Time to say good-bye

My sister Sue called last night, and we had a long talk. I feel a little better about the trip to Michigan now. She helped. She doesn't usually. Usually, she means well, but pushes all my buttons making me feel angry, manipulated and impotent. Last night, either she was being more sensitive or I was being less so, but we cried together and ended the conversations with heartfelt I love yous.

Later this morning I will meet Jake in Manchester and we will drive to the Nashville Airport. Kelly is meeting us there. We will fly to Dallas where Dave will join us and then all four fly to Detroit. A very convoluted way to get from Point A to Point B, but such are the vagaries of Frequent Flier Miles.

I am so not looking forward to this trip. My brother's body has already been reduced to ashes. There will be no funeral, just a memorial service, in a temple instead of a church, where flowers are not permitted. It is going to feel slightly surreal, I am sure. It has been so hard waiting here alone in Tullahoma for a memorial service that is taking place more than two weeks after his death. I am feeling unusually fragile and fear I will lose control of myself at some point. I have been feeling physically sick for three days now. My head hurts. My heart hurts. My blood sugar is soaring or dropping, depending on the time of day, and I have been dangerously light-headed twice today. I am heartsick and the rest of my body is following suit.

It is an inconceivable loss, the death of a much younger brother. I remember him as a baby, as a child, as a teen, as a man, in much the same way as I remember my own children. Sue and I were surrogate mothers to Mike and Pat because our mother was a semi-invalid for almost our entire childhoods. We split the motherhood role. Sue was the nurturer, the story book reader, the tucker in at night. I was the disciplinarian, the enforcer. I didn't show my soft side to my brothers because I needed to maintain fear. I was given responsibility without authority, and so needed to be harder, meaner, scarier and tougher than they were so that not doing what I said was certain to be met with ruthless retribution. It was in hardness that I kept them safe and taught them the proper path.

But the soft feelings were there. I loved my baby brother. I dressed him up like he was a doll, and dragged him around in a wagon until my arms were pulled out of their sockets. When he was very little, he couldn't say "Kathy", as I was called then, and, to the delight of my siblings and cousins, called me "Kaka". Later, I was either Katie or Sissy. Not Kate. Not Sis. He must have known those softer feelings were there.

During our last visit together, Pat told me he was surprised at how well I had gotten my temper under control. I was angry all the time when I was a kid and young adult, and inclined to lash out suddenly and cuttingly at anyone who annoyed me. I told him I finally realized that I was taking my anger out on innocent people and not the people I was angry with, so I stopped doing it. He looked at me with something like wonder in his eyes.

Twenty five years of living separate and apart from my brothers and sister has robbed me of the opportunity of watching them evolve, and vice versa. Their image of me is still somewhat frozen in terms of our shared childhood. But I am not that hard, angry person anymore because I don't need to be. They will expect me to be strong this weekend. That is their image of me. I fear I won't be.

David left for San Diego the day after Patrick's death, so I have been trying to cope with my grief alone. I haven't done well. Complicating my grief is my resentment toward Dave for making me bear it alone. My rational self understands the demands of his job, and how he needed to be there because of job pressures. My irrational self feels it was unforgivable for him to leave me comfortless. I would not have done that to him.

I am tired and must be on the road in 6 hours, so I am going to bed. I must be rested. I am going to Michigan for my brother's memorial. I wish it had been me who had died instead.