A26
Collective Memory
Excerpt from collection:Call it Awash: Stories and aphorisms.

may

This has to be one of the hardest things I have ever done. I have given this too much thought and now it has become a gargantuan task. I want to tell you everything, and for that reason I have limited myself to one standard, college-ruled sheet of notebook paper. I love you, August. I suppose I should start there.

There is an old story of a man who fell over the side of the cliff. It isn’t a true story, otherwise I’m not sure who there would be to tell it. But anyway the man falls from the cliff and is bouncing, rolling, tumbling over the loose rocks and dirt, with his hands flailing desperately to find something to grab ahold of. Just before a cliff which would throw the man to certain death, his right hand feels a plant and instinctively grabs it, stopping him over the side of the ledge. His heart beats as if there is nothing else to do. His breaths are quick and grateful. But looking to the top of the rock face, the man knows that he will never make it back up. There is no question in his mind; he will die.

At this moment, he looks to the lone vine that his desperate hand latched onto. Hanging from the top of the small plant is a large, ripe strawberry. For some reason his eyes well up. He closes them and breathes in deeply through his nostrils, then stares unblinkingly at it for some time. When he starts to grow tired, he reaches for it, plucks it from its vine, and studies it closely. He sets it under his nose for a while, eyes shut tight, until all that exists is that strawberry.

After much deliberation, and as his arm grows more tired, the man decides it should be eaten whole, not pieced up and drawn out, not made into something it isn't. And so he does, with one large-mouthed motion, he takes it in. It was only a strawberry. It wasn't the sweetest strawberry in the world, but it was. It wasn't the best or the most important thing that had happened to him, but it was. And he let go.

The past eight months with you have been the sweetest and most beautiful of my life. I probably didn’t need an entire story to tell you that but I think it accurately describes how I feel. If I am thankful for one thing about this hospital bed it is all the time I have had to talk to you, to learn about you, and to try to guess the person you will grow into. Thank you, August.

I can’t imagine the pain you will experience. When I lost my dad, I thought I would never leave my room, and I was 34 then. People will tell you that “time heals all wounds,” but time doesn’t heal wounds; the only thing time does is pile on memories. All time does is build this thick wall of memories between you and all of the things you miss.

I think of myself sometimes as sitting on the hour hand of a clock tower, looking over a cityscape with the clock-face at my back. Each hour I slide a bit more toward the edge, as my seat tics gradually more vertically. When I was diagnosed, my hope was that when the moment came that I could no longer sit comfortably on my ticking seat, that I would not latch on — that I would embrace my fall and enjoy the view on the way down. And I found that in my time with you. I am no longer afraid for you going on without me; I’m confident you’ll do just fine.

I am trying to picture you now: maybe you have a beard, or long shaggy hair, or maybe a crew-cut. I’m trying to picture what your dad looked like at eighteen and mix that with what you look like at twelve. It looks hilarious.

Advice feels in order with a letter like this, although I have always been terrible with advice. I’ll give you the two pieces of advice that have meant the most to me:

• Don’t set yourself on fire to keep others warm.

I’ve always been one to try to fix others’ problems at the sake of my own sanity. Don’t do this. The balance between selfishness and self-preservation is difficult to find, but keep in mind that you can only stretch so far.

• Everything is specific; nothing is unique.

You have so much life to experience, kiddo. Don’t worry about being the first or the only or the last, because you won’t be. Chances are you’re somewhere in the middle. I feel terrible telling my son that he isn’t unique, but it is important to understand and I learned it too late. You are specific and important and everything in-between, but if you spend your life trying to be the only, it will be a waste. Just experience everything and treat it all like it will be your last.

I wish I could end this letter with some words that would just sum up everything I’ve learned here; some great knowledge that one can only find at the end of her life. But the truth is you'll never find all the answers. There's no moral to this story; take comfort in that.

It’s August now; the leaves are changing – turning all red and orange-yellow – almost quickly enough to watch it happen. Autumn relieves the heat of summer. It highlights the beauty of the end and it promises the freshly new. Of all the months, August was always my favorite.

Ruth Crimson-Forde