Sunday Morning

I watched my mother die. I just didn’t know it at the time.

It was Saturday morning. I had spent my second night in a row by her side in the ICU. There was a rhythm to my visits. I had to teach on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I would stay all day Wednesday, and live there Friday morning through Sunday night. I used Mondays to save my sanity. Wednesdays I would drive, but for weekend stays, I took public transit to save me the stress of paying for parking. The bus was an experience.

* * *

The drive from my home to the hospital was nearly 45 minutes, so public transit was twice as long. I caught the No. 147 bus at Balmoral. It was an express that took riders from Chicago’s far North Side to the Magnificent Mile along Lake Shore Drive in about 10 minutes, depending on traffic. The commuters on this line were predominantly white, with a mixed bag of all the other races and ethnicities that lived north. I rode it all the way until its last stop in front of the Roosevelt University’s College of Performing Arts. The school was housed inside the historic Auditorium Building on Michigan Avenue. It‘s a beautiful building constructed in the late 1800s, with cable elevators that had manual operators. I sometimes took computer design courses there. The nostalgia of riding up and down the lifts was awesome, but the wait for them was brutal, but not so much that I was ever moved to take the stairs. I would sometimes stare at the architecture while waiting to transfer to the No. 4 bus that would take me to my final destination.

It was a brutally cold January–a brutally cold time. In the four weeks I spent living part time in the ICU, temperatures hovered around the 20s and there always seemed to be fresh snow on the ground. And just so I didn’t forget where I was, those infamous Chicago winds would pick up at all the right times and tear right through me.

Sometimes the cold wait for the bus was long. Sometimes not. I wasn’t always in a hurry to get to where I was going. I hope my mother forgives me for that.

* * *

Once the No. 4 bus arrived, it was a 40-minute trek to the hospital. The ride on this bus was as nostalgic as the ride inside the cable elevators. I was now headed to the South Side. The South Side was where my mother raised us. The South Side was where she died. The No. 4 bus was always filled with Black characters like those from my childhood. The young mother with a handful of children. The aging hustler selling loose cigs, or candy bars–and there were always buyers. The con artist working multiple flip phones just trying to handle whatever business he was into.

* * *

The weekend my mother died I decided to drive. There was a storm coming. I didn’t drive in bad weather, but I wanted the warmth and comfort of my car. I would usually worry about parking on the street, but I wised up and bought five parking passes so that I could stay overnight in the hospital garage. Each pass cost me $20, but the convenience and peace of mind was worth it. My cousin already had her car towed a few weeks earlier for a parking violation. I had to pay her fees and lose valuable time away from my mother’s bed side to retrieve her vehicle. I resented that my cousin made me feel like I had to worry about my mother and “No Parking” signs.

But, my cousin stayed with me when my mother was first admitted to the hospital. For two nights she didn’t leave our side. So, paying her fines was the least I could do–I came to feel this way, eventually.

* * *

During my drive to the hospital I wondered what antics were taking place on the No. 4 bus. The riders would no doubt be complaining about the weather with the driver. It was another characteristic of taking public transit on the South Side–community among strangers, especially when temperatures and snowflakes dropped.

I would have shared the stories of my travels on the No. 4 line with my mom, but she wasn’t herself anymore. I could talk to her, but she could no longer hear me. One of her many doctors told me that day that hearing loss was part of the dying process. I didn’t understand why he would tell me that.

It was Friday morning.

* * *

My mother was put in the ICU about a week after being admitted to the hospital. It was a good facility. Not like the one the ambulance initially brought her to. That place wasn’t equipped to deal with her cancer. This place could take better care of her.

She died at the better place about three weeks later.

* * *

Saturday morning was busy. Like all the days she had been there, doctors and nurses moved in and out of her room. There was plenty of space. It was the size of a studio apartment. There was the bed with the machines needed to read her vitals. I got pretty good at reading those machines. I knew the numbers for a good heart rate, and a good breathing rate.

There was a sink with lots of countertop space. Two sanitizer dispensers hung inside and outside the door–just in case someone forgot to cleanse their hands. There were gloves, and masks to keep my mother safe from everyone’s germs. There was a 32-inch flat screen TV mounted from the ceiling a few feet from the end of the bed. I always kept it on. My mother loved to watch TV. It kept her company when I couldn’t. All the weather folks said the coming storm was going to be a bad one.

