by Kim Goldman
So I decided to change the mood—let’s talk ghosts! Who knew that this would be the topic that would inspire Christopher to talk and talk and talk? He was so excited to share the story about how his father had come to him in a dream a few nights earlier. He expressed how grateful he was to see he dad, because since his passing he couldn’t picture his face anymore. All of us nodded in agreement; we knew that sadness all too well. So when his father showed up, it brought so much of his pain to the surface. His dream awoke the grief beast.
Christopher began to sob uncontrollably. I was so happy—not because he was heartbroken, of course, but because he was letting it out. He finally gave himself permission to mourn his father’s death. The girls and I just sat and let him weep. When he’d catched his breath, he talked about his dad’s sense of humor, how he always played football with him, and how he would dance with his mom around the kitchen before dinner. His speech slowed when he spoke about his mom. I asked him how she was doing. “She’s different. She focuses all her attention on me. My brother moved out, so it’s just us. She keeps telling me I am the man of the house now. I am sixteen, not the man of the house. I don’t want that job. I just want to draw, play ball, hang with my homies, smoke out a bit, ya know, be sixteen.” I did know. I understand the feeling of having your innocence swiped away from you in a nanosecond. We all understood the desire to hold onto a life we once had.
The girls gave Christopher the space he needed to let out all of his emotions. Each of them contributed moments when they rebelled against their surviving family members who expected them to be more than they are, or were ready for; the collective resentment of being forced to grow up so fast was liberating for them. I watched these three kids, who came together as strangers, connect through their grief and become friends. The isolation that had suffocated each of them was slowly dissipating. I held back my tears, but this was the breakthrough all of us needed. The “release” was beautiful to witness.
Leaving sessions like these makes my job worthwhile. I struggle with fund-raising and budget management, but I am damn good at connecting with kids and knowing how to make a difference in their lives. It’s not that I’m not good at the administrative things, I just prefer not to do them. But I know that ultimately my success in these areas directly correlates to the ability to provide a much-needed service; that weighs heavy on my heart. But more than anything, I know these kids need help, I know it matters that we show up every day for them, and selfishly, it has given me purpose and has allowed the advocate in me to flourish, and for that I am humbled and motivated.
We teach the kids I work with to find a healthy place where they can escape to, when things get too hard. I need to lead by example, so these days I have to put my own hard-won lessons to the test. As a survivor, I am in the unique situation of being able to reach my hand out and grasp others who are currently in despair and need a safe haven.
* * *
As you can imagine, this job takes a toll on my emotions. It is difficult and challenging work, especially when the people in despair are so young and so vulnerable.
The hardships I witness are sobering, and my role there can be exhausting. But no matter how draining my day-to-day work might be, it is also extremely satisfying to see how my team and I are making a difference. We are helping these kids to find their way on a road that can be perilous and dark and scary. And we are able to be there, to help light the path and offer advice drawn from our own diverse backgrounds.
My times of trouble now can serve as the bedrock for lifting a young person out of her own difficult moment. That is a turnaround I never could have foreseen during my own early, dark times.
I don’t care any longer if creating time and space to heal and nurture my heart doesn’t jibe well with someone else’s vision of how far along I should be. I’ve been walking in my shoes for a very long time, and I know me better than anyone else does.
I know what I need to do to get over the hump, mend my wounded ego or bruised heart, or honor my brother’s memory. By now, my friends know that when I am in a funk, I am okay there. They know the space gives me clarity and insight and often rejuvenates me. The people in my inner circle respect and honor the way I cope, and I appreciate the fact that they respect the room it takes to do so.
Just recently my therapist relayed a sentiment to me: Who shall be serene in every storm. Who shall be troubled by the passing breeze.
It’s taken from a prayer at Rosh Hashanah, and he brought it up when I was talking to him about some of the crap from the past week. We were talking about the how and the why of coping, and how cavalier I think I sound when I say to people, “I just do.”
When folks ask me how I cope, should I say more, reveal more, open up more? Is it learned? Is it innate? Do we even know we are coping when we are actually in the moment, or is it only upon reflection that we realize we have?
There’s a lot to consider. Maybe that’s why I go with the Nike motto: “Just Do It!”
CHAPTER TWELVE
“That inner voice has both gentleness and clarity. So to get authenticity, you really keep going down to the bone, to the honesty, and the inevitability of something.”
—Meredith Monk
* * *
Moments of clarity come to me in the simplest of times, and I am so grateful that I am able to acknowledge them.
One summer day in 2009, I am driving home from wine country just outside Santa Barbara with my son. It’s about a two-and-a-half hour drive, and all that my son wants to do is hear stories or jokes. Since I am a terrible joke teller, I resort to stories.
Usually, he wants me to make them up, but this time he asked for a real one—one he hasn’t heard before. This is actually the most difficult thing for me to do. I find it agonizing to recall things from my past. I am not sure if that’s because my memories are fading—and that notion scares the shit out of me—or maybe it’s because the only big things I can remember from my youth are the life-altering things, things that I’m not sure he’s ready for.
