Open Letter To Molly

Today, you glide ever closer to death. My heart breaks with the thought. Truly.

I have known you all my life because you were my mother's closest friend since childhood. Forty-six years would pass before I had the good fortune to call you mother-in-law. How funny life can be with its twists and turns.

I remember when my mother took me to your house in Plymouth Valley after your fourth child and first daughter, Joanie was born. I clearly remember Joanie lying in her crib. I also remember the house full of boys. Funny that I would eventually marry one of them later though it was this particular son, I cannot remember as a child. But, I remember the one called Jerry all too well. He was born just four days before me in 1960 and we would be nursery-mates as well as you and my mother were room-mates in that same hospital.

That day in Plymouth Valley, Jerry got on my nerves with his nonstop talking and bragging not to mention his grandmother, your mother egging him on because he was 8 yrs old and could spell the word "aspirin". Strange how someone can remember something so silly.

Do you remember when my parents lived in Manahawkin, just outside of Long Beach Island right on the bay? You came to visit every summer and stayed with my parents so we shared numerous barbecues and beach-time. I clearly remember your husband making his (at the time) famous blue fish on the grill. It actually was not too bad. This was the fish that he, my Dad and sometimes my oldest son, Shaun caught while out on those fishing trips.

Then I remember sitting on the beach with you and my mother while you two discussed things that I probably should have never known. Sometimes during those conversations, I had the feeling you both had forgotten I was even there.

Remember, the couple on the beach who had one little girl named "Tara". When you overheard the mother of that child call out to her daughter your first reaction/comment was, "the parents must be yuppies to have named their daughter, Tara". Again, it is funny how one remembers such silly things. Then, there was always that white zinc cream you generously put on your nose to avoid a sun-burn on that area of your anatomy.

Then there was that hot August day when my brother Michael got married and all the bridesmaids including me wore pink satin in one hundred degree weather where the church lacked air-conditioning and where I nicely tore the seam to my very very pink satin gown just as I got out of the car. The entire wedding I spent worrying that the four safety pins holding that dress together would come undone rendering me naked up at the altar in front of all those guests many which were cops because at the time, my brother was a cop.

That night as I laid on the sofa at my parents' house in that stupid hot pink torn dress, I overheard you and my mother talking (probably after many glasses of wine) and the topic was me so naturally I continued to lay there pretending that I was asleep just so I could hear what the two of you had to say about "me".

I remember you telling my mother how beautiful I looked sleeping. I could not be more than 30 yrs old at the time. (an age where no one should be forced to wear pink satin in August)
I just cannot let that dress thing go, can I?

For as long as I have known you, you always drank Merlot. Though Merlot tends to give me a headache, I too like wine. However, my own children saw that I developed an ulcer and put an end to that little pleasure.

12:11pm

I just spoke to Bill. He said the Hospice Nurse tells him its only a matter of hours. He is one thousand miles away and I cannot do a damn thing but talk to him on the phone. To complicate matters even worse, is his father's health. It is my understanding that he too has spent a great deal of time in bed today sick with a fever and sore throat.