Mama's Roots

My mama was born in Macon, Georgia on August 26, 1944. I think my grandmama must've been visiting someone down there because she talked about riding back to Kinston, NC on the bus when my mama was only a couple of days old. Mama was the third child in the family. My aunt Evelyn, who my grandaddy christened Butch because he wanted a boy, was the eldest and then my Uncle Cecil, who instantly became Buddy, came along a year later and a year after that my mama. There was another baby. A still-born baby that my grandmama told me was absolutely perfect except that all of it's orifices were covered over with skin. It's nostrils and ears and mouth were all sealed. She buried it in a shoebox out in the garden. Another baby -or maybe it was the same one, maybe I'm mixing up stories, but another baby was buried underneath my grandaddy. After the still-born child, came my Uncle Danny and my Aunt Joette. They grew up in east Kinston in a poor hardscrabble neighborhood where people grew their own vegetables and my grandmama took in laundry and my daddy worked as an electrician when he wasn't in jail for beating the shit out of my grandmama and their children. He was mean. Mean as a snake. Mean just for the sake of mean and it was all exacerbated by massive quantities of alcohol. I believe he was a gin man. My grandmama was beautiful. I don't mean pretty or handsome, I'm talking Ava Gardner gorgeous. When I was 20 or so, I met a man from east Kinston who, upon finding out I was Pauline Kelley's granddaughter drew back and said, "You're grandmother was the most beautiful woman I ever knew." Too bad it didn't get her any farther than five hungry children and a mean-ass drunk for a husband. For kicks, grandaddy used to make the three oldest kids fight each other out in the front yard. He'd make them literally beat each other up or else he'd beat all of them himself. Those were the choices. So, when my mama was eleven years old, grandaddy got thrown in the tank for beating the hell out of grandmama. Only this time, she'd had enough. She went before a judge and asked for a divorce. He agreed, but then he told her she'd better pack her kids up and leave or else my grandaddy would kill her. It was 1955.

Part The Second

... I told the nurse that Mama had called me twice. The nurse is shocked and then says that there had been a lot of chaos. Someone had code-blued down the hall and nurses and doctors and staff came running from everywhere. So Mama freaked the fuck out and wound up having to be restrained. She thought people were trying to kill her. So I called Wendy and Wendy got Angie and they went to the hospital. For their own piece of mind really, since they had sedated Mama and she was out. After she woke up, she was pretty much fine. In fact, other than a few moments of mild confusion and hyper-mamaness, she's been relatively good. Physically she's much better. They sent a psychologist 'round yesterday and of course she figured out what he was up to and she played his ass like a fiddle. Serves him right because we told him to be discreet. So now the doctor says she can't go home by herself. So they're checking into having a physical therapist/light housekeeper come in a few days a week. I don't know. I just don't know.

Mama had herself a bout of the psychosis. Wendy took Mama to the hospital last Wednesday evening because Mama had had diarrhea for days and had been passing out and of course Mama never told anyone. So anyway, they admit her to the hospital because she's got an infection in her colon and she also has a urinary tract infection. Because she's also been passing out, they put her in CCU so that she has constant supervision. They put her in CCU. Right up the hall from where my daddy died four months ago. We were all panic-stricken. We called regularly to check on her and Sarah sat with her for most of Thursday. I had an encounter with the bitch-twat nurse who told us to stop calling so much because our calling was interfering with Mama's care. I told her too bad and to eat a dick and either tell me what I needed to know or kiss her job good-bye. Afterward, because I really, really suck at confrontation and will get my feelings hurt super-ass quick, I had myself a little breakdown and had to eat a Valium. Friday, Mama's blood-pressure finally stabilized and all of her stats were looking better and things and stuff seemed to be on the mend. She called me for the first time since who knows when and I talked to her for ten minutes. It took 30 seconds for me to figure out she was high as a kite. Like super high. I texted Angie who was in the car on her way to Lincolnton from Kure Beach. And I texted Katie who was sitting in the room with Mama. Both messages basically said, "Woo-Wee! Mama's high!". Well this was just the beginning. Paranoia. Hallucinations. Lack of sleep. Fatigue. Depression. Severe mourning. Complicated grief. Mama called me at 1:30 Saturday morning. She thought the nurses and doctors were trying to kill her. She told me I was her only hope. I told her I'd do the best that I could to help her. Five minutes later she called back and wanted to know what I was going to do. I decided to call the nurses...

to be continued...