“Mother I Miss You”
Back Home Again ( Part 16)
5929 Merrimac
I recorded this part of my life’s
story on tape on May 10th 1998
I was
17 years old
We’re still on 5929 Merrimac
One day, My
Mom wanted to go to a real nice restaurant. I was working at the time and she
didn’t have any money to go to the restaurant. She wanted to take Jeanne and I
to the restaurant so she asked me if she could borrow some money. So I loaned
her some money that I had. I think I had forty dollars that I gave to her and
we went to the restaurant. She got all dressed up and it was just Jeanne, me
and Mom. It was a restaurant on Milwaukee ave. The restaurant’s not there
anymore. They tore it down I guess. Anyway, we get in there and I was so hoping
she wouldn’t order a drink. And sure enough, she ordered a drink and I just
cringed. And then she ordered another one. I can’t remember how many she had
but by the time she was out of there, she was bombed. And I just hated it when
she got like that. I think she even cried for some reason when she got in the
car about having to borrow the money and not having any money. She felt like
she was in a real mess and she was.
Mom got up later on
that Sunday morning June 2nd 1963 . She made a phone call and then started getting dressed.
She was looking through her drawers. She called out at no one in particular,
“Have you seen my girdle?” I was in her room and she looked at me and said, “I
know you wouldn’t have it.” Mom asked my sister if she had taken it. My sister
said, “No, I don’t have it”. Mom was frustrated that she couldn’t find it but
she didn’t seem like she was that upset that morning. I asked her, “Where are
you going?” “I’m going over to talk with the priest,” Mom told me.
I saw her get in the car and drive
away. After about an hour and a half, I saw mom pull up in her black Lincoln.
She started scraping the white sidewall tires against the curb. I yelled out to
her, “MOM, YOUR SCRAPING THE TIRES.” That was the last thing I ever said to my
mom. Mom got out of the car and walked up the sidewalk. She didn’t even look at
me. Mom walked passed me with the look of utter despair on her face. She opened
the front door and walked up into the apartment. That was the last time I ever
saw her alive again. I went up to ask her what happened but she had gone into her
bedroom and closed the door. Maybe that night she would say something. But when
I came home later that night, her door was still closed. I went into my room
for a while but decided to walk back toward my mom’s room. Her door was still
closed. I stood outside wondering if I should go in there or not. My sister’s
bedroom door was right behind me but it was closed too. I was trying to decide
whether to go in mom’s room but I just had this feeling. I don’t know what is
was but something told me not to go in there so I turned around and went back
to my room.
It was Monday morning June 3rd 1963 and I had to get
up to go to work. I was going to stop by and kiss my Mom good-by, but her door
was still closed. That seemed strange to me because she had been in there so
long and I never saw her get up to use the bathroom or get anything to eat. It
was a quick passing thought as I walked passed her bedroom. About 10:30 or 11
that morning, I get a call from my uncle at work. My uncle never calls me. So I
knew something was wrong. My uncle said, “Come home.” I told him, “I can’t, I’m
at work.” He replied, “Never Mind, Get Home, Something Has Happened.” I told
him, “OK, I’ll be right home.” I went up to my manager and told him, “Something
has happened at home. I have to go right now.” My manger said, “OK,” and I
left.
When I pulled up to the apartment, I
saw my grandmother’s and my uncle’s cars. When I went in, I saw them standing
in the living room. I asked them what happened. They said, “Your Mom is dead.”
I looked over at my Mom’s bedroom and saw that her door was still closed.
I walked toward Mom’s door. Then they shouted out, “Don’t go in there.” I
didn’t listen to them. I wanted to go see my Mom. When I walked in her bedroom,
I saw her laying on her bed. She was laying on her back with her head turned to
the right. She had thrown up some kind of bright emerald green stuff. I saw
that there was no life in her at all. My mom was dead. I walked out the other
side of her bedroom and found myself in the kitchen. I saw my grandmother washing
the dishes, weeping. The dishes had been in there so long that there was mold
on them. I went back in the living room and left the apartment. Just as I was
walking down the front sidewalk, I saw my sister coming home from school. She
asked me what happened. I said, “Go in there and see for yourself.” She
repeated her question, “Tell me, what happened,” I said, “Just go in there and
you’ll see for yourself.” My sister walked into the apartment and I got in my
car and drove to where my Dad worked. When I talked to my sister, I sounded
discussed and acted like Mom just had another one of her drunken spells and was
passed out again. I guess it hadn’t hit me yet that she was really dead.
