the open bay ebb and flowed. Several boats, both sail and motorized, coast through its waters, enjoying the hot air and beautiful scenery. I must ave spent nearly an hour just sitting there. My hometown always brings wistful memories. Some good, some bad, but all imprinted in my mind as clear as if they happened yesterday. All imprinted as an integral part of my DNA and who I am. In seeing my mother and recognizing that my grandmother had faced the same difficulty, I asked myself if I was fated to eventually forget all these memories as well. That perhaps someday, the imprinted memories that made me who I am disappeared, much as they had for my mother. Once this happened, would I still be the same person? Who would I become? I’ve often asked myself who I am throughout my life. Never quite to this degree.‘
My evening capped off with a visit to Sensei’s home. Always a pleasure to speak with, we enjoyed some good conversation, that included some questions and corrections on my karate forms. It was good to see him. He asked about my family, both here and in Saskatchewan, and lended some sage advice on many aspects of life; something I’ve come to expect and admire about him. It gave the day a positive spin in an otherwise tumultuous cyclone of bullshit I faced while visiting my parents. Life is balance, right? For any negativity, there must be some positive. I made my way back to the hotel and ended my evening by seeing my wife and children over video chat. Short of being home with them, I couldn’t have ended the evening off on a better note. I drifted off to a dreamless sleep. My time here will see me accomplish a great deal, even if I don’t get the answers I came looking for. As with any other great book, eventually you need to finish out the chapter in order to turn the page and keep going. This may be the situation I find myself in now. While I was born and raised here, the chapter of my life that involves Northern New Brunswick may be coming to an end. While my thoughts will always return here, my purpose for being here may soon no longer be. That’s a chapter I”ll need to close in order for me to move on to the next. Such is life. ☯️
The Blogging Buddhist 