36 Days of Saying Goodbye

I want to remember every moment

Thirty-six days. That is not a very long time, yet the last 36 days felt like an eternity.

What did we do? Does it matter? The mundane events probably do not matter to the rest of the world. Maybe they don’t even matter to those who were there with me — the kids, who might or might not remember it someday.

For me, of course, every moment had such a weight to it. Such significance.

This is the last time we’ll ____. These are our last moments in this house, the last time we will see the light from an afternoon sun in September through that window, the last few times we will play tag on the deck, the last dinners we will eat in that dining room, the last times I will walk Alex up and down that hall, trying to get him to fall asleep…

August 28th was the first afternoon I spent with them. I had seen them so infrequently this summer, I couldn’t believe the good fortune I was experiencing, sitting there at the table, playing card games. Alex sat on my lap, playing with the Joker cards I had given him, pretending he was part of the game. We yelled a lot, whooping when someone ended up with a huge hand, and there were many moments when someone threw their hand down in a tantrum because they had lost three times in a row. (Remember this — all of it.)

I had to wear my mask, at the time. My sister was still a little nervous about the virus, even though I wasn’t seeing anyone else but them, or going anyplace else. I had to keep the visits short because it was so hot in the house, and wearing my mask in that heat made me feel like I was going to pass out.

These are our last moments in this house, the last time we will see the light from an afternoon sun in September through that window, the last few times we will play tag on the deck, the last dinners we will eat in that dining room…

We all went to my mother’s house on the 30th, to celebrate Kai’s 10th birthday. Just before we headed back, I took Alex out to the woods, to the hill where my brother Jack and I sledded with the kids when Alex was entering the world. I told Alex this story — that we had an unprecedented three feet of snow the week he was born and that all his sisters and brothers stayed with us there at Ya-Ya’s house so his mama and papa could spend a week at the children’s hospital, where Alex went into the NICU after he was born.

“We couldn’t wait to meet you,” I told him, as we looked down the hill in the summer sun. “We waited every day for you to come and finally, the day the snow melted, you came here and we welcomed you into the family. And we have loved you ever since.”

He looked out over the hill with me, as if he could see the memory of us sledding there a year and a half earlier, and somehow, I knew he understood the general idea of what I was telling him. He nodded and squeezed his hand closed, his fingers grasping at my t-shirt. (Remember this.)

On September 4th, my sister texted me. Want to have a sleepover? Of course! Always. I was so excited.

The last few times I slept over there were when she had to take Alex to the hospital early the next morning and I had to get the other kids to school. That’s not nearly as fun as a Labor Day sleepover.

My sister promised me a night of Halloween movies, or, if Finn had anything to say about it, dinosaur movies. I was game for both and super excited to sit in a big cuddle pile with everyone, littered with popcorn, watching Hocus Pocus or Jurassic Park.

Somehow, when the girls fell asleep, we ended up bingeing on shark movies instead: Meg (which was based on a book I read way, way back when it was first published in 1997), and The Shallows (during which my sister made the boys put pillows over their faces during particularly bloody scenes — as I did, as well, because while I love shark and dinosaur movies, I don’t care to see people being eaten).

The next morning, while the kids were playing, she insisted we watch two others — 47 Meters Down and 47 Meters Down: Uncaged.

“The sequel is silly, I admit, but come on — wasn’t the original pretty good?”

I think I would’ve liked it more had the ending not been so damn depressing. The whole sister theme was also painfully close to home, being as Tegan and I still haven’t resolved our recent disagreement —and I wonder if we ever will be able to resolve past conflicts.

On September 4th, my sister texted me. “Want to have a sleepover?”

I didn’t want to leave that afternoon — in fact, I kept hinting that maybe we should have one long, three-day sleepover, since it was a holiday weekend. My sister did not get the hint and didn’t say anything except to invite me over the next day.

I came back with an overnight bag in the car just in case — hopeful. Keira jumped up and down when I came in the door. “Are we gonna have another sweepover?” she asked, with her trademark lisp. (Remember this.)

