This has been an especially bad day

POSTSCRIPT 11/18/08

This is going to be another self-absorbed article, the sort that I write whenever I’m feeling self-indulgent. If it bores you, I don’t overmuch care. -BV

My heart is heavy and I’m not sure I can cope. Tonight I had to tell my mother (again) that my brother Mark was dead.

My mother hasn’t had what you’d call an easy life. She grew up in suburban London during the German blitz, she came to America alone in the early 50’s and ended up on the docks in NYC alone on New Years Eve, expecting to be met by her fiancé but met by no one. She made her own way for a few years before marrying my father...and that was no picnic either. Neither were her two sons.

The younger of those sons, Mark William Rosecrans, died last January at the age of 47. I remember that night all too well; the phone call, the tears, having to tell my mother that her youngest son was gone, telling her that no, it wasn’t a mistake, holding her as we both cried. The events of that night are engraved as if in stone in my memory.

And I’ve never gotten over them...and I’m not sure I want to. For me, "letting go" (as my friends all advise) would feel like giving up all that I still hold of Mark, and I don’t care if all I have left is this gnawing grief; if that’s all I have to hold on to then that’s what I’ll hold on to.

But tonight, as I was making her dinner, she asked me where my brother had gone, said he was just here with his son and where had he gone?

My mother will be eighty years old in January, and she’s not altogether all together any more. In short, she forgets things. Lots of things. She forgets to do things I ask her to do, she forgets not to do the things I’ve asked her not to do, she forgets to bathe or feed herself and can’t turn on her TV or light her own cigarettes. I’m sure she doesn’t know her age or who’s President or what day or month or year it is.

And tonight she forgot that she had lost her son.

And I had to tell her. Again.

I told her that Mark was lost to us, that she would never see him again, that it must have been a dream when she thought she’s seen him. What else could I say? Should I have lied to her, told her that he’d just gone to the store and he’d be back soon, told her that I’d let her know as soon as he got back? I could never do that. (It would be so much easier if I could, but I can’t.)

Should I have taken her at her word, and believed her? Should I just accept that (for her at least) Mark had come back to her, perhaps to say goodbye? That, too, would be easier but I can’t do that either; I can’t make myself believe in something that I can’t otherwise believe, and I can’t pretend that I believe. Not to my mother, anyway.

So I told her what I’d told her that night in January. I told her that he was gone, that we’d lost him, that I was so sorry, that I would miss him for the rest of my life just as I knew she would.

And the worst part is that I know that is a few weeks, or however long it takes for her to forget, I’ll have to do it again. Now, how could I possibly let go of my brother when I’ll periodically have to reenact the night I learned of his death, the most difficult moment of my life?

Oddly enough, I’d been planning an article about Mark, about how this was his favorite time of year, about how hard it was to see the leaves turning or the snow falling without having him around, but I just can’t do it now. I can’t get all nostalgic about something that is causing me so much pain. I miss Mark so terribly. It’s taken me a while to write this article because I have to stop frequently and cry like a baby. I am not, and I suspect never will be, over his loss.

And all I have to look forward to is having to relive this horror again.

The Blues Viking


I held on to this article for about an hour, unsure that I would post it. I finally decided to do so (obviously) since I didn’t think I’d ever be able to post again with the specter of this article haunting me. So here it is, more for my own peace of mind than for anyone's enlightenment, and if you don’t appreciate drivel like this I can’t say I blame you, but go fuck yourself. -BV

Postscript--A reader has advised me to remove that last "go fuck yourself" line, saying that it "...besmirches a beautiful blog entry." My response was that perhaps it needed besmirching. I went on: "I am, by nature, a crude man and I make no apologies for that, nor do I revel in it, but it does sometimes color how I express myself and I am aware that that's not a good thing. But I felt that way when I posted the article, and I feel that way now." But I do sincerely apologize if my language offended anyone; I do not apologize in the slightest for what I said, merely for how I chose to say it. Which I would probably choose again. I also said, "These are the dangers of not having an editor." -BV