Nonetheless, I can’t disappoint my son, especially when he is asking for something outside of his little world. He wants to know about his mommy!
So the story I share with him today is about one of my most favorite times in my life since my brother died. I was working for Pallotta TeamWorks, the company that produced the AIDS Vaccine Rides and the Breast Cancer 3-Day walks. My first big bike ride was the “7-Day Ride for AIDS Vaccine.”
When I tell Sam that, he quickly says, “Oh, a week?”
And I said, “Yes!”
He countered, “Then why isn’t it called the ‘Week Ride for AIDS Vaccine.”
Smart kid! Anyway, once we get past the semantics about the name, I tell him about the multiple relocations we endured on this ride, due to severe weather conditions. I told Sam about how the bike tour became a physical struggle against Mother Nature. The other team members and I had to fight the elements, and also make sure all the cyclists were safe and protected during a brutal storm. Sam is gripped by my story. I only embellish a little, to increase my cool factor, of course, but 95 percent of the story is true. By the end of this story—when Sam sits speechless—I revel in my own glory. I just permanently registered myself as “Way Cool Mom” in my seven-year-old’s mind. That feels great. I know that Sam knows I am more than just a mom, but it’s that look I get from him when I do really well at something (like dancing, or sports, or even hanging a picture) that makes me feel so encouraged and appreciated.
The long journey home after a fun-filled day playing in the fields, hiking, eating, laughing, just being free, was sure to be a quiet one—if you’re in anyone else’s car but ours. We crank up the tunes, sing as loud as we can to Lady Gaga, the Beatles, and Pink, and do our usual “dance off.” I sit in the front seat, rocking out as obnoxiously as I can, before “passing it back” to Sam, who continues the craziness with his own version of backseat, seat-belted break dancing. This has become one of our automobile rituals that makes us
both laugh so hard, I swear a little pee comes out.
Anyone who knows me knows I am a complete goofball, and really have no problem with embarrassing myself or those around me, so to have my son play along and share in my goofballness is so touching. To watch him in the rearview mirror, completely losing himself in laughter, and to experience that purity and innocence, warms my soul and leaves such an indelible impression on my heart. As Round Two of our dance competition is under way, the phone rings and interrupts the mood.
We see that it’s Papa calling. We press pause on our fun, and answer his call.
I hadn’t talked to my dad yet today (we usually talk every day) and didn’t want him to worry about us, as he tends to do if too much times passes. I brought him up to speed on the day’s activities and then he asks to talk to Sam.
I pass the phone back and the two catch up, like old friends would. I can hear Sam giggling, and then blurt out yesterday’s soccer score, before telling Papa he spent the day in “wine country” with family friends Lindsay and Jared. He was so grown-up. I didn’t have to tell him what to say, or how to say it, or to remind him what we did over the weekend; he was in command of that conversation and I was so proud.
Once he was done, he gave me the phone back. I said my good-byes and hung up.
Within seconds, it started.
“Mommy, where is your mom?”
“I actually don’t know for sure, son. I think she is in St. Louis.”
“How do you not know where she is? Don’t you talk to her?”
“No, I don’t. Remember, I told you my mom left when I was three and a half and Uncle Ron was just about your age.”
“Why did she leave? And where did she go? How come she didn’t come back?”
“Those are all really good questions, Sam. I am not sure why she left. I guess she didn’t want to be a mommy anymore. I never got to ask her why.”
“Do you miss her?”
“Um, no, I don’t actually. I don’t know her, so it’s hard for me to miss her. I miss having a mommy, though.”
Silence.
“Sam, how does that make you feel?”
“Sad. Mommy, did she ever say things to you?”
“Hmm, I honestly only remember a few things about her. And she was usually yelling at me about something!”
That made Sam laugh. He, of course, wanted to know more about all of the times I got yelled at. I think it made him feel good that he isn’t the only one to get in trouble!
“There’s one time that she told me my ears would fall off, because I got my ears pierced. And another time, after my car accident, she called me in the hospital to yell at me for not calling her when it happened. And another time, when Uncle Ron died, she actually yelled at both Papa and me for not calling her sooner than we did.”
I wonder if I am telling him too much, and I start to get nervous. So I stop talking and wait for his response.
“Mom, how did Uncle Ron feel that she left?”
“That’s thoughtful of you to wonder that, Sam. Uncle Ron was very upset, and hurt, and very sad. It hurt his feelings a lot.”
Silence.
“Sam, you know I would never do that to you. I would never leave you. I would never stop being your mom. You know that, right? And even though I didn’t have a mommy growing up, I was so lucky to have Papa and Uncle Ron, who took such good care of me and made me feel so loved all the time.”
“Mommy, why did the cow cross the road? To go to the moo-vies!”
Finished with his inquisition, Sam resumed his Super Mario Brothers DS game, while I lost myself in familiar feelings of hopelessness and sorrow.