Across the room was a wall of windows that overlooked a street that had rare free, non-permitted parking. On days when I took the bus, I’d get envious of someone who snagged an open space. That could have been me.

Near the window was a nude-colored recliner. That’s where I laid my head when I stayed at the ICU. I also took advantage of the couch in the waiting room. I didn’t miss an opportunity to escape there when staff came to attend to my mother’s more personal needs, like changing her clothes and linens, or other medical treatments. I couldn’t watch or hear her get poked and prodded.

As I sat teary-eyed in the waiting area on Saturday morning, I felt compelled to call my old friend Laura who lived nearby. I was increasingly overwhelmed with emotion. I could usually pull myself together, but I no longer had the strength to do so. She had helped my cousin and I with getting my cousin’s car from the tow yard. I hoped she would help me again. When Laura answered, I could hear in her voice that she was under the weather.

“Can you come sit with me?”

I had enough composure to get those words out without becoming incomprehensible.

She said no. She said she was too sick and didn’t want to make things worse.

How could things be worse?

* * *

As I sat waiting to return to my mother’s room, her friend Edward walked into the waiting area. I wasn’t expecting him. He sat next to me on the couch. He often sat across from me.

Edward was handsome. He was brown-skinned, tall and kind. When we first met the spring before I thought he may have been more than friends with my mom, even though he was much younger than her. That wasn’t the case.

I cried while resting my head on his shoulder. He suggested we leave and get some air. Get something to eat. I hadn’t been more than a few feet away from my mother’s side since arriving Friday morning, so I said yes.

* * *

Before leaving to get lunch with Edward, I checked on the status of the poking and prodding.

By the fourth week of my mother’s stay in ICU, I had become familiar with most of the doctors and nurses, but on this day, a new face showed up. She was an older black woman who was there to manage my mother’s feeding tube. She came in as the last nurse finished checking my mother’s vitals. I was standing next to the bed. On my mother’s right side. It was my preferred side.

She introduced herself to me. She was kind. I continued to be overwhelmingly grief stricken that day. I didn’t know why I couldn’t shake it off. This new person wrapped her arm around my shoulder. She spoke softly to me, as if she didn’t want anyone else to hear.

“I can see how much you love your mother.”

I wept. I nodded. I babbled about wanting to be a good daughter and wanting to do the right thing by my mother.

“She knows you’re here,” she said. “She knows how much you love her and that you’re a great daughter.”

The woman did her best to comfort me. She then told me that the feeding tube was no longer working. That it was just filling her body with fluids, causing her to bloat. Causing her more pain. She said it was time to remove the tube. Do I have your permission to remove the feeding tube?

In between my crying and breathing I replayed the question in my head.

“Do I have your permission to remove the feeding tube?”

* * *

During the second week of my mother’s time in the hospital she had to have surgery. It was her second surgery in two weeks. They had to remove a bowel blockage. The surgeon told me the procedure would take two hours. About four hours later I finally saw her name appear on the electronic board in the waiting area under the “in recovery” column.

Due to some complications she had to be put on a breathing tube for a few days. When the doctors removed it, we all discussed what to do if she ever needed another breathing tube.

“No,” my mother said. “I don’t ever want to have another tube down my throat again.”
“Mommy, do you understand what that means?”
“Yes.”

* * *

It was early in the afternoon when Edward and I got lunch. We went to a spot that was a neighborhood staple. I suggested it. My mother and I had lunch there years before, after seeing Misery at the theater on Christmas Eve. By that time in our lives, I was a teenager and we were on our journey to becoming friends.

The place was the same. It was a classic Chicago eatery. So long as folks came in to eat, there was no need to change the décor. I ordered chili and a salad. My diet had been poor during those weeks living part-time in the hospital. The cafeteria had typical cafeteria fare, and there weren’t any places to eat within walking distance of the hospital.

I felt bad for being hungry. I always felt bad for leaving my mother’s side to eat. I thought people lost their appetites during times like this. I just wanted an excuse to escape. I couldn’t bring food into the ICU, so I used hunger to turn away from her suffering. There was an Au Bon Pain in an adjoining building. The building where the normal sick people stayed. I wished my mother was in that building.

* * *

Edward was nice. He was always nice. He talked a lot about my mother. He said she was a kind, good woman. He told me she would go with him every Saturday to sit with a friend of his who was in hospice.

I didn’t like that word.

