Then Again - Diane Keaton [92]
I went home the next morning and told Duke and Dexter that “Grammy’s heart slowed down, and she stopped breathing. She had a good ending.” “Grammy had a good ending?” “Yes, Dex.” “She didn’t deserve to die,” Duke said. I told him once again how her heart slowed down. But this time I added the miracles. I talked about the day her fingertips started to turn crimson, and how as time passed the color slowly began to crawl up her arms and legs, and how her body began to look like a beautiful plum. That was the first miracle. Then I told them how things changed on the night of Grammy’s death. Her lips turned an indigo blue like the ocean at sunset. I told them I didn’t know the exact moment Grammy passed away, because I was distracted by the sudden sound of flapping wings. I looked outside and there in the dark was a swarm of seagulls standing on the deck, as if they were trying to say goodbye to the nice lady who used to throw bread crumbs on the seawall’s deck. When I turned back and saw Grammy’s arms, then hands, and even her ocean-blue lips return to normal, I knew I was in the presence of a miracle. But the biggest miracle came when I looked into her eyes: The same beautiful brown eyes that had been closed for seven long days and seven long nights were open. Wide open. I asked Dexter and Duke if they thought their grandmother might have been seeing something she’d never seen before. They both agreed she must have been looking into something on the other side of new.
I didn’t tell them Mother’s death was as inexplicable as the life she lived right down to her last undetermined breath. I didn’t tell them how the door stood open for twelve days. I didn’t tell them Mom stepped in and closed it behind her without so much as a murmur.
Little Goodbyes
I’ve been opening and closing doors all my life. But the door marked LETTING GO has remained shut. Writing the story of Mom’s story was not intended to underscore loss over other aspects. I didn’t plan on an elegy. Still, Dad’s five-month sprint to goodbye, followed by Mom’s protracted journey to farewell, had a cumulative effect.
My belated hello to a baby girl and boy created different kinds of endings. I call them the Little Goodbyes, like the day Dexter stopped getting into bed with me at three A.M., and the day Stellaluna was put on the bookshelf for good. There was the day Dexter caught seven butterflies with her bare hands. Goodbye, butterflies. There was the last time she said, “Good night, Dorrie, and Ray [Dorrie’s dog], and Mojo [her other dog], and Shatah [her ugly dog]. Good night to Steve Shadley Designs, and Uncle Bill [Robinson], and Grammy, and Lindsay, and Uncle Johnny Gale, and TaTa, and Sandra, especially Sandra.” There was the day I brought a brand-new Duke Radley home from New York City. That was the day Dexter said goodbye to being an only child. There was the day Duke said his first word. “Moon.” There was the day he was twelve months old. I want back the last day Dexter and I sneaked into the former Jimmy Stewart house, under construction on Roxbury, and the day Duke and I were in the backyard looking at the sky when he said, “We will keep lying down on the grass in order to look at the sky forever, right, Mom?” “Sure, Duke, of course, always.” I can’t remember the day Dexter stopped saying “Member.” “Member how Josie threw up in the car?” “Member the bird’s nest we found?” No more “member”s, Dexie. There was the afternoon she didn’t want to dive for plastic elephants at the bottom of the pool. Goodbye, elephants, and crocodiles too. There was the day Duke stopped watching Kipper