* * *
I’ve been in therapy for as long as I can remember, and recently asked my therapist, Joel Adelman, why I struggle so much with recalling happy memories. I worry that they are fading from my mind. When my son asks me to tell him stories about my life, all I am left to share is when I fell off a bunk bed at Indian Princess sleep-away camp and split my lip open. Or the time that my brother and I were farting around in the backyard, and he started chasing me with a shovel. I tripped, he landed on me, and I broke my arm, but I told my dad I had no idea what had happened. Or the time that my brother and I were wrestling in the apartment where we lived with my dad, and Ron nudged me (ahem) into a wall and I cracked my head open and was gushing blood. Or the time I got my heart broken, or my mom told me I was a slut, or when I had to euthanize my favorite pet, Dakota, after he attacked me, or the fight I had with a friend…
I asked Joel why all of my memories are riddled with sadness and torment. He simply said, “To remind you how you don’t want to feel ever again. It’s your way of coping, Kim. The good stuff can’t ‘get’ you, but the bad stuff can.”
I looked perplexed and pissed, so he continued. “You are made up of lots of stories and experiences that shape you. Your humor stems from your ability to balance the good with the bad; your optimism comes from a belief that you are entitled to more; the strength and vulnerability come from your willingness to delve deep and then move forward. That is all a result of the happy memories that have filled your life and made you who you are. But all of us recall the crap first, before we get to the good stuff. It’s a built-in protection.”
As much as I took to heart what Joel said, and appreciated the positive spin, I was more determined than ever to rustle up some happy times. I know they are in there. I am way too perky and funny and normal for my life to be made up of all yucky stuff. So next time my son asks me to tell him a story from my life, I am going to share—with a few minor details edited out. The surprise party that my dad, Patti, and Ron threw for me for my twenty-first birthday, for example.
It was December 1992. I was living in Santa Barbara and going to college. I was dating a great guy named Joe at the time, just a few months before I moved to San Francisco. My brother called me on a whim and said he wanted to come up for the weekend with his buddies and hang out. I was ecstatic. I couldn’t believe my big brother was coming to visit me. I was beside myself. I wasn’t twenty-one yet, but I had a fake ID and knew a couple of places where I could drink without getting carded. I had already called my boyfriend, Joe, and told him to plan on coming up (he was still living in Los Angeles at the time), and I called a few friends to see if they would be around.
“My brother is coming, my brother is coming! We need to go par-tay!”
The weekend couldn’t have come faster. Ron, his two friends, Joe, and I all piled in the car and drove to downtown Santa Barbara. I was wearing a ridiculously large men’s suit jacket to cover what I thought was my huge butt, with baggy jeans tucked into my boots. (Seriously, girlfriends, how could you let me walk around like that?)
We proceeded to go to a cool bar I knew on State Street. Sipping away on my favorite beer, I was feeling beyond content. So when Ron mentioned he was hungry, I suddenly realized I was, too. I suggested a place, again knowing I wouldn’t get carded there.
We walked across the street and down an alley and waltzed in like we owned the beach-themed bar, complete with sawdust on the floor, surfboards hanging from the ceiling, and the B-52s album rocking the room. The hostess approached us immediately.
“Are you here for the party?”
“Yes, we are!” I hollered back, waving my hands in the air (like I just don’t care!).
She led us through the restaurant, and we followed her like she was the Pied Piper.
We entered the room to a loud “Surprise!” I was shocked. Bummed too, because it sobered me up! I looked around the room and saw all of my good friends, including Rich Davis, Jana Canon, Rich Rueckheim, Sarah Kupper, and so many more. And, of course, my dad, my stepmom Patti, and a very young Michael and Lauren, my stepsiblings, giggling in the corner.
“We got you!”
The room erupted into laughter. Everyone shared their story about how they almost spilled the beans. I was so happy. Everyone I cared about, in one place, celebrating me.
I couldn’t recall the l
ast time that had happened. In another moment of firsts, my father toasted my special birthday with a shot of Jägermeister. To this day, it’s one of my favorite pictures—and one of my last memories of us all together as a family.
You see, throughout every major event in my life, Ron and I had been joined at the hip: the kidnapping, the marriages, my father’s divorces, the move across the country, the blending of families, my father’s cancer, the accident. We relied on one another for comfort, clarity, sanity, and humility.
When we were little kids, playing dolls with one another, he would use his GI Joe as my Barbie’s protector. (GI Joe hated Ken, by the way.) I loved that he engaged in fantasy play with me and humored my silly storylines. The truth is, we loved being around each other; even at four and seven years old, we had a special bond.
He always immediately assumed the role of protector, both in real life and in play. No matter where we were, or what we were doing, he was my big brother.
I loved that safety.
When Ron was murdered, I was angry at him for leaving me behind to deal with the fallout by myself. I was resentful that I was left behind to bear the burden of all the pain. But as the kid sister who never wanted to disappoint her brother, I trudged on and did what I could in his memory, even when I wanted to give up.
Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think the tables would be turned, and I would serve as his protector, in his death.
My role was supposed to be the doting little sister; now, suddenly, I was advocating for my big brother, ensuring that he died with his honor intact. I was so afraid that if I didn’t advocate for him, speak up for him, that he would be lost. That he would always remain the nameless “other” victim.
People always tell me, “You are a good sister.” That humbles me, and brings tears to my eyes.