Dad worked as a car salesman. When I pulled up, he was outside. He saw me and
he was all smiles. Then he changed when he saw my face. “What’s the matter?” he
asked me. I said, “Mom’s dead.” He started crying. I told him I just came from
the house and they were still there. He went to tell his boss that he was
leaving and when he came back, I gave him the keys to the car and said, “Maybe
you ought to drive.” On the way back to the apartment, I told my Dad what I
knew so far. When we pulled up, the ambulance had arrived. I told my Dad to
keep the keys to the car so he could get back to work and said that I didn’t
want to go back in there. I walked to my grandmother’s house, which
wasn’t that far away.
When she left to go talk to the priest that
afternoon, she wasn’t that bad. She was more upset that she couldn’t find her
girdle. So that’s why I didn’t worry about her when she went. I don’t know what
that priest said to her, but whatever he said, it put her over the brink. Like
I said before, when she came back from seeing the priest, “Mom walked passed me
with the look of utter despair on her face.” She hadn’t looked anywhere near
like that before she went to see that priest. I know mom had a problem with
depression because she had been seeing a psychiatrist and she had tried to
commit suicide by shooting herself in the chest about 10 months before this
happened. I wished that she hadn’t gone and talked to that DAMNED PRIEST!! The
other thing I wished I had done was to go in her room right after she came back
from seeing that priest so I could find out what happened and talk to her. I
think if I had done either one of them, she might not have taken her life.
I found out later what that green stuff was
that mom had thrown up. Dad told us that he had gone to the man who embalmed
mom and asked the guy what killed her. The man told Dad that mom had drank some
kind of acid, something like Drano. They almost had to have a close casket
because the whole inside of her mouth and insides were eaten away.
The next thing I can remember is.....I guess
we had to wait a day or two, I don’t know, for the wake. The wake was held at Koop
funeral home on Milwaukee Ave, which doesn’t exist anymore. It’s ah, the Polish
American Legion or something like that, now. But at the time it was Koop
funeral home, so that’s where Mom was laid out. I walked in and I saw her
laying in the casket. Dad Jeanne and I walked in before anyone else came to the
wake. We kneeled down. I still hadn’t cried to this point. Maybe I just didn’t
believe it was true. And I saw her laying there. My friends came from the old
neighborhood and they even commented, “You don’t look very sad Bill.” I guess
it just didn’t hit me yet. Well, this wake was a two-day wake. Oh, was that
ever long I thought it would never end. At the end of the first night after
everybody left, Dad, Jeanne and I went back to the casket and we kneeled down
and I was looking at Mom and thinking to myself, “Why don’t you wake up? Come
on, get up and let’s go home. I’m tired of all this.” And all of a sudden I
just broke up and started crying my eyes out. I realized Mom was really dead
and that I would never ever see her again.
I said, “I just can’t stand this anymore.” Oh, was that terrible and
then I really bawled my eyes out. That’s when I first started crying. It took
all that time. My Dad and everybody even worried that I hadn’t cried yet. My
uncle told me that they had picked out a bronze casket a real expensive casket
for Mom. She was dressed in this off white dress that she had and that’s what
she wore. I remember going to the wake to St Tarcissus church and having the
mass for Mom and Mom’s casket was up there. From there we went to.....We all
got in the car and we went up to Techny Illinois. That’s where we are going to
bury Mom
You know
Princess Diana that died recently and her son, especially that one son, Bill?
Prince William. He was almost the identical age that I was. I mean, I just....
when I saw that recently, that’s exactly how.... I could relate. I knew what
was going through Prince William’s mind, everything. Because I remember how I
felt when I was following Mom. We were in the limousine and I was following the
hearse, DAMN!
Well, we
took the hearse and the limousine up Milwaukee Ave to Waukegan road and
Waukegan road we took all the way to Techny Illinois. And we’re in Techny now
and I’m on Waukegan road and just up ahead is a monastery thing. It looks like
a giant monastery. This is where my Mom and Aunt Marie went to boarding school
when they were kids. And the cemetery is in the back. It’s called St Mary’s
cemetery. A big sign out in front that says, “Divine World International,” I
don’t know exactly what the order does but anyway. Right up here is a little
side street where the hearse goes. And that’s where we’re going to go. You have
to be careful you don’t miss the dog gone thing.... Here it is..... And here we
are. There’s a little white building on the left hand side. I don’t know what
that is. I never did know. The rest of it is just way back in the woods here.
And there’s the cemetery.
Approaching the
cemetery gate in the back
When we were kids, Mom and Aunt Marie used to
come out here and bring us. That’s because Aunt Marie used to be married and
her husband died of Polio. So he’s buried out here. That’s why we came out. And
when we were kids, we used to play on around that statue. I can see that and
the cross. They have steps going up. We use to play around there. Anyway, this
is where we bury Mom.
Just walk around the
gate to enter
Well, we’ll
go through this.... around this little gate here. And we’re on a small path. It’s
really beautiful out here because there’s a lot of trees and its way back in
the.... behind the Monastery. We’ll take a left on the path. We’ll walk down a
little ways.
