cHiCaGo. i have been remiss in updating this. oh well. such is life. it goes by quickly. and often i am stunned by how unremarkable and utterly wild and wonderful it is at the same time. i always feel as though nothing is going on, nothing is happening, nothing is of note. and then i stop and look at things for a moment and realize that i cannot even begin to capture all that is going on, all that has gone on in the past week, month, year. so i will jump back on the horse of posting some of my thoughts and observations and experiences here with an incomplete sampling of reflections from my new year's trip to chicago...



*****************************

it is not to say that having gone to chicago makes me more at ease with my father's death,
it's just
that
every story needs a setting
and this
this well may be
one of the biggest stories of my life
one of the most significant
the most life-changing
and for 20 years
it had no setting
and i owed it to myself
i owed it to my father
to put all the pieces of his story together
to give it that fundamental element, its core
we both
deserve
at least that much
and now
he dropped dead
somewhere
i can
see and feel and taste and smell
and i rest a little better at night
and i hope
i trust
that he does too..........


*****************************

and so it goes. and so it goes. and so i go. blind and bumbling, rushing rashly, no stopping to ponder, no careful review, no wise or weighed decisions. gut instinct. always gut instinct. for all my worrying and analyzing and doubting, i still do this each and every time. jump. leap. go.

i am 2 months from 20 years. 20 years that my father has been dead. 20 years of life without the person who perhaps loved me most and most unconditionally. 20 years without the person of whom i am supposed to be some replica. 20 years of grief. of knowing what loss is, of knowing what pain is, of knowing what loneliness is. 20 years of missing him. 20 years of mourning him. 20 years of moving on.

i am also just under 10 months from turning 30. don't think this doesn't haunt me every day. multiple times a day. i am old. when did this happen? how did this happen? what am i doing with my life? what am i going to do with my life? i am not an adult. not in my mind. dear god, i see myself as being so foolish, so naïve, in such constant struggle to become a better person, to do something productive, to figure out who i truly am and find some sort of peace with that person. i am trying to grow up. fast. before i hit 30. to do something. make something. be something.

and, as of a few hours ago, i am less than 2 months away from setting foot in the spot where my father died. 20 years ago. a place i have never been. a place that for a long time i thought i never would go. and now, well, i am running around like a crazy person trying to put all the pieces together and finagle my schedule and take time off i don't have coming to me to do this. to go there. on new year's eve. of course.

this will be a pilgrimage for me. of a scope that even i am yet to understand. as soon as it occurred to me last evening, standing on the first balcony of terminal 5 straining to see band of horses on the stage below, as i seriously considered trying to make a trip to chicago for new year's to see spoon with anna & colleen happen. as soon as i put two and two together and saw myself landing in chicago at o'hare airport. as soon as the seed planted in my brain that i would be visiting, passing through the exact spot where my father collapsed from a massive and fatal coronary nearly 20 years ago, something exploded, in the very deepest part of me a voice said "you are going" and in the next instant i was consumed by an energy, an emotion, the intensity and strength of which stunned me. i was silenced by it. my body, my mind, my heart became vessels for it, innocent bystanders and onlookers and let it do its thing. i stayed very still, looking ahead, careful not to turn around to my friends, for fear of what they would see or what this emotional surge was capable of. i stood there and felt the throbbing between my ribs, the pulsating ache inside my chest, i stood there and let the tears come silent and hot, and i tried desperately to size this thing up. and i couldn't. it was like looking at a horizon out in the middle of nowhere, no end in sight, no beginning, no end, no left, no right, no up, no down. and it scares the shit out of me.

and i am determined to go. no matter how crazy, how irresponsible, how impossible. i need to do this. i have opened up whatever channel in myself that had been closed to being in that place where he took his last breath and thought his last thought. and i fear that if i don't go, this sadness, this longing, this wonder, this trepidation will just continue to grow. until i finally do something about it. clearly it has been there this whole time, growing and festering. something about pandora and her box, right?

dear god.

i have wondered so many times about his death. it was public. in line at the gate for his connecting flight to las vegas. he fell face first when he had the coronary. he hit the ground hard, or so the swelling and bruises on the face of his corpse indicated. who saw? what did they think? did they know or guess or surmise he had a wife and two young daughters waiting innocently at home in massachusetts for his return from this business trip? have they thought about it since? was it gory? was it scary? did it scar them for life? do they even remember now, 20 years down the road, it happening? did they all just go on and board the plane? what was the energy on that flight like i wonder? all those people who had just watched a man die.

