Dropping Like Flies

As a kid growing up I didn’t have many friends. I was close with my family though; very close. My extended family was such a part of my immediate family’s life that it felt like that would be a special thing I’d have for the rest of my life. My mother’s sister was her best friend, and that sister’s daughter, my cousin, was like a sister to me. We lived about 45 minutes apart on Long Island, and we used to see them almost every weekend, at times every weekend. Four children in that family; one child in my family, me. They moved to Florida. So did we.

All the cousins had spouses and children. I remember one cousin’s 5 year old son. Very cool kid. Spent time playing together in the game room some nights while the family ate dinner in the restaurant next door. Lots of fun. He even mistakenly called me “uncle” a few times. I suppose that’s how he saw me. Close, close family.

Then things began to change. We drifted apart. I remember calling. Calls not returned. Didn’t feel as welcome in other’s homes. It’s a long story. My mother had urged me to stay in touch. I would not. I won’t beg anyone to be my friend. My mother urged me to; she didn’t want me to be alone. Whatever.

Years went by. I saw them occasionally at get-togethers and so forth, but I had my life and they had theirs. If not for the friends and the life I’d made in Florida, I’d have asked myself why I’d left New York in the first place. Whatever.

My mother had two brothers and three sisters. One died back in the eighties. In the early part of this century the oldest sister died of cancer. My mother and her sister started talking again. It was time to patch things up and be a family again—they knew they weren’t getting any younger. Then the son of the oldest brother developed a brain tumor. Then my mother got the cancer. Just shy of two years later when I rushed my mother to the hospital for the last time, that uncle of mine learned on the same day that his baby sister had a few days left to live, and his son was told he had a year left.

Two weeks after my mother died, her sister’s 40+ daughter was diagnosed and given 6 months to live. She lived for 2 and a half years though.

But backing up in time, I was invited over at one of the cousin’s homes for Thanksgiving the month after my mother died. I hadn’t been there in many years, not since that little cousin of mine, her son, was 5 years old. The house was filled with people I did not know. Though it was the same house I’d been in so many years before, I was in unfamiliar surroundings, a stranger in a strange land, surrounded by strangers. Kids, teens and young folks I did not know were seated all around, talking and laughing. There were a tight-knit bunch those siblings and cousins, sons and daughters of the cousins I hadn’t seen in years. I found myself wondering about that sweet little five year old who had adored me like an uncle, and wondered where he was now.

Who is that 20 year old man sitting nearby, talking and laughing with his little sisters and his cousins? Who is he? Wait…Could it be? Is it he? It is. I said hello and he barely remembered me, with only vague recollections of once knowing me. That gave me a good feeling in my stomach. Yeah, right/ Whatever.

One cousin, the one near to my same age, who I had been like brother and sister with, great friends when we were younger, she was married to a man named Ron. Over the next year after my mother died, the only time anyone ever called me was when they meant to call the other Ron but hit the wrong one since we were one under the other on their speed dial. Their genuine surprise told me that they hadn’t done it intentionally as a means to talk to me. They really meant to call the other guy. Whatever.

Not counting one cousin I’m close to now and have been for a long long time, my current roommate, the only extended family member who kept in touch after my mother died was her cousin Gail, my 2^nd cousin.

When Gail died, Aunt Dotty called me to let me know.

When cousin Paula died, Aunt Dotty called me.

When Aunt Dotty died, nobody called. Well, aside from my other uncle, but you know what I mean.

My mother and 2 sisters, one cousin down and another on the way--It seems like my family members are dropping like flies. Who’s next?

I remember when I was at Aunt Dotty’s house after Paula’s funeral. I thought to myself, why is it that the only time I see them is when somebody has died?

I made a few gestures suggesting my cousin and I get together, the cousin I used to be like brother and sister with. The suggestion was agreed to, but the get-together never came to pass. Whatever.

My mother had feared on her death bed that I would be alone without family, because she knew they didn’t call often, and I don’t call those who don’t care to have me in their lives. She was right. Whatever.

Aunt Dotty was diagnosed with stage four cancer less than two months ago. She died yesterday. She was 70 years old. I find myself today sad and deep in thought. How could I be sad though? I hadn’t seen her in years, and barely saw her in the last 20 years aside from an occasion here or there. But literally, I had not seen or spoken with her in the last few years, not since Paula’s funeral. So why am I sad? Nothing has changed, I haven’t seen her in years, and won’t see her now. What’s the difference? What if anything has changed? Nothing.

So why am I sad? Why do I feel this sense of loss? I haven’t lost the future, I lost the past. I don’t miss her in the current or the future, I miss the past I missed out on, the past that once was, and then wasn’t.