Way in the back you can
see that little building. It's called the "Death House" and right on that corner
were the path makes a right is where I'll be buried someday
Right up
ahead is this little building with the skull and cross bones on it and it’s
called the “Death House.” We used to get so scared when we were little kids to
see the skull and cross bones. We thought that’s where they embalmed everybody.
But I found out that’s just where they keep the garden tools and, it’s like a
tool shed. I asked one of the brothers that works here and that’s what he told
me it is. Now we’re going to take a right on this path and right on this corner
is where my grandparents, Nanny and Grampa have two plots, right on the corner
and they never used them. When they died, they moved over to All Saints
cemetery. So they never used them. So I came here and claimed them for myself
and I gave the other one to Jeanne, my sister. So this is where I’m going to be
buried, right here. Man, I hope that’s not going to be for a long time. On the
left hand side of the path as your walking down, you see all these crosses that
are the same. And those are all priests that have died. You can go back there.
The crosses get real old as you go back there and take a look at the dates.
It’s kind of interesting.
We’ll walk up to about halfway down this
little path and you’ll see a big stone that says McCabe. That’s one of our
relatives. Leland J McCabe, he was my grandmother’s brother and Helen McCabe
was his wife. And on the other side is John and Mary McCabe. And they died
before my time. So I never saw them. And there’s two empty plots that belong to
the Happ family, I found that out. And this is where we bury Mom right next to
the empty plots here and next to Raymond F Smith. That’s my Aunt Marie’s first
husband. He died in 1937 of polio. He was born in 1904 and died in 1937. Mom,
Eleanor Kaufman. Born in 1917 and died in 1963. Hi Mom, Happy Mother’s Day.
It was Mother's Day
when I made the recording and took this picture
So when the hearse pulls into the cemetery,
we followed and they take Mom’s casket out of the hearse and they put it above
ground, you know, on the side of the hole that they had dug. Man, I can’t
believe that, I just can’t believe it. I’m sitting here right now and I still
can’t believe it. I sure do miss you.
(Just a side
note here.) When I sat down on the ground on my Mother’s Grave, All of a sudden
the wind started blowing hard. You can hear it on my tape. It’s as if she was
speaking to me through the wind. Maybe just a silly thought on my part but when
you hear the wind pick up on my tape, it’s kind of spooky. It really started
blowing when I started talking to her.)
“Mom, for all those times you stood by me, For
all the Truths that you made me see, For all the Joy you brought to my Life,
For all the Wrong that you made Right, For every Dream you made come True, For
all the Love I found in You, I’ll be forever Thankful Mom, You’re the one who
Held me up, Never let me Fall, You’re the one who saw me through, through it
all, You were my Strength when I was Weak, You were my Voice when I couldn’t
Speak, You were my Eyes when I couldn’t See, You saw the Best there was in Me,
Lifted me up when I couldn’t Reach, You gave me Faith “coz you Believed, I’m
Everything I am because You Loved Me.”
(Then on my
tape, I have Celine Dion singing “Because You Loved Me”)
“If the People we love are stolen from us, the
way to have them live on is to never stop loving them. Buildings burn, People
die but Real Love is Forever.”
( I started Crying at this point while I had
the tape recorder going)
You know,
this is the part that didn’t want to have happen, to end this tape. Not to end it....
I didn’t want to come to this point in my tape of my life were I’m burying Mom.
Because all through this tape, I’ve been reliving the moments I spent with her
and enjoying it because she isn’t around. And now I’m coming to the end of
reliving it on tape and it just hurts, you know? I know I can listen to my tape
over and over again. But it was so nice to relive those moments while I was
doing this tape and now it’s coming to the end again. I’m reliving this whole
thing all over again. Well, that’s the way it goes I guess. Someday I’ll be
over in the corner over there. Don’t take me to soon though, I’ll tell you
that! I want to be around for a long time. (At this moment on my tape, the wind
picked up and just howled all around me for a moment) I’ll be reliving my life
on tape. I’m still not finished with my life story but I won’t be reliving it
with Mom and that’s what hurts.
(As soon as
I got up to leave, the wind was calm again) “Well, see you later Mom. I love
you.” (I’m walking back down the path) “You hear all the birds back here. It’s
really beautiful..... Nice and quiet...” (I walked back out through the gate
and stood by my car looking out over the cemetery)....
”Well that’s
it, that’s the end of Mom.”
(I end my
story about the 17 years I had with my Mom by playing John Tesh’s song “Mother
I Miss You” sung by Dalla)
I Love You
I loved my Mother more
than anything in this world. She’s still with me and always will be.
Mom would have been 100
years old this year 2017 if she were still with us.