the pieces for this sojourn came together with a speed and an ease that surprised me. i had expected more resistance, more hurdles i suppose, based solely on the fact i suppose that nothing is ever easy and my permanent pessimism and conviction that i never get anything i want. and, yet, this trip fell in my lap, my flight bought for me by tricia, the arrangements made for us by colleen…the leg work i had to do to get the studio covered in my absence was minimal in the scope of things. and, so, before i knew it, it was all on my calendar, a departure sunday december 30th out of jfk on jetblue at 9pm and a return on wednesday january 2nd out of o'hare on jetblue at 7pm. and i was moving towards it, rapidly and recklessly, my trip to o'hare….
i am somewhat stupefied, somewhat shocked that i am really going. i can't really wrap my mind around it all and all of its implications right now. i have become somewhat numb. it is too massive, too morphous, too delicate to fully unpack and explore in this cramped little period of time before it happens. so it will get thrown into the luggage with everything else and it will do what it will do and be what it will be when it happens. which i suppose is how it should be.

*****************************

and all of a sudden, we were there
the plane was descending
lights became visible
a skyline
chicago

CHICAGO

and in my hand i clutched
a photograph
of me and amy and daddy
taken in front of the house on blacksmith lane
on graduation day
nursery school graduation
st roberts country day school

the last graduation he saw
the only graduation...
no elementary school
no middle school
no high school
no college

nursery school

1982

and now

it's 2007
and my 29 year old self
is clutching this photo
this image
this memory
descending onto the location of his death
and it is too much
i feel like the tears will choke me
drown me
i am not okay
have i ever been okay?
in the last 20 years
HAVE I EVER BEEN OKAY?

no.

i know this now.


no.

NO.

and i'm still not.

and i may never be.

i miss him.
oh my god do i miss him
as much now as the day i found out
maybe more.

and so i clutch this photo
and i clutch anna
and anna clutches me

and she asks to see the photo

and

of course
she can

i want her to

to have some visual image
of what i am missing
of who we were
of who he was

but i
i become so embarrassed
i feel so naked
and vulnerable
handing her this photo
this is the very deepest
dearest
part of me

a piece i hold
tight
white knuckle tight
always
constantly
for eternity

and i have never felt
more exposed
than in this moment
of letting it go
or letting her in
or both....

i never realized how protective i am of him
how safely i guard his memory
until now....

and anna takes the photo
sweet
kind
wicked
witty
beautiful
dependable
reliable
loyal
loving
anna
and she sees, for the first time i believe, if i remember right,
what my dad looked like
she gets that look on her face
that most people get
when the pieces start coming together
it hits her
how young we all were
how innocent
how naive
how unaware
how unprepared
young and dumb and happy on the front lawn at 32 blacksmith lane, my dad trying to hold us still enough for the photo to be taken
and she asks, looking at these 2 little girls in tee shirts with iron-on glittery mice and rainbows and navy blue skirts:
did you always dress alike?
god bless anna
who can make you laugh
while you are sobbing
no
it was graduation
that was the "uniform"
oh
okay
and her grip on my hand tightens
she rubs my arm
she holds me
she cries with me
she wants to make this okay
she wants to make me feel better
but
she also seems to understand
oh perceptible anna
that that is impossible
and the plane descends
and i am alone
and not alone
that old dichotomy
that tricky game grief plays with me
a world of shit inside of me,
rushing around so rapidly and constantly,
that even i don't understand

oh god
okay
i am okay
i am going to be okay
just keep breathing
just let it come
and keep breathing
don't stop breathing

the wheels hit the ground
for a moment i pause
giving into the superstition that this place is cursed
waiting for the plane to hit something or skid off the runway
waiting to die some gruesome death in a plane crash at o'hare
did you know that her father died at that airport, too?
i know! and that's why she was flying there, she had never gone. she was making peace, turning over a new page.
so sad
i know
we are on the ground
in chicago
at o'hare
just get me off this fucking plane
i am done with this plane
i am ready to deal with the terminal, the airport
and keep this show moving
we have colleen waiting
and jocelyn and julius waiting
and jim waiting
i want to get through this
and keep moving
i can recognize this grief
this is the kind where if you stop it will eat you alive
if you stop
you will wallow
and you will have a bitch of a time climbing back out of it
so don't stop
julia
don't stop
i get up as soon as possible
i have my bag from the overhead
my retardedly and miraculously overpacked bag containing three pairs of boots
plus the fourth pair that i am wearing
no one needs 4 pairs of boots for a 3 day trip
and i am ready to disembark by the time we hit the gate
in the aisle
in line
here we are at the gate at last
here we....don't go
the door won't open
the door
won't open
they can't open the door
they can't get us off of the plane