“If it’s okay with your mama,” I said, glancing Tegan’s way.

“Sure, if you want to,” she said.

So we settled in for another night.

Where was I? Oh, the list.

We played cards. Right. And watched shark movies. The kids forced me to watch a troll movie. Then they begged my sister to let them watch a scary movie.

“What about The Village?” I said. These kids aren’t scared very easily and I knew the villains in this movie would creep them out but not genuinely scare them. And it would be easy to skip over the one violent scene of the movie.

I wasn’t sure it would hold their interest, but they were mesmerized.

“I want to live there,” Brynn kept saying, breathlessly. “The woods are so beautiful.”

It’s one of the reasons I love that movie so much — I would love to live in a place like that, in such simplicity and community.

But even the middle kids didn’t really understand the plot twist of the movie. “So wait,” they kept saying. “Why is Ivy going into the woods?”

“To get medicine for Lucius,” I’d remind them.

And every single time, Keira or Brynn would look at me and say, somewhat indignantly, “Who’s Lucius?”

The fifth time this happened, I jokingly yelled, “Oh my god, girls! I can’t take it anymore!” And I made a dramatic gesture, heaving a sigh.

I didn’t realize the notice they had taken of this until later in the movie, when Keira climbed into my lap and leaned in to whisper something to me. She cupped her hand around my ear and breathed, “Who’s Lucius?”

I looked at her face, her wicked little smile, and burst out laughing.

The rest of the weekend, the girls kept looking at me in wide-eyed innocence, at the most random moments, and would ask, “Auntie, who’s Lucius?” And the more I pretended to be upset or annoyed, the harder they laughed.

(Remember this.)

In the middle of all this came the wildfires. They were the worst my state has seen in a very, very long time. The worst we’ve seen since we moved here nearly 30 years ago.

Our AQI was over 500 (literally off the charts) for days. We could barely breathe. Or see outside the windows.

My sister texted me and asked me to stay over. She was having severe anxiety. Alex was having trouble breathing and it became clear he might need to go to the ER at any moment and she wanted to be ready.

Our last sleepover.

That was a hard week. We were stuck inside the whole time. My sister wasn’t sleeping. Her nerves were fried. The kids were bouncing off the walls. There was a lot of yelling. Lost tempers. Accidents. Arguments. Video game playing that turned into violent tantrums. Me and my sister pressing on Alex’s extremities and nails to see how fast the color would return, or if he was developing hypoxia (remember this).

And then another week of overwhelming stress and fear as Alex’s condition grew worse, even though the smoke had finally cleared, seven days later. He developed a fever. His liver became enlarged. He developed the hypoxia we had been watching for. His doctors scheduled an emergency echocardiogram, convinced he was experiencing heart failure and would have to have emergency surgery.

Alex was having trouble breathing and it became clear he might need to go to the ER at any moment and she wanted to be ready.

And…he was okay. His echocardiogram didn’t register any changes. His oxygen started to go up. His liver returned to its normal size. He got his energy back.

Suddenly, he was back to throwing his toys across the room when someone made him angry or climbing into my lap when he was frustrated. (Remember this.)

When Alex wanted to play with his siblings, he’d summon them with calls that sounded like a velociraptor. Short, loud barks. The middle four would immediately come to him (clearly, Alex is the alpha) and would let him chase them up and down the hall, everyone screaming in delight. (Remember, remember, remember this.)

I bathed him several times over the course of the month. He always tried to eat the bubbles. And when the girls, who were in the bath with him, gave me cups of bathwater and insisted they were filled with tea or beer or coffee and that I should take a sip, I’d pretend to do that, then pretend that I’d just noticed it was bathwater, and would then pretend to throw up into the bath, emptying the cup dramatically, to illustrate my disgusting sound effects. This made Alex hysterical and he would laugh and laugh, even when I’d done it ten times. (Remember.)

He would hold his arms up to me when he was ready to come out and I’d wrap him in his towel and cuddle with him for a few minutes.

