27 Jul Family Ties
My husband’s reflection, soft and nurturing, guided one of our sons in the process of tying a tie. “Will it be a full Windsor or half-Windsor knot?” crooned Damon. Of course, he knew how to jazz up ties. This guy, who as a child was given the task of folding napkins into pieces of art for Cousins Bunny and Hal’s Passover Seder. This guy, who learned what Bunny explained, a fairly simple yet elegant fold, and taught himself dozens of others from a Bird of Paradise to geometric patterns of napkin pageantry, which parlayed perfectly into an Origami hobby because…why not! This was Damon – a perfect blend of logic, learning and love wrapped up as a human.
Ties that bind.
“Okay, who’s next?” Damon laughed at his own joke as our other son stood in line to get the same lesson on tie ware.
During their sophomore year of high school, the boys were asked by their dear friends to accompany them to a dance where the young ladies were expected to present a male escort to a receiving line. Even though my feminist genes prickled under the 100 year-old tradition, I supported the boys in backing friends who chose to be in this philanthropic organization.
“Remember, we’re heading into LA tomorrow to visit with Grandma and Grandpa,” I chimed in as they headed back upstairs to retrieve the pocket squares that Damon would help showcase.
“Where did you learn this from?” I asked Damon.
The only times in my life I had witnessed father and son tie interaction was from the television shows I had consumed trying desperately to catch a glimpse of the Americana that I was assimilating into. Mr. Brady, Mr. Cunningham, and Mr. Keaton were the only father figures that came to mind. Rummaging around the sitcom storage in my mind there weren’t that many exchanges and even less in my own life.
Dada wore ties in Pakistan and India. Supposedly, Nana had a valet who ironed his ties and underwear. Two of my uncles were married in the early years of us settling down in the United States, and the pictures showed suits, ties and 80’s Magnum PI mustaches, but when did it happen? Where was I and who taught whom? Could they have been clip-ons?
The boys emerged with a pocket square matching their ties but wrinkled from the packaging.
“Ohhhhh, we will not have that.” Now, I crooned. “I know you’ll fold these silks right after I iron them, but they will be pressed.”
Damon laughed at my non-joke. “It actually helps keep the folds secure if you start from a piece of pressed fabric,” he added.
“Who taught you that?” I inquired.
“Mom or Bunny…maybe Grandmama,” he added. After all, Grandmama’s mother, Damon’s great-grandmother Esther, washed, folded and ironed laundry to support her household.
“I wanted to know the ins and outs of a supportive, nurturing home where he was guided, loved and could ask questions and get support in the process.”
I’d always been fascinated, almost downright obsessed early on in our relationship, about how much Damon absorbed from his family. I wanted to know the ins and outs of a supportive, nurturing home where he was guided, loved and could ask questions and get support in the process. Damon will be the first to admit that he wasn’t an easy kid because of his curiosity. He questioned everyone and everything around him. He still does, but as a parent I can see how tiring it would be to engage in that manner at all times. Damon will also be the first to admit that his home wasn’t perfect because that’s an impossible human goal, but his love and admiration for his parents is evident to this day.
The next day, after dinner at Tito’s with Mom and Dad, on our way back from LA, as the kids slept peacefully, heads bopping in unison over every bump on the I-10 East, Damon spoke softly while still looking ahead towards the road.
“I had an experience today,” he spoke so steadily that I almost drifted off into my own slumber. “May I share? Are you with me and awake?”
“Our conversations have matured as we have.”
Our conversations have matured as we have. They aren’t the stinging, resentment filled angst of my twenties or the melancholy life-is-slipping-me-by of my thirties. They are deeply present and personal. They are filled with emotions that we acknowledge; loving, individual boundaries; lifelong learning; intimate healing; the work of therapy; and being guided by a Divine Power we refer to as God. They aren’t always easy but they are us.
I perked up. He needs you, my inner Divine whispered.
“Yes, I am here – fully,” I leaned over and pressed on his right hand on the steering wheel.
“Mom pulled me aside today and asked if I could help her with something,” Damon said. This was nothing new to me. Whenever Damon visited Grandmama and Papa Bibby he would replace lightbulbs, change the fire or carbon monoxide detector batteries, or help with whatever maintenance was needed. Both sets of grandparents had been gone for a while and now he was puttering around at Mom and Dad’s home assisting with whatever they needed which was mostly technology related.
“Mom asked if I could help Dad tie a few ties and get them ready so all he had to do was put them on.” There was sadness in his voice.
The silence consumed us both, reminding us of the last few years – maybe more, where we witnessed Dad’s declining health, his inability to do things that gave him joy, his welcome manner giving way to paranoia, depression and other behavior changes that had no explanation, or no explanation that we knew of.
At Father’s Day BBQs, I’d corral Mom and Dad’s best friends into a brightly lit, flower and terra cotta bounty that is Mom’s backyard, her refuge and joy in a city that grows and changes around them both. “Do you know what’s going on with Dad? Have you noticed the changes? We’re concerned adult children that would be grateful for any answers.” Nothing. They knew nothing and were hoping I could share how they could be of help and support.
The few times Damon approached Dad regarding his health, he was told to “leave things alone,” “I don’t want to talk about it,” “I’m your father…” There was a firm boundary set forth by Dad and his son, my Beloved husband, respected that. We had both decided, after much discussion and prayer, that our role wasn’t to force, cajole or nudzh Mom and Dad into anything. Our mission was to create a safe and loving space, nurturing them as they had Damon for over 40 years and me in the last 25 years. My go to mantra was and is “space and Grace.”
Before we had left LA, as Dad looked into the mirror, Damon guided the tie into flips, folds and contortions settling on a knot and length that Dad approved of. One after another, using the ties that Dad chose for himself, his son, my Beloved husband, created pieces of love, art and magic just as Dad did decades earlier for him and just as Damon did 24 hours earlier with our sons. God is here.
As Damon finished up with the few ties, Dad speaking in a softer voice than normal, spoke his truth.
“I’m not the man I used to be.”
Damon looked into his father’s eyes, possibly even past them, into his heart and Soul – into the Essence that created us all, and replied, “You still are and will always be my dad.”
Dad is a person living with Parkinson’s Disease, and Mom is his Beloved carry-giver, creating a safe, nurturing and loving home.
Whenever we have the privilege of visiting Mom and Dad, I sit in prayer, a special moment beyond my daily meditations and sacred rituals. I ask God to show up with me, and sometimes within me. Lately, within me: Sometimes the emotions are too large and encompassing for my human form to contain. They ravage me from the inside out, begging me to control this situation and to make it stop, forcing people to do what I think is best, and going back to all the unhealthy tools that give me the illusion that I am in control of anything or anyone outside my own response to this life. It sucks! God is here, too.
I have no idea what the future holds. I barely know what I’m making for dinner. And yet, through the emotions – the avalanche of emojis that go through me on any given day, I breathe, I give myself space and Grace. God is here. She never left.
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