He smiled a lot. He tried to get me to feel better. He really tried.

* * *

When Edward drove me back to the hospital, I was relieved to see my mother. I caressed her face and legs as I often did. I didn’t say much. I didn’t know what to say. I was worried about the coming storm. It was supposed to dump half a foot of snow overnight. If I stayed, I might be stuck there until Monday. If I left…I was terrified of leaving.

* * *

I spent the next hour staring out the window of her room looking for snowfall. There hadn’t been much activity since the morning. No doctors. No nurses. Just me.

I became overwhelmed with grief again. I needed someone there for me. I was afraid to ask. What right did I have to ask anyone to come out in this pending weather just to hold my hand. Laura said no. Edward had done what he could.

I went through the contacts on my cell. I landed on my friend Jim. We had become good work friends. I needed a good friend.

As soon as he answered I began to cry. I could hardly speak. He put his wife Denise on the line. Men often put their wives on the line when the voice on the other side begins to cry.

“You shouldn’t be alone,” she said.

An hour later, they were sitting with me.

* * *

As night approached clouds began to move in, but only light flurries fell from the sky.

Denise and Jim brought me some snacks. Denise always had snacks. Though she didn’t have children, she treated everyone like her child. She took care of them. They gave me a bag of fruit, nutrition bars and water. I sat tucked away in the nude-colored recliner while Denise held my mother’s hand for me. She stood on her left side.

Jim sat next to me while I cried. I was so relieved when they came. I didn’t realize how much I needed someone else there with me.

Jim and Denise stayed as long as they could. They had a long drive back home and the storm was quickly approaching. The clock in the room slowly ticked toward 6 p.m.

* * *

After they left, I spoke to my mom more than I had in a day or two. I wanted her to let me know if I should get home before the roads got bad, or if I should stay overnight like I usually did. I needed her to tell me what to do. I couldn’t make any more adult decisions.

The clock ticked toward 7 p.m. I could see bigger and heavier snowflakes ascend from the sky. I looked at her heart monitor. The numbers weren’t great, but they were holding steady. I had this feeling that I should go.

* * *

By the time I got to the garage at least an inch of snow had already come down. As I drove northbound along Lake Shore Drive, I felt as if I was leaving her behind. I had made that trip a dozen or so times over those four weeks and I always felt guilty about leaving my mother alone in that room. That night the guilt took my breath away.

I gripped the steering wheel so tight that my fingers ached once I got home. I always let my mother know when I got home at the end of the day. Sometimes I’d text her. Sometimes I’d call. During those weeks as she deteriorated and could no longer use her phone, I chose to text. I thought maybe she’d hear the notification and she’d know I was ok.

I didn’t text that night.

* * *

I had gotten home around 8:30. I was tired, but couldn’t rest my head. It was just too early. I turned on the TV, hoping to find some comfort as my mom had spent so many nights doing. By 12:30 I was finally ready to go to bed.

I thought my eyes had only been closed for a few minutes when my phone rang. I saw 4 a.m. and “University of Chicago Hospital” on my home screen. I immediately answered the phone.

“Hello, is this Renee.”
“Yes.”
“You need to come back to the hospital. Your mother died.”

* * *

Nearly half a foot of snow was on the ground. Even under good conditions I had no business driving. I called my friend Marty to get me. He was the only friend I had who lived on the northside and had a car.

It took him nearly an hour to get me. The drive to the hospital was precarious. The roads were covered with snow and ice. Luckily, at that hour there wasn’t much traffic, and most Chicagoans had hunkered down in preparation of the storm. Marty was quiet and focused on the road. I hated the way he drove. He was too slow. Too careful. I needed to get to my mother.

I hated the way he drove.

It took nearly an hour to get to the hospital. I had two more parking passes left. As we headed to the elevators and walked from the normal sick people building to the ICU, I realized this that would be my last time taking that walk. I had gone back and forth so often that I had worn the heels down on my winter boots – boots my mother had given me for Christmas just a few weeks ago. My pace was steady, but slowed as we entered her room. I had lost track of Marty. It didn’t’ matter where he was. He got me there.

My mother lay in bed without tubes inserted into her. The sheets were pulled high up to her chin. All the machines were off. The TV was off. It was quiet. It was cold. Her skin looked to already be tightening. Her mouth gaped open.

I collapsed on top her. I wept. I shook. I yelled for my Mommy.

It was Sunday morning.