*****************************

o'hare is ugly
the ceilings seem a tad too low
it feels
compressed
long & winding
massive
never-ending
but
compressed
too tight
claustrophobic
it feels
out of date
most gates
seem to
have been that way for
years
and
years
and
years
rugs from the 80's
maybe even the 70's
versions of airline logos
that have long since
been retired
still as signage
it is in and of itself
depressing
some glaring flourescent lit hell
i cannot imagine
it looked much different in 1988
maybe newer?
god, i hope so
what an awful place to die
alone
in public
at an airport
an ugly
cramped
tunnel
of an airport
crowded and chaotic
dingy
dirty
stinking
of deep fried this
or double dipped that
perfume and body odor
stale cigarettes
industrial strength janitorial supplies
teaming with people
with bad hair
and worse clothing
people who eat the shit i'm smelling
people whose arteries should be those clogging
people who should be having heart attacks
it just sickens me
saddens me
angers me
to think about it
everything around him
was tacky and cheap
or utterly unfamiliar
it's just not right
he deserved something better
it's all i can think
as i look at this airport
o'hare
my god
this is it?
this is the place?
it is so ugly, so unremarkable
i don't know what i had expected
but something
somehow
more impressive
and as we make our way
out of this nasty maze
towards baggage claim
and clamoring increasingly impatient colleen
and jocelyn and julius' van
and freedom! chicago!
i notice
AED
automatic
electronic
defibrilators
on the wall
every few feet
my god
everywhere
all so clearly marked
with a big red sign
with a white heart and lightning bolt
and
i notice them
each and every one of them
and i want to know
when were they installed?
(they seem the newest cleanest part of this midwestern hellhole)
and why?
is he
was he
a number
that contributed
to chicago
needing to do something
about people dropping dead
and...
did the paramedics
who found his body
on o'hare's dirty floor
have paddles with them?
use them?
would they have helped?
could they have...
had ugly congested o'hare
had paddles every few feet along its lackluster walls
on january 6 1988
would
no policeman
have rung our doorbell
in andover, massachusetts
at 5am
to tell the wife
of thomas richard henderson, jr
the mother of his two young daughters
8 and 9
the unspeakable news..........................

well,
they are here now
and i am here now
and he is not.....


*****************************


every once in a while
it all comes into focus
i catch a glimpse
i see clearly
what this was
is
my grief
like a kaleidoscope of sorts
that moment when all those
pretty colored pieces
stop & form
that picture you've been waiting
to see
then your hand shifts
the pieces shift
the image is gone...
from time to time
i can see with absolute clarity
(my grief)
the scope of my loss
the breadth of my pain
the magnitude of my loneliness
the tattered
rag tag
threadbare
soul
that i am
i see each gap
each hole
each scar
each place i tied myself back together
each missing piece
each piece of filler
each patch
each bandaid
i see it
(all)
i feel it
(all)
i understand it
(all)
i get it
(all)

i accept it


it is like staring out
into some
huge abyss
and making sense
out of the incomprehensible

but
this knowledge
this understanding
this vision
is just an experience
it will pass
like any experience
it passes
and leaves a murky not-quite memory
like childbirth
the mother knows it hurt
she knows how much
in theory
but in actuality
if she knew how much
it really hurt
if she relived that pain
when she recalled it
no woman would ever have another child
and so
from time to time
i know
what it was
to lose my father

when these moments come
all time stands still
the world it freezes
and i stand
in wonder
awe
jaw gaping open
terrified
and empowered
by this knowledge
knowing it will end
desperate to make it last
i climb into this moment
try to wedge it open with my body
as it quickly presses closed
and pushes me out

sometimes
it brings me peace
sometimes
it brings me to despair

on new year's eve day
in chicago
it brought me to a point
of misery
unspeakable
misery
fucking
god-damned
GRIEF


*****************************


i laid down to sleep
depleted
dehydrated
i laid down to rest
worn out
exhausted
overtired
overwired
i, gently as i could,
laid my weary bones
on my borrowed air mattress
pulled my borrowed blanket
tight around
my cold and shivering form
ready to sleep
replenish
restore
no more...for now
and suddenly
violently
mercilessly
unexpectedly
it overcame me

my pain
my anger
my confusion
my guilt
my sorrow
my regrets
my love
my loneliness
my longing
my disappointment

WHY?
why you?
why us?
why then?

what am i supposed to do?

how do i go on??

why should i go on???

how will i ever be happy again?

???????

in a flood
in an instant
i could not catch my breath
through the tears
as my whole body shook
as i drown
in snot
and tears
and fear

i was on the brink
of something...
what?
and was i ever coming back?

absolutely
perfectly
alone

in a room with 2 of my best friends

alone.

there was no way
to express
this state
to ask for help
i was so terribly alone
in more pain than i can ever remember being
missing him
relentlessly
endlessly
being bludgeoned by
the enormity
of
HOW MUCH I MISS HIM
suffocating
from 20 years
of
MISSING HIM

i was
cold
and
shivering
and
sobbing
with absolutely
no idea
how to make it STOP.