A Change Of Plans

This weekend I received a phone call from Betsy, my deceased wife's sister, one of three. When my wife, Ann was in desperate trouble, Betsy came out from Ohio, hoping that in coming and taking Ann back to Ohio with her, she might be saving Ann's life. It didn't work. Ann died in less than a year. That was in 2001, a month after 9/11. Betsy and I really like each other and have stayed connected through the years. She had news for me. Mary, Ann's elder sister has passed. Mary's death also, like Ann's, was an alcoholic death driven by mental illness. Now mother and both oldest sisters have died in the same general way. Alcoholism in this case is batting four for three. That is because within two months of his wife's death, Ann and Mary's dad died of a heart attack. I wound up writing a poem today about scattering Ann's ashes which I am going to post, jumping the queue. The poem records an event that took place in 2002.

Ann wanted her ashes scattered in Lake Erie and Betsy did that. Betsy held a portion of her ashes back for me and I still have a small stash that I may scatter sometime. I scattered Ann up at Willamette National Cemetary with her aunt and uncle buried there, behind our old house where we lived for more than ten years, under the dogwood tree here at this house, and I took her to Newport, Oregon, where we started out after grad school. It was her first job in Social Work, working for the State of Oregon. It was my first job as a designer after I had trained as a drafter for two years with a firm in Portland. We got married there in Newport. I dumped most of Ann's ashes (the small portion given to me) in a shallow depression I dug in the sand at the tideline, letting the surge take her where it would.

Mary had a harder time getting along with anyone as her illness progressed. Ann and Mary did not do well, especially at the last when Ann was so sick and now Mary has died a similar death.

By the way, there is more alcoholism present in this story. Ann's aunt was the victim of a drunk driving accident. Her husband was driving and they were hit by a drunk driver. They were hit broadside which spun the car around, and Ann's aunt was thrown from the passenger seat and died of her injuries at the scene. The couple in the back seat were also killed in the impact. Ann's uncle, who was driving, had the right of way, and the drunk ran a stop sign. Her uncle walked away without a scratch and so did that drunk. Ann's uncle has since passed, living over a decade without his wife. That is part of why I felt it right to put some of Ann's ashes at their gravestone. Now I can periodically visit them all. I do. I consider that place a power point in my life. None of the family are near. One year there were flowers from an unknown source on that grave. It might've been the kids. It also might've been the drunk, who we were told settled in the Portland area. The thing about the flowers, there didn't seem to be enough of them, nor of the right kind to have been from the kids.

I am pensive just now.

The Long Green Glass

With my friends I took
as you gave me your ashes
to Newport, the beach
we would walk early
in our years together, when
we had no money
nor did we know what

would come. I dug a tideline
hole for you, there placed
your dream as it poured
from the long green glass a thin
ashy stream as we
who knew you witnessed
the tide come for you and take
away from us all

old false empty hope.

August 3, 2009 12:59 PM