Goodbye, Mom.
Today would have been my mother’s 68th birthday.
DECEMBER 15, 2020.
I woke up at 6am to missed calls and text messages from Dad. I had taken a prescription sleep aid after he called the night before to tell me an ambulance had taken Mom to the hospital and it wasn't looking good. I didn't hear the phone afterwards. She didn't make it.
Six months prior, I jumped in the car and drove 3000 miles to Delaware because the doctors had given her six months to live and she was going under the care of hospice. We weren't even through the first year of the pandemic and I didn't want to risk exposure on a plane and giving it to her. I drove straight through, stopping only for gas and quick naps at rest areas along the way.
I spent two weeks at my parents' house meeting with the hospice folks and getting Dad organized so he could better take care of Mom when the in-home care wasn't around. I sat there, that last day, looking for an excuse to delay my departure further. I had done all I could do and it was time to go. Mom got up to hug me goodbye even though she barely had the strength to move. We both knew it would be the last time we would see each other. It didn’t seem real. I drove away.
After I read those messages and called Dad, I told my boss they could let me work out-of-state or I was taking vacation through the end of the year. I jumped in the car for another 3000 mile trip. 12,000 miles driving coast to coast four times in six months. I would make one final 3000 mile trip nine months later with Dad carrying all of his belongings packed in his truck heading West.
THE CAR
I bought a 1985 Corvette in 2004. Two years later, I was moving to Arkansas and needed something more practical. My parents had a 2001 Mazda Millennia and it was a fair trade. Mom loved that Corvette. She had always wanted one though she had never mentioned it until I bought it. Mom and Dad made ends meet growing up but it wasn't easy. Corvettes weren't something worth the energy to talk about.
Mom would tell me stories about how much joy that car brought her over the years, from road trips to Arkansas and Iowa to taking it to school and giving her students rides in it for motivation to get better grades. Sadly, she wasn't able to drive or even get in it anymore. Her legs were in too bad to do the yoga-like motions and fold into it. So it sat in the driveway. My parents had offered to give it back to me several times and I finally agreed in 2019. I flew East to pick it up. Mom's only requirement was, if I ever decided to get rid of it, she was the first in line to take it. Dad and I drove it back to my house in California.
A lot has changed since 2019. Mom is gone. I no longer have a 3-car garage. I moved into a house with a 2-car garage one month prior to Mom going into hospice. My new driveway is too steep for the Corvette to enter and exit without scraping at the front and the rear in both directions. The monthly storage unit rent has nearly doubled in the last 12 months. My interests have moved on from sports cars. I’ve owned three different Corvettes over the years. Now I just dream about, plan and go on motorcycle adventures (or write about them) in my free time. The car sits under a cover in the garage taking up space slowly getting buried under garage things.
I found myself asking I was keeping this car around. The grand plan was to work on it in my free time and get a shop to make a restomod out of it when I had the money. Spending 4-5x what it's worth in shop labor makes total sense. The root of my attachment was Mom. For months, I weighed the emotional ties I have to that car and the “betrayal” to her if I let it go. When we moved Dad out here to be near family and escape the East Coast, I asked him if he wanted it back. The answer was no. He was at our house for breakfast in April of this year and I asked again. Still no. It was then that I had decided it was time to let it go.
LETTING GO
It has been a rollercoaster of emotions since that decision. Waves of relief, angst and sorrow have come at unexpected times as I looked for a buyer.
When loved ones pass, we want to hang on to anything and everything we can so that we don't feel alone. Mom's spirit, energy or essence is not attached to a 37 year old car. She lives on in the memories of those who knew and loved her. The hard truth I have to remind myself at moments of weakness is that keeping that car or any other objects won't bring her back nor does their association with her justify the burden of keeping them beyond their usefulness.
So this isn't really goodbye, Mom. I said my goodbyes over two years ago when I hugged you that last time. This pain I feel is just part of the healing process I've put off for too long.
A young guy flew out from Texas and drove it home recently. He drove a similar distance and is around the same age as I was way back in 2004. I hope he makes as many good memories as Mom did.
