Diary from a Cancer Ward: Just a Mother

Pat’s Journal

 6/21/85 continued

          I’m so alone. Cut off. The world continues to spin on course outside of my daughter’s window. I can see it, but cannot reach it. A glass jar has dropped down to contain us. We can see out, but we cannot get out.

          The air inside grows thin. I have to find a way out soon, or we will die.  

  From the woods behind our house

          It is now late into the night and everyone else is sound asleep. I have been sitting on Heidi’s bed since the latter part of the evening – and praying. Only the rows of stuffed animals that line the walls and cover the bed almost burying the sleeping child, keep me company. The wind blows through the window, gently moving the Holly-Hobbie curtains. Light from the street lamp filters in and softly illuminates the lavender walls.

          Heidi has not once stirred, nor asked why I am here. Her swollen face sinks heavily into the pillow and she does not move with the normal movements of a sleeping child. Instead, she lay there stone-like. Coma-like.

          I pray with every ounce of strength and longing that I can pull up. I reach further and further down until I can reach no farther, for that is all I can do. I am not a doctor. I am not a surgeon.

          I am only a mother.

          So, I pray…

…for what else is left for me to do?

The Two Trees: Dogwood and Christmas

The limbs of the dogwood tree meander gracefully outside our kitchen window. In the spring, flowers festoon its branches in clusters like puffs of pink snow. Heidi loved that tree.

And she loved the birds that sang from those branches. Her Nana gave her a birdfeeder one birthday. I hung it under the porch roof, right outside the kitchen’s window. Season after season, Heidi watched the birds in the dogwood tree as they waited their turn at the feeder.

One Sunday morning in January, as she sat confined to the wheelchair necessitated by a stroke, she said, “Mom – look! Look at the pretty bird!”

I glanced at the pile of equipment that overflowed the foyer, waiting to be loaded for the morning service. But a still, small voice said, “Sit. Have breakfast with your daughter.”

So I put the chore off and sat with her a few moments.

Church was glorious that morning. I could sense God’s presence permeating the worship in a sweet way that often eludes the one serving as the worship leader due to the nature of the work. But that morning, His nearness almost overwhelmed me, yet somehow I managed to keep leading and not turn into a voiceless puddle. The afterglow stayed with me the whole day.

After lunch, I asked Heidi if she wanted to take a nap or help me takedown the Christmas tree. Twelfth Night had passed, and now for our family Christmas was over. Normally Heidi would jump at the chance to help with the tree. Long-term radiation damage had become increasingly compromised her ability to do much with the ornaments. Still, she found a way to cradle one between her paralyzed left hand and her body, and use the functioning right hand to deal with the hook. Her chatter made for good company, and we both looked forward to these times together.

So I asked her, fully expecting her to opt for the tree. But she looked at me a long moment. Time seemed to suspend. Then she said, “Mom? I’m tired, now. I would like to go to sleep.”

Those were the last words I ever heard her speak…

Dusty Pictures: Heidi Elizabeth Kashtock

Dusty Pictures

verse 1:

I dusted your picture today

and I remember

when life was full of promise

and the dreams we had

were something yet to be known

I look at you, your picture

with eyes of brown

a heart of gold and I remember,

I remember…

Chorus:

Oh, where did the time go

the child go

when did she leave?

I want to know

what happened

how did it happen

is it real?

Verse 2:

I reach out to hold you but all

I hold is a picture

your picture with the smile

that always warmed my heart

Must it be that I will never

see your eyes again sparkle

the way that they sparkled

in the sunlight? and I remember,

I remember…

Chorus:

Oh, where did the time go

the child go

when did she leave?

I want to know

what happened

how did it happen

is it real?

Bridge:

And I’m left here

askin’ all the questions

never hearing the answers

never hearing your laughter…

only the falling of dust

onto the rug

Chorus:

Oh, why did she go

must it be so

I will never…

I’ll never know

what happened

how it happened…

what might have been…

Patricia Hammell Kashtock