I dressed him in his pajamas, and stayed until he was asleep almost every night. I hated to leave when he was awake — this often made him cry and I couldn’t bear to leave him when he was crying.

The nights got harder as the days went on. I hated getting in my car alone each night. I hated driving home alone. I hated walking into my quiet house (even though I appreciated the silence and stillness after so much noise and chaos).

I started feeling more and more alone as October drew near.

Day 36 was surreal. I will always remember that.

I spent six hours playing in the front yard with the kids. It was brutal. They had none of their toys, no access to their usual snacks, I had to constantly watch them to make sure they weren’t running into the street, and they were in terrible moods (understandably so).

I kept having these moments of realizing that we only had a few more hours left. And then it would all be over, our time at that house, our time living in the same county.

“Can we go yet?” one of them asked their parents every time they walked by.

I wanted to scream, “No! Please, no! Don’t ask that! Don’t want to go!”

But I understood. No one likes to be in transition. The kids just wanted to move on, get to their new house, unpack their things, reassemble the routines of their lives.

It was a long, long six hours, and yet it also went by so damn fast.

“No! Please, no! Don’t ask that! Don’t want to go!”

Alex fell asleep in my arms just about an hour before they left. I watched my sister and her husband bring the last items out of the house and tend to the final details. As I watched them, I held Alex so close, murmuring over and over again, “I love you, Bug, I love you so much, I will love you forever.”

My sister, with whom I have coexisted for the past 36 days despite the fight we had in April that was never mended, came to stand next to me and said, “It’s just hitting me now. I can’t believe this is it.” And she started crying.

I was stunned. She never expresses her emotions in front of me. She never cries. And I had been waiting for her to express even the tiniest bit of sadness ever since she announced the move.

Finally. Finally.

Of course, I’d already been crying and I broke down again in that moment. Again, she stunned me by bending over and hugging me carefully, so as not to wake up Alex (remember that). “I’m going to miss you,” she said. She hasn’t said anything like that to me since I left for Santa Fe twenty years ago. (Please remember.)

“I love you,” I choked out, hugging her as hard as I could with one arm.

She didn’t respond. But I think she loves me, too.

Incredibly, Alex woke up just as everyone was about to get into the car. He looked so dazed as he took in the sight of his brothers and sisters throwing their backpacks into the car. He didn’t look at me, at all.

“It’s time for your trip,” I said, trying to control my tears. “You’re going to go on a trip now and it’s going to be so much fun. Do you want to get in the car?”

Still, he didn’t look at me or answer — he just moved forward and slid off my lap.

I walked with him over to the car, sad to think of this little child sleeping while the last of his house was cleared out, waking up to get into the car for a “trip” and never, ever returning to the only home he’s ever known.

And not realizing that he won’t be seeing Auntie for a long time.

“It’s time for your trip,” I said, trying to control my tears. “You’re going to go on a trip now and it’s going to be so much fun. Do you want to get in the car?”

He was still a little sleep-drunk as he stared up at the car, and I said, “Would you give me a hug before you go bye-bye?”

He, master of embraces, gave me the full Alex Treatment, throwing his arms around my neck where I knelt next to him and resting his face against my chest. I couldn’t let him go for the longest time and he didn’t move to let me go, either. (Remember.)

And then I put him in his car seat and buckled him up and said one more round of goodbyes to the older kids.

Ben came up behind me on his way to get into the U-Haul with his father and said, “One more hug.”

I cried so hard as I hugged him, my first nephew, the young man I’ve shared my birthday with for the past 14 years, a baby I held and hugged in what seems like another lifetime ago.

We said more I love yous and then he got into the truck, and…

It was over so goddamn fast. The U-Haul pulled away, and I turned to wave to my sister and the kids in the car and they yelled “Goodbye, Auntie!” out the window and every single one of them was waving (remember), and then…they were gone.

I stood in the middle of the street and cried and waved until I couldn’t see them anymore.

And just like that, these strange 36 days ended.

© Yael Wolfe 2020

Saying goodbye to my darlings: