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2001-12-21 || 4:38 p.m. || aunt edie. || when things are bad my mummy has this voice that hinges on strength and insensitivity. i imagine it's from her years as a nurse (accepting death as something biological. the alleviation of pain as a career choice. winessing these things, possibly over and over again so that it somehow seeps in the bloodstream. shifting weight to accomodate all of this.), a shitty childhood, wearing the starchy pants of the family for lack of a better term. the voice is the tiniest bit apologetic, empathetic, soft spoken but very clear. concise. 'jenny, call me back. i have news.' i look up my parents' number because i do not know it yet. this frustrates me. i call and the line is busy. the line is never busy so i paint pictures lying down. she is using that voice to give news to someone else. my mum is on the phone, never my dad. (my dad has death to draw on - his dad dying of cancer. his brother's suicide. but my dad does not swallow these the way my mother does. i imagine my father in his bedroom sitting on the edge of the bed and crying. my dad cries. when uncle jim died i found him like that, sitting and crying, and i remember his back to me. in this body language i understand that i am not going to get hugs from him. i am not going to get the voice.) i call again and it is still busy. i call my sister in san diego and she's not home. i listen to the outgoing message, which is all anthony's doing i think, and it sounds very inappropriate. i imagine mummy calling and listening to this message and hesitating a second before leaving the voice on tape, identical messages with kelly's name at the beginning, not mine. i leave a message and paint pictures again. 'kelly, this is jenny. mummy called and left a funny message and i was wondering if you've heard anything.' i call mum again and it rings. ring and ring and her hello is cut off, but i detect the voice. it says, clearly and slowly and mum-robotic: 'oh, aunt edie died last night.' switching auntie's name for one of our dogs or cats or birds or neighbors, it would sound the same. there is no wavering in this voice. the voice keeps talking. she died last night. she was in the hospital and not doing well. she was dehydrated and died. 'i want you to still come down. dad and i are going to drive up on tuesday and we'll be back wednesday night.' matter of fact. i am crying and the voice doesn't skip a beat. 'i don't think grandma's going to come. i think it's important that you stay with her those days.' the destination is an hour away from my apartment. christmas has been muddled, is not mentioned by name, is referred to as 'tuesday' (it is any other day, after all. things don't stop because we have assigned capitalized words to certain days. people die. it hits me that it is quite possible a christmas card from auntie on its way to me, written in her handwriting, postmarked with a day that could be before or after her death.). i am trying to think how things work. i am terribly selfish and wonder if it's still okay to go to a party tonight, to wear the green dress. to worry about christmas and seeing my friends. i tell my mum she and dad could stay in my apartment if they like. i imagine for a second the four of us, plus grammy maybe, plus aunt colleen, staying in my apartment, opening presents, getting dressed in whatever my mother finally deems appropriate for a funeral. but my mother doesn't want kelly and i to come. the voice says it's important that i come down. the voice says we will have tuesday morning and i can drive her car all around. they'll be back wednesday night. aunt edie and i were penpals. i've been told time and itme again that she has kept all of my letters and cards and drawings, that she loved them all very much. i have aunt edie's dimples and goofy laugh. aunt edie is absolutely beautiful and i never saw her when things changed, when the cancer we all thought she had licked, had laughed at, grew again in dark places. the voice says she was in a lot of pain. the voice says this is probably for the best. (i am thinking about this. i will talk to my mum about this. because i want to go. i want to sit in a room and cry about it, because we have this secret connection with the letters. auntie knows secrets no one else does. i want to thank her for keeping them.) guestbook || notes || archives || profile || photos || d-land |