Happy Mother's Day!! Final Excerpt from "A Mother's Love...

This section is from Pages 180-183 of my book.

 One afternoon I was heading to the hospital to visit with my mother, but as I arrived at her room the bed was empty and cleaned, I instantly felt weak in the knees and I panicked.  I thought she may have died during the night and I was completely unaware.  As I paced the cancer ward frantically trying to find her, a nurse who had recognized me approached, and informed me that around 1am that morning my mother had been transferred to the I.C.U. ward at their sister hospital next door.  I experienced so many emotions as I sprinted to the other hospital, was this the end, why had nobody informed me, where was my father?!?  I entered the I.C.U. ward and immediately started searching for my mother.  After a few minutes of panicked wandering I spotted my mother lying in a bed.  She looked as frail as I had ever seen her, and it was as if all the life had been sucked out of her.  On top of that she was hooked up to several machines including a respirator.  I was all alone and I was losing my mind.  I turned the corner and fell to the ground crying.  As I attempted to wipe away the tears and stand back up I noticed my father heading towards me.  If it wasn’t for the fact that I felt some remorse for what my father must have been going through, I’m sure I would have punched him in the face right then and there.  I was furious and filled with rage.  As he approached I immediately asked him, “What is wrong with you, when did you now mom was transferred, and why wasn’t I immediately notified!?”  My slightly emotionless father actually replied with, “It was late, and I didn’t want to disturb you!”  I was filled with a rage I have never felt before.  “It was late, that’s the best you can come up with!?”  I continued to attack, “I had to go to the wrong hospital, think my mother had died, and then I find her like this!?”  I couldn’t fathom what my father had done.  “Did you actually think this would be a better way for me to find her, why didn’t you call me first thing in the morning?” The onslaught of questions I had left my father speechless.  Lastly I looked him square in the eye and said, “Just to be clear, when it comes to my mother’s life, I don’t care what time it is or where you are, you notify me immediately, are we clear?”  He may have apologized, but to this day I have no recollection of it.  My father told me that we should go check on my mother because he only had a few minutes before he had to leave to play tennis!?  I spared him my next rant but I honestly could not believe that there lay his wife, and the mother of his children, hanging on by a thread, and he was going to play tennis.  What world was this, who would behave like this, I was baffled and losing my mind.  Together, my father and I made our way to my mother’s bed and she was barely conscious.  I stood by the foot of her bed and I placed my hand on her ankle as I was preparing to come closer.  My mother raised her hand at me and it was clear she was not waving hello.  I knew it had a couple of meanings; firstly, it meant stop, don’t come any closer, I won’t let you see me like this, and secondly it meant I love you and goodbye!  I then stood there frozen in time as she motioned for my father to come close.  She reached for his hand and just gazed in his eye’s for what seemed like an eternity.  My father was completely oblivious, and when I recounted this event for him in later years he had zero recollection, but my mother was saying good-bye.  With that my father and I left and went our separate ways, It was the last time either of us would see her alive with the exception of a few minutes on the respirator before she passed away later the next day.  As we would find out later that week, my aunt was actually the last person to speak to her and even when things were looking very grim and my mother had no chance of recovery, my aunt told her it was okay to “let go”.  My mother actually refused and told her and the doctors that if she lost consciousness she wanted to be intubated, which simply meant she wanted to go on a respirator to help her breathe.  What a woman, she was a fighter to the very end!  The day my mother was pronounced dead I remember sitting in her room with her lifeless body as it is Jewish tradition to remain with the body until it is time for her to be moved to the funeral home.  My father and brother were there too and it felt like we were 2 separate groups mourning the same mother and wife.  Both of them stood on one side of her body grieving and consoling each other while I stood crying by myself on the other.  At one point they put their arms around me and we gave my mother one last group hug.  For me it felt like charity and at that very moment I knew I was all alone.  The one person who never judged me and always supported me was gone, I felt empty, and a part of me died that day, Aug. 13/2006.  About a week or two before my mother passed away I was sitting with her in the hospital and I started writing what would be my final song.  As I returned home the night she died, I immediately finished writing the song and I recorded it that same night.  I put my pen down that day and I haven’t written another song since.